The End of Sparta

bear-god to attack-or maybe to be rescued by Lichas. Or maybe in fright waiting to die.’ ”

So Nikon finished relating the speech of Scorpas. “This time your Nikon does not see ghosts, but has a live witness.”

Melon scowled. “I knew he was alive. I know the helot speaks truly, for I have had visions of a hut well before Leuktra, though where it was I did not guess. And just as my dreams of the good city of Messene trumped those of a polis in ruins, so too I know the ghosts tell the truth of our meeting with Gorgos in a hut on high Taygetos. Chion told me that he has also dreamt of a mountain house in flames, with Gorgos its master.” Then he looked to Epaminondas. “I would have wished news that Chion and Neto live, rather than that Gorgos is soon to die. I suppose some will follow me to find this man. I take care of my own-my way. I leave for Taygetos before dusk. Follow who wish. But none need to.”

Epaminondas stepped up to face him. “Watch out, Melon.” He then turned and grabbed the helot. “Now wait, you Nikon. This is just the latest of your many stories and false visions. Like those before, it too is but a phantom. It is the hatred of Gorgos that haunts you and the wish of us all that Neto still lives and that Chion did not fall to the man-bear, who no doubt is some demon our grandfathers warned about. Sometimes the soul makes up pictures at night of what it wants us to believe. Or we make thoughts and then claim there are gods to be honored for giving them. Your dreams are as false as the reports of this two-shoe Scorpas. That liar whittles some wood into a cane and then calls it Neto’s-and you give him gold for his stories? Do you want Melon to tramp after ghosts up on the summit, to end up like Chion in the highlands-dead and forgotten as he goes chasing shades and half-men monsters of myth on Taygetos? The mountain is a foul place, Nikon. Maybe not fatal for four myriads, but lethal for four or five of you. Yes, the man-bear up there may have eaten your one-armed Chion, as well as the kryptes and soon you as well. If there was ever a Kuniskos up there, they are bones and ash now, though alive enough for fakers like your Scorpas to cheat a gold owl from you.”

“Yes,” Nikon replied, “I hate the helot Kuniskos. And I know better than you of the man-bear. I’ve seen a lesser kind of that monster before even here on Ithome. Unlike you, I have seen his victims swinging by their capes from the spruce limbs. Still, the voice in my dreams last night was Neto’s, as real now as in the past. Her voice lives and she whispers that Kuniskos did not die in the flight from Ithome. Maybe this man-bear is finally dead and the mountain passes are open, and so the ghost of Neto tells me it is at last time to come up. This Scorpas, he is a peddler, not a spy. He is dense and has no reason to lie.”

“Oh? No reason other than to do the work of Lichas and get our best killed in an ambush on a high pass? I wouldn’t be surprised to hear your trader once led Chion up to his death on the mountain with the same stories. Or maybe he works for this man-bear bandit who scares those at the loom with stories that he is a Sinis or Skiron come alive. I imagine this bear scare may be a run-away Spartan lord or a pack of renegades that prey on shepherds and the lost.”

Melon heard little of this good-sense warning of Epaminondas. He was too eager to clear the ledger with the killers of the dead Lophis and Proxenos and Staphis, too. Who could believe that anyone or anything could put down his Chion? More likely this shape-changer, if he were real, was already in the belly of Chion rather than the other way around. That might explain why Gorgos was suddenly free to call back in Lichas, free from the terror of the man-bear-free to carve a cane and claim it was Neto’s and get back to what he did best, lying and plotting. If Gorgos were alive, Melon at least would know the fate of Neto, whether she was killed long ago in his compound or perished in the flight from Ithome. Without a live Gorgos, no one would ever learn her fate. He turned to Melissos. “Bring a pony and our arms and plenty of rope. I want to take our Gorgos alive. I think he lives and I want to see whether he really is, as Nikon says, the foul Kuniskos of the helots-or, before I kill him, still part of him the loyal servant who walked with me each morning on Helikon. If he has Spartans with him, the better to kill them all.”

Suddenly Ainias, who had been listening to the back and forth, stepped up and grabbed Melon. “Son of Malgis. Something is not right about this Scorpas. A half-helot at best, maybe even a perioikos who trades with Spartans in the morning and sells his wares to helots at dusk. If Gorgos lives, why has he not sneaked back to his masters? How can he be trapped by our thin patrols on the summit? This story of Scorpas makes no sense. But all the same, I will go with you to ensure that we end up killing someone, maybe even Kuniskos or Scorpas or both.”

Melissos was already packing their gear. Ainias said that he was going back up the mountain to learn the fate of Neto. On Taygetos he would kill some of the Spartans who had killed Proxenos. Epaminondas finished with another warning. “We will see you back here in two days-with the camp cleaned up and the army mustering. If not, I will go up the mountain and follow your trail with Pelopidas and the Band.”

So they parted. Ainias and Melon led toward the peaks of high cloudy Taygetos. Melissos behind followed, leading a small pony. All set out armed with spears and swords. Nikon brought up the rear. They soon met Scorpas waiting for them on the trail ahead. Melon kept still and limped ahead as they went up the path to the low hills. Nikon had unleashed Kerberos, now without his mistress Neto. He growled more than ever, since the hound had picked up a wolf scent, one that brought back some memory of the lost Sturax; and he heard too many say “Neto.” The dog did not like the smell of this Scorpas and twice nipped the stranger’s calf. He already had the smell of the dog-kicker Gorgos in his nostrils.

None knew much about these wilds, only that most of the snow was melted and the even spring high country was now passable. Twice they saw bones tied with red cloth, hanging from pine limbs over the trail-crow and buzzard meat, maybe a month old, maybe two, kryptes, or what was left of them, killed by whom and left as trophies for what? Scorpas had already seen bones like these and was terrified that there would be more ahead. Now he begged them to keep off to the side of the main trail that went into the high forest. The five headed for the crest of the lower peak of Taygetos, but it was soon dark and they were glad to find the huts of the woodcutters for the night at the timber’s edge.

Little was said, though they noticed fresh coals in the hearth and half-eaten deer bones by the door. If they found their old Gorgos, he would not be alone. The small party was happier for that chance of revenge nonetheless, since men had been here in the past ten days. At first light they went up another small creek bed, amid stands of spruce and fir on the banks and a few upland poplars. It rained until midday. Ainias took charge on the route, and was content enough to keep the small band hidden and dry beneath the evergreens. Again they walked in gullies near the trail above to keep away from the sight of the man-bear. But Ainias thought it queer that this hillman Scorpas could discover a mountain hut, even with patches of snow on the ground hiding the trail and with a fresh scent of men, months after the flight of the Spartans. In fact, little was known of this mysterious trader Scorpas, before never named, never seen. Much less did Ainias believe that Gorgos, the flatlander, who had hated the high farm on Helikon, would hide in the up-country. Worse still, for most of the day Ainias saw few signs of goats and so turned back often to Scorpas to question the way and complain there were no longer traces of flocks or shepherds in the shadowy vale.

Most herds were down on flat land with the last of the spring grass and did not come up before Homoloios, so his story about goats and sheep and Gorgos in a shepherd’s hut made even less sense. Proxenos was dead. Neto too. The helots were freed. So there was nothing much left for Ainias to do down here in the south. What happened to him, he confessed, mattered little anymore, though he wanted to learn the fate of Neto or to kill Gorgos before he left or at least find the bones of Chion, or kill Proxenos’s killer. The list of his targets, he offered, was endless, after all, and gave him warmth in the spring air on high Taygetos.

The guide was bundled in fleece, with that rough wool hood over his head. Two gray braids hung through to his shoulders, Spartan-style. A man of sixty or so, slump-shouldered Scorpas said he packed in for the shepherds of Taygetos bronze pots and other goods each spring and led back a she-goat or an ewe for the barter. “I am your eyes back here,” Scorpas finally called out, “to make sure we see any Spartan ambushers behind. We are near the crest. Be careful since we are ever closer to the border of Lakonia.”

Ainias patted his hilt on his sword belt and gripped tighter his spear. Melissos said little, though he grunted under a pack on his back and the reins of a stubborn pony struggling with two shields that hit the brush and boughs of spruce. If there were to be spear work, he would be at the van and take a stab at Scorpas first of all. He knew that much. Melissos had started out the lackey of Melon but this day he would have come, slave or not, on his own accord, since the liberation disease had infected him as well-that notion that one kills for something other than money and fame, and someone far worse than oneself. Melissos had long ceased spying out the forts and landscape of the Hellenes and pondered only how the helots had revolted-and why his masters had come south to free them.

Finally in late afternoon of their second day, Scorpas came to the fore and grabbed the arm of Melon. The