Silence
Like any boy I wanted to fight, I wanted to kill, to protect that which belonged to me. But I wasn't given the choice. The blade that pierced me first passed through my mother as she lay above me, giving her life for mine. "Live," she wept in red, "and tell what happened." A cough racked her body and blood pooled on her lips, draining away her spirit. "Hide," She whispered against my cheek before her eyes slid closed in eternal sleep.
Silver faces flashed in and out of my vision, nightmares that haunted me as I crept stealthily into the fields of grain. When they nailed the bodies, live or dead, to the towering tree I bit my own hand hard enough to make it bleed in order to stop my mouth from crying out and betraying me. And when the devils left I did not dare move. What if they returned?
So I stayed hidden and wept. Men did not shed tears but I was only a boy; one that would never be a man. There were no young girls left for me to grow up and marry, no fathers to train me, no mothers to teach me right from wrong. I was alone.
Consciousness wove in and out of my grasp. Screams and laughing faces chased me while I slept. I could smell the stench of blood when I awoke. Between the memories a new sensation surfaced. Marching feet. I felt the ground tremble as the pounding grew steadily louder, the beat never faltering. A shameful fear encased me as I wondered if they had returned to finish me off.
Then the beating stopped and I heard the shouts of disgust and hatred that marked them as friend not a foe as they stood before the death tree. From their red capes and shields I knew them to be of Sparta and I struggled to my feet. I stood tall as I walked over the ridge, it was almost over now.
My legs gave out as I reached the mighty King and he caught me gently. Cradling me as my mother had done.
"It's quiet now." I whispered as I gazed into his sorrow filled eyes. "They came out of the blackness."
With his gaze my body was filled with peace. I had fulfilled my orders. They knew now. With a soft sigh I let myself join my mother in freedom.