Warrior Heroes: The Spartan's March Read online

  Adakios set off again at a pace that was somewhere between a slow jog and a fast walk, and the boys soon settled into his rhythm. They had only been going for a few minutes when Adakios came to an abrupt halt. The boys saw his raised hand’s shadow in the darkness and stopped as well, hearts thumping with the tension. Someone ahead was whistling.

  We’re far enough from the camp now that it’s obvious we’re running away, Finn thought, shivering silently as he considered what the Spartans were likely to do with deserters.

  All of a sudden Adakios chuckled, and then began whistling himself. Moments later a shadowy figure appeared in front of Adakios and embraced him.

  “It’s Nikodemos,” Adakios said quietly.

  “I didn’t know what else to do, Uncle,” said Nikodemos. “So I just waited for you.” He cast a nervous glance at Finn and Arthur.

  “You did well,” said Adakios, and Finn and Arthur introduced themselves. Nikodemos relaxed when he recognised Finn.

  “Did Drakon get his whipping?” he asked.

  “He did,” said Adakios. “And he will be hot on our heels soon enough. We must press on quickly. He won’t travel far tonight after his punishment, but in the morning he’ll be after us. We need to cover as much ground as we can and find somewhere to...” he trailed off mid-sentence. “Well we can talk about that later,” he concluded. “For now, let’s move!”

  CHAPTER 5

  All through the night Adakios kept up the same efficient pace he had set from the beginning. The moon appeared and disappeared. The boys’ minds became so numb with tiredness that they barely noticed their surroundings and when dawn’s first light began chasing the shadows away they were shocked to find themselves on a mountain path.

  Finn gazed around at the ridges and valleys and was about to speak when he lost his footing and crumpled to the ground with a shout. Arthur reached down to help his brother, and Finn winced as he stood, an angry scrape across his calf slowly beginning to well up with blood. He took a few steps, limping heavily, and sank to the ground once more.

  “OK, we rest.” Adakios nodded curtly. “But we should get off the path.”

  He led the way, scrambling, towards an overhanging crag that loomed high above them. They crossed under it, then climbed up over it, and eventually came to rest sitting on top of it in the shade of a second crag. From here they could see a good distance back along the path but would be all but invisible to those below.

  “I’ll keep watch,” said Adakios. “The rest of you, sleep.”

  Nikodemos and the boys slumped gratefully down, and sleep found them almost immediately.

  The sun was high in the sky when Adakios shook the boys awake. They both stretched and rubbed their sore limbs, stiffened by sleeping on hard rock.

  “Our turn to keep watch?” Arthur mumbled sleepily. Adakios shook his head.

  “Nikodemos and I traded places a few hours ago. We have all rested now. We continue.”

  Finn groaned and rubbed his leg. Regardless of the monstrous purple bruise on his calf, the thought of more walking, on legs more tired than they had ever been, was too much to bear.

  “Come on, boy, you said you wanted to come with me,” Adakios barked. “Sore legs or death at the hands of the Crypteia – which do you prefer?” Finn groaned again and urged his legs forward, his bruised calf throbbing in protest, and soon they were speed-trudging along at the same pace Adakios had forced through the night.

  “It’s past noon,” said Adakios over his shoulder. We’ll stop at sunset or when we find a good place for an ambush – whichever comes first.”

  “An ambush?” Arthur queried. “I thought we were running from the Crypteia, not trying to trap them!”

  “We are running,” said Adakios grimly. “But believe me, Drakon will be running faster...”

  All through the previous night they had been so tired that Drakon seemed a distant threat, and it was unnerving to be reminded of what and who they were up against. Two boys and two helots against a group of well-trained Spartan warrior-psychopaths who were out for revenge... It was a sobering thought, and it propelled them all forward with renewed energy.

  The afternoon ticked slowly by, each minute lasting an age as aching legs and bursting lungs screamed their objections. Water skins were refilled in the streams they passed, but the only incident of note was a chance encounter with a goatherd who was driving his flock along the trail in the opposite direction. He hailed the exhausted band of travellers and asked where they were heading.

  “To Olympia, to watch the Games,” said Adakios without missing a beat. But as he spoke this lie, Finn thought he saw something cross Adakios’s face. It was a new fear, a new realisation of some kind. Finn stored the observation away. There would be time for questions later...

  The goatherd’s eyes widened. “Olympia!” he gasped. “Fare well, you have far to travel!”

  Finn and Arthur exchanged a glance, the same question in each of their minds: just how far do we have to travel? It hadn’t occurred to either of them to ask when they set off, but they had no idea how far Sparta was from Thermopylae, or how long it would take to walk there. Arthur tried to ask Nikodemos when they had resumed the journey, but the young man had no sensible answer, and Adakios was already too far ahead to hear the question, or so it seemed.

  Afternoon was just turning to evening when the path led them through a narrow passage between two slabs of rock. Emerging on the other side of this passage, the path crossed a stream and wound through more of the huge boulders that the boys were getting so used to. As a place to mount an ambush, it could not have been more obvious.

  “Drakon will be on his guard when he comes through that passage,” said Adakios, looking up at the reddening sky. “But we are out of time. We stop here.”

  Finn and Arthur could have wept with relief, and Nikodemos looked close to tears of exhaustion too. They sat down to rest for a while, and eat and drink a little. Adakios was looking around, taking in their surroundings. He asked the boys to demonstrate their aim with the bow and arrow, and seemed pleased enough when each hit a thin sapling some distance away at their first attempt. Next he darted off to clamber up and around the rocks so that he was peering down into the passage from above, and then he did the same thing from the other side.

  Rejoining the others he explained again that they simply would not be able to outrun Drakon and his friends if they were following.

  “They will catch up,” he said, “so we might as well choose where that happens! Anyway, we don’t have to beat them outright – we just have to slow them down...” He explained that he would position two of them as snipers ready to shoot back at the mouth of the passage from sensible vantage points, and that the other two would take up positions atop the rocks on either side of the passage, from where they would be able to shoot down on the Crypteia once they realised they could not go forwards. Knowing that they could be waiting all through the night or maybe longer, they decided that one person would keep watch from up on top of the rocks, and the rest would wait together a short way off the path, ready to take up their positions as soon as a signal was given by the lookout.

  They each familiarised themselves with the positions, and with the detail of the terrain around them as far as possible, and then Nikodemos took up first watch as the light began to fade.

  “How far to Sparta?” Arthur asked at length.

  “Still four days to go,” Adakios replied.

  “Four days!” Finn breathed. “Would he really be able to track us across that sort of distance if we just kept going?”

  “Maybe not, but I need to know he’s behind us and not in front of us heading for my wife and my farm. Better still if we can kill him. But even then his comrades would come for us. We have to get home before they do, and then there’s Argos...”

  “Who’s that?” Arthur asked.

  Argos, it turned out, was Adakios’s son. Some time ago, Adakios told them, Argos had been taken on as a servant to a Spartan fami
ly who were currently attending the Olympic Games.

  “So when you said we were going to the Games at Olympia...”

  “It was a lie. We have to get to the farm. Argos is safe.”

  “But if you get away to Athens he’ll never know where you went...”

  Adakios rubbed his temples, a look of agony on his face, and nodded miserably.

  “Get some sleep,” he whispered. The conversation was clearly over, and the boys did as they were told, but both were wondering the same thing. If Adakios escaped without his son, would his spirit really be appeased in the future, or would he be haunted by regret at having left the boy behind?

  Arthur slipped into a fitful sleep, but Finn could not, despite the tiredness in his body. He lay gazing up at the emerging stars, wondering how they were going to get through this adventure. As he mulled their situation over, he began to feel that they would have to find a way of bringing Adakios’s son Argos with them. What the soldier’s ghost had wanted was to save his family. Leaving his son behind with a Spartan family, to face who-knew-what fate when they discovered what Adakios had done, simply wouldn’t cut it. He turned and looked at Adakios.

  “Tell me about Argos,” he said.

  “He’s a good young man,” said Adakios, sighing and rolling onto his back. “Strong. About Drakon’s age. And he’s clever. He’ll know how to survive.”

  “How can you be so sure?”

  “I have to be sure. What choice is there?” Adakios barked. His raised voice woke Arthur, who opened his eyes and listened quietly. Finn waited a few moments.

  “There might be a way we can bring Argos,” he said at length. Then, when Adakios did not reply, he went on. “Arthur and I could go to Olympia and get word to him, while you go back to the farm. Then we can arrange to meet somewhere...” He left the thought hanging in the air, and for a while Adakios did not respond. Then he sighed.

  “It is a brave thing that you offer to do, Finn,” he said in a tired voice. “But you’re boys. I cannot send you on such a dangerous journey alone.”

  “Hold on,” said Arthur indignantly. “In case you’ve forgotten, King Leonidas made a point of telling everyone how brave...” But the sentence trailed off. From somewhere back down the path came the sound of barking dogs.

  All three sprang to their feet and grasped for their weapons, Adakios whispering urgent instructions as they did so.

  “Finn, to the rock opposite Nikodemos. Arthur, you shoot from here. I’ll cross the stream.”

  Finn began picking his way back down to the path.

  “Good luck, mate,” his brother whispered after him. He had his bow and quiver slung across his back, and using both hands for balance, careful not to dislodge any rocks, he was soon back on the trail. The dogs sounded much closer now, and he was not sure of his ability to reach the top of the rocks above the passage before the dogs got to him. They have to be Drakon’s dogs, he thought, feeling slightly sick with nerves.

  He crossed the stream and began to scramble up the rocks just as the first dog sprinted out of the passage, barking furiously. In panic, Finn tripped, and then the barking stopped with the hiss of an arrow and a yelp, and he heard the dog limping away.

  “Cerberus!” The cry came from some distance away but there was no mistaking Drakon’s voice. The barking stopped entirely. However many other dogs there were, they had been called off and the Crypteia knew they were near their quarry. Any element of surprise was over.

  Finn hauled himself to the top of the rocks and took up his position, waving silently at Nikodemos. He strung the bow, set his quiver down next to him, nocked an arrow, and waited...

  CHAPTER 6

  The drone of crickets throbbed in the warm night air, and Finn’s heart thudded in his ears like a war drum. A bright moon shone down on the empty path. The Crypteia had seemingly melted into the night with their dogs. Finn strained with all his senses for some indication of their attackers’ whereabouts, but to no avail. They know we’re here and all we’ve done is scare off a dog – not much of an ambush! Finn thought as the wait continued. He shifted his weight from foot to foot, tensing and relaxing the muscles in his legs to stop them becoming stiff. Where are they?

  He stopped to check he knew exactly where his quiver was and as he did so an arrow hissed over his head. He dropped to the floor to the sound of Drakon’s laughter.

  “You think you can outsmart the Crypteia?” the Spartan jeered. Finn was nearing blind panic. Drakon’s voice was close, somewhere near the base of the rocks before the narrow passage. There was still no sign of the other Spartans Adakios had warned would be with Drakon. Perhaps he came alone, Finn hoped, and then he felt a shiver course through his body as he heard the scraping sound of a stone being dislodged. It had come from the rocks on his side of the path. Someone was climbing up from the path on Drakon’s side of the passage.

  Of course! Finn thought. They weren’t stupid. They knew they’d be killed if they tried to make it through the passage, so they were trying to climb around it. Finn suddenly felt extremely vulnerable. Although he could see the path from his vantage point, he could not see the rocks that an attacker would climb to reach him. The whole plan had relied on catching the Crypteia by surprise. Now that they knew where he was, he was an easy target, and someone was coming for him!

  He cast around for a safer place to lie in wait. If he could just find somewhere unexpected and regain the element of surprise...

  He slid back from the top edge of the passage and crawled towards the edge of his platform. He would not be visible to anyone on the path, or on the other side of the path now. He inched forward, hoping to catch a glimpse of whoever was climbing up the rocks, but his view was blocked by a slightly lower shelf of rock. He slipped down onto it and crawled forward again, peering over the lip.

  His breath caught in his throat. Staring up at him from no more than six metres below was a red-cloaked Spartan with a long dagger in his teeth, and the Spartan was climbing towards him. Finn recoiled out of sight and tried to re-nock his arrow, his hands trembling as he heard the Spartan scrambling rapidly upwards. Holding his breath, Finn rolled to the edge of the rock once more and pushed himself up to a kneeling position to take aim at the Spartan, who was now on less steep ground and had let go of the rock with one hand and was holding his dagger back over his shoulder, ready to throw it. The arrow and the dagger were released at the same moment. Finn and the Spartan were so close together – separated by less than three metres now – that their projectiles collided in mid air and neither found its mark.

  In a heartbeat Finn realised that he had left his quiver on top of the rocks. He snatched at the dagger in his waistband, just as the Spartan, grinning, drew a vicious-looking sword that flashed in the moonlight. Worse still, Finn could now see that another Spartan was climbing up behind the first.

  All of this had happened so quickly that Finn hadn’t had time to think about Nikodemos and the others, but he thought of them now and shouted out to Nikodemos for help. He glanced over and saw that Nikodemos was not above him any longer. Finn shook in terror. The Spartan closest to him was still grinning, and was stepping carefully towards him, crouching, ready to spring. Finn held his dagger out in front of him in both trembling hands, and the Spartan just laughed. Then Finn lost his nerve entirely, and turned to run. He bounded back up to the top of the rocks, not looking for a better vantage point now but simply running away. He had the presence of mind to snatch up his quiver as he passed it, and then he heard the Spartan shout in pain. He risked a glance over his shoulder and was just in time to see his attacker clutching at an arrow in his throat, toppling backwards and disappearing to the sound of more shouting.

  Finn scanned the rocks on the other side of the passage again, searching frantically for Nikodemos. There he was! Nestled in a crevice that meant he would not be visible to Drakon or anyone else climbing up from that side, Nikodemos had found the perfect sniper’s position from which to cover Finn’s side of the passage. Sudd
enly Finn understood what was needed. He had to find his own position and protect Nikodemos, just as Nikodemos was protecting him. He raced back to the lower ledge from where he had first shot at the Spartan and peered over the edge. The man with the arrow in his throat lay motionless in the dust below, while the second Spartan, who had clearly been knocked back down the rocks by his falling friend, was dragging himself back along the path and away from the passage. Judging by the fact that he seemed barely able to crawl, Finn guessed that both his legs must have been broken in the fall.

  He looked back to Nikodemos and raised an arm in thanks. But as Nikodemos nodded his acknowledgement, Finn felt that sick feeling of dread again. Traversing around the rock towards Nikodemos’s crevice was another red-cloaked assailant, and it looked to Finn as though it was Drakon. He shouted out a warning. Nikodemos couldn’t see Drakon, but he understood Finn’s warning and started to climb up and out of the crevice, back towards the top of the rocks. Finn snatched for an arrow and sent it hissing across at Drakon. But the Spartan was moving quickly and the arrow narrowly missed him, flying under his arm and clattering against rock. Drakon redoubled his efforts and skittered across the rock face like a monkey before leaping up the way Nikodemos had gone, and suddenly both men were out of sight.

  Finn’s stomach turned as he heard cries of pain, and then a roar from Drakon.

  “It is as I said, helot,” came Drakon’s triumphant bellow. “And next it will be your family!” He appeared again at the edge of the rocks on his side of the passage and stared across at Finn, fists clenched, arms outstretched.

  “Your family!” he roared again. Finn shot another arrow, and again Drakon moved out of harm’s way. Just as it began to seem to Finn that Drakon was invincible, the Spartan snarled in surprise and pain as an arrow came from somewhere below and lodged in his arm. He clutched at it and disappeared from view, and moments later Finn could hear Drakon scrambling back down the rocks.