bookpub Chapter 1.99
Chapter 1.99
chapter 1.99
the son of rome
there and back again in just under two weeks. all told, it was one of the faster expeditions i’d been a part of.
it had taken us three days to sail around the southern tip of the peloponnesian landmass where olympia resided, and north up the full length of the aegean sea to the unmarked lands of thracia. it had taken us four more days and four more nights of horseback riding and chthonic wandering to find our infernal drink and return to the eos with golden cup in hand. we’d made good time sailing back thus far, despite the added weight of our cargo and the brief complication of griffon breaking all the oars. by the dawn of our third day back at sea, the coast was on the ship’s starboard side once more.
our last and maddest night in the land of indefinite boundaries had cut the four of us deeply, but time and the steady lapping of the waves had worn the edge of our mania away as surely as a seaside cliff. by the second night, i was able to sleep.
as the rosy dawn broke over our third morning back at sea, selene revealed to us that griffon wasn’t the only one on board with a sweet singing voice.
“whenever bakkhos comes, i lay my cares to rest,” she sang, swinging her legs idly over the deep blue waves of the ionian. she spoke with a cultivator’s universal tongue, conveying the meaning of the words to every sailor’s ear. the men of the eos belted out the following verse with bawdy enthusiasm.
“bring me the cup, boy! oh, bring me the cup!”
“i dream i’m rich as croesus, and it makes me want to sing.” if griffon’s voice was wine-dark deep and rolling smoke, then selene’s was light like honeycombs and falling snow. more than charming enough to put a smile on every sailor’s face.
“bring me the cup, boy! i said bring me that cup!”
griffon and scythas sat beside the horses at the rear edge of the deck, speaking more cordially than i had ever seen them before. it likely helped that half the hero’s attention was committed to the mare, kronia. i’d noticed back when he was buying the beasts that scythas had an eye for horses born of passion.
that passion was on full display now, the hero’s admiration for the white-haired beast of virtue clear to see. kronia hadn’t allowed him to touch her at first, perhaps remembering what had happened to the last two horses he’d ridden, but griffon had convinced her with some cajoling words and a vigorous massage with thirty formless hands. they both poked and prodded at the mare while they discussed the finer mechanics of beast cultivation, searching for changes in her body that had come from the consumption of a higher power.
scythas hadn’t even bothered with atlas. it was likely for the best.
“ivy-garlanded i lie, but through my heart i walk the world.”
“bring me the cup, boy! boy, bring me the cup!”
for my part, i had taken to passing the time in my usual way.
dice carved from a sea bream’s bones clattered and rolled across the deck. eight dice in all, every one an octahedron with various number carved into each of their eight faces. they weren’t the prettiest, but i’d been working with substandard materials from the start.
and they looked pretty enough when they landed with the numbers i desired.
“i win!” a wiry pirate boy with vibrant red hair declared gleefully, already groping for the small pile of berries on the deck between us.
my hand came down, covering the mound of fruit before he could snatch it away. the boy’s grin immediately turned to a scowl. he scrabbled at my fingers, heaved with all his strength at my hand, but no matter what he did he could not lift my hand from the pile.
“cheater!” he accused me. “you said the highest number gets the prize!”
“i did.”
“and i won!”
“did you?”
the pirate child looked at me like i was simple. “thirty-one beats thirty.”
“it does,” i agreed. “but thirty beats twenty-nine.”
“wha-?”
i counted off the values of his dice, adding them as i went. “five, seven, eight, sixteen, twenty, twenty-two, twenty-five, twenty-nine.”
“thirty-one!” the boy protested, jabbing a grimy finger at the last of the bone dice. “that’s a six! the i goes after the-” he blinked, abruptly realizing his mistake.
“the i goes before the v,” i corrected him, tapping the die in question. “if you look at it so that the i comes after, the v will be upside down. it’s a four, not a six. you lose.”
the boy slumped, his forehead thumping against the deck.
“i’m hungry,” he said pitifully. i hummed.
“unfortunate.” i popped a raspberry into my mouth and savored its tang. the little pirate spat an oath and pounded his fists against the planks.
“get it ready and i’ll drink: bring me the cup, boy!” selene cheered, and the oarsmen brought the song home.
“bring me the cup, boy! now bring me that cup!”
it was only a brief reprieve. we distracted ourselves with pleasant things, got to know the men that had kept the eos safe in our absence and amused ourselves with dice and fishing and idle talk. but though the passing days had dulled its edge, we still felt the echoes of that night spent in the orphic house. it haunted each of us in its own way.
griffon had insisted at the beginning of this thracian venture that we keep going until the ingredients were gathered, but that had been before we’d seen for ourselves what one reagent alone required. if we had any hope at all of finding more, we’d need a light to guide us at the very least. or, failing that, an old man’s wisdom.
it came to us unexpectedly - hours before the eos would have reached olympia’s southernmost dock.
a welcome cry from above heralded the return of my eagle, sorea’s grand wingspan blotting out the sunlight briefly as he wheeled overhead. selene jumped off her seat at the starboard rail and waved excitedly up at the bird, calling out his name.
i held out an arm and the messenger beast landed gracefully on it, curling his talons around my forearm and squeezing just tight enough not to cut through skin. his form of greeting, i supposed. i offered him a berry from my pile.
“i was wondering when you’d make it back. how was your-“
“socrates?” i hissed, unsure of where to touch him. his body was a mess of blood and blackened flesh. griffon slid across the deck in a crouch, kneeling at his other side and laying hands of flesh and blood and pankration intent across the old philosopher’s body.
the gadfly grunted and waved a burnt hand at the former young aristocrat. “off.”
all thirty pankration hands were blasted away as if by scythas’ gale winds. griffon sneered. “old man, i’m trying to mend you.”
“not yet. turn this ship around first. now.”
“what?” scythas asked, alarmed. “why?”
“because all of you except the girl are going to die if you dock it at olympia.”
“what?” selene hissed, the scarlet flames behind her eyes flaring up. “why!? what’s going on-“
socrates lashed out with an arm nearly as black as coal, long fracturing lines cracking the skin apart, and grabbed selene by her sunray silks. she yelped as he yanked her down, baring his teeth furiously.
“because you didn’t listen. because three days ago you died, and old polyzalus came howling for my head. your father has left his domain, girl. nowhere in olympia is safe for these men. nowhere.”
his eyes were glassy. he had selene’s face nearly pressed to his, but he wasn’t really looking at her. could he see her at all? could he see anything at all?
“how did you find us?” i asked him urgently, as the energy slowly but surely slipped out of him. his grip slackened and fell away, releasing selene and allowing her to draw back.
“átta did this to you?” the daughter of the oracle whispered, horrified.
“socrates! how did you find us?”
“followed your bird,” the scholar muttered. his sun-blinded eyes drifted shut. “turn the ship around...”
“socrates? socrates?” i slapped him in the face, but the old man didn’t respond. “griffon!”
thirty pankration hands and two of flesh and blood settled over the old man’s burnt and battered body. within moments, the scarlet son snarled a curse and pulled back.
“this is beyond me. son of a bitch.”
“do any of you know anything of medicine? anyone?” i cast around, but found no salvation among the sailors. scythas shook his head silently, eyes darting up and down the philosopher’s mangled frame. i looked to selene.
“honey,” she whispered in a choked voice. “i have honey.”
“will it be enough?”
steam drifted up from the corners of her eyes. “no.”
“sorea!” i snapped. the eagle landed on a bench beside the gadfly, looking down at in a brief, distantly curious sort of way, before turning expectantly to regard me. “can you get me anastasia?”
somehow, i knew he was offended that i’d even had to ask.
“go. now!”
the virtuous beast spread his wings wide and surged up into the sky, rocking the eos with the force of his departure. he left us with a parting shriek that i chose to interpret as assurance. he’d find her, and he’d bring her to us. there was no other way.
“what do you think you’re doing?” griffon snapped, and i turned to see two of the oarsmen freeze, halfway across the deck. halfway across to the opposite benches, where two men already sat manning their oars.
“we-“ the first to speak hesitated.
the second finished. “we’re going to help them correct on their side. it’ll turn us faster-“
“we’re not turning around,” i declared. further down the line of benches, another man protested.
“but the man said-“
i rose. the deck groaned beneath my feet. every freedman fell silent, staring at me in naked trepidation.
“this man is my mentor,” i told them, lining every word with steel. “he is my mentor, as he was the mentor of my mentor’s mentor. my actions brought this harm to him, so it will have to be my actions that see it delivered from him. there is a physician in olympia that can mend him. we are not turning around.”
“solus,” scythas said quietly, laying a hesitant hand on my shoulder. “there are physicians in other cities. if griffon mans the oars and i fill the sails with wind, we can be at krokos by dusk-“
“no,” i said, just as quietly. “look at him, scythas. do you think he’ll last long enough for us to find another anastasia?” burning hazel eyes met mine, searching.
whatever scythas found in my eyes, it was enough. he nodded shallowly.
“row.” i commanded the crew. nine men and one pirate boy heaved against their oars, shouting in unified effort. an inexplicably kind wind began to fill the sails, rising in tandem with the hero’s pneuma. selene and griffon were still knelt at the old philosopher’s side, spreading honey over his wounds from a beehive that she’d pulled out of her silks.
“old ‘zalus thinks we killed his daughter,” scythas told me in grim resignation while the eos picked up speed. “if he did this to the gadfly... when he finds us, he’ll burn us all to cinders before we can explain a word.”
griffon looked up from his healing work, scarlet eyes alight with wrath.
“he’ll try.”
heat and cinders smoldered up from underneath the deck.