In the Moon of Asterion

by Rebecca Lochlann

  He shrugged, hoping she would not.

  When the oracle reappeared, she moved slowly, with assistance, back to the queen and consort. “Help me,” she said. “I feel strange.” The queen supported her on one side and Chrysaleon on the other.

  “Lady Athene offers divine forgiveness,” Aridela told the people who crowded around them. “She shows this by placing a holy child in the womb of Themiste, her faithful servant. Can this be anything other than a promise of life and new beginnings?”

  A wave of nods and agreement met these words. Many made the sign against evil, and some wept.

  Sending her voice out over the assemblage, Themiste announced, “The labyrinth is still dangerous, impassable in many places. We cannot think of sending the contestants down there. Instead the sacred contest will be held here, in this clearing.”

  Chrysaleon barely stifled a sneer of cynicism as he watched the smiles and animated praise for the decision. This would be the first time in all of Kaphtor’s history that commoners could view the famous confrontation and slaying. He knew that was the only reason it was accepted so quickly.

  Themiste’s next announcement didn’t go as well. “Kaphtor will hold no Games this year.” She lifted her hand in a demand for silence at the immediate rumbles of protest. “I have seen this. Our bull-king has been given my permission to choose his cabal, and he has chosen Menoetius, his blood brother. All will be as it was but for these two things. For one year only, the Games are suspended. This we do in mourning and respect for the loss of Queen Helice, and for the many deaths each one of us has suffered.”

  Moans of “the Beast!” undulated through the crowd. Some seemed fearful. Others intrigued. Fascination energized the people.

  Gradually, the mood changed. What Themiste asked was not too much, after all. The most important aspect— his death— would remain the same. Excitement overrode everything else. The people would witness brutal bloodshed, and they would see for themselves the ghastly Asterion.

  Themiste drew in a ragged breath and her knees buckled. Aridela seized her waist, struggling to support her. Together she and Chrysaleon lowered her to the ground.

  Startled cries replaced the cheers. The throng pressed closer.

  Themiste’s hands clawed the air as if to ward off an attack. Her eyes rolled up in their sockets until only unnerving white remained. Her back arched. She panted and gasped. Then she seemed to stop breathing altogether.

  “Goddess,” Aridela cried. “Spare us, Athene, my Mother. We need our oracle.”

  Horrified silence fell. Then, thankfully, Themiste released a soft, drawn out moan. Sweat beaded her forehead.

  “Bring Rhené,” Aridela ordered one of the maids. “Hurry.” The woman kneeling beside her rose and ran off, calling for Kaphtor’s royal healer.

  Themiste turned her head toward Aridela, but her eyes remained unfocused, the irises sliding from side to side. “The youthful sun will marry the ancient moon,” she said, her voice holding no inflection— nothing but cold dispassion. “He who laughs will lie with she who is beautiful to men. Curse the usurper, the changer of the Way. He shall follow without rest, without joy, without relief, until the final devastation of the heavens. He shall follow begging, but love will run from him, and he will receive only sorrow and regret until the world is old and tired, and razed by war.”

  Her eyes closed and her breath escaped in a long sigh. Chrysaleon stared, chilled by apprehension. Aridela screamed, “No!”

  The oracle’s eyelids trembled. Her hands moved restlessly. “You cling to your blindness,” she muttered. Again, she turned her head toward Aridela. “You will suffer. The world will suffer. As you are betrayed, so you will in turn betray those who put their faith in you.”

  The crowd parted for Rhené. She felt Themiste’s face and hands, and listened to her breathing.

  “Carry her to the palace,” she ordered, and several men came forward, lifting the oracle in their arms.

  Chrysaleon rose, his muscles stiff and cramped. Consumed by unease, he met Aridela’s gaze. She stood still, her eyes black and fathomless.

  What had Themiste said? He strained to recall. He who laughs will lie with she who is beautiful to men. What omen was this? Who did Themiste curse?

  The changer of the Way. The usurper. Everyone would identify this as Harpalycus. They would shake their heads and wonder how a dead man could still threaten the people of Kaphtor.

  But he couldn’t fool himself so easily. Certainty crept through him. Somehow Themiste, or the Goddess who spoke through her, knew what he planned to do.

  Aridela remained at Themiste’s side, holding her hand, until Rhené assured her the oracle was in no danger. She needed rest, the healer said, and that meant she needed to be left alone.

  Neoma talked Aridela into going with her to Mount Juktas, where they would leave offerings at the temple. As they were leaving they came across Selene. Hardly anyone saw her these days, for she was always in the labyrinth with Menoetius. Struck by her paleness and the grief in her eyes, Aridela convinced her to go along, using the health of the baby as an excuse the Phrygian couldn’t ignore.

  The temple priestesses came out to greet them, bringing refreshments. Aridela’s companions accepted eagerly, as the day was warm and the journey dusty. After Aridela had a drink of water, she decided to walk on to the clearing that held so many memories.

  She was pleased at the appearance of the forest. The trees were thick and leafy upon either side of the path, the water in the creek cold, swift, and fresh. Wildflowers peeked from shady soil, waving as if to say pick me, pick me, which she did. Perhaps the storm of suffocating ash had missed this area altogether.

  In due course the trees gave way to the clearing where she, her mother, and Themiste had brought Iphiboë last year, to prepare her for her grove dedication.

  She sat on the ground and began weaving a flower necklace as she reminisced about her sister, and Isandros, her reckless cousin, her childhood nurse, Halia, and then of the day she’d brought Menoetius here, when she was ten and he seventeen. It felt like lifetimes had passed since then. He’d been young, handsome, his smiles easy and quick. Neither had any premonition of what was to come.

  “My lady?”

  She released a small gasp, startled by a man’s voice right next to her, and scrambled to her feet.

  Then it struck her. The acrid smell of smoldering ashes.

  Her heart began to pound so furiously she thought for an instant she might faint. But this was not the shade of Harpalycus. He was an older man, dressed in a typical loincloth, with a few armbands that signified he was a soldier. His hair was black but for a few streaks of gray. His eyes, too, were black, not anything like the cruel blue gaze Harpalycus had leveled upon her as he sought to make her lose control and release her hatred so he could then punish her for it.

  But that smell. She couldn’t get it out of her nose, and stepped away from him even as she chastised herself. Why did this keep happening? Why did she continue to fear a dead man, when she knew he was gone?

  “Who are you?” she asked. “Why do you disturb me?”

  He bowed, his face and manner respectful. “I apologize, my lady,” he said. “I saw you here. I wanted to make certain you didn’t need assistance.”

  She relaxed a little. “Thank you,” she said. “I am perfectly well.”

  The man glanced briefly around them then he lifted his gaze to hers.

  Terror writhed out of her core and raced up her throat, blocking her lungs so she couldn’t breathe.

  “Have you told your consort the truth yet?”

  She hardly heard this strange question, for memories of Harpalycus’s attacks were flooding her mind.

  He stepped forward, seizing her wrists, pulling her close. “Have you told him how much you liked what I did to you?”

  A sound ripped through the air. What was it? A cross between a moan and a scream. It sounded like an animal being tortured.

  She tried to yank free,
but his grip was immovable. How well she remembered his strength.

  “Are you ready to take what I offer? Do you want to be one of the Immortals with me, and rule at my side?”

  He leaned in close, suffocating her in the singular, pungent smell of ash.

  “I see you haven’t lost that succulent hatred that sets my blood on fire,” he said, close to her ear. “I haven’t yet tired of you, queen of Crete. My slave.”

  Awareness faded beneath a cold black wave, sliding in at the edges of her mind and blotting out everything it touched. Nothing like it had ever happened to her before. What would he do if she were insensate and unable to fight him?

  But she couldn’t stop it, no matter how deeply she breathed or how hard she yanked, trying to break his grip. The black, drowning swell crashed behind her eyes and carried her away into a deep ocean.

  “Aridela, can you hear me? Wake up.”

  She opened her eyes. Selene’s face was just above hers. Gradually, she realized her head was cradled on Selene’s lap.

  “What…?” Her voice felt hoarse and rusty. “Water,” she whispered.

  Selene motioned to someone. Neoma’s face appeared, holding a bowl. Selene held it to her lips and she drank. The water was refreshing. They must have scooped it from the stream in the forest.

  Yes, she was in the clearing— her clearing, a treasured place of dreams, of stars and magic, of Iphiboë and her mother, of Menoetius when he was her beloved Carmanor, of the Goddess.

  Had she fallen asleep? If so, her friends would not be so anxious and afraid. They would be laughing at her.

  “My head hurts.” She still had to whisper, though the water soothed her throat somewhat.

  Several of the priestesses from the temple helped her stand. She leaned on them and they supported her all the way to the temple, where she was put into a bed and given soup with leeks and barley.

  After a few sips, she fell asleep, only to wake like a flash of lightning at some point, remembering all that had happened. She screamed, bringing Selene, sleeping on a pallet next to her bed, upright and bending over her.

  Selene sat on the bed, holding her as she sobbed. The priestesses and Neoma came in, startled and fighting off vestiges of sleep.

  “Aridela, what happened?”

  “It was Harpalycus.” Aridela choked on the name. “He is not dead. He followed me. He was in the clearing.” An unnerving thought came over her. What had he done to her after she fainted?

  She nudged Selene away and put her hands under the coverlet, under her tunic, feeling, searching for evidence. There was no soreness. No blood. No scent of him. Surely something would remain if he’d raped her again.

  “Aridela,” Neoma said, her forehead wrinkled with concern. “Harpalycus is dead. My cousin, I swear to you he is dead.”

  Selene held Aridela to her breast and rocked her. Aridela felt her friend’s sigh, felt her exchange a worried glance with her cousin and the priestesses.

  They must think she was mad.

  Maybe it was true.

  There was no way to keep what happened from Chrysaleon, even if Aridela wanted to. Their attendants were dismissed so they could be alone.

  “Tell me,” he said. There was an odd, dark look to his eyes she couldn’t quite decipher, but it brought back memories of his furious jealousy in the apple grove. He crossed his arms over his chest.

  Aridela tried to make her voice sound reasonable, tried to make the shivering subside. “I went alone to the clearing beyond the temple,” she said. “I was merely sitting there. I didn’t hear the man come up behind me. He was just there, all at once. He— he—” She stopped as she heard her voice rise, felt the panic rise too, with hints of the same black swelling wave.

  “Did he look like Harpalycus?”

  “No,” she said. Then her throat closed, and she couldn’t speak. She began to weep and shake. He took her to the bed and lay beside her, holding her against his bare chest.

  Chrysaleon fell asleep. When Aridela lifted his arm off her, he rolled onto his back, releasing a snore, but didn’t wake.

  Every sound, no matter how faint or innocuous, prompted nauseating rushes of fear. She’d bitten her lip so often it was sensitive and swollen. Her eyes stung.

  She rose from the bed and padded across the chamber, into the corridor, and down the central staircase to the courtyard.

  All was awash in the pitch black of deepest night. Cool breezes eddied around her. As her eyes adjusted to the dark, she made out the vast flat space of the courtyard, and beyond that, the hulking shadow of the palace wall. Here and there a lamp glimmered, giving perspective to the tower on all sides.

  She went down the steps on the west side leading to the shrine, but didn’t enter that chamber. She passed it, running her fingertips along the wall to keep her bearings.

  Low voices broke the silence. She knew there would be guards, two at least, at the entry into the labyrinth. She slipped past them soundlessly, hidden by shadows.

  She had to drop to her knees and crawl forward as she searched for the grate she remembered from childhood. When she found it, she felt around its edges. It was simply an air duct, not much bigger than the width of her body, covered by an ancient, rotted latticework of wood that was easily pulled away.

  Not allowing herself to think, she worked herself head first into the shaft, creeping along a downward sloping incline carved into the earth like a wormhole, until her hands encountered nothing but air before her. She grabbed a clump of roots sticking out of the dirt on one side— still there, after so many years— and slid free, using the roots to keep herself from falling on her head. She twisted, turning herself upright. Her bare toes touched the dirt floor and she released the roots, straightening. She was in the labyrinth.

  Moving on instinct, she began to walk. Her body knew where she wanted to go. Her thoughts gave way to her body’s will.

  Eventually she found herself in the corridor leading to Menoetius’s prison. Lamps placed in the walls provided illumination for those who brought him food. Most had expired but a few still gave off feeble light.

  She came to the door and stopped. Her mind dropped into what seemed an empty, bottomless crater. She lost awareness, of the chill in the air, the musty, damp smell, and of the dim passage stretching away in either direction.

  Perhaps she should have been startled when she felt someone approach from behind. One hand rested on her shoulder briefly then slid across her chest to her other shoulder, followed by a second arm around her waist, effectively trapping her. Menoetius’s door was still closed and there had been no sound of warning. Yet she wasn’t. She knew it was he, the one she sought. The lord of the labyrinth.

  He put his cheek against the side of her neck, as he’d often done during their time in the Araden mountains, and, more recently, within this prison chamber. His body infused her with warmth, surrounded her with the faint scent of clouds and fallen leaves. She remembered the first time she’d inhaled that essence, when she was ten, and he was carrying her to safety, to life.

  Like a deluge breaking through a dam, her mind woke. Fear slid away. She leaned against him, this Beast, her bastion, and closed her dry, burning eyes. “Do you feel her? The Goddess?” She wished they could somehow return in time to the day she, a silly, spoiled child with a topknot and a heart full of callow infatuation, had taken him to Lady Athene’s clearing. If only they could find a way back, and from that point on, do everything differently.

  She hadn’t really thought he would remember. But he whispered, “Yes,” as he had that day, and added, “Don’t leave me alone this time.”

  The Moon of White Light replaced the Moon of Mead-making, and the days crept inexorably on toward the rise of Iakchos. In ten nights, then nine, then eight, Crete’s foreign king, the king who would forever be associated with the Destruction and the invasion of Harpalycus, would die.

  Knossos and the palace grew stiflingly crowded as the citizens of Kaphtor, high and low, peasant and lord, pou
red in from every corner of the island. Alexiare spent his days in marketplaces and other haunts, listening, watching, gauging the mood.

  “Our plans are working better than I hoped,” he reported to Chrysaleon. “Much unhappiness is brewing. The people love and admire you, my lord. Ah, how they love you. You are foreign, for one thing. That draws everyone’s interest, but they know this worked in their favor, for it was your father’s army that helped defeat Harpalycus the Butcher, and would he have involved himself in the troubles of Crete had his son’s life not been in danger? No. I’ve heard many declare they would still be slaves but for you.” A lump formed in his throat as he added, more tenderly than was safe, “The women coo and flutter over your beautiful face, your skin that reflects the light like a statue of gold.”

  Chrysaleon snorted his disgust at this poetry and fondled his dagger hilt. “That won’t stop them from screaming in rapture as their axe spills my blood.” He speared a date with the point of his blade while making a bloodthirsty grimace. “How many of those women will sing hymns as they tear my flesh from my bones?”

  “Don’t lose hope, my lord. These strong emotions work in our favor. The people of Kaphtor will gladly follow new direction if given the chance. Inside, in here,” he struck his chest with his fist, “they want to save you.” Peering keenly at his master, he added, “Many spoke of seeing you at the queen’s side when she gave the decrees, and how she allowed you to make the offerings in her stead. Helice rarely allowed her consorts such distinction. Though she doesn’t realize it, Queen Aridela helps our cause. She, too, truly needs but a nudge, the slightest excuse to embrace our changes.”

  “What of the vision? Have you turned it to our favor?”

  “I described how the dead hero Damasen came to you and called you his brother. I had them all gawping when I told them he swore an eternity of friendship with you. That story has spread, gaining renown, as I knew it would, as did the rumor I started about Menoetius. Everyone believes him a monster, frothing and raging in the labyrinth. No one wants the Beast to be Kaphtor’s next bull-king.” He laughed. “I heard one man claim he eats nothing but human flesh, and every citizen will be required to sacrifice their daughters for his unholy appetite.”