The Young Lion

by Laura Gill

  “I’m here.” His eyelids fluttered open, yet his gaze remained unfocused. “Orestes. Your son.” I twined my fingers with his, to let him know he was not alone. But his flesh was so cold. “Please don’t die. Stay with me.”

  What little strength he had left, he spent on his final words. “Orestes...avenge...”

  As he went slack, the breath rushed out of him; his soul flew away from that death chamber into the dark netherworld. I was alone, truly alone, and deeply afraid.

  I released his hand to tug at the net, so he would not have to lie there like a trapped beast, but it was so tangled from his struggling that it would have to be cut. I started to reach for my dagger, when it struck me that by removing the net I would give myself away. “Father...” A sob choked my voice. “I’m sorry.”

  I could not stay there, yet at the same time was reluctant to leave him. He had just come home, we had had but a moment together, and now he was gone. It was not right, it was not fair!

  I took his hand once more to kiss it, encountered a hard object. Gold gleamed through the gore. A ring. Father’s seal stone, bearing the double lions of the House of Atreus; it was the symbol of his kingship. Holding back another sob, I kissed the seal, then his battered knuckles; his blood had started to congeal, but I could still taste him. Then I slid the ring from his finger, to have some memento of him; his murderers would not have it.

  I still had nowhere to go. Mother and Aegisthus might be in the megaron, or those others who must have helped them. I recalled the men fighting earlier, and the woman’s scream, and realized there must be other corpses sprawled outside. For all I knew, the entire citadel might be awash in slaughter. Athena, help me! I shivered all over. Tell me what to do! I blinked. The room started to spin, a nauseating blur of blood-spattered walls and oil lamps and the dead. My gorge rose. I stumbled on wobbly legs into the privy just in time to lose my breakfast down the midden.

  With the sour tang of vomit in my mouth, and shaking violently, I scrabbled into the farthest, darkest corner and curled into a tight ball. Great, silent sobs wracked my body. I had so been looking forward to this day, and it had gone so terribly wrong! And worse, I had not done anything to stop it.

  The door outside opened. I started, held back my breath. Men’s voices broke the silence. “What a mess.”

  “Shut your mouth, or we’ll be next.”

  Water sloshed. Something heavy thumped onto the floor. “He’s a heavy one, isn’t he?”

  “Get his leg, you fool.”

  I realized to my disgust that they were moving Father’s body, and obviously without the care and respect due him. Had I only been older, bigger, or had more courage—ah, but had I those things, it all would have gone very differently. I heard the men shuffling out, and imagined Father’s limbs dripping blood and water, and dragging on the floor between them as they moved.

  It was not safe to venture out; it would have to wait until the men—they must be slaves, to be given such an unpleasant task—finished scouring the bathroom. I did not recognize their voices, which meant they were not palace slaves, but they were an unsavory pair, grousing over their gruesome task, and all without observing a single moment’s reverence for the dead High King. Not even a prayer to speed his shade to Hades.

  “She just had to use the axe, didn’t she?”

  “You shut your mouth, and scrape that mess, unless you’d rather be out there. At least he was in one piece.”

  I remained dead still, willing them not to part the curtain and discover me. For all their griping, they did their work quickly, and left. No one else entered; no one else had a reason to, now that the body was gone, and the room cleaned.

  Nevertheless, I did not move. How long had it been? An hour, maybe two? It must be noon now, at least. I did not dare venture out. People might still be in the megaron.

  I must have dozed a little, because my eyes were sandy, and my mouth pasty and sour. It was cold as well as pitch-dark in the privy; there was no way to gauge the time. Sooner or later, my absence would be marked. People would start searching for me. Thank the gods the sentries had not been on the aithousa to see me enter the megaron, but the bath slaves had seen me, and Mother had known someone was hiding behind the curtain. And yet, she had not investigated, had not betrayed me to Aegisthus. What did it all mean?

  Better not to stay and find out. I had to move, find another refuge, and quickly.

  The slaves had taken the lamps with them. I had to feel my way along the walls in utter darkness. Vinegar was thick in the air. Father’s corpse was gone, and the blood scoured from the walls and tub, but no amount of scrubbing could wash away the phantoms. Mother and Aegisthus had changed the world in this room. Father had gasped out his last breath here. Those memories saturated the very stones.

  I found the door, fumbled for the latch, and turned it ever so slowly; the hinges creaked. A fire still burned on the great hearth; it had gone mostly to embers, providing more shadows than light. Again, the acrid tang of vinegar sharpened the air. However many corpses there had been, they had been taken away, as had the garlands and other decorations. To gaze upon the scene, one would never have guessed that there was to have been a celebration.

  The great doors were shut and locked for the night, and there were probably sentries stationed outside now. But there was a service entrance in the vestibule; it led into a narrow corridor, from which one could either go upstairs to the royal apartments, or outside into a rear courtyard. Thank the gods I had explored that area, and could feel my way in the blackness, because otherwise I would have been completely lost.

  I emerged into the cool night air, and stood blinking in bewilderment at the half moon low on the eastern horizon. It had been late morning when I had entered the megaron, and now it was just past dusk. Had I truly been hiding for so long? I sucked in great draughts of clean air and tried to still my nerves. Athena or some other god must be watching over me, to have kept me safe this long.

  I wanted Timon. I wanted to feel his comfortable arms around me and hear him that say everything would be all right.

  Darkness was my ally. I crept through the rear courtyard, turned left toward the kitchen and the courtyard where the laundresses lived, always keeping to the shadows. Roasting lamb and onions and garlic flavored the air. There was to have been a feast tomorrow night—except that Father must have thought it was tonight, meaning Mother had lied about the date. My stomach turned; it amazed me that anyone could eat after what had happened.

  A man was stationed right outside Timon’s cubicle, holding a grounded spear and wearing a mercenary look. Aegisthus had anticipated me, or rather, he had known about my mother’s strict instructions, and sought me with my pedagogue. Thank the gods Timon had relented that morning, or else I might be dead now.

  Nonetheless, one man stood between me and my friend, and I could not take him on.

  I slunk away without attracting notice, and backtracked to the megaron’s service entrance, which seemed like the safest place to hide for the moment. I fumbled my way into the nearest storeroom, and crouched down shivering in the pitch-black darkness. All this going in circles, with enemies lurking everywhere, left me feeling like one of the tribute children abandoned to the Minotaur in the Cretan Labyrinth.

  This could not go on. Sooner or later, I would get hungry and thirsty, and there were only so hiding places on the citadel mount; Aegisthus probably knew them all. I had to escape, find people who could help me. And I craved human contact. I needed to hear another person’s voice, to see their face, and know that I was not alone.

  Aside from Timon, there were relations or friends who would not betray me. Kilissa. Hermione. Elektra. Chrysothemis.

  Leaving the storeroom, I felt my way to the stairs and crept up to the gallery separating the women’s quarters from the royal apartments. A cool breeze fluttered down the corridor from a nearby light well; the lamps guttered in their niches. Mother had dispensed with the sentries, as usual. She must have secured the lo
yalty of Philaretos and the entire garrison, to feel so safe on a night like this. She was in her apartment; I heard her speaking in low tones, then a man’s husky laughter. Mother was in bed with Aegisthus, while Father’s corpse grew cold in whatever godforsaken place she had dumped him. I balled my fists, hating them with all my being. If only I could take a sword and burst into her chamber, and kill them where they sprawled in wanton adultery...

  A moment later I collected myself. My chance would come one day, but not now. I had to be quick and clever, for Father’s sake. Taking a lamp from a niche, I moved down the gallery away from the queen’s apartment, and toward the women’s quarters.

  More voices. I knew Chrysothemis by the sound of her weeping. So they had told her. I doubted the wisdom of going to her; she was so stupid, and not very brave.

  I heard Elektra growling muffled oaths and obscenities between sobs, and she thumped on her door like one who had been pounding for hours to no avail; she sounded like a cornered, wounded animal. Yesterday’s insult remained fresh in my mind. I was a coward! How she would turn on me if she knew what I had seen, and not done!

  Hermione’s door appeared on my right. Brave, sensible Hermione. A fierce longing to see her awoke in me. I scratched at the door. Utter silence from within. She must be there, she must! “Let me in.” I whispered harshly. “Please, let me in!” Those were the first words I had spoken in hours.

  I heard movement inside, then the door opened and my cousin appeared. She was disheveled and distraught, her eyes swollen from crying. Recognizing me, she yanked me inside, and shut the door again. I managed to set down the lamp, but the human contact demolished my last reserves. Like a small child, I crumpled in Hermione’s arms. “They killed him!” I sobbed. “He came home and they killed him!”

  She rocked me back and forth. “I know,” she murmured into my hair.

  “They murdered him in his bath.” I had to catch my breath. “I saw it. I saw them do it.”

  Hermione edged free, and held me at arm’s length to examine my appearance: scraped and bruised and smeared with blood. “Come,” she said shakily. “Sit down on the bed and tell me what you saw.”

  I poured out my story, starting from the beginning with Elektra dragging Chrysothemis to the megaron, to my suspicions about the bath, to the murder itself. “There was so much blood. It was on the walls, the floor, even the ceiling.” I choked the words out. Recalling each detail to describe it was to relive my anguish. “Father was lying in the tub with the net over him. The water was red with his blood. I thought he was dead, but then he moved a little. He saw me. He looked right at me. I swear, he gasped my name. I crawled over to him, to help him, but there were so many wounds.”

  Hermione stroked my hair like she used to when I was small. “It’s all right,” she murmured. “You’re doing fine.” I saw her swallow hard, acknowledging what we both knew, that it was not all right. “Did he say anything to you?”

  I had to tell her, though the telling was hard. “Yes. I had to bend down to hear him, he was so weak. There was blood running from his mouth, but he said ‘Orestes, avenge....’” My throat closed around the words. “And then he died.”

  Reliving the experience was draining. Hermione brought a damp cloth to wipe away the blood. I lay numb on her mattress, trying to shut out the chaotic images which kept crowding in: Mother with the labrys. Father lying under the net. Aegisthus stabbing him again and again. And then, a horrific thought, worse than all the others, forced its way into my head. I bit down on my knuckles. “Oh no! No!”

  “What is it?” Hermione asked.

  “I can’t do it! I can’t!” Giving voice to an evil deed made it tangible, gave it strength, but she did not understand. “Avenging him means killing her.”

  Matricide. A man who murdered his mother, no matter what the circumstances, murdered Mother Dia herself. Thus, he would be shunned, despised, and hounded all his days by the dreadful Erinyes.

  It was better to die than kill one’s own mother.

  “Orestes, listen to me.” Hermione shook me to get my attention. “You have to get away from Mycenae.”

  “I tried Timon, but...” Aimlessly, I studied the wall, the contours of a chair, the shutters. My voice was an indistinct mumble. “I can’t go back to my room to get my things.” Think! “Father’s men might still be at Tiryns...” Focus! “No. Aegisthus might be watching that road, and the road to Sparta.” It would have to be an alternate route, then, something that neither he nor Mother would expect.

  I had kinsmen other than Menelaus. Aegisthus would never expect me to head north, to my aunt Anaxibia’s family in Phocis. “It’ll be rough going, though,” I said. “Corinthia is wild country. There are—” Another, more urgent concern canceled out those lions and wolves and boar. Hermione had seen and heard too much. If Mother and Aegisthus found out, they would hurt her, maybe even kill her. I sat up on the bed. “You have to come with me. You can’t stay here. It’s too dangerous.”

  Hermione demurred, as I feared she would. “I can’t go with you, Orestes. But my father is on his way home, and he’ll soon send for me.” She offered a forced smile. “Now, finish washing up, and go find Timon. You haven’t much time.”

  Despite the trembling in my hands, I managed to wash my face. I hated having to leave Hermione like that, without a sympathetic kinsman to protect her. A man did not abandon his betrothed to enemies. Deep misgivings gnawed me as Hermione walked me to the door. She peered out to make certain the way was clear.

  In the end, all I could do was return her embrace. “I will come back for you.”

  Hermione kissed my cheek in an unsuccessful attempt at lightheartedness. “I’m not in any danger.”

  Yes, she was. “Hermione...”

  “I will pray for you.” The strain was beginning to show; she was losing her nerve. It was not too late; she could still come with me. “Please,” she whispered. “Just go.” With that, she gave me a little shove into the corridor, then shut the door on me.

  II.

  Exile

  Chapter Eighteen

  Timon caught me in a fierce embrace when he opened his door and saw me standing forlorn on his threshold. I spent the next several minutes clinging to him in relief.

  By this time, the evil-looking sentry had left. “Did he hurt you?” I asked.

  “A few threats, some whistles and catcalls at the laundresses, nothing more. He said he deserved better than to have to watch an old man and his clutter, and abandoned his post the first chance he got. Thank the gods for that.” Timon nodded his satisfaction. “I was praying the whole time that you would not try to return here.”

  He gave me food from the supper the guard had allowed his neighbors to bring, and urged me to eat the bread and cheese. I told him my plan. As I had known he would, he hemmed and hawed at the prospect of accompanying me into the wilderness, but in the end he acknowledged that there was no one else. “We will need some things.” He got up. “Wait here.”

  Although he was only gone a short time, his absence unnerved me. Anything could happen. Someone might stop him. I paced the cubicle, fingering my dagger, and trying to remain calm.

  Timon returned with a threadbare but clean tunic and cloak, which he urged me to don, and some food and water the neighbors had given him; he assured me that he had not given away my presence. “I said only that you might come later, because you could not sleep.” He bundled the food into a sack, and rolled up the fleece and blankets he stripped from the bed. “At least Kirros is not here to be left behind,” he said, sighing. “I could not bear that.”

  I changed into the peasant clothes, wadded my bloodstained tunic into a ball, and shoved it under the straw mattress. “It’ll be all right, as long as we can get out.”

  Timon looked skeptical. “Are you sure about this? Tiryns is much closer. Your father’s men are probably still there.”

  Any other boy would have seized upon that option as good common sense, but I was not any other boy. “Aegi
sthus’s men are watching that road. North is the safest way.”

  “Orestes...”

  “Do you want to be captured?”

  Timon sighed. “As you wish, but the journey will be dangerous, and without horses it may take several weeks.” He tied the sack containing our provisions, and gave it to me while he carried the bedroll. “And we still have to get out of the citadel. It depends on who is watching the postern gate.”

  I glanced around the room, wishing there was a sword or axe in all that clutter. “Perhaps you should stay. I can move much faster on my own.”

  “And you are only twelve years old,” he pointed out. “I may not be young and athletic, but there are still some things for which you need an old man’s wisdom.” With that, he doused the lamp, and we exited his cubicle.

  Together, we made our way through the darkness. Timon’s eyesight was weaker than mine, but his long years of service had given him an intimate knowledge of the palace which allowed him to navigate in the shadows. No one was abroad to give us challenge. Philaretos, under my mother’s direction, had shut down the citadel, and confined the servants, scribes, and artisans to their quarters. Earlier, Timon had given me the details. “He has men on the Lion Gate and in the Lion Court, and along all the main thoroughfares.” That also meant there would be men on the postern gate; it only remained to be seen how many, and whether we could elude them.

  Our route took us past the kitchen, where the maids were scrubbing the pots and bowls, and beyond, toward the north wall and postern gate. And there, we encountered our first obstacle.