Eve of the Serpent

by Jon Jacks

  Yet their rivals took their loses with surprisingly good grace, their athletes warmly congratulating the winners, the crowds from this other land cheering on anyone who was performing well.

  Charilaos was pleased that the games were such an obvious success. Perhaps here at last was a model for how bickering states could come together in friendship, working out their differences around tables rather than battlefields.

  Under any other circumstances, Charilaos wouldn’t have wished to leave such an amazing event. But Queen Cynisca was lying in her bed, close to giving birth. When word came that her waters had broken and spilled, Charilaos made his apologies and left: he needed to be there when his son and heir came into the world.

  And so it was that Charilaos was warmly embracing his wife in his palace when every Spartan remaining at the games finally realised they had been tricked after all.

  *

  The changes, when they came, were swift, horrifying.

  With a pained grunt or groan, an athlete’s arm or leg would transform, one moment flesh and bone, the next a glistening black or scarlet, extending, narrowing, hardening. Within the crowd, too, these terrifying transformations were taking place, a seated man abruptly sprouting huge, gossamer wings. Sometimes it was the head, growing, apparently solidifying; becoming what could have been its own helmet, frequently with sharp horns or even angrily snapping pincers.

  The Spartans gawped in alarm at these horrendous transformations taking place amongst their neighbours.

  Were they being punished for some undisclosed crime by the gods?

  Was it witchcraft?

  Only when each metamorphosis was complete did it dawn on the nearest Spartan that, if any punishment was being meted out, it was to them. If any witchcraft had been utilised, it had been invoked at the instigation of and to aid the Spartans’ enemies.

  Men who had only moments before being their friendly neighbour on a stadium bench, or a poorly competing athlete, now loomed over each Spartan as half a warrior, half gigantic insect.

  Their armour was entirely natural, with helmets, breastplates and greaves of glistening emerald, scarlet, sapphire, amethyst, and an amber glowing like captured suns. Their weapons were arms burgeoning with talon-like hairs, clacking horns and pincers that severed waists with one snap, or tongues that erupted from mouths like spears and hungrily sucked life from a man,

  What use was a well-practised, impregnable phalanx if you have no time to form it, no shields to build its armoured wall, no spears to create its many barbs?

  The Spartans, the proud men, women and children once honoured with the name Sparta’s Sword, fled or died.

  *

  King Charilaos comforted Queen Cynisca with a fierce, loving embrace, the great mound of belly lying between them.

  The queen had been struggling to give birth. Yet still the child hadn’t come. She was exhausted.

  She gripped Charilaos’ hand tightly.

  ‘Soon, soon! He’ll be here soon!’

  Her attendants had left to fetch fresh sheets, towels, hot water. Charilaos and Cynisca were on their own in the bedroom.

  There was a fearful shriek from outside. Another scream immediately followed, then cries, the sound of people running.

  Charilaos and Cynisca exchanged curious, anxious glances. Charilaos was about to rise form the bed and take a glance out of the window when, suddenly, the double doors to the room were brutally flung open.

  The insect warriors charged in.

  Perhaps any queen but a Spartan queen would have quivered in fright. Maybe any king but a Spartan king would have wasted valuable time wondering who these people were, what could be happening.

  ‘We must end our embrace,’ they both exclaimed as one, separating and leaping apart.

  Of course, there were no weapons to hand.

  Charilaos reached for the brass statuette of a rearing horse that stood on a table near the bed. In his other hand, he also picked up a many-branched candelabra of flaming oils.

  Cynisca, springing up from the bed despite her agony and tiredness, reached for the double-handled shallow bowl of water prepared for the birth. She also picked up a thick, heavy towel, grabbing an end in one hand.

  The insect warriors rushed towards what they presumed would be easy prey.

  Charilaos brought his equine statuette down hard on his nearest attacker. Far from being a wild blow, however, it was carefully, skilfully aimed. The horse’s curved forelegs hooked on the very edge of the breastplate-like skin of the hybrid warrior. With a sharp, brutal backward jerk, Charilaos pulled the hardened skin away from the rest of his assailant’s body. It took with it muscles and innards, raising a shriek of agony from Charilaos’ mortally wounded foe.

  Cynisca aimed her towel with equal precision, casting it as if it were a net, fully encasing the head of another attacker. Both blinding and confusing her attacker, she then gave the towel a vicious sideways jerk, sending him stumbling and falling to the floor. A sharp kick of her bared foot to his head snapped the thinner, weaker neck.

  Charilaos defended himself with thrusts of the flaming candelabra towards faces and eyes, Cynisca by deflecting clicking mandibles with the now emptied bowl.

  Expertly working together, they were killing and holding off far more assailants than anyone could have reasonably expected. But even as a wall of dead steadily built up around them, their attackers continued to pour into the room.

  It was only a matter of time before they finally succumbed to such an irresistible onslaught.

  Besides, their physical and mental strain was proving too much, especially, for their child.

  Cynisca wailed in agony as her child abruptly slipped into the world from between her spread legs.

  Flailing out to slow his fall, the new-born boy grabbed his mother’s already torn and shredded birthing veils, stripping her of them, unintentionally spinning them around himself like a protective cocoon.

  Naturally, it wasn’t enough to protect him from the attacking insect warriors. Cynisca dropped to the floor with him, wrapping her own body around him like an embracing sheath, shielding him from any of the vicious blows now raining down on her back.

  Swiftly taking the towel from Cynisca, Charilaos used it as she had as a net, while continuing to strike out seemingly endlessly with the stallion at the rapidly enveloping horde.

  Every now and again, through the force and weight of his body only, Charilaos would cleave his way through the surrounding warriors. He would hack, thrust, strike, slash, cut at them as if he himself were a great blade skewering and deeply penetrating the flesh of this enemy body.

  Each time, however, the blade that was Charilaos’ body was sustaining ever more gashes itself. He fell at last, throwing his dying body across the back of his wife, in his death hoping to offer one last layer of protection from the raining blows of the insect warriors.

  Charilaos’ flesh, muscles and bones were butchered across Cynisca’s back, as if she were nothing more than a meat-seller’s slab. She prepared to suffer the same fate, her own body being the sacrifice that would spare her son’s life for as long as possible.

  The blades, the life-sucking tongues, the riving incisors, struck at her back again and again. Yet still she curled her body like a protective sheath around her new-born child.

  She was a living, breathing womb, the rivulets of blood spilling from her soaking and flooding into her child, just as the streaming blood of the dying Charilaos seeped into her.

  Within the comforting walls of this new blood-enriched womb, their child, Teleklos, grew swiftly.

  As a pupa first dissolves into a potent fluid, miraculously reforming within its embracing cocoon, Teleklos transformed immeasurably, growing serpent-like through a rapid series of shedding and changing of skins.

  Even the apparently ever-expanding cocoon couldn’t take it anymore. It burst, spilling Teleklos forth as a full grown, naked man.

  Now the force of any new-born child being thrust i
nto the world scatters a womb’s waters in a drenching fountain – and so the birth of a completely mature Teleklos briefly scattered the encroaching insect warriors. Losing their footing, the heavily armoured soldiers fell backwards, crumpling to the floor.

  Teleklos rose up from the midst of the fallen bodies, like a new foal still drenched in the transforming fluid. It poured down from him in a cascade, washing over the dead Charilaos, the sword that had protected him, streaming across the lifeless Cynisca, the sheath that had shielded him.

  The cast-aside warriors watched, at first, in amazement. Then, collecting themselves, seeing he was naked, defenceless, they also each confidently rose to their feet.

  With a clacking of pincers, the slithering of deadly tongues, a whispering of fierce talons rasping against each other, they began to move in once more.

  The boy reached out to thank the dead Charilaos, the sword that had protected him. He reached out with his other hand to caress the lifeless Cynisca, the sheath that had shielded him.

  The sword was made of a metal never seen before or since, a forging of life and death, the physical and the spiritual, flesh, bone and soul all welded into one.

  The sheath was of many melded birthing veils, of the walls of the protective womb, of nourishing waters, of a life given up for those you love.

  The sword sang with the joy of someone who lives to bring about death.

  The sheath cried out in the pained ecstasy of ensuring life goes on.

  How many warriors did Teleklos kill that day?

  How many wounds did he receive?

  The second is easy to answer; for nothing could harm him as he strode through the city, hacking through phalanx after phalanx of insect warriors as if they had become nothing more than an irritant that must be swatted aside.

  The first question, however, has never been answered; for the number is so vast that, in every retelling of the tale, the incredulous storyteller invariably lessens the numbers to ensure his tale is believable.

  It wasn’t until the city was entirely relieved that King Teleklos sheathed Sparta’s Sword, sliding him home into the loving embrace of his queen.

  Sparta’s Sword stayed sheathed, too, for a remarkably long time.

  There was peace at last, for the wise queen knows the king is usually at his safest when he’s persuaded against going to war.

  When war is inevitable, however, even she realises she must, finally, release him.

  And so they part again, when the charm is said, when those famous words are spoken once more:

  ‘We must end our embrace.’

  *

  Chapter 49

  The warriors moved as stealthily as animals through the undergrowth: silently, swiftly.

  There was just the odd click or clack of twigs broken underfoot, which any creature, even an insect, might make.

  A hunter had told them of strange sightings in the forest; blood trails, of large animals such as deer and boar, dragged over a surprisingly great distance as if weightless.

  Trails that led to a small house deep in the forest, where two girls lived.

  The warriors now carefully, fearfully, surrounded that small house.

  A lord and three of his most trusted attendants approached the door to the house, aghast at its carvings of bone, its walls of stretched skin and hide. They didn’t bother knocking on the door; they forced their way in, swords already drawn.

  Only one girl was seated there, skinning a rabbit.

  Prytani had been expecting the warriors. Not because she had heard them, or because she knew they were in the neighbourhood.

  She had always known that, one day, they would come calling

  Fortunately, Sabea was out. Hunting for food.

  ‘I think,’ she said calmly, ‘you have a slipper for me to try on?’

  *

  The slipper didn’t fit Prytani’s foot.

  Prytani was young, but Sabea was part mermaid: the slipper was ridiculously tiny.

  She pretended, however, that the slipper was a perfect fit.

  ‘You’ve found me,’ she declared imperiously, standing up with the slipper painfully fitted to one foot. ‘I am Princess Sabea, the werewolf you’ve been seeking.’

  But the young lord had recognised her.

  ‘She’s not the wolf: she’s the witch!’

  *

  Chapter 50

  Prytani wanted to warn Sabea that the warriors had set a trap for her.

  But a sword was pointed directly at her throat. Another man, grasping her by her shoulders, was firmly holding her within her chair.

  The other soldiers were well hidden, having camouflaged themselves amongst the surrounding undergrowth and thickets. All they had to do was wait for Sabea to return, and the men making up the teeth of the trap would close in around her before she even realised what was happening.

  The air tingled around Prytani, the sign of an oncoming storm. Outside, the sky was swiftly darkening, adding to the nervousness of the men holding her. Soon, the only light came through the window, as silvery as an eerie moonlight, the white mistletoe berries strewn around the frame glittering like small planets.

  Their own moon-like glow made her think of the lady, and her tower. When would her tower fall? When would she herself rise?

  Sabea had told Prytani of her last visit to see Olwen, a strangely sad one.

  It was as if, Sabea had said, the lady had already recognised that they wouldn’t be meeting again.

  And so Olwen had shown Sabea tapestries of the future: the boy’s uncle arriving in his ship at the base of the hill, planting a new thorn; the glass hill becoming earth once more; the tower collapsing, falling.

  It would be told that Olwen had fallen with it. In fact, however, as the last of the glass glowed like the gilded pinnacle of a great pyramid, she would rise as a benu bird. For a new tree has been freshly erected in Palestine: a tree of death, promising knowledge and life.

  In the way you can sense the changing of the wind, Prytani sensed that Sabea was close.

  Sabea swam endlessly through her mind, through her very blood, right to the ends of her fingers that so frequently touched and caressed that warm, soft flesh. The pertness, the ripeness, the deliciousness of her triple mounds. Her wonderful variety of sensations, given, shared, taken.

  As the wolf, Prytani now realised, Sabea was equally magnificent. An element of nature that lived and moved through it like a wave moves through the sea: part of it, not distinct. Every creature was subservient to her, eventually willingly giving themselves over to her, for she needed food, clothing.

  Did the men sense Sabea’s presence too? Certainly, their edginess had increased, to the point where they looked about them endlessly, as if expecting a sudden, magical attack from any corner of the room. They glanced especially at the small shrine originally erected by the woodsman; one dedicated to the trinity of the Beli, and in particular to the carpenter and coming saviour of the future, Hesus.

  The ghostly light entering via the window fell across Tamesis, made her glisten like a wraithlike alabaster. The silent, watery sheen reached out, flowing across the floor like a stream. It brought with it Tamesis’s own swiftly growing shadow, like a giant wolf at the window.

  Despite their edgy fear, the men were only briefly fooled by this apparition. It was enough, however, for the sword at Prytani’s throat to drop slightly away. And that was enough for Prytani to leap up from her seat and run for the door.

  Prytani dashed outside, looking out across the clearing for any sign of Sabea, whom she knew must be close.

  Prytani was both glad and dismayed. Yes, Sabea was there! Stepping out of the dark embrace of the woods, dragging with her the gored remains of a doe.

  Seeing Prytani rushing towards her, Sabea tried to smile. Then she saw the fear on Prytani’s face, realised that she was shouting out a warning.

  Just behind Prytani, warriors appeared at the door to the house, kneeling, raising their bows.

 
Their arrows were well aimed.

  They both struck Prytani within her back.

  Prytani arched forwards as the arrows sliced through her, the bloodied heads exploding from her chest.

  *

  Chapter 51

  Sabea couldn’t believe, didn’t want to believe, what she was seeing as Prytani crumpled to the ground.

  Arrows and spears were coming in from everywhere around her now, all aimed at her. They thudded hard into her flesh, penetrating deeply and agonisingly.

  She didn’t care. All she cared about was Prytani.

  Ignoring the arrows still speeding through the air towards her, Sabea dropped the doe she had been carrying and ran towards the fallen Prytani.

  Even now, she was hoping that Prytani might still be alive, might still be saved. But the closer she got to Prytani, the more it dawned on her that this was a false hope.

  Prytani was unmoving, perfectly still, the only sign of life that of the blood streaming from her skewered body. She had no chance of surviving arrows that had sunk so deeply into her delicate, beautiful body, Sabea realised with a sickening, heart-tearing sob.

  The long, thick arrows striking her own, much more powerful body were gradually draining away her own life. Each excruciating blow was weakening her further, drawing more and more blood from her, ripping more flesh away, tearing into deeper muscles, shattering even bone. Some of the closely hurled spears – the men, sensing that the wolf wasn’t prepared to fight back, stepping out from their hiding places – were even worse, thudding into her with a force that almost knocked her off her increasingly unsteady feet.

  She toppled to the ground before reaching the fallen Prytani. Still, however, the men fired arrow after arrow into her, evil barbs transforming her body into a thorny bush.

  The last element of her life was seeping from her, she knew.

  She used that last element of life to reach out, to grasp and tightly hold Prytani’s small, fledgling-like hand.