Hero for Hire (15 page)

The crowd turned from me to see a cart decorated with vine leaves and flowers. No harpy was as interesting as the wine-barrel that rode in the back. Iole, Omphale and several other girls stood by with trays of wooden goblets and cups, all the palace held, I’d warrant. No one had to be asked twice. There was a pushing forward, away from the harpy.

The sailors wanted to accept the king’s invitation. I snarled at them. “Get that cage on the boat with no more pissing around or I’ll have your liver and lights!”

Temas was staring at the harpy. I felt I wanted to shield her from any more prying eyes. “I’ll be off now, sire.”

“It’s smaller than I thought it would be. How did you capture it so quickly?”

I didn’t answer.

With the discretion that would make him not only a good king but a good man, Temas changed the subject. “It’s hard to believe that it has been just a few short days since you arrived. And me, standing there, waving those silly red flags.”

“You’ll fix this pier?”

“That fellow who started to make a speech will fix it. He’s got a bit more money than he can account for legally. A good-sized donation to the rebuilding project will just about settle the matter. I’ll let him keep a little, just to have a hook in his guts if I need it.”

“How old did you say you were?”

He chuckled. “You don’t account enough for early training. You only saw my father when he was dead and perhaps have taken a poor impression of his abilities. A more cunning man never lived, even if he lost some of his shrewdness after my mother died. The heart seemed to go out of him and he took no more joy in ruling.” He glanced away to where the townspeople were guzzling away happily. “This girl...this Omphale....”

“Sire?”

“Never mind. I’ll figure it out for myself.” He clapped his hand on my arm. “Don’t worry, Eno. My father may have taught me how to think, but it’s my mother who taught me to love. I shall not fail of her teaching.”

“I am sure of it.”

“One other thing my father taught me is to pay my debts.” He held out a bag, small but heavy. When transferred to my hand, it gave out a satisfying ‘chink’. But the sound brought no joy to my heart or ease to my mind.

I took my leave of Temas. He bade me consider Leros a second home and if ever I wished to settle down to a steady job there’d be one here for me. I thanked him and asked him to drink a cup for me.

One of the sailors, chosen by a quick drawing of lots, approached to tell me all was ready. No one in the crowd noticed as the cage swayed up into the air and was lowered with care onto the boat. The sailors got in, huddled at the farthest end from the harpy, preparing to cast off.

I took a last look at the island of Leros. The citizens were milling around, pledging each other and the king in wine. Temas lifted a cup in my direction and I waved, smiling despite myself. The last I saw of him, he was standing next to Omphale, helping her serve out second helpings.

A disturbance at the rear of the crowd stayed my steps a moment. Here came Phandros, a bag slung over his shoulder and an old straw hat, once broad-brimmed, now drooping with age, falling over his eyes. A stout staff struck the ground with each step. He stopped by me and looked over the edge of the dock. “Rather a small boat,” he said.

“Big enough. Going somewhere?”

He handed his bag down to one of the sailors. “Yes, I’m going with you.”

“You are?”

“Of course.” He turned and held out a hand. “Lower me down, won’t you?”

For a moment, I held his eyes, many questions jostling for expression. “Have you quarreled with the king? I swear this was not in your mind last night?”

“No, who could quarrel with Temas? He admits you are perfectly right in your opinion then does what he wants anyway. And I would have discussed the matter with you this morning but you were too busy leaping off cliffs.”

“You saw me?” It had been his voice, then, that I had heard just before I made my dive.

“I did indeed, you lunatic.”

“It was nothing,” I said, but not from modesty.

“Nothing? In good King Theocrites’ day, that cliff was measured for a series of experiments in mathematics. It stands one hundred and thirty-seven feet high. I thought I was watching a madman commit suicide this morning.”

“And you come with me to prevent further attacks?”

“I come with you because you need a keeper, Eno. Failing that, a friend. I can sing, tell tales, distinguish edible mushrooms from the kind that will send you hot-foot to the latrine, and determine location from the stars. A valuable companion for all eventualities.”

“And you can hide yourself in an instant in a pile of leaves,” I said.

“That as well. Will you accept me for a companion?”

I did not want to. It wasn't that I was afraid of him or that I didn't trust him. But I wanted to leave Leros with nothing to remind me of my betrayal. "We are going to Troezan first. To sell the harpy for the sacrifice."

He showed no moral outrage but then he didn't know how easily she'd come to me only to be betrayed. “You’ll need me, then. I taught in several households there and kept the accounts for one of the banking houses. It’s a very wealthy place, Troezen. You have to know how to play the courtier.”

“I’m not good at that.”

“At last your talents fail? Count me amazed.”

“Get in the boat,” I said.

Jori accepted the harpy with glad cries and reassurances that he’d had no doubt of my success. The crew were afraid to go near the cage, though the harpy continued to hide her face. I lashed the cage to the deck, made sure she had water and straw, then covered half the cage with a sail so that the sun would not beat down on her, nor the spray dampen her.

Jori’s welcome of Phandros was not quite so effusive. “Have you ever worked on a boat such as this? Can you turn out on a black night and take in sail by touch alone? Can you mend rope? Patch a sail? Scrub a deck?”

“I can make soup,” Phandros said, holding onto a line with his beard blowing past his shoulder. He looked a little greenish.

“Soup? Soup?” Jori lifted his palms up as he shrugged. “You’ll share quarters with Eno and do not complain to me if his shoulders take up more than his side of the bunk.”

“Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m sleeping on deck.”

“What?” Jori looked hurt. “You insult my mattresses?”

“Let’s get under weigh,” I said, in no mood for banter.

“Very well, very well. Ho, there, Minos! Haul up the anchor. Nikko, prepare to make sail. Where’s the damned helmsmen gone to? Must I do everything myself? And you...what is your name again?”

“Phandros.”

“Phandros. You go...make soup.”

I was never more in the way than at the start of a trip. Unless I was called to haul up a fouled anchor, I usually retired to my tiny cabin. Jori wasn’t joking about my shoulders. I had finally learned not to crash my head on the low beams every time I turned around.

Maybe my cabin would have been larger if it weren’t for all the secret compartments, hide-away holes, and concealed holds on the ship. I knew of several but I’m sure there were more. Jori loved to come up with new tricks to smuggle goods past the sharp eyes of the royal customs agents. Sailing to so many islands, his profits would have been nil if he hadn’t taken such precautions. Not to mention pirates, tax collectors and others with a firm grasp of the concept ‘what’s yours is mine’ as well as those who preferred the more oblique, ‘nice little ship, captain, pity if anything happened to it.’

However, there was one hiding place in this cabin that I hoped even Jori did not know of, although I was aware he liked to snoop. It was in his nature.

Under the bunk, the builder of the
Chelidion
had made a mistake and hadn’t shaved a board down enough. A lost bootlace between bunk and bulkhead had never dropped to the floor. I had felt for it and found it caught on the half-sprung board. I’d pulled out the nails to find a neat little space on the far side of the built-in bed. I now pulled loose the boards on either side, leaving just enough room for the sword, wrapped up again securely. I hammered them back into place with a few blows from the edge of my fist.

Jori’s eyes had already been upon the sword, appraising its value and questioning its sudden appearance. He wouldn’t ask outright where I’d found it but I could be sure he’d hint. Hiding it seemed safest. Jori wouldn’t steal it, though he might try to win it from me with crooked dice. I couldn’t vouch for the rest of his cut-throats, however. Better to have it out of sight and hope that kept it out of their minds.

Strangely enough, I didn’t feel the same way about the money Temas had paid me. That I put in the strongbox I kept bolted to the wall. If the money went missing, I’d merely hold everyone upside down by their ankles and shake them until all the gold felt out of their pouches. I’d take what I was owed and leave the crew to find out the true thief. It wouldn’t be the first time.

I gathered together my belongings. There were a good fewer than when I’d left. Many things had been lost on Leros, including a good-sized chunk of my soul. But I could, at least, change out of this kilt and into my last clean chiton.

Leros slipped away behind us. Jori, thanks to his ancestor’s arrangement with a sea-god, didn’t sneak from island to island, never going out of sight of land, preferring to cut straight across open water. However, because he hadn’t re-provisioned in Leros, he decided to head for Mykonos, less than two days’ journey away, for water, bread, and whatever meat was available.

The crew seemed cheerful, happy to be at sea once again. Yet even while they were singing a sea-ditty that night, I saw many curious and uneasy glances falling on the covered cage. I strengthened my resolve to sleep beside it that night and every night until we reached Troezen. As if protecting her weren’t reason enough, my suspicions that it was Phandros’ snoring I’d heard last night were confirmed very soon after the ship quieted for the night.

“Chimeras with three heads don’t make noises like that!” Jori complained, coming to find me after an hour of timber-rattling snores. “And one of them is a goat!”

“Put your fingers in your ears,” I advised, sitting up. I never slept well the first night aboard a ship. My time on shore had stolen my sea-legs.

“You have not told me all that you did on that island. While my boys were waiting for you, they talked to the tradesmen. Wild rumors, my friend.”

“Too wild, perhaps.”

“What? No giant snakes? No clever demons with designs on your virtue?”

“What virtue? That’s a tale I’ve not heard.”

“Such things grow with the telling. You chuck a kitten under the chin and the tale says that you slaughtered the Nemean Lion. You argue with your girl and legend says that you attacked a mad Maenad. Such is life. But you, Eno, you really do legendary things, then tell me nothing. Is this kindness?”

“There’s nothing to tell. I came, did what I was paid for, and left. Now we’ll go to Troezen and be paid again.”

“As you say. Rumor says something else. And this Phandros....”

“What about him?”

A noise like war-elephants trumpeting but with the resonance of copper drums rang through the ship.

“Zeus! It’s fit to frighten the fish!”

“Nothing to worry about then. That noise would keep off the Kraken.”

“Aye, unless it mistakes it for the cry of its long-lost mate!”

The sea was darkness exemplified. Only our torches gleamed against the impenetrable black. The ship's boy dozed near a bucket of pitch, to replenish the torches when they burned low. Maybe one or two of the sailors asleep in the waist of the ship might be cursing our voices but not one would dare tell the captain to pipe down.

“I will be glad,” he said, “when the last part of your task is done. I was afraid you would find this task too much for you, this time.”

“This isn’t like you, Jori. You don’t usually worry about me, no matter what I’m fighting. Why were you worried this time?”

“Worried? I? No, I have great faith in your strength, your cleverness, your speed.” He waved his hand circularly, as if to take in all the attributes too difficult to name. “What can stand against you? Only the Gods. No disrespect,” he added and spit on the deck.

“I almost lost my life this time,” I said. “That’s near enough. I don’t have to prove myself on the Gods.”

“Ah, I was right! You did have more adventures!”

“Maybe. But why were you worried?”

He leaned forward and lowered his voice. “A dream, my friend. A very clear dream.”

“Was there a woman in it?” I asked, remembering my own very clear dream. I tried to think of my golden Minthe but all I could see was that dream-woman's coiling black hair and kohl-lined burning eyes.

“Of course...but that was earlier. No, I was walking through a marketplace, somewhere I’d never seen before. I passed a house, with an opening in the side where they’d exposed goods for sale. They shone in the sunlight so I went near. They were skulls, Eno! More than a dozen skulls.”

“You’ve seen skulls before.”

“These were talking.”

“Stop. Can’t you see I’m shivering myself to pieces?” I laughed and stretched out on the deck again. “Go back to bed before you give me nightmares.”