Discord's Apple

by Carrie Vaughn

  Holding them in both hands, she presented them to the woman. With both hands, the woman took them from her.

  “Oh! Not even a scratch on them. They might have been made yesterday. Better than I had hoped.” She cradled them to her breast and turned a wondering gaze on Evie. “Thank you so much.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  Evie saw the woman to the door. Scratching Mab’s ears, she watched her walk down the driveway to the road, but turned away rather than see if the old woman was going to walk all the way to town, or if she’d simply disappear into thin air, back to where she came from. Evie didn’t want to know. Her hands were shaking.

  Like something from a story. A golden fleece. A pair of glass slippers. The slippers knew that the old woman had come for them, as if they had a sentience of their own. Did every object in the storeroom have that same sense of knowing?

  She didn’t even know how to ask that question.

  When her father returned, she was sitting at the kitchen table, hands pressed flat to its surface. It was how she finally got them to stop trembling.

  “Evie? What’s wrong.”

  Carefully, she explained. “An old woman came to the door. She asked for glass slippers. I found them in the basement, so I gave them to her. Is that okay?”

  He sat across from her. “That isn’t the right question. Tell me: Could you have not given them to her?”

  She shook her head. “They wanted to be with her.” She winced, knowing how odd it sounded, knowing it made no sense, but she had no other words to say. She could still feel the shoes pulling at her grasp.

  “Then it’s okay.” He reached across and touched her hand.

  “It wasn’t me, Dad. It was something else, like someone was moving my arms and making me talk—”

  His lips thinned. His eyes were sad, though, making his whole expression grim, resigned. “I knew there was a reason you needed to come home. The Storeroom will be yours when I’m gone.”

  No. She wanted to deny it, but there was a power pressing down on him. On her. The same sense, the same charge that led her to the glass slippers prevented the word no from leaving her mouth. She had her own life, she didn’t want this . . . this weight.

  She didn’t want her father to ever be gone.

  “I don’t understand,” she said simply.

  “You will, in time.” He sounded like a mystic sage. A wizard, not her father. Another character from a story, and she couldn’t turn the page to see what happened next.

  When Irving Walker left Saint Louis with his wife, Amelia, they took only three horses—two to ride and one to pack. What the packhorse couldn’t carry, they didn’t bring. The folk who saw them off thought it scandalous, Irving Walker putting his wife through that, not giving her the safety of a wagon train, making her ride in the open, exposed to the elements and all the dangers inherent in the crossing of the Great Plains. But they didn’t know it was Amelia’s idea. Irving asked her what she needed to bring, and she showed him one bag. “That’s all?” he said. “All the important things, yes.” They’d have a freedom they wouldn’t have with a wagon and oxen. They needed to be free, away from people and civilization. That was why they were leaving Missouri in the first place. It had gotten too crowded.

  Along the Arkansas River, where the Santa Fe Trail turned south to Mexico, an enterprising businessman named George K. Hope built an adobe fort to serve as a base of operations for his trading company, made up of fur trappers, Mexican merchants, and Indian traders. Within twenty years, Hope’s Fort became a primary way station for explorers heading west, merchants serving the pipeline between the United States and Mexico, and settlers looking for their fortunes beyond the Great American Desert.

  When George Hope saw Irving and Amelia Walker approaching the fort with nothing but three horses and the packs they carried, he swore that even after all his years on the plains and all he’d seen in that time, he’d never seen anything like it.

  Ten miles or so up the river, where a village had started to put down roots, Irving built a farmhouse with a massive cellar, which Amelia filled with the contents of the one bag she carried with her.

  4

  That night, Troy slept, drunk with wine and celebration. Sinon climbed to the top of the wall and lit a torch, the signal for the Greek army to return. Then he went to the main square, where the horse stood. Wide streets led out from the square, giving easy access to the heart of the city and its riches. As he watched, a door on the horse’s belly swung out, and Odysseus dropped to the ground.

  He spent a moment stretching arms and legs, easing the cramps from sitting motionless all day. Nevertheless, he drew his sword in a heartbeat when Sinon approached.

  “Easy,” Sinon said, his arms raised. “I’m a friend, I think.”

  Odysseus’s gaze widened. “Sinon, thank the gods!” They met in two strides and embraced. Odysseus stank of sweat and bodies, from being locked in close quarters with a dozen other men. But they were here, within the walls of Troy.

  “You lit the torch?” Odysseus said, stepping back to grip Sinon’s shoulders.

  “Yes.”

  “Then we should open the gate. The army will be here soon.” The man’s eyes blazed in the dark of night. Sinon grinned, though his swollen face felt stiff.

  A short hour later, Troy was on fire.

  Sinon didn’t fight much. He’d done his part for the final battle, had gathered enough wounds, and found that he was too weary to do more. He’d be more of a hindrance than a help, lagging behind while the army pillaged the city. Troy was rich. There’d be plunder enough for all. Right now, all the treasure he wanted was rest.

  He found a vantage at the temple of Apollo, a rotunda built on the highest hill. He hiked the steps to the portico and leaned on a column. From here, he could see most of the city. The fires started on a few roofs had swallowed entire blocks. He smelled the smoke, thick and caustic. The Trojans had been caught off guard. They ran out of burning buildings, fleeing in blind panic from bands of Greek soldiers. The Greeks, identifiable by the waving crests on their helmets, scoured the streets. Screams, shouts, the clanging of weapons and armor, drifted to him here.

  The streets ran with blood. As well they should. The Trojans had been safe behind their walls for too long. Now let them suffer for their pride.

  Sinon crossed his arms and mused.

  Something bronze clattered on the marble floor behind him. He grabbed his sword and looked.

  A woman reached for the dagger she had dropped. Her black hair was unbound, streaming in tangles down her shoulders. She wore the white tunic of a priestess, dusted with soot and blood. She limped, and her face was bruised. She was crying, the sobs coming in dry gasps.

  She held the knife like she was thinking of lunging at him, and her face twisted in anguish. “I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you!”

  He gripped his sword, but kept it low, not to threaten but to guard, to show she couldn’t reach him before he could defend himself. “I think not.”

  “Then there is only this,” she said, and lay the point of the dagger on her own chest.

  He jumped at her and knocked the weapon out of her hand before she could drive it through her ribs. Screaming, she fell away from him, pawing at him, as if his presence pained her.

  She’d been raped, of course. There probably wasn’t a woman in Troy who’d reach morning unscathed.

  “You’re Cassandra,” he said, finally recognizing her.

  Huddled against the next column, she steadied her breathing. “And you’re the liar.”

  He started to argue, but he knew what he’d done. What name he’d earned for himself. Two sides to every battle. To the Greeks, he was a hero. But theirs was not the only story to tell. “Yes.”

  “And you want to have your piece of me as well.” She spat the words.

  “No,” he said, and meant it. She was pitiable, trembling on the ground, hugging her tunic tight around her shoulders. She’d dropped the knife because her ha
nds were shaking.

  “You’ve changed the world today, Liar. Think what you could have done if you’d told the truth. All the people who would be alive now. The city would still be alive.”

  They both looked over the nightmare below them, the inferno and the battles that carried on from house to house.

  “And what of the Greek dead? Paris brought this on you when he took what was not his,” Sinon said.

  Cassandra shook her head. “It was the gods. The gods have played us. Do you see them? I do. Athena fights for Odysseus, there, guiding his spear. And there is Aphrodite, going to save her son, Aeneas. And Poseidon, shaking the walls of the palace. Do you see them?”

  Sinon didn’t, but her words painted a picture: giants among men, the gods and goddesses of Olympus moving people like they were game pieces.

  He sat down, leaning against the column next to hers. “They say you’re a seer. A prophetess, but that no one ever believes you.”

  “I am cursed,” she said, forming a vacant, mad smile. “I told them the horse is hollow and filled with Greeks. They laughed. Ridiculous. And it is, of course it is! I speak, I tell, I plead, and they never listen. And they wonder that I’m mad.”

  He chuckled, a soft, ironic noise.

  She looked sharply at him. “What?”

  “And there I was, lying with every word I spoke. And they believed me.”

  She covered her mouth. He thought she was going to start crying again, that the gesture was to hold back tears. But the skin around her eyes crinkled, and she laughed.

  “We’re an awful pair,” she said. She looked away, but the smile lingered.

  They sat together until dawn. When the sky began to pale with the rose-colored fingers of dawn, he found the courage to say, “I could take you home with me. They—” He nodded to the smoldering city, its streets now paved with bloodied bodies, an occasional scream still tainting the air. “—they will be making slaves of all the women. I could ask for you. I know it is not—it is not what you would wish. But I would be kind. I promise, I could protect you—”

  She was already shaking her head, as he expected.

  “I’m bound for another. Fate has measured out my thread to a frayed end. But—thank you. It is an . . . unexpected kindness that you offer. As kindness goes in these times.”

  He wanted to say more. He felt like he ought to say more, to defend himself and the sacking of the city. She seemed to be mocking him.

  A small group of Greeks climbed the path up the hill, flushing out the last of the stragglers. Below, on the street leading outside the city, the warriors were herding the surviving women and children. They were a weeping mass of bodies, clinging together, shuddering. Crying like sheep. No men were left alive.

  Cassandra saw this scene as well. She hugged the marble column, pressing her cheek to the ridged stone. “I don’t want to go.”

  He stood, straightening his sword belt, smoothing his tunic. “I’ll go with you, if you like.”

  “It won’t help. Nothing will help, don’t you understand? I’m already dead.”

  He waited for the soldiers, standing by Cassandra as if he had captured her himself.

  A trio of the Greeks reached the temple. One of them spoke to the others, then stepped forward alone. He still wore his helmet, masking his face and giving him an inhuman expression. His tunic, breastplate, and arms were covered with blood.

  “Sinon! Sinon the Hero!”

  Sinon raised his hand in greeting. He didn’t know him, but he shouldn’t have been surprised that this one knew his name. He supposed he was famous now—the man who cracked the walls of Troy with a lie.

  Smiling broadly, the newcomer stared at Cassandra. “I hope you haven’t spoiled this one too badly. King Agamemnon has asked for her. She’s the most beautiful of Priam’s daughters.”

  One couldn’t tell by looking at her now. Tears and soot streaked her face, which was still contorted from crying. Her hair was tangled, her clothing soiled. But her eyes still shone with spirit. Sinon remembered her from the day before—had it only been a day?—shouting, defiant: He is lying!

  “She’s mad, you know,” Sinon said.

  “Hmph. So she’s lost her mind. That isn’t what the good king wants her for.” The soldier moved to grab her.

  Before he could reach her, Cassandra struggled to her feet, pulling herself up against the column. Sinon reached to help her, but she shrugged away from him. She kept her gaze on the helmeted soldier, glaring at him like she could peel back his skin with a thought.

  “He is dead. Your King. Your Agamemnon. He doesn’t know it yet, but he is.” Scowling, the soldier again went to take hold of her, but she evaded him, circling the pillar, keeping the stone between them. “He doesn’t know what’s been happening at his home, but I do, and he is already dead. We’re all dead. All of us.”

  Then she looked at Sinon, her dark eyes lit with madness. “Except for you.” Her gaze narrowed, her head tilting curiously. Wonderingly, she said, “You don’t die.”

  She was mocking him again. Except she never lied. And she was a prophetess. But the phrase could mean anything. It could be a symbol. Men made careers interpreting the phrases of oracles. It could mean anything.

  “Come on.” The soldier caught her at last, his fingers digging into her arm. She didn’t make a sound, didn’t struggle at all. He dragged her down the steps, and Cassandra stared at Sinon until they reached the street and traveled out of sight.

  Slowly, Sinon followed, descending the steps carefully, as if he walked on coals. The world had changed this night. Language itself had changed, and he didn’t understand the sounds he heard on the air.

  Before he could raise his foot to leave the temple stairs and start on the path down to the city walls, an arm closed around his neck in a lock. Sinon grabbed the arm, trying to pull away, but his attacker was too strong, unnaturally strong. He dragged Sinon back up the steps as easily as he might have pulled a feather. The unseen man—for he was unseen, Sinon craned his head back, rolled his eyes to try to gauge the stoutness of the arm that held him so tightly, and saw that nothing held him at all—gripped him firmly, locking him against his body. Sinon was trapped, immobile, his head tilted far back, his lungs struggling to draw breath.

  A voice, taut with anger and sweet with power, said at his ear, “Hera promised Cassandra to Agamemnon. But I will be compensated for the loss of my priestess, and you have desecrated my temple with your presence. You are mine, mortal. I will have you, Liar. You will feel what is being done to the women of Troy. You are now a slave.”

  The arm released him, only to grab the front of his tunic and slam him to the marble floor of the portico. Sinon’s head bounced, his teeth cracking. His vision flashed as pain seared his skull.

  For a moment he saw the invisible one who attacked him: a man, thick golden hair crowning a beautiful, smooth-cheeked face and brushing perfect, sculpted shoulders. His glaring eyes were the pale blue of the sky.

  Sinon winced. “Apollo!”

  Apollo grinned and hauled him inside the temple.

  5

  When Evie was little, she used to think there was a rule book, some kind of golden understanding that enlightened you when you became an adult. “When I grow up” was a place, a real state of being, where one shed childhood like a worn-out carapace. Then she learned that if kids were cruel, so were adults. Not much really changed except the size and expense of the toys. There was no book, no magic moment of enlightenment, and she took a grim satisfaction in realizing that everyone spent most of their time being just as confused as she was.

  But this was different. She could feel a key sitting in her hand, even though she couldn’t quite grasp it. She could sense the door about to open. The door to the Storeroom, and what it meant. And unlike that great false Grail of adulthood, understanding really would come. When her father passed away.

  She was an heir waiting for the seal on the will to be broken. And she didn’t want anything to do with it.


  Her father went out again the next day. Evie thought he looked paler. Had he taken an extra painkiller at breakfast? She didn’t say anything. She didn’t want to argue anymore about him going out. He could take care of himself.

  She worked on the script. The team splits up. Talon can’t get the image of his long-lost friend out of his mind. The others have never seen him like this—agitated, obsessed. It makes them nervous. The Captain has always been their anchor. Sarge offers to go with him while the others continue on the original mission to rescue the captured spy.

  Tracker feels like she’s betrayed Talon by insisting on going on without him. She feels disloyal and wonders if he’ll ever forgive her. The hint of her feelings for him have been there for the last two dozen issues. Will it come out in the open soon? The tension is fierce.

  So Talon and Sarge are sneaking into the stronghold of the Mongolian terrorists. The other three race deeper into Siberia—

  A knock rattled the kitchen door.

  Evie’s heart started speeding—a Pavlovian response of anxiety. Not again, she thought. Not this again, please. She didn’t want to stand and move to the door. Her hands were sweating and her limbs felt stiff.

  The knock came again. It could have been just a neighbor. The postman. Please let it just be the postman. She went to answer.

  Mab trotted to the kitchen with her. She looked at the door, her head low, brown eyes glaring. A growl rumbled deep in her throat.

  This wasn’t like yesterday.

  Evie scratched the dog’s back, and Mab wagged her tail once, but never stopped staring at the door. Evie wondered who was waiting on the porch. She opened the door a crack, in case Mab decided to launch an attack.

  She was glad she was showered and dressed today. The woman standing on the porch was extraordinarily poised. Evie felt small and scruffy next to her, but at least she didn’t feel half-dressed.

  The visitor was tall, elegantly slender, like a 1940s starlet. She wore an expensive-looking, calf-length dark coat belted at her waist, and high heels. Her black hair was pulled to the back of her head and held in place with invisible clips, as if by magic. Her dark eyes were exotic, while her expression was indifferent.