by Marilyn Todd
She left him retching his guts up beside the pool. That’ll teach him, she thought, to go spying on women.
And telling everyone the place had been cursed.
Nine
Daphne was still alone in the garden when Iliona set off to rejoin the festivities. The sun was slipping towards the Isles of the Blessed, reddening the sky and casting long shadows over the earth.
‘That’s not what people mean by a balanced diet,’ she said gently.
All afternoon, the girl had been alternating between chewing her nails and sucking her hair. The only thing that hadn’t altered was her scowl.
‘What do you care?’
As an unmarried woman, she could still wear her hair down, and it shone chestnut in the dipping sun. From this angle, it appeared to be her only good feature. Slouching did nothing to improve what Iliona hoped, fingers crossed, was still puppy fat, and frowns are rarely attractive.
‘You’ve cursed us all and you’re proud of the fact. You don’t care that you’ve ruined my life.’
Holy Hera, not another one.
Iliona looked round the garden. The lavender lining the path, clumps of basil and rue, stately lilies and rambling roses. There were statues of Apollo the Prophet, Demeter the Gentle, and Hermes, who protected travellers and trade. But Hermes also summoned the dying. Laying his golden staff of finality across their eyes.
‘I know this is a really tough time for you, Daphne—’
‘You don’t know anything! We were fine until you came on the scene and now look. You’ve ruined everything with your horrible curse!’
With that, she ran into the building, kicking up her heels behind like a small, spoiled child. Which, of course, she probably was.
‘Do you want me to talk to her?’ a voice asked from the shadows.
‘Cadur.’ Where the hell did he spring from? He made no move to apologize or even repeat his offer. The ball, she realized, was still in her court. ‘I—um—well, why not?’ It couldn’t hurt. ‘I just want to make it clear to her that there is no curse, before the situation gets out of hand.’
Dark eyes glittered through the glossy fringe. ‘The old ways die hard. Both the Eagles and the Bulls believe dragons still live in the mountains and that shape-shifters walk after dark.’
‘And you? What do you believe, Cadur?’
‘I believe your black stallion could use another rub down.’
‘I’m sure he could.’ Iliona wasn’t so easily deflected. ‘But Daphne is a very modern young lady. She won’t believe in dragons.’
‘Of course not.’
‘That’s a very emphatic response. It sounds as if you know her well.’
‘No, but she’d like it very much if I did.’
Not cramped by modesty, then? She watched him indolently stroll back through the archway, following the direction Daphne had taken. There was an air of intelligence about this young man, and something else, too, that she couldn’t quite put her finger on. Again, she wondered how long Cadur had been in the garden, and what he had been doing there. Was he watching Daphne? Watching her? Or waiting for somebody else?
‘Oh, hello!’ Surprise lit Yvorna’s face as she emerged from the storage cellar, but for the first time there was no broad smile on display and it looked for all the world as though she’d been crying. ‘Not at the feast, then?’
‘On my way now, as it happens.’
‘Me, too.’ She closed the door to the store room rather too quickly. ‘I’m famished.’
‘Is everything all right?’ Iliona asked, as Yvorna surreptitiously wiped her eyes.
‘Bloody onions, that’s all.’
‘Not a lover’s tiff?’
Yvorna shot her an old-fashioned look. ‘The last thing you want to listen to around here are rumours, milady. Half this lot believe everything they’re told, the other half make it up as they go along.’
Was that a denial? Or a polite way of saying mind your own business? Girls who are constantly in the spotlight wouldn’t necessarily want to flaunt their private life, too. Some things need to remain just that. Private.
In the clearing, trestle tables had been laid out, piled with fresh goat’s and ewe’s cheeses, bread, olives, sardines, and koran, a silver-scaled fish unique to this lake, not unlike trout in appearance, but whose flesh was white in the summer, red in the winter, and just beginning to turn pink at the moment. Washed down with foaming beer and chunks of crusty, dark bread, the meal was delicious, and in between chatting to the Illyrian envoy, listening to an advocate from Athens brag about the length of his speeches and having her ear bent by a hypochondriac cloth merchant on his way home to Corinth, she quietly observed the key players in the posting station’s ongoing drama.
Beneath the Tree of Life, with its dangling woollen dolls and carved offerings tucked into the niches, the Master and his wife ate in silence. With his beard neatly clipped and an air of natural authority, Hector certainly seemed the right choice for the job, but what made the authorities choose a tavern-keeper over other contenders? As lanterns were lit, one by one, round the glade, Anthea’s gold ear studs glittered, as did her cloak pins and the pendants that hung round her neck. Her robe was expensive, as you’d expect, but there was air of sophistication about the way it was draped, the style of her hair, even her posture that convinced her that Anthea’s background was noble. Iliona helped herself to another sardine, and thought, the aristocracy never, ever diluted their bloodlines. So what would make Anthea break the taboo and marry, quite literally in this case, below her station? Despite standing with their shoulders almost touching, the chasm between husband and wife was deeper than Hades. A cloud of sadness hung over them both.
As with earlier ceremonials, Ballio made no effort to join the group, but lingered on the sidelines, still watching intently as if making mental notes. Dierdra stood by an unsmiling Cadur’s side, tapping her foot to the flautist’s merry tune, and drinking more than was probably good for her. While Melisanne was talking to a couple of serving girls under a poplar a little way off. From their gestures, the conversation seemed to revolve around manicure techniques. Somehow, Iliona didn’t see Melisanne smuggling gold.
‘It’s Daphne I feel sorry for,’ she heard someone say.
Leaving the Illyrian envoy to the cloth merchant’s comprehensive list of digestive complaints, she slipped round the back of a laurel to eavesdrop on the group.
‘No one’ll want to marry the kid now. Zeus, that girl’s ugly.’
‘Plain,’ Yvorna corrected.
‘And what if she does take after her father?’ Lisyl piped up. ‘I’d be as proud as punch, me. Nobilor was a legend.’
‘Aye, but uglier than a box full of worms.’
‘Who cares how ugly an heiress is?’ someone else said. ‘Suitors’ll be queuing from here to the coast.’
‘Not if Calypso inherits.’
‘She can’t, mate.’
No man in the family, the group were reminded, and in the absence of male heirs, the law is quite clear. His fortune reverts to the mother.
‘Unless Nobilor specifically made a will leaving it all to his wife, in which case Calypso won’t give a damn about some spotty kid finding a husband.’
‘She’ll be too busy spending the money.’
‘Aye, well, we’ll know soon enough. I heard Hector telling Ballio the banker’s due any day now—’
‘Not a moment too soon for Hermione, I’ll wager. Being stuck out here with a daughter-in-law she can’t stomach—’
‘Not as much as she hates that bloody dog!’
‘There you go,’ said Lisyl’s big, burly fiancée, Morin. ‘Talking about Daphne again.’
Iliona wandered down to the lake, where white water lilies shimmered like ghosts in the moon’s radiance, and the lights of Phaos twinkled like glow worms on the far side. Bats skimmed the water, while the scent of yellow trumpet flowers and marsh parsley freshened the air.
Many questions had been thrown up in even this shor
t space of time, not least why the accommodation at the posting station was so luxurious, and who was responsible for those controversial frescoes. But that conversation just now provided one answer, anyway. Until now, Iliona had blithely assumed the bereaved family was hanging on at the station in the hope of somehow retrieving Nobilor’s remains. Instead, they were waiting for the money.
Because without knowing which way his fortune would go, neither Hermione nor Calypso was able to leave.
Trapped in a hell between avarice and grief, with a fifteen-year-old in the middle…
Iliona didn’t blame Nobilor for racing chariots flat out. On the open road, with the wind in his face and the scenery blurring, the pressures of juggling a leggy new bride with a domineering mother, a brooding teenage daughter, god knows how many aches and pains after twenty years of fighting, and the strain of retaining his title as he grew older would disappear. At the reins of his chariot, he’d be free.
And now he was.
The champion had discovered, in the cruellest possible way, that a man’s reactions are not as quick in his forties as they are in his twenties, nor is his strength, his eyesight or his judgment as keen. All the same. She watched a hawk moth searching the flowers for nectar. It was a horrible way to end a glittering career. Rotting at the foot of a gorge, because no one can get down to recover your body and give it the burial it deserved…
You’ve cursed us all and you’re proud of the fact. You don’t care that you’ve ruined my life.
My life, not ours. Iliona looked up at the mountains and sighed. Was Daphne aware that her future hung in the balance? That everything hinged on what news the banker brought with him?
Certainly if Cadur had managed to speak with her, it hadn’t taken him long. He’d arrived at the feast shortly after Iliona, when Yvorna immediately went running up to whisper something in his ear, and for a moment, Iliona thought the young man was going to smile. Then Dierdra came over and Yvorna ran off again, but only after giving Cadur’s cheek an affectionate pinch. Whatever made her cry in the store room, she seemed to have got over it. But then girls like Yvorna become skilful at covering up—
‘These horses of yours.’
‘Dammit, Ballio, you made me jump out of my skin!’
‘Beg your pardon, ma’am. Didn’t mean to startle you.’
So why creep up on me, she wondered?
‘Just wanted to compliment you on your fine specimens of horseflesh. Indeed, majestic is not too strong a word.’
‘Thank you.’ She forced a smile. ‘I breed them for the cavalry, mostly.’
‘Profitable venture?’
In the moonlight, his official insignia glinted, and for the first time she noticed he had a tooth missing on the lower right side.
‘I suppose it’s the same in Sparta,’ he said, when no answer was forthcoming. ‘Only rich men can afford to join the cavalry, because although the state says they’ll pay for the horses, they don’t bloody mean it. What they mean is they’ll give you a loan that has to be repaid when the animal dies, and if you don’t have the money you’re in deep bloody shit, pardon my Phrygian.’
What was or wasn’t the same was none of his business, any more than the profitability of her breeding horses. All the same, she couldn’t help but wonder what made him so bitter.
‘Yes. Well. Best be getting back.’ Ballio saluted and turned. ‘Ma’am.’
How to make a posting station, Iliona mused, watching him go.
Take a handful of mismatched Greeks who, thanks to a rigid class system, only have each another for company. Add two clans that have been at one another’s throats from time immemorial, then mix in an irregular supply of itinerant workers, seeing how Hector didn’t employ slave labour.
Finally, simmer gently in an isolated outpost and hope to the gods the pot doesn’t boil over.
She stared at the mountains reflected in the stillness of the lake that was home to the Blue Goddess, Zabrina.
Keeping secrets around here must be a nightmare, she thought. Those who kept them would need to guard them with their life.
*
Rising from beyond the lake, the Evening Star, who closed the gates of darkness on the sun, prepared to take her vigil in the sky. Rubbing the sleep of daylight from her eyes, she suddenly noticed the revels being held in honour of the Axe God. Laughter, trumpets, singing, drums. It all sounded very jolly.
As she climbed higher in the heavens, she looked down on the celebrants eating, drinking, singing, dancing, and felt a twinge of jealousy that she would never be honoured in such a devout and forthright manner. But the twinge, as always, quickly passed. Her job was to prevent the Hound of Doom from devouring the constellations and bringing chaos to the world, for everybody knew that if the chain broke loose, the universe would end. That made the Evening Star every bit important as the god that hewed the Tree of Life—even if her role wasn’t so robustly acknowledged!
Having said that, she couldn’t resist watching the party for a little longer. So many people, she thought wistfully. Male and female, young and old, and all those carefree children! Being a goddess, and thus able to see into human hearts, the Evening Star knew the future of every one of the revellers. She knew who would find love, who would encounter tragedy, who would grow rich, or sick, or bitter.
None of which, of course, was her concern, so with a resigned cluck of her celestial tongue, she returned to scanning the sky for hostile canine traces.
Even though more than one among the revellers was a killer.
And more than one a victim.
Ten
Through the open window, the haze that clung to the mountains shimmered violet over the lake. Ospreys skimmed in search of fish, swallows dived, horses grazed in meadows brimming with ox-eye daisies and orchids. Iliona opened one eye, then immediately closed it again. Any beverage made from fermented barley was bound to make its impact felt, she realized that. Especially when quality had been sacrificed very firmly in favour of quantity. And when you add on the countless toasts, the late-summer heat, an aching wound in her side and two hundred rough and dusty miles, waking up to twenty woodpeckers drumming inside your skull was pretty much inevitable. What she hadn’t bargained for was a tongue that had somehow grown a thick scale of armour. Oh, yes. Someone had also crept in and scoured her eyes with salt during the night.
It took a moment before she realized that one of the woodpeckers was tapping its foot against the side of her couch.
‘Good morning.’
The foot was bronzed and muscular, and belonged to a wolf. Iliona peered to see if he had a bag of salt in his hand.
‘It may be morning, Lysander, but I assure you it’s not good.’
‘Damn right.’ Something moved in the back of his throat and it sure as hell wasn’t phlegm. ‘That has to be a record, doesn’t it? Sabotaging your country’s reputation in under an hour.’
Bad news always travels the fastest, and any hopes that Iliona had harboured about rectifying the situation before he arrived vanished into thin air. ‘How did you get into the women’s quarters?’
‘Same way I’ll get out.’ His smile was cold. ‘Without being seen.’
In other words, he could kill her right now and no one would ever know what had happened.
‘Are you sending me home in disgrace?’
‘It strikes me that you’re perfectly capable of disgracing yourself without help from me. But at least your incompetence means the gold thieves won’t suspect you’re on to them and, if anything, it’s bought me more time.’ He leaned back in the chair, folding his arms over his chest. ‘Although I’d appreciate your not making a habit of cursing our allies. One world record is enough.’
Only the Krypteia could twist disaster to his advantage.
She struggled to sit up, but the woodpeckers turned into steaming hot hammers, while tongs tried to prise her brain out through the roof of her skull. ‘How did you get on at the gold mines?’
‘Hm.’ He handed her a
beaker full of viscous purple gunk. ‘Drink this.’
‘What is it?’
‘Sour milk with blackberries. It will make you feel better.’
‘I don’t want to feel better. I want to die.’
A muscle twitched at the side of his mouth. ‘That can be arranged, too.’
She hoped that was his idea of a joke, but his head was turned away as he reached for a spoon, and anyway what did it matter? His face never betrayed emotion.
Probably because he didn’t have any to betray.
‘Apparently you eat it with this.’ He handed her the spoon. ‘And before you ask, I haven’t laced it with hemlock.’
Until then, the question had not crossed her mind.
‘Do you need help?’ he asked, as the beaker suddenly shook in her hand.
‘Lysander, I would rather drink the hemlock.’
‘If it’s any consolation, you look like you already have.’
‘That bad?’
‘That bad.’
He stood up and began to pace the bedroom, while she took a tentative mouthful of slime. Strangely, it tasted quite good, but even so. Any significance in the symbolism of the paintings he could damn well work for himself.
‘My trip to the mines proved one thing, anyway,’ he said, spiking his long warrior hair with both hands. ‘The Macedonians aren’t swindling us.’
She thought of the mines. Of the men forced to work them. Once, as a child travelling with her ambassador father, she’d visited Laurion, south of Athens, where the silver mines were. Her father forbade her to go near the place, it was a veritable plague spot, he warned. But children are inquisitive, Iliona perhaps more than most, and while her father was fawning and flattering, or whatever it is that diplomats do, she gave her servants the slip. What had she expected? A chain gang, obviously. But one in which the men sang to keep the rhythm going, like the helot s in the fields, who sang the Reaping Song, the Sowing Song, the Threshing Song, and so on. There was no joy in the Laurion silver mines. The plague her father had warned her about wasn’t the usual bogeyman story, that might be vampyres this week or harpies the next. This threat was real.