by Mike Rogers
At the end of the night he let a mighty alcohol-laden belch, which accidentally struck a lamp and caused a flame at least half an arm long, and retired to his ship. Much to my despair, Anaxis followed the man to sleep aboard his ship and I was already feeling nauseated at the prospect of sleeping with the smelly man in confined quarters. The next day, we sailed for Athens. There Anaxis had another meeting with someone far more important and a lot less sickening.
Chapter 3
A week later we arrived in Athens, much to my relief. The entire sea voyage had been one long torment on my stomach and smelling organ. From the minute we left the harbor of Sparta, I hung over the side of the boat puking my guts out and this until the moment I set foot on an Athenian dock. The cause of my sickness had not been sea sickness, as one was to expect. Nor was it food poisoning or a lack of fresh fruit. No, it was the smell that dominated Mistra's ship. For it appeared that it was not just Mistra who never bathed nor cleaned his teeth. No, it turned out it was common policy aboard his ship. The other crewmembers, all of them hardened pirates, seemed allergic to soap and clean water. So was the barge, for that matter. The deck hadn't been cleaned in years and was covered in a mixture of fish-oil, excrement and blood. The entire vessel, along with its crew, stank so hard not even seagulls approached it, and when one did, it dropped dead on deck. When I asked my master about this strange policy, he revealed to me that Mistra used the smell as a weapon against other pirates. Everyone could smell Mistra approaching from three nautical miles far—sometimes even six, depending on the winds—and didn't dare to attack. Not because of fear of Mistra or his crew, rather that they'd never get rid of the stench if they were to set a foot on deck. And so Mistra must have been the only pirate in the Mediterranean who never got boarded by another pirate vessel once in a while.
But as soon as we arrived in Athens I was ordered to find us an inn where we could stay for several days. Anaxis claimed he had some unfinished business in the city, which needed his complete attention, so I was granted a large amount of freedom to prepare for the upcoming travel. As ordered, I bought four additional donkeys and supplies for several days.
After having haggled to a good price with a salesman on the daily market, I had some time left to visit the Acropolis. I bought a lamb and had it sacrificed in the temple devoted to Zeus, protector of all mankind. I prayed intensely to him for protection and guidance in the future and then left.
Upon my arrival at the inn, Anaxis was already waiting for me. He was wearing his Hoplite armor, complete with bronze helmet and scarlet cape. His sword dangled menacing by his side, slapping against his thigh with each step. As he approached me, he handed me a Falcata, a sword with a slight bend in the middle often used by cavalry, and ordered me to follow.
We crossed several streets before stopping in front of a rather luxurious inn that had a guard posted at the front of the door. The man stared at Anaxis and turned paler than the marble floor on which he stood, and I noticed his right hand moving slowly towards his own sword. Anaxis simply walked towards the guard who stiffened. He stopped in front of him and said, “Glad to see you still recognize me, Marcus, despite the helmet. I assume he's in his room?”
The pale guard nodded frantically and seemed to shrink to the size of a midget.
“Which room?” Anaxis said with his deep menacing voice. Marcus seemed to struggle on that question, undoubtedly thinking about the consequences of his answer. If he told Anaxis, he'd probably have to deal with whomever it was he betrayed, but if he didn't tell Anaxis he would surely be in for a brutal beating until he gave the answer anyway.
Luckily, Marcus wasn't of the bravest sort and gave the answer to Anaxis rather easy, along with a small puddle of urine seeping down his legs…
Anaxis smiled as he went upstairs to look for his target. Never before had I seen my master so angry, so horrifying. With steps that launched him across the stairs in three or maybe four turns, he reached the upper floor, and before I knew it, he rammed the solid oak door out of the second room in the hallway. I drew my blade, but he still hadn't and this surprised me. Why bother dressing up in battle-gear and not draw your sword?
As I entered the room, I watched my master strike down another guard, who had drawn a knife as he heard the door being forced open, but he had not had the time to use it. He lay suffocating on the floor with a crushed windpipe, gasping for air. And then there was Aurelius.
Anaxis had a tight hold of a man who was sitting behind a desk under the window. His right arm had been twisted behind his back, and the man lay screaming in pain as Anaxis twisted even harder.
“Hello, Aurelius. Remember me?”
The flabby roman screamed out in pain once more.
“Ah! Yes, yes! Of course I remember you! How could I forget?! The champion of Rome! The greatest gladiator in history!”
I marveled at this revelation. What had my master gotten himself into? He had mysteriously disappeared a year earlier and resurfaced only recently, not giving a single explanation to his whereabouts for the missing time. Many had asked questions, none had received answers. Not even I. How did he know this Roman? He hated Romans, despised them profoundly. And now he was talking to this Aurelius as if he knew him intimately?
I heard a snap and a pop and realized the Roman's shoulder had been dislocated. An agonizing scream filled the room, and Anaxis smiled even harder.
“Now then, let's get down to business. I know you placed a rather large wager on my last fight in the arena and that you won an even bigger sum. Fifty thousand Talents if I am not mistaken.”
My breath stopped. Fifty thousand Talents! That was ten times the entire tribute Greece paid to Rome each year.
“Now I think I am entitled to some of that money, don't you? After all, it was I who did all the fighting and not you.”
Aurelius screamed even harder and shouted, “All right! All right! How much do you want?!”
Anaxis lowered his head until his mouth was directly aside the Roman's ear and said, “All of it. And by tomorrow evening.”
Aurelius started laughing out loud. “You think I can get that kind of money in a mere day? You are mad! This is Athens, not Rome!”
Anaxis drew his blade at long last and stuck it right through Aurelius' left hand, severing three fingers. The Roman squealed like a pig being led to the butcher and blood splattered all over the desk.
Anaxis twisted the blade and Aurelius nearly fainted from sheer agony.
“This is Sparta! Wherever I go, it is Sparta, do I make myself clear?! And I am just like Sparta: brutal and unforgiving! I want my money ready by tomorrow night, or you will not live to see the sun rise again!”
And with those words we left the severely wounded Roman. As my master wiped the blood of his blade, I asked if he wasn't worried about the Roman trying to run.
Anaxis merely smiled and shook his head no. “I just took off three fingers. What do you think I'll do when he runs?”
“Probably cut off his balls and force him to eat them.” I stated as a mere fact.
“Exactly. Would you run, knowing that?”
I shook my head no. The Roman wouldn't run either.
The next day we returned to the inn and found Aurelius in his room. The Roman was surrounded by sacks of money and nursed his wounded hand with a grim look in his eye.
Anaxis checked the money and after being convinced the complete sum was there, he ordered me to load them onto the mules I had bought earlier. After taking the last of the money and putting it on the mules, I returned to Aurelius' room to warn my master. As I opened the door, I found a horrific scene. Aurelius had been pinned to the wall with my master's sword and was still alive. He writhed and kicked against the plaster wall to be free, but Anaxis pinned him down with his elbow. His hand covered the Roman's mouth so no one would be able to hear his screams. A few moments later, the fat Roman was dead.
His lifeless corpse was still hung dangling on the wall as we left. Anaxis abandoned his Spartan swo
rd, claiming it was a message for Aurelius' partners. Word of the murder and the Spartan sword spread throughout the city within days and within a week there wasn't a Roman slave trader to be found in the entire city. My master's message had been clear: Anaxis has returned…with a vengeance.
I still marveled at how these men knew my master. He had been to Rome that much I had understood. He had also fought in the arena there, which I didn't understand, nor believed.
But when I asked a question about it, my master merely glanced furiously at me. I asked no further after that.
From that day on, my master replaced his sword for a Falcata, a strange and rather antiquated sword, even for a Spartan. It was much longer than an ordinary sword and had a bend in the middle towards the handle. It was this form that gave it an enormous strength, for it could strike down with the same force as an axe. I had seen Falcata's strike through someone's shield, helmet and skull in just a single blow. Yet it was not often used, for the sword was the new style of weapon and much easier to handle. The fact that my master abandoned the modern Spartan sword and went back to an old Spartan sword was of great meaning. He despised the new and weak Sparta and longed for the times of King Leonidas.
How was I to know he not merely longed for those days, but was planning on reviving them?
Chapter 4
The next day we rode out of Athens towards the northwest. Weeks we travelled until we finally arrived at our destination: Epirus. The voyage there was in all rights dull. We never encountered a single bandit or Roman, but all that changed when we got close to Epirus. The trade lanes were empty and nearly every house we found had been torched to the ground. Skeletons and half-rotten bodies still lay everywhere. The deeper we headed into Epirus, the worse it became, until finally we arrived at what had once been the city of Epirus itself. Immediately we noticed there was a small band of children rummaging through the ruins for food and other useful objects, but as I hailed them they dispersed.
“They're afraid the Romans have returned, Trimidites. Calling them will not help. We need to catch one of the little buggers.” Anaxis said.
Half an hour later my master returned with a fourteen-year-old boy in his arms. The youth had a black eye and was unconscious, but Anaxis merely grunted.
“The young one resisted.” He said, indicating I had to wake the boy up. A bucket of cold water did the trick and as the youth awoke, he found himself between the two of us.
With fear in his eyes he stared at Anaxis, who said, “Fear not. I am a Spartan, not a Roman. I am here to help.”
The youth kicked Anaxis in the shins, who did not even seem bothered by it, and shouted, “Here to help?! Where was Sparta when the Roman legions marched into town and destroyed everything?!”
Anaxis sighed deeply and placed his hands on the young man's shoulders.
“I know. I am here to rectify that mistake. What is your name?”
The youth stretched himself to his full length and said, “Krateros, son to General Licurgos.”
Anaxis smiled and said, “Ah, I know your father's reputation and even met him once. He was a brave man. I am sorry to hear the Romans killed him in the battle, Krateros.”
Krateros did not cry, as I had expected him to do but merely pushed away Anaxis' hands.
“One day I will avenge his death,” the youth said, determined.
Anaxis nodded and asked, “What is it that you want above all things?”
Krateros' eyes lit up with a fire I had never seen before as he said, “To kill Romans! All Romans!”
Anaxis nodded and said, “Then your wish will be granted. I am raising an army and want you to be in it, Krateros. I can always use young men, and if you have a fraction of the mind of your father I am certain you will make a fine commander.”
The young man seemed startled by this. Even I found this odd, for Krateros was an underfed, dirty, lice-infested and smelled even worse than a dead cadaver. A commander was to be made out of this scrawny boy? Had Anaxis lost his mind altogether? I gave him a glance that showed my concern, but Anaxis merely looked at me and said, “Lice can be exterminated, Trimidites. And so can Romans.”
Anaxis ordered the young man to go up into the hills, where the few survivors of the city had taken refuge, and tell them to come down. He told the young man he had plenty of food with him and that he wanted to take them to safer ground. Of the money he did not speak, at least not yet.
Within a week the ruins of Epirus counted five hundred women, one thousand men and two thousand children. When Anaxis was sure he had gathered most of the refugees, he addressed them as a group.
Standing on top of a rock, he overlooked the collection of miserable human beings and shouted, “My fellow Greeks, hear me! Sparta did not come to the aid of your king when it was needed, and it will not come today. But I, as a Spartan, feel ashamed by the current policy of most Greek states! Rather than crushing the Roman peasants, they allow them to infiltrate our lands and ruin everything that is dear to us! And if one refuses to bow to them, as your King did, then they are crushed by steel and fire! Well, I say no more! I say it is time we take back our freedom and our Greece! I am in the possession of fifty thousand Talents and plan on using them to raise an army to crush Rome for once and for all! And the place to begin will be Epirus! The first march of my army will be onto Macedonia and wring it out of the dead fingers of that bastard Paullus!”
The gathered refugees cheered in excitement, eager for revenge for their suffered misery.
But Anaxis had not yet finished his speech.
“I know you have all suffered and you are at the end of your strength! Yet I need to ask you all, who will join me? Who will march with me to crush the Roman filth under our boots? Who of you here will prove himself worthy to reclaim what rightfully belongs to them? Who?!”
Three thousand voices simultaneously roared, “I!”
Over and over again these broken people roared to be part of a machine of war that might just as easily be their downfall or their saving, but Anaxis knew he had gathered the first shimmer of an army on that day, and he smiled.
In the following week the group of refugees staggered into the nearest town where Anaxis bought supplies and medical attention for those who needed it. He gathered the refugees one more time there and told them it was their last chance to get out if they wanted. Except for a few elderly none left. Anaxis gave those staying behind enough gold to last a lifetime, which caused dreadful emotional scenes. Women cried out loud, kissing his feet, thanking him for his kindness. Old men and disabled veterans cried as babies when he pressed the heavy pouch into their hand, staring at the ground and exclaiming their shame for not being able to protect their king. Anaxis told them they did their best and that there was nothing to be ashamed for. And then we left…
At the end of the week we had three thousand soldiers, of which a large number were too old or too young, but Anaxis had not the heart to send them away. He had made Krateros a general, teaching the youth on various tactics, and found the youth to be a quick learner and in the possession of some wit. Given time the young man would make a great commander, or so Anaxis reckoned. For the time being the title would have to be symbolic, but my master had no doubt the youth would be an actual general in time.
We marched for several days until we encountered a city large enough to provide the entire army with horses and carts. The men were fitted with a horse and the woman and children placed on the carts, and so we moved on, towards the Thracian mountains. A month later we arrived at Byzantium, deep in the heart of Thracia, with some ten thousand men. Anaxis had picked up scattered refugees and soldiers from small villages and towns we had met on our way. We had deliberately avoided great cities to stay clear of Roman spies. When we arrived in Byzantium the city's governor approached our army with some caution. It wasn't until he saw Anaxis that the old man's face cleared up. He rode up with a small bodyguard and halted right in front of Anaxis.
“Anaxis, is that you? I had been told
you died!” the governor said, who I found out was named Cerzula.
Anaxis merely smiled and embraced the old man. “Not even Hades could hold me, old man! It has been far too long since we met.”
Cerzula nodded and roared in laughter. “If only your father were still among us! We could have had a celebration like in the old days, when we were still young and you were just a small boy playing horsy on my knee.”
Anaxis smiled and said, “Aye. But as in those times, I am here with a special request.”
Cerzula's face turned to a stern look and he said, “Mercenaries. You're assembling an army. But as far as I know Sparta is not at war with anyone. What are you up to?”
Anaxis lay his arm around the man's shoulder and said, “That has little matter now, old man. I will tell you tonight, when we feast like in the old days. In the meantime, have my army camping inside the city, if you'd be so kind.”
Cerzula nodded and smiled, “It's good to see you, you bastard! Still a cheeky little rascal! Ha!”
And so both men left for the governor's house and feasted all throughout the night, which for Anaxis very un-Spartan.
The next morning Anaxis and the governor went to work. Three dozen couriers left with bags of gold to the Thracian mountains to seek contact with the primitive tribes that lived there. For centuries they had been a solid base for recruiting mercenaries and now Anaxis relied on them as well. These men were huge, strong, brutal and fearless. They could ride a horse like no other man and used a special kind of sword that made them highly lethal.
The fifty thousand Talents we had brought with us were already halfway depleted and one morning, after having paid a particular high food-bill for the gathering army, Anaxis and I came to blows.