Tyrant Read online

  VALERIO MASSIMO MANFREDI

  TYRANT

  Translated from the Italian by Christine Feddersen-Manfredi

  PAN BOOKS

  In Memory of My Father

  There is no doubt, in fact, that the gods

  use certain men for the purpose of punishing

  the evil of others, turning them into slaughterers,

  before they, too, are destroyed.

  Plutarch

  CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  EPILOGUE

  PROLOGUE

  CORINTH, 342 BC

  The man arrived a little after dusk when the shadows were beginning to lengthen over the city and over the harbour. He walked at a quick pace with a satchel over his shoulder, glancing around him with a certain apprehension. He stopped near a shrine and the lamp burning before the image of the goddess Persephone lit up his face: the greying hair of a man past middle age, his straight nose and thin lips, high cheekbones and hollow cheeks bristly with a dark beard. His nervous, troubled gaze still held a trace of dignity and reserve that contrasted with his worn clothing and shabby appearance and hinted at a high-born provenance.

  He turned down the road that led to the western port and walked towards the docks, crowded with taverns and inns frequented by sailors, merchants, longshoremen and soldiers from the fleet. Times were prosperous in Corinth and both of her ports were thronging with vessels carrying wares to and from all the countries on the internal sea and on the Pontus Eusinus. Here in the southern district where the wheat storehouses were located, every variety of Sicilian rang out around him: the colourful accents of Acragas, Catane, Gela, Syracuse . . .

  Syracuse. Sometimes he thought he’d forgotten, but then a little nothing would send him back to the days of his childhood and his youth, swamping him in the lights and colours of a world long transfigured by nostalgia, but above all by the bitterness of a life inexorably marked by defeat.

  He’d reached his tavern and went in, after taking a last look around.

  The place was beginning to fill up with regulars who had come for a bowl of hot soup and a glass of strong wine, swilled straight as only barbarians and poor wretches were wont to do.

  When the weather was fine, people would sit outside under the trellis to take in the two seas, one dark already, prey to the night, the other red with the last gleam of dusk, and the ships hurrying to harbour before the night set in. But when the winter wind of Boreas descended from the mountains to chill men’s limbs, they crammed inside in an atmosphere dense with smoke and stifling odours.

  The tavern keeper poked at the fire in the hearth, then took a bowl of soup and set it down in front of him on the table. ‘Dinner, maestro.’

  ‘Maestro . . .’ he mumbled back, with a faint grimace.

  The spoon was on the table, tied with a string so it wouldn’t be carried off. He picked it up and began to eat, slowly, savouring the simple, tasty broth that warmed his aching bones.

  The girls were arriving as the customers, dinner over, continued to drink or were already drunk, with the excuse that it was cold and that wine was what they needed to keep them warm.

  Chloe was not especially beautiful, but her eyes were deep black and her proud expression was so absurd for a young prostitute that she reminded him of the women in Sicily. Perhaps she was Sicilian after all.

  Yes, perhaps she reminded him of someone, a woman he had loved in his youth in his native land. That was why he glanced at her now and then, and smiled at her; she smiled back without knowing why. Her eyes were wide and a bit mocking.

  He suddenly found her at his side; he was surprised at first, but then gestured at the keeper to bring over another bowl of soup. He pushed it over to her, putting a few coins on the table as well.

  ‘Not enough to fuck with, maestro,’ she said, with a glance at the money.

  ‘No, I know that,’ he said calmly. ‘I only wanted to offer you something to eat. You’re thin, and if you get any thinner they won’t be keeping you around for the customers any more; they’ll send you to the millstone. But . . . why did you call me that?’

  ‘Maestro?’

  The man nodded and continued to eat his soup.

  The girl shrugged. ‘That’s what everyone calls you. They say that people pay you to teach them to read and write. I don’t think anyone knows your real name. You have a name, surely?’

  ‘Just like everyone else.’

  ‘And you won’t tell me what it is?’

  The man shook his head, dipping his spoon back into the soup. ‘Eat while it’s hot,’ he said.

  Chloe brought the bowl to her lips and noisily gulped down the broth. She wiped her mouth with the sleeve of her tunic. ‘Why won’t you tell me?’

  ‘Because I can’t,’ said the man.

  The girl looked across at the satchel slung over the back of his chair. ‘What’s in there?’

  ‘Nothing that concerns you. Eat, your customers are here.’

  The keeper approached. ‘Get over to the room,’ he said, pointing at a door at one end of the tavern. ‘Those two bold men of the sea are looking for a good time. They’ve already paid me. Make sure they leave happy.’

  The girl took another swallow of soup, and whispered into his ear as she was getting up: ‘Careful, that bag is bound to attract attention. People want to know what’s in it. You didn’t hear that from me.’ Loudly, she added, ‘Thank you for the soup, maestro. It warmed my heart.’

  Chloe had been turned over to a couple of foreigners already reeling from their drink. Big, strapping, filthy. The kind who had to hurt a girl to get their thrills. The man heard her scream. He got up and moved towards the door at the end of the tavern; the keeper spotted him and shouted: ‘Where do you think you’re going? Stop, blast you, stop!’

  But he’d already thrown open the door and was lunging into the small dark room, yelling: ‘Leave her alone! Let go of her, you bastards!’

  Pandemonium ensued. The two of them grabbed him and shoved him back out into the tavern, but he managed to seize a chair and waved it around wildly as the tavern-goers crowded around the brawlers, goading them on in loud voices. A third man crept up from behind and tried to slip off with his satchel, but he knocked him over the head with the chair and then backed up, panting, shoulders to the wall.

  He was surrounded. Distressed at his own daring, he was dripping sweat and trembling as his adversaries closed in threateningly.

  One of them lurched at him and punched him in the stomach, hard, and then in the face. As the other was about to jump in, three brutes that no one had ever seen before burst into the room and knocked the two men senseless, laying them out on the ground with blood spouting from their noses and mouths. Their aggressors vanished just as suddenly as they had appeared.

  The maestro made sure that he still had his satchel and wove his way then through the awestruck crowd and out the door.

  A gust of cold wind blasted him and sent shivers dow
n his spine. He felt the effects of the blows he’d taken all at once as the tension that had propelled him began to wash away. He staggered, put his hands to his temples as if to ward off the dizziness that was pulling the ground from under his feet, groped around for a support that wasn’t there, and tumbled into the middle of the road.

  He did not come to his senses until much later, when it started to rain and the icy water dribbled down his face and back. After a little while, he felt someone dragging him to the side of the road under a shed where some asses were tethered.

  He opened his eyes, and the light pouring out of the tavern window revealed the face of an old, bald-headed beggar without a tooth in his mouth.

  ‘Who are you?’ he muttered.

  ‘Who are you, that’s what I want to know. I’ve never seen anything like it! Three monsters show up out of nowhere, beat those creeps to a pulp . . . and then disappear! That’s a lot of fuss over a tramp, I say.’

  ‘I’m not a tramp.’

  ‘Damned if you aren’t.’ The old man pulled him up a little against the wall and covered him with a few handfuls of straw. ‘Hold on, big man,’ he said, ‘maybe I’ve got a little wine left. It’s my pay for watching these asses all night. Here, drink some of this, it’ll warm you up.’

  He watched him as he gulped down a few swallows of wine.

  ‘If you’re not a tramp, what are you then?’

  ‘I earn a living teaching people to read and write, but I . . .’

  ‘You what?’

  His mouth twisted into a grimace that might have been a smile. ‘I was the lord of the wealthiest and most powerful city of all the earth . . .’

  ‘Yeah, sure. Right. And I’m the great king of Persia.’

  ‘And my father was the greatest man of our times . . . Give me a little more wine.’

  ‘Are you going to get on with this story, then? And what have you got in that satchel that you’re always clutching so tight?’

  He took another couple of long draughts, then cleaned his mouth with his sleeve. ‘Nothing that’s worth stealing. It’s his story . . . my father’s story. The story of a man who became the lord of almost all of Sicily and much of Italy. He defeated the barbarians in countless battles, invented machines of war the likes of which had never been seen, deported entire populations, erected the greatest fortress in the world in just three months, founded colonies in the Tyrrhenian and Adriatic seas, married two women on the same day. There’s never been anyone like him among all the Greeks.’

  The old man reached over with the flask of wine again, and then sat down next to him, leaning up against the wall. ‘By all the gods! And just who is this phenomenon, this . . .’

  A flash of lightning brightly lit up the rain-spattered road and the maestro’s swollen face. Thunder pealed through the sky but he did not move. He clasped the sack to his chest and said, emphasizing each word, ‘His name was Dionysius. Dionysius of Syracuse. But the entire world called him . . . the tyrant!’

  1

  SYRACUSE 409 BC

  A HORSEMAN APPROACHED at breakneck speed, lifting a storm of white dust on the road from Camarina, directed towards the city’s western gate. The officer on duty ordered him to stop. ‘Halt!’ he shouted. ‘Make yourself known!’

  His order proved unnecessary. The horse collapsed to the ground suddenly at less than two hundred feet from the walls, sending his rider rolling in the dust.

  ‘Open the gate!’ ordered the officer. ‘Hurry, go see who it is and bring him in.’

  Four guards ran out and reached the horseman, who was sprawled out in the dirt. The horse lay panting in agony.

  The man screamed out in pain when they tried to turn him over. His face was disfigured from the strain, sullied with dust and with blood.

  ‘Who are you?’ asked one of the soldiers.

  ‘I’ve come from Selinus . . . take me to your commander! Hurry, I implore you.’

  The soldiers looked each other in the eye, then put together a litter with their spears and shields, lifted him on to it and carried him inside. One of them hung back to put the horse out of his misery; he gave a last shudder and expired.

  The little group soon reached the guardhouse. Their officer approached, carrying a torch, and the messenger looked up at him: a handsome, sturdy youth with pitch-black, wavy hair, black eyes and full lips.

  ‘My name is Dionysius,’ he said. ‘I’m the commander of the guards. What has happened? Speak, for the gods’ sake!’

  ‘I must report to the authorities. It’s a question of life or death. The Carthaginians are laying siege to Selinus. There are thousands and thousands of them, they are attacking us with huge, incredible machines. We cannot hold out alone . . . we need your help! Now, in the name of the gods, you must leave now!’ Then, in a lower voice, ‘Give me water, please, I’m dying of thirst.’

  Dionysius handed him his own flask and barked out quick orders to his men: ‘You, find Diocles and tell him to meet us at the prytaneum; tell him it’s a matter of the utmost urgency.’

  ‘But he’ll be sleeping at this hour . . .’ objected the guard.

  ‘Get him out of his bed, by Heracles, move! And the rest of you,’ he said, turning to the others, ‘go wake up the members of the Council and have them gather at the prytaneum. They must listen to this man. You,’ he said to the last, ‘go call a surgeon and tell him it’s urgent.’

  The men hurried off to do as they had been ordered. Dionysius had his second-in-command, a friend named Iolaus, replace him on guard duty, and he escorted the soldiers carrying the litter through the dark streets of the city, lighting their way with the torch he held in his hand. He’d glance back every now and then at the man stretched out on that rough litter, his features twisted into a grimace of pain at every jerk and jolt. He must have broken bones when he was thrown to the ground.

  When they reached their destination, the council members had already begun to show up. Half asleep and in a foul humour, they were accompanied by their lantern-carrying slaves. Diocles, the commander-in-chief of the armed forces, arrived nearly immediately, but scowled when he saw Dionysius. ‘What is all this rush? Is this any way to—’

  Dionysius raised his hand sharply to cut off the complaining. He was only twenty-two years old, but he was the strongest warrior in the city: no one could match him in the use of arms; his resistance to fatigue, hardship and pain had already become legendary. He was fearless and had no tolerance for discipline. He had no respect for those who were not worthy of it, be they gods or men. He despised those who preferred talk over action. He believed that only a man who was willing to put his own life on the line deserved to command, and that a commander had to prove his nerve and his courage on the battlefield. And he always looked a man in the eye before he killed him.

  ‘This messenger has done in his horse and shattered his bones to get here,’ he said, ‘and I say we need to listen to him immediately.’

  ‘Let him talk, then,’ snapped Diocles impatiently.

  Dionysius drew close and helped the man into a sitting position. The messenger began to speak. ‘They attacked us suddenly, arriving from the north, from where we would have least expected a raid. And they got all the way to our walls! We have been doing all we can to withstand their attacks, but they’ve been battering our walls day and night. They’ve got moving towers, fitted with swinging rams. Huge trunks of wood with solid iron heads! Archers posted at the tops of those tall towers are picking off our defenders on the battlements.

  ‘Their commander is called Hannibal, son of Gisco. He’s obsessed; they say he descends from that Hamilcar who died immolating himself on the altar of Himera seventy years ago, when you Syracusans wiped out the Carthaginian army with the help of the Acragantines. He has sworn to vindicate his forefather, they say, and he will stop at nothing to get revenge.

  ‘We’ve managed to hold out for three days running, but the only thing that is keeping us in the fight is the hope of seeing you show up with reinforcements. Why ha
ve you done nothing? The city cannot resist much longer; we are short of food and water and we’ve lost a great many men. We’ve had to put sixteen-year-old boys and sixty-year-old men on the front lines. Our women are fighting at their sides! Help us in the name of the gods, I beg of you . . . help us!’

  Diocles looked away from the anguished Selinuntian messenger and turned around to examine the faces of the councillors sitting in the hemicycle. ‘Have you heard him? What do you decide?’

  ‘I say we leave immediately,’ said Dionysius.

  ‘Your opinion has no importance here,’ Diocles hissed. ‘You are merely a low-ranking officer.’

  ‘But those people need us, by Heracles!’ snapped back Dionysius. ‘They’re dying; they’ll be butchered if we don’t get there in time.’

  ‘That’s enough!’ said Diocles. ‘Or I’ll have you expelled.’

  ‘The fact is,’ spoke up an elderly councillor named Heloris, ‘that we can make no decision before tomorrow, when a legal number of councilmen can be summoned. Why don’t you let Dionysius go in the meantime?’

  ‘Alone?’ asked Diocles sarcastically.

  ‘Give me an order,’ said Dionysius, ‘and before dawn I’ll have five hundred men ready in fighting order. And if you give me a couple of ships I’ll be inside the walls of Selinus in two days’ time.’

  The messenger listened anxiously to their debate: every passing moment could be decisive in his city’s being saved or annihilated.

  ‘Five hundred men,’ said Diocles. ‘Now you’ll tell me where you’re going to get five hundred men.’

  ‘The Company,’ replied Dionysius.

  ‘The Company? I’m in charge here, not the Company!’ Diocles shouted.

  ‘Then you get them for me,’ replied Dionysius coldly.

  Heloris broke in again. ‘I don’t think it matters much where he gets them, as long as they can set off as soon as possible. Is there anyone against it?’

  The councillors, who could not wait to crawl back under their covers, unanimously approved the expedition, but without allowing him to take the ships; they would be needed to transport the bulk of the troops later.