Chapter Four
Wearily, Eumenes climbed the stairs to the top of the battlements. It was just before morning, and the wind off the Mediterranean seemed to cut right through his cloak. Strange how chilly it could be along the coast, even in the midst of summer. Back on the trek to Siwah, Eumenes had thought he'd never mind being cold again. Now, standing on the battlements of Tyre once more, the wind tearing at him like a living thing, he could scarcely recollect the heat of the desert.
But he'd never forget that oasis.
He looked around. Battlements and towers stretched all around him, encasing acre upon acre of ruins and wrecked buildings. Tyre was a city-fortress that had stood on an island just off the coast of Syria. Though it wasn't much of a city anymore. And now it wasn't an island either. Before striking east into Persia, Alexander's army had built an artificial promontory across the narrow channel that separated it from the mainland—had dumped tons upon tons of rocks and silt into that channel so as to drag their war-machines across and batter down the walls. It had been one of the most epic sieges ever—and the slaughter that followed had been even more thorough than that which had taken place at Alcibiadia. Eumenes remembered well the lines of wooden crosses stretching down the shoreline, a captured defender of Tyre nailed to each one, the stench and screams stretching off to the horizon…
"All because he wanted to sacrifice at that accursed temple," said a voice.
Eumenes turned to see Harpalus stepping from the shadow of a ruined tower. The treasurer looked exhausted, his beard unkempt, dark circles under his eyes. Small wonder, as his work had doubled since the sack of Egypt. And Eumenes knew just how hard Harpalus had already been laboring under the weight of sifting through the Persian finances. When the Macedonian expeditionary force had first crossed into Asia, Harpalus' job was reasonably simple: ensure what little money Philip had alloted his son went as far as possible. But once Alexander had defeated the Great King's army and stormed into the Persian heartland, Harpalus' task became order-of-magnitude more complex. Now he oversaw a vast mobile bureaucracy dedicated to processing the revenue of the richest Athenian province and virtually all the Persian satrapies—not to mention moving the Persian gold reserves out of Babylonia and back to… wherever Philip and Alexander decided. They were arguing about it. They were arguing about everything. Which was why Alexander had been recalled to Pella, the Macedonian capital—summoned to attend upon his father with all the speed he could muster. In response, Alexander had divided his army, leaving part of it in Egypt under Craterus, while the rest of it returned to Macedonia.
Though it would take some weeks to get there. Alexander and his entourage were well out in front of it now—they'd made camp at Tyre last night and were due to move out this morning. To the dismay of some of his advisers, Alexander was following his father's instructions to the letter—he was making utmost speed, and if that meant letting the army play catch up, so be it.
"It's a mistake," said Eumenes.
"Of course," replied Harpalus. "Tyre would have paid tribute without him needing to storm it. When I think of all the men we lost—"
"I'm not talking about Tyre," said Eumenes. "I'm talking about Alexander's… compulsion to go and face his father directly. Without the army."
Harpalus nodded. "My sources back in Macedonia tell me that Philip wasn't expecting that. That he was worried he'd be facing civil war. I'm almost surprised he's not getting one. His son's forces outnumber his by almost two to one."
Eumenes shrugged. "Philip controls the crossing to Europe."
"You think that would stop Alexander?" asked Harpalus.
"No. If he had to, he'd just march around the entire Black Sea. But the only winners from a civil war right now would be the Athenians, and Alexander knows it."
"So he's putting his head straight into the lion's den."
"And taking quite a risk." Eumenes' tone was somber. "Can you imagine how angry Philip must be by this point? His son strikes Egypt without sanction—"
"—and succeeds—"
"—and no matter what the sycophants around Alexander say, that'll have made the old man even angrier. Philip's an invalid, trapped in his palace back at Pella, dreaming of his past glory. He was the one who started the war with Persia—and now he's had to watch his son conquer the entire empire—"
"Which no one ever expected—"
"No one except him! Zeus almighty, it's crazy to look back on it all. You remember; everyone figured a best case scenario was liberating the Greek towns of Asia Minor, maybe even set up a defensive line in Anatolia. And then next thing, we're sacking Babylon! We've reached Afghanistan! And Alexander's still not satisfied! He wants to continue! Whereupon his father says come back, we need to have a little chat! So he turns around, but does he return? No, he hits Egypt instead and ignites a war with the queen of the seas. And so…"
"Here we are," said Harpalus.
"Here we are," repeated Eumenes, his agitation draining as quickly as it had filled him. He looked out across the battlements at the tide lapping against the beach. Now that dawn was starting to light the ocean, he could see the tops of masts and siege-engines protruding above the water's surface—victims of the withering fire that had poured down from the city's walls during the final assault. Eumenes looked back at Harpalus. "So what did you want to talk about?"
"You know what."
"If Alexander found us meeting like this, he'd say it was a conspiracy."
"He thinks everything is these days. He's convinced that there's a spy among his inner council."
Harpalus' eyes widened. "A spy for Athens?"
"A spy for Philip."
"Zeus. Who knows of those suspicions?"
"Besides me—Hephaestion, certainly. Craterus, probably. Beyond that, I've no idea."
"You and I need to stick together," said Harpalus.
"That's why we're having this conversation."
"If Alexander's getting this paranoid, the others will seek to take advantage of it."
Eumenes nodded. "They already have. Meleager—"
"I heard. He's been imprisoned."
"You mean executed."
Harpalus leaned against the battlements as though he'd been struck. "What? When?"
"Four nights ago. Back in Egypt."
"Does Alexander even plan to announce it?"
"He'll probably tell the army he died in a skirmish with Arab raiders or something—give him a grand funeral, lots of tears, a moving oration, all the usual trappings now he's safely dead."
"Safely?" Harpalus' tone bordered on incredulity. "Meleager was the ultimate loyalist. He would never have—"
"I know. His downfall's thanks to Craterus. Who saw his chance to rid himself of a rival, and used Alexander's mindset to make it happen. So now he can put a more pliable man in command of the part of the phalanx that's been left back in Egypt."
Harpalus seemed to be struggling to absorb all of this. He gazed out at the ocean, slowly shaking his head. Eumenes almost felt sorry for him. Buried in his figures and charts, the treasurer had gradually lost touch with the intensifying pace of court-politics… had lost touch, too, with just how much the character of his boyhood friend Alexander had changed. Eumenes knew there was a time when Alexander and Harpalus had been inseparable. But the fantastic success visited on Macedonian arms had transformed everything. Harpalus looked back at Eumenes, his gaze hollow.
"So what happened out there?" he asked.
"We almost died," said Eumenes.
"I mean, what happened when you reached the oasis."
"The priests hailed him as Son of Zeus."
Harpalus shook his head. "Zeus knows what he'd have done to them if they hadn't."
"And then he went inside the temple. By himself. No bodyguards, no nothing. No witnesses. We waited. And waited. To the point that we wondered whether the priests had been paid by the Athenians to kill him and ride hell for leather out the back door. And then, just as we were about to bust in ourselves, Alexander comes out looking like…." Eumenes trailed off, wondering how to phrase it.
"Like what?" asked Harpalus impatiently.
"Like a man who's just been told his heart's desire." Eumenes thought it over. "But also… like a man who's just had the surprise of his life."
There was a long pause.
"And he was in there for the better part of an hour," added Eumenes. "So if it was a revelation from Zeus-Ammon, it was rather a long one. Presumably fairly specific too."
"Those damn priests. They could have said anything."
"Assuming it was the priests."
Harpalus mulled that one over. "But he didn't tell you what the message was?"
"I'm not sure he's even told Hephaestion. Whatever happened in there is between the prince and the gods. But he's been acting stranger than ever in the weeks since. The paranoia, the moodiness, the drinking—"
"We might be able to piece some of it together," said Harpalus.
"What do you have in mind?"
"Well. Doesn't it strike you as funny that we're here?"
"In Tyre?"
"Yes. In Tyre."
Eumenes pondered this. Try as he might, he couldn't see what Harpalus was driving at. "It's a natural place to stop on the way back north. And Alexander was never a man to resist revisiting the scene of one of his greatest triumphs—"
"Right, but he captured this city so he could sacrifice at the temple of Melkart. That was the whole point, remember?"
There was no way Eumenes could forget. Melkart was the Phoenician incarnation of Hercules, who Alexander had idolized since boyhood. In the wake of Siwah, Eumenes had begun to suspect that identification might have become a literal one, though he hadn't given it a tremendous amount of thought—largely because it seemed to be overshadowed by Alexander's claim to be the son of the father of the universe. But now he found himself wondering if Harpalus knew something he didn't. Still, it didn't add up.
"Melkart was just an excuse," he said. "You know that as well as I do. Tyre was the headquarters of the Persian navy, which Alexander needed to neutralize—"
"Athens had already done a good job with that," said Harpalus. "Back when she took Egypt from Persia, thirty years back. Persia only had a few ships left—"
"Where are you going with this?" asked Eumenes.
"The ambassadors from Carthage," said Harpalus.
Eumenes nodded. He'd personally handled that particular problem. The Carthaginian ambassadors had been at Tyre for ceremonies to Melkart when Alexander sacked the place. It had made for a tricky diplomatic situation, since Carthage had been a Phoenician colony—founded by Tyre itself centuries ago. But Carthage had long since passed out of Tyre's political orbit and become a major power in her own right—until Athens had subjugated her and made the city the crown-jewel of her western empire. Eumenes had suspected at the time that Alexander would have killed the ambassadors out of hand had they not technically been under Athenian protection—it would have meant war with Athens before he'd even finished with Persia. So the ambassadors had been permitted to leave Tyre unscathed. But somehow they were still in the picture.
"What about them?" he asked.
"They've been in contact with Alexander," said Harpalus.
That drew Eumenes up short. "What?"
"Sending him gold. And African ivory. Which naturally went through the treasury—"
"Bribes?"
"Maybe. But they included correspondence. Which was sealed… but I have my ways."
"Correspondence is supposed to go through my office," said Eumenes, realizing even as he spoke the words just how petulant he was sounding.
"What can I say?" Harpalus spread his arms out. "Our prince likes to keep the left and right hands far apart."
"But—what in Hades' name did the correspondence say? What was the message?"
"They weren't messages—they were maps."
"Maps of what?"
"The location and layout of other temples of Melkart-Hercules."
"He's got temples all over the place. I could name several right now."
"I'm talking about the westernmost ones in existence."
"Which are where?"
"At the Pillars of Hercules."
There was a long pause. "You're joking."
"I wish I were," said Harpalus.
"The gateway to the outer ocean? Where Hercules is supposed to have bagged the sacred cattle?"
"Don't be so cynical. From what I can make out, the place is real enough. There are two temples, facing each other across the straits. One's called Gadus; the other, Lixus. And Zeus help us all if Alexander wants to worship at either of them."
Eumenes' mind was working on overtime. "Did you see any other correspondence from these ambassadors?"
"No."
"I'll bet there was some, though."
"What makes you say that?" asked Harpalus.
"Zeus, there must have been. You just don't send a bunch of ivory and maps without some kind of explanation or context."
"Maybe they went through another channel. Or they were in code."
"Or both. Remember all that talk about Carthage at the council meeting back in Egypt?"
"Unfortunately, yes."
"I'd wager Alexander's working with a fifth column there," said Eumenes. "Trying to get them to rebel."
Harpalus looked thoughtful. "Or they're trying to get him to come liberate them"—but as he said this, a blast of trumpets shattered the morning calm. Both men whirled, looking out across the city and promontory, back to the camp. They could see mounted figures riding in — the morning patrols were returning. Soon Alexander would order the day's ride to begin, for the continuation of the journey back toward Macedonia.
"We should leave," said Eumenes, turning back to Harpalus.
But Harpalus was already heading down the stairway.
"I'm sick of this place," muttered Matthias.
Lugorix nodded. He knew the feeling. They'd been cooped up for several days in what they'd quickly come to realize may have as well have been a prison. They'd been allowed to keep their weapons and equipment, but were for all intents and purposes confined to their rooms. Under house arrest, was the phrase that Matthias used for it—Lugorix had never heard the term before. In Gallic culture anyone who had a house was a rich man by definition, and anyone who was under arrest was quickly put on trial, either to be executed or released in short order. He'd asked Matthias whether they were here because they'd committed a crime—Matthias said that wasn't the point, that they were in somebody else's hands now, and would just have to wait to see what happened.
Lugorix wasn't sure that was such a great idea. Though he had to admit, their quarters were comfortable. In fact, they were more luxurious than anything he'd ever seen. There were real beds!—complete with banners that were meant to be pulled over oneself while one slept. Matthias told him they were called sheets. Lugorix would have preferred a woman, but he found the sheets to be comfortable enough all the same. The walls were covered with paintings and the floors were bedecked with carpets. There was even something called a toilet, which was easily the most remarkable thing Lugorix had ever laid eyes on. One pissed and crapped through a hole and apparently someone at the bottom of that hole was responsible for cleaning the mess up.
One of the slaves, presumably. They were the only people Lugorix and Matthias had seen since being escorted upstairs from the basement where the boat had been moored. Slaves brought their meals, cleaned the rooms, changed the linen, and even furnished wine: amphorae stoppered with wax seals and marked with the symbol of what Matthias assured Lugorix was a very expensive vineyard. Lugorix figured the plan was to keep him and Matthias drunk and happy. He certainly couldn't argue with the success of the first objective.
The house they were in was clearly much larger than the wing to which they were confined. Lugorix had gotten glimpses of it when he and Matthias had been led upstairs from the basement—sprawling landings, spacious hallways, doors left tantalizingly open, but no sign of the elusive owner. Theramenes, the man who had overruled the harbormaster, had escorted them to the quarters they now occupied. Lugorix wondered if in fact he was the house's master, but there had been something in the man's bearing that suggested that he was simply what he claimed to be: just a servant. They hadn't seen him since.
Nor had they seen Barsine or Damitra. This seemed to frustrate Matthias above all else, which for Lugorix was clear evidence of a fundamental lack of perspective. Because whatever game Barsine was playing had everything to do with Macedonia and nothing whatsoever to do with Matthias. In the midst of quaffing the contents of a particularly tasty amphora, Lugorix had tried to explain this to Matthias, only to be rudely told he didn't need to be reminded. Tensions between the two men got worse from there. They'd saved each other's lives in the field many times, but confined together in close quarters they were starting to feel like caged animals, able to do nothing but turn on each other.
The view from the window was making matters worse. They were three floors up, looking out over the thicket of trees and vines and ponds that constituted the house's back-garden. Beyond that were more canals and more palatial homes, draped with ivy and vines—and moonlight, now that it was night. The effect was nothing short of haunting; Matthias said it was like the hanging gardens of Babylon, though Lugorix had no idea what that was supposed to mean. They weren't in Babylon, they were in Athens. And he was fed up with it.
"We really need to get out of this dump," he said.
"You said that already," replied Matthias, putting aside yet another empty amphora. He was pretty drunk. "But we're not going to start slaughtering the slaves when they come through the door—"
"We use the bed-linen to make ropes," said Lugorix. "Get down into that garden, find another way into this house. Find out what the hell's going on."
"Best way to do that is to wait here."
"Wait for Barsine to tell you what you should do next?"
"Shut the hell up."
"Place may be gilded, but it's still a cage."
"It's been a nice rest since all the shit we've gone through."
"How's it feel to be a woman's lap-dog?"
"Fuck off."
Lugorix laughed. "Don't like being a kept man?"
"I'll throw you out that window if you keep talking like that."
"What about if we both go out together?"
Matthias was easy enough to wind up. Especially when he was in his cups. In no time at all, he and Lugorix had stripped the beds of all the sheets and created a serviceable rope. They dangled it down to the ground and got ready to climb out.
"Do we take our weapons?" said Matthias.
"What kind of question is that?" asked Lugorix as he picked up Skullseeker and strapped it onto his back. Matthias did the same with his bow; two minutes later, they were both standing on the patio, looking up at the window three stories above and a fourth story beyond that.
Lugorix stretched his arms langorously. "Wasn't so hard, was it?"
"Keep quiet," hissed Matthias. He swayed unevenly, and then steadied himself against the wall of the house. "Let's check this place out."
They began to circle the house cautiously, treading carefully through the undergrowth nestled alongside the walls. They found several doors; all were locked, and looked even more imposing then the one that led from their quarters. All the windows were barred. There was no sign of movement in any of them. Lugorix was thinking of trying his hand at some lock-picking when—
"Over there," whispered Matthias, pointing. Lugorix followed the direction of his gaze to see a door in the garden wall. They skulked over to it. Lugorix threw back the bars, opened the door and led the way onto the street.
Except it was more of a path—or rather, a towpath along one of the canals that bordered the house. They made their way along it, past the walls of more houses belonging to the Athenian wealthy. The occasional houseboat stood in the canal, festooned with banners. At intervals they passed statues of the god Hermes, each one with an appropriately-oversized phallus.
"These people really let it all hang out," muttered Lugorix.
"It's for luck," replied Matthias. "Every household has one."
"If I had one of those, I wouldn't need luck."
"Well, there was a big scandal involving them once."
"So what?"
"So I'm trying to educate you," said Matthias as he led the way across a bridge that sloped over one of the canals. "The expedition to Sicily was about to depart, led by the man himself, Alcibiades, when—"
"This is ancient history," complained Lugorix.
"A century back. This is how the whole thing got started, man."
"What whole thing?"
"The Athenian Empire. The expedition to Sicily that won them the war against Sparta. The night before it was due to depart, all these cocks"—he gestured at one of the Hermes—"all of them got chopped off. Everyone woke up and went batshit. It was blamed on Alcibiades, since he had a bit of a rakish reputation in the first place, but he asked why the hell he'd sabotage an expedition on which he was betting his entire future. His enemies wanted him to sail for Sicily anyway and stand trial in abstentia—"
"No one ever gets found innocent when they aren't at their own trial," said Lugorix.
"Something Alcibiades was keenly aware of. He managed to have it out with his rivals there and then—and then he produced evidence that his fellow commander Nicias—who hated Alcibiades—was behind it all, that he'd had all the Hermes mutilated in order to frame his enemy. So they put Nicias on the rack and did away with the joint command they'd initially been proposing—they sent the entire expedition under the sole leadership of Alcibiades. Six months later Syracuse surrendered. Six months after that so did all of Sicily. Which doubled Athens' revenue and gave them access to all the grain they needed and all the mercenaries in Gaul and Italy and Spain they could hire—"
"Like me," said Lugorix.
"Yeah. Then after Sparta surrendered, Alcibiades led the fleet back west and defeated Carthage. Leaving Athens without any rivals on the sea."
"Thanks for the history lesson," said Lugorix.
"It's not just history," replied Matthias earnestly. Lugorix made a mental note to never ask Matthias about anything when he was drunk. "It's about the way the world works."
"Meaning what?"
Matthias gestured at a Hermes. "Sometimes the fate of an entire nation can turn on the tip of a dick."
"Is that the line you're going to use on Barsine?"
But suddenly Matthias was looking around, entirely distracted. "Where are we?" he asked.
"How should I know? You've been leading the way."
"Told you I never been to Athens before. I only know the big tourist attractions—"
"Great," said Lugorix. They were still among the canals, but in a much seedier area now. The houses were shabby and small, and the canals had become dank and slimy—the moon glistened off that slime in unattractive ways. Obviously they'd left the upscale district behind.
"We could go back," said Matthias.
"What's that up ahead?" said Lugorix. It seemed to be a wider street, lit up in a way that the canals weren't. He and Matthias found themselves drawn toward it like moths to a flame. That was the problem with being plastered in a strange city—one just kind of turned off one's brain and went with one's reflexes. Which now brought them out upon a wide avenue, all the more surreal for being so vacant. Lanterns hung from posts up and down its length, each containing the aggregated light of hundreds of fireflies.
"Streetlamps," said Matthias.
"Bugs," said Lugorix.
They could see much more of the city's skyline now—hills all around them, covered with a tangle of buildings. One stood out in particular—a colossal pillared structure atop one of the highest hills of all, a huge bronze statue of Athena right in front of it. Beside the Pharos, it was the largest building Lugorix had ever seen.
"That's the Parthenon," said Matthias. "City's temple."
"Let's go check it out."
"Are you kidding me? It'll be crawling with watchmen just waiting for drunk fools like us. But the Pnyx is nearby—I know where that is, that'll be interesting."
"The what?" But Matthias was already leading the way down a side-street—and through onto another avenue which brought them to a wooded hill. It was a little incongruous to come across it in the middle of the city, but in Lugorix's inebriated state, he was content to roll with it. He was hoping to find nymphs in the middle of the woods but instead—
"What is this?"
"What does it look like," replied Matthias.
It looked like a theater. The moon shone down on row after row of seats carved down the side of a slope. But the stage at the bottom was comparatively small—not nearly large enough to put on a play, which made Lugorix wonder just what its purpose was.
"This is where the Assembly meets," said Matthias.
Lugorix looked around. It seemed almost anticlimactic that the entire Mediterranean was ruled from this place. He would have found it more appropriate if that big pillared building—the Parthenon—was where all the action went down; it seemed like the kind of structure that would house a king or emperor or someone really important. But this… he couldn't imagine anything ever getting decided here. It wasn't that he wasn't used to community-decision making—it was how his tribe back home had figured things out. But they were only making decisions for themselves—not for a whole world beyond them.
"Hey Gauls!"
Matthias and Lugorix whirled around. Four men were coming toward them. They didn't look like watchmen. More like—
"Drunk thugs," muttered Matthias. "Just what we need."
"Well if it isn't two Gaulish mercenaries taking in the view," said the largest of them—even taller than Lugorix.
"Mercenaries aren't supposed to be in the city," said another—he had a dirty-looking beard, and eyes that gleamed evilly. "Especially Gaullish ones."
"I'm not a Gaul," said Matthias.
"Well, your friend is," said the man with the dirty beard.
"And you're both mercenaries," said the large one. "So what do you think you're doing here?"
"Not looking for trouble," said Lugorix.
That made them laugh. "Well, you've managed to find it. This city's a clean city, know what I mean? It's not supposed to have any dirty trouser-wearing Gauls in it."
"You certainly hire enough of us," said Lugorix. He knew he was rising to the bait, but all the booze in him made it hard to resist. Besides, these guys were starting to piss him off.
"Of course we hire you," said one of them. "You're useful cannon fodder. Do our bidding for the cash, fight the Macks when we tell you. What else are dirty Gauls good for?"
Lugorix could think of a few things. Like kicking this guy's ass, for starters….
"You're barbarians, is what you are." This was the third man, speaking with a pronounced lisp. "Never built a stone building in your life. Probably never seen one either."
"And you believe in human sacrifice," said the large man. "We've heard about your druids. About your wickermen. About how you put your prisoners in them and set them on fire and burn them alive."
Lugorix had heard enough. He unslung Skullseeker—whereupon the four men pulled out their swords.
"You don't want to do this," said Matthias. "We're professionals."
"And we're Athenian citizens," said the man with the beard. "You so much as touch us and it's the death penalty for you both."
"So let's all walk away," said Matthias calmly.
"First you have to get down on your knees and kiss our blades."
"Screw that," said Lugorix, raising his axe.
"Enough!" cried a voice—and such was the force of that voice that everybody stopped and turned.
An old man was walking toward them. He sported a long grey beard and—despite his age—a thick head of hair. His eyes gleamed with a strange intensity, and the four Athenians seemed to recognize him.
"Your honor," said the largest one, "these men are mercenaries. Carrying weapons in the city!"
"They should be punished!" said the one with a lisp.
"And you should be home in bed," said the newcomer. "Instead of roaming the streets, revelling in how your money's bought you exemption from military service while you look to pick fights. Ironic, no?"
"We weren't looking for—"
"You were," said the man. "And you know damn well the Macedonians are right outside the walls. So if you really want a fight, why don't you try them?"
That seemed to do it. The men turned to go, looking more than a little sheepish. All except for the one with the dirty beard.
"What about these mercenaries?" he asked.
"They work for me," said the man. "Now get out of my sight before I call the watch on you. And don't speak of this to anybody or I'll put my boot so far up your backside your nose will itch."
The four men found the threat credible. They left quickly, their footfalls disappearing into the night. The old man turned to Matthias and Lugorix.
"You gentlemen have caused more than enough problems for one evening," he said. "Shall we return to my house?"
"Not until you tell who the hell you are," said Matthias.
"My name's Demosthenes," said the man. He said it as though he expected it to sound familiar, though Lugorix had never heard of him.
But Matthias had. He looked stunned. "The orator," he said.
"It's nice to be known for something," said Demosthenes. "But these days I don't do much public speaking."
"Why's that?" asked Matthias.
"The Assembly's been closed."
"Closed?" asked Lugorix.
"And I hate to rush you, but we really do need to leave. Barsine is back at the house, and we'll explain everything to you."
That was a lie, of course.
But they were about to learn a lot more then they'd bargained for.