Funeral Games by Christian Cameron, Cameron

wharves, Philokles took the man aside on the platform where the steersman conned the ship. When they were done talking, Philokles came down the gangplank with a worried look. Theron was trying to unload the horses with the help of the deck crew. They had kept the three best horses from the farmer, and Melitta’s Bion. The rest of the horses had been sold at Bata, where they had got a good price. Shipping the horses had cost more than shipping the people - but Philokles had told the twins that without horses, they were too vulnerable.
    Bion hadn’t liked being swayed aboard in a sling, and now he didn’t like walking down the gangplank, resisting every step, showing his teeth and acting like a mule. Melitta had to coax him on to dry land with a hastily purchased honey and sesame confection.
    ‘Stupid horse,’ she said fondly.
    Satyrus ignored her. He stood with his back against his own horse and his arms crossed.
    Philokles tugged at his beard. ‘I have to take a risk,’ he said. He was not quite sober - in fact, he had drunk steadily once they were on board.
    Theron shrugged. ‘It’s been all risk since I joined this crew,’ he said. ‘Why do you stay?’ Melitta asked. She was drawing looks from passers-by on the wharves, as a young woman of good family out in the public eye. In fact, she was a young woman of good family who was out in public wearing a short chiton with a scarlet chitoniskos over it and she was wrangling horses. She got a great deal of attention.
    Theron smiled. ‘The company’s good,’ he said. ‘And I’m not bored.’ Philokles gave them all a crooked smile. ‘This is not the place to have this conversation,’ he said. ‘Let’s go.’
    Satyrus got on to his horse with a wriggle and a push. Melitta did her usual acrobatic vault, and every head on the street turned.
    ‘You have to stop doing that in public,’ Theron said. ‘Girls don’t ride. They certainly don’t ride astride. They don’t vault on to horses, and they don’t do acrobatics.’
    ‘Of course they do,’ Melitta said with a toss of her head. ‘I see it on Athenian plates and vases all the time.’
    Theron made a choking noise that Satyrus recognized through his sullenness as ill-concealed laughter. ‘Those are flute girls and hetairai !’ he said.
    Melitta shrugged. Then she turned her Artemis smile on the people around them, and some of the men smiled back.
    ‘Where are we going?’ Melitta asked.
    ‘Leon the Numidian has a factor and warehouses here,’ Philokles said.
    ‘Uncle Leon?’ Melitta asked. ‘Will he be there?’
    ‘I doubt it,’ Philokles said. ‘Gods, what a salvation that would be. Zeus Soter, let Leon be there.’

PART II
    FORMING

4
    316 BC
    S tratokles rode up to the wall of the barn before the Macedonian mercenary could get the girl’s knees apart with his own. He had her hands pinned and he’d headbutted her to stop the screams, but she was a tough woman with a farmer’s muscles and she wasn’t giving up without a fight, as the Macedonian’s face testified.
    Stratokles slid down from his horse, pivoted on his left foot and kicked the man in the head so hard that his body made a gentle thump as it hit the stone barn.
    ‘Who allowed this?’ he asked the ring of mercenaries who had gathered to watch. ‘You - you’re a phylarch, aren’t you?’
    The man so addressed, a Sicilian from far-off Syracuse, flinched at the man with the livid red scar across his face. ‘Yes,’ he muttered.
    ‘Are you aware that without these people, we’ll never catch the fucking children?’ Stratokles was furious - not just from the constant pain of his face, but from the stupidity of the men he was saddled with.
    ‘They know where the children are!’ the Macedonian spat. He sat up and retched. ‘Fuck me.’
    ‘I may, at that,’ Stratokles said. He had a knife in his hand and it was pressed against the Macedonian’s temple. ‘Don’t move around too much.’
    The Sicilian phylarch shook his