The Wrath of God

by Jay Penner

  The last man runs back and watches us from a distance.

  I pray for him. We run.

  My skin singes from the heat and the blasts of scorching air. We get to the hidden boats. We help Sitkamose’s crew prepare for departure, and I tell them to navigate until they reach Egypt. They promise to take her to safety, and she assures them that she will keep them safe when they reach the shores of Egypt.

  I finally pull the Princess aside for one last conversation. “Queen. Innocent. My baby.”

  Her eyes widen. She gestures at me. “Apsara. Atalanni Queen. Your baby?”

  “Yes.”

  She smiles, knowingly.

  “Ask to escape to Egypt. Hide. No harm?” I tell her. I hope that it will never come to this.

  “No harm. Protect. She innocent. I know.”

  “King declare torture death for her. I save. Promise me.”

  “By Amun and Horus,” she says and squeezes my shoulder. I am relieved.

  “You?” She asks me.

  “Want join Apsara. But Egypt?”

  “Cannot promise safety. You general. You fought Pharaoh. Cannot go against Pharaoh,” she says, and I admire her honesty.

  “Understand,” I say. She embraces me and steps into her boat.

  I bid goodbye to them and say that we will be right behind. We watch them sail through the quiet, cool tunnel, and begin our preparation. Our plan is to briefly stop at Kaftu, away from all settlements, and depending on the winds, continue to Egypt or to Cyprus. While it is highly risky, I still long to be with Apsara.

  It takes us a few hours, and by the time we emerge from the tunnels on the far side of the island, it is already late in the day, and the sun has begun to set. But we feel energized and relieved by the cooler and better air.

  We turn south, to coast along the edges of Kallistu, to prepare course towards Kaftu. And that is when we notice something in the Northern horizon.

  A flotilla!

  I cannot make out much in the haze, but the shapes are enough to tell me that these are Mycenaeans, and this time they come in vast numbers. These sneaky bastards will never give up!

  They are in for a surprise.

  I look at the men. There is an understanding in their eyes. While our capital no longer exists in any manner worth defending, our people have fled to Kaftu and other islands. If the Mycenaeans make way, I know they will massacre the weakened Atalanni.

  “The invaders from the North,” I say.

  “They never give up, do they?” Innas, another trusted lieutenant, says, nodding his head in exasperation. “What do they seek?”

  “Our ports. Our ships. Our riches. Our trade connections. Our women. Everything we wanted from someone else,” I say. We watch in silence as the full extent of the Mycenaean fleet becomes clear.

  The sea is still blue here. The imposing cliffs hide the tumult in the inlet. The haze of smoke and ash is visible on the skies above Kallistu, like a cloud of gnats on a buffalo.

  We watch in silence. It will soon be dark, and I know that the invaders will wait for morning. I give my men a chance to leave, but not one man agrees.

  These are the true men of the Atalanni.

  Our eight boats are no match to hundreds.

  But then we have something else.

  CHAPTER 62.

  KALLISTU

  At dawn, we wash our faces with the blue-green waters as the boats sway gently in the unassuming seas. A cool breeze blows in the south-easterly direction and pushes the cloud of ash away from our direction. The hum from the fires that rage in the inlet has become louder, more incessant, more urgent, as if a great cataclysm is about to be unleashed.

  We make our prayers to the gods,

  O’ mighty Trikaia

  Bless us

  Give us wisdom to fight darkness

  Bestow health, plentiful food, and riches,

  We bow to you

  Protect us and give us eternal life

  Once the prayers are complete, we place each other’s palms on the fellow man’s shoulders as the boats dance beneath us.

  “The invaders are in front of us,” I say, and I look at each man. “But our gods are behind us,” I say, and smile.

  One man wipes a tear from his cheek and laughs.

  “I am proud and honored to be with you. We will live in the hearts of our families,” I say. Well, my family is dead, and the woman I love is there, somewhere, hopefully headed to safety.

  “To the general we would all die for,” announces Innas, and I hear a chorus of “hear, hear!”

  “To the man who got between the Queen’s legs while the King scratched his balls!” announces Eluminnas, and the group cackles.

  We raise our hands and bow to each other.

  Eyes shine with mischief.

  We huddle to strategize. Then, we get to work.

  First, we unfurl the bold and colorful Atalanni flags, so they are clearly visible.

  Then, we spread our boats in a broad arc, so that the eight boats still feel like a welcoming party.

  Once in position, we pull out the powerful conches—these are always available in all Atalanni speed boats. These instruments, fashioned from seashells, emanate a powerful battle cry.

  I close my eyes and feel the gods smile upon me, and Apsara lean forward and kiss me.

  And in unison, we raise the conches a blow a long, ear-shattering horn into the air.

  CHAPTER 63.

  KALLISTU

  __

  Draklymaxos, called Drax by his men, squints at the southerly seas. The vessels in his temple throb with a combination of eagerness and anxiety. The powerfully built commander of the Mycenaean forces puts a foot on the boat helm and elevates his height to get a better look at the vista ahead.

  The cliffs of the island of the Atalanni rise to his left, and Drax and his men have been hearing a strange buzzing sound emanating from within the island for two days now. There are dark clouds in the sky, but they seem to be drifting away.

  Drax does not like what he hears, sees, and smells. It does not feel right, and he does not know why. He was of the mind to halt the advance until further notice—but now there is another development. Far ahead, in front of him to the south, there are the Atalanni military boats. They are close to the cliffs, near the entrance to the islet, no doubt the welcoming party to the fleet. They are raising their customary battle horns—loud, annoying, intimidating. Drax knows that previous battles with the Atalanni have gone poorly for his navy.

  “Why have they not met us before with their larger fleet?” he asks his advisor.

  The older man squirms. “We do not know, sir. Perhaps another trick from these wretched sea-farers?”

  “What do you make of the sounds and the strange smells?”

  “We have not heard the likes of it before, sir. I only have accounts from far lands that sometimes lofty mountains hum.”

  Drax looks at the man with irritation and slaps his chest to push him back. “This old fool knows nothing,” he mutters.

  The conches blow again from the Atalanni boats. The enemy boats then turn away.

  “Do you think they are leading us into a trap, sir?” asks the advisor.

  “What trap? Even if it is a trap a few hundred boats are no match for our thousand!” he shouts.

  He exaggerates, of course, for they have three hundred. “This is not any other invasion, you idiot, do you not see how big our forces are?”

  The advisor shrinks and quietly vanishes behind the other men.

  “Kolymos, hoist the masts and prepare to advance full speed!” he orders. “We will put an end to this farce. Aememnon did not send us here to sit and wait with our cocks tucked between our legs!”

  Kolymos raises an attack flag, and the hundreds and hundreds of boats behind them acknowledge the sign. In unison, the great Mycenaean fleet of King Aememnon slices the dark blue waters and races along the western cliffs. Their destination is the only passage into the inlet, beyond which lies the great inne
r harbor and temple of the Atalanni. Drax expects vicious fighting and attacks from the cliffs.

  He inhales the salty wind the exhilarating aroma of seaweed and laughs at the childish tactics of the Atalanni.

  He orders a hundred boats to get ahead of him. Too bad they would withstand the worst of the first attacks, but it is necessary. It takes not long for them to arrive near the inlet, but the signs are deeply unsettling.

  The sea is more disturbed here.

  The sky is darker.

  The hum so much louder.

  There is abundant debris—the inlet looks not the beautiful emerald.

  Thick brown, black, and yellows swirl around.

  The Atalanni boats have vanished somewhere in the turn, behind the cliffs. Drax ponders—should they just wait, or send in the first hundred and see what happens?

  “Should we wait, sir?” Kolymos asks, tentatively, looking worried.

  “Have you heard of the legend of King Amaeos?” Drax asks his lieutenant.

  “No, sir.”

  “Amaeos was a weakling. When he took his powerful army to fight the Northern rebels, they came to a narrow mountain pass. He suspected ambush and sent small units forward to check the ambush. The clever rebels massacred the parties just out of eyesight, and then a man would dress himself up as one of the unit’s men and signal the next batch to come in. This way, he lost a good portion of his best men before his generals realized and intervened. By then it was too late—killed by a thousand cuts—all because of the man’s abject stupidity.”

  Kolymos nods. He does not know if this is a made-up story for it sounds ridiculous. Why would the king send more small parties after the first one? But he is afraid of Drax to protest.

  Drax continues. “Maybe the Atalanni planned it! These tricksters surely created an ambush-like scenario to make us pause, think that this is an ambush, send small groups that get destroyed, and then wear us down.”

  Kolymos nods half-heartedly, unconvinced.

  “I will not let that happen. Not on my watch!” Drax yells, pumping his fist in the air and twirling his great beard.

  He orders the boats to spread wider, into an arc of about fifty boats each, and six rows deep. The rectangular fleet can just fit into the inlet that is about half-a-mile wide based on the assessment by previous messengers. This entry, Drax is sure, will frustrate any ambush for the boats are too many, and in too wide and deep a formation.

  His boat is in the fourth row of formation.

  Ah, to look at their surprised and terrified faces! He fantasizes about the upcoming massacre, loot, and rape—these people would finally experience what they had evaded so far.

  Drax is ecstatic as the wind picks up speed. The closer they get, the harder it is to control the formation. Copious amounts of mud and ash are being ejected from the innards of the inlet.

  What is going on?

  “Full speed ahead, let us thrust the mighty Mycenaean cock into the Atalanni!” he shouts, his face red with excitement. The great fleet makes its slow turn into the inlet, with the farthest wings rowing quickly to get to the inlet.

  CHAPTER 64.

  KALLISTU

  Just when the sun ascended and began its daily ascent in a cloudless sky, the enormous forces beneath the earth’s surface begin to conspire. The central vent, now hundreds of feet wide and spurting prodigious amounts of lava, rumbles like an enraged monster from the deep. First, the entire inlet shakes as a massive earthquake bubbles up from depths. The sea churns with breathtaking ferocity, with waves up to eighty-feet high, smashing against the fragile cliffs and creating large sections to break and collapse. The landslides and the quakes cause the rest of the Palace and the once magnificent cliff-facing complexes and homes to crumble, shatter and fall into the sea.

  The first four rows of the Mycenaean boats that entered the inlet now realize what they have gotten themselves into, after having ignored the obvious signs of danger all around them. Kolymos shouts. “Fire. Their earth spews fire, sir!”

  The boats in the front panic.

  The captains signal the rest to halt and try to maneuver a turnaround. But it is impossible—stuck in a narrow inlet and their own fleet clogging up the entire width, there have nowhere to go as the huge debris-and-mud filled waves begin to sock them. The tumult causes the boats to smash against each other as if a giant bangs the heads of his weak opponents in the arena.

  When the last row of the boats tries to turn, the troops see the eight Atalanni speed boats race behind them. The Atalanni commander stands tall, and he is exhorting his troops. They blow their conches again, which can still be heard in the great din of the smashing boats, waves, rock, and fire.

  The Atalanni boats get close, and the men pull strange metallic orbs from bags tied to their waists.

  “What the—” a Mycenaean captain shouts. And just then the first metallic orb comes arcing through the air and lands on the boat. It then explodes, killing several men instantly and sets the boat on fire. The rest yelp and howl as the flames engulf them.

  The Atalanni boats are like bees, moving quickly from one Mycenaean boat to the other.

  Several boats in the last row are on fire, inducing further panic. The Mycenaeans throw their javelins and kill several of the Atalanni, thinning their numbers, until only a few, including the colorful leader covered in ash and soot, are alive and dash away. But the last row of the Mycenaean boats is a flaming wreck, now entangled and preventing and escape of those stuck ahead of them.

  Birds create a great ruckus as they fly around terrified. The central vent spits out huge columns of fine, superheated ash high into the air, the pillar now exceeding the height of the cliffs and rapidly spreading across the island like an enormous mushroom, grabbing the entire island in a deathly hug.

  Drax feels terror like he never felt before. The spectacle in front, around, and beneath him makes him realize what he has navigated his fleet into. “Turn, men! Signal the last rows to turn!” he yells, but it is too late. The inlet is churning violently, causing the boats to entangle themselves and many overturn quickly, causing shrieking and bellowing men to fall into the poisonous waters.

  It is then that there is a loud roar, like an outraged giant from the bowels of the earth, and simultaneously there is a tremendous explosion and huge sections of the inner ring collapse.

  Drax feels like he is being sucked into a vortex of horror. Powerful blasts eject pulverized rock into the air with great force.

  Drax watches with horror as flying rocks, some the size of boulders, smash into the boats that swirl around, tangled in the turbulent waters near the inlet entrance. The powerful vortex in the inlet, causing by the inward rushing waters, sucks the entire Mycenaean fleet.

  “Gods have mercy!” Drax shouts, the fire in his belly extinguished and now filled with cold, dreadful fear. There is no one to heed their lament or save their lives. Along with black, sharp rock that smashes into them, pulverizing many men into mists of blood and flesh, extremely hot fine ash burns their flesh. The collapse of the inner seabed results in great waves, much taller than even the boat masts, and most of the Mycenaean flotilla flips.

  The colliding, burning, and overturning vessels annihilate the men. Those that jump into the savage seas drown or boil with not even a moment to scream or pray.

  As Drax watches in horror a fiery black rock flies at him and his head explodes like a watermelon.

  The earth gives not much pause.

  As the sun rises, the gods engineer the greatest violent eruption from the center. This one creates a gigantic column of fire and ash that races at the sky like a ravenous beast racing to clutch the sun. The cloud rises and rises, until it exceeds the cliff heights, more than twice, more than thrice… until it reaches the edge of the sky.

  The massive explosion rains enormous volumes of fine yellow pumice and smoldering boulders. Thick, rapidly moving, extremely hot ash flows in all directions, hiding the lava spurts inside. On the eastern inner ring, there are still
people hiding in a tunnel. They have been here for days, terrified, unknowing of the rage of the gods outside. Many are already dead, their corpses still lying amidst the living. The rot and stench are spreading sickness to the rest. They are running out of water, and the air is fetid and foul. Even as they pray to the gods for mercy, the ground shakes, and a side of the wall collapses.

  They cry and hug each other.

  A raging flow of hot pumice envelopes them like molten bronze armor in the heat of summer and turned them into ash statues frozen in time. The entire tunnel fills up in seconds, creating an eternal tomb of the final living Atalanni.

  The ferocious eruption lasts beyond the setting of the sun, and the night is loud, with howls of awful wind, devastating waves, and raging fires.

  The Mycenaeans vanish beneath the waves.

  The entire land that comprised of the Palace collapses beneath the rushing waves and flowing molten rock.

  The remnants of the vast and spectacular temple complex disappear in the explosions.

  And with that, the capital of the Atalanni becomes only a memory.

  The beautiful island is now sawed into multiple sections. The rushing waters and eruption causes giant waves over a hundred feet tall.

  In the North-West, two Mycenaean boats, survivors of the carnage, flee from the destruction behind them. They are safe, for the clouds and the waves are traveling not in their direction anymore.

  They will have tales to tell.

  In the South-East, not too far away, a lone boat in the vast sea first feels the swelling waves pass underneath. Two men lie lifelessly, and one man struggles to keep the boat in control as it sways and plunges with the swells. The fierce waves get bigger. The man gets on his knees when there is a brief lull. He watches as immense dark clouds rise high above his homeland, like a mesmerizing hood of an angry cobra. He pulls out a necklace from his waist and kisses it. The golden thread and the blue-green gems shine under the moon that is fading.

  He then bows his head and prays.

  It looks like he is asking for forgiveness and love in the afterlife.