Thais of Athens, page 28
Thais thought of Urania and the priestess continued. “The service of our women immerses people into nature, uniting them with all living things reared by Rhea-Kibela. That is a man’s happiness and destiny. Gods do not offer a better path. Men find themselves and do that for which they are destined. If they turn out to be unsuitable, the Great Mother calls them back to her, to bring them forth again for a better life. And the men go to her never knowing the bitterness of old age, in the midst of fiery youth.”
“Why are you so certain that people are growing weaker?” Thais asked, hiding a smile.
The priestess suddenly laughed. “Look once again at the image of Kibela-Rhea captured in the ancient statue, and you’ll realize that only insatiable desire can seek such an ideal, and only incredible strength and endurance can hope to match hers.”
Thais remembered the incomparable might captured within the boundaries of that harmonious body and emitted by Rhea’s statue, and couldn’t find any objections.
“Where do the black ones and the red ones live?” she asked, changing the subject.
“They do not leave the temple while they are young. They frequently marry important people or travel, taking high level positions in other, less important temples of Rhea. On certain days of the month they go bathing in a sacred lake, and woe be upon those men who violate their seclusion.”
“What if it is a woman?” the hetaera asked, realizing which lake the woman meant.
“Nothing would happen to her. Only if the unfortunate woman violates the purity of the sacred water would she be killed.”
“Do the priestesses live there?” Thais asked quickly, pointing at the southern wing of the temple. Its flat roof was level with the floor of the main section.
“You are correct. Would you like to visit them?”
“Oh no. And what is in the northern wing?”
The priestess’ eyes flashed again. “I want to take you there at sunset. But I cannot do that unless you bring a sacred vow upon the alter of Kibela-Rhea: the vow of silence. We keep the ancient mysteries of the Great Mother secret. The rituals of the ancient times, brought here thousands of years ago from Licaonia and Phrygia, give power to the servants of Ashtoreth.”
Thais swore to keep the secret in the sanctuary, which was completely deserted at this hour. The mistress of the temple poured her a drink and Thais stepped back.
“Don’t be afraid, it’s not yesterday’s potion. But you will require courage when you see the mystery. Remember that the Great Mother is a mistress of animals,” she said in a strained whisper which filled the hetaera with vague fear. She downed the entire goblet at once.
“Excellent. Now accept this gift.” The priestess handed Thais two vials made of milky white glass, their deep pink stoppers made of precious Indian tourmaline. A moon sickle was carved on one of the vials and an eight point star on another.
“How can I? I cannot accept such expensive things,” Thais exclaimed.
“It’s nothing,” the high priestess replied. “The temple of the Great Mother is wealthy and can make even more precious gifts to beautiful women, for they are jewels created by Rhea for her own purposes. But you didn’t ask what is in the vials. This one,” she said, pointing at the vial with the star, “was in the potion you were given yesterday. If you ever wish to experience all of Ashtoreth-Kibela’s power in the guise of Anaitis, put six drops into a cup of water and split between the two of you. This one with the moon will free you from the effect of the first one. If you drink it alone, it will make you as cold as the distant Moon. No more than three drops, or you might remain cold forever,” the priestess said, then laughed, a sound both grating and menacing.
She led the hetaera to a niche in a side wall and pulled out a shiny black disk which Thais thought looked as if it were made of glass. In it she saw her own reflection, as clearly as in a regular mirror of silver covered bronze.
“This mirror is not made of glass but of stone,” the woman informed her. “It was made when people knew only stone. Metal ores served them as permanent paints, for even then they already painted on walls. Women gazed into this mirror many thousands of years ago, before Egypt and Crete. Take this as a gift as well.”
“You are giving me another priceless object. Why?” Thais asked.
“I am giving it to you along with the vials containing poison. Beauty and death are always together, since the dawn of men.”
“Death for whom?”
“For the one who is beautiful, or for the one who takes it, or for both.”
“Is there no other way?”
“No. Such is the way of the Mother of Gods, and it is not up to us to discuss it,” the mistress of the temple said sternly. Her tone almost threatened.
“I thank you. Your gift is truly beyond all treasures.”
“Are you not afraid?”
“Of what?”
“Of the mysteries of the Great Mother.” She narrowed her eyes while Thais shook her head. “No? Then come.”
In the north portion of the sanctuary a thick column protruded from the middle of a dark opening in the floor. A spiral stone staircase circled the column, leading down. The poorly lit passage led into a temple, decorated in a way Thais had never seen before. Broad stone benches on each side of the passage were set with real horns of huge bulls, or aurochs, curved with closely set, vertical tips. The low, square space of the sanctuary, with its coarse half-pillars of red terracotta, were decorated with beautifully-made heads of bulls constructed of stone or clay but with real horns. The bull’s horns on the western wall stuck out like those of the aurochs on the northern wall: bent down. The ones on the eastern wall were spread out broadly in wavy, horizontal blades after the fashion of the ancient bulls of Mesopotamia.
This ancient sanctuary was strange, sinister, even frightening. Enormous horns were everywhere, including on the short, square pillars and long benches, making it difficult to move around the temple. Silhouette frescoes of red ocher outlined figures of the bulls on the walls closest to the entrance.
Between the bulls’ heads were women’s breasts made of blood red clay, their nipples decorated with beaks of black griffons and snarling ferret skulls. The first room was followed by a smaller hall, with a sharp-cornered niche in the northern wall. Three horned bulls’ heads were set vertically, one above the other, with the figure of the goddess soaring above them with her arms and legs spread. On each side of the niche, two black passages loomed black.
The horns bothered Thais for some reason she was having trouble placing. Suddenly a vivid recollection flashed in her memory. The same symbols, but made of stone and magnified to titanic dimensions, marked sacred places on Crete. In one of the frescoes the Athenian had seen the image of a sanctuary, similar to the one she was in now. Horns of different sizes had separated the fresco’s sacrificial room into different segments. But here the real horns of wild bulls seemed particularly sinister. Though they were relatively small, they made just as strong an impression as the gigantic stone horns rising from the soil of Crete. Thais could clearly see the deep connection between the ancient religion of the Great Mother in Asia and the faith of her ancestors on Crete.
The sculptures of bulls in the sanctuary were particularly terrifying. They did not look like the blunt-faced Cretan giants with their tall horns pointed up. The bulls of the ancient sanctuary were portrayed with long lowered heads, their huge horns pointed forward. They either converged over the forehead with their tips curved menacingly, or were spread wide and arched like knives. This was definitely a different breed, and the Athenian thought that the sacred Cretan dance with the bulls wouldn’t have been successful with these frightening creatures as they seemed hellbent on a fight.
The high priestess paused and listened. Deep, low, rhythmic sounds of gipatas, the strings on the very bottom of a sitar, could be heard in the distance, interwoven with female voices, moans and screams.
Thais’ heart beat faster, expecting something terrible. The priestess silently picked up a torch from a horn-decorated pedestal, lit it from the coals simmering on the sacrificial stone, and stepped into the left passage. After passing through another dark corridor which felt more like a dungeon, Thais found herself in a spacious building, level with the temple garden.
Thais would never tell anyone about the things she saw here, but she remembered every single moment. In Egypt she had been struck by the frescoes in the dungeons of the Dead, portraying Tiau or the Path of the Night Sun. That was the Egyptian version of hell, located on the other invisible side of the Moon. But those were only images. Here at the temple that was almost as ancient as the stone mirror, the ten thousand year old rituals of the Great Mother took place in reality, and were performed by real people.
Strengthened by Rhea’s potion, Thais managed to withstand the performance to the end. All four stages of the incredible ritual passed before her eyes, gradually clarifying their secret meaning. The roots of Earth-Gaea and all things living on it descended into the abyss of chaotic storms, sweeping over Tartar in the terrible darkness of Erebus. That was why the roots of the soul also rose from the darkness of primal feelings, swirling in the womb of Kibela. These feelings, the darkness and terrors had to be experienced in order to become free from their secret power. They had to be released before the eyes of the women who were simultaneously the victims and the participants of the great union with the roots of all nature in the image of Ananka, an unavoidable necessity.
Late at night, accompanied by a black priestess, Thais returned to her temporary home feeling astonished, tired and depressed. Za-Asht was awake, waiting for her mistress. The slave girl’s eyes were swollen from tears, and Thais noticed nail marks in her palms. Thais had no energy to ask, and fell into bed without a bath. As a result, Ptolemy’s letter remained unread.
Thais could not sleep. The Finikian also tossed and sighed until the hetaera called her over.
“Sit down and tell me what happened. Did Lykophon offend you?” Za-Asht nodded silently, and anger flashed in the dark depths of her eyes.
“I shall call him tomorrow and ask the lokhagos to punish the Thessalian.”
“No, no, Mistress. He didn’t do anything and I don’t want to see him anymore.”
“Really? What a strange young man. You are beautiful, and I saw the way he looked at you. Did you give him more wine?”
“He downed a goblet as if it were nasty desert water. He didn’t touch the food and said nothing, simply stared at the door after that Lamia, daughter of the dark. This went on forever until I lost my patience and kicked him out. And then he left without a thank you or a word, as if he were drunk with millet beer.”
“I had never expected this,” Thais exclaimed. “Did the Lamia truly strike him with Eros? Why? He had seen you dance balarita, how agile your body is and how slender your legs are.”
“You are kind to me, Mistress,” the Finikian replied, barely holding back tears. “But you are a woman and won’t understand the black Lamia’s power. I looked at her carefully. Everything in her is contrary to what is in me.”
“How so?”
“Everything that is narrow in me is wide in her: hips, ankles and eyes. Everything that is wide in me is thin in her: shoulders and waist,” the Finikian said, clearly upset. “She is built like you, Mistress, but heavier, more muscular. And it drives men mad, especially those like this boy.”
“So he rejected you and thinks about her?” Thais shrugged. “That is all right. We shall soon travel on and the Lamia will fade from Lykophon’s memory. Oh, I forgot. Do you still want to stay here? Do you?”
“Now more than ever, Mistress. We Finikians have a teaching of Senhuniathon. It says that desire is creation. And I want to create myself anew.”
“We too have desire: Pothos. That is also creation. Desperate desire either brings forth the necessary form or ends in anoya, or madness. We shall see when the time comes. Give me the letter.”
Ptolemy sent his greetings and asked her to remember him. He instructed Thais absolutely not to travel further until he sent a detachment of soldiers to get her, commanded by his friend. If the news were bad, Thais should not stay at the temple, but take her soldiers and make a dash to the Issus bay. That was only fifteen parsangs away to the west, over the mountains. Three ships would be waiting there. The captain would pick up Thais and wait another half a month. If Ptolemy and Alexander did not appear by then, they should sail back to Hellas.
Thais kissed the letter tenderly. She thought Ptolemy was more noble at heart than he wanted to show among the crass Macedonian army leaders. Ptolemy wrote about the march across the hot plain, how the sea of tall grass had already faded from the summer drought. He said they rode and rode, day after day, going further beyond the horizon.
Vague premonitions had bothered everyone, even Alexander. Ptolemy could see lanterns burning late into the night in Alexander’s tent. The king had consulted with his spies and read their reports. Gradually Alexander had directed the army to the left, further to the north. The guides had warned him about the greater heat yet to come. The grass would fade, and the small rivers and creeks which supplied the army with water would dry out.
Thirty-five thousand people were now following Alexander, but there in the limitless plains of Asia, the king felt for the first time that his army wasn’t all that big. Hot winds blew at them with the breath of the deadly deserts which sprawled beyond the plains. Dust swirled like demons, and hot air at the horizon seemed to lift the earth above the blue lakes of ghostly water.
Ptolemy went on to say that when they turned north, the grass became taller and thicker, and yellowish rivers turned gray. There was a full Lunar eclipse.
“How did I miss that?” Thais wondered, then continued reading.
Knowledgeable people said the army was now in the country governed by the Mistress of Beasts, including those of heaven, earth and subterranean. She was called Ashtoreth, Kibela or Rhea. Helenians called her Artemis or Hecate. If she appeared riding a lion, everyone would perish.
Alexander had addressed his soldiers in a speech, asking them not to be afraid. He knew their destiny, and led them to the end of war, as well as countless treasures.
Thais read between Ptolemy’s lines, realizing he was a born writer. She discovered that the Macedonians had encountered a new feeling: fear.
For the first time, the hetaera thought about how insanely brave was Alexander’s mission. What divine courage one must possess in order to walk away from the sea and plunge into the depths of a strange country where they would meet the countless troops of the King of Kings. If they were defeated, Thais realized, the Macedonian army would be wiped off the face of earth. The divine army leader, Ptolemy, and Leontiscus would all cease to exist. Nearchus alone might possibly manage to save his fleet and return to his native shores. Their countless enemies, both large and small, must be waiting for this with such wicked impatience, burning with justified revenge and the cowardly triumph of hyenas.
Her friends could not possibly rely on the mercy of others. Ptolemy was wise to leave behind two possibilities for saving Alexander and himself. The first was with Nearchus’ fleet, waiting near the delta of the Euphrates in case they met Darius in the south. Ptolemy wrote about the rumors that Darius had assembled all his troops, including countless horsemen ranging from the famous Persian Immortal guards to Bactrians and Sogdians.
It was strange, but despite glimpses of anxiety she read in Ptolemy’s letter, Thais was filled with the certainty of victory soon to come. She would wait for more news with even greater impatience.
The next day, instead of Lykophon, the lokhagos sent a pockmarked Macedonian with fresh scars on his shoulder and neck.
“I am here instead of the hestiotus,” the soldier said, smiling. He was clearly pleased at the prospect of a ride with a famous beauty of Athens, the city of legendary elegance and wisdom.
“Where is Lykophon?”
When he said nothing, Thais clapped her hands, summoning Za-Asht, then sent the soldier to get his horse. The Finikian hopped on Salmaakh, whom she had ridden many times during the trip from the Egyptian border, and her sad face lit up with childlike joy. The two women started racing each other, leaving their guard behind and pausing only after he shouted angrily.
Having arrived at the edge of the deserted plane, both women stopped, enchanted. The plain was blooming with incredibly bright flowers unseen in Hellas. Globes the size of apples painted in a divine sky blue color fluttered on tall bare stems. They were scattered everywhere, along with the tall plants blooming with round yellow, almost gold flower clusters and sparse narrow leaves. The gold and blue pattern spread out as far as the eye could see, glorious against the background of dusty green in the transparent morning air.
“It’s a miracle!” the Macedonian exclaimed, struck by the fairytale colors. They decided not to ride through, because it would be a shame to ruin all that beauty with the hooves of horses.
They turned right to go around, but were forced to stop again before the growth of even more incredible flowers. Coarse tipped plants, tall enough to reach the riders’ feet, grew around them, covered with large crimson flowers and shaped like five point stars. Their petals had wide bases and sharp tips.
Thais couldn’t stand it. She hopped off the pacer and picked an armful of purple flowers while the Finikian gathered gold and blue globes. The stems of the latter turned out to be much like regular chive with a sharp onion scent.
Thais rode back at full speed, ascending the northern range and heading toward the small temple of the mocking, alien Ishtar. Trying not to look at the goddess’ slanted green gold eyes, Thais spread the flowers on the altar, stood for a minute, then snuck into the sanctuary with the high relief tile of the menacing Lilith. There she pulled out a hairpin and stuck it into a finger on her left hand. She smudged blood onto the altar, then walked away, licking the scratch. On the way back, her good humor deserted her. She suddenly felt sad, the way the young Thessalian had the day before. Was it the magic of the Persian goddess?
