Killing Pythagoras (Mediterranean Prize Winner 2015)

by Marcos Chicot

  An intense wave of panic washed over Orestes, not only at Eurybates’ words, but at the deep hatred that emanated from his voice and his eyes.

  “No! It’s not true!”

  He realized they were changing direction, no longer heading for the exit. The real aim of the group that had gone ahead to the entrance must have been to prevent the soldiers from coming in.

  Orestes understood in his terror what that meant, and thrashed violently. The hands gripped him tighter.

  “Help!” he shouted with all his might. “Sold…!”

  They grabbed his hair and yanked it back.

  “Shut up, you damned murderer,” grunted Pelias feverishly. “You thought that by getting rid of Cleomenides and Daaruk you would guarantee your own succession. You were never worthy of being one of us, yet you planned on becoming our leader.”

  They think I’m the murderer, that’s why they’re behaving so brutally!

  “I’m…not…” His efforts to speak came out as a hoarse croak due to the violent twisting of his neck.

  His vision began to blur. Even so, he realized that the men carrying him were moving faster. A second later, they were running and, finally, Orestes felt himself hurled through the air.

  The flight was short. They had thrown him at the stone tank where they collected drinking water. It was three feet wide, ten feet long, and three feet deep. Orestes crashed into its stone edge and fell face down into the liquid. The basin was only half full, but the grand master lost consciousness, his face underwater.

  As water began to enter his throat, it contracted, and he rapidly came to. He lifted his head, taking a gulp of air with a gasp of agony. Blood gushed from a hideous gash that ran across his forehead, blinding him. He shook his head, trying to free himself from the hands that reached for him like the tentacles of a marine monster. He leaned painfully on one of his arms, unable to feel the other. It must have broken. Eager hands wound themselves in his hair and submerged his head forcefully, breaking his nose against the slippery bottom of the water tank.

  He heard shouts muffled by the water. Was someone coming to his aid? He tried to relax so he’d last a little longer, giving time to whoever was coming to rescue him. A moment later, he thought the hands were loosening their grip. I need to breathe! He jerked his head up, breaking free of some of the murderous claws, emptied his lungs, and inhaled deeply. Air flooded in, life-saving, but while he was still gasping the hands abruptly submerged his head and he swallowed water. He coughed under the surface and had to make a superhuman effort not to inhale again while they ground his face against the stone bottom.

  He endured longer than he had imagined he could, but he had to breathe. He inhaled water, his body rebelled and he coughed, but the need for air was so urgent his brain forced him to inhale again. His mouth opened under the water, and he gasped. A swift wave of fire and pain ran down his trachea, exploding in his bronchial tubes. Panic and desperation multiplied to an unbearable degree. Part of his frightful suffering was the anguished need for air. His body inhaled again and again, filling his lungs with water.

  When the panic began to subside, Orestes’ final glimmer of consciousness knew that the calm he was feeling was the antechamber of death.

  He accepted it.

  An instant later, grand master Orestes was no more.

  CHAPTER 62

  June 10th, 510 B.C.

  Akenon had never felt such an acute sense of danger.

  No sooner had he entered the palace than he knew something was very wrong. The secretary who received them was unpleasantly cold, indicating curtly that the soldiers were to stay in the courtyard. Servants usually took the same tone with people that their masters did, which made the secretary’s tone an alarming sign. His feeling of discomfort increased when he saw an enormous wooden circle almost thirteen feet high leaning against the courtyard gallery. It looked grotesque, like a monument to madness.

  The secretary turned left.

  Where’s he taking us? wondered Akenon.

  He knew the palace and was aware that this wasn’t the way to Glaucus’ private chambers where he held his meetings. As they advanced, he felt they were being observed. He could feel the hairs standing up on the back of his neck.

  The secretary crossed the threshold to the banquet hall and announced their arrival. Then he turned to them grimly, waiting for them to enter.

  Akenon went in before Ariadne and stopped, aghast. The lighting was poor, but he could see that the hall was completely transformed from the last time he had been there. The far wall had been knocked down, leaving the pantry and part of the kitchen exposed. There was a circle etched on the floor the size of the hall and the pantry put together. Some of the furnishings had disappeared, and what was left was heaped in the corners. He took a couple of steps into the silent darkness and bumped into something that made a metallic sound. Peering at it through the dim light, he saw that the silver panels that usually adorned the walls of that opulent space were now strewn around the floor, covered with scratches.

  By Astarte, what happened here?

  The answer was in front of him. Glaucus had his back to them and was examining the walls, torch in hand. The light wavered against them, revealing carvings of geometric shapes as far as the eye could see.

  The hall looked like a mad mathematician’s cave.

  Even though the secretary had just announced their arrival, Glaucus remained oblivious to their presence. Ariadne and Akenon looked at each other doubtfully before moving closer. The Sybarite continued with his back to them as they walked toward him. When they were one step away, he turned abruptly to face them.

  Akenon knew instantly that Glaucus had gone insane.

  CHAPTER 63

  June 10th, 510 B.C.

  As he did every night, Cylon bade goodnight at the door of his mansion to the Croton officials he had met with, and got ready for bed. He went up to the second floor and quickly crossed the gynaeceum, the part of the house reserved for the women. His wife lived there along with two concubines he had taken on a whim years ago, but whom he no longer visited.

  Now he was more practical and only used slave girls.

  He went into his bedroom. At the foot of his bed kneeled Althea, a fifteen-year-old slave girl for whom he had paid full price, much to the seller’s delight. He gestured to her, indicating that her services were required tonight. Althea quickly went to him and removed his tunic.

  “Ariadne,” whispered Cylon as he caressed her. “Undress for me.”

  The slave had been instructed to respond to the name Ariadne. He had chosen her because she looked so like Pythagoras’ daughter. Actually, for her striking resemblance to the real Ariadne when she had been fifteen years old.

  “Turn around, Ariadne.”

  Althea turned her naked body, and Cylon took pleasure for a while in watching without touching her. Her features were not so similar, but her long, wavy, light-brown hair was exactly the same as that belonging to Pythagoras’ proud daughter. He brushed her hair to one side and bit her neck while he fondled her large breasts from behind. Althea tried to muffle a cry of pain, but Cylon heard it, and his excitement increased. He took a step back and slapped the girl’s buttocks hard. Her skin soon reddened. He observed the result with pleasure, and then lay on the bed face up.

  Never mind music and meditation, Pythagoras, this is the best way to get rid of tension.

  Althea began working between his legs with her mouth. Cylon placed two pillows behind his head so he could get a good view of her over the obstacle of his large paunch. The illusion was perfect from that angle, with the hair covering the slave’s face.

  “Ariadne, Ariadne,” he groaned, without taking his eyes off her.

  He had bought the slave five months earlier, and had pleasured himself with her every night since then.

  It made him remember the time he had been so close to enjoying the real Ariadne.

  CHAPTER 64

  June 10th, 510 B.C.

  Gl
aucus fixed his febrile eyes on Akenon.

  It was your fault I lost Yaco.

  His first impulse when he saw the Egyptian investigator was to call Boreas, but the next moment mathematics eclipsed everything else in his mind again. He turned to the wall and continued what he had been doing.

  “Glaucus,” Akenon called him.

  The Sybarite nodded slightly, as if hearing a distant call, and kept running his finger over the drawings on the wall at a vertiginous pace. One part of him knew the Egyptian was there, but he was incapable of paying him attention. Akenon’s detective work was of no interest to him. The soldiers from Croton had already bothered him with questions about a hooded man two months ago, and he didn’t intend to spend any more time on that.

  “Glaucus,” Ariadne intervened, “I am Ariadne, Pythagoras’ daughter.”

  The Sybarite froze. After a few seconds he turned around and looked at her, opening and closing his eyes as if she had just materialized in front of him.

  “Pythagoras’ daughter,” he murmured.

  “We’ve come to talk about your interest in circles.”

  Those words shook Glaucus out of his stupor. He nodded enthusiastically without saying anything. The skin on his face and neck hung like empty sacks. He had lost seventy pounds in the past two months. The weight loss was also noticeable in his frayed, dirty tunic, which seemed to belong to a much more corpulent man.

  Ariadne showed him the documents relating to the circle.

  “I want you to see this.”

  Glaucus grabbed the parchments from Ariadne’s hand, fell to the ground, and spread them out in front of him. He began frenetically moving the torch over them. Ariadne sat next to him, waiting while the Sybarite examined everything, his eyes bulging out of their sockets.

  For a long time, no one spoke. Akenon paced the banquet hall nervously, observing with growing unease the madness reflected in every detail of that place. He cast a worried glance toward Ariadne. He would have preferred for her to be in the community, with soldiers all around and Orestes in charge. As he continued pacing the hall, he thought about Orestes. In these past weeks, his admiration for the grand master hadn’t stopped growing. Orestes will be a good successor to Pythagoras.

  Ariadne watched Glaucus with interest. Every now and then, the Sybarite cast light from the torch over sections he’d already studied. When he reached the end of the last parchment, he closed his hand around it and crushed it.

  Ariadne was startled. Glaucus turned and looked at her with bloodshot eyes. He shook the fist holding the crumpled parchment and roared furiously,

  “What the devil is this garbage?!”

  CHAPTER 65

  June 10th, 510 B.C.

  Cylon’s memory of Ariadne was from sixteen years before.

  He had been returning from a Council session when he crossed paths with a group of Pythagoreans. He watched them with contempt and was about to continue on his way when something held him back. Walking with the Pythagoreans was a very young teenage girl, attractively curvaceous, who combined the sweet innocence of her age with a lively, self-assured demeanor. She could only be Pythagoras’ daughter.

  Little Ariadne, thought Cylon, unable to take his eyes off her. It was four or five years since he’d seen her and then she had still been a child. She hadn’t yet blossomed into the magnificent woman who now stood before him.

  He returned home, his mind flooded with thoughts of her. His interest was not just carnal—that made no sense, given the circumstances—but lay in the fact that she was Pythagoras’ older daughter and, therefore, presented an excellent means for hurting the philosopher.

  Cylon spent several weeks gathering information on her, the people who surrounded her, how often she left the compound… When he had amassed enough data, he thought up a plan and met with some hoplites who had become used to receiving higher remuneration from him than from soldiering.

  “This time I have an extremely pleasant job for you. Have you seen Ariadne lately, Pythagoras’ daughter?”

  “By Ares, we have!” one of them immediately exclaimed, licking his lips.

  “Well, well, I’m happy to see so much enthusiasm. That way you’ll make sure everything goes according to plan, because I want you to kidnap her tomorrow.”

  He explained his scheme to them. They’d kidnap her on the outskirts of Croton, taking advantage of the fact that she would only have two companions whom they could easily put out of action. Next, they would take her to a good hideout and keep her there for three days, until he arrived to mete out the punishment she deserved. Then they would dispose of the body.

  The plan was a solid one, but it didn’t take into account that Pythagoras would manage in just a few hours to put hundreds of soldiers and mercenaries to work on his daughter’s kidnapping. Damn it, where did he find so many men? They set up tight surveillance on all the roads, to such an extreme that it was impossible for him to get a message to his hired thugs, much less go there in person to deal with Ariadne. If he didn’t act quickly, he would run the risk of his men getting nervous and doing something stupid. And if they were caught, he had no doubt they’d give him away immediately.

  He had to make the only logical decision.

  He called another group of hired hoplites to him. Their instructions were to guide the patrols they were part of to Ariadne’s hiding place. Naturally, they were to finish off the kidnappers before they had a chance to open their mouths.

  At least that plan worked perfectly. However thoroughly Pythagoras investigated afterwards, he never found a shred of evidence to link Cylon to the kidnapping. The only traces left of that episode were in his own head. Over the years, the frustration of feeling he had been cheated turned into an obsession with Ariadne. Ever since that incident, he had selected slave girls for his bedchamber who resembled her. There had been some with a striking resemblance, but the best one was the one who now had her head buried between his legs.

  Satisfied, he contemplated the gentle sway of her chestnut hair and then closed his eyes. If his dream of becoming the political head of Croton ever came true, he wouldn’t limit himself, as many expected, to ousting the Pythagoreans. He’d raze the community to the ground, execute its members, and enslave Ariadne so it would be she, finally, who pleasured him every night.

  CHAPTER 66

  June 10th, 510 B.C.

  Glaucus let the torch drop, crumpled up all the parchments, and got to his feet.

  “This is hogwash!” he shouted, waving them in the air. “Are you trying to make a fool of me?!”

  Ariadne jumped up and stepped back, disconcerted. The Sybarite threw the documents angrily on the ground, and started stamping on them, snorting like an enraged animal.

  “No!” Ariadne fell at Glaucus’ feet in an attempt to protect the parchments with her body.

  The Sybarite lifted a foot to step on her, but Akenon grabbed him by the wrists and pulled him away from Ariadne. Glaucus twisted and turned like an incensed lunatic. During the struggle, Akenon looked into his eyes and saw that the Sybarite was consumed by irrational rage. He wouldn’t be able to appease him. They needed to get out of there before Glaucus’ guards appeared. He and Ariadne had two soldiers inside the palace. If they could make it to the door they could escape. But if Boreas turns up we’re dead.

  “Pythagoras demands your respect, Glaucus of Sybaris!”

  Akenon and Glaucus froze at the severity of that command. Turning around, Akenon saw Ariadne pointing a hand at Glaucus, piercing him with eyes full of fire and ice.

  “Show the respect you swore to the master of masters, unworthy disciple!”

  Glaucus’ lips moved several times without producing a sound. He seemed confused, like a sleepwalker unable to wake up. Akenon threw a glance at the two entrances to the hall. No one had appeared yet.

  Ariadne bent down with apparent composure, gathered up the parchments, and smoothed them out before putting them away inside her garments.

  “I have shown you these
documents, which you didn’t deserve to see, to prove that your goal is futile. And even if it weren’t, your actions are contrary to the spirit of what you promised to honor and uphold. Reflect on that.”

  She turned her back on Glaucus and walked majestically toward the exit. A bewildered Akenon looked one last time at the Sybarite before following her. The Sybarite’s eyes were still fixed on the spot where Ariadne had spoken.

  His face was frozen in a tense expression.

  “Damned lunatic!” Akenon let out a breath once they had exited the palace. He turned toward Ariadne. “That was impressive, the way you dominated him. Though I thought you might take advantage of it to try and make him withdraw the prize.”

  Ariadne answered without looking at him.

  “I read it in his eyes. He was about to order our death.” Akenon was startled at Ariadne’s words, but she continued in a cold, slow voice, as if her mind were far away. “I was able to calm him down momentarily so we could escape with our lives, but Glaucus is uncontrollable now. He’s not going to bend to anyone’s wishes.”

  Akenon made no reply. He had become used to Ariadne’s ability to see more than he was capable of.

  Ariadne kept walking in silence. Containing Glaucus had been exhausting. On the other hand, what she had perceived in him was spine-chilling. The speed at which he had absorbed the contents of the studies on the circle was incomprehensible. She had brought him the most advanced documents on the subject, and Glaucus had deciphered them in barely half an hour. Moreover, she had studied some of the inscriptions on the walls and the silver panels, and even though those fragments of research seemed to lead nowhere, they revealed incredible advances.

  More befitting a grand master than a mere initiate.

  Nevertheless, the most chilling thing, which still made her body tremble, was the fathomless darkness she had glimpsed within Glaucus.