Oracle's War

by Oracle's War (retail) (epub)

  ‘…and bloody Apollo is getting his fingers into everything these days,’ she’s saying.

  Last year, at the so-called Judgement of Parassi, Apollo was toadying around Zeus, and now his worshippers are here on Delos in large numbers, acting as though they own the place. I don’t like it, and neither does Bria.

  ‘I’m going up to the shrine to see what I can find out,’ says Bria. ‘I’ve been among Artemis priestesses before – I know the sacred words well enough to pass myself off.’

  ‘Is it safe?’ I ask.

  ‘Oh, Ithaca, are you worried for me? That’s so sweet,’ she coos mockingly. ‘I’ll be fine, provided I stay out of the way of any theioi in there.’ She looks me up and down appraisingly. ‘Why don’t you mingle with this lot and see what you can pick up? Dionysus’s maenads tend to be very evangelical, especially when they’re pissed.’

  I nod dutifully, but my heart is racing at the thought that Kyshanda might be here. But logically, if she’s here, she’ll be at the shrine. I struggle to think of a reason why a bodyguard should accompany Bria into the sanctuary, and fail. Resigned, I peer at those wild-looking young women doubtfully. ‘I’m not sure they’re going to tell me much that’s of any use…’

  ‘Tush, Ithaca. Too many objections. Meet me back here at sunset, and we’ll compare notes.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘Go on, Ithaca,’ she urges, her eyes full of mischief. ‘It may look licentious, but these girls are supposed to be seeking ecstatic insight through dance, not trying to get ploughed. Your virtue’s probably in more danger from the Apollo lads – they’re not nearly so strict on the whole virginity thing.’

  ‘That’s not at all reassuring.’

  ‘What, scared you’re not so masculine as you think? I’m shocked.’ She snickers evilly. ‘Off you go. Get the lay of the land, or just get laid – it’s up to you.’

  * * *

  Six hours later, and I’m behaving as though I’ve downed a whole wineskin. Actually, perhaps I have: despite my best intentions, I’m a little drunk. And it’s still only midday. I’ve lost my shoes, my tunic’s ripped and I’m arm in arm with an Attican youth called Crios on one side and a maenad from Sparta called Meli-something or other. I’m wearing an ivy crown and my cheeks and chest are dabbled with white face paint, streaked by sweat and spilled wine. We’re laughing wildly at the smallest thing, and we’re absolutely the best friends in the world. The town resounds with bad music, random dancing, laughter and latent debauchery.

  Despite the wine, I’m feeling increasingly uneasy – there’s an undercurrent of danger and disruption here that more than puzzles me. If this isn’t yet a bacchanal, it’s well on the way, but I’m getting nowhere in terms of collecting information about the new oracle. I’ve heard the tale of Leto and Zeus a dozen times already – all about her tragic and romantic flight from ‘evil Hera’, until Leto comes to the sanctuary of Delos. There are wandering tale-spinners and novice priests spreading it avidly, and the young drunkards I’m with are lapping it up like the wine.

  We crash into another group, wild-haired girls and drunken men, mostly eastern as far as I can see. While my head spins, I try to steer the conversation towards the realms of the inexplicable…

  ‘I once got attacked by a magical boar,’ I babble at Meli-thingy. ‘I’ve still got the scars on my thigh.’

  She takes that as an invitation to try and haul up my kilt to look, which was not my intention, but she can’t hold a thought for longer than six seconds – in moments she’s crying over a house pet that died when she was twelve, and Crios hugs her and they both cry.

  I go to hug them too, trip over someone’s flailing foot and crash to the ground, a pratfall that in that moment is the most profoundly funny thing that’s ever happened to me. Laughing helplessly, I’m hauled upright and we’re off again, holding each other up as the wineskin goes round once more, amidst a swirl of faces and laughter and sunlight and kisses and chanting and noise-noise-noise. We’re in a grove with the sun glancing down through the leaves and it’s amazingly pretty, vivid colours that blur as I twirl and twist with my new best friends Geno and Toma. But then I remember Crios and Meli-whatever, and go looking for them, calling their names into the chaos and getting no reply.

  A girl takes my hand and swings me around, then another and another and I’m suddenly in a circle of them, all beautiful in their laughter and carefree grace, weaving through the simple lines of a dance, singing about trees and hunting and life and cycles and circles and birth and regrowth. Still clumsy with wine, I lurch against a buxom girl with honey-coloured hair and bared breasts. She kisses me, her mouth sweet with grape and wine, then laughs and pushes me off and goes on to the next man.

  I suddenly need to breathe. I find my way to a low stone bench and slump onto it beside two drunken boys who seem far more interested in each other than the half-naked women gliding by. I hear rhythmic grunting and gasps behind me and turn to find Crios and Meli tangled about each other, tunics hoisted up round their waists and her thighs wrapped around his hips. She sees me and pokes her tongue out, then a moment of rapture takes her and she’s lost in the moment.

  I look away, consumed by a raw mix of embarrassment and unfocused desire, trying to gather my wits. Then another girl pulls me to my feet, a lovely girl with tumbling black hair half covering her face, whose narrow, equine features remind me of… No, it can’t possibly be her, not in this swirling, orgiastic riot… but we dance, holding hands and spinning and spinning then tumbling together into the sun-bathed sward at the side of the glade. We roll against each other and then she’s all over me, clasping my shoulder, stroking my thighs and hips, and kissing me passionately.

  Her taste and the texture of her lips are intoxicatingly familiar and my eyes go wide. ‘Kyshanda?’

  The Princess of Troy grins crookedly, the most bewitching smile I’ve ever seen. ‘Hello, Odysseus.’

  We stare at each other, while my mind absolutely reels. ‘How did you recognize me?’ I ask, suddenly, startlingly sober.

  ‘Because I’ve been thinking about you all year,’ she tells me, making my heart ignite. ‘Hair dye, face paint… I saw through it all in an instant.’ She gives me a look and adds, ‘Took you long enough to recognize me, though.’

  ‘Er, that was the wine,’ I tell her, staring into her beguiling eyes. ‘I was wanting desperately for you to be here on Delos, but I thought you’d be up at the shrine. Why are you down here, with all these…?’

  ‘I could ask you the same,’ she says, in her darkly eastern voice, before looking around sharply. ‘Come on, let’s go. I know a place.’

  She leads me by the hand up the slope a small distance, where the people are fewer – though those that are here are doing much more than just dance. So much for Bria’s comment about maenads not being interested in sex. I blush despite myself, as I glimpse more than a dozen naked couples of all ages and either sex – bodies entwined and moving. This wildness is nothing to do with prim, virginal Artemis – there’s a primal lust in the air you can taste.

  Kyshanda takes me out of the noonday sun into a shaded nook, a stone bench beside a well, and sits facing me. For a moment we study each other, my head clearer than it has been for hours.

  The last time I saw her was a year ago: first in Pytho at the oracle’s shrine, and then later on a journey into the dark Underworld of Erebus. She’s my age or a little less, highly intelligent, vivacious and with an otherworldly air to her, full of light and dark, of mystery and danger.

  As the eldest daughter of Achaea’s greatest foe, King Piri-Yamu of Troy, she should be my enemy. But there’s a strong, instinctive connection between us; consuming me as I hope it consumes her, though heaven knows I’ve tried to resist it.

  The past year has only enhanced her otherness. It’s not surprising – when we parted, she’d just pledged to spend a season in service to Persephone, the consort of Hades, God of Death. The Queen of the Underworld straddles the threshold of sanity and m
adness, life and death, and sensing the seeds of these very elements in Kyshanda’s own personality, I have feared for her ever since. The signs aren’t obvious but there’s a brittle gaiety in her eyes, and her mouth has an almost leeching hunger to it, as if she wants to swallow me.

  What she sees in me, I’m not sure. Hopefully strength, intelligence, wit, loyalty and purpose. Someone she can trust. We’ve had little time together to share our thoughts, but from what I’ve glimpsed she, like I, desires to live in a world of peace, a vision at odds with her father’s wish to conquer the Aegean.

  She taps my chest. ‘You first,’ she says coyly. ‘Why are you here?’

  I could lie, but I don’t want to. ‘Athena heard of the new prophecy and wants to know about it.’

  Kyshanda strokes my face. ‘Then we’re here for the same reason.’

  ‘What’s that? You don’t serve Athena.’

  ‘For knowledge, silly.’ She clasps the back of my neck and kisses me again, more tentatively.

  I respond in kind, then pull back. ‘I don’t suppose you can tell me anything about it?’

  Her expression saddens a little. ‘Not really. But you need to be careful, my friend. My brother Skaya-Mandu is here as well, and you know he doesn’t like you. And there are others – spies from Mycenae and Athens and Sparta and all your other Achaean kings.’

  ‘And Troy,’ I say, tweaking her nose gently.

  ‘Ah, but we have the inside run,’ she says, using a chariot-racing phrase. ‘Persephone has used my service to strengthen her ties to Kamrusepa, my patron. Apaliunas – your Apollo – has brought his Trojan cult west and engaged with Dionysus’s maenads, using them as a bridge to infiltrate the Caryatids and bind the worship of Artemis to his own. Persephone too has engaged with the maenads, which is why I’m here. Tonight Skaya and I dine with the high priestess of Delos. We’re hoping to get permission to bring in priestesses of Leto from Kos and Lesbos – Leto’s a much nicer goddess than Hera,’ she says lightly. ‘She does what she’s told.’

  She says that with an air of mild contempt – she’s an initiate of Kamrusepa, their Goddess of Magic and Mystery, akin to our own Hecate.

  What she’s just told me confirms my earlier unease. This is a bridgehead into Achaea. ‘Then I’ll expect a full report in the morning,’ I say – only half joking.

  She laughs aloud, her glorious eyes shining with delight. ‘I adore a witty man,’ she tells me, making me glow, despite the fact that she’s just refused my request. We kiss again, longer this time, and I sense she doesn’t want more talk, not when our religion and politics could so easily divide us.

  And it’s not as though I haven’t dreamt of this very moment…

  We sink from the bench and into the lush grass that surrounds the well, shedding clothes, delighting in the revelation of skin. She’s thinner than when I last saw her, but her breasts remain full and high, dark aureoles each crowned by a brown cherry that aches to be suckled. Her hand grasps me and we slowly descend into the joy of giving, taking, desire and surrender.

  It’s the most beautiful afternoon of my life.

  * * *

  The sun is about to set – the western sky is darkening into a crimson glow, painting the scattered clouds in red and gold. Kyshanda sighs against my chest. The festivities have either ended or drifted on from where we lie – likely to the taverns in the port – and we should be going too, but neither wishes to let this moment end.

  She wasn’t a virgin, but then neither was I. I don’t ask. Given what I’ve just seen among those caught up in this Eastern religious ecstasy, her maidenhead was likely taken in a moment of revelry. I don’t care.

  I love her.

  Of course I can’t say that, but I think she knows.

  As for her feelings, I just can’t tell, though normally I’m good at reading people. But she’s quicksilver, she’s moonlight, she’s a zephyr breeze. She wants me for now though, and that’s more than enough.

  ‘A secret for a secret?’ I offer.

  She looks up at me lazily. ‘We’ve not much time left – are you sure you wouldn’t rather…’

  ‘I’m exhausted!’ I tell her, though my shaft thickens at the mere thought and we both giggle.

  She sighs happily. ‘I am too, in truth. And I have to be in the temple for their sunset song.’ She sits up, her lips inches from my face. ‘Very well. You first.’

  I consider, prioritising. ‘I came here hoping to find a man named Ophion. He’s maybe sixty, grey-haired, somewhat effeminate. I’ve seen a letter in which his son or daughter urged him to come to Delos, but I don’t know if he’s here or not.’

  Her brow wrinkles. ‘What’s your interest in him?’

  ‘He used sorcery to ruin my sister’s wedding, destroy the man she loves and wanted to marry, and force her to wed someone she detests.’ My voice sharpens with anger as I recite his crimes. ‘He’s wrecked my sister’s life.’

  Kyshanda’s face is guarded – sympathetic but assessing. ‘Why do you think this Ophion singled her out? What’s important about her?’

  ‘I don’t know. She’s not a theia, not god-touched as I am. My mother is descended from Hermes, but that was too many generations ago and the bloodline has run its course. And Ctimene’s intended husband was no one special.’ That’s not quite true, but I’m wary of saying more. Kyshanda’s mention of the Caryatids earlier today has rekindled my suspicion that they may indeed supply a missing link between Maeus and Ophion, but that can wait. ‘Your turn.’

  Kyshanda frowns prettily. ‘You know the prophecies that say my father’s kingdom will dominate the Aegean? We’ll soon rule the whole of Scythia, Thrace and Achaea, you know. All the prophecies agree.’

  ‘Of course,’ I say, distanced by her self-assurance. Despite her protestations of friendship, she’s excited by the prospect, but it chills me. Can she truly believe all this can be achieved peacefully? Whatever fantasy she holds to, vassal kingdoms are exploited, pillaged, drained. They wither and die. ‘That’s old news,’ I add, hiding my dismay.

  ‘Yes…’ She considers, her eyes hinting at troubled thoughts. ‘We’re all here because this spontaneous prophecy raises… questions…’

  My heart leaps. ‘What questions? Are you saying there’s some doubt?’

  Her face relaxes into a smile. ‘I’m sure it’s just a matter of interpretation.’ She strokes my cheek. ‘Come to Troy, lover. Charm my father and mother, and a place will be found for you.’

  Lover… Did she really call me that? Dear Gods, it’s tempting. And perhaps in doing so, I might be the salvation of Achaea, not a traitor, working from the inside to soften Troy’s policies, persuade them to treat us more as equals…

  But perhaps instead I’ll be neutralized and extinguished, after abandoning my own people…

  And besides: ‘I’ll only arrive in time to see you married off to a Hittite prince, won’t I?’

  ‘That’s not so certain,’ she replies, lowering her voice. ‘The Hittites are stalling and so are we. They have their own issues, and Father’s concerned about being drawn into their dynastic squabbles.’

  For a brief moment, I visualize myself as an eastern prince, seated beside her wearing fine silks and drinking sweet Anatolian wine under brilliant azure skies, in a palace that dwarfs even Mycenae.

  But I’m from Ithaca, and she’s the glittering gem on a great king’s crown. I can’t see that dream ever becoming reality. And if my fantasy doesn’t work out the way I would hope, I’d be paying for a place in her bed with everything else that’s dear to me…

  ‘I’ll come one day,’ I tell her. ‘I swear. I promised you that last year and I’ll hold to it. But not while Troy threatens my homeland. It’s impossible.’

  She pouts, then turns her grimace into a crooked smile. ‘I know, I know. I’m sorry.’ She kisses me again. ‘Be careful here, Odysseus. Ophion is dangerous.’

  ‘So you do know him?’

  ‘Of course.’ She strokes my chest. ‘He’s Ti
resias of Thebes, and he’s here with his daughter Manto.’ She pulls a rueful face. ‘I shouldn’t be telling you such things, but I don’t want you to underestimate your enemies. Tiresias has fought in the War of the Gods for a long time now. You must be careful.’

  Tiresias… The tales say he’s a great prophet and sorcerer, pledged to Zeus and an enemy of Hera. I’ve heard he spent years as a woman, and bore his own daughter Manto, but I’d never thought those tales true. ‘It’s said that Thebes is impregnable, and will never fall,’ I muse, watching her reaction. ‘Agamemnon himself fears their power.’

  ‘He’s right to. You’re far from the only ones taking an interest in this rogue prophecy, Odysseus, but you won’t be permitted to get close to the new prophetess. She’s being very closely guarded. Best to leave while you still can.’

  ‘You know I can’t do that. Athena’s not keen on failure.’

  ‘Then be very careful indeed. Try if you must, but be subtle and cautious, and don’t get caught. My brother Skaya-Mandu has sworn he’ll kill you himself.’

  ‘I’m not afraid of him.’

  ‘You should be,’ she says in a fretting voice. She looks into my eyes, sighing softly. ‘This afternoon has been a dream brought to life, Odysseus. I thought about you all the time when I was with Persephone – your memory kept me sane and whole. But all dreams end, and we must wake.’

  There’s time for one last, longing joining of our mouths, then she’s sliding her tunic over her lithe, lovely body, and wrapping herself anew in cypress and ivy. I watch her, aching to call her back even as she glides away across the now empty hillside, turning once to blow me a kiss.

  And then she’s gone. I lie back in the crushed grass, trying to recapture the feel of her against me, around me, the smell of her skin, the beauty of her eyes and her hair and her body, clinging to the lingering taste of warm, sensual memory.