The Arcadian

The best-selling author of Gates of Fire and A Man at Arms presents a gripping, genre-bending story of a mercenary in late medieval Spain and the eternal costs of violence.



Spain in the 1500s. The Iberian Peninsula is fractured, faiths collide, and war brews. Into this world rides Telamon―soldier, killer, eternal outcast―drawn into a brutal conflict between Portuguese invaders and desperate Andalusian defenders. But he is not alone. Traveling with him through time and lifetimes are others―comrades, lovers, enemies―each reborn in a new guise, all of them entangled in a tale of cosmic justice. As he builds to a siege that represents one of the most remarkable battles ever put to paper, Steven Pressfield, the renowned master of the historical epic, poses questions that every warrior confronts: Can a man born to fight ever lay down his sword? And is redemption possible after so many lifetimes soaked in blood? A gripping standalone novel, as grounded in gritty realism as it is in the mysticism of the ancient Greek world, The Arcadian is a tale of war, fate, and the search for release from a cycle as old as time itself.