And what will we do if she bears a son? Anderle wondered then. Must I try to hide him as I did Mikantor? Her heart twisted with the old pain. King Sa kantor’s words had eased her sorrow but brought little hope. It had been nearly three years since Mikantor had been captured. Even if the boy still lived, he was lost to them.
“Come, and we will offer our gifts to the gods in exchange for their blessings.” She gestured, and two of the men picked up the chest that held the offerings. Hand in hand, Cimara and Agraw led the way along the path from the grove to the place where the river had spread wide to form a marshy bog. Planks had been laid across the mud to allow the pair to get closer to the water. As they neared, a pair of mallards flew up, quacking. The dessicated head and hide of a bull dangled from a pole among the reeds, left from the last ritual conducted by the old queen. Today they ought to have offered another, but that would have left evidence that Galid would question. Instead, Cimara was offering her remaining treasures—a bronze bowl with its side beaten in; a gold pin, bent; and then a good bronze blade that Agraw broke over one knee.
Metal flashed pale in the sunlight as the items were tossed into the bog. Anderle closed her eyes and reached out with her other senses, and it seemed to her that she could feel a change in the pressure of the air. The spirits were listening.
To make offerings to the waters was a new thing. Her mother had begun it, in one of the first years when the rains threatened to engulf the land. The sacred stones still got a little milk and bread, but the sight of dark waters closing over something so valuable was clear evidence that a sacrifice had been received. She hoped the gods were pleased. It had been disturbing to feel the land so uneasy as she crossed Azan.
Cimara and her new husband offered the last gold pin and turned. She was smiling with relief and pleasure, he serious, as if only now understanding that although he would not rule, his was the power that made the queen fertile to bless the land. The witnesses set up a cheer as they reached the grass. Startled by the noise, it took Anderle a moment to realize that she was hearing another sound. She bent and felt a vibration in the earth, and recognized it as the rattle of chariot wheels.
Some of the kings in other lands had chariots, but only one man would be driving so furiously here.
The others had heard and were turning. Anderle hurried toward the bride and groom. “Galid is coming! Agraw, take off the crown and cloak and hide yourself among the other men!”
Cimara’s face had gone white. She stood her ground as Anderle bundled the groom’s gear into the box that had held the offerings, but as the chariots surged over the rise, she reached out to take the priestess’s hand.
Galid’s charioteer reined in the ponies, a pair of chestnuts whose coats glowed the same color as his cloak, pinned with a great brooch far finer than anything Cimara had been able to give to the bog. Behind him came five other chariots, each bearing several men. Their bronze spearpoints gleamed in the sun.
“What a fine pair of birds—” he observed with a nasty smile. “And what fine feathers. But why the celebration? Have I somehow forgotten a holiday?”
“Does it require a holiday to make an offering to the spirits of the land?” Anderle replied.
“It does at least require a reason,” he said slowly, scanning the faces of the others. Flushed or pale, they avoided his gaze as if they had been guilty of some crime. “Has there been some disaster of which I was not informed?”
You are the disaster, Galid, thought Anderle, but she bit back the words as he went on.
“If you wished to make a sacrifice, why was I not invited? I see no beast, no fire, no blood on the ground. Surely you would not insult the gods with a paltry offering.”
“Bring us a bull, if you can find one among your herds that is not someone else’s rightful property, and we will be happy to offer it,” she said evenly. “You have left these people little to celebrate with, or for.”
“Is that so? But I was told that you were planning a very special ceremony.” His lips smiled, but there was venom in his gaze. “A queen’s wedding,” he whispered. “And not witnessed by the protector of this land?”
“You are not my protector,” Cimara said coldly, though Anderle could feel the trembling of her hand. “Not my war-king, nor my husband. You have no authority over me or over this land!”
“Only this!” he hissed, jerking a spear from its holder and swinging it toward her breast. “Here’s a plow for your furrow, if you’re so hot to breed!”
“Even you, Galid the Greedy, know better than to kill a queen,” Anderle cut in.
“I don’t have to kill her, only her heirs . . .” The spear lifted, and swung toward the others, who now stood surrounded by his men. “If she’s wedded, I’ll swear she’s not been bedded, nor will be.” He nodded to his charioteer, and a touch on the reins brought the cart closer to the witnesses. “Seven men stand here, shaking in their sandals like so many girls. And not a one has the stones to step out and face me, much less sire a ruler. Still, to make sure, I suppose I had better kill them all.”
He grinned, letting the spear drift back and forth along the line. Some of the men had knives, and one, a sword, but against those numbers none had dared to draw. As the spearpoint moved, first one, then another, edged away from Agraw, who stood with his eyes tight shut like a man trying to deny a bad dream.
“Is that the one?” Galid asked softly. He dropped the spear suddenly to prick old Orlai’s breast. “Is that trembling lamb the bridegroom, or shall I kill you instead?”
“It was him . . .” Orlai’s answer could barely be heard. One of the other men glared, but none of them had reckoned on paying such a price for witnessing a wedding. Agraw opened his eyes then, looking at Galid with a dazed expression, as if he had not understood. Perhaps that was a mercy, thought Anderle.
She took a deep breath, gathering her power. “Galid!” she cried, but his arm was already swinging. “Ni-Terat curses—” Her words were lost in Agraw’s scream as the spear drove in. For a moment the young man flailed, but Galid’s aim had been true. As he sagged, the spear jerked free. Blood spread across the front of his tunic as the victim sagged to his knees, and then to the ground.
“The food you eat, the ground you walk on . . .” spat Anderle, “Ni-Terat curses them all. Neither long life nor luck nor child nor wife shall you have, cursed by all the gods—”
“Bitch, be silent!” Galid swung the bloody spear around and Cimara clutched at Anderle’s arm. “Don’t you yet understand? The gods have abandoned us! Do you think I could have killed him if the gods cared what men do? But just in case I’m wrong, pitch the body of that fool into the river and let them have their sacrifice!”
“Your doom may be delayed,” whispered Anderle, “but one day it will come for you—” Even in her own ears her words sounded hollow. As the current took Agraw’s body, she put her arm around the weeping queen of Azan, who this night would sleep alone.
ELEVEN
In the heat of the afternoon, cicadas strummed from the hillside above the road like lyres that had lost their tone. Woodpecker pulled the length of brown wool that was one of his few remaining possessions across his nose and mouth to screen out the dust. By night it was his blanket, by day a drape to shield his fair skin from the sun. They had been marching for six days, from Tiryns north on the graded and graveled road to Mykenae, and then turning off before they reached the akropolis and going on toward Nemea. That had been the moment when the boy hoped for rescue, but his captors made a night march, and King Tisamenos had stayed behind his mighty walls, hoping the Eraklidae would think them impregnable. And now the high valley that sheltered Nemea was also behind them. The way ahead curved downward along a slanting ridge. Beyond the stark curves of the hills he could see the green of cultivated lands and the blue glimmer of the sea.
Korinthos, where Aletes now is king, he thought grimly, trying not to wonder what would happen when they got there. First—he glanced anxiously at the wagon where Velantos h
ad been unceremoniously dumped atop piled sacks of grain—they had to reach the city alive. He could understand why Kresfontes, on learning who Velantos was, had not wanted to keep him in Tiryns where he might lead the surviving populace in an uprising. But the prince should not have been moved so soon. Woodpecker had protested, but slaves, as he understood only too well, had no choices. And Kresfontes and Temenos had decided to let the gods choose whether to preserve King Phorkaon’s last son or relieve the Eraklidae of a problem.
The officer whom the kings had put in charge of this collection of loot rode in a chair-litter, out of the dust at the head of the column, shaded by oiled cloth stretched over hoops. A dozen warriors tramped after it, though the boy could not imagine from what dangers the man thought he needed protection. All the scary people were guarding him.
Perhaps if Woodpecker could find a stick he could use it to prop his bit of wool over his eyes so he could have shade without sweltering. I am a slave, he told himself. What I cannot change I must endure. With Velantos he had almost forgotten that, for a while.
He thought he heard a grunt from within the wagon and stepped closer to see. Velantos lay curled around one of the sacks, his head pillowed on another, apparently asleep. But he knew that the prince feigned sleep even when pain did not exhaust him, as if by closing his eyes, he could shut the new reality away.
It did not work for me, thought the boy, and the gods know I tried. On the voyage from Belerion to Tartessos he had been too seasick to care where he was. By the time they arrived, he could count his ribs. He did not know why they had not simply tossed him into the sea.
He leaned over the wagon. Velantos had grown thinner even in the past week. Above the black beard the strong shape of cheekbone and jaw stood clear. Even wasted, the powerful lines of the smith’s body were still apparent, but the tension that had enabled him to manifest that power was missing, or rather disrupted, as limb locked against limb to resist the pain. Velantos’ features tensed as the wagon hit a deeper rut, throwing him against the side, and Woodpecker heard a moan the older man could not deny.
“My lord! I know you’re not sleeping—this jolting would wake the dead,” he babbled. “Would you like water? And maybe I can fix something to keep off the sun.”
“Not dead . . .” Velantos echoed. Woodpecker wasn’t sure whether that had been a confirmation or a complaint. “Water would be . . . good.”
Woodpecker wondered if they had given him the skin of water to test his devotion or his self-control. But after three years in this dry land he could go without if he had to. He pulled the stopper and held it to Velantos’ lips, steadying the man’s head with his other hand.
As they descended, they began to pass scattered farmsteads. Men and women were working in the vineyards, hoeing weeds into the soil and trimming shoots to concentrate growth in the hard green grapes that were beginning to swell on the vines. They looked up as the soldiers came into view, then returned to their labor, satisfied that this was the enemy they already knew, unlikely to ravage fields where food could grow.
“I suppose the worst has already happened to them,” Woodpecker said aloud. “Farmers are like that, even when the world is falling apart. I remember—” He faltered, and then, seeing interest replace the pain in Velantos’ eyes, forced himself to go on. “In my country, after the floods came, or the human wolves, they would go back to the fields.”
“Earth must be served,” said the older man. His gaze grew inward. “I tell myself that it doesn’t matter who rules. The kingdoms of men rise and fall, but the peasants remain. So long as the crops still grow, life will go on. The blood of the slain fertilizes the fields.”
But if the sun doesn’t shine, the crops can’t grow, thought Woodpecker, remembering some of the bad years at home. Men and beasts alike prey on each other. For the first time, it occurred to him to wonder if the disasters that beset the Island of the Mighty had troubled other northern lands. Could such disturbances have pitted one people against another until the pressure set the Children of Erakles in motion? If the whole world was sick, he shouldn’t envy these farmers. They too were doomed. They just didn’t know it yet.
“Is something wrong?”
As Velantos spoke, Woodpecker realized that he had been silent for too long. But his reflections would be a poor medicine for a wounded man. He shook his head with a bright smile. “Thinking about farmers. This land is so different from my home—”
In other circumstances he might have enjoyed this opportunity to see the interior of Akhaea. His earlier journeys had mostly been made by sea. At the summer’s beginning the grass had already ripened to gold. Though patches of brush dotted the hillsides and taller trees clustered in the ravines, the shape of the land was still clear. The dark green pillars of holy cypress were scattered across them like the columns of a temple for the gods of the wild.
“They say that long ago there were more trees here,” muttered Velantos. “We cut them for houses and firewood and charcoal for smelting copper ore. There were lions too, but none has been seen in Akhaea since the one that Erakles killed.”
“If I could I would summon a lion to chase his children home again—” said Woodpecker, and was rewarded by the twitch of a smile.
The hill they had been descending began to level off. At its base clustered a few oak trees and some bushes with leathery pointed leaves and pink flowers, surrounding a stone basin that collected the trickle of water from a spring in the side of the hill. An order from ahead turned the line toward the trees.
When they came to a halt, Woodpecker assisted his master to sit up and found two sticks over which he stretched his bit of cloth to provide some shade. It was hot. When he went to refill his waterskin, he plucked a spray of the pink flowers. They had five petals with squared-off tips and a faint sweet smell.
“It’s so dry here, I’m always surprised to find flowers.” He held them out to the older man. “These are pretty. What are they called?”
“Bitter Laurel—highly poisonous.” Velantos’ wry smile became a bark of laughter as Woodpecker snatched the flowers away. “But only if you eat them. A grown man would only become sick, but a little can kill a child.”
Woodpecker relaxed, but he did not return the flowers.
“You need not fear I’ll try to poison myself,” Velantos added bitterly. “I have no wish to add a bad belly to the pain I bear. Though I do not know why you should take the trouble to keep me alive, or for that matter, what gives you the right to do so.”
Woodpecker gave him a sidelong glance, trying to decide whether this was a convalescent’s petulance or a justified anger. He wondered suddenly if he had fretted so much about Velantos in the days since the fall of Tiryns to avoid asking himself the same question.
“My reasons are selfish, of course—” he said flatly. “Taking care of you gives me a purpose . . . again. When I was growing up, I was told I was born for great things. But I think now that those who said so were fighting their own despair. If the gods had a plan, they should have given me more protection! If I can’t serve myself, at least I can serve you.” He stopped short, breathing rather quickly. It had been a long time since he had allowed himself to feel that particular pain. He cast a quick glance at Velantos, who was looking thoughtful.
“Then I suppose I should try to deserve your devotion, though it seems rather thankless when I am a slave too.”
“Maybe that is why,” Woodpecker replied shortly. “I serve you because that’s what I choose. And what I choose now is to take a look at that leg of yours—” he added, and Velantos, interpreting the look on his face correctly, stretched out his leg with a grimace and a sigh.
The Eraklidae had rousted them awake early, allowing no time for Woodpecker to dress the wound. His lips tightened as he unwound the bandage. The spearpoint had gone deep, and though the wound had bled profusely, who could say what filth still hid within? The skin around the gash was an angry red, hot and hard to the touch. Velantos flinched when he bathed it an
d applied powdered sage to poultice it anew. For whatever good that might do, the boy thought grimly. It should be opened up so that the medicine could reach it. Velantos needed a healer, not a barbarian who could only try to apply what little he remembered of the ways old Kiri had treated his scrapes at Avalon.
He could feel Velantos trembling, though the man made no sound. He wrapped a new bandage around the leg and took the old one to the spring to wash. When he came back, the prince’s eyes were closed. Woodpecker looked more closely and saw that he had stopped sweating. That was not a good sign.
VELANTOS WRITHED IN WAVES of heat. He could see the rim of the crucible around him; he was the raw ore, the essential metal liquifying as the dross rose to the surface. He groaned as a harsh touch scraped his skin, scooping it away. He hoped the smith knew what he was doing; If the fire was allowed to grow too hot, even copper would burn. Perhaps that would be best—the pyre would consume his pain.
“Velantos—open your mouth. Drink this!” The order came from some other world, but his body must have responded; he tasted cool bitterness, and suddenly the heat gave way to racking chills. His sensitized skin screamed at the touch of a woolen blanket, and then he was back in the crucible, and the cycle began once more.
Each time it happened the sensations were more intense, more divorced from any human reality. The crucible became the body of a woman formed of flame, slender and supple, with glowing eyes. He gave himself to Her more fully than ever he had with any mortal lover, pouring out his essence in Her embrace.
“Now you are fire . . .” said the goddess, “by giving all, you become everything.”
“But can do nothing—” came a voice like thunder. “If he would serve You, he must be shaped and hardened, hammered and honed.”
“Then I give him to You!”
I don’t want . . . the spark that was Velantos protested, but already the grip of the goddess was tightening; he felt himself changing in her arms. Still glowing, he was lifted and laid upon an anvil. He convulsed at the first blow, and again and again as each particle of his body was realigned.
Sword of Avalon: Avalon Page 18