The Soul of Time

by Jennifer Macaire

  Plexis glanced at the sky, a cloudless expanse of pale blue above our heads. ‘I don’t think Zeus will send one.’ There was real regret in his voice.

  Then Voltarrix turned his back to the prisoners and marched away. He wore the grey robes of a Celtic druid, and as he walked through the village everyone stopped what they were doing and made a quick sign with their hands. They appeared to be frightened of him.

  Voltarrix motioned to the other druids, and they stepped out of their hiding places and followed him. He was coming towards us now, heading towards the circle of stones, his loose robes flapping.

  The standing stones were nearly beneath us in the centre of a large clearing. I had hated the sight of them last night and I hated them this morning. Nevertheless, I inched closer to the edge of the rock to study them. They were really an odd colour, I decided. Black, but a strange blackness, as if they’d been painted with thick tar. Then as I looked, the stones began to shiver.

  I uttered a gasp and Plexis turned to see what I was staring at. I felt him flinch, and his hand crept over my arm and he gripped my wrist so tightly I felt my bones grind together. I was incapable of uttering a single sound.

  The stones were shuddering. They vibrated like living things. Then suddenly, sickeningly, just before I thought I’d faint with fear, a huge black cloud of flies lifted off them as if a thick, black, skin peeled off and disintegrated in the air with a sound we could hear from our perch.

  I closed my eyes, my stomach heaving. Underneath the flies, the stones were encrusted with dried blood. Blood that attracted the flies; they stayed on the rocks unless something disturbed them. They’d been disturbed by the druids.

  Voltarrix walked towards the stones with measured steps, ignoring the billions of flies that darkened the clearing. The others formed a giant circle around him. When he reached the very centre of the stones, Voltarrix stopped and stood motionless for a long time. Plexis and I were utterly silent. It was quiet all around us. A queer silence descended upon the whole valley. All we could hear was a deep buzzing. Then the air seemed to swell and crystallize around us. My ears hurt and I shook my head. Plexis made a frightened sound deep in his throat and gripped my hand tighter. Voltarrix stared around him, swinging his head back and forth slowly as if scenting the wind.

  I had the sudden intuition that he was looking for Plexis and me. I knew it. I also knew we were well hidden. My breath caught in my throat, and I closed my eyes in a superstitious effort to keep myself invisible. A raven cawed loudly overhead and I pressed myself into the ground. I didn’t dare move. Next to me Plexis had stopped breathing. The strange sensation of a vacuum grew and the roaring, buzzing noise became louder. All of a sudden, the breeze rustled the trees over our heads and the birds started singing again. The air whooshed back to normal with a ‘pop’ that nearly stunned me. My fingers released their grip on the ground. A small branch dug into my cheek. I wondered for a brief second if I’d peed in my pants. My fear had been so overpowering, I was drenched with sweat. A drop rolled down my temple and cheekbone, coming to rest at the base of my throat. We didn’t dare move until the druids had gone, and even then we waited a good hour before peeling ourselves off the ground and worming back into the undergrowth.

  Plexis was shaken. ‘What was that?’ he finally managed to croak, but the question was rhetorical. I had no idea, and he knew it. It took us twice as long to get back to our campsite.

  I wanted to take a bath. I was just about ready to take off my clothes, bury them in a deep pit, and go naked. I was wondering how I could fashion a skirt and a shirt from pine needles. I felt terrible. My hair was sticky, my face was muddy, and my hands were caked with dirt. I won’t bother to describe the rest, you might be eating. Plexis wasn’t much better. He looked like a barbarian.

  I had a sudden fit of the giggles, thinking about presenting him to my mother at that minute. His hair was tied back neatly with a thong, but his beard had a bramble caught in it, his face was streaked with dried mud, and his hands and forearms were black with muck.

  He stood up and stretched, scratching his chest and winking at me.

  ‘Why are you laughing?’ he asked.

  ‘I was just thinking of my mother’s face if she saw you. I would absolutely love to be able to say, “Mother, I do formally present you to my lover, Hephaestion.” … what is your full name, by the way?’ I frowned. ‘We weren’t together in Massalia, with all the paperwork, so I didn’t get to hear you present yourself to the customs official.’

  ‘My name?’ He knitted his brows together. ‘Hephaestion Sophocles of Attica. Rather a long name, don’t you think?’

  ‘I think it’s nice. Was your father Sophocles, the playwright?’

  ‘No, no relation, unfortunately. My father was Sophocles, the lawyer. He died when I was young; I don’t remember him well. I had a brother and a sister,’ he said, divining my next question. ‘My mother took us all to live with her family when my father died. I was the youngest, and a handful, which was why I was sent to Athens to school at a very early age. It was also because …’ He broke off and stared at me moodily.

  I knew the look in his eyes; I got it too, whenever I spoke of my past, which was actually three thousand years in the future. I sighed. Things were complicated enough. ‘You don’t have to say any more,’ I said gently.

  He shook his head, chasing away the demons. ‘No, it’s all right. I was five when my father died and six when we went to live with my mother’s family. And I was eight when my uncle seduced me. I think I was a handsome child, and the Greeks love beauty.’ He smiled, but his eyes were sad. ‘I loved Athens. I loved the school. And I especially loved the attention men paid to me. If I hadn’t missed my father so much, perhaps it wouldn’t have happened. However, I did miss him. And by my fault my brother was killed.’

  ‘Alexander killed him,’ I said, ‘Not you. It was his fault, not yours. And he’s yet to forgive himself.’

  ‘I know. Even though I forgave him, I forgave him completely. But I’ll never pardon myself. I was young and foolish, that is true. However, nothing can bring my brother back or take away my mother’s pain. She lost her firstborn son, and the worst of it was she knew it was my fault. When I came back home she wouldn’t receive me. I was only fifteen and I had nowhere to go so I travelled for a while. Aristotle let me stay with him and his wife. I went to Macedonia but not to see Iskander. Then his father died, and I heard he was looking for finances for his new army. I wrote to him, and told him what I’d done. I’d taken all my mother’s money and invested it in his army. If he lost a battle he would ruin my family. It was a childish strike against the young man who’d killed my brother. I did it out of sorrow and rage – and regret, because I still loved him. He’d been my best friend for so long that I couldn’t imagine life without him.’

  ‘But you did see him again.’

  ‘I did. In Arbeles, after his second victory over Darius. You were there as well. The minion of Hades who frightened Olympias.’

  ‘Was that who you went to see in Macedonia?’ I asked.

  He flinched. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Revenge is sometimes harder to give than to receive,’ I said slowly. ‘If you used Olympias for your revenge, then it must have been bitter indeed.’

  ‘I did it for love, not revenge. I went to Macedonia intending to make up with Iskander, to apologize, something – I don’t know. Olympias was there. She thought I was handsome and she was tired of her brute of a husband. It’s all very painful to speak about, so I hope you’ll forgive me if I just say I didn’t stay long. I was sickened by everything that was happening to me. Sometimes I don’t know why I’m still alive. I thought about suicide, but the hope of making up with Iskander kept me going.’

  I blinked away stinging tears. ‘I’m glad you’re not dead.’

  ‘Me too. I have you, and Chiron, and Iskander. It’s too much for me some days. I still don’t feel as if I deserve any of it. But I try, I try to deserve you all.’ He looked at me fr
om under his long lashes. Even filthy and uncombed, he kept his sensual beauty. I could easily see why men and women would want to seduce him. His mouth was made for kisses, so I kissed him softly.

  ‘You are a sweetheart,’ I said ‘And nothing that happened was your fault. You were young and easy prey for corrupted adults. They should have been severely punished, not you. Your mother was grieving, but I’m sure she loved you still.’

  ‘No, she did not.’ He shrugged and tried to smile but the pain was still sharp in his eyes. ‘She died before I could speak to her about the whole thing. The worst was, she adored her brother. He managed to convince her that everything was my fault. He claimed I was the one who’d seduced him. That I was only eight made no difference. I was “born decadent”, as he explained it. He managed to make it sound so very plausible.’

  ‘Whatever happened to him?’

  ‘I killed him.’ He said this so simply, it sent shivers down my spine.

  ‘How?’ I managed to whisper.

  ‘When my mother died, I went to Athens. It was just before I met you and Iskander again in Persepolis. My family refused to see me. I wasn’t allowed to go to the funeral, and when I tried to see my sister, her husband threatened to have the magistrates throw me out of the city. I was in Athens to see Demosthenes. You can imagine the scene. I had to speak to him about the embezzlement scandal, and at the same time explain why my own family wanted me out of Athens. Demosthenes was accused of stealing half the money from the army’s payroll. It was a fortune, more than a fortune actually; and I’m sure Demosthenes did steal it.’

  ‘But, why? Why you? Why did you have to speak to Demosthenes?’

  ‘I was a lawyer, didn’t I ever tell you? I wasn’t born in the cavalry. I received a note, a rather curt note from Iskander himself, asking me to go and see about it. It was the first time he’d contacted me since, well, since you’d been kidnapped, and I was feeling guilty again. As you can imagine.’

  ‘I suppose.’ I tried to keep my voice level.

  He shot me a pained glance. ‘I’m sorry about that. Well, I went to Athens and my mother died the day I arrived. My uncle made it seem as if I’d killed her. It made no difference to my family that she’d been ill for a long time.

  ‘When I saw my uncle, something snapped. He ordered me out of the house, screaming that I was no longer welcome, that his sister and my brother were dead by my fault. My own sister spat at me, and I was dragged out of the house by the servants. That night I waited in the dark until the funeral feast was over. And I stabbed him. No one saw me, but I think I was past caring. I don’t know why I did it. The strange thing is, I never felt any regret. He’d destroyed my life, so when I killed him it didn’t seem wrong.’ He shuddered. ‘Even now, all I can think of is his cape. Since I’d invested my money well, I was rich, but I’d sent it all to my family and they lived like princes. My uncle’s cape was made of the finest wool and was dyed black. It must have cost a fortune. He lived off my money, and he dared refuse me entrance to my mother’s funeral?’ His voice was rising and I saw his shoulders start to shake.

  ‘Hush.’ I wrapped my arms around him and held him tightly. ‘Why don’t we speak of other things? All that is in the past, years and years behind you. You’re not the same person who I saw in Persepolis. You’ve changed. We all have. The boy you once were is gone forever.’

  ‘No. The boy is still inside me. I feel him when I’m frightened.’

  ‘We all do,’ I said. ‘Honest. Whenever I try and talk sternly to myself, it’s my mother’s voice I hear. We’re all stuck with our past, but we just have to put it in its rightful place, behind us. With our past behind us we can look towards the future.’ I was rather proud of my little speech. I waited for Plexis to congratulate me, but he stared moodily over my head and sighed.

  ‘I stabbed my uncle in the back. It’s when something is behind me that I fear it the most.’

  Chapter Six

  That evening we ate our dinner raw. Plexis didn’t want to make a fire, he was afraid we’d be discovered. I remarked that anyone standing downwind of us would find us in five minutes, but he shook his head.

  ‘We’ll wash when it gets dark,’ he told me, biting into a raw mushroom.

  I wasn’t looking forward to swimming in an icy stream in the middle of the night, but I couldn’t go without washing one more day. I was nearly crying with filth. Plexis, being Greek, loved cleanliness as much as anyone, except perhaps the Egyptians who were fanatical about keeping clean. However, men seem to be able to handle dirt better than women. I thought it was horribly unfair, and told him so.

  He grinned and covered my shoulder with a handful of soft, wet, sand. ‘Here, rub this on your skin, and then you can rinse off and you’ll be clean.’ In the dark his eyes gleamed.

  I scooped up another handful of wet sand from the streambed and scoured myself all over. The sand was cold, but it was fine and it cleansed well. ‘How’s your arm feeling?’ I asked him, scrubbing hard.

  ‘Better – really.’ He didn’t blink when he said that, although I knew it was a lie. He couldn’t use his arm any more. It hung at his side and if I touched it he flinched. I thought there was an abscess that was keeping it from healing, but there was nothing I could do until I got some decent surgical instruments and could boil water.

  I washed, then took our clothes and washed them. They were clean, but wouldn’t be dry by morning. Nights only lasted a half an hour now, and even then they weren’t very dark. The summer solstice was approaching rapidly. That was the day set aside for the ceremony. I paused in my washing and stared at the sky. The edges were starting to pale already, dawn was coming. Plexis made a soft splashing sound as he slid into the water.

  I helped him wash, being careful not to hurt his shoulder. He stood still while I scrubbed, his eyes scanning the bushes around us. Ever since his story, he’d been distant. The hurt had bubbled up to the surface and it would take time to bury again. I understood, or hoped I did. He was a complex man. He rarely let his thoughts show. I’ll admit, the first time I set eyes on him I thought he was probably the most handsome man I’d ever seen. I’d also thought him difficult and unfriendly when I first spoke to him. He took time to get to know. Not like Alexander, who wore his personality on the outside. Alexander, whose face wore a hundred expressions a minute, whose eyes spoke volumes and whose smile could charm the most virulent of enemies. Alexander, who was prisoner in a stone pit.

  My hands fell to my sides and I uttered a frustrated sob. How could we save them? Plexis might be the most handsome man I’d ever seen, but he was wounded. He only had his ancient, bronze sword with him. I was the one carrying it half the time. Plexis knew what I was thinking. He always did. He should have been a psychic; he could pick up thoughts as if they were radio waves. My thoughts must have wounded him, but he just took me in his arms and held me close. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said.

  We hung the clothes to dry in the middle of a thicket, then cuddled up together and tried to keep warm. I was miserable, Plexis was hurt, and things hadn’t seemed so awful since I’d been kidnapped in Arbeles.

  Of course, when the sun’s shining and you’re feeling clean, almost dry, and well fed, things look brighter.

  The sun was hot that day and our clothes dried quickly. Plexis speared three large fish and we grilled them while there was still mist on the ground to hide the smoke from our fire. Afterwards, we wrapped the leftover fish in a large leaf to take with us and made our way carefully towards the village. Plexis didn’t take the same trail twice so it took us two hours that day. I was chafing at the slow pace but knew we had to be careful. The only way we could help the others was to stay free.

  I paused under the skirt of a large pine tree while Plexis scouted the area in front of us. He could move without making a sound. I was always amazed when he disappeared into the underbrush without a ‘swish’. The tree I was hiding under was short but very dense. It would have made a perfect Christmas tree. I could picture it dec
orated with tinsel and twinkling lights, with a little white angel on the top, her wings made of real dove feathers.

  I sighed softly and turned my attention back to the direction Plexis had gone. When he reappeared, motioning me towards him, I crouched down and crawled on hands and knees, as quickly as I could, down the little path he’d opened up. Thorns caught at my hair and nettles stung me, but I didn’t mind – too much. Plexis followed behind and carefully plucked my hair from the briar bush. In his hand the long, silver thread looked almost like a spider’s web, or tinsel. I made a face. Why was I thinking of Christmas? Was it because the whole village was being decorated, as if for a fête? Today everyone in the village bustled with activity, mainly twining flowers into crowns and wreaths and hanging them on doors and windows.

  The men were still in the pit, and I could see them moving around so I knew they were still alive. It gave me scant comfort. There seemed to be even more druids today, and Voltarrix was wandering around. He didn’t appear to have anything else to do besides occasionally glancing into a huge caldron hung over a bright fire. I wondered if I could shoot an arrow far enough to kill him, but since I had no bow and no arrow the question was not even moot.

  Plexis put his mouth next to my ear and breathed, ‘It would take a six-foot-long bow and a four-foot arrow shot by someone with Demos’s force to hit Voltarrix, and even then you couldn’t be sure to kill him. We’re too far away.’ I just turned and stared at him. Sometimes he was downright spooky.

  The sun climbed high and then started to descend. It would hardly set tonight. Plexis and I shared the rest of the cold fish and some vegetables he’d picked in the forest. There were berries too. Summer was coming; I nibbled on a tart raspberry and licked the juice off my fingers. Plexis watched me and I saw his eyes darken.

  ‘Not here, not now,’ I said to him. It was his turn to widen his eyes.

  ‘I didn’t say anything! ‘

  ‘Your eyes change colour when you’re aroused,’ I told him.