Scoundrel

by Zoë Archer

  Back into the pack went the Compass. He stood, his taxed legs momentarily wobbly, but that lasted hardly a second before he gained his strength back. He took a drink from a canteen and splashed his face. Feeling revived, he drew another inhalation as he stowed the canteen. Now it was time to do what he came here for. What that might be, he didn’t know, but he had a fair share of brains. He’d figure something out.

  Bennett turned. And just barely caught himself from stepping back, over the edge of the cliff.

  He’d seen plenty of strange and wondrous things as a Blade. But this was a first.

  Facing him was a massive golden human head, the shoulders and neck rising up from the ground as if its enormous body was buried within the cliff. The head had to be at least fifteen feet high, possibly higher. Upon its brow, it wore a huge, spiked crown. One eye was missing, a dark chasm. The other stared at Bennett. Scowled, actually.

  The Colossus didn’t seem very pleased to see him.

  How did one approach a giant? Bennett glanced at its frowning mouth, wide enough to gulp him down like a minnow. He hoped the Colossus wasn’t a maneater.

  Cautiously, he stepped closer, but not close enough to be within biting distance.

  “You have come alone.” The Colossus’s voice, speaking in classical Greek, rang low, the sound of dozens of huge bronze bells ringing the hour. Under Bennett’s feet the ground rumbled and shook.

  Bennett steadied himself, keeping his head respectfully lowered. Always best to approach from a position of deference.

  The giant waited for an answer.

  “I’ve come far to be in your presence,” Bennett said, also in classical Greek. “From the singing stream, through the crushing strait, always with enemies at my back.”

  This seemed to intrigue the Colossus, massive creases like bundled blankets appearing between its brows, but it did not speak again, so Bennett continued. “They seek to enslave the Greek Fire, so they may enslave their fellow men. Yet I and my friends wish only to protect the mystery of the Fire. I humbly ask that you counsel me, that I might find this Source and keep it safe.”

  Bennett bowed his head, a hand pressed to his chest, where he felt his heart knocking into his ribs. The giant kept silent. Bennett’s mind raced. Would the Colossus require a sacrifice or offering? He hadn’t brought anything with him, not even wine. Greek deities and immortals didn’t require human sacrifices, did they? Damn, maybe they did. If so, the Colossus would be disappointed. The Blades would find another way to find the Source. How, he hadn’t any idea, not yet, anyway. What if—

  “Solver of Secrets,” boomed the Colossus, shattering Bennett’s whirling thoughts. “I will not speak to you alone. Bring forth the Oracle’s Daughter. One man is a liar. But a man and woman together cannot hide their hearts. Only to you both shall I then reveal what I know.” With that, the giant’s mouth shut with finality.

  Oracle’s Daughter? Who the hell was that? Again, Bennett’s thoughts scrambled for footing. Then, understanding. And with it came a knife of fear. He didn’t want to do it. He had no choice. Good thing for the Colossus that the giant was both huge and magical, otherwise Bennett would have punched its enormous face.

  London checked the urge to look into a mirror. She was certain her hair was now streaked with white. It hadn’t been so bad, watching Bennett scale the cliff. Rather arousing, in truth, seeing the bunch and movement of his muscles, his masculine surety as he climbed, never hesitating. Potent and nakedly virile. She actually felt herself heat with desire as she watched, one hand pressed low to her belly. It wasn’t a particularly intellectual response, but she wasn’t mind alone. Her body had its own demands.

  Her desire dried to dust when his footing gave way, and her fear grew even worse when a rocky outcropping he held crumbled, leaving him swinging from one hand over a deadly drop. And there wasn’t a damned thing she could do about it, just watch in terror through the spyglass, trying to keep her hands from shaking right off her wrists. Even Kallas swore a streak leagues wide.

  “Can you do something?” London asked Athena.

  “I have not the ability to create a shield around him,” the witch answered, frustrated.

  London wished she had wings to fly, but such wishes were futile as the man she loved struggled to right himself stories above her. Awful, powerless.

  Saints and gods were praised when Bennett found another handhold and, after a pause, continued upward. London clutched the spyglass like salvation as her gaze followed Bennett up the rest of the cliff. When he finally reached the top, disappearing over the edge, she barely had the strength in her numb fingers to shut the spyglass and put it aside, rather than let it drop from her hand.

  A light gleamed at the top of the cliff. Athena, holding her Compass, flashed a signal back, then smiled.

  “He has done it,” she said. “He is safe.”

  London blew out a shaky breath, so Athena came over and placed a comforting hand on her back.

  “And now?” London asked.

  “Now we wait,” said the witch.

  Several minutes went by, slow minutes that left her with little to do but pace. What had Bennett found up there? Her pacing stopped when deep noises, more rumbles than actual sound, shook the air. London looked to Athena for guidance, but the witch could only shrug. At least London wasn’t alone in her mystification, yet that was not especially comforting.

  “He’s signaling again,” said Kallas.

  Everyone squinted, looking up. More flashes of light at the top of the cliff, in a specific series.

  Athena translated the code: “L-O-N-D-O-N.”

  Both the captain and the witch turned to London. She stared back at them.

  Finally, London said with a calm that surprised her, “It appears I’m following him up.”

  But not bare-handed and not without some assistance.

  Everyone crouched on the boat’s deck, splicing rope. The captain’s tough hands moved faster than London and Athena’s, but Kallas had a lifetime of learning ropes and the women were latecomers to the art.

  Once there was enough rope, Athena went below to the cargo hold. Minutes later, the witch returned, carrying a wooden box, then set it upon the deck.

  Athena reached under the high collar of her gown and produced a key, dangling from a thin chain. After releasing the clasp on the necklace, she unlocked the box using the key. Polished brass and steel gleamed as the lid to the box was opened. She reached into the box and pulled a device from its snug velvet lining.

  A hollow cylinder had a notch running along its top, and was mounted onto several gears. Cranks extended from both sides of the gears, attached to a spring.

  “Another of Catullus Graves’s infernal mechanisms,” Athena said to a curious Kallas and London. “It is built along similar principles as a mortar. We place the knotted end of a rope into the cylinder, with the long end threaded through the notch. Two people must crank the device to build up enough momentum in the compression spring, so that, when the release is pulled, the knot is hurled up to the top of the cliff.”

  Though the design astounded London, she was compelled to ask, “Why didn’t we shoot the rope up there before Bennett scaled the cliff? Then he would have had something to hold on to besides the rock.”

  “Someone still needs to secure the rope to the top of the cliff. In this case, it will be Bennett.”

  “Secure it with what?” asked Kallas.

  “This.” Athena reached back into the wooden box and produced a small metal instrument. With several quick motions, she unfolded it and locked it into place. “A spike, secured with gunpowder so that it cannot be dislodged. At least, not without considerable work.” She refolded the spike so that it measured only a few inches long. “This goes into the knot we shoot up the cliff. Bennett will know what to do when it lands.”

  Both London and Kallas could only gape. The captain eventually muttered, “This Catullus Graves is a second Daedalus, to make such impossible things possible.”


  “He and his family are among the Blades’ greatest assets,” Athena said with pride.

  “Time to put his work to the test,” London said. “Bennett needs me up there.” For what, she had no idea, but she didn’t care. Bennett would not have asked for her unless he felt it necessary, and she would not disappoint him.

  Athena handed the job of knot-tying to the captain, who produced a monkey’s fist knot wide enough to accommodate the spike, but able to fit into the mortar. He spliced the knot onto the long coil of rope everyone had fashioned. As soon as that task had been accomplished, the knot was loaded into the cylinder. Kallas took one of the hand cranks, while London and Athena took shifts on the other. The gears eventually grew so tight, London and Athena had to hold the crank together, fighting to turn it.

  Finally, when it could be wound no more, Athena pulled the release.

  A whoosh as the knot shot upward at incredible speed, the rope speeding after it like a comet’s tail. The coil of rope unwound quickly, a hissing snake. Then the knot vanished over the top of the cliff. London could not believe it. Catullus Graves’s machine had worked.

  Moments later, there came three sharp tugs on the rope. Bennett had secured it.

  “I’ve spare trousers in my cabin,” Kallas said to London. “You’ll need to change into them.”

  “And take one of my shirtwaists,” added Athena.

  London hurried below and shucked off her gown, then dressed in the trousers and shirtwaist. As an example of fashion, it was ludicrous, and somewhat revealing, but it made up in practicality and freedom what it lacked in modishness and modesty. Fortunately, neither Kallas nor Athena were of a mind to judge her appearance when London joined them back on deck. Athena made several quick alterations to the garments using Arachne’s Art so that, while not entirely à la mode, the fit was substantially better.

  With the tail end of the rope, Kallas fashioned a harness, then fastened it around London’s legs and waist. “Don’t tell Day I did this,” the captain warned as he looped the rope around her thighs, his hands brushing against her as impersonally as possible. “Otherwise he’ll use my bollocks for playing marbles.”

  “I’m sure he won’t mind,” said London.

  “He minds when the wind touches you,” Kallas said darkly. He checked his efforts with businesslike precision. “All in? Secure?”

  London tested the feel of the ropes around her thighs and at her waist, and nodded. She had no doubt the captain’s handiwork was excellent, but that didn’t stop her pulse from beating like crows at a dark window.

  “Ready?” asked Athena.

  London’s mouth dried, so she could only nod again. Then she tugged on the rope, three times, as Bennett had done.

  A jolt, and then her feet lifted from the deck of the caique. She was drawn upward, pulled, presumably, by Bennett. Such a strange sensation, as though slowly, slowly flying. More and more distance separated her from the boat, and Athena and Kallas began to shrink beneath her as she rose.

  Bennett was a strong man, and she wasn’t precisely corpulent, but London wouldn’t allow him to bear her weight alone. As soon as she drew up close to the cliff, she searched for foot- and handholds, trying to pull and push herself upward. Even with the support of the harness, it was tough work, straining her every muscle. Thank heavens she had been laboring on the boat these past days, developing her strength, else she would have merely dangled on the end of the rope like a puppet.

  She chanced a look down, then cursed herself. Even though she knew falling was not a possibility, her head spun with the height. Still, she found a gratification in her elevation, the harsh wind and sun raking her, as though completely exposed before the eye of God. When she banged her knees into the rock, or scraped her face and hands, she allowed herself some prime swearing, but kept her resolve for as long as she was able. Better this, to scrabble up the side of a cliff, with the sea below and the sky stretched overhead, than be shut away in a plush prison, safe from danger, entirely numb.

  Her fingers felt like tender, uncooked sausages and her legs shook by the time she neared the top of the cliff. If Bennett hadn’t been there, pulling her up, she wouldn’t have made it. Or, at the least, it would have taken her a day to make the climb.

  When Bennett’s dark head appeared over the edge of the cliff, smiling, of course, liquid joy poured through her. Filled with new energy, London pushed herself hard to scale the rest of the way. After everything she’d seen and done today, she burned with the need to touch him.

  She clambered over the cliff’s edge just as he gave one final pull on the rope. She stumbled forward, knocking him back. They sprawled together, gasping, her lying on top of him. He wrapped his arms around her, holding her tightly. Beneath her, she felt the heat and solidity of his body, the body she knew so intimately, and she pressed her face into the crook of his neck, inhaling him. She could hardly move. Not merely because her limbs were exhausted, but because he felt exactly right, touching her.

  She brought herself up just enough to kiss him, eating him up like a savage woman. He kissed her back with the same hunger, slipping the harness off of her, then pulled away slightly.

  “There’s someone I want you to meet,” he said, when she frowned in confusion. He sat up, taking her with him. That’s when she saw it. And forgot how to breathe.

  “London Harcourt, Oracle’s Daughter,” Bennett said in classical Greek, “allow me to introduce you to the Colossus of Rhodes.”

  A giant, buried to his shoulders in the rock, nodded regally.

  “Um, charmed,” said London.

  What London had learned about the Colossus of Rhodes came from piles of dusty tomes, scholarly and ancient accounts about one of the Seven Wonders of the World. It had been constructed in the fourth century B.C., a bronze monument to the sun god Helios to celebrate victory after a long and painful battle. London had seen many different renderings of the massive statue, some depicting the god astride the Rhodian harbor, others showing a more classical pose. London had always been impressed by the spectacle, wondering what such a gigantic statue might be like in person. Awe-inspiring, she imagined. Spectacular, in the truest sense of the word.

  Nothing, neither her books nor her imagination, truly prepared her for standing in front of what was very much not a statue, yet not truly alive, an enormous creature somewhere between metal and flesh. It only had one eye, but the eye it did possess was easily two feet across, gleaming like fire in the afternoon light.

  And looking right at her.

  “Am I the Oracle’s Daughter?” she whispered in English to Bennett, standing beside her. She held his hand tightly, and felt some grounding from the familiar and wonderful texture of his skin against hers.

  Lowly, Bennett said, “He insisted he would only speak with me, the Solver of Secrets, if the Oracle’s Daughter was here, as well. It’s been your language skills that have brought us to this point, communicating the words of the ancients to us now. I remembered that Kallas called you Lady Oracle, and it made sense.”

  “Are you sure I’m not some variety of virgin sacrifice?”

  Bennett’s glance at her was both droll and reproving. Of course he wouldn’t bring her up to the Colossus if the giant meant to eat her like a kipper. And, as for virgin, those days were quite, quite behind her. She had the blushes and bite marks to prove it.

  “What does he want?” she whispered.

  “Only one way to find out.” He took a step forward. Addressing the Colossus in classical Greek, he said, “I’ve brought to you the Oracle’s Daughter, as you requested.” Bennett tugged on London’s hand so she also stepped forward, though with a bit more reluctance.

  The giant stared at her, its gaze as weighty as time. Despite everything she had done over the past weeks, all she had seen, to be in the presence of a magical being, particularly one so enormous as the Colossus, left her more than a little lost.

  “How do you do?” she said, also in classical Greek, then winced at her gauc
heness. This wasn’t a blasted tea salon! She pictured herself lifting a teacup the size of a birdbath up to the mouth of the giant, and fought down a hysterical giggle.

  “Are you truly the Oracle’s Daughter?” the Colossus thundered in the Samalian-Thracian dialect.

  London barely managed to keep herself from covering her ears from the tremendous boom of the giant’s voice. Such a gesture would read as disrespectful, and she most assuredly did not want to offend this huge creature.

  And she could not let him see any signs of fear or hesitation. “I am she,” she answered in the same dialect.

  The Colossus inclined his head in approval, appearing to London as if a mountain were tipping onto its side.

  “The Oracle’s Daughter and Solver of Secrets seek the terrible waterborne gift, the fire that burns upon water,” the Colossus said in classical Greek, its voice resounding throughout the soft tissues of London’s body.

  “For the protection of the gift, not for our own use,” Bennett answered, his own voice remarkably level for a man addressing a giant.

  The Colossus’s gaze moved over them both, so penetrating she felt as though her every secret had been laid bare. She prayed the giant did not see the time she stole a penny from her governess to buy a piece of boiled sweets.

  After moments of this examination, the Colossus rumbled, “I read your hearts as I had desired, and find them true.”

  London allowed herself an exhalation of relief. Bolstering her courage, she asked, “What must we do to find this gift?”

  “I see far,” the Colossus intoned. “I see the spans of generations as though they were mayflies, decades and centuries no more than glints upon the surface of the rocks. I see the millennia fall away. I see my destruction. The monument honoring me fell, torn asunder by my brother Poseidon’s earth shakings.” The Colossus’s mouth twisted bitterly. “Jealousy. Yet I expect no better from him, the waterlogged fool.”