The Thinara King

by Rebecca Lochlann

  He was silent. She felt the intrusive invasion of his eyes, slicing her mind open like a pomegranate, fingering every humiliation forced upon her by Harpalycus and the eunuch, each fearful conviction that the child of Chrysaleon’s murderer grew in her belly. His gaze shaved truth from lies, forcing her to face what had become indisputable.

  If I could be there, with them. Even from herself, she tried to hide. Beneath Menoetius’s discerning gaze, the lie disintegrated.

  She no longer wanted to return to the people of Kaphtor. Imagining their pity and disgust left her cringing. What she wanted was an end to breathing and memories. They could find another queen, one with a soul. One not devoured by shadow.

  “It’s getting dark,” was all he said. “I’ll make a fire, if I can find enough wood.”

  He attempted to distract her by pointing to the sky and teaching her what his people called the colors made by fading light upon wisps of cloud. He made her repeat the words; she told him with some acerbity that he reminded her of her tutors.

  As stars became visible, she showed him the Cretan sky-bull, Tauros, and beside it, the Hunter. Then, clearer in the south than it had ever been in the lowlands, the star that, for her, had special meaning.

  “See?” She pointed. “The bright white star, just above that summit.”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s Iphiboë’s. So I would know she watches over us.” On their climb up, Menoetius had pointed out the cliff she had nearly fallen over during her escape attempt half a month ago. The drop to a bottom strewn with jagged boulders made her dizzy and faint, and brought back the blurred, snow-fashioned image of her sister, arms outstretched, ordering her to stop. The memory had become vague and suspect with the passage of time.

  “She was the bravest of women,” he said. Silence stretched again but for the hiss of burning wood. Then Menoetius said, “You believe that after we die, there is something left?”

  Startled and wary, she asked, “Do you not?”

  He shrugged. “I did, when I was young.”

  “You are young still, Menoetius.”

  He shrugged.

  “Chrysaleon told me you lost your faith,” she ventured.

  He picked up a branch he’d been using to stoke the fire and stabbed the earth as though wounding an invisible foe. The act brought a faint smile as Aridela remembered him doing the same thing during his first visit to Kaphtor, so long ago. Such an insignificant act, yet it instantly carried her back to happier, simpler times, and how she had adored him.

  For a long while he stared at the flames.

  “Menoetius?” she asked.

  “I wonder if my father is dead.”

  Compassion flooded her with unexpected force. She hadn’t once thought of his kin, so obsessed had she been with the fate of her own. “You told me he is one of King Idómeneus’s warriors.”

  “No. That was a lie. Idómeneus is my father.”

  “The High King… is your father?”

  He nodded.

  “Then you are—Chrysaleon’s brother. His true brother.” Her mind went backward, and she added, “I remember. You said you had a brother, half a breath younger than you.”

  “We didn’t share mothers. Mine was a slave, and his the queen.”

  She searched for any resemblance in the glow of the fire. They had the same straight, dominating nose. Exactly the same, though Menoetius’s bore a scar across the bridge. If not for his scars, so severe and transforming, she might have discerned the likeness long ago. “I should have seen this.”

  “You weren’t meant to.”

  “As Chrysaleon said, you have lied about many things.”

  He drew in a deep breath. “Not everything has been a lie.”

  A lifetime ago, she and Menoetius had eaten fire-charred ibex and watched the sun set on Mount Juktas. He told her a tale of his father, a warrior, and of his ambition to become the captain of King Idómeneus’s guard. He described his spoiled, selfish brother, and how they had to be separated for fear one would harm the other. “You’re royal,” she said, “or would be in my country. Are you the heir, now….”

  He tossed the stick in the fire. Flames gnawed at it, spitting out the moisture. “Heir to what? Has Mycenae survived? All I can say is that the mainland’s greatest citadel deserved a leader who would place his country before his pleasures. Idómeneus ordered us not to compete in your Games. Chrysaleon defied him.”

  For the first time, she realized that Menoetius must have been in on the plot. King Idómeneus had instructed both his sons to search for that weakness which would grant him a way to overthrow Crete. Chrysaleon had admitted to it, but Menoetius kept the secret, even now. Perhaps because he would not have succumbed to love over duty. By his own admission, Menoetius would have stuck to the plan. If Harpalycus hadn’t outpaced his enemies, she might now be Mycenae’s slave.

  Fury welled. She’d suffered one betrayal after another from those she trusted. Never… never again would she give her trust. And she would learn. She would embrace cunning and trickery, until the day came when she escaped this tiresome existence. She could lie too. Maybe she would even learn to enjoy it.

  Nothing you say is the truth, she wanted to shout. But what was the use of confronting him? He would just lie again.

  Old, nagging guilt rose up inside, edging out her anger. Idómeneus ordered us not to compete in your Games. Chrysaleon defied him. “Chrysaleon competed because I asked him to. Because he loved me.”

  “Love? He saw no farther than his lust. You would never be so weak or selfish.”

  “I pray I would not.” His cruel statement burned a blush into her cheeks. Lust, not love. Harpalycus had insinuated something similar, that day in the palace garden before attacking her. He’d made it clear Chrysaleon enjoyed the favors of many women and cared for none.

  “There’s no need for prayer.” Menoetius’s strong, sure voice scattered her doubts. “Day after day, you want nothing more than to fight and free your country. Harpalycus tried to break your spirit. He failed. You have far more courage than Chrysaleon.”

  She stared at the fire, shivering. Tears stung her eyes. Though she tried, halfheartedly, to tell herself he was lying, his words wrapped around her like rivers of sunlight, like the arms of a lover. She wanted to run into the darkness and hide even as she wanted to take his hand and speak her gratitude. She couldn’t bring herself to do either, so she simply hunched further into her jerkin as if it could provide a bulwark between fear and truth.

  She’d believed he saw her as dishonored, blighted, ruined, by what had been done to her. Perhaps she was wrong. A very small spark flared where the old Aridela moldered.

  He spoke again. At first she didn’t hear him, so deeply had she sunk into her thoughts. Gradually, his words drew her away from examination of the bruised frozen sac into which she had stuffed her will to live.

  “—Had Chrysaleon returned to his duties at Mycenae, I could have remained.” The crackle of burning wood and flowing night breeze nearly drowned out his quiet voice. “Nothing held me to that place.”

  Cold air crept down the neck of her jerkin.

  “Harpalycus probably wouldn’t have invaded Crete. It is hatred for Chrysaleon that pushes him to such lengths.”

  “As hatred toward me pushed Lycus.”

  Also because of Chrysaleon.

  Menoetius plucked another stick from his meager collection. Removing his dagger from its sheath, he whittled at the bark. A miniature, crooked spear began taking shape. “After I became my father’s captain, I never allowed myself to care about a woman. I feared if I did, it would make me hesitant or cowardly. I’ve seen that happen in other men.”

  Iphiboë had said almost the same thing. I always knew this would happen. It’s why I couldn’t love a man.

  But she said nothing, not wanting to interrupt his thoughts.

  He spoke slowly, seeming to give each word careful consideration.

  “I believed I would die in battle. I wanted
such a death. I saw no worth or grace anywhere, in anything.” He paused. “But now… this is what I was always supposed to do. I’ve been given another chance… to protect you.” He stabbed the point of the spear into the snow and carved a long, straight line, angling another through the first to make a cross. “If Chrysaleon hadn’t disobeyed our father, I could have been your partner in the cave. I could have won the Games. I could have become your consort.” He turned toward her. “Only the gods will ever know what difference it might have made.”

  That night, in the cave of Velchanos, Aridela had propped herself on her elbows, heart racing, as two beasts dropped off the ledge and approached. The bull-man. The lion. It seemed centuries ago. Sitting beside a fitful, pine-scented fire, deep within steep, glacier-like mountains, she replayed their hostile disagreement. Menoetius, the bull, tried to reach her. If he had, she would have willingly mated with him. But Chrysaleon, the lion, had shown similar determination. Only when Selene intervened, inviting the bull to join her, did the fight end.

  The bull-man had stared at her before he took Selene’s hand and disappeared with her into the gloom.

  A pinecone sparked and popped. Aridela returned to the cold night of the present, yet the memory lingered.

  Other memories flashed through her mind. Menoetius swathing her in a blanket the night he and Selene rescued her from Harpalycus. The way he’d cradled her against his chest, carrying her through the night, without pause, to freedom. How he’d cushioned her wrists and hands with fur before binding them. And perhaps most strongly, there was the day she’d tried to escape. In such foul weather, he could have just let her go. Not even Selene would have blamed him. But he searched until he found her. She’d be dead now if he hadn’t.

  All this time, perhaps ever since Menoetius and his master found that cave and the women inside, she had misjudged him. She’d believed his coldness and reserve were evidence of his contempt. But it wasn’t that at all. It was his way of denying love for the woman his brother had claimed for himself. What other choice did he have?

  She’d been so certain she’d discerned his duplicity. But even as she started to amend her judgment, another collection of memories washed over her.

  She saw Chrysaleon’s face. Menoetius, devout? Not anymore, my lady. He no longer has any use for such things. Harpalycus’s toadying smile. Had you been Crete’s heir and I the winner of the Games, it would have been a matter of love rather than conquest. Lycus, his eyes cold with jealousy. I know he’s taken what you once nearly gave me. And Helice. I’ve manipulated many rites during my reign.

  All, including Menoetius, had abandoned truth to achieve their own desires. Every one of them had fooled her, even Harpalycus in the beginning.

  The tiny spark within kindled to the slow broil of anger, and licked at the cold armored pod surrounding and suffocating her will. She drew in a deep breath and tasted the air, scented of burning wood and crisp snow.

  Menoetius had been watching her. Now he concentrated on the fire, inserting twigs and livening the flames by blowing into the crevices. She suspected he was really trying to back away from what he’d revealed. He was trying to reform the mask he’d allowed her to peer through.

  She addressed the form of his speech and ignored the substance. “I dare not interpret the will of your gods. Why did you lie? Why call yourself Carmanor? Why not tell us you were Idómeneus’s son?”

  His shoulders seemed to bunch higher around his neck. Firelight pricked at the scar on his face, sending it into sad, sharp relief. “Like a child, I played at being free of my father’s demands. And I wanted Helice to believe in me for myself, outside of him.”

  This she understood. She’d grown so weary of expectations, watchful eyes, and constant tutoring. On the night of the Destruction, she and Chrysaleon had imagined what it would be like to be peasants. In that world, they could live together without care or interference.

  “You’re shivering. This fire is lamentable. We should go back.” He rose, kicked snow over the smoldering twigs, and walked by her side through the cold night along a ridge drenched in moonlight. She glanced up as they hiked, watching the gibbous orb slip from cloud to cloud. What does this mean, Mistress? Guide me, I beg you, for I know not what you want of me. I no longer trust my ability to tell.

  They returned to the cave and crept through to the inner cavern, Menoetius’s arm warm against hers, the frosty green scent of pine drifting from his clothing.

  The cover of darkness gave her the courage to ask, “You don’t hate me?”

  “Hate you?” His disembodied voice betrayed a hint of laughter. He grew silent and still. Then he said, “I am yours. As lover or slave. I thought you understood that.”

  Could she believe him? She only knew she wanted to, needed to. “Everyone has lied to me,” she said. “I don’t know what I can believe anymore.”

  He left her to light the lamps and coax renewed vigor into the embers he kept glowing hot beneath a cover of ash. Aridela sank onto the pallet, numb and confused. The wounds within still reached out to the peace and silence death would bring. But for the first time in a month, her suffocated will to live struggled to break free of its ice-bound chrysalis.

  Light wavered; the chill retreated, chasing the shadows back. Menoetius watched the revived embers for some time before rising, crossing to her. He knelt and picked up a clay bowl containing a handful of dried figs. He chose one. Lifted it. Touched it to her lips. Watched her mouth as she took the fruit between her teeth.

  The faint light softened his scar and turned his eyes black as the furthest depths of the sea, black yet not empty. Not frightening. But she didn’t dare trust what she saw. Knowing as she now did how easily she was fooled, how incapable she was of separating truth from lies, she held back.

  His fingertips touched the top clasp on her jerkin.

  She wanted him to unhook it. Astounded at this, she opened her mouth to speak a litany of refusals but just sat there, speechless.

  He studied her face. Her breath shortened; she bit her lip and fought to hide her weaknesses, but he was Menoetius. He saw everything.

  “Believe that I want you to feel joy again,” he said.

  She must put distance between them. Rudeness would work. She could call him the liar he was. She clenched her hands but before she could speak he covered them with his own.

  We’ve been overly concerned with shallow things, Helice said before she died. We’ve cared more about beauty than anything; we forgot how to look beneath it for the substance that matters.

  “You’ve spoken of hate,” he said. “I know hate. I’ve long suffered the hatred of Mistress Athene.”

  She must push him away. Now, quickly.

  Had Leiriope, the priestess on Callisti, been so weak when wooed by the Great Liar, Harpalycus of Tiryns?

  Her consort was murdered. Harpalycus slaughtered innocents for sport. Yet she lay here, contemplating lovemaking with one of the Achaean barbarians, kin to those who had brought her island to this sorry impasse.

  Bad enough that her people might see her belly swell up with the cursed child of the Usurper.

  Aridela had always been praised for her steadfast will. She had taken that will for granted until Harpalycus flayed it from her. She thought of herself no longer as invincible Aridela, daughter of the Calesienda, half-divine, proud as a lioness, full of wit and talent.

  The spark wavered and dimmed.

  She pulled her hands free of his and folded them against her stomach. “Such things are unfit, my lord, for these desolate times.”

  Menoetius stared at her. Aridela thought she detected a shudder run through him, but couldn’t be sure. She wanted to beg his forgiveness. Instead, she gritted her teeth and remained silent.

  “Your island languishes under Harpalycus,” he said. “His purpose is to destroy all that makes your country bright. He has used your desire for peace to overthrow your great cities. Harpalycus seeks to stamp out your people, but especially you, Aridela. By forcin
g yourself to suffer and starve, by blaming yourself for what he has done, you help him achieve his aim.”

  She’d never thought of it that way. It was horrifying. To distract herself as much as him, she said, “You’ve spoken of love for me. What of Selene?”

  His gaze faltered. He frowned then shook his head. “I love her too,” he said. “How could I not? She is your truest friend. But more than that, she offers gifts long lost to me. When she looks at me, I feel whole. I couldn’t speak to you this way without the courage she returned to me. Must I destroy what I feel for her in order to love you?”

  The spark inside flickered, bringing a smile to her lips. “No,” she said. “I feared you were amusing yourself and cared nothing for her. I’m glad you love her, as I do. Our hearts are not as small as your countrymen want to make them.”

  He could have lied. The fact that he didn’t chipped at her wary mistrust.

  He spoke again, his voice husky. “I know a little of trying to destroy something that can’t be destroyed. I’ve loved you since the day I carried you out of the shrine. I have tried to slay it, but I can’t. I would have to rip out my mind.”

  The shadows left her in an abrupt, flooding torrent. They returned to the corners and cracks; their deranged whispers faded to silence.

  Tears blurred her sight. She brought his hand to the clasp on the jerkin even as the frozen husk melted, casting her into the violet light of quickened rebirth.

  Aridela of Kaphtor is not dead and will not die.

  His beard wasn’t wiry and coarse like Chrysaleon’s. It was smooth, soft as down-feathers. She’d wanted to touch it since she was ten years old.

  Her fingertip traced the ridge of scar arcing from his eyebrow to the corner of his mouth.

  A crescent, like the curve on the cutting edge of a labrys.

  It wasn’t difficult to sense, or feel, how much he wanted her. But he was patient, to all appearances content, one leg over hers, one finger just touching her own scar, the one at her jaw, waiting for her to initiate or forbid.