Hero for Hire (28 page)

When morning came, the city awoke. The announcement from the palace that the Hunt had been canceled due to the sudden passing of Queen Zosime caused little grumbling. Troezen seemed ashamed of itself. The sudden reappearance of Princess Kissos and the abdication of King Pavlos brought new smiles to a lot of faces and the number of magistrates, guards, and professional witnesses that absconded from the city shortly afterwards lightened many hearts.

Business was up and running again by noon. I confess I took advantage of some lingering headaches when I auctioned off all the goods, hidden and open, that Jori had on the
Chelidion
.

With the backing of Queen Kissos behind me, no one complained even when I sold embargoed goods from cities associated with Troy. Actually, those goods went for the highest prices as it had been so long since any had been seen there.

Kissos was a good sport. She made no overt overtures yet every word she said and every gesture of her elegant hands made clear just what I was rejecting.

After sounding every board and measuring every corner of the
Chelidion
to be sure I’d missed nothing I could sell, I took her out alone beyond the mouth of the bay. I climbed the mast, out of the smell of the pitch I’d spread around, a torch in my hand. I balanced on one foot on the crossbeam, the ship as gentle under me as an old horse.

“Hades!” I called at the top of my voice. They probably could hear me on shore. “Hades! This ship is for Jori the Phoenician, who languishes in Tartaros. If you cannot let him go to Elysium, let him sail the eternal seas in her!”

With that, I dropped the torch. It fell, end over end, landing on the pile of shredded rope I’d laid there. For a moment, I thought it had gone out, a sign that the Lord of the Underworld refused my demand. Then the flames spread out like vines seeking light, blossoming swiftly with crimson flowers.

I dove into the water just as the
Chelidion
exploded. There must have been one hold of twice-distilled liquor or turpentine that I’d missed. I headed deep as the sea above me turned to molten gold.

I came ashore at a deserted cove as the sun touched the clouds with pink and red. Shaking myself all over like a wet dog, I hopped first on one foot and then the other, clearing the water from my ears. A linen towel hit me in the face.

A short man, muffled in a cloak, stood a little way off. ‘Short’ wasn’t quite the right word. If his legs had been straight, he would have been as tall and broad as I am. His reddish beard was singed at the edges.

“A nice gesture,” Hephaestus said, pointing one of the sticks he leaned on toward the black plume of smoke still rising into the sky.

“Will it work?”

“Probably. They are very fond of grand dramatic gestures, my family. Especially my wife.”

“But not you?”

“I have too much work to do, magic armor, mechanical owls, and Talos, my man of Bronze, is always breaking down. It’s the knees, mostly. Speaking of work, may I see your sword?”

I handed it over. He tut-tutted over the seawater on the blade, blowing the drops off with a powerful breath. “This dispatched some shades, if what I hear is true.”

“And cut Kronos.”

“Indeed.” He lightly flicked the edge and nodded thoughtfully as he stuck the wounded finger into his mouth. “It is good workmanship. Where did you come by it?”

I told him while the shadows deepened. By his nature, Hephaestus was always more interested in objects of craft than in people so I kept it brief.

“So you think it might have belonged to the one who fathered you.” He held up his hand. “Don’t bother telling me he was just a simple shepherd. Your recent activities may have left you wondering if we Gods are all we are cracked up to be but about some things we do not err.”

“I have no quarrel with the Gods. But I have questions. Why didn't the Waters of Lethe work on me? Hekate said...and Kronos said....”

“Don't ask me,” he commanded, but then he smiled, a sad, twisted smile. “These are things you must learn on your own, Eno. You are well on your way, if the answers are indeed what you desire.”

“But....”

“My wife is very fond of you. She says you make her feel quite maternal.” He chuckled at my expression. Smiles sat oddly on his austere face. “Not what you wanted to hear, perhaps? Take it and be glad. It’s much safer to have her as a mother than as...anything else. Even as a wife.”

“She's the most powerful goddess of them all, isn't she? Hekate was wrong to think the prophecy referred to herself.”

“All of us, even the Father of the Gods, bow to her whims, that is true. But she is seldom as whimsical as she would like us to think.”

Seeing he meant to keep his counsel, I changed the subject. “What became of Hekate?”

“She is banished to the same fate as my grandfather, Kronos. Though he is banished for all eternity and my father has decreed that she need only serve three thousand years. She has taken her poisons and her ‘treats’ with her. I will miss those evil crunchy cheese bits, even if my wife objected to my eating them. They were the key to keeping us docile. Zeus has sent them into nothingness as well. Beware if you meet with them again!”

“What will happen now in Troy?” I asked.

“We will meddle. That’s what we do best.” He drew his cloak around him as if feeling a chill. His voice came out of the darkness. “Your sword comes from the East. Seek there.”

I was alone.

* * *

Phandros sat on the bottommost step of the Palace’s entrance, Griffin on a string beside him, pouncing on the pebbles his master tossed. “I told Her Highness that you weren’t likely to be caught in the explosion. Are you going to marry that girl?”

“No.”

“Too bad. She’s very pleasant.”

He fell into step beside me as we went inside. “I’m going to get married myself.”

“This is sudden,” I said. Had someone slipped him a love philter? “To who? Some girl from Leros?”

“Oh, I haven’t met her yet. I’ll work for Skander 'til I have a nest-egg saved up. Then I’ll marry a poor girl from a large family...or a large girl from a poor family.” He stopped Griffin from lifting his leg on a statue. “Then we’ll all move to Telemenos and settle it. I liked that island.”

“What about the ghosts and the monsters?”
“If they trouble us, we’ll call on our old family friend, Eno, to dispatch them for us.”

“I’ll do it. No charge.”

We left Troezen on the morning tide. The captain actually smiled as the last rope was coiled.

There’d been no time for a private good-bye to Kissos. She was already surrounded by those who wanted ‘just a moment’ and those jostling for a ‘single word’. So she handed me a large bonus with some formal words about my service and the lasting friendship of the House of Troezen. By neither sign nor inflection, did either of us make reference to her visiting me in the night. She’d wept and pleaded but that was not good for a queen to remember.

I’d wept a little myself but I don’t mind remembering.

I never did tell Phandros all that had happened. There would have been time, perhaps, if he’d asked. But Griffin had learned to fly before we’d been out of port a day and he kept both Phandros and me, as well as a good portion of the crew, dodging air-borne puppy teeth. He found it great fun to swoop down unexpectedly and nibble ears. Flying puppy poo was a whole other kind of menace.

Skander gave us the reception of a lifetime...or as it is known in his house, Sunday. He agreed to send the money I’d made from the
Chelidion
’s cargo to Jori’s mother in Tyre. I gave him all the information about her that I could recall.

“I have a ship leaving for Tyre in two days. I shall send Charillos and Phandros the Younger. The trip will do them good. But where are you going, my friend?”

“I return to Athens, to pay my debts and deposit funds. Then I must visit my mother in Thrace.”

“You always have a passage on one of my ships. I will write you a letter, good anywhere.”

“You’re the soul of generosity, Skander. By the way, thank you for the job offer. I....”

“Oh, I know, I know. Independence! A free hand! All well and good while you are young. But when the mighty arm grows stiff and the monsters get too large, come and tell me you’ve changed your mind, eh? Or even sooner? There are some interesting and rather frightening rumors coming out of the East. If true, they’ll affect trade. I need someone to go and investigate what is happening out there.”

“The East?” I asked, remembering Hephaestus' words.

“Aye. Egypt. Well, think it over. Think it over!”

My landlord was glad to see me. I was behind on the rent. A scoop from the bag that held Kissos’ generous reward widened his eyes. He sent up the better wine with my evening meal. He also sent up a message that had been left with him some weeks earlier. I thought I recognized the handwriting so laid it aside until after supper. I didn’t want to ruin my appetite.

Minthe’s father wrote to say that, upon further thought, he decided my profession made me too great a risk for his precious flower. She’d been married the week before to one of her other, more boring suitors. I laid the letter aside and laughed until my stomach burned. So much for all my faithfulness and virtue.

I had taken my meal on the roof. The sounds of the street and the city, familiar to me as a lullaby, floated up to me there. I set my chair so I could rest my feet on the coping. Beyond them, I could see the brightest star in all the heavens, a wanderer that, for the moment, hung low in the twilight-shaded sky. It is named Aphrodite.

Read on for an excerpt from Book Two in the Eno the Thracian series by C. B. Pratt, available September 2013.

After the third week of a one-week cruise, the sea had lost its sparkle.

I stood atop the mast, feet braced on the cross-bar. The Idyia wasn't the largest ship afloat and, sailing alone in the midst of a watery desert, she seemed even smaller. The mast transcribed circles with the motion of the sea below me. As I spun slowly, I surveyed empty sky and empty sea.

From time to time, I caught sight of the deck, crowded by the crew, muttering, clutching staves, knives and axes. Some few clutched their heads, taking no further interest in me. Considering that the water ration had been cut the week before so that there was no more for washing, I was just as glad to be up where the air was fresh, even if they hadn't been trying to kill me.

By the second week of our one-week cruise, their camaraderie had begun to fracture. One or two had determined that the voyage had somehow incurred the wrath of some Sea spirit or other and, in time-honored fashion, had looked about for a scapegoat. As usual, they'd picked on the only stranger on board -- me.

When the water ration had been cut the first time, they'd found ears willing to listen to their theory.

Today, with their captain face-down drunk on the deck, the knives had come out. It was climb or swim. I was secure enough for the moment, though I couldn't be sure that they were sane enough to refrain from chopping down the mast.

"Come down, Thracian!" The first mate, Nacrolos, had joined with the crew rather than be tossed overboard himself. A burly-chested man, he had a voice like the roaring of a lion, easily heard over winds and storms.

"You should see this view," I called back.

"We won't hurt you, if you come down."

True, that. Nobody wanted to anger a sea spirit or god further by spilling blood on the deck. They'd agreed that be best thing to do was to throw me overboard and leave my fate in the hands of the Fates. Those three alone knew whether my thread of life foretold my death on this day or another. If I drowned, my blood would not be on the crews' hands as it was evidently my lot in life since before my birth. I had objected for several reasons, not least among them was that drowning was no death for a fighting man.

The sun was a blurred white dot in the height of a pale sky. The sea dazzled with a thousand glittering shards until eye and mind alike were wearied. But beyond all that, I thought I glimpsed something else. I gripped the mast tight between my knees, to bring up a hand to shade my eyes, straining to bring what I saw into focus.

"You can't stay up there forever," Nacrolos said, adding to the others, "Thirst'll bring him down soon enough."

"I'm serious," I shouted back. "You should see this view. Send somebody up here."

After a certain amount of bickering and shoving, Nacrolos himself started up, climbing like a monkey or a sailor bred to the sea. Certainly better than I could do.

Clinging to the mast, braced against me for balance, he snarled, "What game are you playing, Thracian?"

He wasn't as tall as me, so at first he couldn't see it. Then I got a hold of his broad leather belt and hoisted him up, raising him with one arm above my head. He gasped, scratching and beating at my hand like a fool. The crew below cried out, thinking I meant to dash him down.

Then I felt right through his belly the start he gave right as his wildly rolling eye caught sight of what I'd brought him up here to witness, a thing that haunted the nightmares of sailors since the dawn of time. "Do you see it? Do you?"

"By the mother of the Gods...."

"Gods or not, that's the mother of all whirlpools," I said, lowering him 'til I could look him in the eyes. He'd gone green under his walnut-colored tan. "And we've been riding the rim for days, I'd wager."

"Aye. What's to be done?"

"We start by not throwing me to the waves."

"Of course not," he said, mindful perhaps that I had plenty of strength left. "Let's call that a joke, eh?"

"Let's call it a bloody stupid idea. The only thing keeping us riding the edge of this whirlpool is that somehow -- by the luck of Heaven -- our weight is neither too much nor too little. Throwing a weight like me overboard would change that by enough and then you'd really know what a curse is."

Nacrolos wasn't a fool when his thoughts weren't clouded by fear of the unknown. As we climbed down, he was already planning our escape. He thrust a meaty fist into the jaw of the first crewman who charged at me. Even as the poor fellow went down like a felled ox, Nacrolos shouted orders. "We man the oars, boys. And row, damn your eyes, as you've never rowed before."

They cut extra holes in the hull, carefully husbanding the wood to make extra oars. Though the crew continued to throw suspicious glances at me, having something tangible to do gave them heart to work with a will. They'd make a port for every man, saving no one for a second shift.

Pausing a moment in his work, Nacrolos took me aside. "I'm uneasy about this. If it goes wrong, we've had it."

"We've got to do something. Can't just keep sailing in a big circle 'til we die of thirst."

"I wish the captain were awake. He's a clever man; I'm just an old salt."

"At least you're still on your feet." I clapped him on the shoulder. "We'll be all right. I'll get back up there and tell you which way to steer."

"If there were only two of you...I'll need your strength at the oars as well."

In the end, we sent two men up the mast, one to sit on the other's shoulders so he could see the dark, swirling pit of water on the very edge of the horizon. We dared not steer for even one instant in that direction. As soon as we were broken free of the current that carried us endlessly around, we might meet any kind of wild water. If we were unlucky, we'd be swept down into a crushing oblivion of roaring sea and splintered wood.

I did not speak my fears to Nacrolos. There are two things in this world that cause a whirlpool. One is an influx of mixing waters. The other is a monster. We were far from the narrow strait haunted by Charybdis the Vast but there were other creatures almost equal to her brutality.

Of course, monsters make up a good deal of my business. My sign in the Athenian acropolis says it all really.
Hero for Hire. All monsters dispatched from carnivorous geese to Minotaurs. Special rates for multiples. Eno the Thracian at the sign of the Ram’s Head, one flight up.

But this brief journey from Athens to Kalithanos wasn't supposed to be for business. I'd taken down my sign and told my landlord to send any clients to Kyex, a nice fellow and a good fighter. If they didn't want to see him, they'd have to wait until I got back from visiting my mother.

Frankly, I'd rather face a hydra with a head-cold.

Not because she was so formidable - though she could fell an ox with one glance - but because the questions I had for her could easily be interpreted as insulting. Just how did one go about asking a decent woman whether she'd made a slight mistake and passed her infant son off on her husband, knowing he was not the father? Even my extra time on the Idyia hadn't given me an answer to that.

An hour into our labor, the captain woke up, staggered to the side and vomited like a volcano. Straightening up, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. Nacrolos started toward him to explain what we were doing. Before he reached him, though, the captain spewed again.

There's nothing more eye-catching than a man being deeply and thoroughly sick, as much as we might feel our own throat burn with a sympathetic gagging. Everyone watched him for a brief space of silence, then we all felt the change in the ship. A deep lurch as the ship, lightened by just so much, changed position toward portside, where the vortex awaited. "What in Hades' name was that?" Captain Eosphorous demanded.

Nacrolos explained urgently. The captain rubbed his no-doubt aching head as he tried to understand. "So what you're saying is...I should try to hurl on the deck?"

The lookout shouted down that we'd changed position and not for the better. The sailors redoubled their efforts, driven harder by their new fears than by their hope of escape. One by one, the thudding of axes ended as the sailors stood by at their ports, little more than a row of holes in the fabric of the ship. Captain Eosphorous, pale and sweating but in command, took his position where all could see him. He raised the padded drumsticks above an empty barrel laid on its side and gave the beat for the rowing.

The beat was low and urgent. We threw ourselves on the oars, driven by that thrumming which seemed less in the ear and more from someplace inside that warned us to 'hurry, hurry, or you'll be caught!'

At first, it went well. We broke from the current that had held us in place for so long. Two or three men raised a ragged cheer when word came from the lookouts that we seemed to be putting more distance between us and that swirling mouth of doom on the horizon.

The muscles stood up on our arms and backs like armor-plate as we strained to force the Idyia onward. Some men gasped for breath while others groaned with each pull. Their hands, sea-hardened though they were, began to run with blood, the red trickling over their bodies as they leaned back with the stroke, but not a man faltered. Even the two ship's boys, sharing an oar, fought with every bit of their power against the sea.

One of the lookouts came down to tell the captain, face to face, that they were losing. The whirlpool was nearer, close enough to be seen to port without even raising on tip-toe. We were wasting our time and our strength to no purpose.

I shipped my oar. Ignoring the inquiring cries of my shipmates, I went forward. Nacrolos followed me. "What are you doing?"

"Tie a loop in this rope for me," I said, pushing the coil into his hands. "I like to travel by ship, but I have no idea how they work."

"D'ye mean to hang yourself?" He tied a loop like a noose and held it out.

"Make it bigger, man. I'm no bean-pole."

I stepped up into the bow. The Idyia was a newer vessel and lacked the high prow of the old ones. The front end extended farther from the ship and still bore the traditional 'living' eyes on either side. I could only hope that she would watch over me as I tried to save her life.

"Tie each end to those bits over there."

"Very well," Nacrolos said, his eyes busy with questions.

When I slipped the loop over my head and around my chest, the excess rope coiling on the deck beside me, he tried to stop me as one confirmed in his estimate of my mental health. "It's suicide, Thracian. Come back to the oars where your strength is useful. With you, we might succeed. But if you do this, you condemn us all to die."

"It's in the hands of the Fates, don't you think?"

"Gods! Is this your vengeance?"

I shook my head. "Shout to tell me which way to go," I said and clapped him on the shoulder.

I dove over the prow, swimming fast to get ahead of the ship. The ropes grew taut as I found the proper distance. Then I began to plow through the water, throwing my arms forward without stinting while I kicked like a dolphin. With every stroke, I prayed as hard as ever I had in my life. To Poseidon, to Amphitrite, to Tethys, to every god, goddess or Titan who'd ever so much as admired a seashell. "Let there be no monster, let me be strong enough, let this damn well work."

Above the roaring in my ears and the splash of my efforts, I heard Nacrolos bellow that I should turn to starboard. "Not too much!"

I tried to make myself as mindless as a sail, as biddable as a rudder. I emptied myself of thought, aware only of the harsh voice crying instructions.

They told me later that there'd been a solid wall of water forever circling the whirlpool, that we broke through it as though it were made of glass. But don't believe it. We passed through no such wall on the way in. Legends grow like that, though. One day, no doubt, I'll hear the tale told and won't recognize myself at all.