I landed beside Father’s swords, still lying neatly where he had put them down. I bent and picked them up, one in each hand, and ran toward the attackers. Erinna saw me coming and stood, taking a step toward me. She reached for the bigger sword in my left hand, and I gratefully gave it up to her. She put it up just in time to block an attacker. I blocked another, much more clumsily, and ducked away from a third, kicking at his knee as I did. I didn’t have any idea what to do in a fight that wasn’t just friendly wrestling in the palaestra. I was too young for weapons training. The smaller sword felt very heavy in my hand. Neleus came up beside me and punched an attacker hard in her side. “Give me the sword,” he said, and I did. He swung it at her throat as she came forward again, nearly severing her head. She vanished at once. The one I’d dodged fell over as he was coming for me again—I discovered later that Nikias had thrown the white stone at his temple.
All through the crowd people were shouting out for peace and friendship and civilization, and even for excellence. I flew over a man with a sword who was coming at me and pushed him back onto Erinna’s waiting blade. Neleus was still fighting the last of the group, but his opponent looked desperately around and then threw down his sword to surrender, and that was the end of it.
Kebes was bound to the pole, where he had wanted to bind Father. It seemed as if people had been falling everywhere, but in fact we learned later there were only nineteen dead from Excellence, and fourteen from Lucia.
As the last man surrendered, Erinna and I grinned at each other. Then an instant later I realized that one of the bodies at our feet was Ficino. His hat had fallen off and was lying on the sand. I knelt beside him and Erinna knelt at his other side. He had taken a sword thrust and was bleeding but still alive. “Amazons,” he said, trying to smile. “Trojan heroes couldn’t have done better. Don’t grieve for me, my dears. I’ve had a wonderful life, and what a way to die, at ninety-nine, fighting to defend arete.”
“We’ll get you home to Florentia, and you’ll live another ninety-nine years and fight plenty more battles for Plato yet,” Erinna said, but there were tears in her eyes.
“Phaedrus!” I called, as loudly as I could. “Ficino needs you!” Phaedrus could heal him, mend whatever was wrong. Phaedrus came down the stairs running, but Father heard too, and he was nearer and got there first. Father bent over, and Ficino saw him.
“Apollo!” he said, surprised. For a moment I couldn’t tell if he was swearing or recognizing Father. “Of course!” He sounded the way he did when I made a really conclusive point in debate. Then he laughed delightedly, and coughed up a bubble of blood. A flood of bright red blood followed it, bursting out of his mouth and taking his life with it. By the time Phaedrus reached us he was gone, leaving nothing but blood on the sand, and his battered old hat beside it.
Phaedrus wiped his eyes, and turned to Aristomache, who was clutching her arm. “Are you a doctor? I think it’s broken,” she said to him.
He set his hand on it. “Just a bad bruise, I think,” he said. “But let me strap it for you.”
“Aristomache, now that the riot seems to have died down, I want you to speak to Kebes,” Father said, as Phaedrus was finishing.
“Good heavens, is he still alive?” she asked.
Father gestured to the pole, where Kebes was writhing against the iron rings, where Father had bound his wrists and ankles. Aristomache took a step toward it. Auge came down the stairs and onto the stage. “You, Timon!” she roared, pointing at a man in the crowd. “You’re a king this year, and you weren’t fighting. Come here.”
The man came forward. The crowd hushed. “If you’re a doctor, go around to the left. If you’re wounded, go there where the doctors are. If not, sit down,” Timon said, firmly, taking charge. People obeyed him. Phaedrus went over to the left where some other people were gathering. He started helping the wounded.
“Are you responsible for this disgraceful behavior?” Auge asked Kebes.
“For the fixed contest?” Kebes answered, loudly enough for everyone to hear. “No. For my friends who weren’t ready to watch me murdered? No.” He was lying.
“Yes he was,” called the man who had resheathed his sword before Auge’s anger. “He told us to be ready to fight if he shouted fix.”
“And he had us ready to attack the judges,” the man on the ground confirmed.
Timon looked at Aristomache. “Death is the penalty for attacking guests,” he said. She nodded. “Those who surrendered or thought better of it are condemned to iron for ten years,” he went on. The man near me collapsed in sobs. “As for Matthias—”
“Don’t I get to speak?” Kebes asked.
“Ficino is dead,” Aristomache said, as if that were sufficient to convict him, as indeed it was in my eyes too.
“Good,” Kebes said. “I hated him, hated all the Masters, you included. I hate Kallisti and everyone who stayed on it. I wanted to be ready in case Pytheas cheated, that’s all, and as you can see, he did. For us, seizing the ship and killing the sailors was the best way. Now we can sail to Kallisti, where they’re weak and divided, and conquer them all.”
He wasn’t looking at her, he was looking at the crowd, at his people, who had loved him. Some of them looked at him with agreement, but too few.
“This isn’t what Yayzu would have done,” Auge said.
“It’s what the Knights of St. John would have done,” Kebes replied.
“I won the contest,” Father said. “And even leaving aside guest friendship and inciting riot, he broke his oath to abide by the decision of the judges.”
“I did not break my oath!” Kebes shouted. “We attacked because you cheated. I told them to be ready if I shouted fix. I kept my oath, and would have accepted a fair verdict against me, but not this!”
“Kill him, Pytheas,” King Timon said. “This is a civilized city. Do to him what he was going to do to you.” The crowd cheered loudly.
Father looked to the tools, spilled on the grass now, then at Kebes where he writhed on the pole, and lastly at the crowd in the stands. “If this is your justice,” he said. He looked over toward me, and then past me. “Neleus? Help me please.”
Neleus went over to him and gathered up the knives. Then he knelt beside him holding them as Father began to cut.
Erinna and I stayed where we were, crouched on the bloodstained sand beside Ficino’s hat.
Kebes began swearing at Father, calling him names, accusing him of all kinds of vile crimes. Father began with a shallow cut down the breastbone, and then began carving the skin off. Kebes kept on yelling and taunting. Father didn’t respond and just kept on cutting, until Kebes shouted out “And Sokrates didn’t love you! And Simmea didn’t love you!” Then Father paused for a second and looked at him evenly.
“Both of them loved you, in their ways, but both of them loved me more.” Then he lowered his voice so the crowd couldn’t hear and said, “Now tell me, did Athene give you the syrinx? Why? When? And how did you learn that music? Tell me, and I’ll kill you quickly.”