Free Tyrant: King of the Bosporus by Christian Cameron

he’ll threaten the lad – or kill him.’
    ‘When Eumeles hears our hooves, his blood will run like ice,’ she said again. ‘Scared men make errors. There will be a moment.’
    ‘Are you a seeress again, Nihmu?’ Coenus asked.
    ‘I am a woman who has made war,’ Nihmu replied.
    The pentekonter looked as if it would sink at its moorings, but Leon’s chief factor insisted that it was seaworthy, and he’d filled the hull with the very best of Leon’s rowers and crewed the deck with half a dozen officers from the successful Massalia fleet, so that the awful little boat had the air of a Rhodian naval vessel.
    Most of the sailors were openly concerned at carrying women, especially women who had brought weapons aboard, but the officers knew she was their master’s wife, a figure of legend, and all of them knew Coenus – one of Alexandria’s most feared and revered warriors.
    Cardias was the helmsman, a Rhodian sailor who had directed theentire squadron on the Massalia run and saw no demotion in commanding a fifty-oared scow on a cruise up the coast of Asia.
    On the beach beneath her own bedroom window, Melitta hugged her aunt Sappho goodbye and held her son for a long time, all too conscious that she might never see either of them again, and conscious too, that for all her claims of being a Sakje, her youth – much of her life – was tied to the sweaty streets of Alexandria. She had intended to walk once more in the night market, but she hadn’t had the time.
    Idomeneus, the man who had commanded her unit of archers last year at Gaza, came up and put an arm around her waist. ‘Little mother,’ he said in his Cretan accent.
    ‘You bastard,’ she smiled. ‘What are you doing here?’
    Idomeneus jutted his chin at Coenus. ‘He hired me to run the archers on this ship.’ He smiled. ‘I wanted to come – and the wages were incredible.’ He whistled. ‘
Are
there any archers on this fishing boat?’
    Coenus came up. They had a fire on the beach and men were coming from all directions. The rendezvous had been made carefully, to prevent news of the sailing. ‘Eight,’ he said. ‘And you’re one of them. Cretans – what can I say?’ Coenus clasped hands with the Cretan. ‘Thanks for making it here.’
    Idomeneus smiled. ‘I would come far for this one,’ he said. ‘I was sorry to hear of your son. He was brave.’
    Coenus didn’t even show a strain in the firelight. ‘He was,’ Coenus agreed. ‘May his son be as good as his father.’ Coenus looked at the baby in Melitta’s arms. ‘My heart misgives me, honey bee. I think you should stay.’
    Melitta drew herself up and carefully handed her son to Sappho, who handed him to Kallista. ‘The tribes will not rise for you, Coenus,’ she said.
    Nihmu nodded agreement.
    Idomeneus raised an eyebrow. ‘So? We go on a mission, I suppose.’
    Coenus nodded.
    Idomeneus laughed. ‘You don’t have to tell me. Cretans grow up with these games.’ He shrugged.
    ‘At sea,’ Coenus said. To Melitta, he said, ‘Say your goodbyes.’
    Nihmu hugged Sappho. ‘We will win,’ she said simply.
    Sappho nodded. ‘I know.’
    Pounding footsteps on the sand, and Phiale came up, running in cork-soled sandals, attended by Alcaea. ‘Melitta!’ she called.
    ‘Phiale!’ Melitta answered, hugging the other woman. ‘What are you doing here?’
    ‘I caught a rumour that you were slipping away!’ Phiale said. ‘Where are you going?’
    ‘Massalia,’ Melitta said. ‘To be safe.’
    ‘Oh!’ Phiale said. ‘I suppose it is a secret. I’m sorry to be so thoughtless! But I worry so much about – about all of you!’
    Kallista was still light on her feet despite her advanced pregnancy, and she interposed herself between Melitta and Phiale. ‘Let me get you a cup of wine, since you’ve joined our beach party,’ she said brightly.
    Something sparked behind Melitta’s eyes. She turned to Sappho. ‘Don’t let her leave for a day or two,’ she said