“That is the old Circe, the one on Aeaea,” Phrontis answered. “Not for years has she held the goddess. She isn’t strong enough. You see, when the Circe dies, the Mask is handed on to another priestess—the next Circe. With the Mask goes the power of Hecate. So the Circe of Aeaea is very old, and if it should come to a clash between glorious Apollo and the dark goddess, a strong arm will be needed, and a newer, younger priestess—such a one is the new Circe, the next inheritor of the Mask.
“We had her here in Helios.”
I said suddenly, “I’ve heard of that. You killed her.”
“We did not kill her,” Phrontis said. “She escaped. She could not have left the city; we have excellent guardians at the walls. So, because the web of fate is weaving toward a certain pattern, because Jason has returned, we must find the young Circe and kill her. If she lives to wear the Mask, then through her and through you, Hecate can make war on Apollo, and the time of the eclipse is too close for comfort. You had better bargain with us, Jason. Who can fight against the gods?” But his voice was unctuous, and he stole a quick glance at the oblivious Ophion.
I said, “I can’t lead you to this Circe of yours. If you don’t know where she is, I’m sure I don’t.”
THE priest stared at me keenly, then smiled.
“There is one who does know,” Phrontis said. “In a temple like this rumor runs faster than winged Hermes. Already I know very well that news of Jason’s coming is buzzing in certain quarters of the city. You have only to wait. Sooner or later—and sooner, if I know Helios—word will get to you of what to do next. Where to go. Then—” He lifted expressive golden brows.
When I did not speak, he went on smoothly. “Then you come to me. Or send word. We will give you quarters here in the temple, on the outskirts, where messengers can reach you without too much difficulty. Very pleasant quarters, my friend. You need not be lonely while you wait. We have many accomplished slaves who—”
“Whose greatest accomplishment is spying,” I suggested. “Well, suppose I agree? Suppose I find this girl for you? What then?”
His blue eyes dwelt speculatively on mine. As clearly as I saw the eyes I saw the thought behind them—a sharp sword or an arrow in the back was what Phrontis was thinking. I could tell that, he was so much closer to my own civilization than anyone else here on this alien world!
All he said was, “A reward worth working for, if you ask it. What is it that you desire most, Jason?”
“The truth!” I said with sudden anger. “The one thing no one here can give me! I’m sick of all these evasions and half-truths and the lies you tell so easily when you promise rewards. I know what reward I’d get!” Phrontis laughed. “Fair enough. Jason always got his value out of a man. All right, then this much truth—I’ll confess it would be easiest to kill you once we have our hands on the young Circe. Naturally I thought first of that. But since you have sharper eyes than most, then I suppose I must swear some oath I dare not break, to give you assurance.
What besides truth, then, do you ask of us?”
I closed my eyes for a moment, an intolerable wave of longing for peace from this dilemma rolling over me. To be free, to go back to my own world unburdened by the chaotic memories that too-deep probing had unloosed upon my mind—that was what I wanted above everything else in life. Freedom from the memories of Jason!
I said it in a suddenly choked voice. “And if you could do that,” I finished. “I think I’d find that girl for you if I had to tear down the city bare-handed. Can you set my mind free?”
Phrontis pinched his lower lip and looked at me narrow-eyed. Slowly he nodded, and I thought I saw other purposes, devious and subtle, take shape on his face.
“Since you ask it, I can,” he said. “I’ll swear that on the altar of Apollo himself, and may the Ram trample me under his burning hoofs if I fail you. Once you’re free of Jason, we’d have no reason to wish you harm. You’d be no danger to us then. Yes, you shall have freedom if you find us the girl.”
Ophion woke from his brooding to stare at us, a question on his lips. I saw a swift, wordless sign pass between Phrontis and the old priest. Ophion did not know that I was not Jason, but would Phrontis tell him so?
I did not care. I sighed, a deep, tired sigh. Perhaps it was wrong of me to promise. The girl had done me no harm. And yet I was not obligated to her or to Hecate or to anyone in this strange half-world, of legend. I’d been drawn here against my will, cast headlong into danger not of my making, pulled this way and that as a pawn between warring people and warring gods. But I was no pawn. I was Jay Seward, free born and no tool for another hand to wield.
“Then I’ll find her and deliver her to your men,” I said. “I don’t swear by any gods, because it isn’t our custom in my land. But I give you my promise. You can depend on it.
Phrontis nodded briefly and rose.
“I believe you,” he said. “I know the truth in a man’s voice when I hear it. Remember your promise and I’ll keep to mine.
I must consult Apollo’s oracle on this matter. When I return, we’ll make our final plans. Will you wait for me here?”
I nodded. He gave me a half-salute of parting, and turned toward the way by which he had come. Ophion caused. Looking at me, with a long, troubled stare. Once he caught his breath to speak, but he shut his lips on the unuttered words and turned toward Phrontis, who held the curtain of the darkness open for him.
MUSIC faded softly on the air as the dark closed behind them. I dropped back on my couch and stared, at the mist resettling in their wake, wondering what I should do next. Not that there was much I could do, here! I looked about the room, finding no answer. Overhead the rosy clouds rolled slowly, formless and chaotic as my thoughts.
Could I trust Phrontis? There had been subtle scheming in his eyes when he swore to help me, and it might be that what I asked for would not be what I got. And. the girl, the young Circe. Conscience nagged at me when I thought of her. I was not Jason—I had no duty to Circe, masked or unmasked. But—
“Jason—Jason of Iolcus—beloved, do you hear me?”
The words were so clear they might have rung out through the silent room, but I knew they had not. I knew they echoed only in the haunted chambers of my own skull. The shuddering and the chill sweat came over me again, and I was Jason.
Very clearly I could see the lovely, familiar, green-eyed face of the Enchantress-Mask, bending above Hecate’s flame. I knew that face well—I had loved it once and seen hatred and helplessness upon those pale features, exquisitely moulded of living alabaster. Love and hatred mingled—why? Why? Not even I knew, and I was Jason, Aeson’s son, lover of many women but never Circe—lord of the lost Argo. My heart turned within me when I thought of the ship. (Argo, my own, my swift and beautiful!)
“Jason, come back to me,” the sweet, faraway voice was calling through my brain. “Jason, beloved, you must not betray me.”
Now I could see that wonderful white face very clearly, very close to mine, the dark crimson mouth lifted, the long, inhumanly smooth planes of cheek and brow radiant with impossible beauty. The eyes were green fire, green embers smouldering beneath the shadow of her lashes. I remembered from long ago.
“Jason, breaker of vows, murderer and thief—my mother Hecate commands me and I hate you! But Jason, look at me. Jason, who are you? Jason, when these spells of madness are on you and another man looks out of your eyes—Jason, who is that man?”
Who could it be but myself, Jason of Iolcus? I felt the surge of long-remembered anger as I met her searching gaze. Circe, enchantress, lovely and beloved, why do you deny me? Why do you cling to me only to demand an answer I cannot give you? Forget this dream of yours and thrust me back no longer. There is no one here but Jason, who desires you.
“Jason, who is that man I glimpse in the moments of your madness, when you are no longer Jason?”
Rage swept over me again—strangling rage that this woman of all women should resist the irresistible Argonaut, this on
e woman whom I desired more strongly because she would not embrace me like other women, but held me off and cried out her answerless question over and over again. There is no woman alive or dead whom I would not put aside to follow my lovely ship, my Argo, my beautiful galley. But Circe, who will not have me, must learn not to deny Jason of Iolcus!
Madness? What was this madness she spoke of? How did she know about those shadows of dizzy bewilderment that could sweep now and again over the clouded mind of even the hero Jason, moments when the brain thickened in the skull and another man’s memories moved like madness through my own?
Crash! My mind split with a thunder of the brain louder than a lightning-stroke. Pain danced in my skull shudderingly for one desperate moment, and I knew.
I was Jason! I was Jay Seward! I was both men together! And I had for one terrible glimpse looked through the mind of Jason three thousand years dead, and through the cloud of his madness, and through a rift in the cloud.
And seen, as in a sudden mirror—my own face!
Then the rift closed. Then the memory faded. Jason was gone, leaving me half-empty and shaking with weakness in the solitude of my brain. But I knew a little more, a little clearer.
So Jason, too, had been troubled as I was troubled, with the mysteries of a double mind. In his skull, as in mine, the double memories moved. How and why I did not know. Perhaps I would never know. But some inexorable bond linked us over the hundreds of generations, we two out of all the countless lives between us shared a single chain of the mind. He had not understood. How could he? To him these thoughts of my distant era must have seemed sheer insanity. To me, at least, the names of Jason and Argo and Circe were familiar. But as for him—no wonder rage and fear swept over him when the recollection was forced upon him unbidden.
And Circe had known. Circe with her powers over magic and the mind—she alone, perhaps, had sensed the stirring of mystery in the thoughts of this man who desired her, this man she hated and had reason to hate. But this man who gave her at odd times glimpses of another man she did not hate. A man she did not hate at all!
Panyr’s words came back to me. “Something strange happened between you. What was it that set Circe on fire for you? What was it made her hate Jason?”
Could it be possible that the enchantress of three thousand years past had looked through Jason’s eyes as through a lens, and met mine and—No! It sounded incredible to say, “She loved me.” And yet could it be the only answer? What answer fitted better the puzzles that had confronted me in this world? Why else should she call me back?
Only through Jason could she call. Only through her Mask and the priestesses of the Mask.
CHAPTER VII
Slave-Girl’s Plea
MUSIC shrilled softly through the air. I came to myself with a jolt, I had not been here. I had stood with Jason in Circe’s palace, clasping her lovely, unresponsive body in my arms and trying in vain to evade her searching eyes. I had stood again in Hecate’s temple on Aeaea hearing the sweet voice calling me, “Jason, beloved!” But if my suspicion were right, it was not Jason she meant. She had no name to use except Jason, but the man she spoke to was—
A soft hissing of breath sounded. I turned, to see that between two pillars the shroud of darkness had parted, and a glistening ebon face above a silver collar was watching me.
It was the face of the little Nubian slave-girl. I saw her eyes shift as she glanced around the room. Then she slipped between the columns, soft-footed, and came toward me across the mossy carpet.
“I was listening,” she said. “I heard your promise.” Oddly, she had changed. The servility was no longer in her voice nor the delicate impudence on her face. I looked at her more closely this time, seeing the fine modeling of her features, the tilt of her nose, the soft redness of her small mouth. Arrogance was on that face now, but it was no less a pretty face, and it did not look like the face of one who had for very long been a slave.
I had no time for further thought on the matter, for the girl stepped back one step, braced herself on her bare feet, and swung up her silver-ringed arm. Her hand caught me flatly across the face.
The crack of her Wow was loud in the quiet room. Caught off balance, I fell back on the divan and sat there gaping up at her in utter amazement. In that instant a number of half-coherent thoughts raced through my mind.
“She’s a messenger from Circe’s people,” I told myself. “She heard me promise—it was clever of them not to wait. Phrontis won’t expect to hear from them until he’s settled me in my new quarters. This was the time for them to speak now, fast, before he expects it. But why?”
My cheek stung where that angry blow had caught it. I lowered the hand that had risen automatically to touch the spot. Then my mind stopped working altogether as I stared at my blackened palm.
Moving like an automaton, I touched my cheek again and looked at the fresh smear that came off on my fingers.
I looked at the girl. Her eyes were wide. She was looking in terror at my face. She turned up the palm that had struck me and we both stared at her streaked pink flesh where the moisture, of the clenched hand had made that dark pigment run.
Her eyes rose again to mine, stretched wide in fright and dismay. My arm shot out.
I seized her wrist below the silver bracelet and rubbed the moist palm with mine. It turned whitely rosy beneath my touch.
Still gripping her wrist, I drew the back of my hand across my own cheek, wiping away the dark paint her blow had left. Her eyes did not swerve from mine. She was breathing fast, but she did not speak a word.
“How long were you going to wait before you told me?” I asked.
She caught her breath. “I—I don’t know what you mean. I only—”
“You heard my bargain with Phrontis,” I said harshly. “You came in to punish me if you could. What was the plan? Lead me out somewhere on a pretext of finding the Circe, and push me off the wall when you saw your chance?” I let her wait a moment, her eyes hoping desperately that I had finished, before I said deliberately, “Maybe you never did mean to tell me who you are.”
She wrenched at her wrist futilely. “Let me go,” she said in an angry whisper. “I don’t know what you mean.”
It was a gamble. I had nothing to lose by it, and a great deal to gain, and some instinct deeper than reason told me I was right. “You’re the young Circe,” I said.
HER eyes searched mine frantically, hoping to find uncertainty there. The longer she delayed her denial, the surer I grew.
I went on in a confident voice, “You couldn’t have escaped the sacrifice without help from inside the temple. That stands to reason. And if they haven’t found you in the city, for all their searching, the logical answer is that you weren’t there. You’ve been here under their noses all along—here with whoever it was that helped you from the first. The best hiding-place is the most dangerous, and you’ve found it. Who helped you?”
She shook her turbaned head violently. “I’m not! It isn’t true! Oh, let me go—let me go!” Hysteria sounded in her voice, and I saw the tears beginning to gather along her lower lids.
I said, “Careful! Remember that paint runs when it’s wet.”
She paused in her struggle, looking at me uncertainly. “Does that matter now?” she asked, still in her desperate whisper. “Aren’t you going to give me up?”
I hesitated. I’d promised Phrontis, yet—“Come over here,” I said. “Sit down. No, here!” I laughed and dropped to the sofa, pulling her down ungently so that she fell across my knees. It was a loverlike embrace I held her in, but my hand was firm upon her wrist. I knew if I once let her go I’d never see her again in a guise I could be so sure of recognizing. And I was not yet sure which side I meant to play on.
“Don’t fight me—you’re all right,” I said. “Now we can talk without looking suspicious if Phrontis comes back. And we have a lot of talking to do, my girl. Circe—do I call you that? Or have you a name of your own?”
“I—I’m Cya
ne,” she told me, leaning quite motionless in my arms now and looking up at me with steady, lustrous eyes, hazel like running water in the sun and ringed by lashes that cast a velvety shadow on her cheeks. I was trying to picture her without the dark body-paint and remembering Panyr’s words about her.
“Cyane?” I repeated. “All right, tell me your story now, and do it fast before Phrontis comes. How did you escape the sacrifice? Who helped you? Is there someone here you can trust?”
“Not you!” she said, a spark coming into the hazel eyes very near mine. “I—don’t know whom I can trust. I heard you promise Phrontis to betray me, and I . . . I came to you just now to beg your help, in spite of what you told the priest.”
“You plead forcefully,” I said, rubbing my cheek.
She turned her shoulder to me. “Well, I found I couldn’t stoop to that. Instead of going on my knees to you, the thought of it—that knowledge that you had sworn to betray me—very well! I slapped you! It’s been three days now in the temple, and I’ve had nearly—nearly all I can stand. I don’t care much what happens!”
A tremor shook the slender, darkly painted body across my knee. She bit her soft underlip and drew a deep breath. “I’ll tell you, because I must. Maybe if you hear the story—but I’m not going to ask you to help me! It was one of the priests who set me free.”
“Phrontis?” I asked her quickly.
She shook her head. “I don’t know. In the temple, at the time of sacrifice, all priests look alike. And I was—frightened.”
“Tell me.”
“I was lying, across the altar, under the gold cloth, waiting,” she said almost quietly, her eyes going unfocused as she looked back upon that terrifying memory. “I could hear them coming. There was music and singing. And then someone in a priest’s robes came out from behind the altar and unlocked the olden shackles that are chained to the altar, was too dizzy to speak. He hurried me through a little door and into an anteroom, and a woman waited there with slave-trappings and a pot of paint. No one said anything.
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