“The sort that even I dare not name,” she replied.
The remainder of the evening was spent searching for missing Telarchos. Ultimately they found him no worse for wear in a small holding cell in the basement of the barracks. He claimed to have been attacked by four Spartan soldiers as he scouted Delphi, at which time he had surrendered. Heliodas suspected that Pelephon doubted the story, and in truth, he was beginning to have suspicions about the newest member of their group himself.
Wishing to put the blood of Delphi behind them, they descended the mountain that night before making camp. Heliodas and Pelephon were both too exhausted to stand watch, and neither of them trusted Telarchos to do it, so the first watch went to Thermiandra.
Nearly asleep, Heliodas was suddenly brought to full wakefulness when he heard screaming coming from their camp. He jumped to his feet, spatha in hand, only to find that the screaming was coming from Archetus.
He glanced at Pelephon, communicating wordlessly what he suspected was happening. Pelephon in turn pointed to the slumbering form of Telarchos, who appeared not to be bothered by the commotion. Confused, Heliodas ran to the Egyptian, lifted his bedroll, and recoiled from what he saw. Even as Archetus screamed, Heliodas saw what looked like glowing red tentacles beneath the Egyptian’s skin, grasping for his heart. Heliodas also realized that the man was still asleep, despite the screaming. He shook Archetus in an attempt to rouse him.
“What is it?” Thermiandra asked.
“I don’t know,” Heliodas said. “I’ve never seen anything like this.”
“What can we do to help?” Thermiandra asked.
“We could stab that thing in his chest!” Pelephon shouted.
“Only if we want to kill him,” Heliodas said.
“It’s going to reach his heart. I think that will do just as good a job of killing him,” Pelephon argued.
Heliodas shook the large man, but still met with no results, even while the screaming continued.
Pelephon walked up and punched Archetus in the face. Suddenly his eyes opened, he stopped screaming, and the glow from within his chest faded and disappeared.
“Why are you all standing around me?” Archetus asked.
“Because you were screaming and you had a glowing red thing in your chest,” Heliodas said.
“Apologies,” Archetus said. “You were not meant to see that.”
“What was that?” Heliodas asked.
“A night terror,” Archetus said.
“A dream?” Pelephon asked incredulously.
“You dream magic?” Heliodas asked.
“Forgive me,” Archetus said. “It is one of the first phases of a much larger problem.”
“What kind of problem?” Heliodas asked.
“As I said before, stealing the magic of the Titans does not come without a cost. I’ve been channeling a great deal of magic since our meeting, and as a result, my descent into madness has accelerated.”
“Madness?” Heliodas asked. “This is going to drive you mad?”
“If it doesn’t first kill me, yes.”
“Why do you do it?”
Archetus said nothing for a moment as he seemed to contemplate something. “It is the most pure form of power any mortal can know… the ability to manipulate the world around us with a thought. Wealth, political power – these things are insignificant compared to what the Titans shed without even realizing it.”
“Even if it kills you?” Thermiandra asked.
Archetus smiled. “I apologize again. It was not my intention to alarm you. I should have taken better precautions. The power simply feels stronger than before. I can’t explain it.”
“Maybe you should stop using it for a while,” Pelephon suggested.
“I would if that were possible,” Archetus said. “It is not as easy as simply stopping. After one begins channeling Titan magic, it’s like… a draw. It’s difficult to explain. It’s like some people who can’t stop drinking wine. The more they drink, the more they want to have. Magic is not unlike that, but trying to stop using it is likely to kill a person faster than continuing to use it.”
“You remember before when I said that keeping you around was dangerous?” Heliodas asked.
“I do,” Archetus said. “I do not disagree.”
“You’re proving to be even more dangerous than I thought.”
“It’s worse,” Archetus said.
“How?”
“The Pearls of Atlantis are by far more powerful than anything I can channel normally. They literally can destroy an army, or a polis, or wipe out an entire navy.”
“How is it that they’re so powerful?” Heliodas asked.
Archetus brought the five enormous pearls out and held them in his hand. As they lifted into the air and began spinning around his head, Archetus said, “Look on them. Are they not beautiful? They are pieces from the body of the Titan Oceanus himself!”
“Those are pieces of a sleeping Titan?” Heliodas asked, suddenly very alarmed.
“Do not worry. He does not miss them,” Archetus said.
Heliodas frowned. The full realization of the risk posed by simply having Archetus near him was beginning to register. “What I’m worried about is you accidentally using those against us in your sleep, or in a maddened state. Why do you want to have them?”
“The Pearls of Atlantis do not wish to be lost. If I were to cast them away from me, they would be found, and likely by somebody who would want to use them for their own gain.”
“And that explains why Khejani wanted them badly enough to follow me through half of Ionia to get them,” Thermiandra said. “If he’d had them, he could have destroyed Alexander’s army.”
Archetus laughed. “It is just as likely that he would have used the pearls to destroy Alexander’s army, then to steal the throne of the Persian Empire, and then to conquer Greece. One demonstration of their power and who would oppose him?”
A chill went up Heliodas’ back. “Put those away. When this is over, we need to figure out a way to rid the world of them; otherwise the wrong person will get hold of them eventually. Or worse, this madness you speak of will be such that you’ll become the wrong person yourself.”
Archetus opened his hand and the pearls returned to it. “I do not think that a piece of a Titan can be destroyed, but it is something to research… when the time comes.”
Unnerved, Heliodas relieved Thermiandra of guard duty and remained awake the rest of the night. He reflected on his companions and realized that the only one who didn’t appear to have harbored deep secrets from him was Pelephon. Fortunately, he had complete trust in the big Macedonian.
Pelephon and Telarchos rode ahead of the group in the mid-day sun as they raced to the location where their map indicated they should find the ruins of Mycenae. Trying to locate the place was pure guesswork, but there was a method to determine where the ruins might be based on what the Oracle had told them.
They had started with the map of Greece that Aristotle had provided them, then connected the dots on the map with straight lines. Once they did that, they bisected each line, which they drew at a ninety degree angle. The lines intersected at one point, which Pelephon believed should be coming into view shortly.
There were no roads leading to the area that they believed were the ruins of ancient Mycenae. It was as though, in the ages that had passed since it had been a living, breathing city, Greece itself had tried hard to erase the very memory of the place.
Since their departure from Delphi two days prior, Telarchos had been mostly quiet. Pelephon didn’t like the idea of letting the Theban out of his sight, so he insisted that he continue to accompany him as they scouted ahead.
As they crested another sparsely vegetated hill, Pelephon looked to the hill up ahead. It was taller than the others surrounding it. The route to the top appeared rugged and steep, and atop it was what could only be a wall.
“I think that may be it!” he said happily, not expecting Telarchos to share his jo
y.
“Let’s go take a look,” Telarchos said. “We should see what’s up there and report back.”
“Agreed,” Pelephon said.
They urged their horses forward, but the beasts took the hillside slow because of all the loose rocks. At one point Pelephon’s horse began slipping backwards, but it managed to find its footing before pitching the warrior. Soon they came upon the remains of an ancient cobblestone road, which they followed.
As they neared, Pelephon couldn’t help but notice how the wall’s construction looked nothing like the other poleis he had seen in Greece. The walls were cut from enormous rectangular sandstones that must have required the strength of Cyclopes to put into place. There was a city gate before them, and carved into a massive triangular stone at the top was a relief sculpture of two lions standing on their hind legs, their heads coming together with only a small pillar separating them. He noted that the quality of the sculpt suggested artists that were not nearly as skilled as those in Athens today. It had the feel of something very old and far out of style.
“This has to be it,” said Pelephon. “Look at the artistry. It has the look of the ancients.”
“That it does,” said Telarchos. “It looks… crude.”
“For its time, I’d bet that this was some of the best art they knew how to create,” Pelephon commented.
“It shows how far we’ve advanced,” Telarchos said with a shrug.
They passed through the gates, and the first thing Pelephon noticed were the skeletal remains of the city’s former inhabitants. Everywhere he looked, the bones of the dead lay strewn about. Too much time had passed to be able to figure out how they died, but the one thing he was certain of was that their deaths came upon them suddenly. As his horse walked forward, he noted the crunch as the beast accidentally stepped on a brittle bone, causing it to snap.
They were surrounded by poorly preserved houses and buildings, all constructed from the same massive stones as the walls. The road continued up an incline and through a break in another massive wall, eventually emerging at what appeared to be the main section of the ruined polis. Pelephon looked up the hillside and saw a massive though crumbling structure up top. “That must have been the megaron of mighty Agamemnon,” Pelephon said in awe.
“What’s a megaron?” Telarchos asked.
“Were you not taught anything?” Pelephon asked. “They were palaces, except that their design was much closer to modern temples. The difference is that the interior spaces were much larger. They had multiple floors, and interior rooms where people lived. They were the most amazing structures of their time. Or so I’m told. I’ve never actually seen one intact before now.”
Telarchos shrugged. “Do you think that’s where we’re going to find the sword Heliodas seeks?”
“I’d imagine so,” Pelephon said. “Let’s go in for a closer look.”
Pelephon rode his horse forward, past numerous buildings, and up the hill until he stood in the courtyard before the pillared portico at the entrance of the great structure. He dismounted his horse and walked forward, placing a hand reverently on the closest sandstone pillar and feeling the rough texture below. It was so unlike the smooth lacquered marble of the modern Greek cities he’d visited. It was like looking at a living piece of the ancient world.
He was so engrossed in his examination of the structure that he didn’t see the dark green shapes as they approached from within, nor did he notice that they were almost upon him until they sprung. Sensing that something was wrong at the last possible moment, Pelephon threw himself backward and fell onto the rocky courtyard. He unsheathed his sword and sprang to his feet, just as two hideous looking things appeared in front of him.
To his eyes, their bodies and heads resembled giant snakes, though they had torsos and arms that would have looked human if not for the fact that they were covered with the same scales as the rest of their bodies. Both of them wore some strange form of armor that appeared to be made from bones strung together in layers. In their hands were black pieces of volcanic rock that had been shaped into blades.
“Pelephon, get out of there!” Telarchos yelled.
Pelephon didn’t feel like arguing the point. They needed to report this to Heliodas. He needed to survive long enough to do so, however! The snake things slithered toward him, each of them fixing him with their unblinking stares. The nearest one sprang forward at him, its stone blade leading the attack. Pelephon blocked the blade with his spatha, backing up as quickly as he could. He’d seen too many snakes kill their prey by springing forward, catching them, and coiling their bodies around them until they were crushed to death.
He was about to bring his spatha up in an attempt to impale the creature when a knife flew through the air, catching the creature under its scaly chin. Thick, dark brown blood began to ooze from the wound, and Pelephon followed up Telarchos’ attack with his blade, catching the creature in the neck. Blood spurted and the scaly head fell to the ground.
The other snake creature stood at the ready, as though preparing to attack. Pelephon had no desire to get any closer to it, though he had no bow with him to take it from a distance. Instead, he tried a trick he’d been trained but had never tried in actual combat. He brought his blade back behind his head, his arm fully extended behind him. With a mighty heave, he launched it at the snake thing. The blade started to move toward its target, tip first. It hit the creature in the chest, burying itself to the hilt. The snake-thing hissed in pain, but Pelephon just stood and watched until its body slowly sank to the ground. A moment later its body went limp and blood trickled from its mouth.
Telarchos retrieved his dagger from the snake-thing’s body as Pelephon walked forward to reclaim his sword. “There’s sure to be more of these things around…” His sentence was suddenly interrupted by a sharp and unexpected pain at the base of his neck. Suddenly he couldn’t feel anything below the point in his neck where the pain originated.
Pelephon sank to his knees, and he felt a tug from behind.
He couldn’t stop his descent. His body refused to obey, but he was able to look up to the side as he fell. Telarchos was standing there, facing him, wiping blood – very red blood – from his knife. Pelephon noted that the man had a seemingly peaceful expression on his face, as though his act caused him no amount of remorse of concern.
“I just wanted you to know before you die that I’m Isacles, the Butcher of Thebes. This is nothing personal.”
Pelephon suddenly felt too weak to be angry. His vision faded to darkness, and he sensed his impending descent into the underworld… Not the glorious death in combat that he’d always imagined.
Chapter 26
Descent
Heliodas knew there was a problem when midday passed and Pelephon and Telarchos failed to return from their scouting expedition. Worry gripped him, yet he knew that both were capable warriors, and Pelephon would not be one to go down without a fight. Regardless, hanging back and waiting for their return was torturous and, he decided, no longer an option.
“We’re going,” he said to Archetus and Thermiandra without inviting discussion. He could see the worry on Thermiandra’s face, and as usual, it was impossible to read Archetus’ expression.
Their horses galloped over the next few hills. Although Heliodas was not well trained as a tracker, he had learned enough from Pelephon to be proficient enough. They followed the hoof prints until they could see the ancient polis situated atop the hill ahead of them, and they could see that the pair had ridden in that direction.
He could also tell that there were no return tracks. They had to still be there. A short time later, they came upon the remnants of the road leading up to the ruins, and Heliodas wordlessly led them onto it and up the hill.
They neared the wall, and passed through the Lion’s Gate. Heliodas took note of all of the bones surrounding the place, as well as the megaron sitting atop the highest point in the ruins. “They went there,” Heliodas said, pointing up toward it. “We need to
be cautious.”
“There’s something unsettling about this place,” Thermiandra said.
“Maybe all the unburied dead.”
They could see the pillars of the megaron ahead, which was when Heliodas’ heart sank. Sprawled out on the ancient roadway was the unmistakable body of Pelephon in front of a pair of giant snake creatures. “No!” he called out and ran to his friend’s side.
Though the blood was still fresh enough, he could tell that it had long since stopped flowing. His friend’s complexion was pale and his open eyes stared into some distance that Heliodas could not perceive. “No…” he said again, as he took his friend’s blood-matted blond head and rested it in his lap. He checked for a pulse that he knew wouldn’t be there, and then he couldn’t stop the moisture from forming in his eyes.
Thermiandra was visibly shaken, but Archetus stood there, seemingly unaffected by the tragedy.
“Did you know this would happen?” Thermiandra asked the cultist.
He shook his head. “I knew only that Pelephon would not be a part of our journey for long. I knew not why.”
Thermiandra sighed. “You need to tell us when these things come to you,” she said.
Archetus nodded his agreement. “I apologize, but the one thing I know for certain is that one cannot change their destiny. Would you have treated him differently if you had known that his time was nearly at an end?”
“Probably,” Thermiandra said. “You should still not keep such things to yourself.”
“Then you should both know that the danger is far from passed,” the cultist said.
Heliodas climbed to his feet and wiped away the tears, then looked to the creatures that lay dead in front of them. “What are these things?” he asked.
“Titanspawn in all likelihood,” Archetus replied.
“More of them?” Heliodas asked. “And they killed Pelephon. Where’s Telarchos?” He looked to the obsidian blades in the hands of the snake creatures, then gently rolled Pelephon onto his stomach and studied the wound that ended his friend’s life. He knew immediately that the wound hadn’t been caused by the obsidian blades. It was too small and too precise. He then looked to the dead snake creatures and saw that one had a wound in its throat that looked nearly identical. If the wounds were identical then whoever had made them had attacked both Pelephon and the snake creature. “Telarchos…” Heliodas said.
Echoes of Olympus (The Atheniad Book 1) Page 30
