Killer of Men - Christian Cameron [164]
A water-clock before sunset, Lekthes came forward with a black man. I’d seen the Nubian when the prisoners had been herded aboard by marines – you couldn’t miss him, with his skin as black as new pitch in the smithy, ready for the forging of fine bronze.
‘Lord?’ Lekthes asked, coming aft. ‘This one claims he was helmsman on a Phoenician trireme.’ He prodded the black man, and the man looked at him with ill-concealed resentment.
‘Claims, my arse, lord,’ the Nubian said in Ionian Greek – better Greek than mine. ‘Lord, you are too far west of north – I’ve been watching since the evening star rose. I know these waters.’
‘That will be all, Lekthes,’ I said, borrowing Aristides’ manner when dismissing a man. Lekthes snapped a salute and went back to the decks.
‘What’s your name?’ I asked.
The Nubian crossed his arms and looked forward. ‘Paramanos, lord.’
‘Your Greek is excellent,’ I said.
He nodded. ‘It ought to be – I grew up with it. My family owns ships at Naucratis, and there’s more of us in Cyrene.’ He looked forward again. ‘And my daughters will be orphans if you don’t point this ship north, lord.’
Naucratis? A Greek city in the Nile delta. They say it was founded by mercenaries serving the pharaohs at the time of the siege of Troy. And Cyrene is a colony – richer than the mother city – in Africa. What is it that your tutors teach you?
‘You are a helmsman?’ I asked.
‘I’ve been navarch of a blue-water merchant,’ he said.
‘If you are lying, I’ll kill you,’ I said. ‘Take the steering oars.’
I could see his fear, and smell it, but I didn’t know whether he was afraid of me or simply afraid of death – the coming storm – hard to tell. I stepped off the helmsman’s bench and he took the oars. ‘I have the ship,’ he said.
‘Yes, you do,’ I said.
He shook his head. ‘I’m changing course. See the evening star there by the moon? That’s well west of north from here.’ He swung the oars, his arms taut with muscle, and the ship changed course smoothly, the wind passing from under our quarter to dead astern.
‘Before the north star rises we’ll be in with the coast, or you can feed me to the fishes,’ he said. But his voice shook.
I didn’t trust him.
At sunset, Idomeneus came aft with a trio of lanky Asian Greeks. ‘All three brothers?’ I guessed.
‘They were taken in arms as rebels on the mainland and pressed as rowers,’ Idomeneus said. ‘All citizens of Phocaea in Aeolis.’ He looked aft. ‘We’ve a dozen more Aeolians. They shouldn’t be prisoners to start with.’
The eldest brother fell to his knees. ‘Lord, we are Ionians! We fought at Sardis! I was in the agora when you fought, lord!’
It was an easy claim to make – I had no idea who had been in the agora at Sardis, but I had been a slave. I knew that tone. Besides, let’s be honest – I liked being called lord.
I held up my hand. ‘Will you swear – to me? Now?’
All three knelt on the deck and swore. Ionians swear the way Cretans do, hands between the hands of their lords. They aren’t much for democracy, like mainland Greeks. I took their oaths by Poseidon and Zeus Soter, and then I armed them and set them to choosing any other Aeolians that they knew. Herakleides was their leader, and his brothers were Nestor and Orestes, and they were good men.
I have a soft spot for men who carry the name of my ancestor.
I was just congratulating myself on having some good men when the Phoenicians decided to take the ship. They must have been desperate – as they saw the Aeolians separated out, they must have known that their chances of taking the ship were dropping by the moment.
They almost killed Lekthes in the first rush. They clubbed him with oars broken short – what a labour that must have been! They’d worked in secret below decks, of course, muffling the sound in their cloaks and rowing cushions, I suppose. I had no idea. They were brave men, desperate men, and they came in one gallant charge, up the benches, oar shafts falling like axe blows. Lekthes took one on his helmet and fell to his knees, but