Wrath of the Furies (38 page)

I sighed and looked outside again. “How soon will it begin?”

“Very soon, I suspect. First there is to be—”

“Gordianus!”

I turned to see Antipater. Apparently he had just emerged from a hole in the floor, for the trapdoor was still open and Zeuxidemus was following him through the hatchway.

“I'm so relieved to see you!” Antipater threw his arms around me. “I feared you might suffocate inside that altar.”

“Where did you come from?” I asked.

“From the room below. I wanted to see for myself the mechanism that turns the pedestal upon which the statue stands. It's simple, really, but I was surprised that a single man could turn it so easily. Very clever. But not half as clever as you, my boy. I'm told that your performance last night was flawless. You truly looked possessed. Young Zeuxidemus tells me he almost wet himself, watching you mime the lines I spoke.”

“I never said that!” protested Zeuxidemus.

“Antipater is known to take poetic liberties,” I said. Suddenly I was very hungry. “Is there anything to eat?”

“We have bread, water, and wine,” said Zeuxidemus.

“Have you any of that sleeping potion?”

Zeuxidemus cocked his head. “Why do you ask?”

“Freny had a restless night. She needs to sleep. And after the horror of what was done to her, I don't think she needs to see yet more horror. It would be a blessing if she could sleep though the day, never hearing or seeing what's about to happen.”

“You speak wisely,” said Kysanias. “Those who sleep in this chamber do so with the blessing of Artemis. I'll see to it that Freny receives the wine we give to dreamers. Perhaps you should drink some of that wine yourself, Gordianus.”

“No. For better or worse, I'll stay awake, if I can.”

“As you wish. Brace yourself.”

 

XXXIV

I was given bread and water. Freny was given bread and wine. I watched her fall asleep in her sister's arms amid the cushions at the foot of the pedestal, where I had watched Zeuxidemus sleep before.

Amestris continued to hold her sister for a while, then gently extricated herself. She saw me watching her and came to me. Bethesda was elsewhere, and so was Anthea, so that Amestris and I had a moment to ourselves.

“Thank you, Gordianus, for saving her.”

“My reward was the look on your face when we came in the room.”

Her eyes glimmered with tears. “I was heartbroken when they took her. Now I have to say good-bye to her again.”

“It's decided, then, that she has to leave?”

“Freny can't stay in Ephesus, or anywhere else in the kingdom. Can you imagine what might be done to her if Mithridates or Monime ever saw her? No, she'll go with you when you leave. Samson promises to look after her. We have freeborn relatives in Tyre who might take her in.”

I nodded, then touched her arm. “What about you, Amestris?”

“Me?”

“When I decided to come to Ephesus, I hoped I'd see you again. I've thought of you often since … our night together. When I finally did see you, the other night—it ended so wretchedly, with the queen's visit. But before Monime arrived, there was something you said to me. I can't get it out of my mind. It was about meeting me, the first time—you said it changed your life. If you have such feelings for me, Amestris, then perhaps.…”

She narrowed her eyes and looked at me with something between a grimace and a smile. “Oh, Gordianus, you lovely man! I think you misunderstood me. Yes, that night when you and I saved Anthea did truly change my life, because that was the first time I knew what love is.”

“Oh, Amestris—if things had gone differently … If Antipater and I hadn't left Ephesus so quickly…” I cast a sidelong glance at Bethesda, who was across the room, eating a bit of bread and talking to Samson.

“Gordianus, I think you still misunderstand. That was the night I realized I was in love, and always will be—with Anthea.”

“With … Anthea?”

“Of course. I'm in love with Anthea, and she's in love with me.”

“But … she's a freeborn woman.”

“Yes, just as you're a freeborn man. And are you not in love with a slave?”

“I…”

“I should have thought that our love was obvious to you, from the way we talk and touch, just as your love for Bethesda must be obvious to all who meet you.”

“I hardly think—”

“Anthea and I will live together here at the temple of the virgin goddess, where Anthea's virginity is greatly prized. Only virgins can perform certain rituals of purification—and after what is about to happen, there will be a great deal of pollution, requiring much purification. But—did you hear that?” She turned her head sharply, toward the round window with its black screen.

We all heard the noise—all except Freny, who was soundly asleep. Without saying a word, everyone in the room gathered before the black curtain and gazed out the round window. Bethesda stepped beside me. Without a thought for what others might think, I took her hand in mine.

“That sound,” said Samson. “Like a roar. What is it? Where does it come from?”

“It comes from the theater, I think,” said Zeuxidemus.

“Yes, it's the sound of many voices,” said Kysanias. “Criers ran through the city at daybreak, calling everyone to the theater. His Majesty will have staged some sort of spectacle for the people—something to rile them up and get their blood boiling. That captured Roman general probably had a role to play; the king will have humiliated him in some horrible way, if he hasn't killed him. I was supposed to attend and give my blessing, but I refused. I told His Majesty that my place today must be at the temple and nowhere else. Whatever happens here, I must bear witness, as high priest of the goddess.”

“They're chanting something,” said Antipater. “My ears are not what they once were. I can't make it out.”

“‘Death to the Romans,'” I said. “They're chanting, ‘Death to the Romans,' over and over.”

I felt a knot in the pit of my stomach as I peered though the black cloth. If I could hear the chant, then so could the people below. I saw a sudden flurry of movement, as if an ant bed had been poked with a stick. Those who still slept were quickly roused. People began to rush this way and that, with nowhere to go, for beyond the sacred precinct were the trenches that had been dug, and beyond the trenches a ring of soldiers had encircled the entire area. Their upright spears had the appearance of a spiked fence.

Suddenly, responding in unison to a shouted command, the soldiers all lowered their spears at once, pointing them inward.

The crowd panicked. People ran toward the temple. From below us, I could hear the stampede of feet on the temple steps as they rushed inside. But the ring of spear-bearers did not advance. They stayed where they were.

Then, like a river pouring through a broken dam, the citizens of Ephesus flooded though the gate and came rushing down the Sacred Way toward the temple. I could no longer make out a chant. I heard only a great roar that grew louder and louder. By the time the mob reached the sacred precinct, the sound was deafening.

“Oh, sweet Artemis!” whispered Anthea, touching her lips. “It's going to happen.”

The mob carried knives, axes, cudgels, chains, ropes, and bags full of stones. Without hesitation, they fell upon those Romans who had not fled into the temple and set about killing them.

I had seen men die in public before, at gladiator shows in Rome. My father had allowed me to attend a few such spectacles despite his own dislike for them, because I had begged to see them. After seeing a few, I had seen enough. What I saw that day in Ephesus was a little like seeing death in the arena, as I watched from a safe distance while blood was spilled below me. The ring of soldiers were the audience, as they held their line and looked on, cheering. But the killers were not gladiators. They were ordinary people, and their victims were unarmed men and women and children, all savagely slaughtered without mercy.

I saw old men beheaded, children stoned to death, and women staked spread-eagled to the ground and raped. I saw a man cut in two with an ax. I saw men wrap a baby in a bloody toga, throw it against the ground, and then stamp on it.

Those of us watching from the veiled window frequently turned away, sickened and overwhelmed. I think only Kysanias stayed at the window without flinching, forcing himself to witness all that happened below.

Suddenly, by her tangled red hair and tattered stola, I recognized the widow of the Roman I had seen put to death for seizing a spear. Burdened by the frail child she carried and unable to reach the temple in time, the widow sought refuge at the altar. A group of a dozen or more women fell on her, dragging her from the altar. They held her down, tore off her clothing, then ripped out handfuls of her hair. They kicked her repeatedly, then forced her to watch while a man picked up her child by the feet, swung him around and around, and then smashed his head against the stone altar.

The man threw the limp corpse aside, then shouted, “Should I do the same to the Roman bitch?”

“Not yet,” shouted one of the women. “Let her weep over her dead darling for a while, then we'll come back and finish her off. You can have a go at her if you want.”

That was when I turned away from the window and stopped watching.

But I heard what happened next. Having killed almost every Roman in sight, the mob rushed into the temple. The huge open space of the sanctuary seemed to magnify the screams below us as the Romans were dragged outside, then murdered on the temple steps.

I sat on the floor, slumped against the statue's pedestal. Bethesda huddled beside me. I was so exhausted that I fell asleep despite the screams.

It was a dark, uneasy sleep. I dreamed that I was still awake, standing at the window, watching one scene of horror after another, longing to look away but unable to turn my head or close my eyes. Behind me, the statue of Artemis wept. The Furies, flitting on their batlike wings above the killing field, mocked Artemis with doglike barks, grinning to show their fangs and watching all that happened with eyes like glowing coals.

[From the secret diary of Antipater of Sidon:]

Thank Artemis! Gordianus has finally fallen asleep.

The poor boy should have taken a sleeping potion like Freny and slept through the massacre. Now he will have these sounds and images in his head forever.

I will force myself to watch until the very end. I did everything I could to support the king against the Romans, and now I must see the result.

I think I am not long for this world, anyway. Not just because I am an old man, but because I have no more poems in me. My last verses were those I recited aloud in the Grove of the Furies, while Gordianus pretended to speak—before a royal audience, at last! But those words fell on deaf ears. They created a brief sensation, but did not achieve the desired effect. The ritual was interrupted and the sacrifice aborted, but the massacre was not averted. My most ambitious poem was a failure.

These
are my last written words, upon this page. Not a poem, not a confession, not an indictment—merely the final scribblings of a man who fancied himself the world's finest poet, who saw a great deal of the world, who played spy for a while, who came to sorrow in the end. But the sight of you has given me a last moment of joy, Gordianus.

Two nights ago, we were reunited, but our meeting was not exactly a reconciliation—we hardly spoke about the long silence between us, and my hasty departure from Alexandria, and the fact that I deceived you for so long. Circumstances were pressing, and we had no time to speak of all that. But in a way what happened was better, at least for me. We trained our thoughts on a single goal and collaborated on a joint enterprise, devising the words to be spoken by that “uncanny voice,” going over them again and again so that we would both know them by heart. We were like tutor and pupil again—except that in this effort we were equal partners, and working toward a selfless objective, the saving of so many innocent lives. I hope that is how you will remember me, as a poet who used his talents in a noble cause, at least at the end, and not as a skulking spy who tricked an unsuspecting Roman youth.

I give these words to you, Gordianus. They are for your eyes and for no one else's. When you are done reading them, burn them, lest they be found on your person and get you into trouble.

Looking through what I have written, I see that a few more pages have gone missing. Monime's minions must have rifled through the pages and stolen a few more. Why did they take a certain page and send it to you, Gordianus? For surely it must have been Monime who lured you here. But why?

I think the queen was determined to destroy me, or rather, to have her husband destroy me, but first he had to be turned absolutely and irrevocably against me. Had she merely shown him this or that incriminating page from my journal, he might simply have laughed it off—the King of Kings has no fear of mere words. But if she could succeed in luring my Roman protégé
to Ephesus, and catch the two of us in the act of conspiring against the throne, Mithridates could be convinced to kill us both. It was a good thing you played your part so stealthily, Gordianus, and kept your mouth shut. You came to Ephesus and actually met the queen—and she never knew who you were, or your connection to me! Had you been exposed as a Roman and my pupil, Monime would have told the king that I was a double agent and that you were my Roman handler, and that would have been the end of us.

What a creature the queen is! If she had her way, you and I would have been flayed alive—and little Freny would have had her throat cut, just to spite Mithridates.

What I have seen today is the last straw. Not only has my muse been silenced, but any partisanship I felt for the cause of Mithridates is done with. When I imagine that such slaughter is happening not only here but also in cities all over the kingdom, I am sickened.