The Gryphon's Skull

“Get up,” Menedemos told him. His wits worked furiously. His cousin and the olive merchant were right—to a point. “We can't flee in the night, not with half my crew in the taverns and the brothels here, not unless I want to leave them behind. This customer of yours—he won't go to the garrison commander with this word, will he?”

“No,” Kissidas said. “He does not love Antigonos.”

“AH right, then. We'll sail at first light tomorrow. If you and yours are aboard when we leave, we'll take you down to Rhodes,” Menedemos said. The proxenos gabbled out thanks. Sostratos made approving noises. Menedemos hardly heard either one of them. Only he knew how little he wanted to return to his home town.

2

Sostratos stood on the Aphrodite's tiny foredeck, peering into Kaunos. “Where is he?” he grumbled. Twilight was coming on, paling the waning crescent moon, Kronos' wandering star not far from it, and Zeus' bright wandering star now low in the west.

“I don't know where he is,” Menedemos answered from the poop; Sostratos' voice must have carried better than he'd thought. His cousin continued, “I don't much care, either. If he's not here by the time the sun climbs up out of the sea, we're sailing anyhow. Furies take me if I'm going to risk my ship in this stupid war.”

You risked it last year, in the war between Syracuse and Carthage, Sostratos thought. He'd reckoned Menedemos utterly mad, but his cousin had got away with it, and made a fat profit beside. Maybe Menedemos had learned his lesson. Maybe—more likely—he just saw no money in staying in Kaunos.

Aristeidas' arm shot out. “Someone's coming this way.”

“Stand by to cast off!” Diokles rasped. “Rowers, be ready.” If those were Hipparkhos' soldiers approaching the merchant galley rather than Kissidas and whatever companions he had with him, the Aphrodite

could flee in a hurry.

Along with Aristeidas and everyone else aboard the akatos, Sostratos tried to make out who those shapes were. His eyes weren't bad, but the lookout's were better. “Whoever they are, they've got women with them,” Aristeidas said. “See the long chitons?”

After a moment, Sostratos did. “Unless Antigonos has Amazon mercenaries, that'll be the proxenos and his family,” he said. A couple of rowers chuckled. Once Sostratos had spoken, though, he wondered if that wasn't possible. With a gryphon's skull there among the Aphrodite's cargo, what had seemed obvious myth suddenly looked like something else altogether.

Three men, three women, a little boy, a baby of indeterminate sex in one of the women's arms. One of the men, the biggest and squarest, was undoubtedly Kissidas. One of the women would be his wife. One might be a daughter. The other, almost without a doubt, would be a daughter-in-law; hardly any families reared two girls.

As the day got brighter and the women got closer, Sostratos saw they were veiled against the prying eyes of men not of their household. Kissidas called, “Thank you for waiting for us, my guest-friends.”

“Come aboard, and quickly,” Menedemos said from his station at the stern. “We've got no time to waste.”

“You're probably right,” Kissidas agreed with a sigh. “Chances are good a slave in one, of our houses will have gone up the hill to Hipparkhos by now.” He and his companions hurried along the quay toward the ship. As they boarded, the olive merchant introduced the males: “My son Hypermenes, my grandson Kissidas, my son-in-law Lykomedes son of Lykophron.” He did his best to pretend the women weren't there.

Menedemos followed custom, too, doing his best not to look as if he was trying to see through those veils. But be is, Sostratos said. He's bound to be. The more women cover up, the more he wants to know what they're hiding. A lot of men among the Hellenes felt that way, but his cousin did so to a greater degree than most.

“Why don't you all go up to the foredeck?” Menedemos said; like Kissidas, he didn't acknowledge the women with any special words. The closest he came to it was a brief addition: “No one will bother you there.”

“Thank you,” Kissidas said.

Sostratos hastily descended from the foredeck and made his way back toward the stern as the Rhodian proxenos and his kinsfolk came forward. At least one of the women wore perfume; the sweet scent of roses made him whip his head around. But he couldn't even be sure which one it was.

“Cast off!” Diokles called, and the lines tying the Aphrodite to the pier thumped down into the akatos.

At almost the same moment, Aristeidas said, “I see more people coming down toward the harbor.” Sostratos saw them, too. The horsehair plumes in their bronze helmets made them look taller and more fearsome than they really were.

“They aren't coming to invite us to symposion,” Menedemos said with commendable calm. “Let's get out of here.”