“Tell me about this city you’re king of,” Liva said when they were underway once more.

The waves stayed low and the winds cooperated. Mistral’s chill had long since gone, and now they sailed with Harmattan’s dry gusts. Artemisia had overseen the repairs while Hanno had his altar built. He’d laid a block of sail-shaped stone upon the monument and had one of his masons attach a trident atop it.

Artemisia requested that the next god Hanno challenge be one that knew how to sew. A fresh stitching decorated the restored Bull of Mago on their sail.

“Carthage,” Hanno said.

“Yes, that’s the one,” Liva agreed.

Little could be done with the mast and port hull. The hole had been patched with a bit of timbers, though without treatment they’d need to be replaced.

Bostar suggested exchanging vessels, but Hanno refused. Hole and cracked mast or not, this was his ship. They’d have to make do.

Artemisia noted that they’d better not find any more personified winds or they’d really lose their mast.

Hanno ran his hand along the cracked planks, inspecting the work his carpenters had completed while he told Liva of Carthage. He told her of its high walls, of its protected port and its many ships. He told her of his palace, and the gold and trade goods that passed through the city’s wide market each day.

“The grandest city in the world,” Hanno concluded.

“And its people? Are they grand as well? You said nothing of them,” Liva noted.

“The people come with me. They must be grand.”

“Them being with you makes them grand?”

“Of course it does.”

Liva grimaced.

“Do you not feel grand?” Hanno asked.

“It feels grand to be at sea. And I admit that this is a grand fleet, but I have no way of judging. I’ve never seen a fleet before,” Liva said. “I’ve seen many grand things, though, so I can say that this fleet is grand as a family of lions playing with a melon, or a crocodile who predicts the future if you look into his mouth. Though I haven’t seen that, I just heard it in a story, but I’m certain it’s grand.”

“Another story for your collection. The fleet of Carthage, and the expanse of Africa,” Hanno said.

“The people of Carthage too.”

“Yes, them as well.”

“Why are they here? Don’t they want to be in Carthage?”

“Carthage is so prosperous there are too many there. So they sent Hanno to find spots for the people to settle. Like Thymiaterium. Do you know of other places to settle?”

“I’m sure there are many.”

“Where all have you been?”

Liva pointed to the coast. It spanned out further west, to a second growing peninsula dotted with trees that grew thicker and thicker.

“This is the forested promontory of Solois. I’ve met with a people here who worship trees. They have names for the trees and bury foxes at their roots,” Liva shared.

“Is this where you are from? Perhaps the people of your village will welcome Carthaginian settlers. We can share in the ways of the sail and you can share in the ways of these coasts,” Hanno suggested.

Liva laughed. “Oh, I’m not from a people of any particular. I’m just a wanderer.”

“A wanderer? Truly?”

Liva nodded. “I seek stories. That’s why I’m here, of course. A wanderer without destination.”

“A destination is the point of the wandering.”

“Only if you intend the wandering to conclude. And after all, is life not a series of wanderings?”

Hanno laughed.

“All must die, and their destination is either glory or nothing. Hanno’s destination is glory, and you are welcome to join if you so wish,” said the king.

Bostar approached before Liva could speak further.

“The helmsman is requesting a landing,” he said.

“Oh, yes. Solois has fantastic breadfruit,” Liva said.

She spoke of the many dishes she’d enjoyed with the starchy produce. But when they beached and made camp, they found only barren limbs on the dark trees near the sand. Further into the forest, they discovered a few blackened figs but nothing more.

The marines returned with plentiful firewood from dead trees that had fallen in abundance, though, and with their replenished supplies and diminished mouths to feed, none worried over the barren woods.

Mapen sang them a song of their bravery against the winds, and all sang and drank to the praises of Poseidon.

By the next morning, all the firewood gathered from fallen limbs and dead trunks had been used up. Ashen embers barely heated water for lukewarm gruels, and so a few trees had to be chopped. The hearty trees resisted the axes, but the marines’ strong arms eventually won them a warm breakfast.

They sailed along the promontory for the rest of the day. Liva requested every song Mapen had to share, and the piper elevated her brother’s tales with a lively accompaniment. Mapen started with the tale of the stolen princess Europa, for whom the continent was named. Then he told Liva of the great flood, and an ancient song of a warrior felled by trickery by a boy with a sling.

He sang of the fire-breathing Assyrian Empire, and the alliance of Medes that had overthrown it, then of the fair Persians who had won it over them and then grew corrupted and greedy as their forerunners. He sang many songs of Greece, causing Artemisia to spit. Mapen politely skipped the song of Artemisia.

“Wonderful!” Liva applauded when the songs ended. “Your folk tales are near fascinating as mine.”

“Sing us a song of your people then,” Mapen encouraged.

“Oh, I’d rather not. Tell me of your people. All your songs are old, Mapen. What’s the song of Carthage?”

Mapen looked to Hanno.

“It’s a long song,” the singer noted.

“We’ve a long journey. The coast hasn’t altered from its bristling trees since yesterday,” Liva replied.

Mapen looked to Hanno once more.

“Sing it then,” he ordered, though he kept his eyes pinned to the open waters.

Mapen nodded. “Sister, if you will,” he prompted.

The piper began a lively tune, an introductory exultation that earned an applause from below deck. They knew the song well.

“All of Carthage has heard this tale, for it is how we came to be. It begins long ago,” Mapen began, and the music quieted, “in our mother city of Tyre. Its walls stretched to the sky, and the sea surrounded it on all sides. Here the Phoenicians first set off from Syria in the Eastern Mediterranean’s shore. They searched the far reaches of the sea, and mapped the coasts before any knew how far they stretched.”

“Elissa, Elissa,” Mapen sang, though Hanno frowned at the song. “Great Queen of Carthage, Elissa, Elissa. First queen of Tyre and daughter of its king, whose husband’s fabled sacks of gold your cruel brother did desire, you fooled and tricked and tossed into the sea to earn the wrath of his coming fire. But off to Africa, brave Elissa, a new city she did inspire.

The king of the Libyans, she found and asked, for a parcel of land, no larger than an oxen hide. Granted to the Phoenicians, but such strips of leather a whole hill the clever Elissa did provide. But the king did balk, the Phoenicians their walk, and asked Elissa as his bride. Despair did she, for her husband the sea, but the queen she did not hide. Upon a pyre, Elissa, Elissa, birthed Carthage and for love she died.”

Liva applauded. “Oh lovely. What a lovely song,” she said.

Hanno went below deck.

Liva chased after him.

The rowers cheered the sight of their king and translator.

“It is saltier down here,” Liva noted.

Hanno patted an oarsman on the shoulder, the pipes of Mapen’s song muted to a simple rhythm the rowers followed.

“Did you not like that story?” Liva asked.

Hanno busied his hands with inspecting a scrap of leather in need of repair.

“Is it such a sad story it touches the king?” Liva asked.

“It touches me not,” Hanno snapped.

“Is it a true story?”

“Why would Mapen sing it if it wasn’t?”

“I’ve heard many songs that were far from true.”

“This one is true.”

“But so was the story of the Assyrian blood-drinkers. I see this tale gives you concern just as Xerxe’s song gives Artemisia. What does the name Elissa mean for Hanno besides the founder of his city?”

“Heresy,” Hanno said.

“The name of a queen is heresy?”

“Suffete always accused me of heresy for marrying a Libyan with such a holy name.”

Liva frowned.

“My wife. Dead now. She had the same name as the woman in that ancient tale. Queen Elissa, though the Council never named her queen,” Hanno explained.

Hanno looked out the port holes and saw the sun’s glisten on the waves.

“We should search for a camp. With Poseidon’s fortune, we may locate another colony site,” he said.

“Without a Libyan king who wants to marry you this time,” Liva added.

Hanno did not share her smile.

The peninsula of Solois offered few places to beach. The rocks and trees reached right to the water’s edge. Thick trunks wetted themselves against the waves, but the tides had not fully arrived, allowing for a patch of sand wide enough to accommodate their ships.

“There,” Hanno pointed out.

“If that tide grows higher, we’ll be smashed against the trees before the night’s over,” Artemisia noted.

“That’s what axes are for. Notify the marines. We make room.”

What seemed a narrow gap, though, widened when they approached the shallows. Hanno splashed into the low water, axe in hand, while the rest of the marines aided in the beaching.

More rocks than he remembered seeing at sea dotted the shore. Just before the tree line lay piles of rotted wood, stacked between the waves and the high, green trees.

“Bostar,” the king said, “ready your bow and follow.”

The bowman came, as did Liva.

The trees stood so close together their branches intertwined. Hanno turned sideways to pass through the thick wall of trunks, finding the growth abundant but more evenly spaced on the far side.

“You said the people here worship trees,” Hanno said to Liva. “Do they live on the coast?”

“Not that I remember,” she whispered.

“Scout ahead, Bostar. Keep your bow at the ready.”

After the ships were tied and the tents prepared, Bostar returned with an animal carcass slung over his back.

“I found dinner, not much else,” he said.

“Wild goat. Fantastic. And plenty of firewood to cook it upon,” Hanno said.

“I’ll stand sentry if you don’t mind. Something about this place makes me uneasy.”

“Ease yourself with wine then.”

Liva rubbed her shoulders with a sudden chill, though she stood close by the fire.

“Let’s hear one of your people’s stories, Liva. We’re on the coast of Africa. I desire an African tale with my wine,” Hanno said.

“I think I’ll just get some sleep. We had a lengthy journey,” Liva said.

“Goat and wine, I’ll take that deal,” Artemisia said, and took the wineskin out of the king’s hand.

Hanno laughed.

He and the crew ate well, and their tired bodies found sleep within the comfort of low flames and full stomachs.

The next morning, a shriek woke the king.

Sword in hand, Hanno rose and found Aba racing up and down the beach.

“Melqart preserve us. Save your wrath, Baal Hammon!” the priestess shrieked.

“Aba, what is wrong?” Hanno asked.

“Look around you, king, the gods have harmed us and I pray we find who before it’s too late!”

Hanno looked up and down the beach. The rising Libyphoenicians did not seem at all damaged.

“What harm, woman?” Hanno asked.

“The ships!” Aba shouted.

Hanno looked to the waters. The tide had retreated once more, exposing a wide tract of wetted sand. Only then did recognition blink into the king’s eyes. The ships were gone.