Atlantis: Gate by Robert Doherty Read Free Book Online

foreign land simply because his king had ordered him forth.
    Most would have found the Oracle vague, but Leonidas had experience with seers and he actually thought she made more sense than many. Most spoke so vaguely that their words could be interpreted a dozen different ways. At least she was specific in what needed to be accomplished.
    “The other creature I killed—what was that?”
    “It comes from the Shadow’s world,” the Oracle said.
    “It must be a strange place,” Leonidas said. “How far away is this Shadow’s kingdom?”
    “We do not know.”
    “Perhaps that is why you need the map,” Leonidas said.
    “The map is not for my use.”
    “I will send one of my men back with the map,” he offered.
    “Do you remember Croesus, last of the Lydian Kings?” the Oracle asked.
    Leonidas nodded.
    “He sent many gifts here,” the Oracle said. “To my great-great-grandmother. And she gave him a prophecy. He only listened to what he wanted to hear in the manner in which he wanted to understand. She told him that if he warred against the Persians, that he would destroy a great empire. That was what he wanted to hear, so he marched forth and entered into battle with Cyrus, King of Persia. And he was defeated. A great kingdom was indeed destroyed; his own.
    “I have told you that you will have great honor on the battlefield,” the Oracle continued. “But that prophecy is contingent on Cyra traveling with you. Let me remind you, King, that the Valkyrie would have had your head last night if I had not told you its weakness. The paths of fate are very tenuous and easily swayed if one is not careful.”
    “And let me remind you, Oracle, that I would not have been here to lose my head, if you had not sent a dream to me,” Leonidas replied. “And if I had not honored that dream.”
    “The Persians are coming regardless of whether you came here or not,” the Oracle said.
    “Women,” Leonidas muttered. The Oracle didn’t hear him, but Cyra did. The priestess smiled slightly but said nothing. “Let us be going then.” He slid his sword in the sheath and walked toward his hobbled horse.
    **************
    “Master, remember the Greeks.”
    King Xerxes, son of Darius, King of Medea and Persia, ruler of Libya, Arabia, Egypt, Palestine, Ethiopia, Elam, Syria, Assyria, Cyprus, Babylonia, Chaldea, Cilicia, Thrace and Cappadocia, and most blessed of God Ahurumazda, had heard the same admonishment every evening for five years, whispered into his ear by the woman who stood to his right rear. Five years, from the first day he was King in 485, succeeding his father, Darius. Who five years before his demise, in 490 BC, had his army defeated on the Plain of Marathon by the Greeks. It had been a stunning defeat given that Darius’s army had outnumbered their opponents by more than five to one. Xerxes was certain that his father’s death, even though it was years after the battle, began that day. The defeat was like a cancer that had eaten away at his father’s pride and life.
    Time was indeed the enemy of all, Kings and peasant alike, Xerxes ruminated, listening to the rain and wind batter at his imperial tent as he began eating his breakfast. His campaign throne was at the head of a long wooden table. Along each side sat his generals and around the outer rim of the massive tent were fifty of his Immortals standing guard.
    There were nine thousand, nine hundred and fifty more Immortals encamped directly around the Imperial tent to bring the total to ten thousand. That number, like the rising of the sun each morning, was a certainty. Even if one of the Immortals were to be struck this very second by one of the bolts of lightning that were crackling about outside, there would be a man ready to take his place. Because the number was kept always at ten thousand, the Imperial guard had gained its name of the Immortals, because it appeared as if the unit could never be depleted or destroyed.
    Outside of the ring of Immortals