Sword of Apollo (6 page)

“Tell me what you want me to do,” he replied obediently. “I'm strong enough to carry you to the peak.”

“Is your spear still unbending?” she asked, reaching down. “Ah, just like a teenage boy in more ways than one.”

When she was satisfied they lay side by side, staring at the ceiling, which was lit by the orange glow of the lamp, and watching a wall lizard stalking a fly. They had been making love like this during the day often over the last year, and these lusty assignations had helped keep Menesarkus from going mad from the day-to-day toil of running Plataea. Most of his day was spent poring over documents, recording the amount of food and supplies that were being stocked away in the citadel: jars filled with olive oil; casks of smoked meat; skins filled with wine; arrows; swords; helms; herbs for medicine. It was mind-numbing. Especially with Hesiod always by his side. The young man had lost his arm fighting the Thebans. No longer fit for battle, he had been assigned to assist Menesarkus in all his duties. But he was long-winded and overly attentive, and drove Menesarkus mad.

“What are you mumbling?” Eudoxia asked.

“Eh?” he said.

“Are you already back to your accounts? You're rattling off numbers.”

Menesarkus covered his eyes with his forearm. “We've got enough food to keep all twenty thousand of us fed for ten months or so during a siege,” he said. “That's not enough time.”

“But the Spartan prisoners—”

“There are only a score of them left,” he cut in. “Twenty more to buy us time. A few months at most. The Spartans are due to send another emissary demanding that we break off our alliance with Athens. And then I'll have to let the final prisoners go to stave off invasion for a little while longer. I'll keep Draco the Skull till the very end, though.”

He thought of the Spartan general, who'd been his prisoner in Plataea for the last two and a half years—a desiccated, noseless warrior whom Menesarkus first met during the Persian War. They had fought side by side against the Persians at the battle of Plataea fifty years before, storming the Persian Fort together. Later Menesarkus went to Sparta as a guest-friend of one of the Spartan dual kings as a reward for his heroics in battle. There he fought Draco in a pankration contest to honor those who had died against the Persian invaders. Draco, a wily fighter, tried to rip off Menasarkus's testicles, but Menesarkus responded by biting off the Spartan's nose. There were no rules in the Spartan version of the pankration. The Spartans fought dirty. And that was the only way to beat them.

“Have you heard lately from General Perikles?” she asked.

Menesarkus nodded and cracked the knuckles of his rough and callused hands. “I had a messenger pigeon yesterday. The same news as always: the Athenians cannot spare any men. But Perikles welcomes any and even all Plataeans to come and stay behind the walls of Athens.”

“It's a long and dangerous road to travel with children,” said Eudoxia, and stared into space with a haunted look.

He got up and poured them a bowl of wine, and they sat on the floor with their backs to the cool wall, sharing sips, relishing this time to be completely alone together. They played a game of pebbles, and Eudoxia captured all of Menesarkus's pieces off the wooden game board, giggling with every triumphant move.

“Oh, I give up!” he said, shoving the board aside.

“The great general is defeated by a woman,” declared Eudoxia.

“Most men are outstrategized by women,” said Menesarkus. “Nikias likes to think that he wooed Kallisto, but it was the other way around.”

“She is a fine wife,” said Eudoxia. “A hard worker. A good mother.”

“I did not say otherwise. But she is cleverer than he. Just as you are cleverer than me.”

“I am worried about her,” said Eudoxia.

“Why?”

“She is spotting. I'm afraid she might lose this child. She is in the eighth month. She conceived too soon after the twins were born. Not more than two months passed before she became pregnant again.”

“Kallisto is fertile and strong,” said Menesarkus, and quickly added, “Not that you were weak, my darling,” for he suddenly recalled that Eudoxia had bled like this before she had lost her second pregnancy. One son she'd born him—the striking Aristo, a poet and sprinter who was killed fifteen years ago in a pointless battle against the Thebans. Aristo never was a warrior. And he never was lucky. But somehow he fathered the brave and fortunate Nikias. Menesarkus had had no idea how much he loved his grandson until that day Nikias returned to Plataea a broken man after being tortured by Eurymakus the Theban.

He realized that Eudoxia had risen and put on her dress and was now gathering her hair—tresses that stretched to her shapely calves. He stood up and braided it for her, and she handed him a golden hair clip she always wore at the end of the braid. It was a prize he'd taken from a Persian princeling he'd slain at the Persian Fort. His first wedding gift to her. She had just turned sixteen, only a few months older than he.

“I wished that I could have given you more children,” she said at last. “And I don't begrudge you the child that you made while in Sparta, for I know you have suffered greatly since that secret was revealed to me.”

Menesarkus grunted. He thought back to that night in the palace of the kings in Lakonia when that irresistible royal had sauntered into his bedchamber wearing one of those alluring Spartan dresses with the hem that rode far, far above the knees … an athletic girl—a female wrestler of twenty-three—with shorn straw-colored hair and one plump bosom hanging out of her gown, giving her the appearance of a wild Amazon woman who'd cut off one of her breasts to facilitate shooting an arrow. The Spartan elders wished to steal his seed, thus bringing Menesarkus's skills into their bloodlines, but the young pankrator gave it as freely as a rutting bull. Two years and six months ago, when the Spartans sent their expeditionary force to the Oxlands, Menesarkus's Spartan grandson, Prince Arkilokus, was amongst the warriors. Injured during a riding accident, Arkilokus was captured and kept as a prisoner in Plataea, and later exchanged for Nikias after he had been taken by the enemy.

Menesarkus turned Eudoxia around and put his hand gently to her cheek. “I love you, Eudoxia,” he said. “All of my victories on the battlefield and the pankration arena would have been meaningless without you to share them.”

She smiled and kissed his hand. Then she looked deep into his eyes and frowned, saying, “I've wanted to tell you something—”

But her words were cut off by a forceful pounding on the door.

“Hesiod!” shouted Menesarkus. “Go away!”

“It's me—Nikias!” came a familiar voice from the other side. “Grandfather! Quickly. Open up!”

 

SEVEN

Menesarkus limped to the door, slid back the bar, and opened the portal.

“Hera's jugs, boy! What happened?” he asked when he saw Nikias standing there. “You're covered in blood!”

Eudoxia gasped and rushed to him, crying, “Grandson, what have you done?”

“I'm fine,” said Nikias. “I was chasing old Asterion and…” he trailed off as he noticed his grandmother's disheveled appearance and his grandfather's nakedness. He smiled wryly and said to his grandmother, “I need to steal Grandfather from you.”

“Is Asterion hurt?” asked Menesarkus with a stricken voice.

“He yet lives,” said Nikias. “But he is running free over the Oxlands.”

Menesarkus scowled. “That bull is worth many talents of silver for his seed alone. What happened?”

“I've found something far more valuable,” replied Nikias. “A Persian prisoner. And I don't have time to explain. Linos is interrogating him now.”

Hesiod pushed his way into the chamber and grabbed Menesarkus's robe from the floor, throwing it over his master's bare shoulders. Then he stooped and grabbed Menesarkus's foot and lifted it off the ground, causing the old pankrator to hop on one foot and lunge for the wall to keep from falling.

“Idiot!” barked Menesarkus. “My bad knee!”

“Sorry, Arkon!” exclaimed Hesiod, slapping a sandal to Menesarkus's foot. “Not a moment to be lost.”

Nikias led a limping Menesarkus down the hallway and into the first open courtyard. A group of ten guards stood in a semicircle around the naked Persian, who was weeping as he knelt on the pavers. His hands were tied behind his back and blood seeped from the wounds on his biceps and ankle tendon where Nikias had cut him. He had pissed himself, and his urine was mingled with the blood in a little pool at his feet.

An aged man with a white beard knelt by his side, speaking to the prisoner in Persian in a low voice. This was Linos—a spy who had returned to Plataea after many years, and had quickly become one of Menesarkus's closest confidants. The prisoner nodded and wept even harder and spoke quickly—words that Nikias could not hear.

Zoticus, the senior general of Plataea and the leader of the cavalry, paced behind the Persian, staring down his beaklike nose at the prisoner and prodding him now and again with the butt end of his riding whip, causing the Persian to shake violently each time he did it. Kolax—a favorite of Zoticus because of the lad's skills as a horseman and archer—stood next to the general, laughing and chewing on a piece of dried meat.

After a few more minutes of questioning, Linos touched the Persian on the shoulder with a conciliatory gesture, then got up and approached Menesarkus. Zoticus knelt by the Persian and said something in his ear, and the prisoner let out a terrified yelp.

“What is going on, Linos?” asked Menesarkus. “What have you learned? Is this man truly a Persian?”

“Your grandson,” said Linos, glancing at Nikias, “has made a remarkable discovery.” He gestured for Nikias and Menesarkus to follow him to the corner of the courtyard, out of hearing distance of the guards and the prisoner. Hesiod came with them, standing dutifully by Menesarkus's side.

“The man claims he is an emissary who got lost on his way to Thebes,” Linos explained. “Apparently, Nikias killed all of his troop of Median guards and captured him.”

Menesarkus's jaw dropped and he looked at Nikias, who responded with a modest shrug. “It wasn't a troop,” said Nikias. “There were only six Medians. And that Persian is as blind as a gopher. Here is his dispatch bag,” he added, and took the leather bag from his shoulder, handing it to Linos, who immediately opened the flap and riffled through the contents.

“What were you saying to the Persian just now?” asked Menesarkus.

“I was telling him,” replied Linos, not looking up, “that he will be treated with the deference accorded to someone of his rank. And I thanked him for offering to reveal the code to decipher his documents. In all my years I have never met a more timid creature so willing to give up information. He is terrified of torture.”

“That's strange,” said Nikias. “He enjoyed telling me about all the men he'd had the pleasure of seeing tormented in his king's torture chambers.”

“The greatest tyrant often possesses a fawn's heart,” answered Linos.

“I don't understand,” said Menesarkus. “Why was a Persian emissary on his way to Thebes?”

“He is the servant of a man called the City-Killer,” said Linos. “A siege master who has been advising the Spartans for the last few years.”

“Have you heard of this City-Killer?” asked Nikias.

“Oh, yes,” said Linos. “I have seen the aftermath of his destructive genius in eastern Ionia. He has never failed to conquer a citadel, because if he does so, he will be forced to eat all of his children and grandchildren over a great and excruciating span of time.”

“Quite the incentive,” said Menesarkus.

“But why was he on his way to Thebes?” said Nikias.

“The City-Killer is to make his base of operations there,” replied Linos.

“Base of operations for what?” asked Hesiod, piping in.

Linos ignored Hesiod's question as he rooted for something in the bag and held it aloft—a cylindrical object with carvings on it. “Very useful,” he said. “A Persian cylinder seal.” He glanced at Hesiod and said, “In answer to your question: the base of operations for the siege of Plataea. That cowering creature just informed me that there are more than fifty thousand hoplites and slaves marching across the Isthmus of Korinth as we speak, on their way here. They will be here in five days, when they will be joined by another ten thousand from Megaria and Korinth.”

Nikias stared in amazement at Linos, then turned to his grandfather, whose face was twisted in a mocking smile.

“That's impossible,” said Menesarkus. “That would be the entire force that Sparta could muster. Their entire army of Spartiates and Helot slaves, as well as warriors from vassal city-states.” He chewed on this information for a while before waving his hand, saying, “That Persian is inflating the numbers.”

“I don't think he is lying,” said Linos. “But I will know more after I have deciphered all of these documents in this bag … and tortured him, of course,” he added in an apathetic tone. “He says the Spartans are going to build a wall around the entire citadel to prevent reinforcements or supplies and starve us out—part of the City-Killer's advice.”

“A wall?” asked Nikias. “Around the entire citadel? That's impossible. It would take ten years to make a wall of stone—”

A trumpet blared from the wall and all of the men in the courtyard swiveled their heads in unison toward the sound. Three short blasts followed by a longer note. Then repeated.

“The warning call from the mountain lookouts,” said Linos, staring in the direction of the mountain with his piercing eyes, as though he could peer straight through stone.

 

EIGHT

Nikias dashed out of the courtyard and into the street with Hesiod hard on his heels. They ran past the black marble Assembly Hall and into the open area of the agora where crowds of curious people milled about, wondering what was happening. When they got to the gate, the guards had already shut the two ten-foot-tall wood-and-iron-bound doors set into the eastern wall.