The Voyage of Heroes Page 4

  As we trot off, we pass many faces that have become familiar over the previous weeks. Some nod their heads to me, some salute Odysseus, many bow low to the two of us, but a few keep their heads high. As bastard sons of Zeus, men such as Perseus of the Docklands see themselves as equal to, perhaps even better than a prince and his cousin who, although descended from the god Hermes, are merely the messenger god’s great-grandchildren rather than direct spawn of godly seed. At the junction to the Osterian Road, I glance once more at the crumpled letter I hold in my hand.

  “Think the words have changed?” Odysseus asks.

  “I had hoped they were words of praise from my father.” I smile weakly as if in apology for my longing. “The men I led were at the front against the Areans and I didn’t lose a single one.”

  “No, instead you lost your polis,” Odysseus says in a teasing tone that carries no malice.

  “Thank you for the reminder. How could Pelias betray us like this? Or maybe it’s not betrayal. Maybe there is truly something wrong in the Valley.”

  “Not likely. Pelias is an Arean. An Arean on the Osteria Council. A visit from him cannot bode well. Don’t worry though,” he says with encouragement, “at least you have me to do your thinking for you. Look, here come Castor and Pollux. Gods, did I ever swagger like that?”

  I hold back the comment that my cousin still does swagger exactly like the two young men strutting toward us. They lead identical white horses and are mirror images of one another. These two, who wear the vigile charms of both Vancuse’s dove and Illamos Valley’s grape cluster, are not only my friends who fought with great skill by my side over the past few weeks, but will also be my brothers in only a couple years’ time when my twelve-year betrothal to their sister, Helen, ends and I take her as my wife.

  Despite rule in their polis of Vancuse being democratic, the ancestors of their mother Leda had won the majority of the Vancusian vote for over two centuries. As Clytemnestra, the eldest daughter of Leda, has no interest in becoming a leader and Helen will help me rule Illamos Valley after we wed, it will be the twins who will run for presidency when the time arrives. If history is any record, one of them will win, but one cannot rely on a family name to secure position. So, to make themselves more worthy candidates, both boys enlisted as vigiles at the age of sixteen. As a gesture of good will between my polis and Vancuse, they had been sent to train and serve in Illamos Valley. Although, thanks to normally light duty augmented with plentiful helpings of high-quality wine, most sixteen-year-olds yearn for a place in the Illamosian vigiles. However, the twins excelled at their two-year training and, despite their youth, were the first two I chose to join me in the defense of Portaceae.

  “Are we returning already?” Castor asks. It had taken me some time to tell the difference between the twins until finally Odysseus pointed out that Castor has black eyes while Pollux has blue ones. Although both were born to Leda within the same hour, rumors state that Castor was fathered by a mortal man while Pollux’s sire was the god Zeus himself. Still, with Zeus’s inability to resist mortal women, it seems every ruling family in Osteria can claim relation to the head god of the Twelve.

  “If you like, you can stay for the festivities,” I say. “But my father’s throne has been usurped. I must return.”

  “Then it’s our duty to join you,” Pollux offers with an eager glint in his royal blue eyes. Although rumored to be Osteria’s most vicious fighters, it had taken no more than a few skirmishes to scatter the Areans from Portaceae. I have no doubt the quick success of their first battle has given them a taste for fighting. A taste I know must be tempered to keep these two from charging into war without thought. After all, not every success is so easily won.

  Still, I am thankful for the twins’ enthusiasm. I only wish the letter had given more details. Is Pelias’s presence in the Valley an invasion or a diplomatic matter? If diplomatic, then rushing in with an army of vigiles will do nothing but cause further trouble for my polis. And if it is an invasion I should bring the rest of my men. What will it prove to ride into Salemnos, the Valley’s capital city, with only Odysseus and a couple boys barely out of vigile training by my side? The usurper would laugh his Arean head off.

  No, I have to believe the message, signed by Pelias himself is an invitation to talk, not fight. I glance to Odysseus. He makes no effort to rally more troops, a skill he has proven he can do with speed and ease with this Portacean campaign. I take his silence as a sign that entering Salemnos with three men is just the right number.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Hera

  IN THE EARLY afternoon, through a viewing pool in my room, I watch Jason receive word of his polis. He is a bumbling thing, nearly forgetting his horse in his hurry and looking a fool in Hermes’s too-large sandals, but even the most unseemly of men can be made heroes if he has a courageous heart and a clever goddess behind him. And the time is ripe for me to be the goddess that bolsters this unseemly hero.

  It is late afternoon when I position myself at a point on the Osterian Road where the Illamos River can be easily accessed and where the lack of shrubbery makes the river clearly visible from the road. Jason’s small group rides only a short distance beyond. I shed the fine silk gown befitting a goddess and transform myself into a pitiable rag-clad hag. My thick, blonde hair turns sparse and gray, my back bends and hunches on one side, and my lustrous skin dulls and sags from now-bony arms. Hobbling down to the water, I wait until I hear the men approach.

  “Excuse me,” I say, my voice weak with the advanced age I’ve donned. “I dropped my satchel in the river. Can one of you get it for me?”

  “You only need to reach for it,” says the one I know to be Castor.

  “Yes, it’s right there.” Pollux points to the satchel that has caught on a protruding branch far enough from the shore that a younger woman would have just waded out to it, but a frail and elderly one wouldn’t for fear of being swept up in the current.

  “Don’t be rude,” Jason orders.

  “I’ll get it,” Odysseus says. He dismounts and begins to remove his boots. He cannot help me. It must be Jason for the ruse I plan to pull on Pelias to work.

  “No, I would rather he fetch it for me,” I say, my voice ridiculously coquettish and ancient at the same time. Castor and Pollux raise their eyebrows at Jason and make no effort to hide their teasing grins.

  “At your service, ma’am,” he says and swings his leg to slip off his horse’s back. In the motion, the sandals dangle and nearly slip off his feet. It’s no wonder. Hermes appears to have selected the most abused pair of sandals he owns. The leather thongs that would normally lace up the calf have been trimmed away, leaving only a frayed strap at the ankle to secure the shoes to Jason’s feet. I worry he will stop to remove his clumsy footwear, but he eagerly enters the river. The moment his feet slip under the cool water, a look of relief crosses his face.

  “This water treats me better than my own men,” he says over his shoulder. “Whoever took my boots will pay for replacing them with these wretched sandals.”

  The three men look between one another as if wondering who the trickster might be.

  On his second step, I flutter my hands to make the satchel float out further. Jason curses, but the mild oath is no match for what spews from his mouth on the third step when, with a discreet twist of my hand I roll an algae-coated rock to catch the toe of one of the sandals. I hide my smile when, with an ungraceful splash, Jason falls face first into the hip-deep water. It may not be dignified, but heroes must be made to endure a few indignities. Already wet, he dog paddles the rest of the way to the satchel. When he turns to head back to shore, the heel of his left sandal catches the current and is pulled off his foot. This brings another round of curses until he meets my eye and pinches his lips shut.

  “Your bag, ma’am,” he says handing me the limp sack when he reaches the shore. “Hold tightly to it from now on.”

  “You’re a good man.” I pat his forearm. “I wish you well against Pelias.”

  Before he can ask how I know of Pelias, I vanish in a puff of white dust leaving only the satchel behind. From my vantage point at the edge of Salemnos, I flick my hand to bring up the scene I have just left. Jason stares at the satchel, his tunic dripping a puddle of water around him.

  “You should leave it,” Castor says warily.

  “It’s a witch’s trick,” Pollux adds.

  “You two are fools,” Odysseus says. “Witches can poison, they can cast spells, but they can’t vanish like that.”

  “Only the gods can,” Jason mutters as he bends down to pick up the satchel. “This could be a gift.”

  “Looks like an old bag to me,” Pollux says. His twin makes a grunt of agreement, but Jason shrugs off their doubts and tucks the satchel into his own travel pack then heads back to his horse.

  “Don’t you want to take off that other sandal?” Odysseus asks.

  Jason grins. Water droplets arc from his tunic as he swings back up into his saddle. He faces his cousin with an amused grin. “I’m hoping I’ll look so ridiculous that eventually the man who stole my boots will see fit to return them to me.”

  “I’m telling you I didn’t take them.”

  Satisfied Jason will ride into Salemnos one sandal short of a pair, I leave the men to finish their journey as I make my way to the city’s agora. It’s time to rattle Pelias’s Arean nerves.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Typhon

  “I WILL NOT stand for it.” My voice thunders across the plain at the base of Mount Olympus and sends the satyrs that had been making a game of chasing one another scrambling into the stands of fir trees that line the slopes of the mountain. The original temples to each of the Twelve, built when Osteria first formed, dot the Olympian Plain like mass
ive marble daisies scattered in a meadow of green. I would love to grab the boastful structures and pluck them from the ground.

  “You’ll just have to. What’s done is done,” Zeus says tossing a fir cone between his hands and showing not even a hint of fear. He will learn fear. I will goad him into fighting me and I will win, the titans will win. His calm irritates me. I make a flicking gesture with my right hand. The cone flies up and hits Zeus on the center of his brow.

  “Your son killed not one but two of my children.”

  Zeus snatches up the cone, but does not resume his game of feigned boredom. Instead, he stares levelly at me.

  “Children?” Zeus scoffs. “That lion you called your son was threatening the people of the Nemea district in Portaceae. Killing children.”

  “Mortals.” I let out a condescending snort. “Why should I care about mortals regardless of how few years they’ve seen? And what’s your excuse for the hydra. My daughter had ceased to be a threat to your precious mortals decades ago.”

  “At the cost of Portaceae’s trade route. Herc Dion had every right to kill both of your monsters.”

  I clench my jaw so tightly I crack my molars. Before the sound leaves my ears, the teeth have healed themselves. The anger, the frustration at Zeus’s short-sightedness bursts within me swelling my body to three times its normal size. I storm across the plain in five strides hitting my head with massive fists trying to sort out how to make the god understand, to listen to reason. When I turn around Zeus has not backed down, nor changed the arrogant expression of privilege on his face. Instead, the head of the Twelve has made himself just as large as me as if trying to meet my challenge. Good. At least he is finally reacting. I come to a stop in front of Zeus, nearly bumping chests with the god.

  “Mortals, always mortals. They abandoned you once, you know? They won’t hesitate to do it again.” I force myself to calm my voice. “Why do you defend their actions? Why give them leave to kill the creatures of my blood? To kill any creatures? You know why the satyrs play here? Because the humans have hunted them out of all but the wildest areas of Osteria. Olympus is their refuge.”

  “And I suppose you have the solution?”

  “Rid Osteria, rid the entire world of mortals,” I say as if this notion isn’t as clear as the cloudless sky above us.

  “And what? Live as the titans do, on the edge of existence, merely forces of nature? No thanks. There are too many pleasures to be had in this world. Besides, even if the humans abandoned the gods before, they found us once again. That’s all that matters. They worship us. What god could argue with that? Perhaps if you offered them something besides your monstrous offspring, they would worship you as well. Look at Prometheus. He gave them fire when all their technology had been lost in the worst times after the Disaster. Now he is respected, honored. You? You only give them trouble.”

  My hand trembles with the urge to slap Zeus. Prometheus? Prometheus is a traitor. The near extinction of the humans after the Disaster had been the titans’ most powerful era in centuries. After too long of humans arrogantly believing in their conquest over the natural world, nature’s chaos – titanic chaos - ripped its way through and snatched the world from them. It was a delightful time of watching mortals suffer, of watching them die from things they had thought so clever, of watching their devastation at the hands of the mutants their inventions had created. It was a good time to be a titan.

  The gods had been weakened by the absence of mortals. Without mortals, gods can’t exist, or not as they prefer to exist: amongst pomp and riches and power. It had come so close to the gods being gone for good, to the gods being nothing more than vapor on the winds blown from titan breath. Both gods and humans had been on the verge of extinction until Prometheus took pity on the mortals and gave each of the small bands of people scattered around what would become Osteria the knowledge of how to make fire. I still cannot fathom how mortals had become so reliant on their technology to have lost the knowledge of fire making – one of their earliest and most primitive of skills. From Prometheus’s treacherous gift of fire, it had only been a short leap to forming larger groups, creating towns, and rediscovering the gods. And rediscovering their lost technology. How long until they begin their battle against nature once more?

  “Can you not see they’re heading down the same path as before? They will gain more knowledge, they will increase their technology for better or for worse, they will think themselves above such nonsense as the Twelve and they will forget you.”

  Zeus apparently thinks it is his turn to give a condescending laugh.

  “They have already figured out how to harness electricity from the sun, how to grow and tend crops and how to power trains for transport, and yet they do not worship us less. These are different humans. This time will be different.”

  “You are a fool. What of the kingdoms? They were once part of the twelve poli, but they broke away. And when they did, they didn’t hesitate to abandon their belief in you. And what of the Council? I don’t see them offering you homage.”

  “The kingdoms make up only a small portion of Osteria. And the Osteria Council is manned by people from the poli. There is no threat.”

  I squeeze my hands so fiercely in frustration the bones of my fingers crack into pieces. It’s as if every drop of logic I try to drip into the jug of Zeus’s mind dribbles out of some unseen hole.

  “Mortals are getting too numerous. If you allow them to keep expanding, they will try to find their way against the natural order and there will be another Disaster. I don’t want to see the wanton destruction of the land and its creatures happen yet again at the hands of mortals. If you don’t rein them in, the titans will.”

  “You wouldn’t dare. It would be war again. A war we won once before, remember?” He resumes his cone tossing as if this somehow proves his point.

  “Do you think we didn’t learn from that last war? That’s the difference between gods and titans. We learn. We see mortals for what they are: animals that can be used and then disposed of, not beings to boost our own egos.”

  “Your threats are nothing more than the breeze rustling the tops of those fir trees. You should learn to appreciate the mortals; they can be quite enjoyable. Take for instance my most recent sampling, Io.” Zeus sighs longingly as he says the name. “One taste has left me wanting more ever since. Mortals do have much to offer. They are wonderfully distracting playthings.”

  “Are they? Let’s see.” I make two strong thumps against the ground with my already-healed fists. In the distance, the satyrs bleat in fright. Being so near to me, the earth rumbling knocks Zeus off his feet. The cone he has been toying with rolls my way. When the shaking stops, Zeus stands up and brushes down his tunic before fixing his eyes on me.

  “Control yourself, Typhon. You can’t win this.”

  The god waves a hand and disappears in a white flash. Just as I swing my foot to kick Zeus’s fir cone I’m blinded by another flash, this time a red one. A dark-haired god with even darker eyes catches the cone as it takes flight. Compared to my inflated size, my infuriated size, this god is a speck. Something about him, his wry, conspiratorial look sparks my curiosity. I shrink down to stand only two heads taller than him.

  “I heard what you said to Zeus. Actually, I think the whole plain did.”

  “What do you want, Ares?”

  “To help you. You want rid of the gods, right?”

  “I want rid of mortals,” I respond. Although he is a god, I do like Ares. The wars and invasions his people have instigated have killed off many humans.

  “What if there were simply fewer mortals. You know my Areans have always regulated their breeding and that we do not encourage technology.”

  Indeed Osteria could use Aryana as an example. Breeding is allowed only by specific people who are granted no more than two children. One becomes a fighter in their vigiles and the other becomes a raider to forage, hunt and steal the food the Areans do not grow. Like their god they are a tough people ready to fight at a moment’s notice. They live frugally, staying lean and strong. And as he says, they do not encourage the curiosity that spawns the development of technology.