Furies

by D. L. Johnstone

  He was about to enter a nearby tavern when a porne brushed past him, weaving drunkenly into the street. He glanced down at the paving stones, dimly lit from the torches near the entrance. And there, where her sandaled feet had just touched the ground, the blue inked image of a little bird with its wings folded in against its breast. Pornes often put ink blocks with the name of the brothel they work for into their sandal heels so that when they walked about the city men might know where to find them later.

  “Hold up a moment, pretty one,” Aculeo called, taking the porne by the arm. “Come on, I’ll buy you another jar.”

  The building he sought was a few blocks southwest of the Tannery, down the dismal Street of the Dye-Makers. It was a dingy little building, its darkened doorway painted what may have once been a cheery shade of blue, now scarred and peeling. Over the lintel was a small painted placard of a blue bird.

  A slave, a thick-shouldered brute with a harelip, answered the door, eyeing Aculeo warily before finally permitting him within. The slave led him down a dim hallway lined with half a dozen doors decorated with paintings of men and women in various sexual positions and in multiple combinations. Whether they were for decoration or simply advertised the services available behind the doors wasn’t entirely clear. At the end of the hall was a large open courtyard, leading to a small colonnade overlooking a verdant forest at the edge of a moonlit pool. A naked woman stood next to a rectangular reflecting pool, pink and blue seashells at her feet. When Aculeo entered the atrium he saw it was only a plaster statue, the pool, colonnade, forest and sea just a painted mural on the wall.

  There were several small tables and chairs set up about the atrium, most of them occupied by pornes and their clients, the young girls’ diaphanous chitons clinging to their bodies, their pretty faces blushed with rouge, wine and laughter. The thick smell of incense hung in the air like an invisible veil. The space was filled with a soft, warm light from the oil lamps sconced into the pale plaster walls. On one wall was a mosaic of Venus on the back of a white goat, soaring through the sky between day and night towards the moon, the sun resting on her heels. In a room off the atrium, partially hidden by thick curtains, sat several empty looms, the girls’ daytime occupations no doubt. The brothel keepers saw little value from idle hands by day or night.

  A middle-aged woman approached, her hair flaming red, her narrow face painted with white lead and bright ochre accenting her cheeks and lips. She offered Aculeo a practised smile. “Welcome, sir, welcome. I’m Panthea, the owner of the Blue Bird. Let’s fetch you some wine and a pretty friend.”

  “A friend of mine is a frequent guest here,” Aculeo said. “Iovinus. I’m sure you know him?”

  “Of course,” Panthea said. She wore a gold ring with a ruby-eyed snakehead, which she twisted around and around on her finger as she considered him.

  “How long since you saw him?”

  “A few months at least. Where’s he then? Not with you tonight?”

  “He’s been away,” Aculeo said in disappointment, and glanced about the atrium at the other tables. “There’s one girl in particular he recommended to me. Neaera.”

  “Of course. She’s a lovely, talented girl. She’s already been taken tonight, though,” Panthea said. “I do have a new girl. Ethiopian, only sixteen years, and even more talented than Neaera. She was just brought in the other day. I promise you won’t be disappointed.”

  “I’m happy to wait for Neaera,” Aculeo said, offering up a coin – silver this time.

  “As I said, she’s taken for the night.” Panthea eyed the coin and traced her fingertips across his shoulder, giving his arm an inviting squeeze. “Why don’t we find you another friend for the evening, alright?”

  “It has to be Neaera. I’ll come back tomorrow then. Thanks for your help.”

  “Of course, sir. My sincere pleasure,” Panthea said graciously. Her smile hardened though as she watched him leave and she summoned the harelip slave.

  Aculeo walked towards the main street of the Tannery. A wasted trip, he thought in annoyance. No sign of Iovinus in months? Now what will I do? He paused a moment, listening, thinking he’d heard the echo of sandals against the pavement behind him. He looked around. Nothing. He continued walking then heard it again, the soft footfall of someone who did not want to be heard. Thieves, he thought bleakly, why not? He felt his palms begin to sweat, his heart throb in his throat. Am I to be murdered in this dismal maze at the end of a pointless day?

  A face appeared like a vision from the shadows. It was just a girl, fourteen at most, with dark braided hair, long, lovely lashes and a round pale face. She was one of the girls from the Blue Bird, he realized. He’d seen her flirting with a client in the courtyard. She came a few paces towards him, keeping her distance from him though, her pretty cheeks marked with small circles of pink.

  “Did you want something?” Aculeo asked.

  “I … overheard you talking with my mistress,” the girl said, her head bowed shyly. “You’re looking for Neaera.”

  “Yes. Why? Do you know something about that?”

  “I don’t … I …” Her voice cracked with emotion, her ebony eyes glistened with tears. She tottered, ready to faint.

  Aculeo barely caught her in time. “It’s alright. Take a deep breath. What’s your name?”

  “Tyche,” she said weakly.

  “Do you need to sit down, Tyche?” The girl shook her head. “Tell me about Neaera. When did you last see her?”

  “She disappeared two days ago.”

  “Oh? Why did your mistress lie?” The girl shrugged, looking desolate. “Did she live in the brothel with you?”

  “No, not anymore. She lived in a tenement next to the Kapeleion of Menon. Her flat was paid for by her patron.”

  “You mean Iovinus?” he asked hopefully.

  The girl nodded. Aculeo tried not to smile. At last some progress, he thought. “She’s still owned by Panthea though. Panthea was furious when she learned Neaera was missing. Panthea thinks she ran away. She beat me because she thought I might know where she went,” the girl said, unconsciously touching a purplish bruise on her cheek.

  “And do you know?”

  “Neaera didn’t run away. She would have told me if she was going to do that, I know it. She … she promised to take me with her when she left. She gave me money a few days ago, told me to be ready … and that was the last time I saw her.”

  “Have you checked her flat?” Aculeo asked.

  “I can’t, they watch my every move.”

  “I can check it then.”

  The girl dropped to her knees on the pavement before Aculeo, pressing his hands to her lips. “I pray to the sacred Venus to bless you sir! I’ve been so afraid.”

  “Afraid? Why?”

  “There’s stories,” the girl said, still gripping his hands, her lovely eyes haunted.

  “What stories?”

  “Of demons that prey on women. Of rites they’re taken to and never return from.”

  Demon tales, Aculeo thought, the sort children tell one another when they lie in bed at night, trying to frighten one another. He helped her to stand. “Don’t worry yourself, alright?”

  The girl had put herself in danger coming after him like this, risking a beating or worse. She looked up at him, clutched his hands again like a drowning child might cling to a scrap of wood. “You’ll tell me if you find anything? Please? Please?”

  “If there’s anything to tell, of course,” he said. Though I think the only demon here is that bastard Iovinus.

  The flat was in a rickety, five story tenement in the outer edge of the Tannery. A small votive statue of Venus had been placed in a niche next to the building’s lintel, the white plaster stained with soot from years of long forgotten prayers. The landlady, a furtive little woman with brightly hennaed hair, claimed not to have seen her tenant in days but was vague on further details.

  “Show me Neaera’s room,” Aculeo said.

  “Who are you to h
er?” the woman demanded.

  “Her brother.” She clearly didn’t believe him, but grudgingly allowed him into the building. He followed her up to the second floor. A pretty young woman wearing a traditional Egyptian braided black wig and a translucent chiton smiled at him as she passed him in the hallway, her lingering perfume smelling of jasmine. He could hear moaning and rhythmic thumping behind some of the doorways they passed. The landlady seemed oblivious to it all and led him to the far end of the hallway to the last flat. She opened the door and stood aside to let him enter.

  It was a small, cramped little closet of a room with a small open window cut near the ceiling, letting a dim grey light from the streets below seep in. There was a small wooden table set against the wall with a terracotta basin and matching jug, a threadbare rug on the floor, a few cheerfully coloured Persian pillows and a tortoise shell lyre in the corner. A reed birdcage stood beneath the window. No sign of a bird though, the door was open, the water dish was dry, empty husks of seed lay scattered about the floor. On the wall hung a papyrus painting of three women standing near Pharos, the sort tourists have made for themselves by street artists, finely done though.

  The first girl was fairly attractive with dark brown eyes, long, light brown curls that framed her round face and draped over her shoulders, a birthmark on her upper lip. The second looked familiar somehow, tall with high cheekbones and a sharp nose – he couldn’t recall where he’d seen her. The third had a spark of mischief in her dark eyes, a hint of a smile on her lips, as though she was about to laugh. She wore an elegant cameo necklace around her pale neck. Aculeo untacked the papyrus from the wall.

  The cubiculum was barely more than a closet with a narrow bed, a soft red woollen blanket tucked up to the edge. A large wooden chest sat in the corner. Aculeo opened it – it contained a fine, ivory chiton and a smaller wooden box filled with jewellery, cheap gilt-terracotta bric-a-brac, nothing of any value. And no cameo necklace. He put everything back, then stripped the blanket off the bed. A rough hemp cloth mattress, stuffed with straw. He lifted the mattress to reveal a simple wood frame with thick leather strapping to hold up the mattress. He glanced under the bed. Nothing …

  Someone coughed behind him. The landlady stood in the doorway of the bedroom, her suspicions of Aculeo’s unsavoury intentions apparently confirmed. He laid out the portrait of the three women on the table. “Which one’s Neaera?”

  The landlady shot him an accusatory look. “I thought you were her brother.”

  “We grew apart. Just tell me which one’s her?” The woman reluctantly jabbed a crooked fingertip on the woman with the cameo. “Who are the other two?”

  “How should I know?”

  “You never saw them here before?”

  “No,” she scowled.

  “What about a man named Iovinus? He would have paid her rent.”

  The woman sniffed and shook her head. “She paid the rent herself. Except for this month – she’s two weeks late. My oath I’ll throw her pretty little ass out on the street if she makes me wait another day!”

  Your whore disappears around the time you return from the dead, Aculeo thought as he left the dismal place. What are you up to, Iovinus? And where did you go? With Neaera or in search of her…?

  Pah, what does it even matter? he thought bitterly. Either way, their trail is cold and I’m just as fucked as I was before I began.

  The Sarapeion, the city’s main temple to Alexandria’s patron god Sarapis, stood on the acropolis, the highest point in the city. Aculeo turned eastwards down the street leading to the temple. Ancient statues pillaged from the banks of the Upper Nile – sphinxes, long forgotten pharaohs and animal-headed gods – decorated the streetside along its length while towering stands of date palms rasped overhead in the warm morning breeze off the sea. Not the most private place to commit a murder, he thought.

  His hurried breakfast of fermented fish paste, a heel of bread and a cup of flat beer sloshed about in his stomach like lumps of wet paste. He’d woken only half an hour before to snatches of Xanthias’ inane gossip picked up in the Agora that morning, including mention of a dead woman found in the temple at the feet of the god Sarapis himself. Aculeo had tried to get back to sleep until the potential meaning of the discovery had slowly bubbled into his sodden brain and he had dragged himself from bed.

  Perhaps a dozen murders of citizens took place in Alexandria in a given year, typically triggered by lovers’ quarrels, retribution for various misdeeds, drunken brawls that went too far, disputes between the various collegia or citizens of warring nations that had been carried over here. Countless other murders occurred as well of course, of slaves or other members of the city’s teeming underclass of freedmen, actors, pimps and pornes, but those were usually of little concern unless a respected citizen or official happened to be involved somehow. The possibility of the dead woman being Neaera was remote at best, but Aculeo could hardly ignore it. He hoped it wasn’t, of course – as long as Iovinus’ porne was alive, so was the chance she could lead Aculeo to her elusive patron.

  Despite the early hour, the streets leading to the Sarapeion were already filling up with worshippers, young and old, healthy and invalid, Greek and fellahin, all moving up the steep slope to seek Sarapis’ renowned healing powers. A low wall lined the long, empty street leading to the great temple, topped with small, elegant sculptures of panthers, bees, peacocks and goats, with an occasional sphinx to break the decorative motif.

  Aculeo looked with dismay up the hundred steps that led from the street to the temple, a vast compound encompassing most of the hilltop, then joined the dozen or so worshippers in the gruelling climb, grunting and cursing with the rest of them towards the summit. He paused halfway up to catch his breath, work out the kinks and look back over the city. Thick knots of dark cloud unspooled across the sea horizon, coupled with a throaty rumble of thunder, promising a heavy spring rain.

  When at last he reached the top step of the temple, his legs and lungs were burning, his heart pounding in his chest. He leaned against a cool stone pillar to catch his breath. It had been years since he’d bothered to even come up here. The temple compound was enormous, fully two stades in length by one in width. An outer colonnade circuited the area with elegant porticoes leading to the living quarters for the priests along with a large and outstanding library. The compound itself housed a vast mazework of pillared corridors and shrines for the pantheon of Roman and Egyptian gods. The narrow stalls that lined the temple’s main promenade were manned by the merchants and moneylenders to deal with the worshippers.

  He walked across the ceremonial dromos, the only sound the echoes of his own sandals scuffing along the marble tiles, until he reached the temple’s outer courtyard, then into the Hall of Appearance. An inner colonnade led from the hall across a walkway to a square red granite and porphyry sanctuary at the far end. Sarapis was enthroned within the sanctuary. A trick of the architects made him seem even larger and grander than he actually was, for the floor rose gradually as the ceiling lowered between the entrance and the sanctuary. Aculeo continued along the Path between Light and Twilight, across the Hall of Offering and just beyond that into the Sanctuary itself. A thin morning drizzle started to spatter across the marble floor as a rumble of thunder rolled through the darkening sky.

  The god sat on his throne in the centre of the room, his seated height taller than that of two men standing atop one another, his broad, handsome gold-leaf face framed with a flowing mane of ivory hair and thickly curled beard, a look of warm paternal concern on his face and on his head a sacred measuring basket symbolic of the fruits of harvest. A temple attendant poured morning libations into the golden bowl near the god’s great feet, while another whispered into his ivory ear to awaken him. Sarapis’ jewelled eyes sparkled in the morning light.

  The story was three centuries ago Sarapis had visited the old emperor Ptolemy Soter in a dream and informed him that he would be the patron god of the new Egyptian Empire. Also that his cul
t statue, a creation of ivory, fragrant wood and precious metals, could be discovered in Sinope, a city on the distant shores of the Black Sea. So it was, and after a suitable compensation had been paid to the people of Sinope, the god had been freed from his temple there and resurrected in his new place of worship in Alexandria. Bought and delivered – the perfect object of worship for a city of merchants.

  A handful of curious onlookers stood about near the entrance to the stoa, trying to get a peek within. Their view was blocked by several men dressed in the scarlet-edged tunics of city officials. The Office of Public Order dealt with the city’s most serious public issues, those being virtually anything that might somehow slow the wheels of trade. Typically that meant merely ensuring merchants in the Agora had paid their requisite bribes, that the street cleaners were clearing dung properly from the rutted city streets and so on. While the Sarapeion had no role in the city’s trade, contamination of Alexandria’s main temples with the blood of a dead woman would hardly be well received by the priests or city officials.

  Aculeo spotted what looked like a pile of rags heaped behind Sarapis’ glittering throne. The murdered woman, he thought. Another onlooker trying to take too close a look was angrily shoved away by one of the officers. The unfortunate fellow tripped, knocking over a merchant’s barrow, spilling a load of charms and small replicas of Sarapis on the floor. There were cries of outrage as the merchant beat the poor fellow about the head and several of the man’s friends rushed to his aid. The remaining officers swarmed in, trying to break up the tussle.