Spartans at the Gates (12 page)

“Come on, Nikias,” Konon hissed in his ear. “You're about to go diving into a ditch.”

“Leave me alone, Konon,” said Nikias.

“Hey Konon-half-arms,” said the Athenian with a sneer. “Get your boyfriend out of my face before I send him back home on a cart.”

Nikias looked at the crowd that had formed around them. Scores of shoppers and stall-workers were eyeing them intently. He even saw the unveiled and brightly painted faces of a trio of gorgeous hetaeras—the famous courtesans of Athens—wearing elaborate headdresses and regal gowns. They were staring at the scene with curiosity and smiling.

“I can't walk away,” said Nikias to Konon. He smiled wryly and raised his voice so all could hear. “I'm an Oxlander. We never walk away from a fight.”

Nikias's words made the young Athenian throw back his head and laugh. “There's a theatre just over there,” he said and pointed to the nearby structure. “We can fight on the floor of the orchestra.”

“I accept,” said Nikias.

“The Oxlander has eggs!” shouted one of the vendors. “He just agreed to fight young Apollo!”

“A fight!” yelled another. “A fight!”

Apollo turned and strutted toward the theatre, followed by his friends. He mocked Nikias's accent in a loud voice as he went, causing the crowd to snicker. Nikias followed, moving along with a crowd of fifty or so people who were already heading into the theatre to enjoy the spectacle. Konon wrapped his arm around Nikias's shoulder and put his mouth to his ear.

“Apollo is the best young pankrator in Athens,” said Konon, speaking fast. “One of the city's hopefuls for the Olympics. And I think I'd better remind you in case you've forgotten—which I'm pretty sure you have—that your right arm doesn't work.” He gave Nikias a look that said, “Wish you'd listened to me now, don't you?”

Nikias felt a pang in his guts. He'd completely forgotten about his arm. He tried to lift it and could barely raise it more than an inch—it was worse than an hour ago. He didn't slow his pace, though. As he strode into the theatre he squeezed the felt hat onto his head. Squeezed it hard. Then he started to laugh.

“Why are you laughing?” asked Konon. “Are you crazy?”

Nikias said, “I just realized this isn't my hat.”

 

TEN

In the last two changes of the moon Kolax had been kidnapped from his tribe and sold as a slave, escaped from bondage, fought warriors in the dark streets of Plataea, defeated an assassin with nothing more than his teeth, and ridden straight into a phalanx of two thousand hoplites on a suicidal charge—a battle in which he'd killed eight grown men in hand-to-hand combat. But nothing scared him more than what he faced right now, for he was on one side of a deep, wide, and swiftly flowing river while Nikias's runaway Dog Raider horse stood on the opposite bank, calmly grazing in a field of lush grass, drying its wet black coat in the sun.

For Kolax was terrified of water.

The barbarian boy cursed the name of every god he knew, pulled out his hair, and stomped his feet with indignation. But he could not summon enough courage to cross the river to retrieve Nikias's horse.

“Why am I so frightened, Fire Feet?” he asked his own mount, a Theban mare he'd captured two weeks ago after the Battle at the Gates. “I will tell you. Because on the day of my birth the village seer prophesied that I would die in a river. There is no way I am going to put a toe into
this
one.”

Fire Feet stared across the river at the black horse and pawed the rocky ground. Then it let forth a long neigh. The black horse tossed its head and answered back with a piercing whinny.

“Get over here, you stupid spawn of a pus-ridden donkey!” Kolax screamed in Skythian. “I'll make you into a tent-rug if you don't come back!”

He threw himself on the ground and screamed into the earth. He thought that maybe if his voice was loud enough his mama would hear him in the Underworld and help him in some way. Maybe she could fly up and scare the Dog Raider horse into coming back to this side of the river?

Kolax heard a splash and when he looked up he saw that Fire Feet had plunged into the river.

“Fire Feet!” yelled Kolax in astonishment. He jumped up and ran to the water's edge. “Fire Feet, come back! What madness is this?”

The black horse looked up lazily, chewing on a mouthful of grass. Then it pranced away in the opposite direction. Kolax picked up a rock and threw it into the river.

Skamander, the god of rivers, must have done this! He'd made both the horses go insane!

Kolax looked to the right. Fire Feet was far downriver now, struggling against the strong current. She had tried to cross at the deepest part where the current was swiftest. Her nostrils and eyes were the only things above the water. A moment later her head disappeared and it was gone, swallowed by the torrent.

Kolax stopped crying. He swallowed the lump in his throat and wiped the tears from his cheeks. Fire Feet was dead! And it had happened so fast. He craned his neck to catch sight of the black steed, but she was long gone, heading north—back to the lands of the Dog Raiders.

Watching Fire Feet die made Kolax feel like less of a coward. If a strong horse couldn't make it across this river, then surely he, Kolax, son of Osyrus of the Bindi tribe, would have perished, thus fulfilling the prophecy. Perhaps this was the awful day the Skythian seer had foreseen in his vision? Maybe he, Kolax, had cheated Death.

“Skamander-River-God!” proclaimed Kolax. “I give you Fire Feet as a sacrifice!”

Now what to do? He needed to get back to Nikias but he'd ridden for over an hour chasing that crazy Dog Raider horse.

He laid out all of his weapons and supplies on the grass. He had his short wooden bow captured from the black-clad people called Thebans. It was nothing like the recurved-horn-and-sinew bows made in Skythia … but it was well made and strung with quality gut. He reckoned that he'd killed at least twenty men with it. He kissed it and thanked it for its good work. He also had a lidded quiver with thirty-three arrows. This was a very lucky number and made him happy. There was a knife he'd found on the field of battle with a leather handle and sharp edge. He wore it strapped to his ankle just above his short buckskin boots. It was a weapon good for skinning animals … or Theban prisoners, of course.

And there was a short sword given to him by the dark-skinned smith Chusor. This was of the finest quality and his prized possession, forged by the smith's own hands. He could see his reflection in the iron blade, and used it now to admire his tattoos. Kolax could not wait to show this man-killer to his father once he got to Athens. All in all his weapons were good and this fact raised his spirits a little more.

He took off his pack and looked inside. It contained some dried fruits and meats as well as a skin filled with water and another with decent Plataean wine.

He touched the leather pouch that he wore around his neck. It held the Persian gold—the coins that he had collected from the road. He was not going to lose those precious coins. They were going to be a gift to his beloved papa.

He decided to drink half of the wine to lighten his load. In a few minutes he felt a warm glow in his belly. He took a hunk of dried meat and gnawed on it as he headed back in the direction he'd come, following the hoofprints that his and Nikias's horses had made. He figured it would take him about three hours to get back to the road marker where Nikias—the silly sheep-milker!—had tripped and let go of his horse's reins.

Kolax could not wait to see his papa and show him the gold coins. His father would no doubt be surprised to see his boy in Athens. And all grown-up, too, with a fine topknot and several comely tattoos.

Kolax wished his mother could see him now as well. But she had been sleeping under the grass for six summers. She'd died giving birth to Kolax's sister, but the girl hadn't even lived through her first winter without her mama. Before his mother had been buried in her tomb, Kolax's father had placed his torque on her lovely neck. The torque was made of solid gold and depicted a horse attacked by two gryphons—beasts with the head and wings of an eagle and the body of a rampant lion. Kolax often pictured his mama awaking in the afterlife, surprised and pleased to find the fair thing around her white throat. When the first grass had sprouted on her mound Kolax's father had departed for the Land of the Hellenes to serve as an Athenian archer, for he was one of the best bowmen in Skythia, and had beaten all others in the annual contest sponsored by the great warrior General Perikles of Athens.

Before his father had left Skythia he had tattooed Kolax's back with the family symbol—a snarling gryphon—so that he would always know his son, even if many years went by before they saw each other again, or if they died apart and had to find each other in the Underworld. Kolax could remember the agony of those thousands of needle pricks hammered into his skin.

Kolax knew his father would be outraged when he told him the story of what had happened to him. How old King Astyanax—leader of the Bindi tribe—had died. And how his bad son had killed his good son with poison and took his seat on the Horse Throne in the High Tent. Kolax's father, Osyrus, had been an enemy of the bad son—Krouspako, the Snow Dog—and so Kolax had been kidnapped by Krouspako's men and sold into slavery.

And that was how he had ended up in Plataea.

As soon as he found his father he was certain his papa would ride straight back to Skythia, enter the High Tent, cut off the head of the Snow Dog, and craft a drinking goblet from his skullcap. And then he would fill it with sweet uncut wine and he and Kolax would drink the wine until they were properly drunk. Then they would burn hemp seeds and inhale the smoke and sing songs like “Death to Cowards.”

He stumbled a little and realized the wine he had drunk was very strong. He noticed the sun was at its highest point in the sky for this time of year and the sky was blue. He thought, “The sun warms you from the outside, but the wine warms you from the inside.” And this notion made him laugh out loud. He didn't like being forced to walk, but things could be worse. There were interesting things to look at, like the olive trees and little ruined god-places made from crumbling stone.

The question that nagged at him was how he would tell Nikias he'd failed to bring back his horse. Back in Skythia horses were sometimes struck by lightning. One of his father's horses had died that way. He glanced at the sunny sky and frowned.

No lightning today.

He reckoned the best thing to say was the truth—that Nikias's horse had gone in search of a better rider. Sometimes the truth was like a dagger in the guts, but Nikias was a warrior and could take it. Coming to this conclusion made Kolax feel much better. He was almost looking forward to teaching Nikias-the-farmer this valuable lesson. Plataeans were good at growing things, but they were shit when it came to riding horses.

Kolax reckoned that being a farmer was one of the most horrible fates. He did not understand how these Hellenes could spend so much time digging their dry soil. And their grass was pitiful. He wondered why they didn't beg Zeus to give them more rain. Silly sheep-milkers, all of them!

His path took him across a barren field, then down a culvert and up the side of a steep hill. As he approached the top he heard the sound of a girl weeping. It scared him at first because it sounded just like his mama when she cried in his dreams. He crept through a little grove of oak trees and saw a girl—a pretty girl a few years older than himself—sitting high up in the bough of a tree. Her face was streaked with tears and she kept clenching and unclenching her fingers.

Kolax was fascinated by the vision of the tree girl. These Hellene girls looked so different from Skythian girls with their brown hair and dark eyes. He stayed there for a long time, crouched low, as still as a hare. Finally, she nodded her head vigorously and stood up on the branch. She bent down and picked up a length of rope and tossed it up and over another branch above her head. At the end of the rope was a slipknot. Kolax noticed the other end of the rope tied around the trunk of the tree.

The girl stepped out onto the limb so she was under the dangling rope, then put her head through the noose and pulled the slipknot so it was snug around her throat.

Kolax's face tingled. His heart tripled its pace. His hands moved instinctively for his bow and arrow. As she took a step and walked into air, Kolax was already sighting along the length of the shaft. And as she fell he unloosed the arrow.

The girl dropped the ten feet to the ground and landed hard. The severed rope fell down on top of her like a dead snake.

Kolax ran to her. The girl's face was white with pain. Blood seeped from her mouth where her face had struck a rock. A tooth was chipped. Kolax could not take his eyes off her lips. They were perfectly shaped … like a Skythian bow.

 

ELEVEN

Nikias stood alone at the center of the stage waiting for the large crowd to file in and take their seats on the wooden benches. Word had quickly spread that Apollo the pankrator was going to teach a young Oxlander a harsh lesson in Athenian civility. Several hundred people were already in their seats and many more were pouring through the entrance. Apollo stood off to the side laughing with his friends as if he didn't have a care in the world.

Nikias had no desire to be either humiliated or pounded senseless by Apollo. But his body just wasn't up for the fight. He knew he couldn't beat the Athenian with his muscles. So he'd have to use his mind. His grandfather had told him over and over again that a fight could be won before the first punch had even been thrown. The trick was to get inside the head of the adversary. And then blindside him.

Once, after making a stupid boast, Nikias's grandfather had forced him to fight a much bigger man—a brutal warrior named Axe—with one arm tied behind his back. His grandfather had intended on teaching a Nikias a lesson at the hands of the other man's fists. But Nikias had humiliated Axe in public, beating him down before the man had even thrown a punch. He had used Axe's own hubris to trick him into making the wrong attack, and then Nikias had knocked him senseless.