Killer of Men - Christian Cameron [128]
Here’s a truth for you, thugater. War is sweet, when you are one of the heroes.
Late in the evening, Archilogos turned up. He stood in the firelight until I saw him. I rose and went to embrace him, but he held his hand between us.
‘We are not friends,’ he said.
I remember nodding. I understood then, perhaps for the first time, that it was not possible for us to be friends and for him to retain his place in the world.
‘I heard that you had the name of a hero,’ he said. ‘That you slew ten Medes in combat.’
I nodded.
He smiled, but only for a moment. ‘Damn it, Doru! Why did you fuck my sister? We could have been brothers! My father loves you!’ I reached out again, but he turned his head away.
‘Pater intends to prosecute you in the courts,’ he said. ‘Aristagoras pretends he does not know what happened, but he has suggested that we revoke or deny your manumission and have you taken as an escaped slave. Neither Pater nor I will accept this.’ He crossed his arms. ‘Why?’ he asked me, and suddenly he was angry. He had come to talk – but I had ruined his life, or so he reckoned it.
I knew that a shrug might start a fight. ‘I don’t know,’ I said carefully.
‘Was it because of Penelope?’ he asked, his face towards the new moon.
I tried to reach him. ‘The – the first time, I thought that she was Penelope.’
That made him turn. ‘I didn’t even know that you and Penelope were – anything,’ he said.
‘Yes you did. You just forgot – because you were the master and I the slave,’ I said. Then I shrugged. ‘Penelope liked you better. And like all of us, she wanted her freedom.’
‘She’s pregnant,’ he admitted. ‘I’ll free her. And see to it she has employment. Mater will take her to weave.’
‘She’ll like that,’ I said.
‘My fucking sister will marry Aristagoras. Oh, he’s a worm,’ Archi spat.
‘She – plans. She makes plans and then carries them out.’ I decided that anything I said would make things worse. We were having a conversation, but it was a fragile thing, like a spiderweb in a flood.
‘Why does she want to marry him?’ Archi asked.
I paused again. Perhaps it was three days with Eualcidas, but I wanted to watch my words carefully. ‘Part of her believes she deserves no better,’ I said. ‘Part of her wants a man she can control.’
‘Which were you?’ he asked. He was angry now. I had not given the right answer.
‘Both,’ I admitted.
He took a deep breath. ‘If we win tomorrow . . .’ he said, and my hopes rose. Because despite all my talking to your fine people about heroism, what I really wanted back was my family – that house in Ephesus, and daily lessons with Heraclitus.
‘Yes?’ I asked.
‘Run,’ he said. ‘Run far. And don’t let Aristagoras catch you.’ He threw his chlamys over his shoulder. ‘I wish I’d been there – in the pass.’
‘Me, too.’ That’s all I could say. It was true. I knew my former master. He, too, had it in his soul. He would have run all the way into the Medes, or died trying.
He walked away.
I let him go.
I still think about it. I’ve changed that conversation a thousand thousand times, said better things, chased him and wrestled him to the ground.
That’s not what happened, though.
Maybe, if I had, a great deal of pain might have been averted.
I never promised you a happy story, thugater.
In the morning, we formed early. I was in the front rank now, and for the first time I could see the whole army. The Athenians were on a slight hill, with the remnants of an old town under our feet. I rested my shield on the edge of an old wall buried in the ground. This had been a village with a tiny acropolis a thousand years ago, I could see. Then I looked south along our lines, and I could see what a worthless army we were.
No two contingents would form together, except the hereditary enemies from Athens and Euboea. The rest of them were in little regiments, and their lines weren’t even level. Aristagoras had put his Milesians slightly in front, to show us all