Chapter Text
Year: 462 B.C.
“Molon Labe.” said the towering figure of the Lion King to the impending God King. Come and take them. What strength, the amount of resilience in just four words.
~ᛊ~
“When the boy was born, like all spartans, he was inspected. If he’d been small or puny or sickly or misshapen, he would have been discarded.”
Thunder crashed against the night sky. A small baby whimpered in the arms of the elder, waving his little hands. In his innocent gaze, the baby ignored the vast piles of skulls and bones below him. Zeus’ ire rumbles above the trio. The mother hides her worry behind stone eyes as her son is turned left and right, around and around by the crinkled, apathetic hands of the elder before her.
“From the time he could stand, he was baptized in the fire of combat.”
The boy stood up, ignoring the fresh air dancing across his bare skin. He gave a yell and swung his sword over his shoulder, hitting the warrior’s with a loud clang and a grunt. He stuck with every pivot. The seasoned warrior matched the strikes easily with his own sword. The boy gasped as his sword was thrust out of his hand as easily as a spark reviving a flame. In his inexperience, he couldn’t hide the frightened expression on his face. He was the son of a king. Descended from the mighty Heracles himself. There was no room for scared little boys in the Spartan army.
The scarred warrior backhanded the boy across his face. He fell to the ground with a gasp and crawled forward on his hands and feet. His mother watched with crossed arms. She knew what must be done.
Her son stood up and crept backwards a few inches, eyeing the still armed soldier with trepidation. The boy panted as he wiped his mouth against the side of his hand, eyeing the blood with a determined look. He would not let this man beat him down. He was a spartan. A true spartan. Be damned what anyone else thought.
The boy grunted as he rolled under the striking elbow of the warrior. He grabbed the handle of his sword as he unrolled and spun in standing crouch.
“Taught never to retreat, never to surrender. Taught that death on the battlefield in service to Sparta was the greatest glory he could achieve in his life.”
He ran his hand over the ridges with childlike awe, marveling over the work put into his father’s shield. His father sat, towering over him with a secret smile. The boy looked up at his father as his hand slowly slid off the surface of the shield.
The boy watched as his father made a fist and slowly drummed against the inverted v of the chevron on his shield. He did this twice.
The boy nodded, he understood what his father was saying. There was no honor, no glory in not fighting for Sparta. He’d come back with his shield in victory or on it in glory.
~ᛊ~
She struggled against the women holding her back. Why must he do this? Why her son? She knew the ways of Sparta but why must it be her son? Why, she begged the gods as she watched two Spartans take her son by the arms out of the gates of Sparta, why my son?
“At age seven, as is customary in Sparta, the boy was taken from his mother and plunged, into a world of violence,
She watched as the two Spartan stole her struggling son from her arms and dragged him down the road to his strength and to his doom. The two women on either side of her watched their queen’s misery and despair slide across her face. She wanted her son back, safe and in her arms.
“Manufactured by 300 years of Spartan warrior society to create the finest soldiers the world has ever known.
The boy groaned with each pounding of his fists against his opponents face, not caring of the blood splattering against his own face and body and against the fine dirt beneath them.
“The ‘agoge,’ as it’s called, forces the boy to fight, starves them, forces them to steal, and if necessary ...
The boy stood up, tall and strong. His hands at the ready. He panted, looking down at his prone opponent. He looked across the way at the observing Elite, not caring that one of his eyes was swollen and bloodied shut.
“To kill.”
~ᛊ~
“By rod and lash, the boy was punished, taught to show no pain, no mercy.”
He hugged the wooden pole, ignoring the Spartans watching his back get split open by the warrior behind him. He gritted his teeth, doing his best to be stone faced.
“Constantly tested, tossed into the wild, left to pit his wits and will against nature’s fury. It was his initiation, his time in the wild. For he would return to his people a Spartan ... or not at all.”
He crept through the pass, eyeing his surroundings with only his keen eyes and wooden spear. He ignored the lightly falling snow. The snow was not the thing that was most dangerous to him. He looked up at the rocks at his side. You never know what could be lurked above. No one ever looks up. He crept low against the face of the rock formation, hiding himself underneath the low overhanging. He looked out into the area before him. A low growling as approaching.
“The wolf begins to circle the boy, claws of black steel, fur as dark night, eyes glowing red, jewels from the pit of Hell itself.”
Across from him stood the hulking figure of a bear like wolf, it gave a low deep growl. It’s eyes white as it snarled at him. The bear like beast shook its head and continued it’s low growl, starting to sink it’s long nasty claws into the fresh snow as it circle him. The wolf bared its teeth and prowled forward.
The boy slowly stood up from his crouch, never taking his eyes off the hulking beast. It looked like a demon from the deepest pits of Tartarus. One false move and he would be another citizen of Hades’ realm.
They circled each other, the boy with his spear and the wolf with its fangs. The beast was a intimidating figure, thought the boy as they circled each other, but I am a Spartan. I have no fear. The two stood mirroring each other. Both crouched at the ready, weapons tight in their grasp. Man and Beast, Beast and Man.
The boy turned his head and looked behind him at the narrow passage between the rocks. He started to slowly back in between the two rock walls, the whistling wind was blowing more snow around them.
“The giant wolf sniffing, savoring the scent of the meal to come.”
The boy turned his back to the beast and walked into the narrow passage, issuing a direct challenge to the beast.
Molon Labe. Come and take them, come and take my spear and I. I am not afraid. I am a warrior of Sparta. Molon Labe.
The wolf gave a shrieking snarl, baring its stained fangs at the boy as he creeped through the passage, all the while eyeing the beast. It’s eyeing glowing with its feral power.
With a mighty leap, the wolf thrust itself forward, eager for the boy’s tender flesh.
Only for two cries to echo in the passage. One in pain, one with power.
The wolf gave a howl. It was stuck between two rocks with a spear of wood in its chest. It growled and snarled, how dare this boy best it. It was a beast of power and strength, it was a wolf. A wolf of legend. It struggled and snarled, thrusting it’s neck side to side.
“It’s not fear that grips him, only a heightened sense of things. The cold air in his lungs, windswept pines moving against the coming night.”
The boy eyed the wolf with a gaze of a Spartan. He was not afraid. He looked down at his bare feet and the fallen snow. The wolf gave another howl as the boy gave the wolf a nod of respect, one warrior to another one survivor to another.
“His hands are steady, his form ...
The cloud’s part, allowing Artemis’ full gaze to enlighten the boy’s surroundings. He thrust his arms forward, piercing the howling beast’s flesh.
“perfect.”
The wind howls, echoing the wolf’s low, dark growl.
~ᛊ~
The boy, now a young man, stood in the falling snow with his conquest draped over his shoulders, protecting him from Khione’s icy kiss. He stood before the Spartans who had already gone through the agoge as they bowed low and laid down their spears. He stood proud as Spartan after Spartan bowed before him, before his survival and triumph. He was a Spartan.
“And so the boy, given up for dead, returns to his people, to sacred Sparta, a king.”
A man darkened by the shadows of the crackling flame called to the surrounding spartans, “Our King Leonidas!” He thrust his fist into the air, followed by his godson to his left and the many loyal Spartans as they all thrust their spears into the air and hit their swords against their shields, chanting their war cry.
“Ho-ooh! Ho-ooh! Ho-ooh!"
The man’s breath was hard as he stood before the Spartan Army, “It’s been more than 30 years since the wolf and the winter cold. And now, as then, a beast approaches, patient and confident, savoring the meal to come.” He painted the tale of their king with such ferment that the young man beside him couldn’t help but feel in awe of his grandfather’s tale. “But this beast is made of men and horses, swords and spears. And army of slaves, vast beyond imagining, ready to devour tiny Greece.”
He wouldn’t help but feel insulted by some of the words of his godfather. Greece may not be as vast as Persia but at least she was strong, she had her warriors and her grace.
“Ready to snuff out the world’s one hope for reason and justice.” continued the encouragement. Trust Dilios to have such a way with words as he shook his fist as he spoke the men surrounding him. “A beast approaches.”
The thunder rumbles. “It was King Leonidas himself who provoked it.” No one was disillusioned as to how this bloodshed started, Dienekes knew the truth of his father’s and grandfather’s death. His mother and grandmother made sure of it. He knew the truth of his father’s actions and his grandfather’s choice. They were protecting their city, their home and their family. There was great honor in that.