Ariande's Web

  Waiting for his enemy to attack, trying to concentrate on matters of life and death, Alex/Dionysus could not banish from his thoughts hopeful visions of the time when he would at last possess his bride. At that moment, he was thinking now, all the sprites and satyrs were going to be shut out, kept at a distance. He did not want them intruding upon that holy time, any more than he would have wanted other humans present.

  He doubted it would ever be possible to rid himself of his entourage completely, but at least he could banish them to the middle distance, where he could still hear them singing.

  Earlier, when he had tried to discuss these matters with Ariadne, in one of the brief periods when they seemed to be quite alone, she had felt sure enough of her divine companion to gently tease him about it. "Some would think it strange to meet an avatar of Dionysus who is opposed to orgies, or at least chooses to avoid them. How will the world change next?"

  "Orgies . . . have their place. Or so says Dionysus, who ought to know all there is to know about the subject. But I am also Alex, who was once half-nameless, and I say that I no longer want anything to do with such events. Certainly not when I am with my love."

  And somewhere in the background he had heard a murmur from invisible Silenus: We will see if the Twice-Born can be content with such a monogamous relationship.

  Loyal soldiers patrolling near the center of the Maze raised a sudden alarm: a new version of the monster Cerberus had burst up out of the earth, at some unknown location on the island, and was approaching swiftly.

  Alex, mounting into the air in the chariot of Dionysus, soon caught sight of the thing. He could not tell where it had come from, but it seemed to be following the path the sisters had taken into the Maze, tracking one or both of them like a hound on the scent. Driving in pursuit now, urging the leopards to greater speed, he closed in rapidly on Cerberus: big as an elephant and with three fanged heads, stalking and striding on long legs through the Maze, stepping right over walls at places where they were no more than ten feet high.

  Cerberus was not a human, nor a god, nor yet a normal beast of any kind. In part, at least, it was no more than a machine; and yet his Dionysian memory assured Alex that earlier versions of the monster had possessed enough of life to render them subject to madness and to frenzy.

  Had there been an open volcano nearby, he might have tried to plunge it in. Still, Dionysus had doubts about the beast's susceptibility to that kind of damage, coming from the Underworld as it did. Prolonged sunlight might wear it down, but that was not a helpful hint now in the middle of the night.

  Anyway, there was no volcano handy at the moment.

  Alex shouted, "After it, you sprites and satyrs! Goad it, tempt it, turn it from its course!"

  And his crew of invisible, inhuman helpers soon afflicted the machine with madness. It turned away from the center of the Maze, bursting through walls at random, stopping and retracing its steps, wandering off course.

  Meanwhile, Alex had driven his chariot closer and closer to Cerberus. The influence of Dionysus was strong enough to cause its lifeless surface to break out in plant growth. Gradually, whatever power it was that steered and energized the machine was disrupted, weakened, confused into chaos and helplessness.

  The thing staggered on its long legs, and at last crashed down in a heap. The stalks and tendrils of new life, springing from its flanks, finding themselves now with motionless ground to grow in, turned to grope toward the sun.

  Nestor, as he made his way across the troubled city of Kandak, could feel some of the earthquakes that Hades had now begun to induce, sending minor temblors rumbling clear across the island. Such disturbances were usually interpreted as evidence of the displeasure of some god. The God of the Underworld could bring houses and shops and palaces tumbling down, if that was what he chose to do.

  Nestor, having learned from Rafe that his old acquaintance Captain Yilmaz was quartered in this section with his troops, had come looking for him. Yilmaz would not be Nestor's choice for a bosom companion, but his reputation for venality and untrustworthiness was great enough to raise Nestor's hopes of getting him to defect.

  Among the beautiful older buildings in the city of Kandak, there stood one in particular that had once served as a gathering place for worshipers of Apollo. It had been repeatedly desecrated, profaned, by the new Minos and the fanatical devotees of Shiva. Maybe some of Hades's earthquakes had begun to crumble it.

  While in the process of tracking the captain down, Nestor happened to look in through an open doorway of the former temple of Apollo. High windows filled the interior with cheerful morning sunlight, showing him a band of four or five priests of Shiva, identifiable by their skull-necklaces, who had stripped a young girl of her garments and were stretching her out between them on the floor; the victim seemed to have given up struggling, but she was obviously still alive. A couple of irons were heating in a small fire in a brazier nearby.

  Adopting his best sergeant-of-the-watch voice, Nestor called in through the open door, "Anyone know where Captain Yilmaz is? And what do you think you re doing there?"

  To these men the sergeant of the watch was apparently not an impressive figure. "Yilmaz is not here, outlander, nor any of his company. I am Creon, high priest of Shiva."

  "Whatever you think you're doing, looks to me like you'd better stop." Nestor wasn't sure, when he said the words, if he was only bluffing or not.

  Maybe they were just the wrong words to have used to a high priest of Shiva—or maybe there were no words that could have made a difference.

  It turned out that Nestor wasn't bluffing, and a savage sword-fight quickly ensued. None of the skull-wearers had looked to Nestor like men who really felt at home with weapons in their hands, but he knew better than to trust to first impressions in such matters.

  If he had underestimated his opposition to begin with, they had made the same mistake. In the space of a few heartbeats, Nestor had killed one of his opponents, going after the most aggressive first.

  Then he cut down a second.

  There must have been one more opponent than he had mentally accounted for, because the blow that struck him down came from behind, and was totally unexpected. It allowed him only an instant to feel regret, or anything else, before the world went glimmering away.

  Regaining his senses, slowly and painfully, Nestor at first was uncertain whether he was truly dying or only felt that way. His head ached fiercely, and pain in his upper chest told him that he had been stabbed there also—his shirt was wet with blood. His enemies had not bothered either to tie him or to finish him off—that would have been good news, if he could move. As matters actually stood, it didn't seem to be good news at all.

  In the middle distance he had a good view of the one who had called himself Creon, and two or three others, gathered within reach of a small fire in the middle of the temple, preparing to get on with the business at which Nestor had interrupted them. The young girl was stretched out on the paved floor while four men each held one of her limbs. It seemed that only a minute or two had passed, and Nestor could not have been unconscious long. Not long enough.

  But the proceedings were not going to proceed, not just yet anyway. A tall young man had just appeared in one of the doorways leading to the street, and stood there surveying the scene inside. The newcomer wore a white robe or cape, and nothing else, suggesting that he too was one of Apollo's acolytes. Now he stepped inside, advancing with steady strides.

  "Who in all the hells are you?" The priest of Shiva who had just picked up a hot iron from the brazier, causing the girl to scream and faint, now waved it in the newcomer's direction. "You want a taste of this too?"

  The tall youth came right up to him, and spoke in a tone of gentle remonstrance. "This is not your house, after all." And he put out his hand and gently caught the wrist of the arm that held the iron, guiding it even closer to his own calm face; and then with a gentle puff of breath, like a man extinguishing a small candle, he cleansed the metal of its f
iery heat. The one breath drenched and quenched the orange glow and its radiance, in an icy cold that might have come from the dark side of the moon; even Nestor at the distance where he was lying could feel a faint chill spreading through the air.

  "Rather this house is mine," the newcomer added quietly.

  For a long moment, the girl's tormenters gazed unbelievingly at what had happened to the iron. Then, with Creon in the lead, they jumped to their feet and fled in screaming panic, the necklaces of toy skulls rattling madly. Terror himself came under their new enemy's dominion.

  Apollo only watched them go, allowing them to leave his presence unharmed. But as the last pair of running legs vanished through the doorway he shouted after them, in a voice that might have been heard half a mile away, "Let me never see you again under the sun!"

  A moment later he was bending over the unconscious girl, touching her so that she roused from her faint. Nestor heard him murmur, "More than enough blood has already been shed inside my house."

  Then the Lord of Light came to Nestor, and with another touch sent renewed life flowing into him, body and mind. Nestor thought that he could feel, could almost see, the black wave of death receding.

  "You will tell me your story later," said the voice of Apollo, which seemed to reach him from a great distance; and that was the last thing he was aware of for a time.

  Nestor slept briefly, lying as he was on the floor, and when he awoke he felt almost entirely restored. The back of his head was still sore when his fingers pressed it, but that was all. Of the stab wound he thought he had discovered earlier, there was now no trace, though his shirt was caked with dried blood.

  The sunlight in the temple was even brighter now, a clear and steady illumination that seemed not to depend entirely on the windows for its source. The thought crossed his mind that Shiva and Hades might someday succeed in tearing down Apollo's temple, but they were never going to put out the sun.

  The girl was gone. And now Nestor saw, with no capacity for surprise left, that his recent acquaintance Dionysus had come to join Apollo. At the moment, Alex was indicating with a gesture the bones and offal that had been burnt for Apollo on the nearby altar. "Some of them mean well," he observed.

  Jeremy Redthorn nodded. "People most often do mean well, while they are praying to Apollo; they would rather turn toward the sun than to the darkness. But why even well-meaning folk should think I crave burnt guts and bones . . . ?" He shook his head. "So it has been for ages."

  Alex agreed. "I don't care for sacrifices either." He paused, looking inward and considering. "I speak for Dionysus as well as for—me."

  "If it makes people happy to slaughter a few animals in my name—well, let them. They could be doing worse; and wisely they keep the good meat to eat themselves, while putting the gristle and guts and bones in the fire as my share. Fortunately I need not depend on them for nourishment."

  "I understand." Alex drew a deep breath. "What are we going to do now?"

  "I am going to seek out Hades, as soon as the sun comes up," Apollo said quietly. "There's no use waiting longer. I see no reason to think that I'll be stronger tomorrow, or the next day, or that he will be weaker."

  "Are you strong enough to stand against him?"

  "In daylight I think I will be. But there is no certainty about the outcome. He has hurt me badly in the past. You must do all you can to see to it that he gets no help from his allies."

  "I will do all I can. I am—I was—a soldier. But Dionysus isn't . . ."

  "I understand."

  "Can we count on help from anyone else?"

  "Hephaestus is my friend, and would stand with us if he were here. I know of no other Olympians willing to risk their necks." Apollo paused, then added, "I think that we can win, but I will need all the help that you can give."

  "You can count on that."

  "Let me tell you, my colleague," said Apollo, "that I have sworn a great oath to foil Hades wherever and whenever I can, in this great game that we and others play."

  "I see it as no game, but war."

  "It can be both. A war whose first battles were fought so long ago, that the gods themselves can scarce remember. A game, with the whole world at stake."

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  At dawn on the morning following the arrival of Dionysus, Shiva returned to Corycus, with Theseus riding behind him on his flying bull.

  Nestor had climbed to the roof of the temple of Apollo, intending to get a view over the city as the sun came up. He observed what appeared to be a mob of angry citizens, more or less spontaneously marching on the palace.

  Nestor was about to report this to his two divine allies, when his eye was caught by a startling image in the sky. Looking up, he saw in the distance Nandi, with two man-shaped figures on his back, air-trotting downward as if intending to land. Nearly as Nestor could tell, the creature was coming down close to the edge of the Labyrinth opposite the palace.

  The mob dispersed in panic, and the mercenary captain ran to tell the gods who had now become his companions.

  Grumbling and discontent had been gradually becoming more and more open among the officers and men of the Palace Guard, and most of them were now ready to join the revolt. Unfortunately much of the Guard's strength had been dispersed to distant regions of the island, as Perses became doubtful of its loyalty.

  Wild rumors had been flying regarding Shiva's whereabouts. There had been speculation that the God of Destruction was really a coward, and had fled the island altogether at the first hint of serious opposition.

  Others feared that Shiva was only standing back a little, to encourage all his enemies, mortal and divine, to raise their heads, that they might be more readily and thoroughly cut down.

  And still others feared, with good reason, that an even stronger and more terrible god than Shiva might now appear on Shiva's side.

  * * *

  When Nestor had reported Shiva's arrival to Apollo and Dionysus, Apollo took leave of his two allies, saying he had to try to find out what Hades was up to. He hoped he would be able to rejoin them soon.

  Dionysus and Nestor rode the chariot back into the Labyrinth, there to join Sarpedon and the other loyal soldiers in defending Daedalus.

  On the way, they wondered who the second rider might have been, on Nandi's back.

  Alex observed, "Well, I don't like him or her, whoever it was. Shiva is very powerful indeed. But Shiva can only be in one place at a time."

  Also Shiva tended to treat people with an arrogance that quickly made enemies, if only secret ones, out of the majority of those he met.

  The bull Nandi had come down to land inside the Maze, only a few hundred yards from its very center. "The Face of Dionysus will yet be yours," said the God of Destruction to his human client, nudging him unceremoniously to the ground, so unexpectedly that Theseus failed to get his feet under him in time, and sat down hard. "Stay right here, so I can find you quickly when I need you. I will kill this God of Many Names, this Great Party-Goer, again, and as soon as he is dead you shall have the Face he wears."

  As soon as Theseus regained his feet, he forced himself to make a deep obeisance. It had been a long time, but with a little effort he remembered how.

  He might have saved himself the trouble and humiliation, for Shiva totally ignored him. Nandi bounded into the air again, and a moment later the god was gone.

  Theseus, right hand on his sword hilt, stood staring after the divine figure, which had already vanished over the surrounding Labyrinthine walls. The man was thinking dark thoughts, and wondering to himself. "Do I really want to be a god of wine, madness, and lechery?" All amusing things in which to dabble—but are such matters really the important part of a man's life, after all?

  Besides which, he was already tired of being carried along like a child, or a mere woman, on a god's magic steed.

  His sword had been ready at his side, and now it was ready in his hand. He decided that what he really wanted to do now was to slay the Minotaur. S
hiva would be angry—but when he, Theseus, started worrying about who might or might not be angry at him, it would be time to retire. Or to die.

  He said to himself now, "It never does a man any good to be furious with a god. You can of course defy him." In the legends, that course was likely to lead to some eternal and truly heroic punishment.

  He moved on.

  Somewhere in the Labyrinth ahead of him he could hear the shouting of men's voices. He could not make out any of the words clearly, yet somehow he felt sure that they were soldiers. He set out to investigate.

  The true rebellion had broken out first in the city of Kandak, only hours after the first rumors of the return of Dionysus. From Kandak it spread rapidly across the island. People in the hinterland had always resented Perses's usurpation, and away from the capital there was little support for Shiva and his puppet.

  Even in the big city their support, apart from the mercenary troops, was very thin. Nestor in his reconnaissance of the city had seen that in the narrow streets of the old quarter, citizens were constructing barricades, tearing up cobblestones, as if they planned to stop a cavalry charge. On observing this activity Nestor judged it a total waste of time, as no good cavalry officer would launch a charge down a narrow, winding street like this. But he supposed it gave the people a feeling that they were doing something useful.

  In the wealthier quarter of the town, some houses and other buildings owned by people suspected of being especially close to Perses and his imported, bloodthirsty god were set on fire.

  Strong factions of the army and navy were ready to join in the revolt. The Butcher remained loyal to Perses, but the Palace Guard he commanded had largely been already transferred out from under his supervision. He really had no choice but to stay with Perses; the Princess Phaedra would have nothing to do with the man who had connived at her father's murder.

  As was usually the case at any given time, more of the navy's ships and sailors were out to sea than were in home port; but the royal sisters and their allies were confident that most sailors would approve of the revolt when the news reached them. But by then, of course, the matter would have been pretty well settled, one way or the other.