Snakehead (18 page)

All sailors are superstitious, and I am Perseus. But the crew of the
Octopus
were not shaken. “Go home, lad,” said the captain. “It’s nothing personal.”

The busybodies dispersed, leaving us alone.

“There’s something wrong,” said Andromeda.

“You bet there is. He took our fares! What a crook!”

We had far too much luggage: two chests full of warm clothes, food supplies, trade goods to save the coin we carried; everything our family’s tender care could overload us with. I’d have to borrow a handcart, or go and fetch a mule.

“No,” she said. “There’s something wrong with
this
.
Why was it so hard to find a passage to Paros? Why is the ferry mysteriously in dry dock? Perseus, it isn’t an accident. Someone powerful doesn’t want us to get off the island.”

I’d been thinking the same. Maybe we’d all been thinking the same, and praying we were wrong. But who could be trying to stop us? I had
Athini’s shield
on my back. I could not be trapped here. How could I be trapped here?

I felt as if I’d run up against an invisible wall.

“It’s not
us,”
I said reluctantly. “It’s me.”

I told her what the Parian captain had said.

We had been fretting at the delay, and clinging to the idea of our voyage, alone together. The thought that she could leave and I couldn’t was a cruel blow.

“We’d better go back to the taverna,” said Andromeda, through stiff lips.

The boss decided to send for Bozic. “We should have sent for him in the first place,” he said. “Time enough to rely on strangers when you have no choice.” I didn’t like the idea, because it would leave my family with no means of escape, but I saw that he was right.

Our caïque was back in her usual hiding place up the east coast. Kefi went running off to that two-hovel fishing village while Pali went out to do the rounds of the bars and shipping offices, to see if he could find out what was going on. In Seatown most of the shipping offices were
in
the bars. They were single-handed operations; if you had
the price of a jug of wine, there was usually no problem getting inside information. He returned with nothing. Nobody would talk.

“They won’t admit there’s a problem,” said Pali. “They’re just not taking passengers, or they’re fully booked (which isn’t true). Or they’re waiting for a consignment that hasn’t arrived.” Unfortunately, Taki’s agent, the most reliable source, was not in port. Apparently, he was on Naxos.

We spent an anxious night, because Kefi didn’t get back until the next day. When he turned up, he reported that the caïque was gone, and the village was “deserted.” If
deserted
was the right word for the fact that Kefi hadn’t found anyone at home in those two shacks … He was thoroughly frightened, convinced the king had taken the boat, and was about to descend on Dicty’s and kill us all.

We opened the restaurant again, just to be occupied. There weren’t many customers. Andromeda went to her room as soon as we’d cleared up, and the rest of us sat in the yard. Kefi kept whimpering,
“Trapped! Like rats in a trap! Trapped! Like rats in a trap!”
until Anthe told him very sharply to shut up.

“Perhaps we should apply to Polydectes.” Moumi sounded almost serious. “He has ships. He offered to equip Perseus.”

There was one other harbor on Serifos, at Megalivadi in the west: deep water in a narrow bay. It belonged to the High Place; it was forbidden territory.

“What if the king
is
behind this?” I asked. “He’s the
only real enemy I have. But if he wants rid of me, why would he stop me from leaving the island?”

“Either the king,” said Pali, “or you have competition on the Medusa Challenge, Perseus, and somebody’s rich relatives are putting you out of the running.”

“That’s ridiculous!” snapped Anthe. “Anyone who stops Andromeda or Perseus from leaving is in trouble with the Achaean Supernaturals. The captains are
sailors
. They’re terrified of getting on the wrong side of a black cat. Exactly who do you think could have got to them?”

“Who indeed,” murmured the boss. He stroked Mémé, frowning. “This isn’t Polydectes, Perseus. Your mother may be right about his murderous plans, but he’ll wait until you’re off the island. Let’s give it a few days. Bozic has no doubt vanished on one of his smuggling escapades; he’ll be back. And the
Afroditi
will be here soon.”

The Blue Star
Afroditi
, of course: the ship that had brought Kore here, and carried the earthquake victims. She would be calling at Serifos very soon on her way down the line for the last trip of the season. She could take us to Naxos. It was cutting the timing fine for Andromeda, but at least we could rely on Taki. No power in the Middle Sea told
him
what to do.

I felt no relief. The invisible wall was still there.

The
Afroditi
duly arrived, and we went out to her on one of the lighters. The lightermen wouldn’t take our heavy luggage. They said the chests could be fetched on board
if we got a berth, only they’d heard Taki was poorly, and he wasn’t taking on passengers. He didn’t want the trouble of them. We’ll see about that, I thought.

But it felt ill-omened, a backward step, to board the
Afroditi
again.

Taki seemed to be in perfect health, a big, broad-chested sailor, oiled and adorned like a prince. He received us in his office, a fine saloon on the upper deck, though not as fine or as strange as the stateroom on
The Magnificent Escape
. We explained that we needed a passage. The shipping magnate played with the weights of his antique Minoan assay scales and asked after everyone at Dicty’s, down to the household gods. He was very pleased to meet Princess Andromeda again, under her own name.

He knew everything. He’d even heard about the “new kind of writing.”

“I have a
very
promising little girl, mother’s a slave, but that’s no odds, she’s my darling. Six years old, very pretty, brainy as a barrelful of monkeys. What d’you think? Could she learn how to do your new trick, noble Andromeda?”

“I don’t know,” said Andromeda. “The problem would be finding a teacher.”

Andromeda was the only one who knew the craft, and she would be dead in a month, if the God of Earthquake had his way. “And you might want to think about the consequences,” she added bleakly. “If you’re fond of your
little daughter. The flying marks have not brought me a long life, or happiness.”

Taki cleared his throat, and arranged the executive toys on his desk again. Normally, our shipping magnate had a heart of stone. It gave him no trouble to lie to anyone. But he was stumbling over this interview. There was something on his mind that made him twitchy as a guilty mule boy.

“About our passage to Naxos?” I prompted him.

“It would be a great favor,” added Andromeda.

“Ah. I’m afraid it can’t be done. Not, er, not this season.”

So even Taki was against us. But there was one chance….

“I have gold,” announced Andromeda, as we had agreed beforehand. “I have no more treasure
on
me, but you will be paid very, very well for setting me on my way to Haifa. I can promise that.”

“Noble lady,” sighed Taki. “Your money is no good. I can’t help Perseus with this senseless Medusa Challenge.” He glanced meaningfully at the portable shrine, bolted to the paintwork opposite his desk, where his Supernatural sponsor was honored, and raised his voice. “I don’t approve of young men throwing their lives away, tearing off after monster this and treasure that. I’m thinking of your poor mother, Perseus, and Papa Dicty, going down in sorrow to their graves. Don’t argue with me, it’s a serious moral issue.” The shipping magnate glowered righteously.

“Someone should put a stop to the whole ugly, macho, violent business. It’s barbaric, if you ask me.”

This, from the man who thought human sacrifice was a fine, modern idea. But I wasn’t tempted to argue. I’d got the message, finally.

“I won’t take you, and neither will any captain, merchant, trader or pirate who wants to keep on the right side of me. Sorry, but there it is. Do you take my meaning?”

We did. We understood everything. Our difficulties made perfect sense now.

“What about me?” wondered Andromeda. “Would you give me a berth? Though you know where I’m going?”

“I’d rather not,” said the great man.

I had the strange feeling that he’d done his level best for us. We told him thank you and goodbye, and the lighter took us to the quay. “Hera,” said Andromeda.

“Hera,” I agreed bitterly.

The shrine in Taki’s office, which he’d made sure we noticed, was dedicated to the Goddess Hera. He was a Hera worshipper: a devotee of my Supernatural father’s estranged wife, whom Zeus had told me I must avoid at all costs. Not that I’d needed the warning. I knew from my mother that lady Hera would do anything to spite Great Zeus’s plans, especially if one of his mortal “girlfriends,” or half-mortal children, was involved. Somehow, through a dream or an omen, she’d ordered the lord of the Middle Sea’s shipping to stop me from leaving Serifos. And he had obeyed.

“I was sure he worshipped Afroditi,” I muttered.

But my father had warned me against Afroditi too.

We left the chests to be picked up later. Neither of us ever wanted to see them again.

The boss said, “Taki. I knew it,” and retired to his furnace yard. He could be heard banging things savagely in there, through the long, hot afternoon. Palikari and Anthe had a perverse scrap, with Pali defending Hera, and Anthe snarling about the Supernatural First Lady’s witless attitude:
Why doesn’t she just leave him, like a normal person would? Why doesn’t she have her own collection of human boy toys?
Moumi tried to make peace, and made things worse. Andromeda and I sat by the banked-down summer hearth. There was nothing left to say, so we said nothing. I listened to the sounds of Koukla wheeling a cart of laundry, slapping out wet table linen, shouting for Kefi to stoke up the outside stove so that she could heat her smoothing irons. Ordinary life, going on …

The tenth month had seemed a long way off when Andromeda had agreed to come with me, at least part of the way. It wasn’t so far off now. She didn’t have to say it: I knew she couldn’t wait any longer. She must leave; I was trapped. Our parting was no longer somewhere ahead, out of sight. It was here.

In the end I went to my room and lay there, my choices going round and round in my mind. The winged sandals.
Could I use them to leave Serifos? Would Hera prevent me? Could I fly along beside Andromeda’s ship to Haifa, and fight the priests? I did not doubt my own destiny, but I couldn’t get past the idea that we must part,
here and now
. I would get off the island somehow, but it would be too late. I would reach Haifa with the Medusa Head,
too late…
.

I woke in the dark. I’d fallen asleep, and someone was climbing noisily through my window. Luckily, I didn’t leap onto the intruder. I struck a light first. It was Kia from the Yacht Club. She sat on my floor in a heap, her pretty brown hair all over her face. She was wearing a yellow singlet smeared with tree bark, and a little purple sailor’s kilt that didn’t leave much to my imagination.

“Kia?
What are you doing in my bedroom? Are you drunk?”

“Hee hee hee. In your dreams, lover boy.” She parted her hair and grinned at me. She didn’t
look
all that drunk. “Yours is the only room with a window on the street.”

“I know. I planned it that way. What are you doing here?”

“I’m the best tree climber, and we didn’t want to wake the house.” She stared at the
harpe
, which was unsheathed in my hand. “What is
that?
We’ve got a surprise for you. A ship! Come and let the boys in. They’re hiding in the alley.”

“It’s a Chaldean dagger. I’ll get the boss….”

“No! Don’t wake the grown-ups! You have to let us explain.”

She insisted on waking Anthe and Palikari, then Anthe ran to fetch Andromeda. Pali and I went with Kia, down to the kitchen yard. Niki and Gliko, the lads from the Twelve Islands who had been flirting with my girl at Polydectes’ feast, sneaked in from the alley with a covered lantern. We gathered behind the wellhouse.

They’d found us a ship. The captain had agreed to take us, but on the quiet.

“He
doesn’t care about the great Taki,” hissed Gliko. “Only we do, so we’d like our help to be a secret, if you don’t mind.”

Andromeda nodded eagerly, without a word.

“Done!” I whispered. “But why can’t we wake the boss, or my mother?”

“Er, we’re not sure. Your friend said just to tell you two.”

“What friend?”

“He says this ship won’t be stopped by contrary winds,” broke in Niki. “Which Someone might be trying to arrange. She’s
manpowered
. The captain’s an Achaean.”

Manpowered: I knew what that meant. “You mean she’s a warship.” My hope plunged again: I might have known this was too good to be true. “I know why warships take on stray young men, Nik. Are you sure this captain isn’t going to press-gang me into service with the Achaean fleet?”

“It’s not like that! It’s more mysterious than that!”

“You have to come
now,”
Gliko insisted. “The
Argo
,
that’s her name, will be long gone at dawn. Your friend says some of the crewmen have been doing a little night hunting, er, for deer, so they’d rather be away before daylight.”

“There are no deer on Serifos. We ate them all, hundreds of years ago. You mean the ‘Achaean captain’ is raiding our herds. Who is this ‘friend’?”

The kids seemed puzzled. “Dunno,” said Gliko. “Didn’t get a straight look at him.”

“Perseus,”
breathed Andromeda. “We’re wasting time!”

We hugged Pali and Anthe. I had the Supernatural loot on my back, and a wallet with a few necessities; she had her bundle. We took nothing else. The Yacht Club kids led us to the end of the waterfront and onto the headland path. We passed the inlet where I had met my father, and climbed down into the next bay. I saw the ship, long and black against the starry horizon, riding without lights (a pirate trick). She definitely looked like a warship. But there was something
strange
about her….