Gates of Fire: An Epic Novel of the Battle of Thermopylae

by Steven Pressfield

  By the time the Sacae broke, the sun was well over the mountain. The dance floor, now in full shadow, looked like a field ploughed by the oxen of hell. Not an inch remained unchurned and unriven. The rock-hard earth, sodden now with blood and piss and the unholy fluids which had spilled from the entrails of the slain and the butchered, lay churned in places to the depth of a man's calf. There is a spring sacred to Persephone, behind the sallyport adjacent to the Lakedaemonian camp, where in the morning, immediately following the repulsion of the Median assault, the Spartans and Thespians had collapsed in exhaustion and triumph. In that initial instant of salvation, however temporary all knew it must be, a flush of supreme joy had flooded over the entire allied camp. Panoplied men faced one another and slammed shields together, just for the joy of it, like boys rejoicing in the clamor of bronze upon bronze. I saw two warriors of the Arkadians standing face-to-face, pounding each other with fists upon the shoulders of their leathers, tears of joy streaming down their faces. Others whooped and danced. One warrior of the Phliasians grasped the corner of the redoubt with both hands and pounded his helmeted brow against the stone, bang bang bang, like a lunatic. Others writhed upon the ground, as horses will do sand-bathing, so overflushed with joy that they could discharge its excess in no other way.

  Simultaneously a second wave of emotion coursed through the camp. This was of piety. Men embraced one another, weeping in awe before the gods. Prayers of thanksgiving were sung from fervent hearts, and none took shame to voice them. Across the expanse of the camp, one saw knots of warriors kneeling in invocation, circles of a dozen with clasped hands, knots of three and four with arms around each other's shoulders, pairs crouching knee-to-knee and everywhere individuals upon the earth in prayer.

  Now, seven hours into the slaughter, all such observance of piety had fled. Men stared with hollow eyes upon the riven plain. Across this farmer's field of death lay sown such a crop of corpses and shields, hacked-up armor and shattered weapons, that the mind could not assimilate its scale nor the senses give it compass. The wounded, in numbers uncountable, groaned and cried out, writhing amid piles of limbs and severed body parts so intertangled one could not distinguish individual men, but the whole seemed a Gorgon-like beast of ten thousand limbs, some ghastly monster spawned by the cloven earth and now draining itself, fluid by fluid, back into that chthonic cleft which had given it birth. Along the face of the mountain the stone glistened scarlet to the height of a man's knee.

  The faces of the allied warriors had by this hour clotted into featureless masks of death. Blank eyes stared from sunken sockets as if the divine force, the daimon, had been extinguished like a lamp, replaced by a weariness beyond description, a stare without effect, the hollow gaze of hell itself. I turned to Alexandros; he looked fifty years old. In the mirror of his eyes I beheld my own face and could no longer recognize it.

  A temper toward the enemy now arose which had not been present before. This was not hatred but rather a refusal to reckon quarter. A reign of savagery began. Acts of barbarity which had been hitherto unthinkable now presented themselves to the mind and were embraced without a quibble. The theater of war, the stink and spectacle of carnage on such a scale, had so overwhelmed the senses with horror that the mind had grown numb and insensate. With perverse wit, it actually sought these and sought to intensify them.

  All knew that the next attack would be the day's last; nightfall's curtain would adjourn the slaughter until tomorrow. It was also clear that whichever force the foe next threw into the line would be his finest, the cream saved for this hour when the Hellenes labored in exhaustion and stood the likeliest chance of being overthrown by fresh troops. Leoni-das, who had not slept now in more than forty hours, yet prowled the lines of defenders, assembling each allied unit and addressing it in person. Remember, brothers: the final fight is everything. All we have achieved so far this day is lost if we do not prevail now, at the end. Fight as you have never fought before.

  In the intervals between the first three assaults, each warrior readying for the next engagement had striven to scour clean the face of his shield and helmet, to present again to the foe the gleaming terror-inspiring surface of bronze. As the threshing mill of murder progressed throughout the day, however, this housekeeping became honored increasingly in the breach, as each knurl and inlay on the shield acquired a grisly encrustment of blood and dirt, mud and excrement, fragments of tissue, flesh, hair and gore of every description. Besides, the men were too tired. They didn't care anymore. Now Dithyrambos, the Thespian captain, sought to make a virtue of necessity. He ordered his men to cease from burnishing their shields, and instead to paint and streak them, and the men's own body armor, with yet more blood and gore.

  This Dithyrambos, by trade an architect and by no means a professional soldier, had already distinguished himself with such magnificent courage throughout the day that the prize of valor, it was a foregone conclusion, would be his by acclamation. His gallantry had elevated him second only to Leoni-das in prestige among the men. Dithyrambos now, stationing himself in the open in full view of all the men, proceeded to smear his own shield, which was already nearly black with dried blood, with yet more gore and guts and fresh dripping fluid. The allies in line, the Thespians, Tegeates and Man-tineans, ghoulishly followed suit. The Spartans alone abstained, not out of delicacy or decorum, but simply in obedience to their own laws of campaign, which command them to adhere without alteration to their customary disciplines and practices of arms.

  Dithyrambos now ordered the squires and servants to hold their places, to refrain from sweeping the advance ground of enemy bodies. Instead, he sent his own men out onto the arena with orders to heap the corpses in display in the most ghoulish manner possible, so as to present to the next wave of the foe, whose marshaling trumpets could already be heard around the shoulder of the Narrows, the most ghastly and terrifying spectacle possible.

  Brothers and allies, my own beautiful dogs from hell! he addressed the warriors, striding helmetless before the lines, his voice carrying powerfully even to those upon the Wall and marshaling in the ready-ground behind. This next wave will be the day's last. Cinch up your balls, men, for one final surpassing effort. The enemy believes us exhausted and anticipates dispatching us to the underworld beneath his onslaught of fresh, rested troops. What he doesn't know is we're already there. We crossed the line hours ago. He gestured to the Narrows and its carpeting of horror. We stand already in hell. It is our home!

  A cheer rose from the line, overtopped by wild profane shouts and whoops of hellish laughter.

  Remember, men, Dithyrambos' voice rose yet more powerfully, that this next wave of Asiatic ass-fuckers has not seen us yet. Consider what they have seen. They know only that three of their mightiest nations have advanced against us wearing their testicles and come back without them.

  And I promise you: they are not fresh. They've been sitting on their dogblossoms all day, watching their allies carried and dragged back, hacked to pieces by us. Believe me, their imaginations have not been idle. Each man has conjured his own head cleaved at the neck, his own guts spilling into the dirt and his own cock and balls brandished before him on the point of a Greek spear! We're not the ones who are worn out, they are!

  Fresh shouting and tumult erupted from the allies, save the Spartans, while the Thespians on the field continued their butchery. I glanced to Dienekes, who observed this all with a grim twist upon his features.

  By the gods, he declared, it's getting ugly out there.

  We could see the Spartan Knights, led by Polynikes and Doreion, taking their stations about Leonidas in the forefront of the line. Now a lookout came running back in from the forwardmost post. This was Hound, the Spartan Skirite; he sprinted straight to Leonidas and made his report.

  The news spread swiftly: the next wave would be Xerxes' own household guard, the Immortals.

  The Greeks knew that these comprised His Majesty's picked champions, the flower of Persian nobility, princes schooled fr
om birth to draw the bow and speak the truth.

  More to the point, their numbers were ten thousand, while the Greeks had fewer than three thousand still fit to fight. The Immortals, all knew, derived their name from the custom of the Persians that replaced at once each royal guardsman who died or retired, thus keeping the number of Xerxes' finest always at ten thousand.

  This corps of champions now advanced into view at the neck of the Narrows. They wore not helmets, but tiaras, soft felt caps topped with skull-crowns of metal glistening like gold. These half-helmets possessed no cover for the ears, neck or jaw and left the face and throat entirely exposed. The warriors wore earrings; some of their faces were painted with eye kohl and rouged like women. Nonetheless they were magnificent specimens, selected it seemed not merely, as the Hellenes well knew, for valor and nobility of family but for height and handsomeness of person as well. Each man looked more dashing than the fellow at his shoulder. They wore sleeved tunics of silk, purple rimmed with scarlet, protected by a sleeveless coat of mail in the shape of fish scales, and trousers atop calf-height doeskin boots. Their weapons were the bow, belt scimitar and short Persian lance, and their shields, like the Medes' and the Cissians', were shoulder-togroiners made of wicker. Most astonishing of all, however, was the quantity of gold ornament each Immortal wore upon his person in the form of brooches and bracelets, amulets and adornments. Their commander, Hydarnes, advanced to the fore, the only mounted antagonist the allies had so far beheld. His tiara was peaked like a monarch's crown and his eyes shone brilliantly beneath kohled lashes. His horse was spooking, refusing to advance across the charnel sward of corpses. The foe drew up in ranks on the flat beyond the Narrows. Their discipline was impeccable. They were spotless.

  Leonidas now strode forth to address the allies. He confirmed what each Hellenic warrior presumed by sight, that the division of the enemy now advancing into view was indeed Xerxes' own Immortals and that the number of their company, as nearly as could be estimated by eye, was the full ten thousand.

  It would appear, gentlemen, Leonidas' voice ascended powerfully, that the prospect of facing the picked champions of alt Asia should daunt us. But I swear to you, this battle will prove the most dustless of all.

  The king used the Greek word akoniti, whose application is customarily to wrestling, boxing and the pankration. When a victor overthrows his opponent so swiftly that the bout fails even to raise the dust of the arena, he is said to have triumphed akoniti, in a no-duster.

  Listen, Leonidas proceeded, and I will tell you why. The troops Xerxes throws at us now are, for the first time, of actual Persian blood. Their commanders are the King's own kinsmen; he has brothers out there, and cousins and uncles and lovers, officers of his own line whose lives are precious to him beyond price. Do you see him up there, upon his throne? The nations he has sent against us so far have been mere vassal states, spear fodder to such a despot, who squanders their lives without counting the cost. These-Leonidas gestured across the Narrows to the space where Hydarnes and the Immortals now marshaled-these he treasures. These he loves. Their murder he will feel like an eight-footer in the guts.

  Remember that this battle at the Hot Gates is not the one Xerxes came here to fight. He anticipates far more momentous struggles to come, in the heartland of Hellas against the main force of our armies, and for these clashes he wishes to preserve the flower of his army, the men you see before you now. He will be frugal with their lives today, I promise you.

  As to their numbers: they are ten thousand, we are four. But each man we slay will sting like a regiment to their King. These warriors are to him like miser's gold, which he hoards and covets beyond all else in his treasury.

  Kill one thousand and the rest will crack. One thousand and their master will pull the remainder out. Can you do that for me, men? Can four of you kill one of them? Can you give me one thousand?

  Chapter Twenty Six

  His Majesty himself may best judge the precision of Leon-Idas' forecast. Suffice it to note, for this record, that darkness found the Immortals in shattered retreat, under His Majesty's orders as Leonidas had predicted, leaving the broken and dying upon the orchestra, the dance floor, of the Narrows.

  Behind the allied Wall the spectacle was one of corresponding horror. A downpour had drenched the camp shortly after nightfall, drowning what few fires remained with none to tend them, all effort of squires, attendants and mates being required to succor the wounded and the maimed.

  Slides toppled from the wall of Kallidromos, sluicing the upper camp with rivers of mud and stone. Across this sodden expanse, slain and spared sprawled limb upon limb, many still in armor, the slumber of the exhausted so profound that one could not distinguish the living from the dead. Everything was soaked and muck-begrimed. Stores of dressings for the wounded had long since been depleted; the spa-goers' tents requisitioned by the Skiritai rangers as shelter now found their linen called to duty a second time, as battle compresses. The stink of blood and death rose with such palpable horror that the asses of the supply train bawled all night and could not be quietened.

  There was a third unrostered member of the allied contingent, a volunteer other than the outlaw Ball Player and the roan bitch Styx. This was an emporos, a merchant of Miletus, Elephantinos by name, whose disabled waggon the allied column had chanced upon during its march through Doris, a day prior to arrival at the Gates. This fellow despite his misfortune of the road maintained the merriest of spirits, sharing a lunch of green apples with his hobbled ass. Upon the brow of his waggon rose a hand-painted standard, an advertisement as it were of his congeniality and eagerness of custom. The sign intended to declare, The best service only for you, my friend. The tinker had misspelled, however, several words, chiefly friend, philos, which his hand had inscribed phimos, the term in Doric for a contraction of the flesh which covers the male member. The waggon's banner declared roughly thus:

  The best service only for you, my foreskin.

  The luster of this poesy rendered the fellow an instant celebrity. Several squires were detached to assist him, for which courtesy the tradesman expressed abounding gratitude. And where, if one may inquire, is this magnificent army bound?

  To die for Hellas, someone answered.

  How delightful! Toward midnight the tinker appeared in camp, having tracked the column all the way to the Gates. He was welcomed with enthusiasm. His specialty lay in applying an edge to steel, and at this, he testified, he stood without peer. He had been sharpening farmers' scythes and housewives' cleavers for decades. He knew how to make even the meanest untempered trowel hold an edge, and moreover, he vowed, he would donate his services to the army in repayment of their kindness upon the highway.

  The fellow employed an expression with which he spiked his conversation whenever he wished to emphasize a point.

  Wake up to this! he would say, though in his dense Ionian accent it came out as Week up to thees!

  This phrase was immediately and with high glee adopted by the entire army.

  Cheese and onions again, week up to thees!

  Double drill all day, week up to thees!

  One of the two Leons in Dienekes' platoon, Donkeydick, rousted the merchant that succeeding dawn by brandishing before his slumber-dazed eyes a prodigious erection. They call this a phimos, week up to thees!

  The tradesman became a kind of mascot or talisman to the troops. His presence was welcomed at every fire, his company embraced by youths as well as veterans; he was considered a raconteur and boon companion, a jester and a friend.

  Now in the wake of this first day's slaughter, the merchant appointed himself as well unofficial chaplain and confessor to the young warriors whom he had over the past days come to care for more intimately than sons. He passed all night among the wounded, bearing wine, water and a consoling hand. His accustomed cheerfulness he contrived to redouble; he diverted the maimed and mutilated with profane tales of his travels and misadventures, seductions of housewives, robberies and thrashings sustained up
on the road. He had armed himself as well, from the discards; he would fill a gap tomorrow. Many of the squires, uncompelled by their masters, had taken upon themselves the same role.

  All night the forges roared. The hammers of the smiths and foundrymen rang without ceasing, repairing spear and sword blades, beating out the bronze for fresh shield facings, while wrights and carpenters manned spokeshaves limning fresh spearshafts and shield carriages for the morrow. The allies cooked their meals over fires made from the spent arrows and shivered spearshafts of the enemy. The natives of Alpenoi village who a day earlier had peddled their produce for profit, now, beholding the sacrifice of the defenders, donated their goods and foodstuffs and hastened off with shuttles and handbarrows to bear up more.

  Where were the reinforcements? Were any coming at all? Leonidas, sensing the preoccupation of the army, eschewed all assembly and councils of war, circulating instead in person among the men, transacting the business of the commanders as he went. He was dispatching more runners to the cities, with more appeals for aid. Nor was it lost upon the warriors that he selected always the youngest. Was this for speed of foot, or the king's wish to spare those whose share of remaining years was the greatest?