Odysseus in the Serpent Maze (2 page)

Mentor’s mouth went even drier, if that was possible. “Me?”

“Just stand up and wave your arms. Till the boar sees you.”

“Me?” Now his mouth felt like it was stuffed with Egyptian cotton.

“Stop worrying,” Odysseus said. “Boars have notoriously bad eyesight.”

“I’m sure that’s a great comfort.”

Odysseus sighed and shifted his weight. He put his left hand around his right wrist to help hold the weight of the spear. “Really—there’s nothing to worry about, Mentor.”

“I hate it when you say that.”

The big black boar had trotted over to another patch of brush and was now ripping it up and grunting with pleasure.

“Look,” Odysseus whispered, “I’ll be hidden right here in front of you. As soon as the boar comes close, I’ll jump up and spear him. Just like my father did when he and the other heroes slew the great boar of Calydon.”

“I thought the great boar of Calydon killed or maimed half of the men in the hunt before anyone slew him,” Mentor said.

“Do you want to be a hero or not?” asked Odysseus.

“Right now,” Mentor said carefully, trying not to let the hand holding the sewing-needle javelin shake too much, “I’m not sure.”

Odysseus sighed. “If we go back with no prize to show, we’re going to look like fools. Or worse. Like
cowards
!”

“We’ll only look like boys, Odysseus. Which we are.” Mentor knew the argument was already lost. There was no greater disgrace for an Achaean warrior than to be thought a coward—man or boy. He stood slowly and waved his hands. “This is a really bad idea.”

The black boar ignored him and continued rooting in the briars.

Mentor waved his hands more vigorously.

“Don’t you feel like a hero now?” Odysseus asked.

“I feel like a fool,” Mentor answered flatly. “I just don’t want to feel like a
dead
fool. How fast do you suppose that boar can run between its bit of brush and ours?”

“Not so fast that I can’t get my spear into it,” said Odysseus. He was holding the spear with both hands now. “Shout, Mentor! Let it know you’re over here.”

“Hoi! Widow maker! Over this way,” Mentor cried.

The black boar paused in its egg hunt and looked up. Its small piggy eyes searched out the source of the sound. Swinging its massive head back and forth, it finally focused directly on Mentor.

“Again,” Odysseus whispered. “You’ve got his attention now.”

Mentor’s lips felt more padded than his leggings. He couldn’t make another sound. The boar was now heading towards their thicket at a lope.

“Is it coming?” Odysseus whispered.

All Mentor could manage was a grunt, much like the boar’s.

Slowly Odysseus stood, peering over the bush. He could feel the boar’s hooves drumming on the earth. Then he saw it.

“What a monster!” he cried appreciatively.

Behind him Mentor was silent.

“I’m ready,” Odysseus cried. “Hold your ground, Mentor. Keep him coming.”

“I don’t …” Mentor managed to croak, “don’t think I could stop it if I tried.”

The boar was now only a few yards away. Its tusks seemed gigantic and sharp and curved and deadly.

Finally upright, Odysseus braced the long spear against his body, the bronze point aimed at the boar’s heart.

The boar lowered its head for the attack, grunted twice, and then ploughed into the brush.

Bronze spearhead met bristly hide right above the breastbone, lodging there for a moment before the wooden spear shaft snapped in two. The broken stump of the weapon dropped from Odysseus’ numbed hands.

“
Oooof
!” he grunted.

Mentor shrieked, “Odysseus, no!”

Odysseus twisted away from the boar’s continuing charge, but a second too late. One of the tusks scored a ragged gash down his right thigh. Like lightning, pain flashed along his leg. He fell back against Mentor, biting back a scream.

The boar ran on past them, further into the brush.

“Odysseus—are you alive?” Mentor cried.

“Get … your … javelin.” Odysseus’ face was screwed in pain.

Only then did Mentor realise that he had dropped the thing. He bent to pick it up and when he stood again, he saw that the boar had broken through the other side of the thicket and was making a large circle back towards them, snorting with rage.

“One … good … throw …” said Odysseus, carefully speaking through his pain. “That’s … all … you … need.”

Mentor licked his dry lips and hefted the javelin in his right hand. He had thrown in competition with other boys, had hunted small game, but how could he hope to stop this great beast with what was really no more than a toy?

“Look … in … eye…” Odysseus said.

Mentor could hardly breathe. He kept his own eye fixed on the boar. His heart seemed to be pounding in time with the boar’s hoofbeats.

And then—as the beast came within striking range—Mentor felt his own breath stop. His arm seemed to drive forward by itself, sending the javelin flying. The javelin wobbled a bit in its flight, and the sound it made was a strange
whoosh
.

Then everything went dark.

Eyes closed, Mentor waited for the boar to rip him to shreds.

“You … did … it!” Odysseus was hitting him on the leg.

Mentor opened his eyes. The boar was speeding away from them, the javelin trailing from its flank.

“But I didn’t
kill
it,” Mentor said miserably. “All I did was make it madder.” He paused. “And lost us our only weapon.”

“Real … weapon … here,” said Odysseus, touching a finger to his head. “Help … me … up!”

“You can’t run on that leg,” Mentor said.

“Not … run,” Odysseus told him. “Roll.” He pointed behind them to the steep slope.

Glancing nervously over at the boar, which had now managed to shake the small javelin loose, Mentor whispered, “Are you crazy, Odysseus? That slope’s a hundred feet down if it’s a—”

“Take … hold.” Without waiting for an answer, Odysseus grabbed Mentor’s arm and hauled himself to his feet.

Mentor wheeled Odysseus around, and they headed back the way they had come. They ploughed through the tangled thicket towards the edge of the slope while the boar was still making up its mind whether to charge again. Mentor half carried, half dragged Odysseus, who hobbled as best he could.

“Faster …” Odysseus said, gasping with pain.

Behind them they could hear the boar bellowing as it started to charge again.

“Faster …”

“I’m going as fast as I can,” Mentor said through clenched teeth.

“Talking … to … myself,” Odysseus said. “Not … you.” He took a deep breath and said in a rush, “Better leave me. Only slowing you down.”

“Heroes together or not at all,” Mentor told him, and just then they reached the edge of the slope.

Slipping free of Mentor’s grasp, Odysseus pitched himself forward, going head over heels. Mentor slid after on his bottom, thinking that there was no hope for his tunic now.

Thorns and shards of flint tore at their clothing and flesh. Every bump and knock jarred their bodies, till Mentor began to think they would have had an easier time with the boar.

Then they landed in a heap at the bottom, fetching up against a spindly tree.

“Odysseus, are you …?”

“Keep … still,” Odysseus said.

Mentor raised his eyes warily and saw the boar standing at the top of the slope, stamping the grass in frustration. He opened his mouth to speak.

“Remember … poor … eyesight,” Odysseus said. “Small brain.”

Mentor shut his mouth.

Time seemed to drag by as the boar shook its massive head and peered down the slope. But at last, seeing nothing and hearing nothing, it gave one last grunt and snort, and disappeared back to the bushes to finish its breakfast.

When the boar didn’t return, Mentor whispered, “We need to get you back down to your grandfather’s palace so your wound can be properly tended, Odysseus. But meanwhile…” He stripped off his linen leggings and, using them as a makeshift bandage, bound up the gaping wound on Odysseus’ leg.

“Thanks,” Odysseus said. His normally ruddy face was blanched with pain.

“Being a hero,” Mentor said, “is awfully bloody work.”

“Isn’t … it …” Odysseus said, and then, unaccountably, he grinned.

“H
OLD STILL, MASTER ODYSSEUS
,” his mother’s old nurse, Menaera, snapped impatiently as she bathed his leg with cold water. “The wind may make the tree’s branches tremble, but it cannot heal the broken limb.”

“That stings!” Odysseus cried.

Drying his leg roughly with a coarse towel, Menaera showed him no mercy. “Not even bad enough to call in the physician, my princeling.” She examined the wound closely, sniffing at it for contagion and finding none.

“You’re worse than that boar,” he complained.

A smile spread over Menaera’s wrinkled face. “Now, now! You sound like a child, not a hero. First the bile and then the honey, little man.” She spread a pale yellow paste over his wound.

“Ouch! Ouch!” he cried again, which was only half of what he really wanted to say. The paste smarted like vinegar on an open sore. He tried to yank his leg away, but Menaera seized his ankle with a strength that a Cyclops would have envied.

“Ooof. Let me go, old lady.”

“A lady, am I?” Menaera laughed.

All the while Mentor sat on a seat in a corner of the room, smirking.

The pungent smell of the yellow paste made Odysseus’ eyes water, and he turned his head away, afraid the old woman or Mentor would think he was crying.

“There, there,” Menaera soothed. “Where there’s stink, there’s cure.”

“Then,” Odysseus said, “I’m entirely cured.”

Mentor laughed, clapping his hands.

“Never you mind, young man,” Menaera said, turning to Mentor. “I’ll fix all your little scratches next. We’ll see if you bear it as well as my young princeling.” She began winding a clean bandage around Odysseus’ thigh.

“Hah!” Odysseus said. Then, “Ow! Menaera—that’s too tight.”

“Keep still, boy. The stag cries where the doe stands quiet. I swear you are twice the trouble your mother was when she was half your age.” She kept winding.

“I’m an Achaean warrior,” Odysseus said, puffing out his chest. “The gods expect me to make trouble.”

“For your enemies, perhaps,” Menaera said, coming to the end of the bandage. “But not for your old nurse.”

Odysseus made a sour face. “I don’t have any enemies.”

Menaera laughed. “Give it time, my little olive.” So saying, she gave the bandage a final yank.

“Owowowow!”

Mentor collapsed with laughter. When he recovered, he said, “She looks after you well.”

“I’d rather be lashed by the Furies than be so well attended.” Odysseus gritted his teeth while Menaera tied up the bandage.

Pursing her thin lips, Menaera regarded her work with a nod of satisfaction. “Now rest that leg until the wound has closed. A pot half-baked will surely break.” She winked at Mentor over Odysseus’ head. “No man ever won the gods’ favour without a little pain. Your turn, Master Mentor.”

Mentor bore the old nurse’s ministrations better than Odysseus, but of course his wounds were less severe. He merely ground his teeth till he was afraid he would break them off.

When Menaera finally gathered up her bowls of balms and the linen bandages and left, both Odysseus and Mentor let out deep sighs of relief.

“She’s never short of an adage, that one,” Mentor commented. He looked rather spotty, for Menaera had daubed every scratched and torn place with a whitish paste.

Odysseus grunted. “Old women think everything they say is wise just because they’re old.”

“And young men think everything they do is brave just because it’s dangerous,” came a deep voice from the doorway.

“Grandfather!” Odysseus cried out. He tried to stand to greet the old robber prince, but his leg gave way and he fell back on to the bench. “I … I am a prince of sea-girt Ithaca, Grandfather. I can’t very well
shrink
from danger.”

Grandfather Autolycus stood with both hands on the doorjambs, frowning in disapproval. “Right this moment I have swineherds who look more princely than you do.”

“Sir, we haven’t had time to bathe …” Mentor said, his normally pale face flushed beneath the white spots.

This time Odysseus stood, though most of the weight was on his left leg. “There’s nothing dishonourable, sir, in the scars of battle. You have shown me yours and never apologised for them.” He ran a hand through his unruly hair and found it matted with dirt. “It’s not my fault that the spear broke at a vital moment.”

“Before you steal something,” Autolycus said, “be certain it’s worth the stealing!
That’s
the first rule of successful thievery.”

“I didn’t know thieves had rules.” The pain in Odysseus’ leg was like fire, but he swore to himself that he wouldn’t show that it hurt.

“Hermes is most particular about the rules of his craft,” Autolycus said. “Corollary to rule one: if a spear’s on the wall gathering dust, chances are it’s not worth much.” He came into the room, wrinkling his nose at the smell of the medicines.

“But only yesterday you said how much that spear meant to you.” Odysseus sat down again.

“Sentimental value puts no coin in your purse,” Autolycus replied. “And it will
not
bring down a boar.”

The vertical line appeared between Odysseus’ eyes, signalling he was about to lie. Only Mentor noticed.

Odysseus leaned forward. “Owl-eyed Athena appeared to me in a dream,” he said. “In her hand was a spear just like the one in your trophy room. When I woke, I knew that the goddess wanted me to take the spear of my illustrious grandfather and hunt a man-killing boar as had my illustrious father.”

Autolycus made a strange sound, half laugh, half snort. “And did things go as the goddess intended?”

“Well, some rival god—Pan maybe—or … or …”

“Ares?” put in Mentor.

“Yes!” Odysseus said. “Or Ares broke the spear. Afraid that a mere mortal would outshine them in glory.”

Autolycus could not hold back his laughter. He howled, and all Odysseus could do was look down at the floor and outlast the gale.