"Yes," said Clearchus.
Phalinus looked at him in confusion, then glared. "What am I supposed to tell the king?" he asked in irritation.
"That for once we agree with him. There will be truce if we stay, and war if we move."
But he did not say which he intended.
That evening, Clearchus ordered us to break camp just after dinner. When Xenophon passed the order on to me, I could not believe I had heard him right.
"Do you realize that Clearchus has just signed our death warrant?" I exclaimed. "We are only ten thousand-the king will have his entire army upon us by daybreak!"
Xenophon didn't flinch. "That may be-but Clearchus' hand was forced, by our own troops. Did you know? Three hundred Thracian infantry and forty cavalry deserted to the king this afternoon."
"Three hundred and forty? Couldn't their officers keep them in line until we all came to a decision as a unit?"
Xenophon hesitated, and looked away with an expression of bitterness. "Their own officers led them. And as soon as word of the desertion spreads through the army, there will be others."
I pondered his words. There was no telling how much longer Clearchus would be able to keep the army together in the absence of the common hope of plunder from Cyrus. A frontal attack on Artaxerxes, with badly outnumbered troops, was out of the question. Staying where we were with no provisions, while the king wore us down by delaying, would be to commit passive suicide. Our position simply was not tenable.
"Where does Clearchus intend to march us?" I asked.
Xenophon shrugged. "He sees no choice but to unite with Ariaius and the native troops, and to hope they remain loyal to us rather than to the king."
It remained unspoken, yet implicit, that moving from our present location meant a declaration of war against the entire Persian empire, as surely as our forebears had declared war on the king's own ancestors, Darius and Xerxes.
After a long march in the darkness, we reached Ariaius' camp at midnight. The officers immediately gathered around a council fire, and all of them, Persian and Greek alike, swore to defend each other to the death. At Ariaius' insistence, they sealed the pact by dipping their spears in the blood of a newly sacrificed bull, each man daubing a bit on the breast of his neighbor with his spear point as a sign of mutual trust.
Clearchus then spoke up, impatient.
"Now that we've sworn allegiance to each other with that spear-point bullshit, and recognize that we're both in the same predicament, what do you propose, Ariaius? You know this country. Do we return the way we came?"
Ariaius stared morosely into the fire a few seconds before answering.
"If we return that way, we're sure to starve. On our march here the countryside was a barren desert. For seventeen stages we had to rely on the provisions we brought with us, and now we have none." He paused again for a moment, in thought. "Returning by the northern route is longer, but it at least brings us through fertile country with plenty of villages, where we can take provisions. The key is to move fast, and put as much ground between us and Artaxerxes as possible. He won't dare to attack us with a small force, but if he moves with his entire army he'll be too slow to catch us. I propose we move quickly, while we can."
This set the officers to grumbling, for it looked like the coward's way out-a mere cut and run. No one else had a better idea, however, so by default the officers voted it as their plan, sacrificed to the gods, and each went back to catch what few hours of sleep he could before rousing the exhausted army the next morning and embarking on a forced march.
I lingered for a time in the shadows by the fire, reluctant to return to the tent, my mind whirling and my body tense and restless. Despite the awfulness of that long, bitter day-the burning of the dead, the confrontation with Phalinus, the exhausting march in the dark to Ariaius' camp-I had scarcely been able to think of anything but the event of the night before. My thoughts raced with the vivid dream I had experienced, my near certainty that I was about to die at Asteria's hands from having unknowingly committed some crime of concupiscence, like one of those sticklike male insects I once watched in horror as a child which, even during the very act of mating, is calmly devoured by the female headfirst, right down to his still rutting abdomen. After wandering aimlessly across the camp for some time, I realized with a jolt that my feet had carried me, almost instinctively, to the quarter of the camp followers.
Picking my way through the confused jumble of wagons and tents in the women's section, I sensed the burden of mournful and accusing glances pressing upon me from every shadow and shelter. I wandered blindly and fruitlessly for an hour, uncertain that I would ever be able to find her-when suddenly, seemingly from nowhere, I felt her soft hand slip into mine and tug me gently away. She led me to the edge of the camp, and I tried to pull her close to me, but she stiffened, resisting me, and continued to guide me forward in the dark until the mournful sounds of the camp had been left far behind and we came to a small rock outcropping, sheltered by a forlorn shrub. Here she finally stopped, and without sitting down, turned toward me, her face shadowed in darkness and her body tense.
"Theo, last night was… last night I was afraid of everything, and what we did was wrong. I am sorry."
I remained silent, waiting for her to continue, for I had nothing to contribute to a statement such as this.
"You know me but you know nothing about me," she said. "I am a child of the Persian court. I was beholden to the prince, and before that to his family. Yet here in the desert I have nothing. I can bring you only misery."
"Asteria, if you mean a dowry, that is not something I am concerned with. I too have nothing of my own. And a marriage is impossible for the time being anyway, under these circumstances."
She paused for a moment, seemingly puzzled, before I saw a faint, sad smile briefly flit across her face. "That isn't exactly what I meant. It is a question of family honor. My father…"
I interrupted her, glowering. "You are concerned about honor and your father-why, because I have no rank? I am a soldier of Athens, a warrior. I have no money, but I have a strong arm, and the vast heritage of my city. Who is your father, what does he have to boast of?"
She sighed. "Theo, you don't understand. If it were merely his disapproval, that I could endure. It is something far more than that, though, something I fear I could not live with. How can I betray my father?"
"Betray him? Where is your father now? Of what possible threat can I be to him, or him to me?"
"I'm not even sure myself…"
"Asteria-look at our situation, look at your situation. A woman must take protection where she finds it. I am here, and he is not."
She paused for a long time in the darkness, peering into my face, seeming to perceive me as clearly as if it were light, again attempting to divine the response of the gods before acting. After a moment she moved toward me, and I felt her warm, fragile body press against me. I bent down to breathe in her scent, the same powerful perfume of charred wood and crushed flowers that had lingered in my nostrils since her visit the last night. As we settled on the sparse, dusty grass beneath us, I began fumbling clumsily with her tunic, attempting to slip my hand beneath.
"Wait," she said, "we haven't time. The sun is beginning to rise already." The eastern sky had indeed begun to lighten and the camp was beginning to stir with the sounds of morning activity, though hardly anyone had slept more than a few hours.
I relaxed and an almost overwhelming sense of weariness and release washed over me, leaving me grateful for the opportunity merely to lie still with her in my arms. She, too, seemed content, worlds away from the tension and desperation of the night before. Still, the terrible doubts I had harbored earlier continued to nag at me.