Odysseus in the Serpent Maze

by Robert J. Harris

  “Real … weapon … here,” said Odysseus, touching a finger to his head. “Help … me … up!”

  “You can’t run on that leg,” Mentor said.

  “Not … run,” Odysseus told him. “Roll.” He pointed behind them to the steep slope.

  Glancing nervously over at the boar, which had now managed to shake the small javelin loose, Mentor whispered, “Are you crazy, Odysseus? That slope’s a hundred feet down if it’s a—”

  “Take … hold.” Without waiting for an answer, Odysseus grabbed Mentor’s arm and hauled himself to his feet.

  Mentor wheeled Odysseus around, and they headed back the way they had come. They ploughed through the tangled thicket towards the edge of the slope while the boar was still making up its mind whether to charge again. Mentor half carried, half dragged Odysseus, who hobbled as best he could.

  “Faster …” Odysseus said, gasping with pain.

  Behind them they could hear the boar bellowing as it started to charge again.

  “Faster …”

  “I’m going as fast as I can,” Mentor said through clenched teeth.

  “Talking … to … myself,” Odysseus said. “Not … you.” He took a deep breath and said in a rush, “Better leave me. Only slowing you down.”

  “Heroes together or not at all,” Mentor told him, and just then they reached the edge of the slope.

  Slipping free of Mentor’s grasp, Odysseus pitched himself forward, going head over heels. Mentor slid after on his bottom, thinking that there was no hope for his tunic now.

  Thorns and shards of flint tore at their clothing and flesh. Every bump and knock jarred their bodies, till Mentor began to think they would have had an easier time with the boar.

  Then they landed in a heap at the bottom, fetching up against a spindly tree.

  “Odysseus, are you …?”

  “Keep … still,” Odysseus said.

  Mentor raised his eyes warily and saw the boar standing at the top of the slope, stamping the grass in frustration. He opened his mouth to speak.

  “Remember … poor … eyesight,” Odysseus said. “Small brain.”

  Mentor shut his mouth.

  Time seemed to drag by as the boar shook its massive head and peered down the slope. But at last, seeing nothing and hearing nothing, it gave one last grunt and snort, and disappeared back to the bushes to finish its breakfast.

  When the boar didn’t return, Mentor whispered, “We need to get you back down to your grandfather’s palace so your wound can be properly tended, Odysseus. But meanwhile…” He stripped off his linen leggings and, using them as a makeshift bandage, bound up the gaping wound on Odysseus’ leg.

  “Thanks,” Odysseus said. His normally ruddy face was blanched with pain.

  “Being a hero,” Mentor said, “is awfully bloody work.”

  “Isn’t … it …” Odysseus said, and then, unaccountably, he grinned.

  CHAPTER 3: THE OLD THIEF

  “HOLD STILL, MASTER ODYSSEUS,” his mother’s old nurse, Menaera, snapped impatiently as she bathed his leg with cold water. “The wind may make the tree’s branches tremble, but it cannot heal the broken limb.”

  “That stings!” Odysseus cried.

  Drying his leg roughly with a coarse towel, Menaera showed him no mercy. “Not even bad enough to call in the physician, my princeling.” She examined the wound closely, sniffing at it for contagion and finding none.

  “You’re worse than that boar,” he complained.

  A smile spread over Menaera’s wrinkled face. “Now, now! You sound like a child, not a hero. First the bile and then the honey, little man.” She spread a pale yellow paste over his wound.

  “Ouch! Ouch!” he cried again, which was only half of what he really wanted to say. The paste smarted like vinegar on an open sore. He tried to yank his leg away, but Menaera seized his ankle with a strength that a Cyclops would have envied.

  “Ooof. Let me go, old lady.”

  “A lady, am I?” Menaera laughed.

  All the while Mentor sat on a seat in a corner of the room, smirking.

  The pungent smell of the yellow paste made Odysseus’ eyes water, and he turned his head away, afraid the old woman or Mentor would think he was crying.

  “There, there,” Menaera soothed. “Where there’s stink, there’s cure.”

  “Then,” Odysseus said, “I’m entirely cured.”

  Mentor laughed, clapping his hands.

  “Never you mind, young man,” Menaera said, turning to Mentor. “I’ll fix all your little scratches next. We’ll see if you bear it as well as my young princeling.” She began winding a clean bandage around Odysseus’ thigh.

  “Hah!” Odysseus said. Then, “Ow! Menaera—that’s too tight.”

  “Keep still, boy. The stag cries where the doe stands quiet. I swear you are twice the trouble your mother was when she was half your age.” She kept winding.

  “I’m an Achaean warrior,” Odysseus said, puffing out his chest. “The gods expect me to make trouble.”

  “For your enemies, perhaps,” Menaera said, coming to the end of the bandage. “But not for your old nurse.”

  Odysseus made a sour face. “I don’t have any enemies.”

  Menaera laughed. “Give it time, my little olive.” So saying, she gave the bandage a final yank.

  “Owowowow!”

  Mentor collapsed with laughter. When he recovered, he said, “She looks after you well.”

  “I’d rather be lashed by the Furies than be so well attended.” Odysseus gritted his teeth while Menaera tied up the bandage.

  Pursing her thin lips, Menaera regarded her work with a nod of satisfaction. “Now rest that leg until the wound has closed. A pot half-baked will surely break.” She winked at Mentor over Odysseus’ head. “No man ever won the gods’ favour without a little pain. Your turn, Master Mentor.”

  Mentor bore the old nurse’s ministrations better than Odysseus, but of course his wounds were less severe. He merely ground his teeth till he was afraid he would break them off.

  When Menaera finally gathered up her bowls of balms and the linen bandages and left, both Odysseus and Mentor let out deep sighs of relief.

  “She’s never short of an adage, that one,” Mentor commented. He looked rather spotty, for Menaera had daubed every scratched and torn place with a whitish paste.

  Odysseus grunted. “Old women think everything they say is wise just because they’re old.”

  “And young men think everything they do is brave just because it’s dangerous,” came a deep voice from the doorway.

  “Grandfather!” Odysseus cried out. He tried to stand to greet the old robber prince, but his leg gave way and he fell back on to the bench. “I … I am a prince of sea-girt Ithaca, Grandfather. I can’t very well shrink from danger.”

  Grandfather Autolycus stood with both hands on the doorjambs, frowning in disapproval. “Right this moment I have swineherds who look more princely than you do.”

  “Sir, we haven’t had time to bathe …” Mentor said, his normally pale face flushed beneath the white spots.

  This time Odysseus stood, though most of the weight was on his left leg. “There’s nothing dishonourable, sir, in the scars of battle. You have shown me yours and never apologised for them.” He ran a hand through his unruly hair and found it matted with dirt. “It’s not my fault that the spear broke at a vital moment.”

  “Before you steal something,” Autolycus said, “be certain it’s worth the stealing! That’s the first rule of successful thievery.”

  “I didn’t know thieves had rules.” The pain in Odysseus’ leg was like fire, but he swore to himself that he wouldn’t show that it hurt.

  “Hermes is most particular about the rules of his craft,” Autolycus said. “Corollary to rule one: if a spear’s on the wall gathering dust, chances are it’s not worth much.” He came into the room, wrinkling his nose at the smell of the medicines.

  “But only yesterday you said how much
that spear meant to you.” Odysseus sat down again.

  “Sentimental value puts no coin in your purse,” Autolycus replied. “And it will not bring down a boar.”

  The vertical line appeared between Odysseus’ eyes, signalling he was about to lie. Only Mentor noticed.

  Odysseus leaned forward. “Owl-eyed Athena appeared to me in a dream,” he said. “In her hand was a spear just like the one in your trophy room. When I woke, I knew that the goddess wanted me to take the spear of my illustrious grandfather and hunt a man-killing boar as had my illustrious father.”

  Autolycus made a strange sound, half laugh, half snort. “And did things go as the goddess intended?”

  “Well, some rival god—Pan maybe—or … or …”

  “Ares?” put in Mentor.

  “Yes!” Odysseus said. “Or Ares broke the spear. Afraid that a mere mortal would outshine them in glory.”

  Autolycus could not hold back his laughter. He howled, and all Odysseus could do was look down at the floor and outlast the gale.

  Finally Autolycus said, “Oh, grandson, you wriggle like a serpent to escape the trap of your own folly. You amuse me. You really do! Don’t put on the gods what are your own faults.”

  Odysseus said nothing.

  “If you’d taken a closer look at your stolen spear,” Autolycus continued, “you’d have seen a crack running through the shaft. Which is why I stopped using it.”

  “It was dark, sir,” said Mentor, trying to help his friend out.

  “Ah, the wise counsellor.” Autolycus turned towards Mentor and glared at him. “The hero’s friend. And where were you all this time?”

  “By his side, sir.” Mentor’s voice broke under the old man’s stare.

  “You should have been talking him out of such foolishness.”

  Mentor chewed his lip. Should he tell Autolycus the complete truth—how he’d been dragged unwilling from his bed and had argued with Odysseus each step of the way? That would only make Odysseus look worse in his grandfather’s eyes.

  “It seemed a good idea at the time, sir,” he mumbled. “The hunt, the glory …”

  “Ah yes,” Autolycus said. “Glory. A poorer provider than sentiment.”

  “An old man’s answer,” mumbled Odysseus, but low enough so that his grandfather could ignore it if he so chose.

  Just then a servant appeared in the doorway, holding out a spear to his master. “The men are prepared, my lord, and the dogs ready.”

  Autolycus took the spear and, for all his years, hefted it as if it were a twig. “I’ll be right there.” He waved the servant away. “Now this is a proper spear. If you’d managed to steal this,” he said to Odysseus, “it would have been a deed worthy of respect.”

  “There’s still time for that,” Odysseus said defiantly.

  “Not on that leg, I fear,” Autolycus said. He turned to leave, saying over his shoulder, “I’ll bring the boar back, and you can feast upon him in revenge for the ill done you.” Then he was gone.

  Odysseus spat in disgust. “A bitter feast that will be.”

  CHAPTER 4: A HERO’S TALE

  THE HUNTERS CAME BACK from the hunt with the boar and—from what Mentor could find out—only one dog lost to its tusks.

  “So we’re invited to the feast tonight.”

  “I’m not going.” Odysseus crossed his arms and lay back on his pallet. “Tell them the wound is too painful. Say I’m asleep.”

  But Autolycus himself came to escort the boys. “You can walk, or I can have you brought in a litter,” he told his grandson.

  “I’ll walk,” Odysseus said sullenly. Nothing would have induced him to be carried in. But he used a stick because putting too much weight on the leg made the pain unbearable.

  In the feast room Autolycus, splendid in his purple robe, sat in a carved ebony chair. Behind him was a bright fresco of wild cattle being caught and tamed.

  Odysseus reclined on a couch on his grandfather’s right while Mentor perched on a stool next to Odysseus. The heroes of the hunt and other men of Parnassus filled the rest of the chairs and couches, chattering and joking about the day’s events.

  At the three-legged cauldron, a slave stirred an ox stew. The smoke drifted up through the opening in the roof, obscuring for a moment the night blue of the sky.

  “Smells good,” whispered Mentor, his face bright red, having been scrubbed clean of the white paste.

  Odysseus said nothing.

  “Better than your sickroom and old Menaera’s balms.”

  Still Odysseus was silent.

  “Well, you can sulk if you want,” Mentor said. “But as for me—I’m famished!” He rose and went to one of the long wooden tables where baskets of flat loaves of bread and bowls full of pomegranates, olives and figs had been set out.

  As if the entire company had the same idea at the same time, the room erupted into a frenzy of eating. Whole kraters of wine were soon emptied and new jars brought in.

  Suddenly Autolycus banged his knife on the rim of his gold cup, a clear signal for silence. “Let us hear the bard now. Shall he tell us a tale of the Argonauts?”

  The room burst into a riot of sound. “Argo! Argo! Argo!”

  Mentor sang out with the rest of them.

  Only Odysseus, still nursing his anger, was silent.

  The singer was a man called Phonos, who had an amazingly stiff black beard and sun-bronzed skin. He was blind, his eyes as round and black as ripe olives. A slave girl led him to the very centre of the room, where he stood by the central hearth.

  “My lord, sirs, young gentlemen,” Phonos said, “I will sing of the Argo and the mighty heroes who sailed on her.”

  He placed his hands on his hips, threw his head back, and began:

  “The heaven-sent wind filled the swelling sail

  And the swift-oared ship shot through the Clashing Rocks

  Like a feathered arrow from a huntsman’s bow.

  The angry stones scraped the painted stern

  Like a wolf snapping at the tail of a hare,

  And then Jason’s brave crew were safe

  Upon the bosom of the wine-dark sea …”

  Apart from the bard’s deep, lilting voice, a complete silence fell over the feasting hall. The singer held all eyes, all ears, till the very end of the tale.

  And then the hall erupted once more, this time with loud applause and cheers. Even Odysseus had been caught up in the story, and he applauded with the rest.

  Autolycus rose and presented the singer with a brooch of silver. “Small recompense for your splendid tale,” he said.

  At his grandfather’s words, the spell of the story was broken. Once again Odysseus felt the twin throbbing of his wound and his shame. He snatched up his cup and drained it. The watered wine helped dull the pain in his leg but did nothing for the pain in his heart.

  “Wasn’t that exciting?” Mentor whispered.

  Wiping the thin line of wine from his upper lip, Odysseus said, “One day my adventures will draw cheers like that.”

  “I’m still smarting from your adventures,” Mentor told him. “Can’t you just enjoy the feast?”

  Odysseus turned to his friend. “Don’t you see, Mentor? We should have brought home the boar. We should have been toasted at the feast.”

  “We are lucky to be alive,” Mentor said sensibly.

  “Alive without glory,” Odysseus snapped, “is not alive at all.”

  “Your father wouldn’t say so,” Mentor told him. “He specifically asked me to keep an eye on you.”

  “My father sailed on the Argo,” Odysseus said. “He faced countless dangers and returned with the Golden Fleece. And”—his face was a misery—“no one was assigned to nursemaid him.”

  “I’m no nursemaid!”

  As if he hadn’t heard Mentor at all, Odysseus continued, “And how far have I travelled from my rocky little island? No farther than to my grandfather’s home.”

  Mentor came and knelt by the couch. “Those heroic
days are over, Odysseus. The Argonauts are home. There’s peace everywhere. The treasures are all found, the monsters all slain. Be sensible.”

  “Sensible?” Odysseus’ anger pulled him upright on the couch. “You can be sensible, my friend. But I know there are still adventures and monsters aplenty. Only not here in Parnassus. And not in Ithaca!” His face had turned bright red.

  Mentor held out his plate. There was a bit of bread left, a few olives, black and round as the bard’s eyes. “Here. Eat something. Hunger is a monster easily conquered.”

  “You sound like Menaera,” Odysseus said, but he ate.

  Suddenly the door opened, and a priest walked across the feast hall holding a pair of huge tusks. Behind him came a boy carrying a silver plate on which sat the boar’s tongue.

  The priest laid the tusks at Autolycus’ feet.

  Odysseus knew those tusks all too well. Intimately in fact. His wound throbbed in recognition.

  Picking up the tusks, Autolycus stood and declared, “Men of Parnassus, the beast that terrorised our countryside has this day been slain. Courage and skill have brought us this victory!”

  A great cheer went up, and wine cups clashed together.

  Then Autolycus plucked the boar’s tongue from the silver plate and walked over to the hearth. Flinging the meat into the fire, he said, “I offer this share of the kill to the gods.”

  The tongue sizzled on the flame, and the sweet, thick smell of it went straight up towards the hole in the roof.

  “To Apollo whose light guided us, to Artemis who led us to the prey, to Ares who gave us strength for the fight. The rest is for us.”

  A round of good-natured laughter followed, and—right on cue—servants entered the room bearing plates of roasted boar.

  Even as those were passed around, Autolycus called for silence once more.

  “Those who were with me today know the truth of our hunt. But I tell it now for all to hear. When we came upon the boar, that mighty man killer, widow maker who made orphans of nine children in ten days, he was already sorely used. His wind was gone. His legs had no speed left in them. His fury had been blunted by fatigue.” He looked around the room as he spoke.