Marathon: Freedom or Death lw-2

by Christian Cameron

  ‘See red-scarf? He’s got a death wish — oops! Wish come true.’

  ‘White-belt? He’s getting ready to step out to get that fascine — here he comes. You missed left. Now he’s going to come around the other side of the wicker shield — ooh, nice. Dropped like a sack of barley.’

  ‘Teucer?’ I asked.

  ‘Oh!’ He put his bow down and embraced me. ‘A pleasure to see you, my lord.’

  I sat on my haunches after an enemy arrow ruffled my chlamys. ‘Hot work here.’

  Teucer laughed. ‘This is my life, these days.’

  ‘Care to ship out for the battle?’ I asked as casually as I could manage.

  He glanced at me, shot another arrow and exchanged a long look with his spotter. ‘We can’t,’ he said, after a delay so long I thought I’d offended him.

  The spotter was Kreusis, a younger archer who’d also served aboard my ship. His face was marked with soot and I hadn’t recognized him at first. ‘Sorry, lord. Histiaeus would cut our ears off. We’re to hold the Windy Tower while you sailors fight their fleet. Our lord is afraid of an escalade during the sea-fight.’

  I couldn’t argue with that. It was the sort of thing I’d have tried myself.

  I handed Teucer a bag of things from his friends on the Storm Cutter — a skin of wine, a sack of dried Athenian sausage and other delicacies — for a city under siege. He and Kreusis ate bread and sausage as I watched.

  I also had a letter from his wife, who had wintered in Kallipolis and who I’d sent to Plataea when the weather broke with a pouch of money and a long letter.

  He wept a little as he read it, then folded it away.

  Finally, I gave him the fine Persian bow I’d bought for him at Sardis. He took it without acknowledgement. It was just a tool to him — a sign of how far gone he was in his head.

  ‘We’re going to die here,’ he said. ‘But I know now — thanks to you — that my wife and son will live. Means a lot to me. Wish I could sail with you — sail away.’

  I told him to stop talking nonsense — that the Persians were as good as beaten. But I could tell he was beyond such things. I’ve been there: when the horizon is no longer the next week, or the next day even — it is merely the next instant. When you are there, you cannot see out.

  We embraced again and I climbed down the tower, thinking dark thoughts.

  Phrynichus was still talking to Istes. I hugged the swordsman. ‘We’ll win,’ I said.

  ‘You’d better,’ he answered.

  As Phrynichus and I walked back from the harbour, a couple of Persian archers had a go at us, racing along the rocks above us. That’s terror — being shot at from long range with no chance of reply. We had to wade to get around the end of their lines and we couldn’t move fast, and I cursed my arrogance in going by day. And not bringing a shield.

  One of the Persians gave a great scream and plummeted from his rock into the sea. I walked over and retrieved his bow and arrows — soaked, but not ruined.

  I saw Teucer waving from the wall. He’d shot the man at some incredible distance — Phrynichus has that shot in the play, of course.

  Phrynichus shrugged — he was a cool man in the rage of Ares. ‘It’s a little like living in the Iliad,’ he said.

  ‘Imagine what a jumpy bunch they were, after ten years at Troy,’ I said, and the poet nodded.

  ‘I was thinking of Istes,’ he said.

  ‘Exactly,’ I said.

  Idomeneus claimed my new bow as soon as I reached the ship — dried it, restrung it and shot at everything that he could. He was an excellent bowman, as I’ve said before, and he’d decided that he needed a bow in the coming sea-fight, which was fine with me. After all, Archilogos’s archers had unsettled me in the fight by the harbour.

  He told us that the Persians were coming. ‘They’re camped just down the coast,’ he said. ‘Epaphroditos has seen them.’

  Later that afternoon, Leagus, Dionysius’s helmsman, came across in a skiff and went to Miltiades for permission to hold the games on our beach. We were delighted, and Miltiades and Aristides competed to build fires, lay out courses and prepare an altar and sacrifices.

  The next day dawned grey, with weather threatening from the west. But the athletes came across in boats, and more than a few swam the half-stade in their exuberance, arrogance or poverty.

  Miltiades acted as host, and he and Dionysius sat together in apparent camaraderie, made sacrifices with the priests and watched the competitions as if they were brothers. All of us were delighted by this display of propriety. We were further delighted when the men of Miletus sent a contingent to compete, led by Histiaeus and his brother Istes. They, too, sat under the great red awning that Miltiades had set up, and watched.

  The competitions were, in order, the one-stade run, the two-stade run, the javelin throw for distance, the throw for accuracy, the discus, archery for accuracy, the run in armour — the hoplitodromos, the pankration, the fight in armour. I had intended to enter only the fight in armour, but as I lay on my bearskin by the awning where the judges watched, young Sophanes of Athens came up, naked and glistening with oil, and squatted next to me.

  ‘You are the most famous man — as a fighter — in this host,’ he said. He gave me a shy smile. We had not been friends since I killed the thug in Athens. ‘I want to compete against you. These Ionians — most of them are hardly fit.’

  ‘Wait until you run against my friend Epaphroditos,’ I said. But his desire was genuine.

  ‘I. .’ He paused and looked around. ‘I think that I blamed you — that I had killed a man. It made me feel. .’ He stopped, blushed and looked at the ground between his feet.

  I nodded. ‘It made you feel greater and less than a man yourself, eh?’

  ‘You slaughtered that thief like a lamb. And made me look like a boy.’ He shrugged. ‘I am a boy. But I want to win today, and I want to win against the best. The noblest. And I came to say that I wronged you over the killing. I didn’t like what I had done — I made that part of you.’

  ‘Nicely put,’ I said. Goodness, he was earnest and polite and handsome and probably brave and morally good, to boot. He made me feel old at twenty-three. ‘But I have spent a year coming to terms with killing. What I did that day was ill done. I don’t regret the man I killed in the fight. But the man in the cellar — what Aristides says is true. That was murder. I have spent a year atoning to Lord Apollo, and all the gods, for my hubris.’

  Sophanes grinned. ‘Then you should run, lord. Competition is a sacrifice to the gods.’

  What could I do? He was right. Besides, he made me feel like a slacker. So I pulled my chlamys over my head, and Idomeneus came up with my aryballos, oiled me and smacked me on the back.

  ‘About time you got off your arse,’ he growled. He was very tender of my reputation, which in a way was his, as well.

  A word about exercise — though I normally try not to drone on about how much time I spent on my body every day — still do. When we were at sea, I rowed at least an hour a day with the oarsmen. The Pyrrhiche of Plataea included a set of exercises with an aspis, and I did that portion of the dance every day, lifting the shield over my head, and moving it back and forth across my body. On a full exercise day I would run eighteen to twenty stades and lift heavy stones in the way that Calchas taught me at the tomb of Leitos. In addition, I would practise against one of my marines with a wooden sword — some days, against all of them. My favourite sparring partner had become Philocrates. He was by no means the best of them, but he fought hard, and had long arms and was a dangerous opponent — with surprising inventiveness.

  At any rate, I tell you this so that you won’t think that I went soft between bouts of combat. None of us could afford to be soft in those days, when freedom from slavery depended on your ability to cut a rival down.

  I made the final heat in the one-stade run, and again in the two-stade run, where I finished second, to my own delight. Sophanes won the one-stade, and finished behind me in
the two-stade, which Epaphroditos won. I was surprised, and pleased, to see Stephanos’s cousin Harpagos run well in both events. He was, by virtue of his position, a gentleman now, and he rose to it. Some men cannot. I shared a canteen with him and Epaphroditos after the second heat. We laughed together and told each other that we were still the men we had been five years before.

  Stephanos placed well in the javelin throw for distance, and I lost the throw for accuracy by the width of a finger.

  I think it was at this point that I recognized I might win. For those of you who have drunk the heady wine of victory, you know this moment — when you start to pull away from the pack.

  The next contest was a surprise, as Philocrates — my Philocrates — won the discus throw with his first throw, a throw so far and so mighty that much bigger men simply shook their heads and declined to throw. They put the olive wreath on his head before the last men had thrown, and men said the gods had filled him, which made me laugh. But the victory made him a different man — open-faced and beaming with good will.

  ‘I have no idea where that throw came from!’ he said. ‘I’m still not sure it was me.’

  ‘Have you made your victor’s offering?’ I asked.

  ‘No,’ he said.

  ‘Do not forget,’ I said. ‘Blaspheme in private if you like, but if you serve on my ship, you make public obeisance.’

  When you are in command, you are always in command, children. Even when a man you call friend wins at the games. It pleased me to do well — but as commander, it pleased me more that many of my people were also doing well. I walked around and congratulated them.

  The sun was still high in the sky, and the judges declared an hour’s rest for all competitors. Then the archery started. The Lesbians had several fine archers, and the Samians had one, Asclepius, whose shots were so strong that I didn’t think he could be beaten. Most men’s arrows lofted into the target at fifty paces, but Asclepius’s arrows flew straight as if shot from Apollo’s bow. But as a group, the Cretans were the best.

  I was out in the first round. I can shoot a bow, but not with archers like these.

  Teucer was there, and he shot patiently and seriously. He just made the first cut and went on to the second round, the lowest-ranked man there. In the second round, he had to shoot against Asclepius. That was a bout to see — every arrow thudding home into the stretched hide at fifty paces, every shot inside the charcoal marking of the highest score. None of us had ever seen shooting like this. The judges sent both men to the third round with the issue undecided.

  Idomeneus also went to the third round, and one Lesbian, an archer in service to Epaphroditos. The four of them poured libations and drank wine together, and then the target hides were moved to one hundred paces.

  At that distance, even Asclepius had to loft his arrows. He shot first, and hit the charcoal every time. Idomeneus was next, and he placed two of his three arrows within the charcoal, but the third was caught by a flutter of breeze and sailed high over the target. We all sighed together, and Idomeneus bowed and was applauded by two thousand men — out of the competition, but with great honour. The Lesbian shot next, and only hit the charcoal once. He, too, received the applause of the whole army. Finally, Teucer stood to the line. He shot all three arrows so fast that a man who turned his head to speak to his neighbour might have missed the whole performance, and every shot went home in the charcoal.

  Now there was open argument about how to carry on — whether to award both men, or to move the target. Miltiades rose to his feet and held up the baton of the judges.

  ‘For the honour of Lord Apollo, we will have both of these men shoot again,’ he said. ‘Although we deem both worthy of holding the prize.’

  There was much applause, and the hides were moved to one hundred and fifty paces.

  At that range, a bull’s hide is smaller than the nail on your little finger. A moment’s inattention and your arrow drops short. At a hundred and fifty paces, a man with a Greek bow must aim it at the heavens to drop the arrow into the target.

  It was Teucer’s turn to shoot first. He used the Persian bow I had brought him, which pleased me. He shot one arrow, as directed, and it hit the charcoal.

  We roared for him.

  Asclepius took a long time with his shot. By his own admission, the Samian was an expert at close, flat shooting, and he didn’t excel at the long shots. He waited patiently for the breeze to die. There was no rule against it.

  I drank water.

  Suddenly, without warning, Asclepius lifted his bow and shot. His arrow went high — very high — and came down at a steep angle into the target. Dionysius proclaimed it in the charcoal and we roared again. This was competition, dear to the gods. I remember slapping Phrynichus on the back and saying that now he had something to write about.

  And then an arrow came from behind us. It lofted high over the spectators and the red awning where the judges sat, and it plummeted to earth like a stooping falcon to strike the target just a few feet from where Dionysius stood. He leaped in the air, and stumbled away.

  Because I was near the awning, drinking water, I turned and saw the archer, who had shot from at least two hundred and fifty paces. In fact, I counted later two hundred seventy paces. His shot hit the charcoal. He raised his bow in triumph, gave a long war cry and ran.

  He was a Persian. He must have slipped over the mudflats while we all watched the competition. He killed no Greek. He shot further, and better.

  Miltiades awarded him the prize — an arrow fletched in gold.

  We roared our approval — even Teucer and Asclepius, both of whom had shot like gods.

  But later — much later — I saw Teucer pace off the distance. Night was falling, and he thought that no man watched him. He raised his bow and his shaft fell true, but a fist of breeze moved it, and later he told me that he missed the charcoal by the width of his hand.

  We were elated by the shooting — the sort of heroism in which any Greek (and apparently, any Persian) might take joy.

  I put on my armour with some trepidation. It wasn’t really mine — it was a good bronze bell cuirass that Miltiades had given me, and while I liked it, it lacked the flexibility and lightness of the scale cuirass I had won in my first games — a cuirass that was hanging on its wooden form in my hall in Plataea with my shield and my war spears. A bronze cuirass never seems to fit just right over the hips. It flares there, so that the hips have full play in a long run, but that same flare makes a waist where much of the weight of the armour is borne, just over the hard muscles of the stomach, and that can make running uncomfortable.

  Worse by far is running in ill-fitting greaves. They snap over the lower leg, covering a warrior from the ankle to the knee, and if they are too big they slip and bite your arches, and if they are too small, they pinch your ankles and leave welts that bleed — even in one stade. I’d spent all my spare time fitting and refitting those greaves — a plain pair in the Cretan style, worn over linen wraps.

  It was a strong field — Epaphroditos, Sophanes, Stephanos, Aristides himself, Lord Pelagius’s nephew Nestor, Nearchos of Crete and his younger brother, Neoptolemus, Sophanes’ friend Glaucon, and Dionysius of Samos’s son Hipparchus, a fine young man without his father’s arrogance. He was next to me in the first heat, and I made the mistake of giving way at the first step — I never caught him. But I placed second, and went on to the next round.

  The men I named had all gone on in their rounds. We were down to two eights, and the men running were the heroes of our army, the champions of the East Greeks and their allies. I was proud just to run with them. I drank water, pissed some of it away and lined up, the aspis on my arm as heavy as lead after just one race.

  I was between Epaphroditos and Aristides, chatting with both, waiting for Miltiades to start us, when the cry went up.

  The Persian fleet was sailing around the point. Their fleet was immense, and it came and came and came. They crossed the bay under sail and put in to the beaches
at the foot of Mycale, and I stood on the shore and counted them.

  Five hundred and fifty-three ships, first to last, biremes and hemioliai included. Just two hundred more ships than we had, including all of our lighter ships.

  On the other hand, the Cyprians sailed like fools, and the Aegyptians were so wary that they edged away from us, though we didn’t launch a single ship.

  We took it as an omen, that the Persians had come while we competed. We watched them, and we laughed and called out to them to come and join us, and then, as if by common consent, we turned our backs on their display of imperial power and went back to our athletics.

  I remember that walk away from the shore, because I hated the aspis I had on my arm, an awkward thing with a badly turned bowl and an ill-fitting bronze porpax. I still had the cheap wicker Boeotian I had purchased on the beach at Chios a year before, a far less pretty shield with a split-ash face and a plain leather porpax, but it weighed nothing. In those days, there was no rule about competitions and shields, and besides, the Boeotian was, in fact, the shield I would carry to fight. I dropped my heavy aspis on my blanket roll, picked up my Boeotian and trotted to the start line.

  Aristides looked at my shield with interest. ‘Surely that big thing will impede your running,’ he said.

  I shrugged. ‘It weighs less on my arm,’ I said.

  ‘I seem to remember that you beat me in this race four years ago,’ he said.

  I grinned. ‘Luck, my lord. Good fortune.’

  Aristides smiled. ‘You are rare among men, Arimnestos. Most men would tell me that they were about to beat me again.’

  I shrugged, watching Miltiades go to the start line. ‘In a few heartbeats, we will know,’ I said.

  Epaphroditos laughed. ‘Listening to you two is like an education in arete,’ he said. ‘Me, I’ll just run my best. But for the record, Aristides, he may have beaten you in this race,’ he grinned, and his teeth sparked, ‘but I beat him, as I remember.’

  We all laughed. I remember it well, the eight of us laughing. In all the Long War, there were a few moments like that, that sparkled like bronze in the sun. We weren’t fighting for our lives. We weren’t freezing cold or burning hot. No one was going to die. We were comrades — captains, leaders, but men who stood together. Later, when all Greece was at the point of extinction, we never laughed like that.