Free Tyrant by Christian Cameron

Philokles have kept this until the end of the meal? But he didn’t want to say yes.
     
    ‘Not if you want to eat it. Otherwise, yes.’
     
    Kineas raised his eyes to Isokles and tried to pass a message. I know I’m being rude, I’m being importuned by someone whose life I saved . Isokles winked. The gods only knew what he thought was happening.
     
    ‘I’ll take you. It may be dangerous,’ he added weakly, too late to make any difference.
     
    ‘All the better,’ said the Spartan. ‘Goodness, we’re being rude. We should greet the other guests.’
     
    Isokles and Ajax greeted them and took their places on couches. The girl had vanished, probably taken to the women’s rooms on the other side of the house.
     
    Dinner consisted of fish, all very good; lobster, a little undercooked, and then more fish - the sort of opson -filled meal that moralists in Athens complained of. Watered wine made the rounds, a series of slaves bearing in the ewers of wine and Calchus mixing in the water himself. He was the only one alone on a couch, and he started conversations to include all of his guests; the wars of the boy king of Macedon, the hubris of the boy king claiming to be a god, the lack of piety in the younger generation, with the exception of Ajax. Despite his best intentions, he tended to launch monologues on his views on each of these matters. Ajax was silent and respectful, Isokles didn’t rise to the arguments as Kineas had expected he would, and Philokles applied himself to the fish courses as if he didn’t expect to eat this well ever again.
     
    After the last food course basins of water were brought and all the men washed their hands and faces.
     
    Calchus raised a wine bowl. ‘This is really a family gathering,’ he said. ‘To Isokles, my rival and brother; and to Kineas, to whom I owe everything I have achieved here.’ He poured a libation to the gods on to the floor and then drank the bowl to the dregs and upended it to show it was empty. ‘Since we are just family, it will outrage no god or goddess for your daughter to sing for us, Isokles.’
     
    ‘I couldn’t agree more,’ said the older man. He took a full bowl of wine and raised it. ‘To Calchus, for hosting us to this excellent dinner, and to his friend Kineas, who we all hope will grace us with his presence for long years to come.’ He, too, poured off a libation.
     
    Kineas realized that it was his turn. He felt out of place, shy, unaccustomedly foreign. He took a full bowl and rose to a sitting position. ‘To the hospitality of Calchus, and to the making of new friends - for new friends are gifts from the immortal ones on high Olympus.’ He drank the cup down.
     
    Philokles took his bowl and stood with it. Kineas could see on the faces of Isokles and Calchus that Philokles had it wrong - he was not supposed to raise a toast any more than young Ajax - but he did.
     
    ‘Poseidon, Lord of Horses, and Kineas saved me from the sea, and Calchus’s hospitality made me a man again.’ His libation to the gods was half the cup, and then he drank the rest. ‘Surely there is no bond dearer than guest to host.’ He subsided back on to his couch.
     
    Ajax recognized the quote and applauded. Isokles raised his bowl in salute. Even Calchus, who at best tolerated the Spartan, gave him a nod and smile of thanks.
     
    Two women entered the back of the room, unveiled, their hair piled high atop their heads and wearing fine linen. The older had to be Calchus’s wife, although this was the first time Kineas, who had lived in the house for three days, had laid eyes on her. She was tall, well built, long of limb and elegant in her movements, and she carried her head high. Her face would not have launched a thousand ships, but her expression of pleasure and her obvious intelligence took the place of beauty. She smiled at all of them.
     
    ‘This is Penelope,’ she said quietly, without raising her eyes. ‘Daughter of Isokles. I will just sit by and