The Arms Of Hercules

by Fred Saberhagen

  The dancing girl laughed and put her hand on my arm again, more lightly this time, and the stroking touch of her fingers burned like fire.

  Chapter Ten

  Argonauts

  It was midmorning when I emerged from the tavern, rubbing my eyes and blinking in the sunlight, with the sights and smells and sounds of a strange city all around me. At once I spotted Enkidu, sitting on the step of a market across the street, eating some toasted bread and waiting for me.

  Evidently the youngster found something amusing in my appearance as I shuffled across the street, wincing at what seemed to me the inordinately loud noise of cartwheels thundering past.

  "Did you sleep well, Uncle?" he demanded impertinently as I approached. "Or was that upstairs room with all the mirrors too bright for you?"

  I sat down beside him with a groan. Holding out both hands in front of me, I marked how the fingers trembled slightly. My head was throbbing faintly, too, a phenomenon almost totally unknown in my young life. Something strange indeed must have affected me, more than putting down a mere half-gallon or so of wine. The drink had not had anything like the exotic, intriguing taste of the centaurs' ancient vintage.

  "I slept passably well," I grumbled. "Though I could have done with another hour or two."

  What had deprived me of sufficient rest, apart from the energetic activities of certain dancing girls, had been the insistent presence of strange dreams, prominently featuring the strange, bull-like figure who had now been intermittently invading my sleep for several months. Again I thought the bull-man had been trying to convey some warning to me, but my dreaming mind had been too fuddled for it to come through clearly.

  I started to try to tell Enkidu about my latest experience of these puzzling visions, but he had heard me speak of similar things before and was not much interested. He said he had spent most of the night in a nearby barn, where he slept well and got over his troubled stomach. Fortunately for our fortunes, he still had most of our money safely with him. But he was not now in a mood to do much listening, once he realized that I was not going to relate in great detail my adventures in the room of mirrors.

  And now, in a sudden change of mood, my nephew no longer seemed at all amused. For once he was unhappy enough to be serious, and even glum. Looking listlessly at the remnant of toast he had been chewing on, he complained: "I wish I was strong."

  "You're quite strong, for your age."

  "You know what I mean, Herc. Strong like you. And I wish that girls and women came flocking around me."

  "We all have things we'd like to change. I wish my head would cease to ache. A philosopher would say that sooner or later all our wishes will be granted." As soon as I had made that pronouncement, it did not sound quite accurate to me. It was close, though. I was sure I could remember hearing something of the kind from the most philosophical of my former tutors. At least my version was encouraging.

  My nephew told me, in a few disapproving words, what should be done with all philosophers.

  Now only a few of the Lizard's coins remained to me, and those only by accident, a few that had become stuck in the lining of my tunic, where they were almost impossible to find. It seemed the wrong time to ask my nephew for money. I thought of looking about in the market for food and drink, but decided not to. Enkidu offered me a fragment of his toasted bread, but at that moment my stomach was too queasy. Getting up, I made my way carefully to a nearby fountain, where I slaked my newly raging thirst in the jet from a stone dolphin's mouth, and soused my head. That helped some, but still my head and belly were not right.

  Only at that point, I think, did it occur to me to wonder whether my companions in last night's revelry might actually have put some foreign substance in my drink, with the intent of increasing its potency far beyond that of the natural power of wine.

  Thinking it over, I realized that there might well have been some plan under way to drug me into a stupor and then rob me. I had talked in the tavern about selling my great pig for a good price, which meant I would be carrying money. It would have been no trick at all for one of the girls to drop something in one of the several—all right, one of the many—drinks I had consumed upstairs, or even in the one I had started on before ascending to the room with mirrors.

  Well, if their plan had indeed been to knock me out and rob me, it had certainly miscarried, because here I was, and my few coins still with me. I had remained reasonably alert, and certainly functioning, for hours after going upstairs . . . though when I had awakened in midmorning and had decided to get up, everyone else in the upper room had been still totally passed out.

  While I was struggling to sort out my more reasonable memories of the last twelve hours or so, and to see if any of even the clearer ones were worth retaining, Enkidu tugged at my sleeve. A familiar figure was making its way toward us across the square. Out of courtesy I got to my feet as Daedalus came up. One shrewd glance from the experienced Artisan allowed him to deduce my condition. "Bit of a hangover, young man?"

  "I believe that's what it's called, sir. I don't have a lot of experience along this line."

  With a shake of his head he expressed his sympathy. "Being young has great advantages. But of course there are drawbacks, too." He paused, then added expectedly: "I have a son at home, somewhat younger than either of you lads."

  Enkidu was still gloomy. "I'm not very big. I was just telling Hercules, I wish I was six feet tall, and strong like him."

  "I'll never be six feet tall," I said.

  Daedalus nodded thoughtfully. "Having a wish not immediately granted is often grounds for sorrow. Unhappily, having one granted often produces the same result."

  That sounded like a more accurate version of the philosopher's precept I had been trying to remember, and my nephew began to repeat his prescription for practitioners of that art. But in the midst of it he was suddenly struck by an idea, and broke off to ask a question. "Daedalus, sir? Could Hermes make me strong, do you suppose?"

  "I doubt it, lad," the Artisan responded absently. "That is, he might, but I doubt he will." Though he spoke to Enkidu, he was looking at me now, and he began to frown. "Hercules, I feel I should warn you about something."

  "Sir?"

  "I myself have some experience of celebrity—though not nearly as much as you seem destined to endure. It can be a dangerous drug, more dangerous than wine."

  My stomach gave a queasy stirring at the thought of wine, and my head felt in no shape to cope with sage advice. "Thank you, sir—Daedalus, if I may—actually there's something else I'd like to ask you about."

  "Ask away."

  I began to tell him of my strange dreams. As soon as I described the horned figure, Daedalus said unhesitatingly that it was Prince Asterion of Corycus whom I had met.

  "Who's that?"

  The Artisan seemed mildly surprised at my lack of knowledge. "There are some—ignorant people in many countries—who do not know him, and who call him the Minotaur."

  Enkidu, who was listening, let out a faint gasp—and I said: "Ahh." I said it thoughtfully, for certain things that had not quite made sense suddenly began to do so.

  Daedalus was still talking. "But you are very fortunate, Hercules, if Prince Asterion takes an interest in your welfare. He is a friend of those gods who are most friendly to humanity. Had he any special message to convey to you? Perhaps a warning?"

  I clenched my eyes tight shut and tried to think. "He had a message of some kind, I think. But I was too fuddled, even in my dream, to understand it."

  Meanwhile Enkidu's attention had been captured, and he was still quietly marveling, repeatedly whispering that other name. The Minotaur. In his mind, and in mine as well, the word called up more legends: of the island kingdom of Corycus and its fabled Labyrinth; of a queen who had lusted unnaturally for a bull, and of the grotesque offspring that had resulted.

  Daedalus, taking note of the boy's mutterings, suggested sternly that he had better not use that name at all. Then the Artisan looked around,
as if to make sure that we were not being overheard.

  "I assure you," he said, "it was no ordinary bull, but great Zeus himself, who visited Queen Pasiphae some twenty years ago and is the father of the prince. May the good queen's spirit rest peacefully in some quiet corner of the Underworld. If any such place actually exists."

  "You doubt it does?" I asked.

  "I have seen too much of the world to be very certain of any part of it. But one thing I know is that the monster called the Minotaur is a creature of legend, and very little more than that. The prince, on the other hand, is very real."

  "The figure I have seen in my dreams, and who has spoken to me there, is certainly more than legend, Artisan. Having seen centaurs, I am more ready to believe in him."

  Daedalus nodded reassuringly. "The prince Asterion, the real visitor in your dreams, indeed has the skull and horns of a bull, though the heart and hands and brain of a man. He almost never leaves the Labyrinth, but he has the power to roam the world in his dreams, and also to enter the dreams of others. If the prince has given you a warning, you had better heed it."

  Presently Daedalus squinted up at the sun and announced that there was business he had to be about. After saying that he would probably see us soon, the Artisan took himself away.

  My nephew and I soon got up and, for want of anything better to do, strolled in the opposite direction.

  "Oh, Hercules." It was a faint whisper, luxurious, weary, and admiring, all at the same time. Looking around, I saw the girl who had spoken my name in passing, and who was now retreating in the direction of the tavern where I had spent the night. She had now clothed herself for an appearance on the public street, but my brief glimpse of her face was enough for me to identify one of my bedmates of the mirrored room. One of those who might have been trying to rob me. What was it that Daedalus had said about celebrity?

  Having turned our backs on the street of taverns and easy women, my nephew and I kept moving in the opposite direction. Our feet seemed to carry us automatically toward the nearby harbor. After all, water lay always downhill, and that was the easiest direction in which to carry an aching head.

  There was no doubt as to which of the ships along the busy docks was the one being prepared for Jason's much-celebrated expedition. That was, plain even before we came close enough to see the name of Argo painted on the bow. And presently, working our way through a scattering of idle onlookers, we got our first close look at the ship, resting unguarded against the quay.

  Long and narrow, with places for fifty oars, her every line breathed adventure, and a great, challenging, staring eye was painted on each side of the prow, just forward of the name.

  The Argo, the ship in which the heroes planned to accomplish their great adventure, was an impressive sight. There was a notch in the raised central deck where a mast could be mounted, though neither mast nor sail were visible right now.

  I fell into conversation with some local idler—or perhaps he was a worker, for there were brushes and a paint pot at his feet, suggesting that he or someone else might have just completed the job of painting on the giant eyes. My curiosity was greatly stimulated. "And the object of this expedition is—?"

  The man looked at me as if he thought I might be having fun at his expense. "To find the Golden Fleece and bring it back."

  Overhead a gull was screaming, as if in derision. But I was just bewildered. "Back where? Here to Iolcus? And what is this Golden Fleece?"

  My informant shrugged. "That's what everyone tells me, but I don't know what it means."

  I thought that my new acquaintance Meleager would surely be able to tell me, and I supposed I would see him somewhere in town today. But I hesitated to betray my ignorance by pestering everyone else with questions.

  Enkidu was tugging at my arm. "Look, Unc. What the man is carrying. That must be the compass-pyx for Jason's ship."

  I had wondered what sort of navigational instrument the heroes would be provided with, and now I could see. It looked like something special indeed.

  The man I had been talking to explained. "That's one of the heroes, the steersman Tiphys. Last night he carefully removed his compass-pyx from the ship, to make sure it wouldn't be stolen. Hah, who would dare swipe anything from that bunch?"

  Tiphys, a very solid-looking fellow though not especially large, now came carrying the device onto the pier, obviously ready to reinstall it, a job that I had always heard was easily accomplished with a few simple, routine rites of magic. He acted as if the instrument belonged to him, treating it with the familiar care of a man who handles a treasure that has been passed down in his family for generations.

  By now a little crowd had begun to gather onshore, just behind Enkidu and myself, as we stood there on the narrow pier. There was a murmuring from the crowd, and it gave me a strange sensation to hear people I had never met, or even seen, using my name, pointing me out to one another as someone worthy of notice. It seemed that word had finally reached the people of Iolcus regarding what had happened to the Hydra in its swamp, and how the Boar had been carried into town. And I had been observed to be in earnest conversation with a hero. Many now presumed me to be of that company.

  I could hear some muttering behind my back: "Is it true that he clubbed a lion to death as well?"

  Soon there came a louder murmuring among the crowd as a small group of young men, most of them taller than the average, made their way into it and through it. Now the pier swayed slightly underfoot with the weight of several heavy bodies moving briskly along it.

  I turned around to face the shore just as a deep voice approaching from that direction asked: "You are the one called Hercules?"

  "I am."

  The speaker, perhaps ten years my senior, towered over me. He was arrayed in fine garments, and his whole head seemed a dark, luxuriant mass of hair and beard. "My name is Jason. And do you think yourself qualified to join us in our quest?"

  "I don't know the answer to that, sir. I'm not sure just what qualifications you expect."

  The mass of dark hair nodded judiciously. "A reasonable answer."

  Jason explained that he and some of the others had begun just recently to hear of a certain youngster named Hercules, who was said to have achieved great things. They all assumed that I had come to Iolcus to join the heroes on their quest, and by the time they joined us on the crowded pier, it was obvious they had already decided among themselves that the next step must be to test my worthiness in some way.

  Various murmurings around me soon informed me that the gods only knew how many other youthful would-be heroes had already been disposed of in the same way. In most cases, a bout or two of one of the milder forms of wrestling had sufficed to do the trick. I have no doubt that a majority of the qualified heroes on hand thought this would promptly eliminate me.

  I felt relieved, having been worried that some bloodier test would be suggested.

  "A little arm wrestling, then?" Jason was proposing jovially. "It's a warm day, whoever loses shouldn't mind a little swim." Actually, as we were all quite fully aware, the water just below the pier looked quite foul, a state of affairs only natural for a busy harbor that received much of a sizable city's waste. Today the wind and tide were doing a poor job of flushing, and it was not the place that any of us would have chosen for a refreshing dip.

  Before the test could actually get started, more of the Argonauts appeared and introduced themselves to me. Eventually it seemed that their whole number came crowding onto the quay, forcing the retreat to shore of an even larger number of spectators. Among the newcomers I recognized Meleager, evidently no worse for his own visit to the tavern last night—of course his visit had probably not lasted nearly as long as mine.

  Meleager asked me how my head felt this morning, after my adventures last night. "My own skull feels a bit thick," he added.

  And then there happened that which I had not expected—and my life was changed forever. First I heard her voice, talking at a little distance, utterly unexpe
cted, tantalizingly familiar . . .

  . . . and then I raised my eyes and saw her, standing on the next pier over, only a few yards away, beyond a gulf of noxious water. She was looking, I realized, not at me, but directly at the man who stood just next to me. A pair of green eyes that I had seen only three times before, and then in very different circumstances, but could never have forgotten. The last time I looked into them it had been by candlelight, in a dark kitchen.

  Looking at Meleager now, and at the family resemblance between them, I realized why I had thought his face familiar at first sight.

  She was dressed differently now than on the last occasion when I saw her, but I did not doubt for a moment that it was in fact the same girl who had helped two young itinerant laborers who had been badly cheated.

  Now she was calling to Meleager in a familiar way. He waved back casually and then turned to me to make the introduction.

  "Over there you see my sister, Deianeira, informally known as Danni. Danni, this is Hercules, who says he wants to come chasing the Golden Fleece with us."

  Then he paused, awareness slowly dawning in his honest face. He smote his forehead with his palm—then seemed to regret the act.

  "But no, what am I saying? Of course you two have met before. That's where I heard the name of Hercules!" He raised his voice again. "By Hades, Danni, I ought to have remembered what you told me!"

  The other heroes were meanwhile wrangling among themselves, so far good-naturedly, about which of them was to administer the test of wrestling. No one was that eager, for testing an undersized recruit was not the kind of trial that seemed to offer any chance of glory. Danni took advantage of the delay to come around and join us on the same pier. When she came near, I took her hand gently, as a man of quality does in Cadmia when introduced to a fine lady of his own rank.

  She nodded a greeting to Enkidu and then turned back to me. Her straight brown hair was blowing a little in the breeze. "I see, Hercules, you and your friend have abandoned your earlier profession of farm laborer."