The Arrow of Apollo, page 18
There it was.
Looking like an ordinary wooden thing, feathered by an expert fletcher, yet thrumming with divine power, was the other half of Apollo’s arrow.
Elissa’s heart quickened. The king held out his hand, but Silvius shook his head. ‘No. I will place it back with the Shaft.’
There was a perceptible shift in the air as the two caskets were positioned next to each other, and a glowing arc of white light sprang from one to the other.
Elissa sensed another presence in the room, a joyous one which charged the atmosphere.
There, lit by the whiteness, apparently as yet unseen by the others, was the god Hermes.
He had slipped into her sight in the curious way that gods had, as if he had always been there but she just hadn’t noticed, with his warm smile and glossy black, curly hair. He was eating an apple rather studiedly, a quiver slung over his shoulder. The god swallowed the last bite of the apple, nodded mock gravely to Elissa and tossed away the core.
‘My lord Hermes!’ Orestes had seen him, and now the others were aware of him, his bright essence lighting up the clammy chamber. Silvius bowed his head, whilst Tisamenos gazed in wonder.
The god, without seeming to move through space, was now bending over the Arrowhead and the Shaft. ‘Such power,’ he murmured. Tenderly he lifted up the Arrowhead’s casket. Silvius flinched as he opened the lid. But of course Hermes did not ask for destruction, and instead stroked it with his finger.
‘A pretty thing.’ Hermes toyed with the Arrowhead, turning it up and down, admiring the sheen of colours rippling over it. ‘And now, I bring together what has been separated.’
Elissa felt a surge of Apollo’s clarity. She grabbed Silvius by the hand, and saw his face was lit with joy. Tisamenos was kneeling, and Orestes, awed by the presence of the god who had absolved him, was prostrate on the ground.
‘The Arrow of Apollo!’ Hermes called, voice ringing and echoing through the chamber. ‘The weapon that will lay Python low once more. Tisamenos, son of Orestes; Silvius, son of Aeneas. You have brought them together. And now you must find the Bow.’
Elissa remembered the vision she’d had when she’d first touched the Arrowhead. She knew the god would have a message for her.
‘Where is it?’ Elissa asked.
‘The Bow lies across the waves.’
Another journey then. Another chance, perhaps to see someone from her own country.
‘You will find it in the ruins of Troy.’ Elissa’s eyes lit up. She saw a worried expression pass over Silvius’s face. ‘Apollo placed it in his temple there, and when Troy fell it was forgotten. Now you must retrieve it. But it must be done by one who is neither Achaean nor Trojan.’
Hermes replaced the Arrow in the quiver, and presented it to Elissa. ‘Silvius carried the Arrowhead. Tisamenos led you to the Shaft. And now, Elissa, it is your turn – to bear the Arrow and find the Bow.’
Elissa held the quiver, trembling, as Silvius and Tisamenos looked on.
The air was suddenly tinged with sweetness, then Hermes was gone; there was only blackness where he had stood, and a lingering scent of wine and honey.
Silk-covered couches lined the walls of Orestes’s inner chamber, which was now lit by dozens of torches whose light gleamed off the surfaces of gold and silver vessels and the bronze armour that stood always at the ready by his dressing table. Elissa had never seen such luxury. The King of Mykenai was resting in a carved wooden chair with a soft cushion behind his back. Electra was next to him, her eyes blank, her gaze steadily but not unkindly on Elissa, her fingers interlaced.
Seated on three smaller chairs in front of Orestes, each inlaid with golden enamel, were Tisamenos, Silvius and Elissa. Elissa had gulped down three tall beakers of cool water, and was now devouring some cured and salted hams, whilst Silvius and Tisamenos regarded each other warily, each picking off bits from a roasted partridge. She finished the ham, and then took a sweet, juicy date from a silver plate.
The delicious taste of the food overwhelmed her, making her forget for a moment about the unaccustomed weight of the quiver on her back and the power of the Arrow it held. An Arrow that had brought down a monster, that had been wielded by a god, that now she, and she alone, was carrying.
Tisamenos had told his father about the stones, and the head of the Last Gorgon, though Elissa felt that he was being evasive about something. And now they were discussing how to reach Troy. She could see that it was difficult for Silvius, that despite all his efforts to pretend it didn’t mean anything to him, it was still his city. As a result, he was being a little possessive.
‘We need to go as quickly as possible,’ Silvius was saying tightly. ‘Just the three of us, so we will be fast. I wonder if the ship nymph would help us?’
‘I think we should wait,’ Tisamenos said. ‘We still don’t really know what this threat is. What if this Python of yours has taken the cities near Troy? Do we have spies there, Father?’
‘We do not, but I have heard nothing from Thessaly.’ Orestes addressed them all now, clearing his throat. ‘I have considered it. My information from Italia was pressing, and it is clear that the Bow must be found. Tomorrow, you must leave immediately. I will send you to Troy with a full crew and in my fastest ship.’
Silvius gave a small nod of satisfaction.
‘We must act with all speed.’
‘Yes, Father,’ Tisamenos answered. But Elissa could tell that he felt his pride was injured.
There was a noise outside, and Electra went to the door to listen, bending her head slightly. Her brows drew together with worry, and, her black garments flapping, she came hurrying back, hands clasped together, fingers twisting. ‘There’s fighting in the kinghouse,’ she said.
‘Impossible! Our guards would have seen anyone approaching.’
‘Then it must have begun inside …’
A servant boy rushed in, the air from the door shifting the tapestries on the walls. He was clearly terrified, his forehead gleaming with sweat. ‘Orestes, my king – it’s the Swallows!’ Elissa saw Tisamenos look up suddenly, part guilty, part fearful. ‘They’re slaughtering us! The guards were not ready – there’s a dozen of them in the main hall, and they’re spreading out into the rest of the kinghouse.’
Slowly Orestes stood up. He went, limping slightly, to where his breastplate and his sword were laid out. His eyes glinted. ‘I will lead the fight.’ He buckled on his breastplate. He turned to his son, whose hand was already grasping his sword.
‘You go now.’
‘But, Father! My place is here with you, helping to defend the kinghouse!’
‘No. This is my kinghouse, my battle. You, all of you, go now, to Nauplion, and ask for my sea captain, Andros. You have the Arrow, and the head of the Last Gorgon, your wits and the favour of Apollo and Hermes. You will succeed in your task, I am sure of it. Go, go now.’
Tisamenos wavered. Then he ran to his father and embraced him tightly.
‘This mission from Apollo. It’s a way to atone for the past,’ he said.
‘Yes, my son,’ answered Orestes. ‘It will heal us all.’
Orestes then gripped Silvius by the shoulder. ‘Son of my enemy,’ he said. ‘The feud between our houses has ended. I call you now Silvius, friend of the Achaeans.’
‘And I accept your friendship.’ Silvius bowed his head formally.
The King of Mykenai turned to Elissa. ‘And you, your part to play is yet to come. Play it well.’
Elissa could not help flinging her arms around the old warrior and burying her face in his neck, as she might have done her own father.
Armed and ready, Orestes hurried away into the fray, a lion defending his pride. Just as he reached the door, Electra called him. ‘Brother – I will fight with you. It is my house too.’ Sister joined brother, and they clasped hands. Elissa noted the steel in her eyes, the strength in the veiny hand that took up a sword. The two of them marched out into the corridors of the kinghouse.
Elissa would be like Electra. She would be strong, too. She would find the Bow, and deliver the world from Python.
Thirty
The Fall of a City
Tisamenos took the lead, bringing the half-Trojan Silvius and the Arrow-bearer Elissa behind him, through the beehive tombs that now seemed full of shadows watching them, and down the winding mountain path.
He pressed onwards in the darkness, down the hill, aware of the ravine to their right, aware that there might be those who meant them harm. ‘Stay close to the side!’ he ordered them, knowing one misstep could be fatal.
All the time he wondered if he should turn back.
They soon reached the plain, and the wide road ahead of them to the port of Nauplion. The sky was tainted with orange, yet it was not the right time for sunrise. Flames were licking all over the kinghouse. Tisamenos stopped, heart pounding.
‘I have to go back,’ he said, and started up the path again.
‘No!’ Silvius called.
‘You have to come with us,’ said Elissa. ‘We need you!’
Torn, Tisamenos heard the cries of battle above, and the kinghouse of his ancestors burning down. If he returned to the citadel, he would fight with honour, but maybe die. If he went with these strangers, he would face unknown dangers.
‘Please!’ Elissa was by him now, her gentle hand on his. ‘The Shaft was kept here for a reason. The Lion of Mykenai will be a great part of this!’
‘What do you mean?’
‘The Sibyl,’ said Elissa. ‘She gave us a prophecy. I don’t understand half of it, but now I know at least some. The dolphin is me. And Silvius is the wolf. Lion, dolphin and wolf – they are the parts of the prophecy that must come together. So you must be the lion.’
Breathing deeply, Tisamenos acknowledged the grave look in her eyes, and he nodded. ‘Then the three beasts that Hero mentioned … she was wrong! They did not foretell my death. The three beasts – it’s us.’ A new resolve came over him. ‘I will come with you.’
The road was hard in the dark, and they tripped and stumbled. ‘It’s not so far,’ Tisamenos was saying. ‘We’ll be there before dawn.’ But it was far, he knew. He had to keep the others going. They had only one water skin between them, and they eked it out, but even so their lips were soon parched.
‘There’ll be water when we get there. The ship will be ready for us, I’m sure of it. We’ll be on our way soon.’ Tisamenos was filled with an energy that came from knowing he was going to live.
When Elissa, missing her footing, stumbled and almost fell, hands reaching instinctively for the quiver on her back, he caught her. She smiled her thanks, clear in the starlight. Silvius, who had been lagging behind a little, gave him a curt nod.
How Tisamenos wished they had stopped to get horses. But there had been no time. Soon he recognised a curve in the road, and knew that they would be approaching Nauplion within an hour or so. They shared out the last of the water. Elissa shifted the strap of the quiver around her neck. It had clearly been weighing on her. Tisamenos offered to carry it, but she refused.
There was a strange brightness in the air, though it did not feel like dawn. They reached the inn where Elissa and Silvius had stayed. Not a light was on in the house.
‘Don’t,’ said Elissa. ‘They tricked us.’
‘But the captain might be in there. They will listen to me, the son of Orestes.’ Tisamenos banged on the door, but nobody stirred within.
Undaunted, Tisamenos led the way down to the shore.
And now he understood the lightness in the sky. Ranged in front of them were six ships. The sea was scarlet, burnished by the flames that licked all over them as they lay at anchor.
Somebody had set fire to them all.
It was hard for Tisamenos not to collapse – torn, bleeding, thirsty – and sink to his knees.
Hero. Hero and the Swallows, all this time, had been wanting to destroy him and his family.
She had betrayed him. She had simply used him to get rid of Erigone, and then had attacked when she knew that he and Orestes would be occupied. And now his city was burning.
His father was probably dead.
‘What can we do?’ They were all covered in sweat and soot. Silvius coughed as a plume of smoke passed over them. Crumpling to the shore, Elissa cradled the quiver in her lap. A mast toppled into the sea, blazing.
‘The ship nymph can’t help us now – she’s gone home.’ Elissa held her hands together as if in prayer. ‘And I am glad that she did. She would have been killed if she’d stayed.’
‘We’ll have to go by land, reach another port …’ This journey was the only thing left for Tisamenos. He had broken the curse of his House, but now it was destroyed.
He couldn’t show his emotions to the others, though. He had to keep going. ‘We can find horses, somewhere. There must be some.’ He picked up the Last Gorgon’s head, and turned away from the flames. ‘We must get as far away as possible. The Swallows may still have spies here.’
He hadn’t, in the end, been able to save his blood family. But he would help Silvius and Elissa.
‘Let’s get off the shore. It will be cooler.’ He took them behind the rocks, and gasping, they pressed on, limping, woozy, leaning on each other. ‘We’ll make our way round the bay until we have to stop. Then we’ll rest somewhere high up, and in the morning we can go on.’
This time he walked in between the two, sometimes helping them, sometimes exhorting them onwards.
Climbing up the hill was the worst. A path made for sure-footed shepherds was only just visible in the starlight. There might be wolves or bears out on the hunt. Silvius slipped once, and almost seemed to lose consciousness, but Elissa pulled him upwards. Tisamenos slung Silvius’s arm around his shoulder, and helped the boy to stumble on.
It seemed to take an eternity, step by faltering step, but eventually they were at the top of the hill, and the breeze was cool and fresh. Tisamenos placed Silvius gently down. Elissa, too, looked drained. ‘We’ll stop here. There’s shelter, and a spring.’
The first thing Tisamenos did was bring a helmet-full of water to Silvius’s lips. Silvius sputtered awake and went to kneel by the stream, drinking deeply.
There was a hollow under the brow of the hill which was not quite a cave, but large enough to accommodate all three of them. Tisamenos threw a rock into it to scare out anything that might be using it as a home. Nothing emerged, except a tiny lizard, which skittered away.
‘We’ll sleep now.’ Gratefully Elissa and Silvius crept into its protection and lay down, slumbering almost immediately.
Tisamenos, just outside the cave, did not. His body was aching and he had a stiff neck, and he was hungry. His thoughts ran over the same patterns, again and again, and he hurled a stone away down the mountainside in silent rage.
Just after dawn, the sun was pushing itself up from the lip of the sea. The other two were still asleep, and he felt a stab of unaccustomed envy when he saw that Elissa’s arm was draped over Silvius.
He stumbled away, blearily, to relieve his bladder behind an outcrop, and then went to drink from the stream.
A thin plume of black smoke was rising from the citadel of Mykenai. The whole kinghouse might have been destroyed. The cruel head of the Last Gorgon rubbed against his skin through the sacking, and he felt a sudden revulsion. What had he won it for?
A cough made him turn round. Silvius was behind him, black hair lank.
‘I give you thanks,’ said the half-Trojan, in that formal way he had; so stiff and yet so unpractised, like a rustic trying to be polite. ‘You didn’t have to help us.’
‘I should be there.’ Tisamenos indicated the citadel.
‘I left my city too,’ said Silvius. ‘I left my father, my mother, my little brother. But this mission is from Apollo himself.’
‘If Mykenai is weak, the other cities will hear of it. One of them is probably already mustering an army – Argos most likely. It was always a better positioned city.’
Silvius took hold of Tisamenos’s arm. ‘Python’s danger is real, and more terrible than any army from Argos. I’ve seen it. I’ve seen the people Python controls. They’re terrifying – unstoppable. They might even have destroyed my own city.’
‘We must go to Troy to find the Bow.’ Elissa joined them, the quiver on her back. ‘My people are near there. It is all meant to happen. An Achaean, a Trojan, a Carthaginian – lion, wolf, dolphin. It makes sense, doesn’t it? We don’t know what we have to do yet, but it’s us three who have to do it.’
‘The children of enemies, seeking to make a greater peace …’ Silvius paused.
Trembling, the son of Orestes gazed across at the burning citadel. They were right: Apollo’s mission was a greater one. That had been what his actions were for. The cleansing of his house so that he could join in this deed for the god.
Clenching his fists, Tisamenos turned to face them, and he was matter of fact once more. ‘And how in the name of the Skyfather do we get there? Over land is thousands of miles.’
‘If only we could fly,’ Elissa said, thoughtfully, watching the buzzard. ‘How did Hero move us with those feathers?’
‘Spells. Some terrible dark spell. I don’t trust that kind of thing.’ Tisamenos frowned.
There was a rumbling sound, like rocks falling, and he placed his mutilated hand with its stone stump on the ground. His face wrinkled in concentration as he struggled to understand the harsh speech of the rocks. They were trying to warn him of something, some gathering darkness.
His anger was too loud; he could not make out what they were saying. There was only the hissing and clattering of thousands of harsh tongues.
Watch out, one said. Watch out. From the Nine Rivers. Darkness. World. Watch out. Under.
It was too late.
He saw that something was coming out of the hollow where the others had slept, something shadowy and huge.
It crawled out into the light and unfurled, pulling itself into an upright position so that it looked like a very tall man wrapped in a billowing black cloak. It seemed to flicker in and out of existence like a candle, and had a long white face, with black glowing spheres for eyes.
Looking like an ordinary wooden thing, feathered by an expert fletcher, yet thrumming with divine power, was the other half of Apollo’s arrow.
Elissa’s heart quickened. The king held out his hand, but Silvius shook his head. ‘No. I will place it back with the Shaft.’
There was a perceptible shift in the air as the two caskets were positioned next to each other, and a glowing arc of white light sprang from one to the other.
Elissa sensed another presence in the room, a joyous one which charged the atmosphere.
There, lit by the whiteness, apparently as yet unseen by the others, was the god Hermes.
He had slipped into her sight in the curious way that gods had, as if he had always been there but she just hadn’t noticed, with his warm smile and glossy black, curly hair. He was eating an apple rather studiedly, a quiver slung over his shoulder. The god swallowed the last bite of the apple, nodded mock gravely to Elissa and tossed away the core.
‘My lord Hermes!’ Orestes had seen him, and now the others were aware of him, his bright essence lighting up the clammy chamber. Silvius bowed his head, whilst Tisamenos gazed in wonder.
The god, without seeming to move through space, was now bending over the Arrowhead and the Shaft. ‘Such power,’ he murmured. Tenderly he lifted up the Arrowhead’s casket. Silvius flinched as he opened the lid. But of course Hermes did not ask for destruction, and instead stroked it with his finger.
‘A pretty thing.’ Hermes toyed with the Arrowhead, turning it up and down, admiring the sheen of colours rippling over it. ‘And now, I bring together what has been separated.’
Elissa felt a surge of Apollo’s clarity. She grabbed Silvius by the hand, and saw his face was lit with joy. Tisamenos was kneeling, and Orestes, awed by the presence of the god who had absolved him, was prostrate on the ground.
‘The Arrow of Apollo!’ Hermes called, voice ringing and echoing through the chamber. ‘The weapon that will lay Python low once more. Tisamenos, son of Orestes; Silvius, son of Aeneas. You have brought them together. And now you must find the Bow.’
Elissa remembered the vision she’d had when she’d first touched the Arrowhead. She knew the god would have a message for her.
‘Where is it?’ Elissa asked.
‘The Bow lies across the waves.’
Another journey then. Another chance, perhaps to see someone from her own country.
‘You will find it in the ruins of Troy.’ Elissa’s eyes lit up. She saw a worried expression pass over Silvius’s face. ‘Apollo placed it in his temple there, and when Troy fell it was forgotten. Now you must retrieve it. But it must be done by one who is neither Achaean nor Trojan.’
Hermes replaced the Arrow in the quiver, and presented it to Elissa. ‘Silvius carried the Arrowhead. Tisamenos led you to the Shaft. And now, Elissa, it is your turn – to bear the Arrow and find the Bow.’
Elissa held the quiver, trembling, as Silvius and Tisamenos looked on.
The air was suddenly tinged with sweetness, then Hermes was gone; there was only blackness where he had stood, and a lingering scent of wine and honey.
Silk-covered couches lined the walls of Orestes’s inner chamber, which was now lit by dozens of torches whose light gleamed off the surfaces of gold and silver vessels and the bronze armour that stood always at the ready by his dressing table. Elissa had never seen such luxury. The King of Mykenai was resting in a carved wooden chair with a soft cushion behind his back. Electra was next to him, her eyes blank, her gaze steadily but not unkindly on Elissa, her fingers interlaced.
Seated on three smaller chairs in front of Orestes, each inlaid with golden enamel, were Tisamenos, Silvius and Elissa. Elissa had gulped down three tall beakers of cool water, and was now devouring some cured and salted hams, whilst Silvius and Tisamenos regarded each other warily, each picking off bits from a roasted partridge. She finished the ham, and then took a sweet, juicy date from a silver plate.
The delicious taste of the food overwhelmed her, making her forget for a moment about the unaccustomed weight of the quiver on her back and the power of the Arrow it held. An Arrow that had brought down a monster, that had been wielded by a god, that now she, and she alone, was carrying.
Tisamenos had told his father about the stones, and the head of the Last Gorgon, though Elissa felt that he was being evasive about something. And now they were discussing how to reach Troy. She could see that it was difficult for Silvius, that despite all his efforts to pretend it didn’t mean anything to him, it was still his city. As a result, he was being a little possessive.
‘We need to go as quickly as possible,’ Silvius was saying tightly. ‘Just the three of us, so we will be fast. I wonder if the ship nymph would help us?’
‘I think we should wait,’ Tisamenos said. ‘We still don’t really know what this threat is. What if this Python of yours has taken the cities near Troy? Do we have spies there, Father?’
‘We do not, but I have heard nothing from Thessaly.’ Orestes addressed them all now, clearing his throat. ‘I have considered it. My information from Italia was pressing, and it is clear that the Bow must be found. Tomorrow, you must leave immediately. I will send you to Troy with a full crew and in my fastest ship.’
Silvius gave a small nod of satisfaction.
‘We must act with all speed.’
‘Yes, Father,’ Tisamenos answered. But Elissa could tell that he felt his pride was injured.
There was a noise outside, and Electra went to the door to listen, bending her head slightly. Her brows drew together with worry, and, her black garments flapping, she came hurrying back, hands clasped together, fingers twisting. ‘There’s fighting in the kinghouse,’ she said.
‘Impossible! Our guards would have seen anyone approaching.’
‘Then it must have begun inside …’
A servant boy rushed in, the air from the door shifting the tapestries on the walls. He was clearly terrified, his forehead gleaming with sweat. ‘Orestes, my king – it’s the Swallows!’ Elissa saw Tisamenos look up suddenly, part guilty, part fearful. ‘They’re slaughtering us! The guards were not ready – there’s a dozen of them in the main hall, and they’re spreading out into the rest of the kinghouse.’
Slowly Orestes stood up. He went, limping slightly, to where his breastplate and his sword were laid out. His eyes glinted. ‘I will lead the fight.’ He buckled on his breastplate. He turned to his son, whose hand was already grasping his sword.
‘You go now.’
‘But, Father! My place is here with you, helping to defend the kinghouse!’
‘No. This is my kinghouse, my battle. You, all of you, go now, to Nauplion, and ask for my sea captain, Andros. You have the Arrow, and the head of the Last Gorgon, your wits and the favour of Apollo and Hermes. You will succeed in your task, I am sure of it. Go, go now.’
Tisamenos wavered. Then he ran to his father and embraced him tightly.
‘This mission from Apollo. It’s a way to atone for the past,’ he said.
‘Yes, my son,’ answered Orestes. ‘It will heal us all.’
Orestes then gripped Silvius by the shoulder. ‘Son of my enemy,’ he said. ‘The feud between our houses has ended. I call you now Silvius, friend of the Achaeans.’
‘And I accept your friendship.’ Silvius bowed his head formally.
The King of Mykenai turned to Elissa. ‘And you, your part to play is yet to come. Play it well.’
Elissa could not help flinging her arms around the old warrior and burying her face in his neck, as she might have done her own father.
Armed and ready, Orestes hurried away into the fray, a lion defending his pride. Just as he reached the door, Electra called him. ‘Brother – I will fight with you. It is my house too.’ Sister joined brother, and they clasped hands. Elissa noted the steel in her eyes, the strength in the veiny hand that took up a sword. The two of them marched out into the corridors of the kinghouse.
Elissa would be like Electra. She would be strong, too. She would find the Bow, and deliver the world from Python.
Thirty
The Fall of a City
Tisamenos took the lead, bringing the half-Trojan Silvius and the Arrow-bearer Elissa behind him, through the beehive tombs that now seemed full of shadows watching them, and down the winding mountain path.
He pressed onwards in the darkness, down the hill, aware of the ravine to their right, aware that there might be those who meant them harm. ‘Stay close to the side!’ he ordered them, knowing one misstep could be fatal.
All the time he wondered if he should turn back.
They soon reached the plain, and the wide road ahead of them to the port of Nauplion. The sky was tainted with orange, yet it was not the right time for sunrise. Flames were licking all over the kinghouse. Tisamenos stopped, heart pounding.
‘I have to go back,’ he said, and started up the path again.
‘No!’ Silvius called.
‘You have to come with us,’ said Elissa. ‘We need you!’
Torn, Tisamenos heard the cries of battle above, and the kinghouse of his ancestors burning down. If he returned to the citadel, he would fight with honour, but maybe die. If he went with these strangers, he would face unknown dangers.
‘Please!’ Elissa was by him now, her gentle hand on his. ‘The Shaft was kept here for a reason. The Lion of Mykenai will be a great part of this!’
‘What do you mean?’
‘The Sibyl,’ said Elissa. ‘She gave us a prophecy. I don’t understand half of it, but now I know at least some. The dolphin is me. And Silvius is the wolf. Lion, dolphin and wolf – they are the parts of the prophecy that must come together. So you must be the lion.’
Breathing deeply, Tisamenos acknowledged the grave look in her eyes, and he nodded. ‘Then the three beasts that Hero mentioned … she was wrong! They did not foretell my death. The three beasts – it’s us.’ A new resolve came over him. ‘I will come with you.’
The road was hard in the dark, and they tripped and stumbled. ‘It’s not so far,’ Tisamenos was saying. ‘We’ll be there before dawn.’ But it was far, he knew. He had to keep the others going. They had only one water skin between them, and they eked it out, but even so their lips were soon parched.
‘There’ll be water when we get there. The ship will be ready for us, I’m sure of it. We’ll be on our way soon.’ Tisamenos was filled with an energy that came from knowing he was going to live.
When Elissa, missing her footing, stumbled and almost fell, hands reaching instinctively for the quiver on her back, he caught her. She smiled her thanks, clear in the starlight. Silvius, who had been lagging behind a little, gave him a curt nod.
How Tisamenos wished they had stopped to get horses. But there had been no time. Soon he recognised a curve in the road, and knew that they would be approaching Nauplion within an hour or so. They shared out the last of the water. Elissa shifted the strap of the quiver around her neck. It had clearly been weighing on her. Tisamenos offered to carry it, but she refused.
There was a strange brightness in the air, though it did not feel like dawn. They reached the inn where Elissa and Silvius had stayed. Not a light was on in the house.
‘Don’t,’ said Elissa. ‘They tricked us.’
‘But the captain might be in there. They will listen to me, the son of Orestes.’ Tisamenos banged on the door, but nobody stirred within.
Undaunted, Tisamenos led the way down to the shore.
And now he understood the lightness in the sky. Ranged in front of them were six ships. The sea was scarlet, burnished by the flames that licked all over them as they lay at anchor.
Somebody had set fire to them all.
It was hard for Tisamenos not to collapse – torn, bleeding, thirsty – and sink to his knees.
Hero. Hero and the Swallows, all this time, had been wanting to destroy him and his family.
She had betrayed him. She had simply used him to get rid of Erigone, and then had attacked when she knew that he and Orestes would be occupied. And now his city was burning.
His father was probably dead.
‘What can we do?’ They were all covered in sweat and soot. Silvius coughed as a plume of smoke passed over them. Crumpling to the shore, Elissa cradled the quiver in her lap. A mast toppled into the sea, blazing.
‘The ship nymph can’t help us now – she’s gone home.’ Elissa held her hands together as if in prayer. ‘And I am glad that she did. She would have been killed if she’d stayed.’
‘We’ll have to go by land, reach another port …’ This journey was the only thing left for Tisamenos. He had broken the curse of his House, but now it was destroyed.
He couldn’t show his emotions to the others, though. He had to keep going. ‘We can find horses, somewhere. There must be some.’ He picked up the Last Gorgon’s head, and turned away from the flames. ‘We must get as far away as possible. The Swallows may still have spies here.’
He hadn’t, in the end, been able to save his blood family. But he would help Silvius and Elissa.
‘Let’s get off the shore. It will be cooler.’ He took them behind the rocks, and gasping, they pressed on, limping, woozy, leaning on each other. ‘We’ll make our way round the bay until we have to stop. Then we’ll rest somewhere high up, and in the morning we can go on.’
This time he walked in between the two, sometimes helping them, sometimes exhorting them onwards.
Climbing up the hill was the worst. A path made for sure-footed shepherds was only just visible in the starlight. There might be wolves or bears out on the hunt. Silvius slipped once, and almost seemed to lose consciousness, but Elissa pulled him upwards. Tisamenos slung Silvius’s arm around his shoulder, and helped the boy to stumble on.
It seemed to take an eternity, step by faltering step, but eventually they were at the top of the hill, and the breeze was cool and fresh. Tisamenos placed Silvius gently down. Elissa, too, looked drained. ‘We’ll stop here. There’s shelter, and a spring.’
The first thing Tisamenos did was bring a helmet-full of water to Silvius’s lips. Silvius sputtered awake and went to kneel by the stream, drinking deeply.
There was a hollow under the brow of the hill which was not quite a cave, but large enough to accommodate all three of them. Tisamenos threw a rock into it to scare out anything that might be using it as a home. Nothing emerged, except a tiny lizard, which skittered away.
‘We’ll sleep now.’ Gratefully Elissa and Silvius crept into its protection and lay down, slumbering almost immediately.
Tisamenos, just outside the cave, did not. His body was aching and he had a stiff neck, and he was hungry. His thoughts ran over the same patterns, again and again, and he hurled a stone away down the mountainside in silent rage.
Just after dawn, the sun was pushing itself up from the lip of the sea. The other two were still asleep, and he felt a stab of unaccustomed envy when he saw that Elissa’s arm was draped over Silvius.
He stumbled away, blearily, to relieve his bladder behind an outcrop, and then went to drink from the stream.
A thin plume of black smoke was rising from the citadel of Mykenai. The whole kinghouse might have been destroyed. The cruel head of the Last Gorgon rubbed against his skin through the sacking, and he felt a sudden revulsion. What had he won it for?
A cough made him turn round. Silvius was behind him, black hair lank.
‘I give you thanks,’ said the half-Trojan, in that formal way he had; so stiff and yet so unpractised, like a rustic trying to be polite. ‘You didn’t have to help us.’
‘I should be there.’ Tisamenos indicated the citadel.
‘I left my city too,’ said Silvius. ‘I left my father, my mother, my little brother. But this mission is from Apollo himself.’
‘If Mykenai is weak, the other cities will hear of it. One of them is probably already mustering an army – Argos most likely. It was always a better positioned city.’
Silvius took hold of Tisamenos’s arm. ‘Python’s danger is real, and more terrible than any army from Argos. I’ve seen it. I’ve seen the people Python controls. They’re terrifying – unstoppable. They might even have destroyed my own city.’
‘We must go to Troy to find the Bow.’ Elissa joined them, the quiver on her back. ‘My people are near there. It is all meant to happen. An Achaean, a Trojan, a Carthaginian – lion, wolf, dolphin. It makes sense, doesn’t it? We don’t know what we have to do yet, but it’s us three who have to do it.’
‘The children of enemies, seeking to make a greater peace …’ Silvius paused.
Trembling, the son of Orestes gazed across at the burning citadel. They were right: Apollo’s mission was a greater one. That had been what his actions were for. The cleansing of his house so that he could join in this deed for the god.
Clenching his fists, Tisamenos turned to face them, and he was matter of fact once more. ‘And how in the name of the Skyfather do we get there? Over land is thousands of miles.’
‘If only we could fly,’ Elissa said, thoughtfully, watching the buzzard. ‘How did Hero move us with those feathers?’
‘Spells. Some terrible dark spell. I don’t trust that kind of thing.’ Tisamenos frowned.
There was a rumbling sound, like rocks falling, and he placed his mutilated hand with its stone stump on the ground. His face wrinkled in concentration as he struggled to understand the harsh speech of the rocks. They were trying to warn him of something, some gathering darkness.
His anger was too loud; he could not make out what they were saying. There was only the hissing and clattering of thousands of harsh tongues.
Watch out, one said. Watch out. From the Nine Rivers. Darkness. World. Watch out. Under.
It was too late.
He saw that something was coming out of the hollow where the others had slept, something shadowy and huge.
It crawled out into the light and unfurled, pulling itself into an upright position so that it looked like a very tall man wrapped in a billowing black cloak. It seemed to flicker in and out of existence like a candle, and had a long white face, with black glowing spheres for eyes.
