Satyrus didn’t turn his head. He was still waiting for the signal. ‘I don’t know,’ he said. His dreams of being king of the Bosporus this autumn were fading rapidly, rowed into froth by the sixty or seventy triremes that Eumeles of Pantecapaeum, his mother’s murderer, had somehow mustered.
Leon had stopped talking to his helmsman. He came to his rail and put his hands to his mouth. ‘Lay alongside me!’ he called.
Satyrus turned and nodded to his own helmsman, Diokles, a burly man whose curling dark hair showed more Phoenician than Greek.
‘Alongside the
Lotus
,’ Satyrus said.
Diokles nodded. ‘Alongside it is, sir.’
Satyrus owned only one ship, and that by the laws of war. The year before, he had taken the
Black Falcon
in a sea fight off the coast of the Levant in a rising storm.
Falcon
was lighter and smaller and far less robust than Leon’s
Golden Lotus
or the other four
triemioliai
of Leon’s squadron – all his own ships, for Leon the Numidian was one of the richest men in Alexandria, one of the richest cities on the curve of the world.
Falcon
was a small, old-style trireme, built light and fast the Athenian way. He had good points and bad points, but Satyrus loved him fiercely – all the more as he suspected he was about to lose the ship.
Falcon
turned to port and ‘folded his wings’, all the oars coming inboard together to the call of Neiron, the oar master amidships, so that he slowed into a long curve. Diokles’ broad face was a study in concentration, a hard frown creasing the corners of his mouth as he leaned on his oars.
Lotus
closed on the reciprocal course. The two ships had been side by side, each leading a column of ten warships eastward along the north coast of the Euxine. They didn’t have far to close, and the rowers on both ships pulled their oars in well before their blades might foul, and the helmsmen steered small, guiding the hulls together as they coasted along.
Leon stepped up on the rail, holding one of the white-linen shrouds that held the mast. He leaned out, and just before the sides of the ships touched, he leaped – easily crossing the distance between ships, his left foot on the
Falcon
’s rail, his right foot stepping down on to the deck of Satyrus’s ship just forward of where the bulwark rose in the sharp curve of the stem.
‘We’ll have to fight through them,’ Leon said, as soon as he was aboard. He nodded to the statue of Poseidon on the mast. ‘No other choice, I’m afraid – unless you want to beach and burn the ships. And I don’t think we’ll survive that.’
‘Twenty ships should have been enough,’ Satyrus said.
‘Somebody gave Eumeles plenty of warning,’ Leon said. ‘Listen up, lad. I’m going to put my ships in line and you’ll form line behind me. My ships will bite into his line and you punch straight through. Don’t stop to fight. Just keep going.’
Leon’s plan was practical – if the goal was to save Satyrus’s life. Eumeles would execute him without a thought – or worse.
‘Don’t be a fool, boy!’ Leon said. ‘If I fall, you avenge me another time.’ His dark skin glowed with vitality, and it didn’t seem possible that Leon could speak so blithely of his own death. ‘If Eumeles captures me, he’ll ransom me. I’m worth too much to kill. You – you’d be dead by nightfall. Don’t be a fool. Do as I order.’
Abraham nodded soberly. ‘He is correct, Satyrus. You can try again next year. Dead, we have all lost our wagers, eh?’
Satyrus bowed his head. ‘Very well. We will form the second line and go straight through.’
Leon put his arms around his adoptive nephew, and they hugged,
their armour grinding and preventing the embrace from carrying any real warmth. ‘See you in Alexandria,’ he said.
‘In Olbia!’ Satyrus said, his voice full of tears.
The Alexandrians formed their two lines as they advanced. They had practised formations all the way out from Rhodos, three weeks of sailing and rowing, and their rowers were in top shape. Leon’s ships in the first line were as good as Rhodians – highly trained, with professional helmsmen and standing officers who had been at sea their whole lives – indeed, many of them
were
Rhodians, because Leon paid the best wages in the east.
Satyrus had the mercenaries. They weren’t bad – again, they were professional seamen. Few of them had the quality of ships that Leon had, although Daedalus of Halicarnassus had a mighty
penteres
, a ‘five-er’ that stood a man’s height further out of the water than a trireme and mounted a pair of heavy scorpions. The
Glory of Demeter
was in the centre of the second line.
None of Leon’s captains needed special orders. They could all see the direction of the wind and the might of the opposing armament. The choices were narrow and they were professionals.
Satyrus was on the right of the line, and the next ship over was a former Alexandrian naval vessel, hastily built and hastily sold after last year’s campaign, called
Fennel Stalk
, with his flamboyant friend Dionysius in command. ‘Bit off more than we can chew, eh?’ he called across the water.
‘Break through, get your sail up and head for home,’ Satyrus called back.
The enemy fleet was just a couple of stades ahead, the eyes painted above the beaks of their rams clear in the golden light. Despite everything, the fact that Leon’s ships were coming straight at them seemed to have thrown them into confusion.
‘Ten more ships,’ Satyrus said.
Diokles nodded, but Abraham shook his head. ‘What?’
‘He means that they look so bad that if we had ten more ships we could take them – or make a fight of it.’ Diokles spat over the side, apparently unconcerned by the odds.
Satyrus ran down the centre catwalk. ‘Kalos! Deck master, there! Any man who has a helmet needs to get it on. Oar master, relieve the
benches in shifts.’ If they actually broke the enemy line, their whole length would be vulnerable to enemy archers. He went back and put a hand on the steering oars. ‘That means you, Diokles. Armour up.’
‘You have the helm,’ Diokles said.
‘I have the helm,’ Satyrus replied, and the dark-haired man ran off down the deck.
The Alexandrians were closing under a steady stroke, saving energy. The enemy columns – all six of them – were still deploying. The two centre columns had fallen afoul of each other and were delaying the formation, but the consequence was that as the centre fell behind, the flanks reached well out on either side – the worst thing that could happen to the smaller fleet, whether by intention or by accident.
‘Leon’s signalling,’ Abraham called. He had his helmet on, and his voice had a strange resonance.
Satyrus had his own helmet in his hand, but he swung up on a shroud to watch the bright bronze shield flash aboard
Golden Lotus
.
‘Arrowhead,’ he said. But the flashes went on, and on.
‘By the hidden name!’ Abraham muttered.
Diokles came back, buckling his scale breastplate. ‘Of course, wearing this fucker, I drown if I go over the side.’ He looked up. ‘Poseidon’s watery dick, that’s a long signal.’
Satyrus saw that it was in repeat and jumped down from the rail.
‘Arrowhead – we’re to be the point of the second line. He’s not going to engage the centre – he’s going to go for the southern edge of the line. At least, I
think
that’s what he means. Prepare to turn to starboard!’ Satyrus called the last in a command voice.
Diokles got his last buckle done. He tugged the scale shirt down on his hips so that the
pteruges
sat right, and then put his hands on the steering oars. ‘Got him!’ he said.
Satyrus shook his head. ‘After the turn,’ he said. ‘Find me my greaves, will you?’
Diokles ducked his head and started to root through the leather bags stuffed under the helmsman’s bench.
Satyrus watched the shield. There. The command ship gave a single flash and all down the line, ships turned to starboard, so that the two lines of ten ships heading east were once again two columns of ten ships heading due south.
The shield flashed again, repeating the next order. In the column
next to them, Theron’s
Labours of Herakles
was slow to turn and almost fouled the
Glory of Demeter
. The two ships brushed past each other, oar-tips entangled, but momentum saved them and Theron’s rowers had the stroke back.
Abraham shook his head. ‘I can’t watch!’ he said. ‘This is not like fighting elephants!’ Abraham had proved his courage at Gaza the year before, capturing Demetrios the Golden’s elephants and winning a place on the list of Alexandria’s heroes.
The shield flashed on, now repeating the order. Then the flashes stopped.
‘Any time,’ Diokles said.
‘Take the helm,’ Satyrus said.
‘I have it,’ Diokles said, suiting action to word.
‘You have it!’ Satyrus said, and ran for the command spot amidships. ‘Watch for the signal! Neiron, the next signal will require us to slow.’
‘Aye aye!’ Neiron, the oar master, was Cardian – a prisoner of war who’d chosen to remain with his captors. He seldom wore hat or helmet, and had the habit of rubbing the back of his head. He did so now.
The bronze shield gave a single flash.
‘Got it!’ Neiron called. ‘All banks! Cease rowing!’
Behind them,
Fennel Stalk
made a quarter-turn out of line to the north and the ship behind
Fennel
made a quarter-turn south, so that in a few heartbeats they were ranging almost alongside, just a few oar-lengths behind. The next two ships came up on their flanks, so that Satyrus’s second line was shaped like a wedge.
Whatever the odds, it was well carried out, and despite some spacing issues created by the size of the
Glory of Demeter
, they were formed in a wedge before the enemy could react. Ahead, Leon’s better-trained column had angled in to cover them and then formed a wedge themselves, so that
Golden Lotus
was the centre of the first line and
Black Falcon
was the centre of the second wedge, all rowing east against the flank of the enemy line.
The enemy ships were caught broadside-on, strung out over a stade of quiet sea in the morning light. Moments before, they had been the horns of a giant envelopment, hunters of the doomed prey. Suddenly they were the target, and the opposite horn was six stades
away – hopelessly far to take part in the sort of
diekplous
head-to-head engagement that the Alexandrians were forcing.
Diokles grinned. ‘That was something worth seeing,’ he announced.
A stade to go, and the enemy ships were turning to face them. The enemy centre, now more than two stades off to the east, was still tangled.
Another signal from the
Lotus
and the first line picked up speed.
Fennel
took up the stroke in the second line, advancing at battle speed until his helmsman realized his error. The second line was there to take advantage of the chaos caused by the first. They continued to move at cruising speed, and
Fennel
coasted back to his spot.
‘Don’t board unless we’re sinking,’ Satyrus said to Abraham. ‘Understand?’
Abraham gave his sarcastic smile. ‘All too well, brother.’
They embraced briefly, and then Abraham buckled the cheekpieces on his high-ridged Thracian helmet and ran down the catwalk to the marines that he commanded.
Satyrus had time to gulp a few lungfuls of air and to feel the flutter in his chest and the cringing in his bowels – the fear that never seemed to change for him when danger came. He spat over the side and prayed to Herakles, his ancestor and patron, for courage.
Half a stade ahead,
Golden Lotus
seemed to dance, a swift quarter-turn and then back to his course, his oars suddenly in.
Lotus
was the point of the wedge, the first ship to hit the enemy line, and he was ramming an enemy trireme head to head, the most dangerous manoeuvre in war at sea and the most likely to cripple the attacking ship.
There was a sound not unlike that of two phalanxes crashing into each other – or like a lightning storm ripping through the woods on the slopes of a mountain – and the engagement was over, the
Lotus
already getting his oars out and coasting free, the enemy ship half-turned to starboard and showing his flank to the
Falcon
because the
Lotus
had ripped his starboard oar gallery and mangled his oarsmen on that side.
‘Ramming speed,’ Satyrus said.
Diokles made a face in the stern. The oar master called the new speed and the ship leaped forward.
‘What?’ Satyrus asked.
‘We’re supposed to break free, not kill ships,’ Diokles said.
‘I’m not afraid to fight,’ Satyrus said.
Diokles shrugged and said nothing.
‘Ready for impact!’ Abraham bellowed from the bow.
‘Oars in!’ Neiron called.
Satyrus braced himself against the stern and Diokles crossed his arms over the steering oars.
As they crashed together, the ram went in, and there was resistance – and then something gave. Men on the deck crew were thrown flat, despite their best efforts, and Satyrus only just kept his feet.