Hero for Hire (7 page)

Add in the paperwork, receipts, sub-contracting for big jobs, and funeral expenses when said sub-contractor failed to duck, and a lot of freelance heroes go back to a third-shift night watch at the local acropolis just to make it easier on themselves.

So when business had picked up, I figured that, between the war in Troy and the accounting hassles, I was just getting the overflow. Now I wondered if there wasn’t more business because more dark forces were stirring. If that was true, did Nausicaa’s last words explain why? How far did this nightmare reach?

I found myself scanning the sky for the harpy, not in any fearful way, but just because I wanted to see her -- it -- again. I wondered if it would burn across the sky like a comet, pale against the sunlight, but a portent of evil days to come.

Rather than a bath, which would only make more work for the disorganized household, I asked Iole for some hot water to be brought out to the stables. Of course, life being what it is, Iole didn’t bring it herself. Nor could she spare any of the young and active maids.

The crone brought it, her thin shoulders bowing under the weight as she shuffled forward. But she shooed me away with hissing noises when I tried to take the buckets.

She perched on the end of the horse trough. Muffled in dusty black draperies, she looked like a molting crow with eyes just as black, shiny and inquisitive. Black bands bound brow and chin, white hairs sprouting from both. She rocked a little on her uneven perch and screeched, “Go on, go on! You have nothing I haven’t seen before. I’ve buried three husbands and have another one on the string any time I say the word!”

“The men of Leros are valiant,” I muttered. Well, if she didn’t care, neither should I. The men of Athens often walked through the streets wearing little besides their short capes. It was times like these that reminded me that I remain just a country lad at heart.

I stripped and upturned one bucket over my head. The soap was scorchingly strong, pumice and lye mixed with goat’s fat. Some hopeful soul had added verbena flowers but they had long-lost the battle to overcome the goat smell. It worked though. I felt I’d added significantly to the local topsoil and seemed at least two shades less tan when I was done.

I rinsed while the crone cackled. “A well-set up fellow indeed. Brave too, I hear. Fighting the dead...and other things.”

Hearing some undertone in her voice, I cast her a sidelong glance. One of her eyes was buried in puffy flesh, the other surrounded by a web of wrinkles. I decided she wasn’t actually screwing up her face in a leering wink but that this was her usual appearance.

Every case, it seems, must contain at least one cryptic crone. I'll teach a whole class on them in my school someday. What is so frustrating is that they never come right out and say what they mean. I suppose once you are old, with all your intense emotions behind you, you have to find your fun where you can.

They want careful handling, the crones. Show your impatience or try to awe them with your authority and they'll tell you nothing, or worse than nothing. They seem to enjoy sending busy men on wild goose chases. Be especially cautious if they start calling you 'dearie' or complaining about their feet. It's like the warning rattle of a snake. It means trouble.

While pondering the right approach for this ancient creature, I picked up my discarded clothes.

I sniffed gingerly at the sweat-stained crumpled pieces and decided that they’d do for another day or so. Doing battle in the nude has never been my choice. I had no reason to assume today would not end in a fight. It would be pleasant to get to grips with something reliably human for a change.

The crone cackled again, less like a mocking crow, more like a setting hen. “Men,” she said, in a tone of indescribable knowingness.

After fumbling in the depths of her robe, she drew out an oblong length of crisp white fabric and, from her sleeve, a tunic actually long and wide enough for me. They were so white, especially in comparison to the others I’d worn since leaving Athens, that they seemed to sparkle as they passed from her hands to mine.

“Now you are dressed as befits the emissary of our new king.”

“Thank you, good mother.”

She snorted wetly and spat. “Call me
Doris
.”

“
Doris
?” It was the name of mother of many sea-nymphs, lithe, beautiful, and full of joy. Everything she wasn't.

“Aye. I was nurse to the late king and favorite handmaiden to his mother. My own children are scattered to the four winds.”

“That must grieve you.”

She shrugged or perhaps she merely hitched at her robe. “They are good children and follow their paths. I even have a son and grandson fighting now in Troy for good King Priam.”

“Good luck to him,” I said, and spat.

“Aye.” She spat again. “You try to help the young ones but they don’t listen, think they know it all.”
“I’ll listen.”

She peered at me, plucking at one of the long hairs that grew from her chin. It came out and she flicked it away. “Will you, dearie? You want to know about last night? About the temple?”

“Whatever you want to tell me.” I smiled down on her, trying to imagine that I had nothing better to do than listen to the meandering tales of the old ones.

She impatiently motioned me closer. “That Nausicaa was bad clear through, like an apple with a canker. I would have watched over the boy but she never let me near him. Still, she couldn’t do much with him while I was always on the watch. So she turned her wicked ways upon the king, made him kill himself.”

“What ‘wicked ways’?”

“Telling him things men shouldn’t know. Divulged the Mysteries, got him hooked like a fat eel, and then drew him ever deeper in. Why did he buy a lock for his door and only she had the other key? What rites did they perform during the black of the moon? I could say more, but I will not corrupt your heart.”

Having seen the remains of the king, I didn’t really want to hear more. “What were they trying to do?”

“She told him he could bring back his wife, with certain rites. But whether those were the rites she taught him...ah, that's another question, isn't it?”

“At least Nausicaa is dead now.”

She laid her hand on my arm. I expected it to be hot but it was as cool as the clean cloth laid on a fevered man’s brow. “Did you kill her, Thracian?”

“No, one of the Dead did for her. One of the priestesses.”

“They were good women. Their service will not be forgotten. Others will come to rededicate the temple.” Her voice was fainter, as though she were speaking to herself or to someone I could not see. “All must pray to the Fearful Goddess that no harm will come to Leros itself through being used in such a way.”

“I’m sure Artemis will protect her people.”

“Artemis? She'll do her best, I'm sure. We shall see. But I am glad you are not guilty of any crimes.”

“Thank you, mother. Why did the king kill himself?”

“What else could he do? How else could he turn the spell back on she who sent it?”

“What spell?”

“He cast her out, didn't he?"

"Did he?"

"Aye. He repented all they’d done, all the terrible things. They made the women miscarry and the crops wither. They made the sky turn green and the spring dry up.” The cackle had come back.

“Temas didn’t tell me his father had dismissed Nausicaa.”

“How could he know? He was down by the pier. And that foolish tutor was drunk in the tavern. But I...we of the household...we know all that happened.”

“She was here when I came. She was running the household.”

“We saw him thrust her down the stairs so that it’s a wonder she didn’t break her neck, and more’s the pity that she didn’t. But he gave no orders to the rest of us and who was brave enough to tell her she must go after the king died? She could shrivel a woman’s womb or rot a penis off with a look.”

“Mine’s all right,” I couldn’t help saying and I thought she was going to choke with laughter.

“So I saw....”

I felt relieved. Whatever the late king and housekeeper had summoned from the dark pits of Hades had been dispatched. Perhaps the king’s sacrifice had made it easier for me, the way the mother’s embrace of her dead child had eased my task last night. Everything would return to normal, I hoped, not just on this one island but throughout Hellas. Less business for me, maybe, but somehow I didn't mind.

“What do you know about this Eurytos fellow?”

Her hand slipped from my forearm. “A paltry blowhard, one would say, and yet I have felt some stronger force within him. Perhaps the same force that moved Nausicaa. Perhaps another. Not even the Gods know everything, let alone one old woman." She coughed juicily, pressing her hand to her thin breast. "Be wary of him.”

“I will, never fear. Tell me one thing more, good mother."

"Aye?"

"What Gods does this Eurytos worship?"

That was one of the side benefits to having a Pantheon. You could tell a lot about a man from the temples he frequented or never visited.

She shrugged again. "None, perhaps. Or all. The snake, the hyena, the lion...he kept a talisman of each one, the deadliest and the most cowardly. No woman would go near him with that claw of his and he never bent his knee to any goddess."
Doris
straightened her back. "Oh, me poor old bones," she said. "No rest for us women-folk, not even today."

I bent my arm and offered it to her. She laughed and slapped my wrist. "You're a gallant fool, Thracian. Go carefully as you well know how to do and may the blessings of an old woman go with you."

* * *

As we’d discussed, Temas and I went down to the ruined dock. I still tried to reassure him that leaving wouldn't be necessary. But he wanted to have an escape plan in reserve which made a certain amount of sense. This Eurytos fellow might prove tricky.

Some shutters were open in the town and a few goods were exposed for sale. People were still spooked, though. If so much as a gull flew over, they’d crouch down, making themselves small and unappetizing. Some drew courage enough from the presence of their young king to come out to greet him. I got mostly sideways glances and crooked fingers held to brows to ward off the Evil Eye.

A few strong pulls of the oars on a borrowed dinghy and King Temas and I were stepping aboard the
Chelidion
to a graceful welcome from Jori. He claimed to have done nothing but fished and lazed about since I’d left. “A most pleasant anchorage,” he said, bowing to the king.

“You’ve heard nothing strange?” Temas asked.

“Strange noises? None, lord. Should we have noticed something?”

Temas glanced at me. I shook my head and went forward to inspect the cage. It looked just the same. I kicked the cook forward with a few delicacies for refreshment.

As I thought, Jori was perfectly willing to take on as many passengers as Temas’ treasury would permit even if it meant stacking them like cordwood in the hold.

Then he said something that surprised the moussaka out of me. “This ship, my fleet little Swallow, will take you wherever you wish, lord, but I see no need for you to be alarmed into thus fleeing. You cannot do better than to trust my old friend Eno, here. He will not fail you.”

“How much money do you want to borrow?” I asked.

Jori laughed, as did the king after an uncertain moment. “No, indeed. You have arranged many such troubles, have you not? What I have not seen with my own eyes, I have heard with these ears. The tales they tell in the marketplace of Athens alone, lord, would entrance a sorceress. Have faith in Eno. I do.”

Temas eagerly voiced his agreement and reiterated it when I took him back to shore. I thanked him, refusing his hesitant yet gallant offer to go with me to deal with Eurytos. I set off, waving to him as I entered the woods.

Jori’s vote of confidence should have lightened my heart as I walked over the stony spine of the island. Instead, I was so puzzled I hardly noticed which way I went. Jori was never one to ladle praise over someone like a cook basting tough mutton with oil. About the only answer I could find was the outside chance that he’d suffered some kind of prophetic dream in the night and had been thus convinced of my invincibility. I wished such a dream had come to me, though all too often such things are more a snare than a promise.

As I started down between some large boulders toward the far side of the island, I became more alert. None too soon, either.

Though lost in thought, I had heard the calling of small birds, the rustling of this creature and that through the grasses, the skittering of lizards, and always, flowing through and around all other sounds, the rasping of the cicadas in every tree. From time to time, I heard the far-off lowing of a sheep, though I couldn't see where they rested in the shade. All the usual sounds of the beautiful, peaceful Attic countryside sleeping under the beating heat of the noonday sun.

So when I distinctly heard the hoot of an owl, echoed immediately by another a little farther away down the hill, my ears pricked like a hungry dog’s.

Of course, I whispered a fast prayer to Athena, the All-Seeing, whose herald and avatar is the owl, just on the off-chance she was putting in an appearance. The Gods are often nearer to us than we knew, or so the priests say.

More likely, however, was that Eurytos, trained in Cadmus’ service, still used the owl’s hoot as a signal between sentries. As much as anything, it had been the incessant hooting that drove me away from that army. Ghost owls, tawny owls, scoops, every soldier was sure that he and he alone could imitate the birds better than anyone else. As an officer, I’d had to referee more ‘my sleepy owl at the first touch of Rosy-Fingered Dawn is better than yours’ arguments than I cared to remember.

I walked on more slowly, letting anyone who wished to have a good look at me. When you are built like the lighthouse at Rhodes, this is often a useful technique. No doubt their suppliers had delivered to the rebel guards all the gossip along with their fish. It is natural to discount such tales by half, but I fancied I live up to even exaggerated reports. I paused for a moment where the sun shone strongly and pretended to yawn and stretch, letting the spread of my muscles ripple and gleam.