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.Darkar knew that Artaphernes liked me, so he had me pouring wine as the Ganymedes.Laugh if you like, thugater.I was a good slave.Hippias tried to fondle me from the first time my hip was close enough to touch.It was odd, because I had grown past the stage when Spartans liked their boys – smooth.I had hair, and muscles.At any rate, Hippias couldn’t keep his hands off me, and so I served him from farther and farther away, and bless them, the other slaves got in his way as well.Slaves in a well-run house will protect each other – up to a point.If his hands were eager for me, his voice gave nothing away.He harangued poor Artaphernes ceaselessly, from the first libation to the last skewer of deer meat, on how he needed to storm Athens to lance the boil that would otherwise fester.Let me just say that Hippias was, in fact, correct.Don’t be blinded by his enmity, girl.He was a wise man.‘Athens must have her government changed,’ he argued.Artaphernes shook his head.‘Athens is so far west that she could never be part of my province,’ he said.‘Some other man would be satrap of the west.And then – Athens is part of another world, another continent, perhaps.Am I to conquer the world to restore you, Hippias?’Hippias drank wine.His eye had gone from me to Kylix, a smaller boy who carried water and was now serving him.Kylix slipped away from his fingertips with graceful experience, and I passed between them, helping Kylix as he helped me.‘Young Archilogos, all your slaves are beautiful!’ he said, and raised his cup.Archilogos tried to be polite.‘Thank you,’ he said into his cup.Hippias ignored him anyway.‘Artaphernes, if you refuse me, I’ll be forced to go to the Great King.This is not a distant threat.I have friends in Athens.Aristagoras will speak before the assembly and they will give him ships.This war is coming.Athens will drive it if you do not.You will not do your duty to the king if you do not launch a preemptive attack on Athens!’Assertion, I thought.I disliked Hippias because he was a pudgy, ugly man with greasy fingers who wanted to fondle me.Yech! But he was correct, of course.Artaphernes was an honourable man who didn’t want a war.But he was, in this case, wrong.‘War will hurt trade, and every man in this city will pay – aye, and in your city and in Miletus.And the cost of a war with Athens – a real war, not just a raid – could force taxes that would drive men to open rebellion – especially if men like Aristagoras and Miltiades bribe their way into men’s hearts.’ Artaphernes took a skewer of meat from the stand beside his couch and ate carefully, fastidiously, like a cat.‘We do not want a war like that.Why don’t you take care of it for me, my friend? If you have so many friends in Athens, why not take a few ships and restore yourself? I could lend you the money from tax revenue.Would a thousand darics of gold finance your restoration?’Hippias grew red in the face.‘I don’t need a thousand darics,’ he spluttered.‘I need an army, and the power of your name.And you know that.You mock me!’‘You are a friend of the Great King.I never mock the king, nor his friends.If you feel that you must go to Great Darius and speak this way, be my guest.But I have neither the ships nor the soldiers to storm Athens for you.Nor is it my duty.’ Artaphernes stretched on his couch.Hippias left soon after, when he found that none of his advances, political or sexual, were going to lead anywhere.When he was gone, Archilogos lay on his couch and chatted with his hero.I served both of them.Archi had no head for wine and I was already pouring pure water into his cup.‘Why do you even entertain a man like that?’ he asked the satrap.Artaphernes shrugged.‘He is a powerful man.If he goes to Darius, I will not look well.’Archi shook his head.‘He is a petty prince from a foreign power.Surely he can be ignored?’‘He provides me with excellent intelligence,’ Artaphernes said.‘And in his way he is wise.’ He drank, and then said, ‘Even though he plays both sides like a treacherous Greek.’That last was not his happiest statement.‘He is on the other side?’ Archi asked.‘Can’t you have him arrested?’Artaphernes laughed.‘You are young and idealistic.Ruling a Greek is like riding a wild horse.Like herding cats.Every lordling in these waters is his own master and has his own “side”.I have many roles – I am the oppressive foreign master, I am the ally of convenience, I am the source of gold and patronage, I am the lord who serves the Great King.I slip from mask to mask like one of your actors – never was an image more apt, Archilogos [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]