Bring Down the Sun (22 page)

Myrtale was not looking for praise. She rose stiffly. The child was so still that her hands flew to her center in a flare of pure terror—but he was alive. He was exhausted, as were they all, but he was well; he would live.

She could not collapse in relief. She was a long way from Pella. However she managed to return there, return she must. She had a husband waiting, and friends and kin, and a son to bring into the world.

He would be born free, and the world would be his to rule. No one and nothing would bind him, except honor and glory and—she could hope—love for his kin, and most particularly his mother.

Epilogue

After so bitter a winter, spring that year was unusually beautiful. The air was soft, the rain fell lightly; the fields were full of flowers.

In Pella, every child who was born in that season both lived and thrived. Even poor witless Arrhidaios seemed to find a fragment of his former self. He learned to laugh again, and to walk, and even, as summer drew near, to fall into a stumbling run.

Summer was no gentler than it ever was in these mountains, but it brought victory for the king both in battle and in the games at Olympia. Philip was a happy man, and he brought that happiness into the portico where Myrtale spent her days, sitting by her as often as not and entertaining her with stories.

The witches' curse had died with them. The curse in men's minds was less inclined to wither away; rumors flew still, lies and distortions that would have plagued Myrtale if she had been in any frame of mind to care. Even the sight of her king looking after her with tender solicitude fed their malice. He was ensorcelled, they said; she had enslaved him to her will.

The time would come when she dealt with that. It barely dimmed these long bright days, this golden time of waiting for her son to be born. The heavier and more unwieldy she grew, the less she cared for anything but the child within her and his father beside her.

Timarete had gone back to Dodona after she rode the tide of their mingled magic to Pella, but at midsummer she appeared again, this time with an embassy from the king of Epiros. Arybbas had sent gifts to his niece and her royal husband, and tribute to the child who was to be born.

Myrtale was happier to see her aunt than she might have expected. Timarete was no different in words or actions; the battle at the shrine of the dead might never have happened at all—except for one thing.

Myrtale had some understanding now of what she was and why she did as she did. It was enough, just, to ease the tension between them, though Myrtale had not forgiven Timarete for a lifetime of ignorance. That might never come to pass, but it was no longer so strong as to poison every word they spoke to one another.

They could almost be friends. Myrtale would never in this world have expected that.

They had more in common than either of them liked to admit, Myrtale reflected one breathlessly hot morning. She had lain abed well past sunrise: it was difficult, these days, to shift her bulk. Nevertheless she did at length make her way to the portico in search of such relief from the heat as there might be.

There was a faint breeze wafting up from the lake, just enough to taunt her with promises. She lay on the couch that Philip had given her, that had come all the way from Persia. Its arms were carved in the shapes of fantastical beasts; she smoothed the curves of one elaborately arched neck and reflected on the ways in which even the most obstinate mortal creature could change.

Timarete was never so feeble as to succumb to heat. She looked as cool as she ever had, sitting upright on the bench that Philip tended to favor.

He was not there this morning, but Myrtale had no reason to fret. This time of day, he held court in the hall, hearing disputes and giving judgment. She could have gone to listen, if she had had any will to move.

The weight of air was heavy on her, even heavier than the heat. Only the Mother's snake and her own hatchling seemed in comfort. They basked in sunlight, stretched long and glistening across the pavement.

As her eyes rested on them, the hatchling stirred, slithering toward her couch. It was quite large now, almost as large as the Mother's snake—and that was no small creature. When it raised its head and half of its body, its unblinking eyes were level with the edge of the couch. It poured itself up over what was left of her lap, coiling against her side. She closed her eyes and sighed.

She lacked the will to move or speak, nor did Timarete break the silence. Each of them had said everything that could or should be said. Now they only had to wait and watch and hope, until the child was born.

What would happen then, how he would grow, what kind of man he could be—that was his to choose. Myrtale had refused to do it for him. He was free as every man is, to live the life the Mother had given him.

Her body was never in comfort these days, but she had expected that; she had learned to endure the aches, the heaviness, even the occasional sharp pain. This was a new kind of pain, and yet she recognized it from a deep well of memory.

She was not afraid. She never was, not of the great things. She spoke without opening her eyes. “It's time,” she said.

All the long slow months of waiting gathered into this moment. The languor of the summer morning erupted into a flurry, with her aunt marshaling troops as briskly as any general.

Myrtale's mind was at once clouded and clear. Her body seemed distant and rather alien, as if it belonged to someone else. She knew, equally distantly, that the alternation of all-encompassing pain and all too brief respite might seem to last as long as the rest of these nine months.

She had time enough and more to search out the roots of magic, to sink deep into the earth and to touch the sky. Dread had lingered in her that even yet there might be an assault against her or her son, but that truly was done. The only danger now would be his own self, his strong will and his proud spirit.

That would be a fair fight. It began here in the chamber to which Timarete saw her carried, where the midwives waited—an army of them, so many that Timarete dismissed them summarily, leaving only the most skilled. That one and a handful of deft and quiet servants waited out the hours, giving her what comfort they could.

He was eager to leap into the world—too eager. The pain blurred into a single long moment of agony. Voices babbled, feet ran swiftly, now swelling close, now fading away.

She could die. As long as he lived, she hardly cared. She would rule among the dead, then, where the Mother was still strong, and the world was not all given to the whims of men.

Odd that she should come round to that now, in the most female of all rites, for which every woman was made. Her son, her strong male child, tried to rip his way out of her. If he had had a sword, he would have cloven her in two.

She would not let that be an omen. She had magic still; she had the earth and the sky. They were all around her always.

She enfolded him in them. She soothed his vaunting eagerness; she taught him, not to be gentle, but to stop and think and consider how best to conquer—not always by force; sometimes by subtlety, too.

Twice she had brought down the sun. Now she brought its child into the world, a fiery spirit and a presence so strong it would yield to no mortal power.

It yielded to her. A great cry burst out of her, a cry more of triumph than of pain.

*   *   *

For all the weight of fear and hope and foresight that they had laid on him, he was as unprepossessing an object as any other newborn child. Myrtale looked down into the small, crumpled, crimson face and knew both cold clarity and a love so fierce, so strong, so all-consuming that it left her gasping.

She knew exactly what he was and would be. A man—with all the good and the ill that went with it. A king—of that she had no more doubt now than she had since he was conceived. An adversary, maybe, as he grew in his own way and with his own will.

Philip's shadow fell across her. He recoiled even as he bent to peer at his son, startled by the snake that nestled between the child and his mother. Then he caught himself; his breath hissed, but he bent again, lifted the swaddled bundle from her arms and held it up.

“His name is Alexander,” Myrtale said.

She braced for resistance—after all, he would be expecting to name the child himself—but although he paused to consider the name, no frown darkened his brow. He nodded. “Alexander,” he said.

He should go, take their child away and acknowledge him before the people, but he lingered. He had never been eager to leave her—nor, if she had her way, would he ever be.

He bent and set a kiss on her forehead. “You,” he said, “deserve a new name yourself. Lady of power, lady of victories, I name you Olympias: for you ran your own great race, and brought home the crown.”

She took time to consider that, as he had considered the name she gave his son. It was not a long moment, though maybe long enough for his patience. In it she felt her old name falling away, casting off her former self as a snake would shed its skin.

“Yes,” she said at last. “Yes, I am that, both lady and queen. I am Olympias.”

About the Author

Judith Tarr
is the author of more than twenty widely praised novels, including
The Throne of Isis, White Mare's Daughter,
and
Queen of Swords,
as well as five previous volumes in the Avaryan Chronicles:
The Hall of the Mountain King, The Lady of Han-Gilen and A Fall of Princes
(collected in one volume as Avaryan Rising),
Arrows of the Sun,
and
Spear of Heaven.
A graduate of Yale and Cambridge University,
Judith Tarr
holds degrees in ancient and medieval history, and breeds Lipizzan horses at Dancing Horse Farm, her home in Vail, Arizona. You can sign up for email updates
here
.

HISTORICAL NOVELS BY
JUDITH TARR

Lord of the Two Lands

Throne of Isis

The Eagle's Daughter

Pillar of Fire

King and Goddess

Queen of Swords

OTHER NOVELS BY
JUDITH TARR

The Hound and the Falcon

Queen of the Amazons

Bring Down the Sun

White Mare's Daughter

The Shepherd Kings

Lady of Horses

Daughter of Lir

Tides of Darkness

Avaryan Resplendent

Avaryan Rising

 

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Contents

Title Page

Copyright Notice

Dedication

Part I: Polyxena

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Part II: Myrtale

Ten

Eleven

Twelve

Thirteen

Fourteen

Fifteen

Sixteen

Seventeen

Eighteen

Part III: Olympias

Nineteen

Twenty

Twenty-one

Twenty-two

Twenty-three

Twenty-four

Twenty-five

Twenty-six

Epilogue

About the Author