At the head of the column, three hundred Spartiate warriors swung along, lost in contemplation. Some of them had talked quietly that morning, but as the day waned, the grim mood of battle was settling on them, stifling laughter and light talk. They could all see the mountains ahead, rising slowly green and brown, with the sea dark on their right flank. They had reached the city of Plataea the night before, having marched two days from Sparta and through the barricades on the isthmus. Men of Plataea had joined them then, running for their weapons and armour as the Spartans came loping through. Others had joined the column as soon as they saw the red cloaks. Leonidas looked back to Demophilus of Thespiae, with seven hundred warriors alongside. Those carried their own spears, never having earned the labour of helots. The man seemed in awe of the Spartan king, as he should have been. Leonidas had not told him all that lay ahead, nor that there would be no greater army of Sparta coming to join them. He found one fist clenching as he strode along, putting the stades behind on the road. With an effort, Leonidas relaxed.

The priests had come close to making him break his word, given by his brother to the Athenians. When they’d said he could not march against the Persians, not until the festival was over, Leonidas had been caught between obedience and outrage. Just the thought of it made his fist clench once more, this time unnoticed. War was forbidden during the festival of Apollo Carneios. In all his life Leonidas had never disobeyed the ephors, nor scorned the gods. Sparta was a dry place, a precarious place, without the natural gifts of other regions. They survived only with the blessings of Apollo and Ares. No man could pit himself against the gods of the sun and of war, not without destruction.

Even so, he had stood stunned for a time, with torches spitting and hissing at his back. Leonidas was a man used to making decisions. He had given his word to his brother to swear an oath. They would fight alongside Athens, though he despised those Greeks for the effete whores they were. Even so, he would not see their vanity exposed by Persians, their blood spilt. Yet he was not allowed to complete that oath and take the ten thousand and their helots out to the field of battle. He had to wait three more days, while the Persian flood approached a range of mountains where they could be stopped!

In that moment, when he had stood like stone and despaired, the priest had reached out and touched him on the shoulder. He’d felt the coldness of an old man’s bony hand and he had remembered what had been forgotten.

Years before, when he’d been made king on the death of his older brother, Leonidas had visited the oracle at Delphi. He’d crossed the gulf of Corinth in a small boat and walked alone to see what his reign would hold. He remembered the priestess sitting above the crack in the stone, where Apollo’s sleeping breath wreathed her in smoke. She had been beautiful, he recalled, though her eyes were terrible, as one who had seen and known too many things.