The Thinara King

by Rebecca Lochlann

  Exhaustion depleted what little strength she had left and she leaned against him, panting and dizzy, her heart thundering. He dragged her closer to the fire pit where he kept a pile of animal skins. Keeping her wrists secure in his unbreakable grip, he wrapped strips of fur around her hands then covered them with the leather straps, binding them together from wrist to fingertips, which would prevent her from working the strap free of the trunk. When he’d finished, she couldn’t move her hands or fingers at all.

  “You truly are kin to Harpalycus,” she said, dismissing how he inspected his work, making certain her skin wouldn’t be chafed or the blood flow hindered.

  He made no reply and didn’t look at her. The only sign he heard her at all came from the reflexive clenching of his jaw.

  “Coward!” she shrieked, her earlier remorse burned away. “Do you know how much I hate you? Keep me tied, because if you turn your back I will kill you. Do you hear me, you spineless traitor? You have no feeling. You are made of stone.”

  Stone… stone… stone echoed off the stalactites in the depths of the cave.

  The shadows leaped from her stomach, engulfing her, thrusting her back in time.

  She lived again the night when the statue of Velchanos came to life, stepped off his pedestal, and crossed the clearing on Mount Juktas to stand above her.

  Stone grated against stone as his head swiveled. The shadows had been there that night, using moonlight to paint beautiful patterns on his face.

  My love, he had whispered, but his mouth didn’t move. The words formed in her head.

  Sparks of brilliant light played through his marble hair.

  Save me, Aridela. Open your heart.

  Calesienda? She had asked through fear and fascination.

  He lay upon her, pale stone warming into human flesh, eyes burnishing into a hypnotic combination of blue and silver.

  She saw herself say, Carmanor, why have you come to me through Velchanos?

  In the cave, as Menoetius bound her up tight, her bewilderment and frustration escaped in a gasping sob.

  For longer than you can imagine, I will be with you, in you, of you. Together we bring forth a new world. Nothing can part us.

  “Selene charged me with your safety.” Menoetius’s bitter tone scattered the memory like wind through mist. He gave the security of his restraints a final check and leveled a gaze on hers that blazed with fury. “I will do whatever is necessary to keep you alive. Do you understand? I will keep you safe against your own will to die.”

  Themiste offered Chrysaleon what she hoped was an encouraging smile as he entered her private chamber, a small alcove separated from the rest by a large ibex hide.

  He dropped onto a footstool next to her, his expression impatient and restless. Placing her distaff next to the basket of unspun wool and folding her hands in her lap, she prepared for more discomfiting questions.

  “Why was Aridela not brought here at once when she was freed from Harpalycus?”

  “I wish Selene were here to answer your questions.” Themiste gave a helpless shrug. “The messenger she sent had hardly any information. She and Menoetius and a small band succeeded in freeing Aridela. Menoetius took her into the Araden mountains.”

  “Where they disappeared.” Chrysaleon’s voice was curt.

  “The second messenger said the cave in which they were hiding was abandoned within a matter of days. Selene and others have scoured the mountains but have failed to locate them.”

  “Why?” Chrysaleon rose and paced, shoving his unruly hair off his forehead in a manner that betrayed his frustration. “Have they been captured? Killed?”

  Themiste wondered, not for the first time, whether Menoetius, or as she privately called him—Menoetius of the few words—had proved false. “Could he have given her to Harpalycus for the promised reward?” she asked, keeping her tone neutral.

  Chrysaleon stopped pacing and stared at her. Then he shook his head and snorted. “If they haven’t been captured or killed, he is protecting her as only he can. Completely.”

  He dropped back to the footstool. She couldn’t help but notice the sallow hue of his skin, how every bone in his face stood out sharply. His shoulders slumped.

  “Let me send for wine,” Themiste said. “You must eat, my lord, and rest. I promise to tell you as soon as I hear anything.”

  This wasn’t the complete truth. Selene’s first messenger had carried a sealed papyrus that briefly detailed some of what Aridela was rumored to have suffered at Harpalycus’s hands. Themiste had burned the missive and kept that information secret.

  “No.” He stared at the rough rock floor with a heavy sigh. “I must know what happened to her. Would you spare me a few provisions? I will go there myself.”

  “That’s impossible. You’re not strong enough. Nor are you familiar with Kaphtor. You’ll most certainly be captured. Those mountains are remote; you could get lost. And the weather, my lord. We can only imagine how severe it is there.”

  “Nevertheless, I will leave before daylight.”

  She saw his resolve and realized nothing she said would make a difference. “Take one of my men with you.”

  “Your men are needed here. I am not the weakling you think me, lady.”

  “I’ll gather what you need.” Themiste felt oddly proud of him. “This is a time for healing, Prince Chrysaleon, and for divine intercession. Some intuition tells me the Lady approves of your decision.”

  He gave her a tired smile and went off to make preparations.

  Themiste left the protection of her stony chamber, though this caused her personal guard much anxiety. She climbed the hillside above the cave entrance and stood at the highest point where she could view the surrounding landscape. Pink twilight deepened into indigo; the air fell still and frosty. It felt wonderful to breathe fresh, dry, air.

  One of Minos Timandra’s more obscure prophecies came to her mind.

  For longer than can be dreamed or imagined, mortal lives will hinge upon the tiniest sliver of chance, of human frailty. The final unfolding of Earth’s destiny remains hidden.

  Was earth’s destiny even now being determined, not by those with wisdom and insight, but by chance and frailty?

  So much had happened to thrust the uncommon sphere of Kaphtor from its delicate balance. The Destruction. Harpalycus and his invasion. The untimely deaths of Helice and Iphiboë. The capture and torture of Aridela, which, if she still lived, must have changed her in ways that could never be measured.

  Now Chrysaleon, the ‘Gold Lion of Mycenae,’ had proclaimed himself the thinara king. The prophecies stated this king would bring the death of all that went before. He heralded a new world, a new way. Themiste had studied every mention of the great-year-king, but never felt she understood the subtleties. Would this ‘new way’ be terrible or wondrous? The predictions gave no clear answers.

  Yet she could sift in hints from other oracles’ divinations. She could blend the zest of one to enhance the flavor of another, and simmer them together. She could inhale the aromas and translate the sensations they offered.

  She thought again of Timandra’s other prophecy.

  The child must rise up from the intoxication in which she willingly drowns. If she becomes pure, utterly clear, the thinara king and his disciples will give her their allegiance. If she does not, every living thing will languish and the end will come.

  The thinara king….

  Aridela had said something about the thinara king, long ago, when she was only ten years old. Themiste recalled that terrible morning. Menoetius had carried the princess out of the shrine. She was bleeding profusely, near to death. She stared into Themiste’s eyes, but without recognition. She clutched at Themiste’s necklace, pulling her closer. Her voice shook with dread. Whatever the child saw, in that fearsome place between life and death, she was terrified of it.

  Death cannot stop the thinara king. He will follow. He will slay me until time wears out.

  What if Chrysaleon was, in trut
h, the thinara king? What did that mean for Aridela? She loved him so much. How could he be the thing she also feared so much?

  The confusion of it all sent Themiste’s mind down another path, the one that held Aridela’s magical dream on the summit of Mount Juktas. Velchanos had come to Kaphtor’s princess, and he had taken on Chrysaleon’s face. In no way had he frightened her, but he had made her a promise.

  For longer than you can imagine, I will be with you, in you, of you. Together, we bring forth a new world. Nothing can ever part us.

  Themiste placed the palm of her right hand upon the rough trunk of a cypress tree. This tree, from the look of the aged, gnarled bark, had sprouted in Earth’s infancy. Through the intervening uncountable years, it had survived. When the rain of fire and ash, the disappearance of sunlight, and the onslaught of frost descended upon Kaphtor, this tree did not succumb. Although alive, the tree didn’t grow straight and tall but twisted close to the ground, branched almost like a shrub. She liked to sit with her back against the trunk, breathing its spicy scent, looking to the west toward Knossos.

  This tree had observed Aridela, Iphiboë and Selene on the night of Iphiboë’s dedication. It witnessed Iphiboë fall and dislocate her knee. It listened when Iphiboë begged Aridela to serve as her proxy. It watched the arrival of two foreign warriors, and later, a third.

  Shivers ran over Themiste’s skin, not entirely from the chill. She fancied she heard the young women’s voices, at first excited, then anxious when Iphiboë hurt herself. She imagined Chrysaleon and Menoetius tying their horses then slipping toward the black mouth of the cave, not knowing what they would encounter inside.

  The decisions made that night took Kaphtor off course. More, she realized. Those three women may have unwittingly thrown many other societies into the confluence of Kaphtor’s destiny.

  None could ever now know what would have unfolded if Chrysaleon had become Iphiboë’s lover, as was meant, if Aridela had remained in her bedchamber, as she was ordered.

  Chafed by frustration and sick with worry for Aridela, Themiste turned her thoughts to Chrysaleon’s fantastic story. Damasen, Aridela’s father, appeared to be taking an active interest in the goings-on of the mortal world. Not only had he visited with Chrysaleon in the prince’s skirmish with death, he’d also stayed Themiste’s hand when she had considered murdering his daughter. She remembered his instruction well. The child must live, to fulfill the tasks set before her.

  The dead king’s unfathomable eyes had changed colors like the heavens at sunset.

  No matter how many possibilities Themiste tried to attach to the visions and prophecies, she always returned to the same conclusion. Aridela, the child of Velchanos, the god of lightning, had been given to guide the people of Kaphtor. Somehow, that scrap of a girl must change the hearts of ‘the thinara king and his disciples,’ so they would follow her.

  Lion of gold from over the sea,

  Destroy the black bull,

  Shake the earth free.

  Chrysaleon, as Velchanos, had promised Aridela a love that would transcend death.

  Chrysaleon, the thinara king, would slay her until the end of time.

  How could these two images of the Mycenaean prince, one adoring, one terrifying, be reconciled?

  For the briefest instant, no more than a flash, Themiste’s mind opened. She saw into the future, but it was a jumble of incomprehensible images, of men and women she did not recognize, of hatred and jealousy, a desperate competition for power and love, all entwined to the point where none of it could be untangled.

  “Themiste?”

  The unexpected voice emanating from the night made her jump in fright, but she recovered as she rose, keeping one hand on the cypress, and smiled at Chrysaleon as he climbed up to her.

  “I am leaving early tomorrow,” he said. “I came to say goodbye.”

  “I feel success is at hand, my lord.” Themiste bowed her head. “The omens suggest it. Our spies, too, bring happy news, that Harpalycus is continually drunk and has lost the respect of his men. Apparently he has stretched his forces too thinly. I’ve been told that Kydonia is close to falling back into our hands. We will pray and make offerings. Perhaps they’ll guide you to Aridela. I, too, cannot sleep for worry over her.”

  He nodded. Silence stretched between them. Chrysaleon plucked a lock of hair off her shoulder and ran his fingers underneath, allowing it to slip free. “In my dream your hair was lighter,” he said.

  As his gaze lifted to hers, all desire to speak evaporated. She felt as though her obsessive efforts to translate the prophecies were as useless as grasping at clouds. She swallowed the sensation of her heart rising into her throat, and tried to steady her breathing.

  He bent and kissed her on the mouth, then turned and strode down the hill, sliding a bit on the scree.

  What had they shared in his death-dream?

  She blinked away tears as his figure disappeared into the gloom.

  I pray Mycenae’s prince has dreamed the key to Kaphtor’s freedom.

  Storm after storm blanketed the Araden mountains in treacherous snowdrifts. Warmth and light abandoned Kaphtor, and took with them the spirit of Aridela.

  She tried to bolster herself with memories of the day she’d leapt the bull. The crowd roared her name. Chrysaleon lifted his dagger in awed salute. Sometimes she managed a searing instant of triumph and joy, but it was always crushed in the next by painful truth.

  He is dead. You will never see him again. He will never touch you. If he were alive, he would turn from you in disgust. He wouldn’t care that Harpalycus bound you or that you were unwilling. The proud warriors from Argolis can only see your ruin.

  She wept into the animal skins on her pallet.

  When she succumbed to the hopelessness of those thoughts, she knew Menoetius had discerned her hidden truth. I will keep you safe against your own will to die, he’d said. She didn’t think she would ever forget the fury in his eyes when he spoke those words. But she would defeat him. No more barbarians would inflict their will upon her.

  Menoetius couldn’t force food down her throat. Soon her shade would rise between the stalactites and fly away to Athene’s paradise, dragging the infant inside her along.

  All she loved was gone. Her country, her people, her mother, her sister, her lover. Not even her dog was spared. Her pride had been stripped from her like a dead goat’s skin, her body used like a crude clay cup, leaving nothing but putrid, helpless rage and memories of Harpalycus’s rapes, no detail of which faded, no matter how much time passed. His cruel laughter. His vow that she would bear his offspring. That threat grew stronger with every passing day and no flow of kaliara blood. Her own womb had sided with the usurper.

  One evening he had stretched out beside her and stroked her stomach. He told her how he would kill the baby if she had one growing in her, since there was no way of knowing whose it was. He described with relish how he would let some of his most loyal men enjoy her if she was pregnant. Then, he said, after, he would keep her all to himself so there would be no doubt about who fathered the next one.

  The beautiful palace of Labyrinthos, bull dances, festivals and harvests, mead-making and lively competitions between contenders for king—all grew indistinct. Even the need for vengeance dimmed.

  She heard the echoing rasp of Menoetius’s boots before he reached the inner cavern. Although that meant her hands would be unbound and she could enjoy some small freedom, her jaw involuntarily clenched.

  “The sun is out.”

  He crossed to her pallet, holding by the ears the limp bodies of two rabbits. Rabbits were their main source of meat, but often they made do with dried fruit and nuts, for when storms struck, every creature vanished into hiding.

  “Were you sleeping?”

  She made an effort to soften her frown. “No.”

  “The sun is setting, but the clouds are gone. There’s time enough to enjoy the sunset and I’ve seen no sign of search parties in many days. Wouldn’t you
like to look at stars again?”

  His gaze was uncomfortably intent. She felt him trying to judge how far her will had flown. No doubt he could see the evidence of recent weeping. Perhaps he could tell she was pregnant. No matter. When she died, he would be free. He could return to Selene.

  But because she was unbearably lonely, desperately weary of her own thoughts, and because he’d penetrated the long, cold silence between them to invite her outside with such courtesy, she decided to be civil.

  “Yes,” she said. “I would like to see stars.”

  They emerged, blinking, into dazzling light. The first thing Aridela saw were two ravens playing in the sky, their harsh cries offering subtle promise of warmth and coming spring.

  Ice clung to the banks of the stream, but the center ran clear and cold. Twisted cypress and hardy pine trees leant hints of green to the otherwise white, formless landscape.

  Aridela, bundled in leggings and jerkin as well as furry boots, followed Menoetius up the nearest cliffs and into a bowl between three severe mountain summits that offered protection from the worst of the wind. She drew mosaic patterns in the snow with a sticky pine branch, reveling at the feel of sun-warmth on her bare head.

  Menoetius squatted, his back against a boulder that must have tumbled, along with several others, from the rock-choked southern summit. “I went into Araden,” he said.

  “What did you find?”

  “Sprouting barley and corn. There’s renewed hope among the villagers that their crops will survive. Life returns to Crete. If we—”

  “How can you say that?” She leaped to her feet, flinging the branch away. “With Harpalycus ruling in my palace? My mother and consort murdered?”

  He frowned and glanced away. “I thought you would be happy to hear there are surviving crops. It means food, at least for some. Fewer will starve.”

  Suffocating despair fell over her. She rubbed her wool-covered arms. “If I could be there, with them, I could see for myself. I could share this hope.”