raised his hand in surrender.
And then we were lighting the fires, and men were preparing
for fighting in armour. I was tired, and I suspected that I had won
the games. I was surprised at my own hesitation.
Is this how cowardice begins, I wondered, or how youth
ends?
But I tied my corslet back on my torso, picked up my shield
and went down the beach to the fires, with Idomeneus carrying
my shield and my sword.
Aristides grinned sheepishly at me and shook his head. He
was wearing a clean chitoniskos, and no armour.
‘That brute almost kiled me,’ he said ruefuly. He grinned at
the ‘brute’ to take the sting out of his remark. ‘I want to live to
fight the Medes.’
I nodded. I felt the same way myself, but I also felt that as
one of the best fighters, I would be seen to shirk if I balked at
the armoured combat. Paramanos helped me into my armour
and gave me a drink of wine.
and gave me a drink of wine.
‘I think the gods have stolen your wits,’ he said. ‘Fighting
your friends in the dark with sharp weapons. Grow up!’ But he
cuffed me on the back and wished me good fortune. ‘Not much
of a field, eh?’
There were only a couple of dozen men brave enough, or
foolish enough, to fight with sharp weapons, in armour, at the
edge of dark. Many of them were Athenians and Milesians. ‘The
fewer the men, the greater the honour,’ I said, but I remember
giving him a sarcastic grin to go with the line from Pindar.
I faced Aeschylus’s brother in the first round, and he hit hard,
cutting pieces from the oak rim of my shield, but I ticked him in
the pectoral under his sword arm on our third engagement,
drawing blood from a place that showed when he overexposed
his side in a long sweeping cut. The cut itself was under his
armour, and I had to make him take the breastplate off to show
it, and he was as surprised as Dionysius. I was awarded the
victory, and the young man apologized for doubting my word.
I had a long rest, and my muscles started to stiffen before my
second bout – which was against another Athenian.
Sophanes. Of course.
He was good – fast, light on his feet, careful. He wanted to
dance.
I faced him with the opposite strategy. I stood my ground,
barely reacting, offering nothing, alowing him to dance while I
waited with bovine patience.
There isn’t much to hit on a man wearing Greek armour and
greaves and fighting behind an aspis or a Boeotian. I stood my
greaves and fighting behind an aspis or a Boeotian. I stood my
ground, backing from his wilder rushes, and waited him out.
After a number of engagements – some men were booing me,
because I was so dul – my blade licked out and cut him on the
bicep, and it was over.
‘You fight like an old man,’ Miltiades said to me.
‘I plan to be one,’ I said, which got a good response.
Most men felt I had won the games by that time, and my
friends began to gather, dumping wine on my head, kissing me or
throwing their arms around me. Epaphroditos and two of his men
picked me up, carried me to the edge of the water and threw me
in. Then a smal crowd came and fished me out, and I cursed
them for the effect on my armour.
The third round was just two of us. Too many bouts resulted
in double hits, or real wounds, and knocked both men out of the
competition. In our rules then, a double hit disqualified both men.
So it was me – and Istes.
He was reputed to be the greatest swordsman in Greece.
So was I.
It was stil bright enough to fight, and we had fires lit on either
side of us, and I think almost every man in the fleet was on that
beach for our fight. If I had thought I had word-fame before that
fight, I realized that every oikia in Greece would know me after
this.
When we faced each other, we reached out our blades and
touched them together. Istes grinned under his helmet, and I
grinned back.
grinned back.
‘Let’s show them what excelence is,’ he said.
What can I say? He was a great man.
Both of us must have decided the same thing – to dispense
with the slow testing that most swordsmen employ in a bout.
When Dionysius lowered his spear, we closed – instantly – and
the crowd roared.
I threw three blows in as many heartbeats, and he fought
back, a blur of motion, and our swords left sparks in the air.
Then we circled apart, and neither of us was touched, and the
crowd roared.
As if by consent, we closed again immediately, and this time I
launched a combination – an overhead cut to draw his shield and
then a punch with my shield rim and a back-cut to score on his
thigh. I have no idea what he planned, but our shields struck –
rim to rim, a jar like an earthquake up your arm – and my back-
cut fouled with his overhead cut as I turned my body. I kicked
out with my right foot as we both rotated on our hips and I
caught him behind the knee – luck, I suspect – and he went
down, roling away. He roled right over his aspis, something
that, up until then, I had never seen a man do, and came to his
feet a horse-length away.
If I had thought the crowd loud before, they were a force of
nature now.
We saluted each other, and charged – shield to shield. Both
of us cut high, and our blades rang together – back-cut, fore-cut.
For the third time we fel back, and stil neither of us bore a
For the third time we fel back, and stil neither of us bore a
wound.
I had never faced anyone like him. He was as graceful as a
dancer and as fast as me, with arms as long as mine.
Our next engagement was as cautious as the first three had
been heroic, and we both tried counter-cuts at each other’s
wrists.
He was a bit faster. And he could do a wrist movement I had
never seen – a rol of the blade that caused a direction change so
fast I couldn’t believe Calchas hadn’t known it.
I gave ground at his next rush and tried a complex feint to get
a cut at his shoulder – the same combination I’d used so
successfuly against Sophanes.
Instead, we had a chaotic muddle, as he was feinting into my
feint. Both of us closed, our shield rims slipped inside each other
and suddenly we were chest to chest.
I rotated on my hips to get away and saw my opening as I
stepped back. I kicked with my left foot, straight to his hip, and
he leaned out, went flat on his back – and the tip of his sword
caught me on the sandal.
He was down, and I stepped over him – he’d gone down on
his shield. He was mine – but he was grinning.
‘Wel fought, brother,’ he said.
Then I felt the cold/hot of a cut – on my ankle, but my head
resisted it for a heartbeat.
I’m proud to say that no man would ever have seen that
wound. I wor
e Spartan shoes, as I always did to fight, and his
blade, by some il fate, had slid between the leather and the ankle
blade, by some il fate, had slid between the leather and the ankle
bone to cut me. The wound was invisible, and darkness was
faling. I’m proud, because although I felt the sly temptation to
act the coward’s part, I stepped back from Istes, the best
swordsman I ever faced in a contest, and saluted him as he got
to his feet. Then I put my sword and shield on the ground,
unlaced my sandal and showed him the cut.
Perhaps some sighed for disappointment, but most approved.
And Istes wrapped his arms around my shoulder and headbutted
me, helmet to helmet – not in anger, but in elation.
He got the crown of olives. I got a cut on the foot. But we
both felt like heroes.
The sun was a red bal on the horizon when al the winners
sacrificed – even Philocrates – and I was declared winner of the
games. I suspect Istes would have won if he had competed in
two or three more contests, and I think Aristides would have
won if he had had better fortune. Fortune is so much a part of a
contest. But I won – my second games.
When I had sacrificed again, and put my crown on my head,
I offered to take the archer’s crown to the Persian camp.
People seemed to think that fitting.
I wore a chiton, because the Medes aren’t big on nudity, and
I wore my crown, and I ran across the no-man’s-land with a
torch.
The sentries were waiting. They were al Persians of the
satrap’s guard, led by Cyrus, and they had, apparently, watched
the games al day. They cheered me.
I bowed to Cyrus.
I bowed to Cyrus.
‘Are you the man who shot the arrow?’ I asked.
Cyrus gave a dignified smile. ‘Don’t you think that would be
the feat of a younger, more foolish man?’ he said.
And then I saw that Artaphernes was there. And my heart
almost stopped.
Artaphernes came forward, and I bowed, as I had been
taught as a slave. I was never one of those Greeks who refused
obeisance. Foolishness. I bowed to him, and he smiled at me.
‘Young Doru,’ he said. ‘It is no surprise to any of us that you
are the best of the Greeks. Why have you come here?’
‘I come bearing the prize for archery, voted by acclamation
of al the Greeks to the Persian archer who dared to wade to our
shore and shoot – a magnificent shot. I am to say that had he
remained, only honour would have come to him.’ I handed the
chaplet of olives and the arrow to the satrap of Lydia.
Artaphernes had tears in his eyes. ‘Why are we at war?’ he
asked. ‘Why are you Greeks not one with us, who love honour?
Together, we could conquer the world.’
I shook my head. ‘I have no answer, lord. Only a prize, and
the good wishes of our army for the man who shot that arrow.’
He presented the prizes to Cyrus – as I had expected. And
while the Persians cheered their man, Artaphernes stood next to
me.
‘Have you seen our fleet?’ he asked.
‘We wil defeat it,’ I said, with the daimon stil strong on me.
‘Oh, Doru,’ he said. He took my hand and turned me to face
him, despite the crowd of men around us and his guards. ‘You
saved my life and my honour once. Please alow me to save
yours. You have no hope at al of winning this battle.’
‘I honour you above al the men of the Parsae I have known,’
I said. ‘But we wil defeat you tomorrow.’
He smiled. It was a wintry smile, the sort of smile a man gives
a woman who has refused his hand in marriage.
He clasped my hand like an equal – a great honour for me,
even among Greeks – and kissed my cheek.
‘If you survive the battle,’ he said into my ear, ‘I would be
proud to have you at my side.’
I started as if he had spat poison in my ear. ‘If I capture you,
I wil treat you like a prince,’ I responded. And he laughed.
He was the best of the Persians, and he was Briseis’s
husband. The world is never simple.
7
The next day, it rained, and the next as wel, which was as wel
for al the Greeks, as many of us had smal wounds, aches and
pains that would not have served us wel in the heat of battle.
The Samians began to behave badly. Many of their oarsmen
refused to patrol, despite the Persian fleet being just twenty
stades across the bay. Their odd behaviour enraged the Lesbians
and the Chians. There were fist fights, accusations of cowardice.
We on the shore of Miletus were protected from al that, but
not from the Persian army laying siege to Miletus. As if the
unspoken truce of the games was over, the Persians attacked
our sentries the very next dawn, shooting men on the wicker wal
we’d woven to protect our ships, like the Achaeans at Troy.
When it happened again the next day, I decided to do something
about it.
On the third night, Idomeneus, Phrynichus, Philocrates and al
On the third night, Idomeneus, Phrynichus, Philocrates and al
our marines slept, if you care to cal it that, out in the rain, on the
rocks north of our camp. It was a miserable night, long and
tedious, but we were rewarded when, after a lashing
thunderstorm that hid the first paling of the sky, we heard the
teltale clash of metal on stone that heralded the Persians moving
up to their usual harassment position.
This morning’s attackers were a dozen Lydian peasants with
slings, and a hand of actual Persians, al officers come for the fun,
talking quietly as they moved across the rocks, their magnificent
bows already strung.
They walked to the same point on the rocks they had used
the day before. Our northernmost sentry was fuly visible, his
dark cloak nicely outlined in the growing light, and al five Persian
officers drew together and let fly.
I’m sure al their arrows hit the target, but I didn’t see, as I
was moving. And the ‘sentry’ was made of baskets, anyway.
I don’t remember much of the first part of that fight, because
there was so little struggle. The Lydians were just shepherds, and
they surrendered.
Not the Persians. The Persians were a tougher proposition,
five of them and four of us on a smooth piece of rock. It might
have been part of the games. They came at us as soon as they
saw us.
My first opponent was an older man with a heavy beard dyed
bright red with henna. He had an axe at his belt and a short
sword covered in beautiful goldwork that shone in the rising sun.
sword covered in beautiful goldwork that shone in the rising sun.
I remember wanting that sword.
I had a shield, my light Boeotian, and a spear – one of the
short ones we used then, a man’s spear, not one of these long
things you use today.
Truth to tel, a man with an axe and a short sword has no
chance against a man with a shield. But no one had told the old
man, and he came for me fast and
determined – like a man who
knew his tools. I put my spear-point into his chest, and it glanced
off – he had a coat of scales under his cloak – but I knocked him
down with the force of my blow. He put a gaping cut in the face
of my shield with his axe.
Two of the other Persians leaped at me, ignoring Idomeneus
and Phrynichus. Both attacked me with a ferocity that belied the
Persian reputation as careful fighters. They attacked like
Thracians, al war cries and whirling cloaks. I took two wounds
in as many heartbeats – nothing serious, but enough to drive me
back.
But Phrynichus and Idomeneus were true men, and they were
not going to let me die. Idomeneus speared the bigger Persian
through the side. The man screamed, but he must already have
been dead. The smaler man continued to rain blows on me while
he baffled Phrynichus with his cloak. He was a canny fighter, and
he used his cloak as a shield and a weapon, and Phrynichus
stumbled back when he got a cloak weight in the head. But I had
my feet under me, and I thrust hard with my spear, hitting the
Persian in the head. His helmet gave under my spear-point –
shoddy work, and no mistake – and he died like a sacrifice, his
shoddy work, and no mistake – and he died like a sacrifice, his
sinews loosing as if I’d cut them.
Philocrates was fighting the older man and another opponent,
and they were both retreating across the rock face. Philocrates
was everywhere – his spear was high and low, and he kept
moving, facing one and then another, heedless of the bad footing.
The two Persians wanted no more of the fight, I could tel, but
backed steadily away, abandoning their comrades.
The fifth Persian shot Phrynichus with his bow. The shot was
hurried, and the arrow struck the Athenian in the helmet. Unlike
the Persian helmet, Phrynichus’s good Corinthian held the point,
but he fel, unconscious from the blow. The archer now put a
second arrow to his bow and turned to Philocrates.
I threw my spear. The range was short, and in those days any
spear you carried could be thrown.
I hit the archer and knocked him flat with the strength of the
blow, but even as I threw, Philocrates missed his footing and fel
on the rocks, and the younger Persian leaped to finish him.
I sprang forward, but Idomeneus was faster, throwing his
spear. He missed his target, but the tumbling shaft caught the
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