What If It's Really a Rebellion?
Only when I opened my eyes the next morning did I get a true sense of how far I'd come. It was a small military supply post, I'd been told, perched at the northern edge of the plain outside a town called Helos. We had arrived after the sun had all but sunk, leaving no chance to look around — but come daylight, the whole landscape spread itself out at a single glance.
And, strangely enough, there were people everywhere. Workers in the fields, men hauling carts, others trudging by under sacks of grain — crowds of them, and what struck me as odd was that nearly all of them were Helots. Spartans in red cloaks with weapons at their sides were scarce enough to count on one hand.
I spooned down my barley porridge while scanning the scene.
"What are you looking at?"
A voice came from beside me, and I turned my head to find Brasidas sitting there. Doesn't this man ever eat with his fellow officers?
"The people. There's hardly a Spartan in sight, but the Helots are everywhere."
"Who did you think farmed the land?"
I stopped mid-bite and met his eyes.
"The Helots."
"So you knew."
"Knowing it and seeing it are two different things."
To one side, five men were shifting sacks; a little farther off, women were threshing grain. Even children wove between the adults, getting caught and scolded for it. They were just people — and somehow, that fact kept snagging on my mind.
"Arista. Stop staring and eat."
"I was thinking."
"You?"
Was being insufferable just his default setting? On impulse I shoveled in a big spoonful of porridge and instantly regretted it.
It really was awful. Bad enough to make me miss the mess-hall food from my army days.
I was still stuck in Helos come that evening. Under normal circumstances I could have unloaded the cargo and headed home, but Brasidas had ordered me to stay until the day's wagons had been checked in.
"Keep this up and I'm going to get hired here."
"I don't know what 'hired' means, but it sounds like a good thing."
"It absolutely is not."
"Then we're fine."
At this point, even talking to the man was exhausting. Still, the work went faster than the day before. We counted the sacks as they came in, checked their condition, and marked down where each shipment had come from. Anything clean passed through; anything off got pulled aside. Wash, rinse, repeat.
"Thirty-six."
"Thirty-six..."
I scratched the number onto the wax tablet and was reaching for the next sack when a laugh suddenly bubbled out of me. All that fuss about becoming a soldier, and here I was doing inventory. The only difference from yesterday was the spear — and even that wasn't mine. I'd spent the whole morning pestering Brasidas until he lent me one of the old weapons lying around the depot.
"Nothing happened yesterday, so I won't need one today either, right?"
"I suppose not."
"Then lend me one. You never know."
He studied me for a long moment, then tossed a spear across. I could barely heft the thing, and he'd thrown it as casually as a javelin.
"If it's in the way while you work, you carry it around yourself."
"That one's mine, then."
"It is not yours."
This man was genuinely impossible to talk to. I opened my mouth to push back, but I'd gotten the spear out of him either way, so I just nodded and let it go.
Come nightfall, word arrived that we would return to Sparta the next morning. I spread a single cloth in a corner of a small warehouse and lay down. My back ached and my skin was sticky with grime, but between the flutter of going home and sheer exhaustion, my eyes closed almost at once.
How long had I slept when—
"Fire!"
I was up and shoving through the door before the second shout even rang out. Beneath the black sky, orange light rolled and surged like a tide. Flames were already leaping from the warehouse — and now the wind was rising too.
For a heartbeat it looked exactly like Methone. My hand shot for the propped-up spear, then I set it back down and sprinted outside.
"Where's the water! Get the jars moving!"
People were already in motion, but they kept slamming into one another in the dark, curses flying everywhere. I grabbed the nearest person by the arm.
"Empty hands, form a line over there! Anyone with a full jar, bring it back this way!"
"Why are you—"
"The fire comes first, doesn't it!"
The moment I yelled, a section of the burning roof came crashing down. With the heat pressing in, people screamed and stumbled back.
Then, from the opposite side, a different shout tore through the night.
"The Helots are running!"
A Spartan soldier hauling water dropped his jar for a spear before the cry had even finished. In a blink, the rest of the soldiers were grabbing their weapons too.
"Block the roads! Don't let them scatter!"
I stood frozen, water jar still in my arms. They seemed more afraid of the Helots than of the flames.
It was then that Brasidas came running, his armor half-fastened.
"What happened?"
"The Helots scattered the moment the fire broke out."
Brasidas glanced at the blaze, then swept his eyes over the surroundings.
"The fire first."
"But they—"
"If that jumps to the next warehouse, there'll be nothing left for you to eat tomorrow."
The soldier spun and ran back to fight the flames. I watched him go — and then my gaze caught on the spear riding in Brasidas's hand.
"Is a few runaways really such a big deal?"
"This is no time for questions."
"They could just be panicking from the fire. So why is everyone reaching for a spear first?"
Brasidas didn't answer. He jerked his chin at the world around us.
Faces floated in the firelight. A handful of Spartans with spears — and Helots, far, far more of them.
The numbers I'd counted that morning surfaced in my head all over again.
"Arista. Keep the men on the fire. It must not spread."
He turned to go.
"Brasidas. And if it really is a rebellion?"
He stopped for a breath at my question — then kept walking.
"Then it is no business of yours."
This time, I had no argument against him.
The fire was beaten down faster than I'd expected. Water was close at hand, and they'd caved in part of the burning roof with axes before the flames could leap to the next warehouse.
The trouble came after.
"Got one!"
As two soldiers dragged a Helot man over, the crowd surged toward them. Blood smeared the man's face, and one arm was wrenched up behind his back.
"Let go! Let go of me!"
A soldier raised his fist and swung. The man's head snapped aside.
When the hand rose again, I heard myself shout.
"Wait!"
Every eye in the vicinity swung to me in an instant. Why did I yell that? Too late for regrets, though.
"You should ask why he ran first."
"And what would you know."
"Then we never find out why he ran, do we?"
Before the exchange could turn into a real argument, Brasidas returned to the scene.
"What's this?"
"One of the ones who ran."
The soldier forced the man down onto his knees before him. Brasidas looked down at him.
"Did you set the fire?"
"No."
"Then why did you run?"
The man clamped his mouth shut instead of answering. In that silence, my eye caught on something bulging beneath his clothes.
"What's that?"
I pointed at his belly; the soldier yanked the cloth up, and a small sack dropped to the ground. A grain sack.
"A thief, then."
The instant the soldier lifted his spear butt, the man twisted his body. The hands holding him came away as if they'd never gripped at all — and he bolted.
"Grab him!"
The shout turned the whole scene upside down. Reflex took over — I snatched up a spear lying nearby and ran.
"Arista!"
Someone called my name, but it was already too late.
I followed the man as he vanished behind the burning warehouse, plunging into the dark right after him. Once the firelight fell behind, I couldn't even see the ground beneath my feet.
'Fuck. Why did I follow him?'
Ragged breathing sounded somewhere ahead.
"Stop right there!"
I screamed it, but of course nobody stops just because you tell them to. The man veered off and dropped down into a narrow ditch; I followed him down, my foot skidded, and I staggered.
"Agh!"
When I raised my head, the man was standing a short distance away. A water channel in front of him. Me behind.
I leveled the spearhead.
"Don't move."
A blade flashed in the man's hand — and my heart plummeted.
The spearpoint I'd seen at Methone and the face of the Athenian going down swept through my mind all at once. But the man was trembling too. We were both heaving for air like two people with blades already at each other's throats.
"Put the knife down. Please."
"Out of my way!"
But he charged straight at me.
"Fuck!"
I drove the spearpoint toward him — and my hand locked. One thrust, and he was simply dead.
That single heartbeat of thought was one too many. The knife tore through the hem of my clothes, and I swallowed a scream and swung the shaft.
Thwack!
The knife flew from his grip — and the man slammed his whole body into mine. No match for a grown man's strength, I went down hard into the dirt with the breath knocked clean out of me.
As he snatched up the fallen knife and swung it down at me, I abandoned the spear and caught his arm.
"Let go!"
"You let go!"
He was simply stronger. My arms gave ground by degrees, the blade turning toward me until it hovered a few finger-widths away, the fire's glow flickering just beyond its tip.
'No.'
I twisted my hips, planted a knee, and hooked my leg behind his. A move drilled into me by getting flattened by Telekles more times than I could count.
Thankfully, his balance wavered — and in that instant I threw my whole body into the push.
We went down in a tangled heap. I wrenched his arm behind his back and pinned him under my knee.
"Stop!"
"I'm only doing this so you don't die — hold still!"
Only when the scuffle ended did I hear footsteps. A soldier came sprinting up and leveled his spear the moment he arrived.
"Move aside!"
"Wait! Spare him."
The spearhead froze a hand's breadth from my face.
"He's a runaway Helot."
"Which is exactly why we keep him alive! We have to find out what started the fire!"
Then a heavy voice sounded behind me.
"The child is right."
Brasidas.
At his gesture the soldier withdrew his spear, and only then did I release the man's arm. Other soldiers swarmed in at once and clamped hold of him again.
Brasidas's gaze came to rest on my torn clothes.
"I seem to recall saying it was no business of yours."
"He was getting away."
"Then you should have let him."
"That I couldn't do."
When Brasidas let out a long, slow sigh, the sight of a reaction I'd never seen from him felt strangely satisfying.
It was then that the captured man spoke, urgent and ragged.
"I didn't set the fire."
"You stole the grain. The fire?"
The man bit his lip. Brasidas came a step closer.
"What did you see?"
After a long stretch of silence, the man turned his eyes toward the burned warehouse.
"Someone went inside before the fire started."
"Who?"
The man's throat bobbed hard.
"A Lacedaemonian."
This time, no one found their voice right away. Everyone had suspicions they'd been quietly carrying.
Sacks that had come in under-filled. Water skins that had leaked. Two jars of oil found empty. And now, a fire in the night.
"Don't tell me—"
"Quiet."
His answer came faster than usual.
Brasidas looked from the burned warehouse to the man in custody, then spoke in a low voice.
"You saw his face. Would you know it again?"
This time the man hesitated a moment — then nodded. Brasidas straightened up.
"Seal the gates."
One soldier's eyes went wide.
"Now, sir?"
"Now."
Brasidas's gaze went past the firelight, toward the supply post. Dozens of people were still moving about in there.
Spartans, Helots — even the men who managed the stores.
A chill ran down my spine.
The culprit hadn't run at all.
He could still be here.
