Electra (28 page)

Old Neptha was there, but Orestes brushed her aside.

'Electra!' she exclaimed. 'Electra with blood on your hands. By all the Gods, Princess, don't, don't go in, not with armed men. She is your mother!' She seized me by the sleeve and I pushed her away. She caught sight of my face and stepped back several paces, afraid.

I was not afraid.

The Queen was awake. She had aged. My beautiful mother was gaining flesh, sagging, and her cheeks were marked with the wine drinker's red patches. She was dressed only in her sleeping tunic, and she dragged a gown around her as we came in.

'You!' she said to me. 'Who is this you bring, Electra, your husband?'

'My son,' I said, and she paled, clutching at her bosom.

'We have come to kill you, woman,' I hissed. 'The usurper is dead and his blood is on my hands,' I showed them to her, wet and red. She ignored me and turned to the weaker target.

'Orestes,' she said sweetly. 'Have you come to kill me?'

'I have come to avenge my father,' he said through his teeth. He was as white as clay. Pylades closed the door and leaned on it. No one would interrupt us.

'Your father is avenged, if Aegisthus is dead,' she said. Her hair hung down, black as night, and she came closer to Orestes. He flinched under her smile.

'This is the breast that nourished you,' she said, baring her torso to the waist. 'The arms that cradled you, the womb that bore you.'

'I know what womb carried me, who endured the pain for me,' he said quietly.

'When you were sleepless, so was I,' she said, not answering him. 'If you hungered, I fed you. If you had thirst, I gave you milk. You used to lie in my lap and play with my necklace - do you remember, Orestes?'

'You murdered my… You murdered Agamemnon!' he cried. She smiled again, moving closer by each step.

'You cut your first tooth on my beads,' she said, lifting his left hand and placing it on her breast. 'I birthed you with long agony but I was glad of it, for it gave me you. I am your mother. What do you want, Orestes?'

'To kill you, and die,' he said.

I came to his side and laid my hand on the bronze sword. Before she could speak again, seduce him from his holy purpose with words, I pushed it and it entered her side.

She staggered away, and Orestes followed. He seized her by the arm and struck, hard. Her throat was cut and he let her fall.

Blood pooled on the floor, spreading in a red tide. Dead as my father. I would not even look at her face again.

I was avenged. I felt empty, like a house through which the sea-wind is blowing, scoured clean.

Orestes dropped the sword. Pylades picked it up, wiped it, sheathed it, and took our hands.

'Come,' he said. 'We need look on this no more,' and he led us into the courtyard and bade us wash.

They brought us water and we rinsed ourselves clean of blood. The men of the city were gathered in a silent group, watching, waiting for what Orestes would say. They needed to be told that the reign of the usurper was over, that the rule of the monstrous woman was completed by a clean act of revenge, sanctioned by the Gods.

They waited, and Orestes screamed and ran.

We pursued him along the main streets, out through the gate and down the hill. All the way he shrieked and cringed as though under attack, but we could see no assailants. He stopped where we had left the horses, weeping and shaking.

'The old women, the terrible old women,' he said through trembling lips. 'Three of them. Black rags, snakes - can't you hear their bells? Iron bells, can't you hear them say, "Matricide! We will hound you to death!" Sister? Can't you see them?'

'I see nothing,' I whispered, amazed.

'See how they have beaten me,' he said. He tore off his tunic and I saw long welts as from a whip, curling around his back. The skin was broken and he was bleeding.

'They will not let me enter Mycenae again. I must go to a temple of Apollo. The Sun-God Apollo says I must go to Delphi.'

'But Mycenae is your kingdom!' I said.

'I have no kingdom,' he replied.

Pylades helped him onto his horse and we rode away from the city. I began to believe in the old women when I heard the sound of running animal's feet behind, but it was only the black bitch Racer, who had found Orestes again, and did not mean to lose him.

We lived on an island while waiting for the sailing season again. I like islands. This was Skiathos, off the coast of Thessaly.

We dragged
Waverider
ashore there and made new sails for her, greased and mended her timbers. We stored her while the Meltemi blew; those ferocious gales that rake the deep and drive galleys stadia off course. Set sail in that wind, and only Poseidon will know where the wreck lies.

I could not come to my twin Eleni yet and I tried to have patience.

Here Diomenes was acceptable, but not I. I was tired of selling magic potions on the sly, visiting cloistered women in stifling houses who did not need medicine but fresh air and exercise and better food. I wearied of procuring abortions for terrified maids in danger of death if their unchastity was known. I was sick even of the Argive tongue, as well as of their philosophy.

Towards the end of the winter I found myself grabbing automatically for a veil as I left the small house and thereupon decided that it was time we went to Epirus, sailing season or not. I wanted desperately to see Eleni again. I could feel him all the time now. He was very unhappy. I felt that if I did not come to him soon he might despair.

My companions agreed - I had been snapping at them for weeks. We would leave
Waverider
at Iolkos, Jason's capital. We could not sail around Achaea in such a wind. Eumides' friend Laodamos would bring the galley to Amouda when the weather allowed. To travel in the wrong season, we would leave the sea and buy horses. We would have to ride several weeks through the mountains to get to Dodona; and the tribes along the way were said to be savage, illiterate and dangerous.

'We shall make any journey, Lady,' said Eumides, 'even on horseback instead of in the sea, if you will only like us again.'

'We grieve to see you so unhappy,' agreed Diomenes. 'And there is a temple to the Healer God at Dodona in Epirus. We might be able to stay there.'

'We even have enough treasure left to buy your brother,' suggested the sailor, 'if this son of Achilles will sell him.'

'He will not leave,' I said shortly. 'He is in love with Andromache, widow of my brother Hector. It was the God's doing.' I added.

I embraced them in remorse. I had been unbearable. But I would never live the life of an Argive woman.

'My Lord and Brother Apollo, your revenge is complete. The terrified children of Atreus flee, pursued by the Furies. I do not think they will survive,' commented Athene.

'Little lost beasts,' grumbled Pan.

'Murderers,' said Hecate.

'I will cleanse them of their deed,' said Apollo. 'They need only get to one of my shrines.'

'You cannot cleanse them of matricide, the primal crime,' said Hecate, breathing venomous breath into the flawless face. Apollo did not recoil, but smiled.

'Your reign has ended, hag,' he said.

'Has it?' she asked.

In the Pool of Mortal Lives the Gods heard a whip crack, heard a scream, saw blood creep in a thin line to stain a ragged tunic.

Zeus Father looked at a little ship on Ocean in the Pool of Mortal Lives, driven into landless wreck, and spoke to his brother Poseidon.

'Release that unhappy sailor,' he urged. 'Troy is gone, Brother.'

'I will torment him until the Gods grow old.' The Sea-God struck the marble with his trident.

Zeus wiped his brow and tasted salt. 'The Gods do not grow old, but they are tired. Cut the strings, Poseidon, Lord of the Sea. There are others who need your counsel. Leave Odysseus to Fate.'

'Not yet,' growled Earth-Shaker.

Terror pursued us. It was the worst journey I had ever made, ever known. We stopped by preference in a thicket, avoiding the sight of men. The first night we did not sleep, fearing for Orestes.

We could only calm him if I lay on one side of him and Pylades on the other, and even then he thrashed and whimpered.

'Mother!' he cried, then 'Death', he whispered. My arm lay over him, Pylades embraced him, and our hands met.

I was empty and revenged now. I did not fear the lust of other men. So, when a warm hand touched mine in the pitch dark, where the horses stamped and fretted and Racer whined and licked Orestes' feet, I clasped it tightly.

It felt good, in the night and the fear, to touch another human.

I woke in a pine forest. Racer had gone off on some purpose of her own, and I made a little fire and heated a mealy pottage. We had supplies for many days. I sat by the fire for a while, waiting for the others to rouse.

Pylades was lying on his side - Orestes in his agony had rolled away from him - and I examined him idly. It might have been the first time I had really looked at him.

The new sunlight struck silver lights from his chestnut-husk hair. His face was olive-brown, bony, the jaw firm, the throat rounded. Eyelashes made a delicate fringed line on his high cheekbones. His hands, large hands with well-shaped fingers, were empty and cupped, and sunlight fell into them. Pylades my cousin had both hands full of light, and it pooled in the hollow of his shoulder.

He woke. Dark brown eyes considered me gravely and I blushed so that I was flooded with heat.

'It's morning,' I said inanely.

'So it is. And you, Lady, have been busy.'

He got up carefully so as not to jolt Orestes and came to sit with me and eat soup. I let him drink most of it before I said, 'Pylades, what shall we do? Orestes cannot travel far, not with this madness on him.'

'We must find a temple of Apollo. We will have to go north, to Corinth.'

'That will take days! Is there nothing nearer?'

'Not that I know of. This country belongs to Artemis and Poseidon. Neither of them are likely to be of any use. The Sun-God set Orestes onto this path, now he must rescue him. To find Pythian Apollo quicker, we would have to go south to Tiryns or Argos, and that is not a good idea.'

'No,' said Orestes. He must have been lying awake, listening to us. 'I am cursed. I cannot go into a city or the Gods may set it on fire. I may not eat with men, or they may choke. I may not drink from a stream, or I will poison the water.'

'If we must find Apollo, then you must go into Corinth and the city will just have to take its chances.' Pylades looked at my son. 'How have you fared the night, little brother?'

'Well enough.' He tried to get up, winced, and Pylades helped him to his feet. Orestes was pressing a hand to his side. When we peeled away the tunic there were great bruises there, as though he had been beaten.

'They have clubs, bronze-studded clubs,' he said. 'Is there something to eat?'

I gave him a clean bowl and began to pack away the gear. Racer, returning with a fresh-caught rabbit, sat at Orestes' feet. He ate about half the broth and gave her the rest. Then he took my hand in his and said, 'Electra, you are a woman of virtue. You cannot travel with me and Pylades unattended.'

'Why not? We have made many journeys together. Pylades is my cousin. You're my brother.'

'I am your brother and your son. I am responsible for you. I love you and Pylades most in the world, and would have you married. Someone must care for you when I, when I am gone.'

His eyes begged me to take him seriously, so I did. He smoothed my hand. I noticed that my skin was not fine and white any more, as it had been when I lived in my mother's house. I had spinner's callouses on my forefinger and thumb, and a few small cooking-fire burns. Also my fingernails were filthy and I had not even noticed.

'I know you will not leave me,' Orestes said to me. 'So I am giving you to Pylades.' He put my hand into that of my cousin. 'We will celebrate it at the next shrine we come to, on the way to Delphi. Do you agree, Pylades?'

'That depends on whether Electra agrees,' he said.

Argive women belong to men. All women belong either to father, husband, brother or son. As my brother, Orestes had the right to dispose of me as he saw fit and I could not have argued. But Pylades was asking me how I felt about it. He was giving me a choice. Like the barbarian women, I could make a bargain for my virtue and some terms on which to live the rest of my life.

'You know my history,' I said to him. 'Do you want to marry me?'

'Yes, Lady,' His voice was deep. 'We know each other well, Electra.'

'I know little of men. I will not please you as the slave Alceste did.'

'You please me,' he said steadily.

'You will not lie with me until I consent?'

'I will not.'

'Then I agree.' I could not think of anything else to ask.

We mounted and rode gently north through the spring flowers, gold and purple, towards Corinth and the temple of the Pythian Apollo. Banthos was slow because he'd filled his greedy stomach with green barley.

That night we lay, as always, one to each side of Orestes who cried in his sleep.

I could not see them, though I strained my eyes. I could not hear the thud of club or lash as it struck my brother-son's cringing body, but bruises bloomed under their assault. I saw no glimpse of black rags and heard no hiss of snake-crowned heads. Pylades could not see them either.

But Racer could. A wolf-bitch, fiercely loyal, lay at Orestes' feet every night. She, who had never learned to bark, accomplished this one night. The moon was full. We lay in a pinewood, under the deep shade. Selene's radiance made inky shadows and ice-light. The stars were damped by her flooding beams.

Racer, who slept little, woke and bayed. Orestes flung up his arms to cover his face. The bitch barked and howled, snapping at the air, for almost an hour while Orestes was assailed. We heard the click as her teeth met on nothing. Then she settled down into an alert crouch, like a dam with puppies watching for anything which might threaten her children.

Orestes, when he woke, joked for the first time since Clytemnestra's blood pooled on the stone. He said that he had two mothers, one human and one animal, and that he hoped he had a divine one as well.