Herakles sat like an he was under a spell, eyes wide, limbs frozen. It was the most interesting story he had heard in his short life. Family history, mighty warriors and intrigue. “Fascinating,” the young man shouted out, no hint of malice in his voice. He was so excited that his eyes glowed, like stars in the sky. How did his master know all these things? Herakles smiled at the person who had given him all these revelations.
“Well, that"s all I know from the only uncontaminated person in all of Olympus. Well, unless we"re talking about alcohol,” Nestor added with another chuckle. “Your brother, Dionysus, visited me a couple of times on my lonely island and told me all these revelations, accompanied with aromatic wine. Part of it is probably stretched because of that red liquid, but it also makes it believable and real. Wine loosens the tongue, after all.”
“Wait, wait, stop. I have a brother?” stuttered Herakles, once again confused.
For Prometheus’ sake, Nestor thought. He supposed he should understand. Young Herakles didn"t know anything about his father"s… well, love conquests. After a moment"s reflection, he answered.
“Yes, although to say „you have a brother" is a big u nderstatement. You have a lot of siblings. Mortal and immortal. But ask your father for details,” the Satyr cut himself off. “But let"s get back to your so-called „curse."”
Herakles snapped out of his trance, looking more focused. “I think your beliefs have been influenced by those around you, telling you that you"re cursed, and it"s become ingrained. You have enormous strength, it is true, but that"s not enough for a warrior. You have to have grace, balance and speed. Blind rage will make you nothing but clumsy.”
He regarded the young boy, tapping his bearded chin. “Because people are self-appointed experts, and critics, in nature, they have no trouble expressing their opinions. All your life, you"ve had to deal with the unruly and dangerous, people afraid of you trying to destroy you. But the truth…” Nestor heaved a weary sigh.
Herakles watched, showing every intention of wanting to interrupt but resisting the urge. He sat, looking up at Nestor with admiration and relief, as though he had finally found someone who understood him.
“I think,” continued the master, “you"ve never had a nyone try to get into your sandals before. Strong emotional or physical pain interacts with a feeling of misunderstanding and loneliness. All this switches off your mind and at such moments, your most primal instincts set off. No logic, no pity. That"s your whole „curse." And there"s a chance that it is because of your family tree that you have such problems.”
When Nestor finished his argument, Herakles had doubts about how to feel for the second time that morning. He was happy that somebody understood him, but on the other hand, he felt a huge powerlessness against these primal reactions his master spoke of. It wasn"t really a curse? It was just… a flaw? Something he couldn"t control?
Seeing his disciple"s doubts, Nestor added, “Don"t worry too much. There is a way to use these negative emotions to make you stronger, not only physically but also mentally. Of course, this will take some time, but I believe we will succeed with some discipline and practice. Now,” the master sat across from Herakles, “tell me, is it your fault that you are so strong?”
The simplicity of the question made the young hero perk up. He may not have been the most educated young man in Greece, but he knew the answer to this riddle. “No. That"s how I was born,” he answered, pleased with himself.
“Yes, you"re right,” Nestor nodded his shaggy head. “And can you blame the lion for stepping on four feet instead of two?”
“Of course not.” They talked for a long time that morning, and with every subsequent question Herakles became more satisfied. He hadn"t felt such support for a long time and had forgotten how nice that feeling was. As for his master, he knew that they would have many hours of disputes and lectures, but he had no doubt that they would overcome them.
Seven
Nestor was lost in a white, freezing world of bitter gusts and falling ice. It swirled around him, a howling wind battering his body and the surrounding cliffs. He stood in knee-deep snow, shivering as he tried to make out a distant shape. Something whispered on the wind, the fuzzy figure trying to speak to him. Its whisper turned to a frantic screaming, echoing around him like a thousand lost souls.
“You have to find me,” said the voice, a voice that Nestor recognised.
“By the gods,” he murmured. “Dionysus?”
“A new threat is coming,” said the god of wine. “Worse than the interregnum!” Nestor squinted through the white haze, the freezing snow on his eyelashes, turning to ice. The figure was taking shape, into the form of a woman. Behind her, a city rose from the haze.
“…Olympus?”
His own voice was harsh and came out as barely a whisper, his throat scratchy and sore. Strange people and creatures appeared from the haze which, for all his wisdom and knowledge, he didn"t recognize. A woman wearing a coat of hawk feathers. A rotund man with a thick, black beard. A man with the head of a falcon. They surrounded him, and something grabbed him by the arm. The bloody figure whispered...
Nestor jumped awake, covered in sweat and breathing hard. Something terrible had happened to the gods. He had to leave the island.
He wasn"t sure what he"d seen and why, but it didn"t matter. There was no reason to be stuck in that damn place anymore. He"d been rotting here almost three hundred years. It was time for me to do something else, and that dream was a vision or a sign. If the gods were in trouble, he desperately wanted to save them. For all their flaws, Nestor did care about the mighty gods and goddesses that had breathed life into the world.
But how could he leave? After all, there was no boat here, and even if there was, the sea was so restless that even if he did fashion a boat, any attempt to sail cross it would end up in certain death.
“Well, there is one way,” he said to himself and sighed hard. There was only one person for his job; someone Nestor was sure was alive and still doing his job. He just
Łukasz Konopczak
wished that there was someone more cheerful who could do it. He had nothing to pack. He hadn"t worn clothes for years, and his only personal belongings were armour, a spear, a shield, a sword and a bow. He wouldn"t need a bag.
The armour still fit, though it fit snugly around his belly. It must have lost its elasticity. Yes, that must be it. He looked down at the breastplate, refusing to accept the more likely reason.
As he dressed, Nestor found it wasn"t as easy to get i nto his armour at it used to be. The shin guards, especially, gave him trouble, and sometimes his legs behaved as though they had minds of their own. His body was older, less mobile, than it had been when he"d served as a mentor for some of Greece"s greatest warriors. He had grown used to his Satyr hooves, and his meaty legs proved difficult to control.
If only they could see me now, he thought, amusement battling frustration as he hopped on one leg, furiously pulling the armour onto his thigh. After thirty minutes and much cursing, he was ready to go. He checked his reflection in a bowl of water, where stern eyes stared back, his beard unruly and his hair sticking to his neck.
He stepped out of his hut and into the gusty and perpetual cold that had been his home for all these centuries. It wasn"t the most beautiful view in the world; the grey sea rose and fell like a breathing beast, the rock littered with animal remains and corpses. Such things sometimes washed up on the island, the sea bringing debris from storms and battles from even miles away.
Traders? He thought, worried as he examined the nearest corpse. It was the body of a man with tanned skin, a nasty sword wound from neck to groin, flayed open and rotting for the birds to feast upon. One eye, the other already plucked out by a bird, stared sightless into the sky.
Pirates.
You can’t help them, he reminded himself. It was time to go. He waded into the water, feet clumsy in his boots. It would take a while to get used to his returned human form. He waded up to his ankles,
the extra weight of his armour heavy on his shoulders as ice-cold water lapped at his ankles. He stood in the water, unsheathed his sword and pressed the blade against his wrist.
“Carrier!” he shouted, his deep voice booming as though it could reach across the sea and into the sky. “I call upon you to respond to the call of a stray soul and save it from eternal damnation!” He bellowed it as loud as he could, drowning out the whistling wind and the crashing of waves against rock. He was not sure what hurt him more, the feeling of the hot blood flowing and trickling into the chainmail at his wrist, or the fact that he was entrusting his soul to such a gloomy person.
Eight
Nestor rushed to the castle as fast as he could. Something terrible had happened during the birth of Queen Pazyfae, the wife of King Minos. The head of security had never been so nervous. He"d faced many challenges and enemies, but the knowledge that something bad was happening to people he thought were a second family made butterflies take wing in his stomach.
When he was rushing through the next floors, he was sure that he could hear the cry of mother and child. But the baby didn"t sound normal. It sounded indecent, like... some kind of animal. The crowd standing in front of the royal chamber knocked him out of his thoughts.
“Are you people crazy? Get out of here!” he snarled as they scattered. “It"s barbaric to listen to your own queen like that!” He almost felt like an old man chasing a bunch of children trampling on flowers in his garden. But that wasn"t the worst of it. Looking at the people around, he knew that they too were disturbed by the baby"s strange cries. Their faces were drawn and pale, and they muttered to each other in tightly knit groups or pairs.
He quickly recovered from this thought, because he was alone in front of the gates separating him from the royal couple. He took a deep breath filling his lungs with muchneeded courage, and called through the gate, “Most just Lord and Merciful Lady, I, Nestor, come to give all necessary help.”
After these words, a deafening silence fell. He was not sure if he had been heard. Seconds passed and no one spoke inside. He was already ready to repeat his call when the gate opened slightly and he saw Minos emerge. The king"s serious face was drawn and pale, the opposite of how a new father should look after welcoming his child into the world. His brown beard was tangled as though he"d been running his fingers through it.
“Come in,” muttered the king and let Nestor inside. Passing the threshold, he realized that he had never been here before. The closest he"d ever been to the chamber was during the guard"s time under it. There had never been a case where he"d had to go inside and protect the peaceful king from danger. Frankly, he would rather have been here kill mercenaries and assassins than when his nerves were twisting his guts and a thousand thoughts were rushing through his head.
The king"s bedroom was huge, but surprisingly mo dest. There were no golden floors or endless mosaics. A bed sat in the centre, and around it there was a colonnade which Nestor privately thought to be rather grotesque, on which a mosquito net was hanging. Nestor tried to be as
Łukasz Konopczak humble as possible, but he was losing to his human nature. A small, disrespectful voice in his head whispered to him, “Look around as much as you can, because you"ll never come back here again.”
On the left side stood a gorgeous, enormous bathtub that could have accommodated ten people. On the right side there was door to a terrace, from which in turn you could walk to a beautiful garden supposedly as magnificent as those of Semiramis", a beautiful courtesan who had seduced and ordered the death of King Ninus.
There was no time to admire the brilliant architecture, however; he had to focus on the child. Nestor turned to the king as quietly as he could without offending and upsetting the queen even more, who was sitting in a corner and crying bitterly, her black hair hiding most of her face. Sometimes she glanced towards the cradle and then raised her tear-filled gaze to the sky, as if begging the gods for answers.
“Lord, please tell me what happened,” he chose his words as carefully as he could. Minos lifted his eyes, his gaze penetrating his faithful servant. He said something very quietly, as if uttering it brought him great pain. Nestor did not want to offend the ruler, but he was almost certain that he heard the word “curse.” He didn"t have to think long about it.
The king pointed at the cradle and went to embrace his wife. The head of security fought with various possibilities. “Cursed” could mean anything, and images floated through his mind of two-meter-high giants from Persia, toothless pirates from the Aegean Sea, assassins from the east. Whatever was awaiting him in the child"s cot, it wouldn"t be something he couldn"t handle. He took a deep breath and moved forward slowly, a tickle of sweat running down his spine.
Standing over the cradle, he was almost swimming in his armour. When he looked down at the baby, his heart stopped, and he wanted to vomit. He"d never seen anything like it in his life.
Nine
It got quiet and dark. The wind was no longer whistling in the ears and the waves hitting the rocks made no sound, like Nestor had suddenly been stricken deaf. But he could hear his heartbeat, the blood flowing in his veins and his working lungs. It was as if his ears were not an organ on the outside.
The sea was completely still as if it was a statue forged before Fidias the world"s greatest sculptor. The wind stopped. The trees did not bend or wave and the fragments of the crashed boat did not ripple in the waves anymore. When the master of Herakles looked at the whole scene, he noticed, about fifty meters from the shore that an object was emerging from the bottom of the sea.
The bow appeared first, sliding from the suddenly calm water, before the rest of it emerged to rest on the surface. A boat, Nestor realized in wonder. It was a red structure with golden stripes stretching along the two sides, and it was coming ashore. On its bow was a statue of a woman with black wings at her shoulders and a torch in her hand facing the sea beneath her.
At the rear rudder stood a man, tall and thin with long, black hair. His skin was the colour of ash and he held a long oar in his hands. As it came ashore, Nestor realized that its red-rust hue was from being painted with blood. As the sailor came closer, it was clear it was not a simple oar in his hand, but a halberd.
“For the second time in my life I feel like this, and I hate it,” said Nestor, standing like a stickler incapable of moving even a muscle. The grey figure slowly came ashore, his boat halting on the rock. He climbed out, his limbs painfully thin, and walked towards the warrior.
“The last time you felt this way was when you sa w him in the cradle,” said the ship"s “captain.” Every vowel stretched, a gloomy air to his voice, as though simply speaking brought him misery. They stood face to face.
“No, I think that back then, I felt a hundred times be tter,” Nestor choked, nausea churning in his stomach, his head spinning as the smell of rust and blood filled his nostrils, a metallic tang resting on his tongue.
The ashen character crooked his mouth. It was probably a smile, or as much as he could manage. His black hair was lank, his eyes white and empty. He reached out a skeletal hand and grabbed Nestor"s wrist.
“Oh, dear, you"re dying,” said the captain, glancing to where blood seeped from Nestor"s self-inflicted wrist wound. “It"s a good thing I"m here.”
If Nestor hadn"t known what he was up against, he"d believe he felt sorry for the man before him.
“I know why you"re here, but I have a proposition for you,” Nestor said, a little more bravely. The skinny captain"s eyes widened in surprise. “You?” he scoffed. “I do my job, for what it"s worth. I need nothing but a reward for delivering your soul to Hades. There is nothing you can offer me.”
His grip on Nestor"s wrist tightened, and it throbbed with stinging pain. Even though the blood was siphoning out of his veins, he could have sworn that there was an opposing current running up his hand. The pain made him want to collapse to his knees, his head spinning as a knifelike agony raced up his arm, but he fought for balance. He forced th
e words out with big effort. “I know that Hades isdead.”
The black-haired captain let go of his hand like it had burned him, shocked etched on his sunken face. This was the first real emotion that he"d shown since he"d arrived. He regarded him with white eyes, as though trying to read him, like he wanted to get inside his mind and examine his thoughts. The captain wrinkled his eyebrows. “How do you know that?”
“I had a vision, Charon.”
Ten
Nestor tried to stay calm. The child was surely cursed. Horns stuck out from its skull, and the face itself looked more like a small calf"s than a human baby"s. Its small body was covered with brown hair. The hands were ordinary, human, but the legs were finished with hooves, which despite the whole situation seemed quite charming to the head of security. Nestor had already seen such figures, but could not remember where. The sight of the prince, the precious child of his king and queen, in such a hideous form shocked and sickened him. How could this have happened?
His king knocked him ou t of his thoughts. “What is it?” he said, with undisguised disgust. He couldn"t even bring himself to look at the cradle. His wife gave a dry sob.
“It seems, my Lord, that it"s a Minotaur,” as he uttered the words, Nestor recalled where he had seen something like this. In the temple of Poseidon, during one of his visits to Athens, he"d had the opportunity to admire many beautiful paintings. He was sure that his father"s friend was talking about the half-man, the half-bull.
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