Fleeced (24 page)
Authors: Julia Wills
The others looked at each other blankly.
“Maybe it’s a code?” suggested Alex. “One where numbers stand for letters of the alphabet. You know, one stands for ‘A’—”
“And fifty-ssseven?” muttered Hex.
Aries tutted loudly. “Clearly the Scroll’s as useless as ever! When it’s not waffling on in mysterious verse it’s reciting pointless numbers.”
“Hang on a minute!” said Hazel quietly, pulling her smartphone from her bag. The others watched as she began tapping the screen. “Somethin’ ’bout those numbers with all their minuses and points sounds jus’ a bit familiar to me.”
Everyone waited, watching.
“I thought so!” she cried. “I knew they were the sorta things my pilot talks about when we’re tour-plannin’. They’re coordinates!”
“Coordinates?” said Alex blankly.
“Numbers,” said Rose. “They pinpoint places on a map.”
“Look,” said Hazel, holding out the glowing screen.
The others looked to see a single red dot glowing on an illuminated map of a wide river surrounded by green jungle.
“It’s showin’ a point way up in the north-east Amazon,” added Hazel. “The Amazon, Rose! Didn’t you say—”
“He’s alive!” squealed Rose, leaping up and punching the air.
Euphoric, she threw her arms around Alex and
Hazel. Aries jammed his head in between them whilst Hex flicked his tongue into the air, tasting the happiness and looping round their feet.
“Oh, Hazel!” cried Rose, her eyes glittering with tears. “Thank you! You’re wonderful!”
At which the Scroll cleared its throat pointedly.
“And so are you!” added Rose, tickling the Scroll in the palm of her hand so that it squealed with laughter. “You papery marvel!”
Cradling the Scroll she began pacing across the room, thinking out loud. “So, I need to find someone who’ll take me to look for him. Someone from the Royal Geographical Society, maybe? I mean, they funded his trip in the first place.” A frown crossed her face. “Except they gave up looking for him months ago.”
“Hang those ol’ boys,” said Hazel. “I got a plane, don’t I?”
Rose stared at her. “You mean…?”
“Sure,” nodded Hazel. “Least I can do after today, ain’t it? Besides, I reckon I’m in need of a vacation after this tour!”
“Oh!” squealed Rose, which was really the only sensible thing to say, and everyone jumped up and down a bit more and hugged each other again. For the longest time the friends embraced again, or at
least Alex and Rose and Hazel did whilst Aries gave everyone an affectionate prod with his horns and Hex weaved between their ankles.
But finally when they all stepped apart again, pink-faced and happy, there was an awkward silence. One of those bumpy bits of quiet that happen when everyone knows there’s a goodbye coming and nobody wants to be the one to say it.
Finally, Alex stepped back and picked Hex up from the floor, looping him over his shoulders and began walking, with Aries, towards the ramp to the scaffolding.
At the top, he lifted the curtain and turned.
“Goodbye,” he smiled, and letting Aries walk through in front of him, stepped inside and let the curtain fall.
There was a moment’s silence, loaded with a sparkly anticipation that something special was about to happen, before the cloth rumpled up messily and Aries stuck his head back out.
“I’ll miss you, Rose,” he said, blinking back his own tears.
Rose sniffed and blew him a kiss. “And I’ll miss you, too,” she whispered. “I never met proper heroes before.”
Aries stepped back inside, blushing.
The two girls watched the cloth fall back, rippling in a cold breeze before lying flat against the wall. For a moment the room thrummed with a deafening quiet, suddenly yawning with new emptiness.
“C’mon, little lady,” said Hazel, linking arms with Rose. “We got us some plannin’ to do.”
Nodding, Rose swallowed her tears and together the two girls walked out of Room 18, leaving its secrets behind them, into the Grand Hall where the first splashes of moonlight were painting the floor silver.
“Do you think they’ll throw a party for us?” said Aries, nudging the boy’s hand. “With Elysian thistles, I mean, and dandelions and some fresh swags of nettles?” He slapped his lips. “Ooh, and some wine for you?”
“Maybe,” said Alex uncertainly, stepping through the portal.
Behind them, the huge stone door thundered closed, sending a rumble around the walls of the cavern.
“Maybe?” Aries looked up at him, puzzled.
“What I mean,” said Alex gently, “is that we didn’t complete our quest, did we?” He rubbed Aries’ brow. “We don’t have the fleece, Aries.”
Aries turned away and studied his hooves quietly as Alex tucked the Scroll back into his bag and started down the shale-strewn slope towards the Styx. He was halfway to the riverbank when he felt the sharp jab of Aries’ horns.
“But we thwarted her, didn’t we?” said Aries brightly. “I mean, we saved Hazel, we freed the sheep. Alex, we stopped a sorceress!”
“True,” said Alex slowly.
“And that’s more than Jason or Herakles or any of those other tunicked twerps managed, isn’t it?”
“Well, yes,” said Alex. “I suppose so!”
At which Aries shot past him, skittering over the rocks, down to the water. “I mean, did you hear what Rose called us?” he cried over his shoulder.
“Proper heroes,” replied Alex.
“That’s right,” said Aries, scuffling to a stop. “Hey, do you think Athena will commission statues of us? To stand with the other ones in the pavilion?” He lifted up a front hoof and stuck it out nobly in front of him. “What do you reckon?”
“What’sss he doing?” muttered Hex in Alex’s ear.
“Striking a hero’s pose,” smiled Alex, watching Aries spin round to stick out a back hoof instead.
As Aries continued to model for the imagined sculptor, Alex picked his way gingerly down the
bank and began thinking back over the last few days.
Perhaps Rose was right, he reflected.
After all, who would have thought that he, Alex Knossos, potter and zoo keeper, could fight harpies and fauns and Cyclopes or persuade a sorceress’s snake intent on killing him to change sides, or rally an army of frightened sheep into action?
“A hero’s
krater
filled with olives would be nice!” added Aries. “At the big unveiling, I mean!”
Or that Aries could accept that his fleece was lost forever? That he was no longer obsessed about how he appeared on the outside, but had become a different and better ram on the inside?
Despite the chill wind lifting off the Styx, Alex felt a warm glow around his heart, thinking about Rose’s words. More than that, for the first time in his life (and death) he understood the difference between the sort of person who lops the heads off monsters for the sake of it and the sort of person who finds the courage deep inside themselves to fight for their friends. The difference between one who’s born looking fabulous and the one who learns to behave that way.
The difference between a Greek hero and a
proper
one.
Not that he was about to share that thought with
Aries.
Not yet, anyway.
After all, there’s only so much swaggering and bleating you can put up with on the dusty road back to the Underworld.
HE
E
ND
39
.
What? You were expecting a scrunched Rose snail, too? Ah, no. You see, Medea hadn’t spent hundreds of years on Earth without developing a great deal of patience, and having found such a super student in Rose, she wasn’t about to turn her into a mollusc. That’s the good news. In fact, she still liked her. That’s the bad. Sorry.
40
.
Actually Shakespeare, in his puff ball pants. (No, honestly, that is their proper name. Trust you to mention pants again!)
41
.
Junction 6 off the A23. Follow the signs to Brighton. Open 10 to 5 each day and all bank holidays (except Christmas Day).
42
.
What, you’re surprised she was there? What with her being a world-class mega pop star and everything? Well, don’t forget she would have been at her own world-class mega pop star’s funeral, but for Alex, Aries, Hex and Rose, and she wasn’t about to miss saying goodbye to three of her four newest and most special friends.
LL
G
REEK
TO
Y
OU
?
Just ask the all-knowing Scroll if you’ve forgotten who’s who, what’s what and what’s not…
Agora
Agora is the Greek word for market place. We still use the word to describe a phobia, or fear, of wide, open spaces: agoraphobia.
Apollonius of Rhodes
Or Old Baloney of Rhodes as Aries prefers to calls him, since he was the ancient Greek poet who wrote about Jason and the Argonauts’ adventure and, as we now know, got it all wrong.
Argo
This was Jason’s ship and was named after Argus, the man who built it.
Atalanta
Atalanta was the only female member of Jason’s Argonauts. She was the fastest runner in ancient Greece and used this to challenge men who wanted to marry her and whom she didn’t fancy. She knew that she could beat them easily and then execute them, which was great fun and saved loads of money on wedding parties.
Alexander the Great
Alexander the Great was the son of King Philip of Macedon, a country to the north of Greece. After his father died, Alexander led the army and conquered a third of the world including the Persian Empire and Egypt. During the twelve years of his campaigns, he founded seventy cities and never lost a battle. He always rode his favourite horse, Bucephalus. Regarded as one of the cleverest military leaders ever to live, his strategies are still taught to army leaders today. He died at the age of thirty-two. Personally, I think Alexander the Absolutely Amazing would have been a better name.
The Argonauts
These were the sailors who travelled with Jason. ‘Naut’ comes from the Greek word for sailor so Argo-nauts, are sailors on the
Argo
. Lucky their ship wasn’t called the
Coco
really, otherwise they’d be Coconauts.
Athena
The goddess of wisdom, war and crafts. With all that battling, brain-strain and button-making to deal with, no wonder she liked to throw a good party.
Barque
A barque is a small boat, rather like a gondola; a funeral barque is a small boat used to carry coffins over water and should not be confused with the sound a dog makes when it sees a hearse.
The Battle of Marathon
The first time the Persians invaded Greece was in 490
BC
at the Battle of Marathon. There were tens of thousands more Persians than Athenians. However, by clever use of phalanxes, the Athenians drove the Persians back to their boats. Unfamiliar with the terrain, many Persians drowned in the surrounding marshlands. The Athenians then marched quickly back to Athens and defeated the Persians when they made their second attempt, this time to seize the city. Score – Athens 2: Persia 0.
Centaurs
Creatures with the head, chest and arms of a man and the body and legs of a horse, these chatty trotters can be found in the Underworld’s Centaur Parcs.
The Ceryneian Hind
The Ceryneian Hind was a female deer with golden antlers and hooves made of brass. Faster than a flying arrow, she could have beaten any horse in the Grand National but would have been disqualified for eating the hedges.
Charon
Charon was the skeleton boatman who escorted the dead over the River Styx. For the price of one
obol
, this bony ferryman, dressed in a hooded cloak, would take shades over the water from the Land of the Living on to the path to the Underworld. A gloomy sort, he seldom made
small talk on the journey, which was hardly surprising after centuries spent in a murky cave with rising damp seeping up his shinbones.
Charybdis
A ferocious whirlpool that sucked sailors round and down into a horrible watery death, rather like being flushed down the world’s biggest toilet. She stayed close to Scylla, offering sailors a thoughtful choice of how they’d like to get to the Underworld.
Chiton
This was a common sort of clothing in ancient Greece worn by men and women. Made from rectangles of cloth, the chiton draped from the shoulders like a tunic and was often worn with a belt. Why not impress your friends by making your own? Simply wrap your duvet cover around you and pin the top edge at each shoulder. Instant Greek chic! (Although, do remember that traditional Greek chitons, unlike your duvet cover, were rarely stripy and absolutely never had pictures of superheroes or pop stars on them.)
Circe
Circe was Medea’s aunt. Unlike normal aunts, who come round for tea and cakes every so often, Circe taught Medea how to be a sorceress. Turning sailors into pigs and harnessing dragons to chariots were amongst the many skills Circe shared with her niece, which set her
on the road to bad behaviour but cheered up many a wet Wednesday.
The Elgin Marbles
In the early 1800s a Scottish nobleman called Lord Elgin brought lots of bits of the Parthenon back to Britain. These are now in the British Museum and include the carved panels that used to hang beneath the roof of the Parthenon, decorated with
centaurs
fighting men on one side and an ancient procession on the other. A lot of people think that the marbles should be returned to Greece. A lot of people think they should stay in the British Museum. What do you think?
The Fates
The ancient Greeks believed that three old women decided what would happen to you in your life. These were the three Fates. One old lady began spinning a skein of thread on the day you were born. A second measured it out day by day whilst a third snipped it with silver scissors on the day of your death. This job made her very busy and bad-tempered on battle days, when she could be found saying all manner of rude words and complaining about missing her favourite television programme.
Fire-Breathing Bulls
One of Jason’s three tasks on Kolkis was to yoke, or harness, the fire-breathing bulls in order to plough a field and sow the dragons’ teeth as King Aeetes demanded.
I suppose he was lucky it wasn’t a competition for matador skills. One flick of the cape and it’d be smoking trousers all round.
Glauce
The princess who would have been the second Mrs Jason but for you-know-who turning her burning love into a burning wedding dress instead.
Greaves
Greaves are the bronze shin-plates that Greek soldiers wore to protect them from swords, horse kicks and stinging nettles.
Harpies
Birds with the heads and shoulders of women, these creatures were famous for snatching food away from people and never being invited on picnics.
Hector
A prince of Troy who was popped off by Achilles during the Battle of Troy, according to Homer in his epic poem,
The Iliad.
Herakles
One of Jason’s Argonauts, Herakles was the strongest man on Earth. He began his monster-mashing career early when he throttled the two giant snakes that the goddess Hera had released into his cradle. Without his later antics there wouldn’t have been much point going to the Underworld Zoo since it was largely down to his
handiwork in performing his
Twelve Labours
that Alex had so many creatures to care for.
Homer
No, not the yellow one with a skateboarding son, but the ancient Greek poet famous for giving us the story of the Battle of Troy in his epic poem,
The Iliad.
Hoplite
A Greek foot soldier. Hoplites were armed with spears and shields and attacked the opposing army in their
phalanx
formation.
The Hydra
This reptilian monster with hundreds of heads lived in a swamp and spent her days mooching about blowing mud bubbles. Then Herakles arrived. Chopping off each of her heads, he was horrified to see two more grow back on each stump. However, he finally killed the monster with the help of his nephew, who seared each neck stump with a fiery club so that no new heads could grow back.
Jason
The Prince of Iolkus, robbed of the throne by his wicked Uncle Pelias who snuck in and made himself king. Brought up by a centaur, Jason later sailed to Kolkis to steal the Golden Fleece.
Krater
Despite sounding like the smoky hole you find on top of a volcano, a krater was a large clay pot used for mixing
wine and water to serve to guests at parties. Like an ancient Greek punch bowl, drinks were drawn from it. Or, in Aries’ case, slurped.
The Lion of Nemea
A ferocious big cat strangled by Herakles, who then snaffled its impenetrable pelt to complete his strongman’s outfit.
Man-Eating Horses
The clue’s in the name. These four terrifying horses belonged to the giant Diomedes and with their huge appetites and horrible diet put the ‘mare’ into nightmare.
Medea
The sorceress of Kolkis who helped Jason steal the fleece from the sacred grove and became his first wife.
Medusa
An old lady with hair that was made of real snakes. As if this wasn’t bad enough, anyone who looked at her was immediately turned into stone, which made it very difficult to get a good hairdresser.
Midas
Midas was the king who was given the golden touch so that everything he put his hand on turned into gold. The gift became a curse when he hugged his daughter who promptly became a gleaming statue. However, on the bright side she did make a delightful garden feature.
The Minotaur
The Minotaur was a monster with the head and shoulders of a bull and the body of a man. This made finding clothes very difficult and so he was usually to be found pacing about in his maze, beneath the palace at Knossos, in just a pair of big underpants. Every so often young men and women were pushed screaming into his lair for him to eat. This went on until
Theseus
took the place of one of the men and stomped into the maze with a sword and ball of wool. He slew the Minotaur with his sword and then found his way back out of the maze by following the wool he had unwound along the passages.
Narcissus
Narcissus was an extremely handsome man who fell in love with his own reflection in a forest pool and spent his life gazing wide-eyed at it. He was so besotted by his own loveliness that he couldn’t leave it. He stayed by the pool until he died. I know. How silly was that? But, as I said, he was good-looking, not smart.
Obol
An ancient Greek coin. Although the word ‘obol’ sounds like ‘oboe’, you’ll find that however hard you blow, you can’t get a decent tune out of it.
Oracles
Oracles, for those of you who’ve never had their palms read on Brighton Pier, were widely respected Greek
women, whom people consulted to find out what was going to happen. A sort of ancient Greek fortune teller, they leaned over steaming pots to see into the future. Of course, it’s not the leaning over steaming pots bit that’s important, otherwise all dinner ladies would be oracles and they’re not, because when they look into pots all they see is custard.
Parthenon
Athena’s temple still stands high on its rock in Athens today. However, during its long lifetime it has been blown up by people from Venice who stored gunpowder under its roof, had bits taken away by Lord Elgin and endured years of traffic pollution, acid rain and curious tourists stomping all over it. So, I’m afraid it doesn’t look quite as snazzy as it used to and Athena would not be amused.
Pegasus
A beautiful white horse with wings so that it could fly. And you thought seagull doo-doo was bad…
Perseus
Another have-a-go hero, Athena’s nephew, Perseus, killed
Medusa
by reflecting her face back at her in his shiny shield and turning her to stone.
Phalanx
A rectangular formation of soldiers, or hoplites, who marched behind a wall of shields with their spears high and ready to fight the enemy.
Prow
Part of the bow, the prow is the very front of a ship, the bit above the waterline. Oddly enough, Jason was killed by the
Argo’s
prow. It happened many years after the voyage when he took a nap under the beached
Argo
, only to be dispatched first class to the Underworld when its prow dropped off due to rampant wood rot. (Of course, I think we can guess who magicked the rot into it, can’t we?)
Queen Persephone
Pronounced pur-sef-pho-knee (otherwise it sounds like a mobile someone called Percy might text on) Persephone was a teenager minding her own business on Earth, when one day King Hades suddenly burst through the ground of the field where she was gathering flowers and dragged her down to the Underworld to be his wife. Her mother, Demeter, the goddess of grain, was distraught and travelled down to the Underworld to demand King Hades return her daughter. However, anyone who’d eaten food in the Underworld may not return, and Persephone had eaten six pomegranate seeds. Hades ruled that Persephone must spend six months, for the six seeds eaten, in the Underworld each year, but could live with her mother on Earth during the other six. Of course, during those months, Demeter was delighted, the sun shone and harvests flourished giving the Greeks spring and summer. But for the six that her daughter
resided in the Underworld the Earth was cold and rain-swept giving the Greeks autumn and winter.
River Styx
The Styx is the river that separates the Underworld from the Earth and the dead from the living and, as you might expect, it’s not terribly cheerful. It’s not the sort of place that you’d choose to picnic in or pitch a tent. The river doesn’t babble or tinkle, nor does it weave prettily beneath rustic bridges and there are absolutely no fluffy-wuffy duckies. Instead, the water roils and twists, lurching black and menacing beneath rock that skitters with eyeless cave spiders.
