Tyrant: King of the Bosporus by Christian Cameron Read Free Book Online Page B

back into the ropes by the simple expedient of falling on the upper rim – and then past it into the water. He grabbed hold of the naked bow timbers as the water hit him, wrenching his shoulder, and got his head above water. Now the force of the ship’s passage pinned him against the shield, and the shield was held in place.
    ‘Pull, you bastards!’ Satyrus managed.
    Ba’alaz, the bigger of the two, hauled his rope back until it sang.
    Kariaz, the smaller, belayed it against a cross-member that had supported the weight of the ram and then hauled on the other line until Ba’alaz got to him and added his weight.
    ‘She’s home, master!’ Ba’alaz said.
    Satyrus was already sinking under the bow.
    ‘Stand up and fight, boy!’
    Theron stood over him on the sand of the palaestra, his hands still in the fighting stance of the pankration.
    ‘Are you down? If you are one of mine, get up! Get up and fight!’
    Theron was even larger here – and the sands stretched to an infinite horizon. Theron towered over him, his lion-skin
chlamys
whipping in the winds – the smell of wet cat.
    ‘Get up and fight!’
    Satyrus struggled to get a foot under his own weight – to rise on an arm. All the weight of the world seemed to press him down. He got an arm out from under his body and he pushed against the sand. The force pinning him to the ground was like the hand of the gods. He pushed.
    Suddenly, the weight on his back released . . .
    Only the will of the gods kept Satyrus alive – his foot caught in the mess of old rope and canvas that marked their first attempts to fother the bow, and he was held there, drowning, until Theron reached into the water and pulled him up by sheer strength. It took Diokles hundreds of heartbeats to revive him – or so they told him after his choking breaths had turned to steady breathing.
    ‘You were there,’ Satyrus said to Theron, catching his hand.
    ‘So I was,’ Theron agreed. He wiped his nose. One of the wounds on his thigh had opened, and watery blood ran down his leg, deeply marked where he had stripped off his greaves.
    ‘No – I saw it. Was I dead?’ Satyrus asked.
    He could see on their faces that they thought his wits were wandering, so he didn’t say more. ‘Any sign of the other ships?’ he asked.
    Diokles shook his head. He’d been at the steering oar for ten hours.
    ‘None,’ he said. ‘We ran west. They ran east.’ He shrugged.
    Theron slumped heavily. ‘Zeus Soter, lad. If you’d left me, you’d be halfway to Rhodos now.’
    Satyrus managed a smile. ‘Sounds bleak, doesn’t it? We’re much better off as we are.’
    Diokles stared ahead woodenly.
    Satyrus made his shoulders rise off the deck. To one of the boys, he said, ‘Get my satchel.’ To Diokles, he said, ‘We’re not dead yet.’
    ‘Close,’ Diokles said.
    Satyrus put raw wool on Theron’s thigh, twisting the ends as Philokles had taught him, washing the wound as Sophokles – a traitor, a poisoner, an assassin, but an excellent doctor – had instructed him years before in Heraklea.
    Heraklea, where Amastris would be tonight. Would she see the sunset? He looked out to the west, where the sun was setting as they edged into the low-lying swamps. There was nothing on this coast – nothing but the channels of a hundred forgotten watercourses and the swamps their passage left.
    He could just see the land under the setting sun, and just north of the brightest part of the sun’s red disc, he saw the notch of a sail. He pointed.
    ‘Poseidon’s watery dick,’ Diokles said. ‘Zeus Casios who conquers all the waters. Thetis of the glistening breasts.’
    Satyrus could just about manage to stand erect. ‘Could be Dionysius,’ he said hopefully.
    Diokles shook his head, spat over the side. ‘That golden bastard who shaved our stern.’ He looked forward. ‘That rig of yours strong enough that we could rig the boatsail after dark?’
    Satyrus was watching. The oarsmen were tired – so tired that