A Boy of the Agoge by Helena P Schrader

Author:Helena P Schrader [Schrader, Helena P]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Cultural, Fiction, Greece, Historical
ISBN: 9781604944747
Google: ixKFFxg9vdsC
Amazon: B0048EJZ3W
Goodreads: 30639501
Publisher: Wheatmark, Inc.
Published: 2010-11-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 8

Age 16

PERCALUS WASN’T THE ONLY TROUBLE WITH girls that Leonidas and his friends had by the time they reached 16. After consulting their elders, it had been arranged for Percalus to return to Laconia and live with Lysandridas’ neighbour Cleitagora. Cleitagora, who had taken in Koiris on that fateful stormy night three years earlier, was a widow with two unmarried sons on active service. She had agreed to teach Percalus her future duties as a Spartiate wife and to “introduce” her to society. Percalus was clearly pleased with the arrangement, although Leonidas and Alkander were both somewhat uncomfortable with it; Leonidas because everyone seemed to assume that he would provide a dowry for Percalus, and Alkander because he found the attention his sister attracted embarrassing. She couldn’t go anywhere without young men taking notice of her. Percalus loved the attention and openly encouraged it—in her modest, mincing way.

Meanwhile, however, they had discovered their own interest in the opposite sex, albeit to differing degrees. As so often in other situations, Prokles was the most forward, actively seeking out opportunities to watch the girls of the older cohorts at sports. The fact that Hilaira was still winning every race she entered provided a good excuse for them to hang about the racecourse when the girls competed, but Prokles took little interest in Hilaira herself. In fact, he took no interest in any girl in particular, just “girls” generally.

Alkander had the opposite problem. He was as beautiful in the same golden way as his sister, and it was the girls who took an inordinate interest in him. Whenever Prokles led them over to loiter around girls’ events, Alkander would become the object of repeated efforts, by maidens both bold and shy, to attract his attention. No matter how indifferent Alkander acted, the girls persisted. For some his shyness constituted a challenge, and for others it increased his attractiveness. One lithe, dark beauty, Eirana, who was an outstanding rider, openly snubbed Prokles but had only smiles for Alkander.

Leonidas found himself frustrated that his friends were so “obsessed” with girls and less interested in riding about the countryside with him. Once or twice he left them to their “girl watching” and went off on his own—but that wasn’t really much fun either, so he ended back with them although he was mostly bored. Until, that is, they found themselves watching some girls wrestling.

On the whole the quality of girls’ wrestling was far beneath their own and not really worth watching, but a crowd had been attracted this particular afternoon by a maiden who quite simply defeated every opponent she faced with ease and elegance.

“Who is she?” Prokles inquired, looking automatically to Alkander. Alkander seemed to know all the girls’ names.

“Don’t you recognise her? That’s Lathria, Timon’s sister.”

“Timon?” Prokles asked, disbelieving. Timon had long been Alkander’s most merciless tormentor, and still treated him with disdain, long after most of the unit had accepted him. Timon increasingly challenged Ephorus, too, calling his decisions “stupid” or simply ignoring his directives contemptuously.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.