Page 10 of Eryx

“I fear he’d be disappointed in me,” Axios said, meeting my stare. I didn’t see how anyone could ever be disappointed in him. “My skills are poor, and I lack the warrior mindset. My mother does not worry over me because she fears for my safety, it is because she fears I will disgrace our name.” He paused as sorrow filled his eyes. “Unlike you. Your father must be proud of the man you’re becoming.”

I shrugged and laid my head on the soft grass. “My father is dead, so I do not know if he’d be proud.”

“Did war take him?” he asked.

The question stopped me cold. It’d be easy to say my father died a hero in battle. However, as my gaze flickered to his honey eyes, I knew I couldn’t lie to him.

“No. He did not die in war.” I averted my eyes, too humiliated to look at Axios. “He fled battle, and when he returned to Sparta, he was publically shunned. As all cowards are treated, he was forced to dress in rags and have his face shaved. Everyone who looked upon him saw his disgrace.”

As the son of a known coward, my family honor was lost. Gaius knew the truth about my father and had often treated me more harshly than the other boys. Instead of beating me down, it had only strengthened my determination to succeed.

“What happened to him?” Axios asked.

“He slit his own throat. The shame was too much for him to bear. Do you think badly of me now?” I whispered, staring at a lone cloud above me instead of meeting his stare.

I waited for the disgust. Waited for him to say he no longer wished to be my friend and turn me away. The rejection would hurt, but I would understand.

Axios touched my cheek with the back of his hand.

Shocked by the tender action, I finally met his gaze. What I saw in his eyes made my heart beat faster.

“Never,” he said, leaning closer to me. “You are not your father, Eryx. You are brave, with a keen mind, and you possess skills that are far greater than even the more experienced youths. Nothing could ever cause me to think badly of you. Nothing.”

If there was ever a moment when the earth shifted beneath me, it was that one. The tenderness in his eyes and the softness in his voice touched a place inside my very being that had never been reached before. His words told me that this connection I felt between us was one he shared too.

“I treasure you,” I finally spoke, afraid my emotions would cause my voice to shake. “Not a day passes when I do not thank the gods for placing you in my life.”

Axios was silent. He swallowed and seemed to struggle with how to respond. He then smiled and lay his head beside mine, becoming playful as he nudged me. “Becoming sentimental are we? I suppose I feel the same.”

His teasing tone was light, but I knew him. My words had affected him just as greatly as his had affected me.

“What of your mother?” he asked.

His arm pressed to mine, and it took a moment to formulate a response as I was too focused on how peaceful it was to lie beside him in this way.

“She died bringing me into this world. Before theagoge, I visited her grave often.”

In Sparta, only men who fell in battle and women who died in childbirth were permitted inscribed graves. They were heroes. How odd that my father would always be remembered as a coward, and my mother a hero.

I wondered on which end of the pendulum I’d fall.

“So, if your mother died at your birth, how old were you when your father met his end?”

“Nearly seven,” I answered. “I took care of myself until I joined theagoge.”

Axios was quiet for a while, his brow furrowed in a way I’d come to associate with him being deep in thought. I waited for more questions, but they never came. We spent the rest of our time sprawled out in the grass and enjoying the warm day.

Some time later, we left our secret place near the stream and returned to the training field. Youths of various ages huddled together, watching something I couldn’t yet see. Axios flashed me a questioning look, and I shrugged. They could’ve been watching anything. Perhaps Gaius had pitted two more boys against each other in our absence.

As we approached, the scene became clear. Boys from our herd stood in a line facing Felix and other men who’d taken turns training us. Felix walked down the line, tearing off each of their tunics and exposing their naked flesh for all to see.

“What is happening?” Axios asked, worried.

The answer became clear when I witnessed Felix taking the boys’ clothing. We’d endured so much already, and now we would have an even tougher road ahead of us. But I didn’t wish to worry my friend. No matter what happened, I would protect him.

Gently, I touched his arm. “Do not worry. This is expected. We are youths of twelve now, and this is the next phase of our training.”

“But we are here. We…” Axios looked at the boys surrounding us, ones who weren’t of our age group. Our herd was the one in the center of the arena. “We returned too late. I’m sorry. It’s my fault.”