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  “Avert the evil omen!” Menedemos said, and spat—red—into the bosom of his tunic to help do that. Grunting in something as close to approval as he was likely to give his son, Philodemos imitated the gesture.

  But Menedemos went right on gnawing at the inside of his lip. Yes, Baukis was pregnant. Menedemos had no idea whether he’d started the baby when his father’s new wife was coming home after a religious festival or whether it was Philodemos’ seed sprouting inside her. Philodemos had no idea how Menedemos felt about his stepmother … and how she felt about him. It made life under the same roof with them harder than he’d dreamt anything could be.

  “Look!” he said suddenly, pointing ahead. “There’s Sostratos.” More than a palm taller than most men, his cousin stood out in crowds. Relieved at finding something safe to talk about, he hurried on: “Uncle Lysistratos will be with him. Shall we catch them up?”

  “Let’s.” His father quickened his pace. For a man in his fifties, he was in good trim. His teeth hadn’t troubled him much, and he still exercised in the gymnasion. Lately, in fact, he’d been practicing with spear and sword and shield, as Menedemos had. Menedemos needed to step lively to stay up with him.

  Sostratos was looking this way and that, as he usually did. Sometimes he tripped over his own feet on account of it. Now he spotted Menedemos and his father. He waved, then turned back and spoke to Lysistratos. They slowed to let their kinsmen join them.

  “Hail!” all four men said at the same time. Menedemos laughed. Laughing at anything felt good.

  They’d run most of the merchants and traders out of the agora. Affairs of the city would cost them a day’s business. That was their hard luck. A few sellers did work their way through the incoming citizens with trays of cheap wine in cheaper little cups, of grilled squid on wooden skewers, of dough wrapped around cheese and fried in olive oil.

  It was as noisy as a usual day at the marketplace, but the timbre was different. No one shouted, no one chuckled. No women’s voices lightened things, either. Well-to-do women stayed home and sent slaves to shop for them, but the poorer ones had to go out for themselves. Menedemos missed their leavening, though he didn’t say so for fear of another sharp comeback from his father.

  Someone had run up a small platform near the northern edge of the agora, from which Demetrios would speak. Like Sostratos, he was tall enough that people would have been able to see him anyway. Still, the platform was a nice touch. Menedemos and his kinsfolk worked their way towards it. So did everyone else, of course. As men squeezed closer together, a few elbows found ribs and a few toes got stepped on. Menedemos tried to give better than he got.

  “Hail, Philodemos! Hail, Lysistratos!” The plump, gray-haired man’s well-trained voice showed he’d done his share of public speaking and more.

  “Hail, Xanthos,” Menedemos’ father said with less enthusiasm than he might have shown for other acquaintances. Uncle Lysistratos just dipped his head in a bare minimum of politeness. Xanthos liked to hear himself talk … and talk … and talk.

  He paid no attention to Menedemos or Sostratos. He looked down his nose at the younger generation when he noticed them at all. But he regaled their fathers with a preview of everything Demetrios would say—everything he thought Demetrios would say, anyhow. To Menedemos, he sounded more like a Rhodian man of business than a Macedonian warlord, but that didn’t stop him. It didn’t even slow him down.

  Someone clambered up onto the platform: not Demetrios but a man named Komanos, one of the most prominent people in the city. He called for quiet, then called for it again. When he didn’t get it, he gestured to two men behind the platform. The trumpeters blew a loud, discordant blast that startled everyone.

  This time, the assembled citizens paid attention when Komanos asked them to settle down. “Thank you, O men of Rhodes!” Komanos said. Menedemos eyed Sostratos, wondering if his cousin would explain how O andres Rhodioi was modeled after Athens’ O andres Athenaioi, as he did at about every other Assembly. Sostratos pined for Athens the way most young men pined for a gorgeous hetaira they couldn’t begin to afford.

  But Sostratos, like the other men in the agora, really was giving Komanos his attention. He could see the civic leader better than Menedemos could; Menedemos was a digit or two under average height. At least I make the most of what I’ve got, Menedemos thought.

  “O men of Rhodes, our polis has been free and independent since it was built, almost a hundred years ago,” Komanos said. “The three towns here before, Ialysos, Lindos, and Kamiros, were likewise free and independent poleis.” Demetrios won’t like that went through Menedemos’ mind as Komanos continued, “We are gathered here now to decide whether the day of the free and independent polis is past in Hellas, whether all small states must seek the protection of one strong neighbor lest another strong neighbor destroy them altogether. Here to put to us terms for a possible alliance with himself and his illustrious father is the general and admiral, Demetrios son of Antigonos. I know we’ll hear him with the serious attention his proposal deserves.”

  By the gods, don’t start throwing cabbages or rocks at him! That was what Komanos had to mean. By the way one of Sostratos’ eyebrows jumped toward his hairline, he was thinking the same thing.

  Up onto the platform stepped Demetrios. Where Komanos had scrambled, he was big enough simply to step, and that despite the weight of greaves and a corselet polished till their bronze shone almost like gold. His face was handsome and ruddy, his hair halfway toward the blond sometimes found among Macedonians and more often in their barbarous neighbors to the north and west.

  “Hail, O men of Rhodes!” Demetrios’ big, deep voice effortlessly filled the marked square. He spoke an Attic-flavored Greek much like Sostratos’, with only a vanishing trace of the broad vowels and odd consonant clusters he must have used as a little boy. “It is a pleasure and an honor to speak to the citizens of the free and independent polis of Rhodes.”

  Some of the men in the crowd made small approving noises, soaking in Demetrios’ flattery like dry sponges soaking up water. Menedemos thought the Macedonian was being sardonic, in effect saying, You believe you’re free and independent, but I’m the one with the soldiers and the ships. By the way Sostratos’ eyebrow rose again, he heard the Macedonian’s words the same way.

  Demetrios went on, “In the old days, it was easy for a polis to stay free and independent. It was facing only other poleis, more or less the same size it was. But times have changed. I was fortunate enough to liberate Athens from Kassandros’ oppression last year. Athens was a polis, with only the force a polis could draw on. Kassandros rules broad lands in Europe. He has great wealth, and many men to obey him. Without help from my father and me, Athens on her own couldn’t have hoped to gain freedom and independence once more.”

  Again, some of the citizens of Rhodes dipped their heads in agreement and made approving noises. Menedemos had been in Athens. To him, what Demetrios called its newfound freedom and independence looked a lot like a change of masters from Kassandros to Antigonos and his son. To Sostratos, too, by the set of Menedemos’ cousin’s mouth.

  “Out in the east, Seleukos rules huge tracts of land, all full of barbarians,” Demetrios said. “Hellenes are settling there, but they have no free and independent poleis. Seleukos doesn’t let them, and the locals would swallow places like that if he did. Egypt is the same way. You know that’s true, O men of Rhodes. Ptolemaios rules Egypt like the Persians before him, and like the Pharaohs before the Persians. He tells people what to do, and they do it. No free and independent poleis in Egypt, by the gods!” He threw his hands high, artfully scorning the very idea.

  “He’s sly,” Sostratos murmured before Menedemos could. Demetrios was doing the most dangerous thing he could: telling the truth, but slanting it in his direction.

  “Now my father, on the other hand, has plenty of free and independent poleis working alongside him as friends and
allies,” the Macedonian went on. “That’s what we’re looking for from Rhodes: friendship and alliance. That’s all, by the gods! Join with my father and me in our struggle against the tyrant Ptolemaios, and everything will go back to the way it was as soon as the fight is over.”

  To Menedemos, he sounded like a man trying to talk a girl into bed. No mean seducer himself, Menedemos knew a smooth one when he heard him. He looked around. How many of his fellow citizens felt the same way? Did they think freedom and independence were worth holding on to in a world that had changed?

  Then again, how many of them traded with Ptolemaios’ Egypt? Joining Antigonos and Demetrios would put a crimp in that. Men tended to think about where their silver came from.

  “We don’t want trouble on our border,” Demetrios said. “Next to my father’s lands, Rhodes is only the size of a flea, but even fleabites are annoying. Friends, it’s easier to go the way the wind already blows. Think about that when you make up your minds. If you try to sail the other way, the wave that’s coming will swamp you. Good day.” He hopped down from the platform. In the dead silence in the market square, Menedemos heard Demetrios’ armor clatter about him, as if he were one of Homer’s warriors going to his doom.

  He also heard Sostratos mutter, “ ‘My father’s lands,’ ” to himself in thoughtful tones. He understood that; he’d noticed the odd phrasing himself. Since Alexander’s half-witted half-brother and young posthumous son met their untimely demises, none of the generals who held chunks of his empire had declared himself a king. That day might be—likely was—coming, but it hadn’t come yet.

  Komanos got back up where the citizens could see him. He was smoother than he had been the first time, but he still didn’t have Demetrios’ size or grace to make the ascent seem easy. “Thank you, most excellent son of Antigonos, for being so plain about your views and those of your illustrious father. We shall now discuss your proposal and determine what the sense of the polis may be.”

  Everyone started shouting and waving his hand hand at once. In Homeric assemblies, only the man holding the scepter had the right to speak. Rhodian democracy was rowdier and more freewheeling than that. Everyone thinks he’s Agamemnon or Nestor, Menedemos thought, but a lot of these people would embarrass Thersites.

  Xanthos made his way up onto the platform. Menedemos and Sostratos exchanged glances. So did Philodemos and Lysistratos. If that wasn’t a put-up job, none of them had ever seen one.

  “Hear me, O men of Rhodes!” Xanthos said loudly. And hear me, and hear me, and hear me some more went through Menedemos’ mind. Sure enough, his father’s long-winded friend spent half an hour walking through the obvious: that Rhodes had long been free and independent, that the polis would probably stay safer if it didn’t get caught up in its bigger neighbors’ quarrels, and that many people in the polis did a lot of business with Egypt. Much later than he should have, he finished, “All this being so, that which is now most expedient to us is to continue the course we have always taken,” and stood down.

  The next speaker, a farmer named Polyaratos, proved a fiery partisan of Demetrios and Antigonos’. “They’re what the future looks like,” he declared. “They’ll put Alexander’s empire back together. Do we want to be on the outside looking in after they do that? I don’t think so! They’ll be kings with crowns, and they’ll treat us the way kings always treat people who make ’em angry. We’d have to be mad to turn down what the Demetrios is offering us—mad, I tell you!”

  “I wonder how much of Antigonos’ silver he’s got in his wallet,” Sostratos said in a low voice. Menedemos dipped his head; it wasn’t as if the same thought hadn’t crossed his mind.

  But others also spoke for the Macedonians. Most of them, like Polyaratos, were men with few ties outside the island. Then another merchant, Rhodokles son of Simos, got on the platform. He was a rival to Philodemos and Lysistratos’ firm, but no one had ever called him a fool.

  Blunt as usual, he said, “I’ve heard that Demetrios and Antigonos are paying pirates to join their fleet. If they do things like that, I don’t care to go to war alongside ’em. It’s about that simple.” He jumped down again.

  His blunt announcement seemed to take the wind from the sails of Demetrios’ friends. Not a Rhodian breathed who didn’t hate pirates. When Komanos called for the vote, a solid majority chose continued neutrality. Komanos invited Demetrios up. As the warlord scowled at the citizens who hadn’t done his bidding, Komanos put the best face he could on things: “We are not your foes, O Demetrios. We wish only to remain friends with everyone.”

  “I shall take this news to my father. Hail!” Demetrios said, and not one word more. That ended the Assembly in unceremonious fashion.

  “What do you think?” Menedemos asked Sostratos as they started home with their fathers.

  “We may try hard to stay away from the wider world’s affairs, but those affairs won’t stay away from us,” his cousin answered. Menedemos clicked his tongue between his teeth. That seemed only too likely to him, too.

  II

  Damonax tore a chunk from a loaf of barley bread and dipped it into a small bowl of olive oil. Then he held it out to Sostratos. “Here, O best one, try this.”

  “Thanks.” Sostratos took the morsel from his brother-in-law with odd reluctance. He popped it into his mouth and chewed, smacking his lips once or twice as he judged the flavor.

  “Tell me what you think. Be honest.” Damonax’s smile was crooked. “As if you could be any other way.”

  He’s nervous of me, Sostratos realized with surprise. He was also nervous of Damonax. Any handsome, self-assured man could do that to him. Menedemos certainly did, and he and his cousin had known each other since before either could remember. He also resented Damonax for taking his sister Erinna, one of the few friends he’d had in the world, out of his house, and for caring more about himself than about the trading firm he’d married into.

  But Sostratos was honest: relentlessly so, sometimes. He wouldn’t—he couldn’t—tell Damonax the oil was fit only for greasing capstans unless that were true. And it wasn’t. “Good oil,” he said after swallowing. “Nice and fruity—you can really taste the olive in it.”

  “Is it good enough to take off the island?” Damonax sounded anxious. And well he might; he was still paying down debts he’d had before he married Erinna. Before Sostratos could answer, his brother-in-law held up a hand. “Your father and I went round and round last summer while you and Menedemos were in Athens. He made me see why none of you wanted to ship the oil there. I still don’t like it, but I understand it.”

  “All right.” Sostratos left it at that. Lysistratos had told him he’d finally told Damonax he would sooner stick an amphora of his olive oil up his back passage than carry it to Athens. He’d also told Sostratos not to let on that he knew that, so he didn’t.

  Damonax continued, “But Alexandria isn’t Athens. Olives don’t grow there, so they have to bring in all their oil. You could get a good price for mine in Egypt.”

  “It is good oil.” Of his own accord, Sostratos dipped another chunk of bread into the bowl and ate it. “We can probably take some. Trouble is, an akatos like the Aphrodite doesn’t have the carrying space a sailing freighter does. We have to weigh value against bulk a lot more carefully than those ships do.”

  “How much do you suppose you can get for each amphora?” his brother-in-law asked. Yes, Damonax was anxious about silver.

  Sostratos had a figure in mind, but named one only half as high. Damonax’s face fell. “We’ll try to do better, O marvelous one,” Sostratos assured him. This way, if he did better than he said he could but not so well as he hoped, Damonax would stay happy. If he promised the high price but didn’t deliver, he’d never hear the end of it. Few merchants’ tricks were so basic, and few worked better.

  “I shall have some jars ready to load before you sail away,” Damonax said. “Try not to leave w
ithout them this time, all right?”

  “We’ll do our best.” Sostratos matched dry with dry. The year before, he and Menedemos had had to feign deafness to keep Damonax’s oil off the Aphrodite as she headed towards Athens.

  Lysistratos walked into the dining room. He dipped his head to Damonax. “Will you excuse us, please? Someone is here with whom Sostratos and I need to consult in privacy.”

  “However you please, of course, my father-in-law,” Damonax replied, though curiosity stuck out all over him like a hedgehog’s prickles. No, not just curiosity, Sostratos judged: annoyance, too. Damonax would be wondering, Why don’t I get consulted, too?

  Because you aren’t important enough, that’s why, Sostratos thought, enjoying the other man’s discomfiture even though he had no idea who his father’s prominent guest might be. Damonax sulkily took his leave. When his sandals flapped on the stairs leading to his second-story room, Lysistratos also left the dining room. He returned a moment later with Komanos.

  “Hail, best one!” Sostratos said in surprise. He clasped the Rhodian leader’s hand.

  “Hail,” Komanos said. Threissa came in with wine, a mixing jar of water, and a tray of little cakes sweetened with honey and almond paste. He made small talk till the slave woman left the room. After pouring himself a little wine and watering it well, he resumed: “So you and Menedemos will be going across to Alexandria soon?”

  “That’s right, sir. As soon as the weather gives us a decent chance to cross safely,” Sostratos said. “You’ll know this from my father?”

  Komanos dipped his head. “So I will,” he agreed. “Do you think you might be able to get in to see the Ptolemaios and let him know what the Rhodian Assembly told Demetrios? He should hear as quickly as possible. Knowing what we’ve done will affect what he does.”