—OOO—
Chapter 3 of 4.
'Mytilene'
The mountains of Lesbos rolled away into the distant blue haze under a clear sky. The harbour at Mytilene was crowded with boats of all sizes and nationalities; including many representatives of its own navy. This year the island authorities could boast a grand total of two Quadriremes; four Triremes; and three Biremes available to protect their citizens, and as security for the island as a whole. This incorporated a complete naval grasp of the strait separating the island from the coast of Mysia; their control reaching from Assus in the North to Atarneus and Cyme in the South. The significance of this to Xena and Gabrielle was that the Lesbos navy forces would give them, and all other citizens, protection in sailing from Mytilene to the coast of Mysia. Thus neutralizing any further threat from Tros, at least by water. As a result they had decided to stay over for a day on the island which held both their hearts.
"Has Tros arrived in the harbour yet?" Gabrielle was sitting at a table outside a well-set-up Inn on the main street. "Bet he'll be miffed when he does."
Xena was leaning contentedly against the back of her chair, with long legs extended straight before her. It was still early in the morning, and she was contemplating the empty pewter goblet on the table beside her and wondering if Gabrielle would let her have a re-fill. She somehow thought not.
"Nah. He won't show his face here." The Princess had a decided opinion of the man's personality. "The harbour's too constricted for his comfort. He likes a wide horizon round him. He'll be somewhere out in the strait, swearing volubly at his crew and rueing the fact we escaped him back at Tinos. That'll hurt. What'cha doin' ?"
Her last remark was occasioned by Gabrielle taking a soft leather pouch from the shoulder bag wherein she kept her valuables (or 'all that rubbish' as Xena was fond of saying) while visiting towns. Now she was busy scattering a handful of loose coins from her pouch across the table-top.
"Counting our worldly wealth, darling." The Amazon financier bowed her head over the assembly of coins in front of her. "You know the old adage—look after the obols, and the obols'll look after the tetradrachms. First, a total. Second, figure out what my cut is. Then, shop till I drop, baby—shop till I drop!"
"Oh, Gods. Don't shout like that. Aphrodite'll hear ya." Xena sat back and raised her eyes to the heavens; though she had been expecting something like this—only not so early."What is there you could possibly buy here? It's an island off the coast of Mysia. Nothing goes on here but fishing an' farming."
"Eight."
"Eight. Eight what?" But it suddenly occurred to the Warrior Princess that she had a good idea what.
"Eight scroll-shops, between the harbour where we got off our ship yesterday an' this Inn." Gabrielle actually clapped her hands in glee, adding a broad grin for good measure. "Eight scroll-shops. So think how many more there must be in the whole of Mytilene."
"What's in the scroll-shops that you're so het up on buyin'?" Xena, though, knew perfectly well what the answer would be.
"Poems, Xena, poems." There was a shining light in the Amazon's eyes as she paused to consider. "Poems in glyconic lines; Asclepiad distichs; 3-line stanza's; epithalamia, my favourite type as you know; and lyrical poems."*
"Only poems, dearest?"
The Warrior Princess had decided to accept the inevitable, like floods in Spring. She smirked a little at her excited companion, light-heartedly of course; but Gabrielle was far away in a different world.
"Sappho." The Amazon spoke softly, as if intoning the name of a revered deity. "Oh Gods, Xena. Think of that. This is the home of Sappho. And we're here, now. And I've got lots of money. And the scroll-shops are bunged to bursting with every possible edition of her works."*
"An' you figure on buying them all, an' putting the shops out of business for a year afterwards, eh?"
Xena could be cutting when she wanted, but as she had just aimed her sarcasm at a green-eyed warrior with a mission her words fell on deaf ears.
"So, how much money have we between us?" Xena sat up straighter, getting down to the nitty-gritty, and showed her teeth in a little smile. "An' remember, I get the bigger cut, dearie."
Her blonde companion merely sniggered impudently at this futile demand. If there was going to be a cut, that cut was going to be Amazons-3 Warrior Princess's-1, no mistake.
"Well, that's what's worrying me." Gabrielle frowned over the variety of coinage now spread wholesale over the table. "We seem t'have accumulated all the riches of the Indies; not to mention the Silk Road; Athens; and Rome altogether. Look, here's some denarii; then that, over there, is a stater; an' those little ones are hektai; and, of course, these here are tetradrachms. An' we have a pile of obols, beside you; an' another pile of sestertii, beside me."*
"What are those, over there?"
"These silver—thingy's." Gabrielle bent low to study them carefully. "They're silver, er, thingy's. I don't know!"
The Warrior Princess leant over and picked up a couple of the mysterious coins with a horny hand. Gods, did Warrior Princess's have to do everything in this world. Then, after carefully subjecting the badly worn items in question to a long and absolutely uninformed scrutiny, tossed them down again.
"Well, er, they might be shekels, from the Land of Punt. They look sorta shekely." Xena tried to avert defeat by sheer brazenness. "Remember, we were there last year. Or perhaps they're some kinda dinar from Sheba. We visited Sheba eighteen months or so ago, didn't we?"
"Or maybe they're golden aureus's from the Land of Hy-Brasil." Gabrielle, too, could be cutting. "When were we last there, darling?"*
"Oh, come on. I'm tryin' my best here." Xena pouted grumpily though this, as usual, had no effect on the lithe perfectly-formed one. "So, what d'ya think then?"
The Bard of Potidaea hadn't reached her present exalted position without bringing the art of prevarication to perfection. Now she showed her true colours.
"We'll call them half-staters. And if anyone argues, whack 'em with your chakram—that's what chakram's are for."
Pleased with this effective, and wholly commendable, solution to their problem Gabrielle began to shove the coins into two separate piles. One of which from the very start, beside the Princess, showed unmistakeable signs of being subservient to its big sister, in the fair Amazon's clutches. Xena noticed.
"Hey. Hey. Hey, lady!" She liked to be emphatic in a crisis. "What'cha doin'. Tryin' t'take over the world. Ya got about two thirds of the lot t'yourself. What's up?"
Gabrielle sneered; Amazons didn't take prisoners: well, actually they did—but this was just a hypothetical situation so—Amazons didn't take prisoners.
"Needs must, Xena." Gabrielle tossed her head superciliously. "Let's call it emergency measures. Lesbos equals Sappho. Sappho equals lots'a her poems. Lots'a Sappho's poems equals—I gotta have 'em at any price! So stand outta the way, or be trampled in the rush, sister."
—O—
The late afternoon was cool but still bright. A cloudless sky allowed the waning sun to gild the houses of the city with a faint golden tint which added warmth to the busy crowded streets. Xena and Gabrielle were sitting once more at the same table outside their Inn, watching the passers-by pass by. They had been shopping. Or, at least, Gabrielle had done the shopping; Xena had merely held her back from the more outrageous extravagancies. Now the Princess leant back in her chair and took a fortifying gulp of wine from her full goblet; she needed sustenance. Gabrielle was quite content, gloating over the trophies of her successful campaign against the massed ranks of the Mytilene scroll-shops. It had been a severe battle, but Gabrielle had triumphed over all the odds.
"What'cha got, then?" Xena spoke wearily, feeling it only polite to seem interested. It had been a hard day.
"Whee! What ain't I got, Xena." The Bard was happy. In fact the Bard was ecstatic. "I got everything. Well, to start, see this scroll?"
Xena opened her eyes. She had been leaning back comfortably resting them—merely resting.
"That dirty, ragged, old scroll? Yeah, I see it. Why ya bought it at all's another matter." The dark-haired warrior shook her head. "Waste of two denarii, in my opinion."
"You oughta be happy." Gabrielle sniggered, dearly loving a bargain. "One of those denarii was one of those dodgy half-staters, after all. Did you notice how the shop-keeper was chary of taking it; before you sorta looked at him, with that funny expression?"
Xena shuffled awkwardly; she didn't like being found out in a good deed.
"It's an early edition, from the last century." The happy shopper continued, as she caressed the rolled-up object. "A bit tatty, I agree, but it has a long foreword by Aristotle that most of the modern scrolls miss out. And I like the scribe's hand who copied it. Their style was just so attractive at that period; makes the poems all the more beautiful. Worth every obol."
—O—
The shop in question had presented a somehow wary face to the public. It was found by Gabrielle down a narrow side-street, with only a small sign on the unobtrusive door giving the name—'Aristeus. Old Scrolls'. The Amazon had been over the Moon.
"Why should we go in here, Xena?" Gabrielle had replied to her half-hearted companion. "Because second-hand scroll-shops mean bargains, and low prices, and scrolls for practically nothing, and wonderfully made editions that nobody wants anymore; but are still way better than today's tat, that's why."
She had spent the next hour happily scouring the dusty interior; finding her way to cobwebbed corners that even the proprietor had probably forgotten about. The result was a satchel full of precious discoveries; all the more so for being so cheap. At least they had ended up cheap after the owner had finally lost the will to live under Gabrielle's determined bargaining, and taken what she offered.
—O—
Now, sitting at the Inn-table under the waning sun, Gabrielle passed on to the next treasure. After all, part of the joy of a bargain was showing it off to your friends.
"See these six small scrolls?" The Amazon fondled them tenderly. "This is a first edition, from about one hundred and fifty years ago. It has all Sappho's Lyrical poems. The scrolls probably originally had a wooden container like a little box, with compartments for each scroll and written tags giving the titles of the poems in each scroll, and a lid to shut and lock; but that's all gone. Look, you can still see where maybe the original owner marked her name at the beginning of the first scroll. What does it say, it's very faint. 'Alkyone, her book age 22'. Ain't that kinda romantic, Xena? Makes you wonder who she was, and what sorta person she was; and now they're ours."
"Whoop-de-doo!"
"Come on, Xena. Don't be so blasé. You know you love Sappho, just like me."
"Sorry." The Princess was instantly contrite, knowing Gabrielle's real affection for the poet. "Yeah, I even have a couple'a her works off by heart. Just two or three verses. Well, I do!"
Gabrielle, of course, insisted on evidence of this remarkable assertion; and when Xena there and then softly declaimed with deft simplicity a complete short poem perfectly, Gabrielle didn't hesitate but leaned over and kissed her tenderly; there at the street-table in front of the Inn.
—O—
The night was clear and cool. They had left the shutters of their room open to let in the scents and quiet sounds of Mytilene's night-life. There was a peaceful hush, except for the distant hooting of an owl somewhere far-off over the rooftops.
Xena had stowed away the shoulder-bag containing their precious cargo in the deep drawer of an antique chest on one side of the room. Now they were contemplating sleep and bed. Xena had already loosened the fastenings of her top and was fiddling with a recalcitrant leather cord.
"So what're our plans for tomorrow, Princess. And for Tros?" Gabrielle spoke off-handedly, as she gazed searchingly at the wide bed which took up most of their room. She was frowning.
"Damn Tros. He's just a bully, with far too big an opinion of his own worth." Xena grunted in the dark. "I can take care of him. We'll hire horses from whatever settlement is on the coast, then head out for Pergamum along the road they've made for travellers. Shouldn't take more than seven days."
"What if Tros follows us an' tries something?"
"Oh, I think we'll beat him; whatever he comes up with." Xena sniggered softly. "Do you think you could beat him?"
"Damn straight, Xena. So, that's your plan, then. Sounds good t'me."
"That's my plan for tomorrow." There came the sound of gentle movement in the moonlit shadows. "But I got plans for tonight too, darling. Damn this cord, I can't get the knot undone."
While the Princess paused, filling the night air with a series of deeply-felt expletives—in four different languages—Gabrielle walked over to the old curtained bed, covered with linen sheets, where they meant to spend the night. It was a four-poster, with a solid oak frame on which was a thick but firm mattress. This last item was exercising Gabrielle's attention. She tested the left-hand side by punching the sheet-covered mattress and giving the oak framework an experimental kick or two; then moved round to subject the opposite side to a similar assault. It creaked agonisingly under the first onslaught, and gave out pain-wracked groans under the latter. Her findings were apparently not good.
"You think we can sleep in this thing, eh, Xena?"
"Why not, it's a bed." The Warrior Princess generally took little note of such things. "Gah! Got it. That's the last time I let ya tie these damn cords, Gabrielle. A girl could take an hour to get back outta them."
"It may look like a bed, but it's really an evil weapon of torture." Gabrielle was not impressed. "We gotta stay in this all night, y'know. It's lumpy; worn-out; an' too firm by half. Gods, I've lain on ground in Sparta that was softer than this mattress. How can a girl sleep in a thing like this!"
"Were we goin' t'sleep? Hi-ho!"
"Come on, Xena, stop with the witticisms." The Amazon had important reasons for her disfavour. "Here I am, in need of six good hours of restorative wanderings through the realms of Morpheus, an' what do I get? A torture-rack."
"Well we can't change rooms now, it's far too late. Past midnight probably."
Xena, still entangled in her bronze-plate protected top, considered the options then walked over and lay down on the object in question with hands behind her head, reclining on the pillow. She made a few tentative movements, designed to test the bounce in the mattress and its firmness. There were some grinding squeals from the works underneath her, then something went 'ping'.
"OK, OK, ya may be right. But what're we goin' t'do, then?"
"That's easy." Gabrielle smirked with self-satisfaction. "An Amazon's always ready to bend with the wind, an' make new plans at a moment's notice."
"Oh Gods, You got a plan? What sorta plan?" Xena felt a bad case of despondency overtaking her. She knew Gabrielle's plans.
"Oh, yes. This ain't much of a furnished apartment, Xena." The house-proud one raised an eyebrow as she cast a glance round the room; managing to give the impression of sneering coldly, without actually doing so. Xena was impressed. "But that's a fine big comfy couch over there in the far corner, an' I bags it, Princess. I'll need this sheet an' that blanket too. Thanks, I got 'em."
"Oh yeah. Oh, yeah." The Princess could see disaster looming as she rose from the decrepit bed. "What about me? What do I get? That couch ain't big enough for two."
"Well darling," The hard-nosed, and now comfortably established, Amazon cast an indifferent glance at her better half, where Xena stood in the moonlight with hands on hips, tapping one boot impatiently on the floor. "This room does have a lotta floor-space, an' there's still a coupla blankets over there in that cupboard. OK?"
"But Gabrielle, that means we'll be split up all night. I was sorta thinking we might —"
"Might what, Xena?" The Amazon was already curled up sleepily in her blanket cocoon.
"Oh, nothing." The Warrior Princess surrendered, with an unseen pout. "G'night, Gabrielle."
"G'night, Xena."
—O—
Notes:—
1. epithalamia. An epithalamium (or epithalamion) was a poem written for the bride on her way to the bridal chamber with her husband. Sappho and Catullus are known to have written examples.
2. Sappho. Born sometime between 630-612 BC. Died around 570 BC, though personal details are sketchy.
3. All coins named are real types.
4. a) Land of Punt. Known as a trading partner of Ancient Egypt, probably located in the Red Sea area. b) Sheba. The fabled Queen of Sheba, located probably in the Ethiopia-Yemen area, is mentioned in various ancient texts. c) Land of Hy-Brasil. A mythical island said to be located in the Atlantic Ocean west of Ireland.
—OOO—