Killer of Men - Christian Cameron [103]
Stephanos came at me with a grin, and tried to break my left hand at our first engagement, the bastard.
I didn’t fight back the same way. My blood wasn’t up, and I knew he had to pull an oar. I’m not always a bad man. So I punched him, even when we were grappling, and I got his shoulders down for a count and had a fall.
The second fall, he roared like a bull and came in at me, going for a throw. I stayed away, avoiding his hands, and just barely kept him from pinning me against the crowd. But by my third retreat the crowd was hissing at my apparent cowardice – especially as I was up by a fall – and like a foolish boy I let the crowd noise sway me. I saw my opening. Went over the attack, and found myself face down in the sand.
Then I was angry – angry at myself – and I tried to stand toe to toe with him. I got a leg behind him and I went for a throw and missed – we all miss sometimes, honey – and he got hold of me and then I was grappling a bigger man. He got me, although we put on a long grapple and a good contest and we were both covered in sand and sweat, and when we rose, Stephanos looked at me with a certain wariness.
Down two throws to one, I was a sober fighter. I was bone weary, but still unhurt.
Stephanos made a mistake, or was unlucky. Seconds into the fourth round, as I circled him, he crossed his legs – a foolish thing to do, and something even Chians must have trained against. I was on him in a flash and he was down, and although he was strong I got my legs around his hips and I had a control hold on one arm. I knew I had him – and after some long minutes of struggle and some grunting, he knew it too.
They applauded us like heroes after that round. We looked good. And I had him. He’d squandered energy trying to match my hold with sheer strength, and now he was beaten.
So I stepped in to finish it, grappled him and got dropped on my head for my pains.
Never believe all those stupid country-yokel stories. That Chian played me like the city boy I had become. He let me think him exhausted. He let me believe it with everything from posture to his weary ‘you’ve got me beaten’ smile as we stretched our arms out and started the last engagement. I don’t think I ever made that mistake again.
I came to with fifty men around me, and Stephanos all but weeping on my chest. He’d dropped me just wrong – but thank the gods, he hadn’t snapped my neck, although it hurt like blazes, a line of cold that was worse than fiery pain running up my spine.
Heraklides was there, too. He had a reputation as a healer, and he had my spine under his palms. ‘Can you move, lad?’ he asked me.
‘Yes,’ I said, and swore. Ares, I hurt! My fingertips hurt. But I was on my feet, swaying, but up.
They gave me a lot of applause and some back-slaps, and somebody, one of the Athenians probably, groped me. So much for heroism.
‘Sorry, mate,’ Stephanos said.
I laughed, and we clasped hands. ‘Last time I teach you anything,’ I said.
He grinned. ‘I like to wrestle,’ he said.
Then we had a break before the next event – until the sun was past a certain point in the sky, no water-clocks on a beach on Chios. I slept, and when I awoke, Stephanos came and massaged me himself.
‘I can’t throw a javelin, and I’ve never touched a sword,’ he said. ‘So you’re my man to win. You’re ahead, you know.’
I lay like a corpse under his hands. He knew how to get his thumbs deep in the muscle. He said his father taught him. Melaina had the trick too – she came and did my lower legs and feet, bless her.
When they were finished, I felt like quitting once and for all. And I felt like sex. Melaina suddenly appealed to me – the touch of her hands – hard to explain.
Instead, I