“Then we had better win,” I said. “Let Zeus the Merciful bear witness, I have given the people better laws than that.” And I told the news to the men upon the walls, to make them stubborn. The second wave of attack was coming; if we broke it, I knew we were past the worst.
The Rock had weathered many sieges. Down in the caves I had found the great bronze-shod pikes from my father’s wars, to fling down ladders and climbing men. All round the walls I saw them bristling, then dipping to their work. War-yells and death-yells rose again, stones crashed and rumbled, cutting swathes through screaming men; arrows pattered on earth or sank in flesh; the battle rose up the Rock like a stormy sea. Hippolyta stood beside me on the western wall, where the ramps slope to the gates and the Citadel is weakest. Here I had posted the little dark Cretan archers, in their quilted jerkins, and the Hellene spear-throwers, the tall young men who had won prizes at the Games. I threw well myself that day. The press down there was seething below the ramp. They were going to charge.
We heard a wolflike paean. A thick swarm thrust out from the mass upon the zigzag causeway, like an angry snake writhing upwards; and, like a snake, marked brightly at the head. For in the van were the Amazons; and out before them strode a Moon Maid dressed in purple, tossing in her hand the sickle ax of the King.
The arrows whistled, the javelins flew, bodies fell from the ramp’s edge to the rocks below. But the girl ran onward, as lightly as at a hunt, and sprang on an outcrop beside the path, and gave a loud high call. The tongue was not so strange to me as it once had been. “Hippolyta! Hippolyta! Where is your faith?”
She stepped out from beside me, while I called to her to take care and held my shield before her. She hollowed her hand to her mouth and cried, “It is here! With my man and my king! These are my people.” She added more, which I could not follow word for word. But her voice was saying, “Do not hate me. I can do no other.”
The girl stood fixed for a moment. Hippolyta was still too, waiting; I felt it was only to hear her say, “What must be, must; it was our fate,” and that would have brought her peace. But the Amazon below screamed out, as shrill as a wheeling eagle, “Treacherous whore! Your man shall feed the dogs and your people the ravens, and when you have seen it we will throw you off the rock!”
Hippolyta gasped and shuddered. Then her mouth set; she pushed my shield aside from her, and fitted an arrow to her string. But I could see her anguish, and her hand moved slowly; the Maiden King leaped down unhurt into the press. I did not see where she went, there was too much to do.
Almost to the gates they pressed their charge; but in the end we turned them. Little by little they lost their thrust, and wavered, and sank like turbid water back on to the plain, leaving a silt of corpses and stones. Our joy was too deep to cheer. Old warriors hugged the comrade next them; men stood singing alone a hymn to their guardian gods, and vowing offerings. Hippolyta and I walked round the ramparts hand in hand, like children at a festival, praising and greeting those we passed. We were too tired to talk that night, but sank to sleep in each other’s arms as we fell to bed. But I had myself called at midnight, just as usual, lest victory make us careless. It was they, not we, whom I meant should be taken off guard.
I reckoned three days. The first they would lick their wounds, and look out for us to follow up our victory; if we did, it would cost us dear. The second they would settle to think what next, and count their stores. The third, unless I was far out, half of them would go foraging. They would have no choice. And since they had stripped the land for miles, I doubted they would be back by nightfall.
Just so it proved. On the third night I gave orders to light the signal fires, having done already what else was needful. To hide our purpose, we sang loud hymns about the Deacons, as if at some god’s festival. They did not know our customs; and indeed we had need to pray. The wine and oil we poured—for drink-offerings were all we had to give—made the flames leap higher. I asked the priest of Apollo which god to choose as patron of the battle; and looking into the smoke he said I should pray to Terror, son of Ares. As I lifted my hands, I saw a point of light on the peak of Salamis; a single beacon, signalling “Yes.”
Athene gave us a dark sky. That was her second favor; the first I had asked already. For, since even in darkness an army coming down the ramps would have been spied, we must go another way. It was sacred, secret, and forbidden to men; I had heard of it from my father, but never seen it, till the night before when I went alone with the priestess, to ask for leave.
It was always night there. It went down through the cavern of the House Snake, in the very core of the Rock. Its mouth, my father had told me, was in the western scarp below the sheer of the walls; but it was closed with raw stone, so that even I who knew of it had never found the place. It could only be opened from within.
The priestess was old. She had served the shrine before we brought Athene back from Sounion. But beside the House Snake, she was a little child. Some said he was Erechtheus himself, the ancient Snake-King, the founder of our line. Neither my father nor my grandfather had ever been into his presence; and as the old woman with her lamp went down before me, my palms were cold with awe. The way was steep, the steps little and shallow; often I, who am not tall, had to bow my head. But when we reached the cave, the roof over the narrow walls was lost in shadow. It was a split in the living rock, going up into the stones the Palace stood on. Though only the naked feet of each single priestess had trodden the floor-flags, they were worn in a channel a hand-span deep.
On the steep rough wall, going far up into the dimness, were pictures like the work of children; little men with bows and spears, hunting beasts no one has seen. In the flickering light they seemed to leap and run. At last she stayed me with her hand, and pointed: there was a narrow hole by the wall, a cleft within a cleft. She lifted the lamp, and stood finger on lip. Deep down I saw thick folded coils, as big as a man’s calf, heaving and squirming. I covered my mouth, and the hair rose on my nape.
She took from a ledge a painted crock of milk, and set it beside the hole. The coils worked and furled among themselves; I saw the gleam of an eye. The head rose up, as pale as bone, marked with strange faded signs; the eyes were blue and milky, and did not see me; they looked only at fate. The mouth was shut; but a forked tongue flickered from it, dipped in the milk, and drank. The priestess stretched out her withered hands. For all the clammy sweat upon me, I saw thanksgiving in her eyes.
Since he had given consent, she led me to the closed end of the passage, and showed me the old signs carved there, where to put crowbars in. So, when she had concealed the sacred things, I had led my masons there, and now the way was open. It would be our path to battle.
In the dark before cocklight, we went to arm. As I reached for my gear, Hippolyta stayed my hand. “This once,” she said, “I will do like other women.” She belted my sword on, and when I had slung my shield upon my shoulder, gave me my helm. I said smiling that no other woman would be half so neat, and swung back the shield to take her in my arms. We stood together in the great curved shell of bull-hide; as she pressed her face to mine and stroked it with her fingers, some sorrow reached me from her silence, and I whispered, “What is it, little leopard?” But she answered lightly, and drew away and put her helmet on.
I looked at the crest of glittering sheet-gold ribbons, that danced and caught the lamplight. “It will soon be day,” I said, “and out there you have enemies. Wear something less showy.” She laughed, and tossed it to make it flash. “Will you do so?” she said; for I was plumed with scarlet, so that my men could see me. “Or shall I stay back from your side, in case they know where to find me? We are what we are, love. Let us keep our pride.”