Chapter 2 - THE PHYSICIAN OF PIRAEUS
Leandros did not save the merchants.
Not alone.
He barely saved himself.
The crowd had become a single body.
Bodies pressed from every side.
Arms.
Sweat.
Spit.
Fear.
A man’s elbow struck Leandros in the ear.
Someone stepped on his foot.
A woman screamed directly beside him that Apollo demanded blood.
Ahead, Damon pushed toward the bound merchants.
“Move!”
Nobody did.
He used his shield.
Not striking.
Forcing space.
The priest with the knife raised it.
Damon grabbed his wrist.
The crowd roared.
“Traitor!”
“He protects poisoners!”
Stones flew.
One hit Damon’s helmet.
Another struck Leandros’s shoulder.
Pain flashed.
Leandros climbed onto an overturned grain cart.
“Listen!”
No one did.
He screamed louder.
“The grain dealers want them dead!”
That made some people turn.
Not many.
Enough.
Leandros pointed toward the merchants watching from behind the mob.
“They’ll take the warehouses!”
One grain dealer’s face changed.
There.
Truth.
Or at least motive.
Leandros shouted,
“Kill these men and tomorrow grain costs twice as much!”
Athenians understood hunger better than justice.
The crowd hesitated.
A woman near the front looked back.
“Is that true?”
The dealer shouted,
“He lies!”
Leandros answered,
“Then swear before Athena you claim nothing they own.”
Silence.
The dealer did not.
The crowd changed.
Not calm.
Never calm.
Direction.
Anger flowed toward the grain merchants.
Damon cut the prisoners’ ropes.
“Go!”
The Phoenicians ran.
The priest shouted.
Someone punched him.
The grain dealers retreated.
The mob split.
Nobody was safe, but the three prisoners were no longer the easiest target.
Damon grabbed Leandros off the cart.
“You are an idiot.”
“You went first.”
“I’m armed.”
“So?”
“So stupidity looks better in bronze.”
They escaped along the wall.
The old woman still held Myrine.
She slapped Leandros when he returned.
Then Myrine slapped him too.
“Why?”
“You left me.”
“I came back.”
“That is not the same.”
Damon laughed.
Leandros wanted to hit him.
Instead they continued toward Piraeus.
The port city smelled of salt and death.
Ships remained in harbor.
Not many.
Some captains refused to dock.
Others unloaded grain under guard.
The docks were crowded with desperate people trying to board vessels.
Sailors beat them back with oars.
One woman threw her baby onto a departing ship.
A sailor caught it.
The mother tried jumping after.
She fell between hull and quay.
Leandros did not see her come back up.
Myrine hid her face.
This time Leandros did not tell her not to look.
The physician Nikias worked in a warehouse once used for olive oil.
Now it held patients.
Thirty at least.
Maybe more.
Mats covered the floor.
Jars of water lined one wall.
Herbs dried from rafters.
Two armed sailors guarded the doors.
Damon spoke to them.
They allowed entry.
Nikias was not old.
That surprised Leandros.
Perhaps thirty-five.
His hair had been cut short badly.
His tunic was stained.
He wore no sacred amulet.
No physician’s white robe.
He looked exhausted enough to be honest.
“You lived with someone sick?” he asked.
Leandros nodded.
“My mother.”
“Dead?”
Probably.
The word caught.
“Yes.”
Nikias looked at Myrine.
“Same house?”
“Yes.”
“Any fever?”
“No.”
“Vomiting?”
“No.”
“Burning eyes?”
“No.”
“Throat pain?”
“No.”
“Rash?”
“No.”
He examined them from arm’s length first.
Then washed his hands with water and vinegar.
Leandros noticed.
“Why?”
“Why what?”
“Wash.”
Nikias looked at his hands.
“Because filth harms wounds.”
“The plague too?”
“I don’t know.”
Again.
Good answer.
Nikias checked their tongues.
Eyes.
Skin.
Breathing.
He asked about Thaleia’s symptoms.
Fever.
Cough.
Swelling.
Weakness.
Nikias frowned at swelling.
“Not everyone has that.”
“My mother did.”
“Many illnesses travel together in crowded cities.”
Leandros stared.
“You think there is more than one sickness?”
“I think Athens has become a bowl where every disease eats.”
That sounded right.
Myrine asked,
“Will we die?”
Nikias looked at her.
He did not lie.
“I don’t know.”
She nodded as if that was acceptable.
Leandros asked,
“Why watch people who were near the sick?”
“Because some remain well.”
“So?”
“So either they escaped exposure, or bodies differ.”
“Differ how?”
Nikias shrugged.
“That is what I want to know.”
No gods.
No poison.
No certainty.
Only questions.
Leandros felt strangely relieved.
Nikias gave them a corner behind stacked amphorae.
Food in exchange for work.
Leandros carried water.
Myrine rolled bandages from torn linen.
Damon left for his unit at the port barracks.
Before leaving, he told Leandros,
“Do not trust everyone here.”
“That is useful in all Athens.”
“Especially here.”
“Why?”
Damon looked at Nikias.
“Knowledge is becoming valuable.”
Leandros frowned.
“To who?”
“Men who want power.”
Then he left.
For two days, Leandros worked.
He saw plague without riot around it.
That was worse in some ways.
A strong man entered walking and died before night.
A woman survived fever but lost her sight.
Two brothers became sick together.
One died.
One recovered.
Nikias wrote everything on wax tablets.
Age.
District.
Water source.
Food.
Contacts.
Symptoms.
Duration.
Leandros asked,
“Does writing stop it?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
“So ignorance has less room.”
On the third day, a man named Timon arrived.
Wealthy.
Citizen.
Three slaves carried supplies.
Wine.
Honey.
Clean linen.
Everyone liked him immediately.
Leandros distrusted him for that.
Timon spoke gently.
“My wife died yesterday.”
Nikias looked at him.
“I am sorry.”
“I want to help.”
He donated food.
Good food.
Myrine ate figs for the first time in weeks.
Timon asked Nikias questions.
How many recovered?
How many exposed stayed healthy?
Which districts were worst?
Nikias answered some.
Not all.
Leandros watched.
Later he asked,
“You don’t trust him.”
Nikias continued writing.
“I trust gifts least when they arrive with questions.”
“What does he want?”
“Maybe nothing.”
“That means something.”
Nikias smiled.
“You are learning Athens quickly.”
That night, Leandros woke to voices.
Timon.
Nikias.
Arguing outside the warehouse.
“You have names,” Timon said.
“Patients.”
“Survivors.”
“Yes.”
“The Council needs them.”
“For what?”
“Study.”
“That is what I am doing.”
“With jars and observations. The city needs order.”
Nikias laughed quietly.
“The city needs water.”
“Twelve households have survived exposure without illness.”
Leandros went cold.
Twelve.
He and Myrine might be two.
Timon continued.
“If there is protection in blood—”
Nikias cut him off.
“You do not know that.”
“Neither do you.”
“And you want to bleed them anyway.”
Myrine stirred beside Leandros.
He covered her with a cloth.
Outside, Timon’s voice hardened.
“People are dying.”
“So you will take blood from frightened children?”
“If it saves Athens.”
“There is no proof.”
“There is no time.”
Leandros understood.
Desperation had found another costume.
Not religion.
Not mob justice.
Reason without restraint.
Still dangerous.
Timon left.
Nikias returned.
He saw Leandros awake.
“You heard.”
“Yes.”
Nikias sat.
“He will come back.”
“With soldiers?”
“Perhaps.”
“Then we leave.”
Nikias looked at Myrine.
“If you go into the city, you may be safer from Timon and less safe from everything else.”
“Wonderful.”
Nikias rubbed his face.
“There is another place.”
“Where?”
“An old sanctuary outside Piraeus.”
Leandros laughed.
“Outside?”
“Between the port wall and marsh.”
“Spartans?”
“Not that close.”
“How do we get there?”
“Drainage channel.”
Leandros stared.
“You have used it?”
“No.”
“Then how do you know?”
Nikias smiled faintly.
“People who treat sewage learn where it goes.”
At dawn, Timon returned.
Not with soldiers.
With archers.
City archers.
Six.
The warehouse guards stepped aside.
Bought.
Timon entered.
“I’m sorry.”
Nikias stood.
“No, you aren’t.”
Timon’s face remained calm.
“Athens cannot survive if every man protects private knowledge.”
“These are people.”
“They may carry the only protection we have.”
Myrine gripped Leandros.
Timon looked at them.
“There.”
Leandros moved in front of her.
Timon raised both hands.
“I will not hurt her.”
“How much blood?”
Nikias snapped.
“No.”
Timon ignored him.
“A cup.”
Myrine whispered, “Will it hurt?”
Leandros said, “We’re leaving.”
An archer blocked the door.
Timon sighed.
“Please do not make this ugly.”
Leandros laughed.
“Athens burned my house with my mother inside.”
Timon’s face flickered.
“I am not those men.”
“No.”
Leandros looked at the archers.
“You brought different ones.”
Nikias knocked over a jar.
It shattered.
Oil spread.
Everyone looked.
He kicked a lamp.
Flame caught.
Smoke leaped.
Patients screamed.
Archers turned.
Nikias shouted,
“Back door!”
Leandros grabbed Myrine.
They ran.
Timon screamed,
“Stop them!”
One archer followed.
Leandros threw a clay jar.
It struck the man’s knee.
Myrine opened a side door.
Salt air hit them.
Nikias joined.
Behind them, the warehouse filled with smoke but not yet real fire; the oil was mostly a diversion.
They ran through fish alleys.
Past sailors.
Past corpses.
Past a shrine where someone had nailed dead rats to Apollo’s image.
Nikias led them to a drainage opening beneath a wall.
Black water.
Human waste.
Rot.
Leandros stared.
“That?”
Nikias nodded.
Myrine said,
“I hate Athens.”
They climbed in.
Darkness swallowed them.
Behind, Timon’s men reached the alley.
A voice shouted,
“Find the children!”
Leandros crawled deeper into filth.
For the first time, he understood what Damon meant.
May you like
Knowledge had become valuable.
And in plague-stricken Athens, anything valuable eventually needed guarding from Athenians.
