A Heroic King

by Helena P. Schrader

  Pausanias didn’t have the option of protesting. Thersander was cutting off his air, slowly but surely.

  Thersander’s eyes bore into Pausanias. “Cleomenes is so crazy they’re going to have to lock him up, and Leonidas is going to become regent, and my dad is going to be Paidonomos.”

  Pausanias managed to get out a choking sound, and Thersander let him go. Pausanias grabbed his throat in both hands, gasping open-mouthed for breath. Dazed, he stared at Thersander. Was it really possible that everything was going to be turned upside down? That his uncle Leonidas would dare usurp the throne? It didn’t seem possible. All his uncle’s friends were like this eunuch―misfits and foreigners and inferiors! But Pausanias felt uneasy, too, because he was here eating Thersander and Danei’s catch, and he realized that Thersander was right: nothing was going to be the same again.

  CHAPTER 7

  INVASION

  IT WAS THE FOURTH DAY OF the Karneia, and nine tents had been set up along the Eurotas. The herds of sacrificial cattle were grazing in an enclosure just beyond the ball field, and the athletic contests were in full swing around the racecourse to the west. As always during a religious festival, the army was furloughed and the drill fields empty. The runner coming down the Tegean road did not, therefore, encounter anyone until he reached the bridge across the Eurotas itself. Even here, the first man he saw was evidently a somewhat senile old helot, who only gaped at the lone runner.

  Pheidippidas had no choice but to continue. He was beyond pain or breathlessness. His whole body was numb to itself and its surroundings. Only his heart, and to a lesser extent his head, were still consciously functioning. His feet pounded heavily on the paving stones, all elasticity long since consumed by the miles behind him. His eyes could hardly focus as they swept the eerily empty city, looking for someone who could direct him.

  At last he came upon some young men with sweat-soaked hair and towels hung over their shoulders. They were chattering among themselves, apparently arguing good-naturedly. Pheidippidas tried to call out to them, but he didn’t have the breath. All he managed to do was marginally correct his course in order to intercept them.

  They drew up and gaped at the apparition. Then one lifted his head sharply and said, “Isn’t that the Owl of Athena? Are you from Athens?”

  “I―must―speak―” Sweat started to seep from every pore. It made Pheidippidas glisten in the afternoon sun. “―to―to―” He was so tired he couldn’t remember the curious name the Spartans used for their archons, so he said, “archons. I have―a message.”

  “He must mean the ephors,” one of the youths translated for his fellows, and then told the Athenian, “I’ll lead you.” He pulled the towel from his around his neck and tossed it to one of the other youths, then with a signal to the Athenian to follow him, started jogging.

  The ephors were judging the races, and so Pheidippidas found himself being led through crowds of spectators. He could hear voices exclaiming, “Athens! A runner from Athens!” Soon the entire crowd was watching him anxiously. The Spartans could tell just by looking at him that he was nearly finished―and good news is never urgent.

  The youth indicated five middle-aged men with long Spartan braids in robes with purple trim. With relief, Pheidippidas realized he had reached his destination. There seemed no reason not to blurt out his embassy; certainly there was no secret about it. So he gasped out: “The Persians. The Persians have landed at Marathon.”

  The five ephors immediately withdrew to the Ephorate to hear the full text of the Athenian plea for help. The Athenians were nothing if not eloquent, and Pheidippidas, by then refreshed with some water laced with wine, was not just a long-distance runner, he was also a good messenger. He conveyed the full pathos of the situation. Six hundred triremes, two hundred horse transports, thousands of horses, and tens of thousands of archers had landed just twenty-six miles north of Athens on the plain of Marathon. Athens would fight with every man she had. Athens would fight to the death. But against these numbers! Against the invincible Persians….

  “Men of Sparta,” he urged, “do not stand by while the most ancient city of Greece is crushed and enslaved by a foreign invader.”

  The ephors heard him out, and then solicitously told him to rest. They would give him their answer before sunset. Pheidippidas was escorted out, and then the five men faced one another.

  Kyranios was the oldest of them, a year short of being eligible for the Gerousia. He had been elected by a large majority. Sperchias, in contrast, had only just squeaked through, helped along by Leonidas’ emphatic support. But then, having elected two of Leonidas’ closest associates, the Spartans showed their reluctance to commit themselves to one or the other of the increasingly hostile factions by electing two of Brotus’ followers as well, Lysimachos and Euragoras. The fifth man was Polymedes―a sober, withdrawn widower who had distinguished himself as an administrator of public works, particularly a tricky drainage system. His election had taken both Leonidas and Brotus by surprise. No one knew exactly where he stood on most issues―which seemed to be exactly what the majority of Sparta’s citizens wanted when they elected him.

  Kyranios sat stiffly in one of the five chairs in the center of the chamber, with Sperchias nervously beside him. Polymedes preferred to sit on one of the benches circling the room and Euragoras leaned against one of the thrones, while Lysimachos paced the room like a caged lion. “The Persians have never―never―been defeated in battle.”

  “The Scythians didn’t exactly get crushed,” Euragoras noted.

  “Only because they had no cities, no crops, no orchards―nothing but their herds and women to defend. They withdrew before the Persians into the endless spaces of their country, but they never met the Persians face to face. They never fought them, much less defeated them.” No one contradicted Lysimachos; everything he said was true. “And twenty thousand fighting men! Just how many men can the Athenians field?” Lysimachos directed the question to the two former officers.

  Kyranios shrugged and answered, “Ten thousand hoplites.”

  “And maybe another ten thousand archers,” Euragoras added.

  “Then they can match the Persians one to one?” Lysimachos stopped pacing and looked at his fellows in amazement. He hadn’t realized Athens was that populous.

  Kyranios made a face and a dismissive gesture. Euragoras answered for him, “Only if you call potters and fishmongers soldiers! What the Athenians can field is a hodgepodge force composed of farmers and craftsmen. Such men at best know how to put on the breastplate their granddad left them, and at worst don’t even own one! They’re no match for a Persian army of this size.”

  “Then you think the situation is hopeless?” Polymedes asked in a sharp, almost reproachful tone.

  “No. Fifteen to twenty thousand Athenians stiffened by two to three thousand Lacedaemonians should be sufficient to stop a Persian force of this size; after all, the bulk of the troops landed at Marathon won’t be Persians, but conscripts from their subject peoples. There’s no way of knowing the exact mix, but many of Persia’s subject peoples have only second-rate troops. We can presume that many of the men under Persian command at Marathon are resentful and nearly worthless. There are probably no more than three to five thousand Persians in this invasion force, and maybe that many Medes as well. These are the men we need to beat,” Kyranios judged.

  “So. We agree,” Lysimachos concluded, astonished. So often in the last nine months the ephors had been divided: Kyranios and Sperchias on one side and Lysimachos and Euragoras on the other. Again and again, Polymedes had either broken the stalemate or abstained and forced decisions to be postponed.

  Kyranios was relieved to discover that for once there would be no bitter fight with Lysimachos and Euragoras. He nodded. “We must support the Athenians with our standing army immediately,” Kyranios declared firmly.

  “Exactly,” Euragoras concurred, glancing at Sperchias to see if the man who had been so keen to save Persian lives a year ago whe
n the ambassadors were here would now find some objection.

  But no matter how hard his enemies tried to portray him as a Persian toady, Sperchias was not pro-Persian, he simply believed in civilized behavior―which did not include killing ambassadors. He nodded now, although he was frowning in anticipation of the next problem.

  “And who will command the army?” Polymedes asked.

  Stunned silence answered him.

  When a Spartan army left Lacedaemon, it was always commanded by one of the kings. Indeed, until Cleomenes and Demaratus had fought publicly during the campaign against Athens more than a decade earlier, both Spartan kings had led her armies in the field. But the man occupying the Eurypontid throne was viewed as a usurper by at least half the citizens (and that meant half the troops), and the Agiad king was obviously insane. Not one of the five men in the room was willing to entrust Sparta’s army to either of these men in a confrontation with the most powerful military force on earth: the Persians.

  Kyranios took the initiative. “Leonidas,” he declared firmly.

  “No!” Euragoras responded instantly and emphatically.

  The other four men, however, gazed at him so intently that he felt embarrassed by his own transparently knee-jerk reaction. He tried to make himself sound reasonable. “He’s only thirty-eight. And he’s the most junior of the lochagoi. Why not one of the others? Hyllus is senior.”

  Kyranios snorted. “And he’s a boneheaded old mule. Leonidas is the best of the lot.”

  “That is your opinion!” Euragoras snapped back. “Not shared by everyone.”

  “Not everyone has to,” Polymedes reminded them. “Leonidas is an Agiad prince and husband to the ruling Agiad king’s only surviving child.”

  “If he is to be appointed for his bloodlines, then Cleombrotus—”

  “—would never be accepted by the army. He was never so much as an enomotarch!” Kyranios cut Lysimachos off before he could finish.

  “We have to put this to the Assembly—both the deployment outside of Lacedaemon and the command.” Polymedes put an end to the threatening altercation.

  “Assembly?” Lysimachos protested. “It’s the middle of the Karneia! We can’t hold an Assembly during the Karneia. Besides, Sparta’s citizens are scattered to the corners of Lacedaemon. Men are as far away as Kythera and Pylos. It will take us at least two days to get word to all of them, and another two days before they can get back here.”

  “Whether in their capacity as citizens or as soldiers, it will take that long to recall them anyway,” Polymedes argued. “After they are assembled, it is only a matter of one extra day to get the approval of the Assembly before deploying.”

  “But time is critical!” Kyranios protested. “One day could make all the difference between victory and defeat. The Persians have already landed. For all we know, the Athenians are fighting for the freedom of Greece at this very moment!”

  “In which case we will come too late in any case,” Polymedes retorted, unimpressed. “We cannot commit the Spartan state and Spartan army in a matter as important as this without the approval of the Assembly.”

  “What is there to debate? We chose war with Persia the day we murdered Darius’ ambassadors, rejecting his peace offer,” Sperchias reminded them bitterly.

  “After we rejected Persia’s demand for submission,” Kyranios corrected his younger protégé sharply, adding, “What is left for the Assembly to decide?”

  “The number of age cohorts to call up and the commander,” Polymedes insisted. “We can go to the Gerousia with our proposals, and they can prepare to bring a petition before the Assembly five days from today. Meanwhile, we can issue orders for the perioikoi to muster their forces and set in motion all other necessary preparations for a deployment, including sending the perioikoi with arms and supplies to the Isthmus. The Assembly can be held on the first day after the end of the Karneia, when everyone is sure to be back in Sparta. The army can march the following day, fully sanctioned by the Assembly and with a commander supported by the majority of citizens.”

  “That’s almost a week away!” Kyranios protested. “If we wait that long, our troops will not reach Athens for ten days. Is that what you’re going to tell the Athenian runner? That we’ll come—but not for another ten days?”

  “Yes. That’s exactly what we must tell him.”

  “I don’t know if it is wise to let the Athenians—or anyone else—know that we have no king capable of taking the army to war—or that it takes us five days to mobilize during a religious holiday,” Sperchias remarked.

  “For once Sperchias is right,” Euragoras admitted grudgingly. “Cleomenes seems to have sparked latent resentment among some of the Arcadian cities. He invited them to attack us. It would not be good for them to hear that we are leaderless.”

  “We need not tell the Athenian our reasons,” Polymedes observed. “All he needs to know is that we will come—but not before the full moon.”

  “Calm down, Euragoras,” Talthybiades urged the younger man, handing him a glazed, cream-colored mug decorated with a black horse and containing more wine than water. “I’m not sure it is such a bad thing for Leonidas to be sent north to support Athens.”

  “Not a bad thing?” Euragoras asked incredulously. “It’s practically like appointing him king—or at least heir to the throne!” Euragoras’ words were chosen to enrage Cleombrotus, but he had miscalculated.

  Brotus, frowning, turned to Talthybiades to ask: “Do you really think my brother might be dumb enough to accept this command?”

  Talthybiades smiled. “Yes. I do. He’s like our friend Euragoras here. All he sees is the potential for military glory. What he doesn’t see is that he will probably arrive too late and find himself facing the Persians alone. Even if the Persian forces take some casualties in their fight with the Athenians, the Persians are still bound to outnumber the two thousand men we are sending north. If Leonidas leads the army north to fight the Persians, I think it will be the last we ever see of him.”

  “It sounds too good to be true,” Brotus concluded.

  “It won’t be the last you hear of him, of course,” Talthybiades noted. “He will earn eternal glory. A new Achilles—dying away from home against an enemy that hasn’t done us any harm. No doubt poems will be written about him and songs sung in his honor. You might even have to build a monument to him.”

  “As long as he stays dead and doesn’t rise from the grave like Kastor! Brotus exclaimed, raising a laugh from the others.

  “I believe Polydeukes had to beg Zeus for the favor―and be prepared to sleep in his grave every other night―which I gather you don’t plan to do,” Talthybiades remarked with a smile.

  “You’re damned right! Let Leo have his hero’s grave―as long as I am king.”

  “Who can stand in your way? His infant son, perhaps, or his sharp-tongued wife?”

  They laughed again. Then Talthybiades turned deadly serious. “This is your chance, Brotus. This is the moment you have been waiting for. You need to seize the opportunity and act decisively the moment Leonidas crosses out of Lacedaemon.”

  Gorgo couldn’t sleep. Leonidas had drifted off, his steady breathing almost a snore, his hands―so powerful and fractious when conscious―lying limp and harmless on the white sheets of the bed. He needed his sleep. He was determined to reach Athens as soon as possible, and had already announced his intention to march twelve hours a day. Twelve hours of marching with breaks every two hours would leave them less than eight hours to sleep at night by the time the camp was made and food cooked.

  And what would he find when he reached Marathon?

  Gorgo slipped gently from her marriage bed so as not to disturb her sleeping husband. She pulled a peplos over her naked body, dispensing with breast-bind and chiton at this time of night. She moved out onto the exterior stairs, avoiding the nursery, where her children might not be sleeping as soundly as she hoped.

  The moon was high and only a sliver short of full. It lit up t
he night so brightly that the potted plants cast sharp shadows onto the terra cotta of the terrace, and turned the leaves of the apple trees silver as they shivered and swayed in a light breeze. Farther away, Taygetos stood out sharply against the bright sky.

  Gorgo could see her footing clearly as she descended the stone stairs to the courtyard. The limestone steps were rough but still warm under her bare feet. At the foot of the stairs she was met by one of the cats, who trotted out to rub herself against Gorgo’s legs. Gorgo leaned down to pet her without thinking.

  Everything seemed so normal, so peaceful, but it wasn’t. Somewhere roughly 150 miles to the north, tens of thousands of barbarians threatened Athens, and if Athens fell, Lacedaemon would be next. Darius had defeated one nation after another. He had put down every revolt against him―and there had been many! He did not suffer insubordination. He did not tolerate diversity or dissent. Darius saw himself, as Danei explained it, as the representative of the one true God, Ahuramazda. He believed that he, Darius, had been sent to bring order out of chaos. Darius despised the Greeks precisely because they were organized in hundreds of squabbling cities, always at war with one another. He believed it was his duty to civilize the Greeks. He had offered to do so without bloodshed or oppression when he gave them the opportunity to submit without warfare. Instead they had killed his ambassadors, confirming all his prejudices against them.

  Now Persia came not just to civilize them, but to punish them for their impudence. It would be far better for Sparta to face the inevitable at the side of Greece’s most populous city than to do it alone. It would have been better for Sparta to have responded at once to the plea for help. Gorgo understood all that. She understood her husband’s urgency to march north―and she knew, too, that she would have been insulted if the ephors and Assembly had chosen anyone other than her husband to command the army.

  But she couldn’t shake the unease that filled her, either. She knew her role as a Spartan wife was to smile and wave as her husband marched off to war. She knew it would be unforgivable to voice any regret or concern. Leonidas was only doing his duty, and he would be accompanied by two thousand other citizen-soldiers―the entire active army. Furthermore, Leonidas had confided in her that his orders were to join the Athenians and fight with them, but to return without engaging the Persians if he found Athens already defeated. He was not being sent out to fight a hopeless battle against all odds. If Athens was still defiant, his troops would form part of a much larger force; if Athens had caved in, he would not be asked to fight at all, but to return to Lacedaemon with his entire force intact so they could prepare to defend Lacedaemon with their Peloponnesian allies closer to home. Either way there was a risk, but no certainty, of death. She ought to be able to face this with more fortitude than she felt.