by Jodi Taylor
I was crying with frustration. He wouldn’t make it. He knew it. I knew it. This was just some desperate last-minute attempt to get things back on course. It wouldn’t work. How could it?
‘I won’t let you do this. History can repair itself. If we weren’t here then it would have to. I’m mission controller, Tim, and I’m telling you now. Get back to the pod.’
‘If we weren’t here then we wouldn’t have to do it. Ephialtes would have had a quick slash behind a rock and they’d all be on their way by now. I’ll be fine. And I’ve got Markham.’
He sounded breathless.
‘What are you doing?’
‘Swapping clothes. Markham’s dressing Ephialtes in my gear.’
‘What for?’
‘I’m not lugging a naked man about,’ said Markham, primly. ‘That sort of thing can be open to misinterpretation. We can’t leave him here to raise the alarm when he comes round and we can’t kill him. I’ll get him back to the pod and you can keep an eye on him there and record the battle at the same time. Either he recovers or he doesn’t. The main thing is that the Persians get over the mountain tonight. Everything else is irrelevant, really.’
He was right. There was an awkward silence and then I heard Markham grunt as he heaved Ephialtes over his shoulder. He said to Peterson, ‘It’ll take them a while to get ten thousand men across the river and Hydarnes will want all his men safely on this side before they set off. I should easily be able to catch you up when I’ve dropped off buggerlugs here.’
What could I say? They were both of them almost certainly going to their deaths and I couldn’t be there with them.
‘We’ll try to leave our links open, but don’t call us, Max. We’ll call you.’
‘Understood. Good luck, both of you.’
‘It’ll be a piece of piss,’ said Markham. ‘You just wait and see.’
The link went silent as they parted. Markham on his way back to me, and Peterson to whatever awaited him down by the river.
Markham arrived far more quickly than I thought he would. He dumped Ephialtes at the Kallidromus site because we didn’t want him anywhere near the pod, and I arranged him in the recovery position. He was still out cold, breathing heavily. Markham donned armour and packed himself some extra water and a few high-energy biscuits. I passed him my stun gun.
‘Here, take this.’
‘I can’t leave you unprotected.’
‘I’m not. I’ve still got my trusty pepper spray.’
‘Max …’
‘No, I’m not important. If Peterson doesn’t get them over the mountain then I don’t know what we’ll do. What happens to me is pretty irrelevant.’
He took it.
‘Please, take care of him.’
‘I will. And you, Max, don’t you get into any trouble. I really don’t want to have to explain to Chief Farrell that I fell down on the job.’
He was good. I looked up from Ephialtes to find he’d faded away completely. I listened, but even with him moving around in all this loose rock, I couldn’t hear a thing.
Left to myself, I checked the patient – no change – and curled up against a rock. To my left were the Persian campfires. Down below, I could see the Greek lights. Somewhere out there, Peterson was leading ten thousand men through the night with only Markham to get him out of any trouble. By this time tomorrow, it would all be over. How many of us would still be alive?
It was a long and lonely night.
Peterson was necessarily silent, but he’d left his link open and I could hear everything that was happening around him. Murmuring voices. Feet sliding on rock. The odd curse from someone nearby. The faint chink of armour. His own heavy breathing as he struggled up the mountain. Given their numbers, they moved surprisingly silently, but these were the Immortals, Xerxes’ mountain troops, completely at home in this sort of terrain. There was no shouting and no sounds of violence, which I interpreted as a good sign.
Markham, on the other hand, was very chatty, guiding Peterson through the night, instructing him to bear a little more to his right, or turn left around that rocky outcrop. The moon was full and bright; Peterson should have no visibility problems. I think Markham was doing it for reassurance. Occasionally, he remembered to spare a word for me, reporting everything was going well.
I stared up at the same full moon that was lighting their way. Then I looked down at the stertorously breathing Ephialtes and wondered if we would ever be able to put things back on track.
The hours passed. I listened to Markham guiding Peterson guiding the Persians through the night. Surely if the Persians had any suspicions, they would have acted by now. Was it possible this would actually work? I watched the moon travel across the sky. How long till dawn?
And then it all went wrong.
All I could hear through my earpiece was a sound like waves, breaking on the shore. Surely, Peterson hadn’t got lost and found himself down on the coastal plain? No, of course not. As Herodotus recounts, they were making their way through an oak wood and this was the sound of ten thousand men kicking up the fallen leaves. Any minute now, they would encounter the Phocians, despatched by Leonidas to guard the path. They shouldn’t be a problem. They would assume the Persians had come for them and strategically retreat to higher ground where they would be safe. This, however, would leave the way open for the Persians who would sweep contemptuously past them and vanish into the night.
‘Bollocks!’ said Markham in my ear, his voice high with agitation and alarm. ‘No, no, no. That’s not right. Bloody hell! Max, can you hear me?’
‘What,’ I whispered, frantic with worry. ‘What’s not right? What’s going on?’
You’re just supposed to say, ‘Report.’ I always forget that.
‘The Phocians – they’re going to fight. They’re gearing up and advancing.’
‘What? No! They can’t do that. They’re supposed to run away. They’re not supposed to fight.’
Bloody hell. If they fight … if they hold the pass … if the Persians don’t get through … My mind skidded all over the place with the implications. We were here – at a major point in History and everything was changing around us. How can everything go so wrong so quickly?
‘It’s all right,’ said Markham, in my ear. ‘I’ve had an idea.’
‘What? What are you going to do?’
‘I’m going to get them to pull back.’
I opened my mouth to tell him no – and closed it again. He’d been with St Mary’s for years now. He knew the score. You don’t mess with History. Lives are always lost when you do. And we’d messed with History. We’d slugged Ephialtes, the most important man here tonight. We’d changed History and we had to put it back. Whatever the cost. I knew what he was thinking. This was his fault. He should make it right. In his place, I would do exactly the same thing. The best thing I could do for him was let him get on with it. Whatever he was going to do.
‘How?’
‘I’m going to attack. I’ve been sweating cobs underneath this armour all night, so I might as well get some use out of it. I can’t use my blaster on them, but I can spray some fire around. I’m going to frighten the living shit out of them. I suspect that now they’ve actually seen the Immortals in front of them, they’re halfway there, already. I attack the Phocians and by the time they realise it’s a trick, the Immortals will be well on their way and they won’t be able to do a thing about it.’
My heart sank. One man. He was only one man. What could he possibly do?
‘What about the Immortals themselves?’
‘My guess is that Xerxes’ orders are to let nothing stop them getting over this mountain. Unless they’re directly attacked, they won’t stop for anyone. That’s what I’m counting on, anyway.’
‘Good plan,’ I said, as calmly as I could. I took a second or two to get my voice steady. ‘Report back to me when you’ve finished.’
‘Copy that. Max …’
I swallowed. ‘Yes?’
He paused. I had the impression he was groping for words. I could hear him breathing. ‘Hunter …’
I closed my eyes. ‘Yes. I’ll …’ I took a deep breath. ‘I’ll …’ What would I do? ‘I’ll tell her.’
‘Thanks. Tell her I … well, you know. And tell her as well that if she … Well, that ugly bugger Randall’s been sniffing around and …’
I nodded, even though he couldn’t see me. ‘Are you asking me to tell her it’s OK to … to …?’
‘She won’t want to,’ he said with confidence. ‘I’m a hard act to follow, you know. I’m the standard against which all other men are measured.’
My eyes blurred. ‘Just get up that bloody hill,’ I said.
He laughed. ‘I’m going to close the link, Max. I think that’s best. You need to concentrate on your bit. Peterson, I’m going to have to leave you now. Good luck, everyone.’
I heard Peterson grunt an acknowledgement. It was all he could do. All the links went dead.
I sniffed hard and went to check on Ephialtes, who was still very deeply asleep. He lay on his side, his breathing was regular and his pulse strong. He was going to survive.
Which was more than could be said of Peterson and Markham. We’d joked about me being killed by my own wedding present. It never occurred to me it could be fatal for them, too. They could be dying at this very moment and there was nothing I could do about it.
I decided to concentrate on the things I could do something about. I moved a little way from our site, picking my way through the rocks, and drawing nearer to the edge of the plateau. I wanted to see if there was any movement yet from the Greeks. Dawn could surely not be far off. I found a comparatively flat piece of ground and wriggled forwards on my stomach.
I lay motionless for a long time, listening to the sounds of the night. An occasional insect whirred past my head, but mostly, all I could hear was the distinctive song of the every male cicada in the area. There must have been hundreds of them around to be making that amount of noise.
And then – quite suddenly – it stopped. Stopped dead. Absolute silence. Something was here. Something had disturbed them. I felt the hairs rise on the back of my neck.
My first thought was that Ephialtes had come round but no – conscious he might be, but walking was going to be beyond him for a good few hours yet. Which left …
I was an idiot. I’d made a terrible mistake. How stupid to assume the Spartans wouldn’t take advantage of the moon to send out scouting parties. Of course, they wouldn’t sit passively behind their lines. Leonidas would want as much information regarding the disposition and numbers of the enemy as he could get. The whole hillside was probably crawling with invisible Spartans. And they were good at it. Spartans moved as easily through the night as they did through the day. During training, boys would be sent out alone for long periods to fend for themselves. Anything was permitted. Murder was encouraged. Some poor helot would have his throat cut for any food he was carrying and never know what hit him.
This little plateau had an excellent view of events below. That was why we were here. And that was why the Spartans were here, too.
Ephialtes still lay like a dead man, concealed among the rocks. I sent up a prayer to the god of historians. Don’t let him wake up now. Or snort. Or grunt.
I was prone on my stomach, facing out over the Gulf of Malia. I had no idea what was going on behind me and if I twisted my head to find out, it would be the last thing I ever did. My face was filthy so that wasn’t a problem. My clothes were a sensible mottled green-grey mix. Just lie still, Maxwell, and fade into the earth. I tried to slow my breathing and not listen to my heart going like a hammer.
I cut my eyes to the right and there they were.
Nothing chinked and there was no sound of breathing but suddenly, they were here. What I thought was a dark mass of rock resolved itself into a group of three or four men. They even stood like rocks – not upright because then they’d be silhouetted against the skyline, but unevenly, at strange angles. Not man shaped at all. Blending in. Each one becoming part of the landscape. They weren’t wearing helmets and they’d left their spears behind. Each man wore just a brief tunic and carried his xiphos. They were almost right on top of me and I hadn’t even known they were there. If I hadn’t been lying motionless myself …
On the plus side, they obviously didn’t know I was here, either, or I’d be dead. There was no question of making a run for it. If I was very lucky, I might get perhaps five or six inches before they cut my throat. I tried not to hold my breath because they’d hear the gasp when I had to breathe in again. Just breathe slowly and quietly. I was on the ground, vulnerable, exposed, and helpless. Long seconds dragged by. I waited either to be pulled to my feet or for the sword thrust that would kill me. My face was in the dust. I breathed through my mouth so I wouldn’t sneeze. At ground level, I was squinting up at them, and from that angle, they looked absolutely bloody massive.
They stood stock-still. Watching. Listening.
I swear time stopped.
I felt the sweat break out all over me. The urge to get up and run was overwhelming. Could they see me? How could they miss me? I was lying almost at their feet. I could smell them. Sweat. Leather. A faint whiff of oil.
The seemingly never-ending silence was killing me. Were they watching me to see what I would do? Was one of them even now raising his sword? My eyes stung with sweat. I daren’t blink, even. I lay, still as the corpse that I might soon become, awaiting the red-hot, ice-cold agonising explosion of pain as a sword thrust skewered me into the dirt.
Silently one detached himself and took two steps towards me. I closed my eyes and that was all I could do as he planted his right foot firmly on my left hand.
Don’t move. Don’t pull away. Don’t gasp with pain. Don’t do anything.
I bit my bottom lip and tried to think of something else other than my bones grinding together under his boot and I might – just might – have been successful, only the bastard fumbled for a moment and then peed on me.
Seriously – what is it with men and peeing on things? Can they not help themselves? Trees. Rocks. Walls. Me. You name it and the next minute there’s a bloke peeing all over it. Peterson has peed on me at least twice and he’s supposed to be a friend.
Another little known fact I can contribute to our knowledge of the Spartans is that they don’t do the traditional bloke splash and dash. A seemingly never-ending stream of warm, asparagus-smelling wee splashed off the rock onto my head and shoulders. For God’s sake! The only good thing about this was that he wasn’t looking what he was doing. Sword in one hand, todger in the other, he was constantly scanning around him. This was a war zone and his attention was on everything but what was happening at ground level.
He did that funny thing that men do when they’ve finished, eased his weight backwards, which did my hand no good at all, and finally, finally, stepped back. For some reason, my hand hurt even more once he removed his foot.
I never heard them go. I certainly never saw them go. I wasn’t even sure they had gone. I ran through various courses of action and discarded them all in favour of just lying still. Other than the breeze, I could hear nothing. Of course I wouldn’t. The entire Spartan army might be sitting in a circle watching me and I would never know.
I lay, not moving, for a long, long time, straining my eyes, straining my ears.
Nothing.
I rolled my eyes around, but at ground level, you can’t see much.
Eventually, what passes for common sense reasserted itself. If they knew I was here, I would have been long since dead. Lifting my head a fraction, I looked around. Rocks. The obligatory prickly bushes. Dust. The damp patch I was lying in. Nothing else. No dark mass of Spartan warriors blending effortlessly into the landscape. I was alone.
Apart from bloody Ephialtes, of course. It would be entirely typical if he were the only one of us to survive the events of today. We knew they didn’t kill him. Ephialtes lived long enough to coll
ect his reward from the Great King and enjoy it. His name would become synonymous with traitor. All sorts of rewards were offered for him and he fled. He died some years later in, I believe, a non-Thermopylae related incident, but the Spartans paid the reward anyway.
Slowly, the sky lightened in the east and I shivered in the pre-dawn chill. I could make out individual rocks and the lump that was Ephialtes. He was too big to move by myself, so I dropped a blanket over him to protect him from the coming sun and considered my compassionate duty done.
I considered calling either Markham or Peterson but if they were in trouble, they wouldn’t want me gabbling away at them. They would call when they were OK. If they were dead then they wouldn’t. It wasn’t rocket science.
I sat down, glugged some water, and examined my hand, which throbbed, but not hugely. I’d had worse. I wondered when I’d last slept. Or when I’d last eaten, and it wasn’t going to be now, because the trumpets sounded below. The alarm was being given. Word was out that the Immortals had made it across the mountain. I was torn between anguish for the Greeks, all of whom were now doomed; relief for Peterson, and near-demented concern for Markham. However, both of them were perfectly capable of looking after themselves and I should get busy. If they were dead then this was the best way to ensure they hadn’t died in vain.
I activated all the recorders and not a moment too soon, because the Greek force was splitting up.
I knew what was happening here. Everyone but the Spartans was being ordered to retreat. The Thespians would refuse. The Great King’s army had already overrun their city. They preferred to die with the Spartans. The Thebans would remain too, somehow become separated from the main body of the army, and surrender almost immediately.
Disciplined as always, the remaining Greeks assembled themselves for battle. Tiredly heaving their dented shields into place one last time, they clustered together, spears bristling. The plumes were gone from their helmets. They were white with dust, through which trails of red blood made a shocking contrast.
