Electra (17 page)

'Many seas you will sail, Eumides, but they will always be waiting, those who love you, to welcome you home.'

Eumides knelt before Cassandra and the Asclepid and they accepted him into their arms. They were all weeping.

'Blood calls for blood, Orestes,' said the oracle. 'Blood will answer blood, tainted and cursed. Yet in the end there will be justice. In the end fate will relent. When Mycenae lies empty, shattered and void, stone cast from stone as was the fate of Ilium, from the North the last son of Atreus, after long wanderings, will find his place.'

Orestes considered this. I was about to go to him when the oracle spoke again.

'Much-tried Electra, cruelly punished, until the ice melts from your eyes, cold-hearted maiden, blood will follow you, pain possess you. Footsore, weary, journeying long, no God can see your fate.'

There was nothing to say. I tried to hug Orestes, but he moved away from me. I don't know why I had expected better fortune.

We came down from the mountain, a hilarious group. The others were almost running along the pink-dusty path. We collected our sandals and our possessions, and walked down to the springs where we would remount and ride along to Delphi polis, to seek an inn. It was not seemly to laugh or dance in the temple, but I could see that this was what my companions were going to do as soon as they reached unsanctified ground.

'That was worth even an exceedingly expensive Delphic goat,' said Arion. 'Menon, we must go home. There is a little farm near Epidavros, and there I am bound, never to leave again.'

'Master, Arion, what of me?' wailed the boy. 'Can't I stay with you?'

'No. Old men speak to old men. I have much to say to Glaucus, Master of Epidavros. You shall conduct me home, Menon, and we will build you a lyre. Then I will stay and sleep in the sun and you will go on, boy, to wander these roads which I am abandoning, and become a great singer, bard of the Argives.

'You shall have my songs, son of my heart, and will make more of your own. Music-makers die, Menon. Only if someone still remembers their verses will they live. Do not weep,' he said gently.

'Apollo has released me,' Cassandra was crying and laughing at the same time. Diomenes and Eumides, one cleansed and the other comforted, hugged her from either side and they wept until they began to laugh and to dance, a Dionysiac dance of joy which reeled down the road.

None of them noticed me or cared for me. I mounted
Banthos
and took Orestes up before me as they recovered their senses and mounted as well, turning the horses' heads for the town.

And there, in the road, I saw our cousin Pylades of Phocis, and I pulled
Banthos
up with a jerk which made the horse look around to see what had happened to me.

'Pylades!' cried Orestes, and leapt down. Pylades embraced him and said, 'What do you here, boy? And by all the Gods, the maiden your sister as well.'

He put Orestes away at arm's length and looked at him from sandals to face, smiling. 'You've grown, child. And the Lady Electra - maiden, how fare you?' he asked.

'Better for seeing you,' I said, feeling a sense of great relief. Pylades the tall and strong, reliable; our cousin. It was wonderful to see him. He had known me since I was a child. He held out his hand to me, a worried line creasing his brows.

'Come, I have a house here - not worthy, small and rustic, but you cannot stay in a tavern, Princess. Say farewell to your companions, worthy people I am sure. He bowed to Arion, who as the oldest man in the group was responsible for me. 'I will take charge of the Lady and her brother.'

'Indeed, and who are you?' asked Arion sternly.

'He is the Lord Pylades, our cousin,' said Orestes. 'We can go with him. Lord Eumides,' he laid a hand on the sailor's boot. 'Do not forget me.'

'Orestes,' said Eumides, leaping down and kneeling in the dust so that he could see into the child's face. 'Do you truly wish to go with this man?'

'Truly,' said Orestes.

'Very well. I will never forget you,' said Eumides gravely, tugging at one finger. A ring came free, which he put into Orestes' hand. 'Wear this when you are grown. I do not know where I will be, son of Atreus, but if you need me, I will come. For the moment, you will find us in Delphi. Good fortune, little brother,' he said, and kissed him on the forehead.

They mounted and rode away, calling good fortune and farewell, and we followed our cousin up the mountain, towards a white house in a sea of olive trees.

Pylades' house was old but sound and clean. He conducted me to the women's quarters' stairs, saying apologetically, 'I have no women here to care for you. I will find someone tomorrow, Lady.'

He was tall and slim. I had known him for years. His hair was the colour of old chestnuts, a deep glossy brown, and his eyes were of the same colour. He took my hand and kissed it very lightly, saying, 'I and all I have are at your service, Lady Electra.'

'My Lord Cousin, I need to sit down and be quiet for a while.'

'You have been to the oracle?'

'Yes, and she gave us riddling words, hard to unravel; cruel words.' I was sinking down onto the step. Electra, whose fate was unknown - I would almost rather that the Pythia had told me of my death; at least that was a truth. And Orestes, the revenger… I began to weep.

Pylades did not attempt to embrace me, but gave me my veil and went away, returning with a cup of warm wine. I drank some. It was unmixed and strong and stopped my tears.

'Orestes, your sister is faint. Can you lead her to her bed? Then come down and talk to me.' .

I was too weak to stand, however, and though it was monstrously improper for Pylades to enter my room, he had no choice but to carry me, which he did with ease. As soon as he had laid me down and pulled a blanket over me, he left.

Orestes stayed until I sent him away. I wanted to weep over our fate, most evilly treated of all the cursed House of Atreus, but weariness overcame me and I slept.

I dreamed. In the dream I heard the screams again. It was the slave Laphanes of Paeus, lying with broken limbs outside the walls. They had thrown him down from the citadel, and no one was allowed to go near him.

The laws of Mycenae were strict. He who seduces a royal princess must die.

He took two days to die, and he screamed all the time. I could hear him as I lay in my bed. Laphanes with dark curly hair and black eyes, who had smiled at me from the courtyard, and sung love songs in the city so they would come to my ears.

I could not even drag myself awake. I curled around the pain as I had done as a child, cradling the agony in my arms.

Laphanes screamed and, eventually, so did I.

The next day, Pylades and Orestes came back from Delphi town with an amphora full of sleeping potion which he had obtained from the Asclepid Diomenes, who sent me good wishes. He also bought two women-slaves, one old and one young, to attend me. The old one was Lysane, a Corinthian, and the young one was called Alceste.

I heard them talking as they prepared my bath.

'It's a good house,' said Alceste. 'The walls are thick and the fields good. I think we will not starve, old woman.'

'And the master?' said Lysane slyly. Alceste laughed. 'I hope he will be kind,' she said. 'The last man I lay with liked to be beaten. I was glad when he sold me. He said I hit him too hard. I did, too.'

Lysane grunted and I heard water being poured into the bath.

'There, just the right temperature. What do you think of our mistress?' asked Alceste.

'They say she is possessed, haunted by demons,' said the old woman. 'She is very beautiful. I hope that she likes us. For we are isolated here, Alceste. If she is cruel then we might die.'

'She does not look cruel. They are memories, maybe, not demons. The Asclepius-Priest told us to be careful with the sleeping potion. Sleeping potions will not banish real ghosts. Her ghosts are in her mind, poor lady.'

'And the master - he is her cousin? And the child her little brother. They are singing songs in Delphi, Alceste, about the Princess of Mycenae and her brother the avenger.'

'But they will not find her here. She's been pleasant so far. And I have no mind to be stoned to death for slander. Let's wake her before the bath cools, Lysane. She needs our care, whoever she is.'

I started as if I had been asleep and they bathed and tended me, combing out my hair.

'The Lady is beautiful,' commented Alceste. 'Her hair is like silk, and so long and fine.'

'The Lady has been ill, or is in mourning,' said the old woman Lysane. 'She needs care. The Lord Pylades sent us to you, Lady. We are your women now. What are your orders?'

'We shall spin and weave and be at peace,' I said, leaning back as my hair was properly arrayed over my shoulders.

I looked around the women's quarters which occupied the whole second story of the house. Below us were the common rooms, and above us storage for olives and herbs and grain.

The walls were well built and thick, whitewashed this season, although there were no hangings. I resolved that it should be decorated finely. The floor was of well-cut, smooth wood, as were the beds for me and my women. There was a large table, and several chairs. The quarters smelt of spring and of the last of the stored grapes; sweet and clean. If I could trust the master of the house, I could be happy here. I had found my white farmhouse, the one I had spoken of to Cassandra the healer so long ago under an olive tree.

But humans are not allowed much happiness by the vengeful Gods, and I did not feel secure. I thought I knew Pylades, but I had thought I knew other people who had proved untrue.

'Where are the Lord Pylades and my brother?' I asked my women.

'You may see them, Lady,' said Lysane. 'They are sitting in the sun.'

But they weren't. They had been. Two cloaks laid out as cushions were still lying on the stone bench. But Pylades had given my brother a wooden sword, and was teaching him to fight. On the green pasture, in the sun, the wooden foils cast shadows as long as spears.

'You released her?' asked Demeter, smiling at the Sun-God. 'That is a good deed and I will praise you for it, but why? You were not wont to be merciful, Apollo.'

'It is not mercy. Cassandra is of no importance to me now. She may find her own fate. The House of Atreus is my concern.'

'The tale and the curse has run on for five generations,' objected Athene. 'Why must it conclude?'

'Once more they will offend the Gods by such a deed as will stagger men. They are vermin, irreparably wicked and cursed beyond repair. Their presence pollutes my shrine.'

'What, this poor little Princess and her eleven-year-old brother?' asked Demeter.

'Born in murder, conceived in murder, suckled on blood,' mumbled Ares hungrily.

'My Lord Ares, there has been war for ten years and the sea ran red with Trojan blood, with Argive blood. The heroes are dead and the world is poorer for it. No wars, not until they recover,' ordered Zeus Father.

'Cruel and young,' said Pan the Ageless. 'Young and cruel, these new Gods. I say this, Apollo. If these Atreidae flee into my forests, I will shelter them. If they thirst, I will give them water; if they hunger, I will feed them. No beast shall threaten them. They are possessed with nightmares, tender young creatures, not long to live.'

'And if they murder their mother,' said Hecate, 'there are those who will pursue.'

Behind her, black forms soiled the bright sunlight of Olympus. Serpent-haired crones armed with staves tipped with bronze; slavering, white-fanged dog's muzzles. They had small drums ringed with iron bells and they beat and jangled them, a tooth-gritting, toneless rhythm.

'Erinyes,' said Hecate. 'The Revengers of Blood.'

'Away with them,' Apollo waved a slender, marmoreal hand and they vanished. 'The children of Atreus are mine, hag. I have set them on to complete the story, and I shall save or punish them as I see fit. It is my voice the boy hears.'

'There is still law in Olympus,' said Hecate. 'By the law, if they do this deed, they are mine.'

Poseidon, sitting by the Pool of Mortal Lives, gestured over the water. For a moment the pool filled with a living picture. An elegant man in a fine chiton, his red hair bound behind his neck, his eyes brown and very seeing, stared up at the God.

Odysseus,' grunted Poseidon, and the picture vanished. On the broad sea, as blue as Aphrodite's eyes, a ship the size of a pea pod was blown far off course by the God's breath.

There was no doubt, now, that we would stay together, live together. We knew that Eumides was a wanderer, but his question to the Pythia told us that he needed a place to return to, a safe home.

The discussion, which lasted far into the night, was not about whether we would make this unusual pairing, this tripling. It was about where we could all live.

Arion was going home to Epidavros, and I could see that Chryse longed to return there, though there was something he was not telling either Eumides or me.

I could not go home. Troy was destroyed. But I could go to Troas, child of Troy, on the Hellespont, the new city founded before the destruction of Ilium. I could not seek my twin, for I did not know where he was, or even if he was still alive. The cobweb on which our communication depended had thinned to a wisp and then gone. I had woken the morning after Delphi to find myself, for the first time in my life, utterly alone. In losing prophecy and the anger of Apollo I had also lost Eleni. I was trying not to think about him. I nudged Eumides with my bare foot.

'What about you, sailor? Where do you want to go?'

'All land is alike to me,' he said. 'As long as I can find you again, I don't care where we live.'

'We could go home to Epidavros, to the temple of Asclepius,' said Chryse. 'I want to go there, to greet my master again and see that old rascal of a bard settled. He has been a good friend to me, and there are more songs to hear.'

'But the temple will not allow a woman to heal, will it?' I asked.

'No,' sighed Chryse.

'And if we go to Troas, you will not be accepted. Only women are healers in Troy.'