Authors: Christian Cameron

Tyrant (24 page)

BOOK: Tyrant

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Cleitus motioned to a slave to bring around more wine. ‘We’re loyal to the archon here, poppet - so watch your insinuation. I’d like to think that the possibility of an assembly is a good sign.’

Eumenes looked about a little wildly. ‘I meant no disloyalty!’

Kineas felt that the whole conversation had subtext - even Cleitus’s declaration of loyalty seemed to have a coda. Just watching the men’s eyes and facial expressions told him something of the tensions between them.

‘Perhaps things will be different after the assembly,’ offered another gentleman. Kineas knew the man was the largest ship owner in the city and that his son, Cliomenedes, was barely old enough to serve in the cavalry and was coming on the expedition in the morning.

It seemed an ominous statement, the more so as it was left to lie with the spilled wine. None of the other men took it up - not even Philokles. Instead, Cleitus turned the talk to the success of the muster.

Kineas gathered praise - too much praise, he felt. ‘We haven’t begun to train,’ he said. ‘None of you will think of me so highly when your butts are sore.’

That got a laugh, but Clio’s father - Petrocolus - shook his head. ‘We expected another mercenary, like Memnon. We were surprised that you are so clearly a gentlemen. I think I can speak for many men when I say that we’ll be happier for the training - at least, come spring. This notion of winter exercise has my old bones creaking already!’

The party continued on a lighter note from there. Cleitus, despite his public gruffness, was an excellent host. There were dancers - tasteful and skilled - and acrobats, and a dark-skinned freeman who mimed several of the city’s important men - Memnon, Cleitus himself, and finally, Kineas.

Even Kineas had to laugh at the gross parody of his legs and autocratic hand motions. He knew himself immediately - it wasn’t the first time he’d been imitated. The others present roared, and he collected several smiles.

At the end of the evening, Philokles performed on the Spartan harp and Agis recited a section of the
Iliad
. It was a nice reminder that Kineas’s men were gentlemen of accomplishment, and both performances were well received.

Huddled in their cloaks, trying to avoid puddles in the street as they walked back to the hippodrome escorted by a pair of Cleitus’s slaves, Philokles laughed. ‘That went well,’ he said.

Agis laughed as well. ‘I expected my old tutor to appear at the door and point a bony hand at me if I missed a word. Not like performing at the campfire!’

Diodorus was more sombre. ‘They’re hiding something.’

Kineas nodded agreement. ‘Steer clear of it, whatever it is,’ he said to Diodorus. ‘Don’t get involved. Is that clear?’

Diodorus nodded. He looked at the sky, paused, and then said, ‘We’re in for a weather change. Feel it? It’s colder already.’

Kineas pulled his cloak tighter. He was already cold. He coughed.

T
hey left as the dawn reddened the frosted glass north of the city, under a cold blue sky. The seven young men were well mounted and each of them had a slave; the two eldest each had two slaves and half a dozen horses. They were well turned out, with good armour and heavy cloaks. And they were all eager to go.

Their eagerness made the situation easier to bear. Hostages or not, they were city cavalry and his men, and Kineas found himself enjoying their company as they followed the narrow track out of the city and up the bluffs beyond to the plain. For stades, the track wound along the stone walls that edged grain fields, now a blasted desert of stubble and broken stalks where the harvesters had cut the crops. Heavy stone farmhouses dotted the landscape and as the morning went on they began to pass farmers making their way into town, most on foot with small carts, a few more prosperous on horseback. Their breath left plumes in the cold air, and the farmers didn’t seem happy to see so many soldiers.

The young men chatted, pointed out farms that belonged to their families, discussed hunting in this or that copse of woods and rehearsed their views on philosophy with Philokles - until Kineas began to ask them questions.

‘How would you ride up to that farmhouse,’ Kineas indicated a distant stone building with his hand, ‘leading twenty men, so as not to be seen in your approach?’

They took him seriously and they talked about it, waving their hands excitedly. Finally the leader, Eumenes - his leadership was obvious to Kineas, less to his friends - pointed. ‘Around the woods and up that little gully, there.’

Kineas nodded. It was interesting to see the change in Eumenes from the timid boy of the night before. Among his own, he seemed quite mature. ‘Good eye,’ Kineas said.

Eumenes flushed at the praise. ‘Thank you, sir. But - if you don’t mind my asking - isn’t cavalry warfare more of, well, fighting man to man? It’s for the
psiloi
to sneak around - as I understand it. Don’t we cover the flank of the hoplites and fight it out with the enemy cavalry?’

Kineas said, ‘War is about having an advantage. If you can gain an advantage over the enemy cavalry by sneaking, you should do it, don’t you think?’

Another youth, Cliomenedes, Petrocolus’s son stuttered, ‘Is that - is it - is it - I say, can it be, I mean, right? Right to take an advantage? Did Achilles do such things?’

Kineas was now riding easily in the midst of them. Ajax had stayed on his right hand, Philokles had dropped back with an amused look that suggested that mundane matters such as war were beneath his notice, and Ataelus had already galloped off ahead - lost in the morning glare.

‘Are you Achilles?’ Kineas asked.

‘I should like to be,’ said another boy, Sophokles. ‘My tutor says he is the model for a gentleman.’

‘Are you so good a man of arms that I can expect you to cut down any number of enemies?’ Kineas asked.

The boy looked down. Another boy - Kyros - cuffed him.

‘Real war is to the death. And dead, you lose everything - liberty, love, possessions, all lost. To preserve them, a few tricks are required. Especially when your enemies are numerous and better trained than you are.’ He said all the words that old soldiers say to young ones, and was greeted with the same respectful disbelief that he had offered his father’s friends who had fought at Chaeronea.

They dismounted for lunch and the slaves set out a magnificent meal fit for a party of princes on a hunting trip. Kineas didn’t complain - the supplies would be gone soon enough and then they’d by eating the rations that Kineas had on two mules under Arni’s supervision. Philokles ate enough for two and turned the conversation back to philosophy.

‘Why do you think there are rules in war?’ he asked.

Eumenes rubbed his bare chin.

Philokles motioned at Kineas. ‘Kineas says that you must be prepared to use subterfuge. Should you use spies?’

Eumenes shrugged. ‘Everyone uses spies,’ he said with the cynicism of the young.

‘Agamemnon sent Odysseus to spy on Troy,’ Sophokles said. He made a face, as if to indicate that he might say such things, but put no faith in them.

‘If you take a prisoner, can you torture him for information?’ Philokles asked.

The boys wriggled, and Eumenes paid too much attention to his food.

Kineas kicked Philokles in the knee without getting up. ‘Odysseus tortures a prisoner,’ he said. ‘It’s in the
Iliad
. I remember it.’

‘Would you?’ Philokles asked.

Kineas rubbed his beard and looked at his food - much like Eumenes. Then he raised his head. ‘No. Not without some compelling reason, and even then - that’s filthy. Not for men.’

Sophokles glanced up from his bread. ‘Are you saying that rules are foolish?’

Philokles shook his head. ‘I’m not saying anything. I’m asking questions, and you are answering them.’

‘The captain says that war is to the death. So why have rules?’ Sophokles glanced at Kineas, looking for approval. ‘Anything that wins is good. Isn’t it?’

Philokles leaned forward. ‘So - would you attack an enemy during a truce? Perhaps while he is collecting his dead?’

Sophokles sat back, and his face displayed outrage, but with the tenacity of the young, he stuck to his argument. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Yes, if it would give me victory.’

Philokles looked at Kineas and Kineas shook his head. ‘Never,’ he said.

Sophokles’ cheeks developed two bright red spots, and his throat blotched, and he hung his head.

Kineas fingered his beard again, rubbing in the oil from his lunch. ‘Rules in war have purpose,’ he said. ‘Every broken rule deepens the hate between the enemies. Every rule preserved keeps hate at bay. If two cities fight, and both abide by their oaths, follow the rules, and fear the gods - then when they have settled the dispute, they can return to trade. But if one side violates a truce, or murders women, or tortures a prisoner - then hatred rules the day, and war becomes a way of life.’

Philokles nodded. And he added, ‘War is the greatest of tyrants, once fully unleashed. Men make rules to keep the tyrant bound, just as they use the assembly to keep the over-powerful citizens from dominating other men. Fools speak of “getting serious”, or of making “real” war. They are invariably amateurs and cowards, who have never stood in the line with a spear in their hands. In the phalanx, where you smell the breath of your enemy and feel the wind when he farts - war is
always
real. Real enough, when death awaits every misstep. But when the tyrant is fully unleashed - when cities fight to the death, as Athens and Sparta did a hundred years ago - when all the rules are forgotten, and every man seeks only the destruction of his enemy, then reason is fled, and we become mad beasts. And then there is neither honour nor victory.’

The boys nodded solemnly, and Kineas was left with the feeling that he and Philokles could as easily have proclaimed the utility of torture and rapine and convinced them.

After lunch, Kineas had them throw javelins at a tree on foot, and he watched them mount their horses and commented on how that could be improved. While they threw, he said to Philokles, ‘That was quite a speech. You are against war?’

Philokles frowned. ‘I am Spartan,’ he said, as if that answered Kineas. ‘That Kyros has a good arm.’

Kineas let the subject drop.

‘In combat, you’ll be unhorsed,’ Kineas said. ‘It’ll happen several times. Every time you are on foot in a cavalry fight, you are very nearly a dead man. Being able to remount is the most important skill you can master. Practise mounting your own horse, if you can, practise mounting other men’s horses - because the usual reason for finding yourself on foot is because some bastard has killed your horse.’

When they were all riding into the afternoon, passing the very last walled field and the last deep ditch and dyke that marked the very edge of the town’s property, he said, ‘In wrestling, were you taught first how to fall?’

Ajax smiled, because he’d heard this speech so many times already.

‘Practise coming off your horse, recovering, and getting back on. Practise it at a walk, at a trot, even at a canter. Ajax, here, was barely able to ride a few weeks ago.’ Kineas spared him a good-natured glance. ‘Now he can come off at a canter and remount in a flash.’

Ajax did it on cue, without warning, taking his horse a few steps away into a field, rolling from the saddle and landing on his side. He looked winded, but he bounced to his feet and his horse had already stopped. He ran to her and vaulted into the saddle, his back straight and his leg thrown clear of her back. He looked like an athlete.

Several of the young men thought he looked more like a god. Then they all had to do it, their fine cloaks and armour getting an array of dirt and dents as they threw themselves to the ground and remounted. Several of them lost their horses entirely - Eumenes, a competent young man, rolled out of the saddle and his horse bolted, and had to be run down by Kineas himself. After that, Kineas curtailed their enthusiasm. ‘We have miles to ride today,’ he said.

Ajax rubbed his hip. ‘That hurt.’

Kineas smiled at him. ‘You did it very well.’

BOOK: Tyrant

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