In the Shadow of Heroes

by Nicholas Bowling

  Nero was still staring at the fragments of the counterfeit fleece.

  ‘Britannia,’ he said again. ‘I can’t go all the way there. It is a land of savages. Besides, think how my people would despair if I was away from Rome for so long!’ He turned to Tullus again. ‘You shall go. With Polydamas. With my heroidai. Not as our guest, or our advisor, but as our prisoner. I still do not trust you, but I recognize your usefulness. If you do not cooperate, you will find yourself crucified alongside your boy, when we find him.’

  He jerked his thumb at the lifeless form of the priestess.

  ‘You’ll take her with you too. I’m sure the goddess can provide more specific answers if we really push her.’

  One of the giants came forward and slung the young woman over his back. The slaves collected the other items they had pilfered from the shrine, and the whole party melted one by one into the darkness. Tullus was the last to go, prodded by one of the heroidai. He looked over the ruins of the farmhouse one last time, and Cadmus could see his eyes were shining with tears. Then he too disappeared with a slow and lonely trudge.

  Cadmus came out from behind the piles of stones and stood in the light of the dying fire. He picked up the pieces of the fleece and inspected them. The craftsmanship was incredibly fine. Who could have made such a thing? Surely not the priestess? He cursed himself for not recognizing it was counterfeit earlier – it plainly hadn’t come from an animal.

  He suddenly realized he was holding an armful of spun gold. Frayed and dirty as it was, there was a good chance it would fetch an extraordinary price. That kind of money could get him far. He went and found a leather bag from among the priestess’s possessions and bundled it inside.

  In the middle of the courtyard the bronze dish was still smouldering with oddly coloured smoke. He stared into the fumes and shivered. He’d never seen or heard anything like it. Of course, he told himself, it was probably quite easy to find an unguent or a herb that induced hysteria. It was probably quite easy to fake a divinely inspired ‘fit’, as he was sure most prophets did.

  But even so, everything he had just witnessed seemed very real. The priestess had spoken with a voice not of this world. A huge, dark question reared up before him, one that he had only glimpsed until now and had tried to ignore: what, exactly, did he believe?

  While he was lost in thought, there was a rattling sound from the corner of the courtyard. He looked up and squinted into the darkness. His heart leapt into his throat.

  Polydamas was looking straight at him. The ancient figure had never left. He began to cackle, and then scuttled off with surprising speed.

  Cadmus ran. He was barely out of the grounds of the farmhouse before he heard shouting. He looked behind him, down the hill, and saw the torches of the heroidai dancing like fireflies against the night.

  He wove through the olive groves, the dry air scouring his throat. When limestone reared up out of the ground he climbed until his hands and feet bled. He tumbled down the other side of the ridge and came to a stop, dust-caked and panting, next to an outcrop of overhanging rock that formed a shallow cave. It smelt of wild animals.

  With the shouts of his pursuers still echoing around the other valley, he climbed inside and prayed to Hermes to shroud him in darkness.

  XVIII

  Cadmus was woken by a warm tongue rasping over his face. He spluttered and flailed his arms, then sat up too quickly and banged his head on the roof of the cave. That knocked the sleep out of him. He muttered some words that Tullus didn’t allow in his household, and rubbed the dirt and sweat from his eyes.

  Silhouetted against the half-light was Orthus. The dog was watching him without a huge amount of sympathy.

  ‘Oh,’ said Cadmus. ‘It’s you.’

  The dog came towards him on slender, delicate paws. He was old, Cadmus noticed, a beard at the end of his muzzle that was almost white.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ he said, crawling out of the cave and dragging his bag behind him. ‘Shouldn’t you be protecting your mistress?’

  The dog wagged his tail and followed him.

  Cadmus stood up and stretched, clicking from his neck to his knees. It was cold, and the earth was blue in the dawn. He strained his ears. All he could hear was the twitter of the birds, the occasional tiny rockfalls dislodged by goats who had ventured up this far.

  The hill was not especially high, but it gave him a good view of the city. The walls and the Acropolis were still dotted with torches and small fires. The peace and quiet did little to calm Cadmus’s nerves, though. For all he knew, the heroidai were still scouring the hills and the plains for him.

  ‘Any ideas about what I should do now?’ he asked Orthus. The dog slumped to the ground and scratched behind one of his ears. ‘No, I thought not.’

  His first thought was to go back and find Tullus, but returning to Athens was out of the question. It wasn’t just Nero he was worried about. He was thinking of the merchant too, whose network of friends and associates no doubt included some unpleasant types. Cadmus knew how men like that operated. In fact, he could imagine the merchant and Epaphroditus striking a lucrative deal after the incident at the baths.

  Cadmus racked his brains. The towns of Eleusis and Megara seemed too close for comfort. But beyond them, about fifty miles from Athens, was Corinth.

  Corinth was almost as famous and prosperous as Athens. It was a major port too, which meant two things: first, he could probably find a merchant to buy the remains of the fake fleece from him; second, there would be plenty of ships to take him away from Greece. Where exactly he planned on sailing to was still a matter of debate. Rome? Antium? Britannia? Everywhere seemed equally dangerous.

  The sun rose and the mountains took on their hard white edges. Within an hour, the earth was hot as griddle. Cadmus set off on foot towards the coast road, hoping to find a driver willing to take him as far as Corinth.

  He wished he could talk to Tullus, to Tog, to anyone. So he discussed his predicament with the dog. To his credit, Orthus listened patiently and attentively and never interrupted. Cadmus was glad for that much.

  At Eleusis, Cadmus found a man heading to Corinth with a wagonload of amphorae, and after a little haggling and a few sideways glances at the dog, he agreed to let them ride in the back with his wares.

  They spent two days on the road, perched uncomfortably on the hard, clay wine jugs. Cadmus had plenty of time to think about what had happened back at the farmhouse. The priestess’s words had worked their way into the marrow of his bones. He usually set little store by prophecies, but hearing it from the priestess’s foaming mouth was different from reading about it in a book.

  Dominion without limits of time and space. Youthful vigour without end.

  If this was truly what the real Golden Fleece promised, then handing it to Nero really would be as catastrophic as Tullus made out. As they rattled along the coast road, Cadmus came to the slow, cold realization that he was the only person outside of the emperor’s circle who knew about any of this. Which meant that he was the only person who could stop it. Which meant that, by the time he arrived at Corinth, he had made up his mind. He had to go to Britannia.

  At midday on the second day, they pulled up outside the city walls. Cadmus thanked the driver and paid him from his ever-diminishing purse, then made his way to the agora for something to eat and drink. The centre of Corinth was similar to Athens, lined with temples and porticos, although both the buildings and the people seemed a little rougher around the edges.

  Cadmus kept to the shadows of the north stoa, scanning the marketplace for any sign of Nero’s men. His heart nearly stopped when he saw a tall, muscular man loitering on the steps of the sacred spring. He looked like he could be one of the heroidai, minus the gaudy uniform.

  Cadmus tried to laugh off his paranoia. Just being tall didn’t make him an agent of the emperor. Still, he moved as far as he could from the man’s line of sight.

  He skirted to the south side of the agora where there wa
s a row of shops and bought two cups of well-watered wine. Orthus immediately knocked his over with his long nose, but didn’t seem to mind licking it off the paving slabs. Cadmus smiled and sipped his own cup. It was strangely reassuring having the dog around.

  In front of the shops, a slave auction was taking place. He watched for a moment as a boy with enormous, dark eyes – Egyptian, Cadmus thought – was paraded in front of the clamouring crowd with a tablet hung around his neck. He was younger than Cadmus. A man in a toga stepped up on to the platform, checked the boy’s teeth, slapped his flanks like he was a horse, and then returned to the crowd, shaking his head and chuckling. This happened several more times until the boy was led from the stage without a buyer.

  That was when he saw her. Unlike the others, she wore manacles on her hands and feet, and these were connected to the collar she already had. She didn’t seem at all pained, but wore her usual expression of complete boredom. As alarming as it was to see Tog chained and subdued, Cadmus couldn’t help smiling.

  He had to help her. She was standing behind four or five other slaves, but the queue didn’t seem particularly orderly, so he couldn’t tell when she would be beckoned to the platform. If he didn’t act quickly she would be sold right there in front of him.

  There were five denarii left in the merchant’s purse, hardly enough to purchase another human being. Then he remembered: he still had the fake fleece in his bag. At least one libra of woven gold. He ran along the row of shops with Orthus until he found a Syrian selling jewellery. He was talking to a wealthy Roman matrona who was already wearing so much gold she seemed to be struggling to stay upright.

  ‘Please,’ Cadmus interrupted, ‘how much will you give me for gold thread?’

  ‘Excuse me?’ said the woman, turning very slowly under her necklaces and circlets and earrings. Her eyes flicked to Orthus.

  The shopkeeper didn’t look at either of them.

  ‘Ignore him, my lady. As I was saying, these pearls come from the Euxine Sea, there are no others like them in all the world . . .’

  ‘I have lots of it,’ Cadmus blurted. He looked behind him to the auction. There were now only two individuals between Tog and the platform.

  ‘I don’t care,’ hissed the Syrian. ‘I don’t want some dirty piece of thread you have found on the streets, you brat! I am dealing with a real customer.’

  Cadmus pulled the scraps of the counterfeit fleece out of the bag and threw them on to the table between them, which was spread with bangles and rings.

  Buyer and seller fell completely silent. Cadmus watched with satisfaction as both sets of eyes bulged. There were gasps from the other shoppers.

  The Syrian picked up the remains of the fleece with his thumbs and forefingers and scrutinized the weave very closely. He held it up to the light; then compared it with a headdress, which was also threaded with gold; then held it to the light again; then looked at Cadmus.

  ‘Twenty,’ he said.

  Twenty denarii was more money than he had ever seen in his life, but it still wouldn’t come close to paying for Tog. He looked over his shoulder again but the auction was now concealed by the crowd that had gathered around the merchant’s stall. Among them was the tall, tanned man he had seen earlier. Whereas everyone else was trying to get a glimpse of the fleece, he was looking straight at Cadmus. The man’s gaze fell on him like a slab of granite.

  Cadmus turned back to the stall, unsettled.

  The Syrian was still inspecting the pieces of the fleece. He extracted a single thread, and grinned. The woman huffed with impatience as the shopkeeper turned, slowly unlocked a strongbox behind his stall and began to count out twenty coins. He straightened up and placed them one by one into Cadmus’s palm. Cadmus almost wept. They weren’t silver, but gold. Twenty aurei. That was five hundred denarii.

  He thanked the man and apologized to the woman, then thanked the woman and apologized to the man, before sprinting across the agora with the heavy bag of gold. He joined the back of the auction crowd and tried to squeeze his way to the front. Tog was on the platform now. The auctioneer was just getting warmed up.

  ‘One thousand,’ he called. ‘Do I hear one thousand denarii?’

  Cadmus’s blood ran cold. Double what he had! And the price was only going to go up. Tog hadn’t seen him – she was staring out over the heads of the crowd as though she could see the shores of her home from the top of the platform. He felt the hand of the man next to him twitch and then fly up into the air.

  ‘Does she speak Latin?’ he asked.

  ‘Um, well,’ said the auctioneer, a tiny Greek man with a bulbous, plum-like nose. ‘No. But she speaks Greek very well. For a barbarian, I mean. And Gaulish. I think. Don’t you?’

  Tog stared at him and said nothing. The auctioneer gave her the briefest of glances and turned back to his audience. He was scared of his own merchandise.

  ‘And physically she is without compare,’ he said, trying to pique the crowd’s interest again. ‘Wouldn’t you say? Look at the size of her!’

  ‘Why’s she got all those scars?’ asked another potential buyer. ‘Looks like her other masters had reason to punish her.’

  ‘Trouble written all over her,’ agreed another.

  Tog yawned, and Cadmus laughed to himself. It was a spectacular performance.

  ‘Well, she used to work in the mines . . .’ The auctioneer stopped, knowing immediately he had misspoken.

  ‘The mines?’

  ‘I give her two days before she’s stone dead!’

  ‘Very well, eight hundred denarii,’ said the auctioneer, plainly flustered. Cadmus’s spirits rose a little. Keep it up, old friend, he thought.

  ‘She seems a little slow to me,’ said the man next to Cadmus, who had asked about what languages Tog spoke.

  ‘Yes,’ Cadmus chipped in, hoping to drive the price down further. ‘I don’t think she’s all there. Mentally.’

  Tog saw him. Her face was not so much one of surprise as curiosity. Cadmus grinned back at her.

  Down went the price. ‘Six hundred denarii . . .’

  ‘What’s that on her shoulder?’ someone shouted.

  Tog’s mouse was poking its head out from under the cascade of her hair.

  ‘Is that a rat?’

  ‘Is she diseased or something?’

  The little man moved to swat the mouse away, but Tog took a particularly menacing breath and he decided to keep his hands to himself.

  There were general noises of disgust from everyone, and Cadmus could have sworn the auctioneer’s nose began to glow with embarrassment.

  ‘Five hundred denarii?’

  ‘Yes!’ Cadmus threw his hand into the air and pushed his way to the front of the stage. The auctioneer looked at him in surprise. There was laughter from some of the other men in the crowd.

  ‘Serious bids only, young sir . . .’

  ‘I am serious.’

  Cadmus came up on to the platform, not caring who saw him. He handed his coin pouch over to the auctioneer, who peered inside and then looked over at a much larger, burlier man who was standing with the rest of the slaves. He must have been the slave dealer who had actually captured Tog in the first place – though how he had achieved that, Cadmus did not know.

  The two men nodded to each other, and the auctioneer announced, with some relief:

  ‘Sold.’

  XIX

  The slave dealer grudgingly removed Tog’s manacles, with the exception of her old collar, which was still locked and keyless. The rest of the crowd watched in bemusement as Cadmus led her away – or rather, as was always the case, she led Cadmus. The first thing he did was to buy her a new tunic. Then they left the agora as quickly as possible.

  In the shadow of the basilica, Tog finally stopped and spoke.

  ‘You’ve got a dog,’ she said.

  Cadmus looked at Orthus, then at Tog. He knew not to expect a great outpouring of emotion or affection from her, but even by her standards this remark seemed a little
flat given what had just happened.

  ‘Um. Yes?’

  ‘What’s his name?’ she said, crouching down and putting her arms around the dog’s neck.

  ‘Orthus.’

  ‘I like him,’ she said.

  Cadmus watched them both. Tog pressed her face against the dog’s muzzle, and he wriggled like a fish out of her embrace.

  ‘Aren’t you going to thank me for saving you?’ said Cadmus.

  ‘I wouldn’t have needed saving if you hadn’t brought me back to Athens,’ she said matter-of-factly.

  ‘Oh.’ She had a point there. ‘Are you still angry with me?’

  She shook her head. ‘I was never angry with you.’

  ‘You were. With good reason.’

  ‘I was not. How would that have helped our situation?’

  Cadmus shrugged. ‘I suppose it wouldn’t. Doesn’t look like running away helped either, though.’

  ‘Leaving you was better for both of us.’

  ‘I wouldn’t say that . . .’

  Tog looked him up and down. ‘You seem fine.’

  ‘Well. I’m tired, and confused, and very, very badly sunburnt. But I’m all the better for seeing you again.’

  ‘Hmmm.’ She took a moment to decide whether she was pleased to see him. Then at last she nodded. ‘Yes. It’s good to see you too.’

  Just that was enough to make Cadmus glow. His smile turned into a full-blown belly-laugh. He wanted to throw his arms around her like she had done to Orthus, but knew she probably wouldn’t appreciate it.

  ‘What happened?’ he asked. ‘How did you end up here?’

  She stopped trying to snatch another cuddle from Orthus and stood up. ‘They caught me while I was asleep. They must have heard me talking . . . I thought I was far enough from the road, but obviously not. I was so tired they had the chains on me before I was awake.’ She offered a finger to the mouse on her shoulder. ‘Embarrassing,’ she added.

  ‘You’re lucky I was here,’ said Cadmus. ‘What are the chances?’

  She shrugged. ‘What happens, happens.’