For the Immortal

by Emily Hauser

  But this sky, stretching like an arch overhead, the grass without walls or boundary-markers, stirred only by the wind – this was a vastness of which I could never have dreamt. The camp was filled with the activity of daily life. There must have been at least a hundred Amazons, perhaps more, their tents clustered together, their lives interweaving as closely as those of their horses, which fed together at the troughs and slept huddled side by side for warmth. A pair of women seated on stools, one spinning wool, the other darning clothes, talked to each other in low voices while they worked; a group of men tanned hides in wooden vats by the camp’s edge, where the breeze blew away the stench; several others tended their horses, filling the water-troughs and digging stones from hoofs with picks – and it was all so different from how I had thought it would be, yet so real, so alive, that I could feel my imagined world draining away, like water through cupped hands.

  The queen, her riders and the Greeks, Alcides among them, had gone from the camp to hunt, and I was left behind, so filled with anticipation that here, after so many weeks at sea, we might find the long-sought herbs to deliver my brother that I hardly knew where to turn. And yet beneath my excitement, something else: that same fear prickling my skin, now that I had come, that she might not be here or, if she was, and did not want me … And so I distracted myself with seeking out the healer of the camp, trying not to look into the curious faces of the women who wandered past so that I could continue to think that somewhere, there, was my mother.

  A day later and still I had not sighted her, and I had not had the courage to ask of her, though at times I thought – or perhaps imagined – I heard her name whispered as I passed. When I looked up, certainly, those whom I could have sworn had said her name were busy at their work, silent with their heads bowed. After some enquiry I had found the healer, an elderly woman, Ioxeia, with a scar gashed over a blinded eye, and she had agreed to take me through her stores of herbs when the sun was up.

  At dawn, therefore, I rose filled with eagerness from the tent where they had given me a bed, along with some Amazon women of my age, Polemusa, Aella and Deianeira, who stared at my Greek clothes and my plaited hair and barely replied when I spoke to them in the Scythian tongue. The sky was streaked with pale pink clouds edged with gold as I hurried to the healer’s tent, a cloak around my shoulders against the morning chill and dew on my sandals from the wet grass. Smoke was rising in a blue column as I drew back the tent-flap to see the healer holding a lamp and seated on a stool before a cauldron filled with the mare’s-milk drink they called koumiss propped over the fire. Baskets of herbs were stacked against the hide walls. At once I smiled – I could not help it. The scents that greeted me were so familiar – meadowsweet, bright as honey, grass-like pennyroyal and powdered safflower – that, without thinking, I closed my eyes and drew a breath to take them in.

  ‘A true healer, then,’ Ioxeia said. She was regarding me with her good eye, head to one side and stirring the koumiss with a ladle as it simmered. ‘But if you are half an Amazon, as you say, it is little wonder. We have always had a way with plants.’

  My gaze wandered around the tent, taking in the bed of pelts, the dried plants hanging from the struts, then back to the herbs.

  ‘Help yourself,’ she said.

  I stepped towards them across the rugs on the ground and held a basket of dried liquorice roots to my nose. ‘I am seeking a cure for a particular ailment.’

  ‘You have seen the disease yourself?’

  I nodded, picking up a handful of elecampane.

  ‘The signs?’

  ‘Fever,’ I said, replacing the elecampane and ticking off the symptoms on my fingers. Ioxeia had stood and moved over to me now, and as our gazes met, determined, absorbed, I felt the satisfaction of a language we shared, beyond Scythian, in our understanding of plants and their effects on the body. ‘But not a fever such as I have ever seen. It cycles around and around, regular as the seasons, rising and falling, then rising again. Sweating. Chills. Weakness. Delirium.’

  She pursed her lips, making the skin wrinkle. ‘Fever,’ she muttered, and moved past me to the baskets. I watched as she began to remove the herbs one after another, holding them to her nose to identify them, then naming them and their properties. ‘Halinda – but that increases warmth … Quince and black cumin seeds for digestion … Yellow pheasant’s eye,’ she took a handful of dried leaves and golden petals, ‘you might try to slow the pulse.’ She picked up a cloth pouch and dropped into it a couple of handfuls of the herb, then moved back to the stacked baskets, running her fingers across them. ‘Hyssop, again, is warming, though it relieves sickness – is there sickness?’ she asked, turning to me.

  I nodded, and she took some for another pouch. ‘Angelica induces sweat. Tarragon aids sleep. Carob for pain in the stomach …’ She lifted another to her face, then turned to me. ‘You might try yarrow,’ she said, and she handed me a pouch of the dried leaves. I took it, feeling dispirited: I had used yarrow already, and to little effect, except to lower his fever somewhat. Pray the gods she has more, or this voyage will truly have been for nothing.

  ‘You have tried feverfew?’

  ‘Yes, and willow-bark,’ I said, trying to keep the snap from my voice.

  She returned the basket and moved back to sit before the fire, one hand on her back as she lowered herself to the stool. ‘Then that is all I have.’ She picked up the ladle and began to stir again. The tangy-sweet smell of milk curled into the air.

  I pushed the pouches into my girdle and rounded on her, half desperate, half enraged. ‘It cannot be. Please, I beg you. There must be more! My mother spoke of herbs such as we had never seen, of such potency that they might cure any ailment …’

  She brought the ladle to rest and placed her hands one over the other on it, a look of resignation on her face, both eyes fixed on me. ‘And who was your mother, child?’

  I hesitated. ‘Antimache,’ I said.

  Ioxeia grunted. ‘I thought as much,’ she said. She eyed me for a moment, then said, ‘You have the look of her about you well enough.’

  I started forwards, all thoughts of herbs forgotten, my heart leaping so hard in my throat I could barely breathe. ‘Then – then you know her?’

  ‘Oh, I knew her.’ Her eye flicked up to me, and I thought I saw a shadow cross her expression. ‘It was I who taught her to heal.’

  ‘Then – but then –’ I twisted my fingers together, hardly able to speak ‘– you must know where she is?’

  She shook her head. Her grey hairs shimmered in the firelight. ‘I’ll say no more.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘No more.’ Her voice was sharp. ‘You must ask the queen.’

  I took her in, her lower lip jutting forwards and her hands crossed before her. ‘I will, then,’ I said, ‘I will go to her now. I thank you.’

  ‘Daughter of Antimache,’ she called after me, and I turned, slipping a little on the rug in my haste. ‘If you still wish for a cure …’

  ‘You have something else?’

  The old woman shook her head and drew her stool closer to the cauldron. ‘No. But if the disease is as potent as you say, I’ll wager – for all you seem to depend on herbs – that it is a scourge sent by the gods, and only the gods will cure it. So, if you are to see the queen,’ her blind eye gleamed milky-white, ‘you might ask her of the golden apples.’

  Hippolyta

  Amazons, Land of the Saka

  The Forty-first Day after the Day of Earth in the Season of Apia, 1265 BC

  The Greeks, it transpired, had voyaged to our lands in search of herbal lore. The king’s daughter, who so resembled an Amazon, had some fancy to cure her brother’s illness with plants, rather than the propitiation of the gods – there was a bite in Hercules’ voice as he told me – so they were come in peace, that she might visit Ioxeia and learn her trade. If the elders of my council murmured that it was strange to have brought so many swords and spears in search of knowledge, if the whisperings of my o
wn caution told me to be on my guard, then I was determined to ignore them. I was resolute: I would trust their word, and their honour, as my mother would have done, as a queen bound by the laws of hospitality beneath the gods.

  And so, as Ioxeia occupied herself with demonstrating her knowledge of herbs, I spent the days leading the rest to the plains. That morning we were to hunt together once more. The Greeks seemed to enjoy the novelty of women who could ride, and I took pleasure in demonstrating to them the skills of my tribe, our time-honoured customs and the beauty of a life spent beneath the sky, where men and women rode side by side, the wind flying through their hair and a quiver at their hip. I could hear my people gathering their horses in the camp outside my tent, the resounding clop-clop of hoofs on earth, the horses snuffling and whinnying. The hunting dogs were baying, and shouts in Greek and Saka mixed with the laughter of children, stirred up by the excitement of the hunt.

  I straightened my tunic, embroidered at the edge and dyed in strips of purple and green, beneath my war-belt, checking the clasp at my side, the plates chinking beneath my fingers. My plait was twisted with a golden thread in honour of our guests, and pinned on my tunic I wore a brooch of a leaping stag – my mother’s before me. I held up a bronze mirror, and in the reflection, proud and stern, I saw a queen, a leader of her people; her face pale, perhaps, but her jaw set and her eyes bright.

  I raised my chin, set down the mirror and, with one thumb tucked into my war-belt, pushed my way out of the tent.

  Theseus, prince of Athens, who so reminded me of that other Greek, was waiting outside amid the clamour of the gathering riders. His hand was on my horse’s reins, and he looked well groomed with a careless grace about him. His hair was oiled back from his head, the beard dark on his chin and over his lip.

  ‘My lady,’ he said, taking my hand and bowing. ‘You are as beautiful as Artemis before the hunt.’

  I withdrew my fingers from his, disliking the intensity of his gaze on me. ‘The Amazons do not usually address their queen so.’

  He led Kati forwards. ‘Then may I help you onto your horse?’

  I moved around him. ‘I am queen of the Amazons,’ I said, taking Kati’s mane in one hand and swinging myself up to her back. Kati sidled beneath me, whinnying. ‘I have ridden since before I could walk. What do you think, prince of Athens?’ I asked, looking down at him.

  He bowed his head, saying nothing, a dull flush creeping beneath his beard.

  ‘Melanippe?’ I called, bringing Kati round to search through the milling crowds, the stamping horses and barking dogs. At last I saw her, and cantered over. She was mounted too, dressed for hunting, her quiver and bow at her waist and her wool tunic light-woven for the warmer spring weather.

  She whistled to the dogs and the pack closed together. The rest of the Amazons – my band of fighters, Aella, Xanthippe, Asteria and the others, joined by some of the tent-holders who took pleasure in the hunt – leapt onto their steeds at my call, first in Saka, then in Greek. Hercules mounted Teuspa’s horse, and the other Greeks followed suit, calling to each other, some complaining at the harsh-woven felt rugs we used for saddles, others adjusting their sword-belts and the spears fitted in the baldrics on their backs.

  The air was scented with the promise of rain, that sweet-damp tang, and the sky was a rolling grey blotted here and there with dark stormclouds as I rode forwards. I took Kati’s reins in one hand and brought her around to face the troop of Greeks and Amazons. Bright Amazon tunics and trousers mixed before me with the more sober Greek clothes, horses in all colours – black, bay, and tan, chestnut, dun and dark rich brown – and, weaving between them, Teres, Ainippe and Cayster, pulling at the horses’ tails and laughing as they rolled on the grass with the hounds.

  ‘To the hunt, then,’ I called, drawing my bow from the case at my war-belt. The Greeks clamoured, the dogs bayed. Melanippe and Aella shook the wide-meshed hunting nets. I plucked at Kati’s reins and, as always, mirroring my thought, she started into a trot, then a gallop towards the open plain. I heard hoofbeats behind me and saw Theseus at my rear. I tossed my head and spurred Kati on, rising and falling with her as if we were one, and Theseus fell behind.

  ‘You cannot ride?’ I threw at him over my shoulder.

  ‘In Greece,’ he called to me, ‘women do not ride like this. Many would say it is improper.’

  ‘In the land of the Amazons,’ I replied, the wind whipping the words out of my mouth, ‘women and men alike learn to ride, and it is often that a woman on horseback will be faster and better with a bow than a man.’

  ‘If the women are so taken with riding and the arts of war,’ he shouted back, ‘then are they not mothers too? How is it, Queen, that you have so many children in your camp, if your women are always on horseback?’ He laughed and hurled the next question forwards like a dart: ‘Do women not also lie with men?’

  I did not answer, for at that moment Xanthippe and Asteria galloped up beside me. In any case, my throat was dry, my heart pounding at what he had said. Was it mere chance that he had spoken so? Or did he know of the Greek? Had someone told him? And if he revealed … If the Amazons discovered …

  My vision blurring with panic, I gestured blindly to the outlines of a herd of deer grazing in the distance, and my women nodded, spurring their horses on. The dogs ran ahead, the rest of the hunt pressed forwards with cries and the thundering of hoofs, and I galloped on, feeling the wind whipping my cheeks and the familiar firm steadiness of Kati’s back against my thighs. I tried to ignore the sensation that Theseus’ eyes were on me, steady as a falcon on its prey.

  A distant rumble filled the sky. Sudden as a thought, the dark clouds split into a pillar of lightning ahead, followed by a bellow of thunder. The deer started and sped over the open field, massing together in a fleeing herd. A second bolt arrowed down the sky before us, blinding white, then splitting into thunder so loud I felt it shiver through my ribs. Kati bucked and veered, tossing her head and galloping over the plain.

  I cried out to her, pulling on one rein to bring her under control and gripping hard with my thighs to keep my seat. Now sleet was hissing down from the sky, and Kati’s eyes were white with fear. I twisted around, shielding my face with my free hand, and saw other riders scattering across the plain, some attempting to calm their horses, others trying not to fall. And then the rain and sleet closed over everything in a silver-grey veil and I turned back, thinking only of clinging on, my trousers stuck tight to my legs and water filling my boots. I could see nothing but Kati’s head before me as she galloped wildly and the pearls of rain sliding down her mane. I twisted the reins around my hands and ducked my head, calling soothing words to her, which were stolen from my lips and shot away behind me on the wind.

  At last, the shrouded shapes of trees shimmered up before me. We must have reached the river’s edge. Kati raced beneath the shelter of the canopy and then, abruptly, her whole body trembling, came to a halt. I slid from her back to the grass and ran to cradle her head in the crook of my arm, stroking her neck and muttering, ‘It’s all right, oh, it’s all right,’ as the rain spattered the leaves above us and the sky lit with sparks of white. I could feel her calming, her gaze growing steadier, responding to the firmness of my body and my voice. Her breath was warm on my sodden clothes and skin, and I smiled as I pressed my forehead to hers and inhaled her scent, of hay and smoke.

  And then I started.

  A second rider had approached us, and I knew at once that it was, must be, Theseus: the unpleasant tingle of apprehension on my skin told me so. He led his horse to me, then loosed the reins. I did not turn.

  ‘You are not afraid?’ he said, his voice soft, a thread of sound under the rain. A flash of lightning above made Kati’s ears twitch. I stroked and soothed her, though my own heart was hammering at the thought of what he might know, and the presumption of his addressing me so.

  ‘No,’ I said quietly. ‘The lot of a queen is to have no fear, except for her people.’

 
; Silence fell between us.

  Then he stepped closer, his hand gripping my wrist and the heat of his breath on my face. Fury welled in me, strong and sharp, like the flames beneath the breath of the bellows, and I thrust the heel of my hand against his face, feeling the nose break and split. As he reeled back, blood gushing, I drew my sword, swift as wind, and held the sharpened bronze at his throat. Drops of rain glanced off the blade, singing.

  ‘How dare you?’ I said, my voice low with threat. ‘How dare you think to lay a hand on—’

  He did not wait to hear me. Staggering, hands held up to his broken face, he reeled away and, slipping on the wet grass, crawled onto his horse’s back. There was a moment, as he turned back to me, gushing blood, when our eyes met, and I felt the hatred of his gaze.

  ‘Go!’ I shouted, drawing myself up, my sword still outstretched, heat trembling through my veins as if my very skin was blazing with my fury. ‘Do not – ever – dare to speak to me again.’

  Without a word, he kicked his steed out into the storm and the darkness of the drenched plain.

  Ἀδμήτη

  Admete

  Amazons, Scythia

  The Twelfth Day of the Month of the Harvest, 1265 BC

  I did not go at once to the queen. A storm had broken overhead, and Ioxeia allowed me to shelter with her by the warmth of her fire. When at last I decided to leave, seeing that the rain would not abate, my spirit failed me as I crossed the camp, water pouring down and pooling on the grass. I felt the eyes of the Amazons glinting at me, heard their whispered mutters in the Scythian they thought I could not understand.