Marathon

by Christian Cameron

  wal stairs, and the right files up the right wal stairs.

  Understand?’

  We stil had a minute. I grabbed the rightmost and leftmost

  men. ‘Folow me!’ I caled, and I took them in the gate. ‘You go

  men. ‘Folow me!’ I caled, and I took them in the gate. ‘You go

  that way – single file, like forming or unforming the Pyrrhiche.’

  He didn’t understand, but another man did, and I pushed the

  first man into the third rank. ‘Sorry, lad. I need a thinker. You –

  can you live long enough to get them up these stairs?’

  The new phylarch shrugged.

  ‘Here they come!’ the men at the gate caled.

  I got back there with my two appointed phylarchs. We had

  time to take our places – me in the centre of the line, they at

  either end. We were seven men to a rank, three ranks deep.

  ‘Listen up,’ I said. ‘We take their charge, and hold. On my

  word, we give ground to the edge of the courtyard – and then

  charge. Can you do it? No shirking – al together.’

  And then they came at us. It was the bodyguard. Cyrus led

  from in front, and I knew him as soon as he came up the steps,

  and he knew me, as I heard it later, from my shouted commands.

  These were the best of Artaphernes’ men, picked

  swordsmen, nobles al, and men of discipline. They came into us

  together, and our line gave a step, and then we were fighting.

  Cyrus didn’t come against me – by luck or the wil of the

  gods. He had a big wicker shield, and he pushed it into the man

  next to me.

  I didn’t await the onset of my man. I threw a spear – low –

  and took my man in the ankle, and down he went, and I went

  forward into the space, right past Cyrus. I had my second spear,

  and my shield was better than theirs. My second spear – like my

  old deer-kiler – had a wicked tapered point like a needle, and I

  old deer-kiler – had a wicked tapered point like a needle, and I

  used it ruthlessly in the firelit dark, ramming it through wicker

  shields into their shield arms. I don’t know how many men I

  wounded that way, but it was more than three, and then I

  stepped back into my place in the ranks, leaving a holow behind

  me.

  ‘Break!’ I caled, and we turned like a school of fish

  threatened by a dolphin and fled, just ten steps in the tunnel, and

  I turned. ‘Stand!’ I said, and the Milesians turned and stood like

  heroes. ‘Charge!’ I caled, and we went at the startled Persians.

  We had men down, and so did they, and the footing was

  treacherous, and on balance, it was foolish of me to charge like

  that, but foolish things are unexpected things, and we crashed

  into them and pushed them right off the platform of the steps, so

  that one of my file-leaders took an arrow in the side – we’d

  over-charged, and we were in the open.

  ‘Back!’ I caled. We shuffled back as a storm of arrows fel

  on the portico. I tripped – a man grabbed at my leg, and I was

  looking into Cyrus’s helmet. My sword point stopped a finger’s

  width from his eye.

  ‘Doru,’ he said. He managed a smile, although I was about to

  slay him.

  I stepped over him. ‘Can you walk?’ I asked, and he

  managed to get to one knee. Another wounded guardsman rose,

  holding his left arm – where I’d put a spear into it, no doubt.

  ‘Let them go,’ I told my men. Apollo, witless lying god,

  witness my mercy.

  Six Persians shuffled away. They didn’t meet our eyes. But

  Six Persians shuffled away. They didn’t meet our eyes. But

  they lived, and they had fought wel. As my hero Eualcidas of

  Eretria told me once, everyone runs sometime.

  I could hear argument in the darkness.

  Istes came up beside me.

  ‘We’re out,’ he said. ‘Al but ten archers up on the wals with

  al our remaining arrows.’

  ‘No time like the present,’ I said. ‘By files, to the right and

  left, retire!’

  Istes laughed. ‘You Dorians have orders for everything,’ he

  said.

  We backed up the tunnel, and then they came at us.

  Greeks. In armour.

  They came fast, hard and silent, and the man who led them

  had a great scorpion on his shield. He put my right file-leader

  down and sent his shade away screaming at the first contact, and

  the line couldn’t raly because the end men were retreating up the

  stairs.

  Suddenly, our orderly flight was chaos.

  Istes went forward into the fight, and al I could do was go

  with him. For ten heartbeats – maybe twice that – the two of us

  held ten armoured men.

  Istes kiled a man in that time. He was that good.

  I didn’t. I was facing three men, and one of them was the

  man with the scorpion on his shield. It was Archilogos.

  It was bound to happen sometime.

  I had sworn to save him and his family, before al the gods, at

  I had sworn to save him and his family, before al the gods, at

  the shrine of Artemis. And he was one of the best fighters in the

  Greek world. We had the same training. We’d been in the same

  battles.

  The gods send us these chalenges to see what we’re made

  of, I think.

  The last thing I wanted Archilogos to know was that he was

  immune to my blade. I rammed my shield into his and made him

  stumble, and then I thrust at each of his two companions, fast as

  a cat, and then I jumped back.

  Istes, as I said, kiled his man.

  He felt me back away, and he backed, and then we backed

  together.

  Archilogos shouted for his men to get around me. ‘They’re

  abandoning the gate!’ he roared.

  As the leftmost man sprang forward, I threw my second

  spear and caught him in the outstretched leg, and down he went.

  I was out of spears, but I felt the right-hand stairs to the wal

  under my right heel.

  Archilogos came for me again, and I backed up a step and

  then another, and then he cut at my feet – remember, I had boots

  on, not greaves, because of my wounds. I got my shield in late –

  too late – and he got a piece of my leg, his blade slicing through

  my boot, through my bandages, to lay a line of icy fire across my

  calf.

  But my shield rim caught his helmet as he leaned into the

  blow, and staggered him, and he fel.

  blow, and staggered him, and he fel.

  Another man leaped into his place, and I backed another step

  and my heart fel to see the amount of blood I’d already lost. The

  step I abandoned glittered in the light of the doomed city.

  I backed again, and the new man cut at my legs. I had no

  qualms about kiling this Ephesian, and I parried his blow with

  my sword and turned my xiphos over his blade and cut his

  throat – a nasty move learned in close-quarter fighting. Not very

  sporting. But I thought I was dying.

  Put yourself in my place. I had lost everything – friends, lover,

  ship. The rescue of the Milesians would make my name for ever,

  I thought. And if I died here – what more could I
want? A sad

  end, but a great song. I could trust Phrynichus, if he survived his

  wound, to write of it.

  When I took that wound, I thought I was done. It was too

  damned far to the ships, and I was losing blood like a dying man.

  But nor am I a quitter. I kiled the man with my xiphos and I

  got up another step.

  Idomeneus leaned past me with a spear and put it through the

  next comer’s faceplate, and I was up another step.

  Teucer shot the next man, and he fel back, an arrow in his

  upper thigh, and he swept the steps clean for a hundred

  heartbeats. Then Idomeneus got a hand under my arm and I was

  up on the wal.

  It is good to have companions.

  ‘I’m finished, friends,’ I said.

  Idomeneus picked me up bodily.

  ‘Like fuck you are,’ he said.

  Our wal was empty. Teucer was the last man behind us. He

  shot, ran to us, turned and shot again. No man of the Ephesians

  – even wearing ful armour – wanted to be the first to put his

  head above the parapet.

  ‘Can you stand?’ Idomeneus asked. He could see something

  I couldn’t.

  ‘No,’ I responded. The world was going dark on me.

  He stood me up anyway. I sank to one knee.

  Teucer cried, ‘No!’ and shot, right over my head.

  The wal had a crenelated parapet on the city side, but on the

  courtyard side, just a low wal to keep foolish or drunken

  sentries from faling to their deaths on the flagstones benath. The

  stairs were recessed into the wal. We couldn’t see the enemy on

  our steps, but I could see – even as the curtain came down over

  my eyes – the line of armoured men racing up the far steps, and

  Istes, alone on the wal, taking them. I have never seen anyone

  fight as wel, unless perhaps it was Sophanes, but that was later,

  and Sophanes wasn’t fighting in the last moments of a losing

  battle, doomed, against overwhelming odds. Istes threw them

  from the wal, he stabbed them, he baffled with his shield, his

  cloak, his sword, and they died.

  But he was flagging. I could see it. And he’d sent his men

  away – they al said as much later.

  In fact, Istes never intended to reach the ships. I saw him

  there, burning with godlike power on the wal, fighting so wel

  that he seemed to glow with his own light. He had ful bronze –

  that he seemed to glow with his own light. He had ful bronze –

  cuirass, helmet, greaves, thigh guards, arm guards, shoulder

  cups, shield face – and his armour caught the fire of his city as it

  died, and rendered it a golden sun atop its last defended wal.

  Teucer had three arrows left and he used them al for his lord

  – three more Ephesians sent to Hades.

  Then Idomeneus was there, having put me down to run al the

  way around the wal to Istes. Idomeneus threw his spear over

  Istes’ shoulder, and then tapped his shoulder – but Istes shook

  his head and went shield to shield with a big man. Behind that

  man was the Scorpion. Archilogos had shaken off my blow.

  I dragged myself, one step at a time, paraleling Istes’ retreat.

  Helmeted heads began to peek above our stairs. On the far wal,

  the man behind Archilogos fel with an arrow in his side.

  Teucer cursed. ‘That was my last arrow, lord.’

  I managed a laugh. ‘Might have been better if you hadn’t told

  them,’ I said.

  There was a great black puddle under me. I got to my feet

  anyway.

  On the opposite wal, Archilogos, my boyhood friend, faced

  Istes, the best sword in the world. Istes glowed gold.

  ‘Miletus!’ he roared.

  Archilogos took his sword cut on his aspis and pushed

  forward with it, and Istes stumbled back and Archi cut up under

  the shield with his sword – once, twice, as fast as a hawk

  stooping – and Istes stumbled back, and I could see his shield

  arm was wounded.

  Now Istes had fought al day. And he knew he would die.

  Now Istes had fought al day. And he knew he would die.

  But Archilogos showed himself to be a master. He gave the

  golden man no respite, and cut again – a heavy blow to the

  helmet.

  He got Istes’ shield in the face, though, and he went back,

  and Istes backed a step. Idomeneus tapped him again, and he

  said something. Later he told me that he begged Istes to live.

  Istes didn’t reply, except to charge Archilogos. He had his arms

  out, and he ran like a man finishing a race, and he swept my

  childhood friend and slave-master off the wal in his arms, and

  they fel together to the courtyard, and as he fel he roared

  ‘Miletus’ one more time, and then he was gone, and his armour

  rang as he hit the flagstones.

  Teucer had got me to the ropes over the wal by then. I must

  have been lighter by the weight of al my blood, but I remember

  stepping on a spear that one of the men had dropped to slide

  more easily to the ships.

  ‘Go,’ I said to Teucer.

  He shook his head.

  ‘Go, you fool,’ I said.

  He let go of my shoulder, grabbed the rope and slid off

  towards the deck of Black Raven.

  I was the last man on the wals of Miletus – the last free

  Greek. I had no intention of leaving. The spear came to me as a

  sign, or so I thought. And Istes was dead. And Archilogos was

  dead.

  So I had no reason not to be dead, too.

  I had the strength to raise the spear over my head, and I set

  I had the strength to raise the spear over my head, and I set

  my shield, and waited for the rush. I could hear their feet on the

  wals, and I couldn’t see very wel, but I knew they were

  coming.

  One Ephesian came out of the dark and his aspis hit my

  Boeotian, shield to shield, and mine broke like a child’s toy. The

  blows from the Aegyptian must have weakened it.

  But even blind with blood loss, I got my spear into his face,

  and he went down, cursing.

  I stepped back and caught a breath. I was stil alive.

  I can only tel this as I saw it, honey. What I wil say is what I

  saw.

  Helen came to me on the wal – or Aphrodite, or perhaps

  Briseis. I like to think it was Briseis. Her hair was unbound, and

  her skin glowed like a goddess.

  ‘This is not your fate, love,’ she said. And she was gone.

  That’s what I saw.

  So I threw the spear as hard as I could, right along the

  parapet. I stumbled backwards, my fingers reaching for the rope,

  almost blind. I found it even as a blow rang off the scale shirt on

  my back – a spear-thrust on the heavy yoke over the shoulders.

  I fel, my hands holding the rope, and my feet dropped free of

  the wal, and I slid down the rope. My palms burned, but I

  wouldn’t let go.

  I’m told I hit the mast quite hard. I was already pretty far

  gone, and I fel to the deck as if dead, al my sinews cut. But my

  armour did its job, and the wool stuffed in my helmet.

  armour did its job, and the wool stuffed in my helmet.

  I remember the men crowding around me
. I remember hands

  on my leg, and fire.

  I have never run the stade since.

  The women wept and keened, and men as wel, as the oarsmen

  puled us away into the dark. I lay cushioned in blood loss, far

  away and yet able to think clearly enough, and Black Raven

  unfolded his wings and swept us out to sea. The Phoenicians and

  the Cilicians and the Aegyptians never saw us, or thought we

  weren’t worth their trouble, or simply let us go. We saved

  Teucer and a hundred other soldiers, five gentlemen of property,

  and another hundred women and children. Four thousand died

  and forty thousand were sold into slavery.

  And that was just the start.

  We made Chios in three days – three desperate days, when

  Harpagos, Idomeneus and Black did the work of keeping us

  alive while my body made the hard choices between life and

  death. I missed the moment when Idomeneus made a speech –

  he ordered the treasure thrown over the side, and he told them

  that the babes of the Milesians would be their treasure, and

  asked them to count the weight of the silver and tel him which

  was the most valuable, and they cheered as they threw it over. I

  missed that, although it is al part of the story.

  The Milesians pitched in and rowed, and we shared what

  food we had, and everyone who had lived to flee the wals of

  Miletus lived to see the beaches of Chios.

  Miletus lived to see the beaches of Chios.

  The next thing I remember was Melaina weeping. There was

  a pyre for Stephanos, and another for Philocrates, and

  Phrynichus wept as he said their elegies. Alcaeus of Miletus –

  one of the gentlemen we’d rescued – organized funeral games.

  Melaina cared for me, cleaning my wounds, bathing me,

  cleaning away the wastes of my body. My fever broke in the

  second week, and by the third week I could walk. Summer was

  almost over.

  ‘The Persians wil come,’ I said. ‘Come with me. I owe you

  – and your brother’s shade – that much.’

  She shrugged. ‘I’l stay anyway,’ she said. ‘I’m a fisherman’s

  daughter. I don’t like the change. And my father is here, and my

  sisters, and al the children. Can you move the whole of Chios?’

  Another week, while my body healed. Black was restless, eager

  to get to sea. Suddenly, there were Cilician pirates everywhere,

  and down the coast, a vilage burned.

  Finaly, I set a sailing date. The evenings were brisk, and the