The Pillars of Hercules Read online

  The other side of the park bordered one of the aqueducts, the hill sloping down to where a bit of judicious scrambling allowed them to climb into the channel in that structure’s upper-tier. Water sloshed up to their knees, pumped up from the Nile to keep the gardens of the rich in bloom—Lugorix could only imagine at what expense. Barsine began to lead the way.

  “Wait a second,” said Matthias.

  She turned. “Yes?”

  “You’re going downriver. Deeper into the city.”

  “So?

  “So I thought you were trying to get us out of here.”

  “I know what I’m doing.”

  “Doesn’t look it.”

  Her face reddened. “Don’t question my orders.”

  “You’re giving us orders?”

  Lugorix realized this was going nowhere. He looked at Barsine. “You want us to run escort, this is the wrong way to do it.”

  “Meaning what?” asked Barsine.

  “This isn’t a proper formation. I’ll take the lead, Matthias brings up the rear. The two of you in the middle.”

  “The Gaul speaks wisdom,” said the crone. “His friend, not so much.”

  Matthias blanched. “I’m just trying to understand—”

  “You heard the lady,” said Lugorix. Matthias threw up his hands, admitting defeat. He mock-bowed to Barsine. She didn’t smile.

  “We need to make haste,” she said.

  They did just that, moving out across the city. Below them the shouting was getting louder, the screams more frequent. Smoke drifted past as more fires kept breaking out. Occasionally the aqueduct they were on intersected with others; each time, Barsine gave directions unhesitatingly, always taking them further downhill. Lugorix realized that his suggestion for their deployment had a big disadvantage—he couldn’t ask Matthias what the hell they’d gotten themselves into. The cool night air outside the tavern had made him feel more sober; but now that he was moving across the city’s roof, it seemed that all the alcohol had rushed back into his brain. He figured that was as much a function of the weirdness of the situation as anything. And the way Matthias had looked at Barsine made him uneasy. He knew his friend well enough to know that the man’s arguments were really just a means of flirting. But these women had enough of a hold on them without Matthias playing into their hands. A Persian noble, accompanied by her very own witch… Lugorix knew when he was out of his element, and sneaking over an aqueduct in a stricken city with that kind of company certainly qualified.

  As they neared the place where aqueduct became tunnel, the noise around them rose up a notch in intensity. The screams increased in number; the shouting got louder, was interspersed with the galloping of hooves—and the clash of steel on steel, as well as commands bellowed in a Greek dialect so harsh it was barely Greek…

  “They’re here,” whispered the crone.

  “Macedonians,” muttered Barsine. For just a moment, Lugorix realized how scared she was—how much of a façade she was putting up. She was practically running now, slipping and sliding through the water, and everybody was keeping pace. The sack of the city was beginning all around them. Lugorix wondered if anyone was still alive back at the Dryad’s Tits. Presumably they were selling their lives dearly. Not like they had a choice. The Macedonian soldiers clearly had orders for slaughter, and they were carrying out their instructions with alacrity. And high above the city—

  “Look at the Pharos,” said Matthias.

  He might have saved his breath. It was impossible to miss. The fire atop Pharos Lighthouse had suddenly blossomed toward inferno—perhaps triggered by Alexander’s sorcerers, perhaps the function of his sabotage of the fuel within the lighthouse. But someone had obviously managed to coat the upper portion with incendiary, and now that substance was blazing into full fury with a light that sent ghastly shadows roiling across the top of the aqueduct. The four of them splashed onward, picking up the pace still further. The water was getting deeper, and from the smell of the tunnel just ahead, they were crossing into the city’s sewers. Lugorix led the way inside—and slowed down almost immediately, holding out his arms to stop the rest of them in their headlong flight.

  “We need light,” he said.

  “Damitra,” replied Barsine.

  “M’lady,” said the crone. There was the sound of her pulling aside cloth—fumbling for something—and then a dim bluish glow suffused the rocky walls around them, radiating outward from an amulet the crone was holding. Lugorix was impressed.

  But then he felt the ground shift beneath his feet.

  At first he thought it was some byproduct of the crone’s magick. But then he realized that what he was standing on was alive—and twisting with a suddenness that sent him flying. From the corner of his eyes he saw a gigantic pair of jaws rising from the water, snapping straight at Barsine—who was knocked out of the way by Matthias.

  “Crocodile,” he yelled.

  “I noticed,” said the crone. She thrust her amulet at the thrashing reptile. There was a flash as the glow went white-hot, followed by a sizzling. Lugorix smelt burnt flesh, but the beast seemed unphased. It leapt at the crone, but she dodged aside with a surprising nimbleness. Lugorix raised Skullseeker, and brought it down in a sweeping arc onto the creature’s neck. If he was hoping for a decapitation, he was disappointed—the axe made it a few inches in and then stuck fast beneath the hardened scales—but Lugorix used the purchase to leap onto the back of the crocodile, holding on and trying to work the axe deeper while the animal bucked and writhed in a frantic effort to throw him off. Matthias had his bow out—

  “Close-quarters,” snarled Lugorix.

  Matthias nodded, tossing the bow back over his shoulder and drawing his xiphos short-sword as he raced in at the crocodile, somehow dodging past its teeth and slotting the blade straight through the roof of its mouth. The beast convulsed, but Lugorix held on, barely avoiding being smashed into the tunnel ceiling while his axe finally started to hit paydirt. Blood gouted up at him as he cut into the animal’s brain—he leapt off as it flopped over and went into further convulsions. Matthias turned to Barsine, who was standing as though petrified.

  “Are you alright?” he asked.

  “I’m fine,” she said in a tone of voice that made his question sound like an insult.

  “Wait,” said Lugorix as the animal’s death-throes ceased.

  “Wait for what?” asked Damitra.

  “No noise,” he said, gesturing at the tunnel mouth.

  Sure enough, most of the noise in the immediate vicinity outside had died away. They looked at one another.

  “Probably because we just made so much of it,” hissed Barsine.

  “There,” said Lugorix—pointing back at the tunnel mouth, as a Macedonian soldier scrambled over the side of the aqueduct and into view.

  “Get him,” said Barsine.

  “On it,” said Matthias—there was a twang as an arrow leapt from his bow, shot through the air, and smacked straight through the soldier’s face. He fell without a sound into the water.

  “There’ll be more of them,” said Matthias as he nocked another arrow. Sure enough, even as they waded deeper into the tunnel they could hear a hue and cry being raised behind them. The shouting sounded like it was at least an entire squad, the Macedonians in hot pursuit of the four fugitives racing into what was evidently a whole labyrinth of sewers. At the behest of Barsine, they turned left, then right, then left again. Damitra had dimmed her amulet to the point where it was just barely visible.

  “I hope you know where you’re going,” said Matthias.

  “Just stay alert for more crocs,” said Barsine.

  Lugorix was working on it, but he was somewhat distracted by the Macedonians behind them. Their yells and shouts echoed through the catacombs, and it was impossible to tell whether or not they were gaining.

  “Lugorix,” said Matthias.

  Lugorix turned—realized that the others had stopped. Barsine and Damitra were studying a section
of the wall while Matthias studied Barsine.

  “What are you doing?” said Lugorix.

  “Quiet,” said Barsine.

  “And keep an eye out,” said Damitra. She fumbled her hands along the wall.

  “It’s right here, somewhere,” said Barsine. The shouting was coming closer, along with torchlight…

  “They’re coming this way,” said Matthias.

  “I didn’t hire you for your tactical analysis,” said Barsine.

  “Didn’t realize you’d hired me,” said Matthias.

  “Can we talk about this later?” said Lugorix.

  “Both of you shut up,” said Barsine. She twisted something in the stone. A section of the wall slide aside.

  “Gods preserve us,” said Matthias.

  “We need to do that ourselves,” said Barsine. She scrambled through. Everybody followed, to find themselves in a narrow passage. Barsine shut the slab behind them while Damitra re-intensified the glow. They heard the muffled shouting of the Macedonians somewhere behind them. Barsine led the way forward, leaving them all trying to keep up in more ways than one.

  “Where in Hades are we?” asked Lugorix.

  “Near the harbor,” replied Barsine.

  “Wouldn’t we rather be at the harbor?” said Matthias. “That’s where the boats are, right?”

  “They’ve all been burnt to the waterline by now,” said Barsine. She opened another door, looked out at the room beyond.

  “Except that one,” she added.

  Chapter Two

  The ship that sat at the underground jetty wasn’t like any ship Lugorix had ever seen. At first he wasn’t even sure it was a ship. It had no mast, rode low in the water, and was a combination of both metal and wood, lacking towers aft and rear, instead sporting a lower, raised platform which ran along its center. A strange cylinder was positioned just behind that platform—and now as Lugorix looked, he realized there was in fact a mast, but that it was lying along the deck, fastened horizontally into place along with its sail. The entire vessel was no more than thirty feet from end to end. Damitra helped Barsine down onto the platform, whereupon Barsine opened up a hatch. Both women looked up at the men.

  “What are you waiting for?” said Barsine.

  “Is this a magick ship?” asked Lugorix.

  “Not at all,” said Barsine.

  “Persian,” said Matthias, suddenly understanding. “You’re Persian spies.”

  “You forget,” said Barsine. “We ruled Egypt first.”

  “Before Athens took it from you,” muttered Matthias as Barsine climbed through the hatch and disappeared within.

  Damitra grinned toothlessly. “Like my lady said: we’re all on the same side now.” She unfastened the ropes and the ship started to drift away. Lugorix and Matthias leapt aboard.

  “Welcome to the Xerxes,” said Damitra. She tossed her amulet down to Barsine, who caught it—and then shoved it into a strange copper lattice framework set against one of the walls in the compact room below. Sparks flew across that copper and Lugorix felt a rumbling grip the boat. The water behind them started churning and smoke began pouring from the cylinder.

  “We’re on fire!” screamed Matthias. Lugorix wasn’t wasting any time on words—he was about to jump into the water when Damitra yelled at him to stop.

  “We’re not on fire!” she shouted in his ear. “This ship moves by burning!”

  “I see,” said Lugorix, not seeing at all. The boat was surging away from the jetty, out into the hidden harbor. Matthias shrugged, started to climb down through the hatch when—

  “No,” said Damitra. “You need to stay on top till we get clear.”

  “Of what?” said Lugorix—and then he ducked his head as the roof dipped toward him and the ship churned through a narrow cave-mouth and out into the open ocean. And it was the open ocean, he quickly realized—the tunnel entrance was situated well beyond the Great Harbor, out on the northern edge of the main city-island, which was now on fire in multiple places. Even as Lugorix watched, a series of explosions rocked that receding island; pillars and towers began toppling into one another, causing a chain-reaction of deafening booms and crashes. But then all that noise was drowned out by a larger explosion from above. Lugorix looked upward to see the—

  “Pharos,” breathed Matthias.

  The enormous lighthouse was shaking as though it was in the throes of earthquake—shaking and swaying from side to side. Lugorix thought for a brief moment of all he’d heard about that lighthouse—of how it could its light could be seen by ships for scores of miles, of how its operators could stand at its base and use a series of lenses to gain a telescopic view from the top, of how the giant ballistae at its top could punch straight through the sides of enemy ships. But those who were destroying the Pharos had never given it a chance to deploy such measures. For a moment, the lighthouse’s swaying slowed its oscillations—it seemed to Lugorix for just the briefest of instants that the structure would hold against whatever infernal sorcery the Macedonians had unleashed upon it.

  Then it started to topple.

  Right toward the boat. Lugorix heard himself muttering prayers to Taranis. As if in a dream, he watched that lighthouse blot out the sky as it crashed down toward them. Neither he nor Matthias nor Damitra said a word—he wondered if they as transfixed as he was. Or perhaps they had all already reached the afterlife. Barsine was the only one to react—she stopped the boat entirely, threw the engine into reverse as the lighthouse crashed down toward them, long arcs of fire trailing in its wake. Lugorix’s eye was rooted to the statue of Poseidon that adorned the Pharos’ summit—the trident that the god held had come loose and sailed like a missile over the boat and into the water. And then the lighthouse itself impacted, a huge wall crashing into the ocean, sending up a vast spray of water even as a colossal wave rolled across them, almost capsizing them entirely. Damitra lost her grip; Lugorix grabbed her with one hand while he held fast to the rails with the other. Barsine stopped reversing, sent the boat forward through swells that rocked them as the ship picked up speed, plowing over the final resting place of the Pharos and out into the deeper ocean. Damitra drew herself from Lugorix’s grasp.

  “I owe you for your quickness,” she said.

  Lugorix was too rattled to reply. They were reaching the edge of the burning Athenian fleet; the Xerxes zigged and zagged as Barsine maneuvered it through wreckage. Lugorix gaped as they headed straight at what was left of a trireme, more than a hundred feet long, but now almost burnt to the waterline.

  “Those are the smallest of ’em,” muttered Matthias.

  “What?”

  “Look past it,” hissed Matthias.

  Lugorix nodded, his eyes wide in disbelief. Triremes may have been the most numerous of the ships in the Athenian navy but they only had three decks of oars. Teteres (“fours”) and penteres (“fives”) formed the middle types of dreadnaught, while the largest were the octeres and the deceres, though not much was left of those now. Lugorix remembered seeing a decere once—it seemed like it went on forever, bedecked with flags, held upright in the water by long catamaran-outriggers, and sprouting so many oars as to look like the needles covering a hedgehog, while a whole array of ballistae and catapults lined the decks. Such ships were the mainstay of Athenian naval power. But now a whole fleet had been reduced to a holocaust of flame and wreckage. And as Barsine steered her strange vessel ever deeper into the maelstrom, it became clear that parts of the ocean itself were on fire—that Alexander’s incendiary somehow burnt on the surface of the water. Damitra was muttering something in Persian that Lugorix figured to be a prayer. She was gazing at intently at one spot in particular. Lugorix stared.

  And then he realized what she was looking at.

  “People,” he said slowly.

  Sailors adrift in the water had noticed them, were swimming toward them, screaming for help. But their boat simply accelerated, the paddlewheels within turning ever faster as it churned past. Matthias looked aghast
.

  “What in Athena’s name are we doing?” he asked.

  “Not picking up survivors,” said Damitra.

  “Why not?”

  “Too great a risk.”

  “According to Barsine?”

  “She gives the orders.”

  Matthias’ face darkened. The yelling was growing louder as stricken sailors realized their last chance was passing them by. Matthias turned to the hatch but—

  “No,” said Damitra. “Don’t go down.”

  “I need to talk to her.”

  “You mean you need to force her.”

  “Try and stop me, witch.”

  “I’ll stop you,” said Lugorix suddenly. Matthias whirled toward him.

  “What’s your problem? Those sailors are—”

  “Already dead,” said Lugorix. “Most of them are badly burnt. We stop for any, the rest will swamp us. And even if they don’t, the pursuit has that much more time to catch us.”

  “I haven’t seen any pursuit yet.”

  “We should keep it that way. If anyone climbs aboard, be sure to throw them back in.”

  “What?”

  “That why we’re up here,” said Lugorix. And then, to Damitra: “True?”

  She nodded gravely. “And once we get out of here, you’ll be keeping watch.”

  They were leaving the fleet in their wake now, heading out into the swells of open ocean. Spray lit by the glow of the burning boats behind them splashed across their faces. Lugorix grasped the railing, looked at his friend’s bemused expression.

  “So where are we going?” Matthias asked Damitra.

  “Athens,” she replied.

  “Why?”

  “Mistress has friends there.”

  “That’s just fine,” said Lugorix. “Best place to hire out for more merc duty.”

  “You’re already hired,” said Damitra.

  “You keep saying that,” said Matthias. “But every time I ask for details, Barsine tells me to shut up.”

  “That’s because she noble.”

  “Nobles abandon sailors to drown?”