Necessity (10 page)

My uncle Porphyry had noticed us come in and was pushing his way through the crowd towards us, two cups of wine in each of his big hands. “Do you know him?” Dad asked me, sounding much more surprised than I'd have expected.

“His name is Poimandros, I think he's from Psyche. I only met him once. He's Alkippe's father,” I answered, looking back at them. Poimandros had turned back to Thee. Jason was on her other side, she was smiling teasingly, flirting with both of them at the same time. I tried to smooth out my brow and look serenely at Dad.

I always volunteer for the Festival of Hera. Plato was in favor, so if you want to stand for civic office, it's a good idea to do it. Besides, it's a great opportunity to enjoy uncomplicated sex. There are two little festivals every year and one big one, at the end of summer, when people come here from all the cities. Long ago, when there was only one city and the Masters were in charge, participation was compulsory and the Masters cheated to get what they thought would be the best children. Plato says that's what they should do, though how he, or anyone, imagined they could tell what the children would be like I don't know. That ended at the Last Debate, and resulted in Dad's generation, which was followed by a decade or so when they didn't have any Festivals of Hera here at all, though they kept on with them in Athenia and Psyche. Then they started them up again, on a voluntary basis, and with the lots chosen truly at random, though still always within the same metal. I've been volunteering since I was seventeen and wildly curious.

Being drawn together at a Festival of Hera left people with no obligation to each other afterwards. The marriage was strictly time-bound, until the participants left the room. By Plato's original rules, that was supposed to be the end of it—indeed, what Poimandros had done, in never seeking me out again, and even ignoring the half-besotted note I'd sent him (at Thee's urging) was precisely in accord with the
Republic
as Plato wrote it. But in present-day practice, if the people had got on well, which we had, a marriage at festival often develops into a friendship or a love affair, occasionally even a long-term marriage. Marriages that began that way were considered to be lucky. All my other such pairings were now friends, or friendly acquaintances. In any case, looking straight through me as if he'd never seen me before was well beyond what Plato had written, never mind custom. By any interpretation, that was rude. Though it
had
been eight years; perhaps he really had completely forgotten me.

Porphyry reached us and gave winecups to me and Dad and Aroo. Dad swallowed down a great gulp of his right away. “Gods!”

Porphyry laughed. “He didn't get here until well after Father was dead,” he said. “He told me explicitly that he didn't come as a psychopomp, and seemed surprised at the idea. And while he seems intrigued by everyone and everything, he has been paying a great deal of attention to your Thetis. He's very strange, not how I would have imagined Hermes at all. What do you think?”

Hermes. Was he? Of course he must be. It wasn't really warm enough for anyone human to be comfortable naked. I felt icy cold inside and out. Though I suppose it did explain both why the sex had been so wonderful and how he could have forgotten. If he was a god, probably it was always like that for him. I wished I hadn't revealed what I'd admitted to Dad.

I had often heard the story from Grandfather of how, when my grandmother Simmea discovered that he was the god Apollo, she had said, “Then that's why you're so awful at being a human being.” For the first time, I understood it.

I took a sip of my own wine. It was watered three to one, which was correct for a funeral, of course, but at that moment I could have done with something stronger.

“Why do you think he came now, and not before?” Dad asked. “The Olympians must know we're here. Zeus put us here. And we're worshipping them. Some of that must get through. But none of them have ever come before.”

“Except Athene,” I said, knowing Dad would know what I meant and that Porphyry and Aroo would think I was talking about the Relocation.

“Excuse me, do you believe gla to be one of your Olympian gods?” Aroo asked. (“Gla” was the special Saeli pronoun for divinity. I knew it because of the negotiations about temples. I'd never heard it in normal conversation before. The Saeli didn't generally use it for Pytheas and his children.)

“Yes, that's Hermes,” Dad replied.

The three of them had been moving through the crush and were now beside us. “Father, Aroo, Marsilia, this is Hermes,” Thetis said, beaming. He was lovely. Of course he was. He was a god. How could I not have guessed? I felt furious with myself.

We exchanged conventional wishes of joy, though my voice seemed choked in my throat. Hermes still showed no sign whatsoever of recognizing me. He did remarkably well at the Saeli sideways head-bow, which takes most people a long time to master. But then, he was a god. “I think you all know Jason?” Thee went on.

“Yes,” Aroo said, making the head-bow to Jason. “You are in charge of the boat where Marsilia and Hilfa work. Joy to you, Jason.”

“Joy to you, Aroo. And that's right,” Jason said, making a creditable response to the head-bow. He'd been there the day Hilfa was trying to teach it to me. The memory of our shared laughter steadied me.

“So tell me about your gods?” Hermes asked Aroo, directly.

Aroo blinked her silvery inner eyelids across her eyes, and took a tiny step backwards. A tiny step was all she could take, because there was so little room, and now her back was to the wall. “We have four major religions,” she said, carefully, without unveiling her eyes. “Three of them have gods. Most of us here prefer the fourth.”

“But you're not used to gods showing up at parties?” Hermes asked, and giggled. He couldn't be drunk on that over-watered wine, unless he'd been here for a long time.

“Religion is for us a more private thing,” Aroo said, sounding very much like Hilfa now. “We do not have people enact the roles of gods, no, nor do we worship in public as part of civic life the way humans do. There are those who could instruct you, but I am not one of them.” She closed her eyes completely now, lowering the colored outer lids.

“But—” Hermes began.

“Enough,” Dad said, sternly. “You're making Aroo uncomfortable, and she is a guest here.”

I wouldn't have cared to refuse Dad when he spoke in that tone, but Hermes had another laughing objection on his lips when Aroo suddenly opened her eyes and fled, thrusting her empty cup at Porphyry and backing out through the door of the sleeping house and into the street. Porphyry took the cup, turned it in his hands with a strange gesture, then nodded to Hermes. “I see,” he said, at his most gnomic. Porphyry is my uncle, and I love him, but he can also be one of the most infuriatingly enigmatic people on the planet. “I will speak with you tomorrow.” Then he vanished, still holding the cup. Hermes kept smiling but did not speak.

At that moment, Alkippe came in from the garden and began wiggling her way across the room towards us. Hermes smiled over at the child as she approached, then paused. For the first time since I'd known him there was no smile twitching at the corners of his lips.

“Your daughter?” he asked Thetis, uncertainly.

“My niece. Your step-great-grandniece.” Thetis was smiling again, but Hermes still looked grave. I saw a family resemblance between him and Pytheas, not in feature, but in his expression as he looked down at Alkippe as she approached. I didn't know what to do or say. I hadn't imagined that he'd recognize his connection to her.

“Your daughter, I think,” Dad said. He sounded matter-of-fact about it. Jason's eyebrows rose into his hair. Thee gasped.

“I think so too,” Hermes replied, not looking up from Alkippe, who had reached us. She hugged my legs, and I put down a hand to smooth her hair. Then she gave Thetis the same hug, looking up at Hermes wonderingly.

“Fate plays strange tricks sometimes,” he said. “What's your name, little one?”

“Alkippe,” she said.

“A lovely name,” Hermes said. “And how old are you?”

“Seven and a half,” Alkippe said. “Why aren't you wearing any clothes?”

Jason gave a bark of laughter, then choked it off.

“I'm more comfortable that way,” Hermes said, smoothly.

“But aren't you cold? Outside I mean?” I could see the gap in her teeth as she spoke.

“No, I didn't feel cold. I was flying and that kept me warm.”

“Oh.” She didn't seem surprised at all. “You can fly, like Aunt Arete? You must be a god.”

“Yes, Alkippe, this is Hermes,” Thetis said.

“Hermes! Then you're an Olympian? I've been to your temple. You're different from how I imagined. Why are you here?”

Thetis took Alkippe's hand. “I think Grandma has some quince paste left for us. Let's go and see.”

“But I want to talk to Hermes,” Alkippe protested, not at all mollified by the thought of the treat.

“Later,” Hermes said. “I think I should speak to your mother now.”

“You should have spoken to her before,” Neleus said, as Thetis led Alkippe, still protesting vociferously, across the room. “It's a bit late now.”

“You mistake me,” Hermes said, meeting my eyes for the first time. “I've never been on this wandering world before today. That is my daughter, true, but Necessity has caught me, for I have never met her mother until now. So I shall set this as straight as I may, but this is as early as I can begin it.”

It explained why he hadn't recognized me, at least. “Never been here?” I asked. I don't think I'd ever experienced so many conflicting emotions in such a short time.

“Your past encounter lies in my future,” Hermes confirmed.

I suppose this kind of thing happens to gods, but it was quite outside my experience. “Perhaps we should have this conversation somewhere quieter,” I suggested.

He looked at Dad, who was frowning. “But this is—well, yes. Let's go outside.”

Jason put his hand on my arm. “Will you be all right on your own, Marsilia?”

“Yes,” I said, though I appreciated his offer. “Thank you.”

“Let her go,” Dad said, and Jason stepped back. I followed Hermes through the crush, which parted before us.

The fountain room was as full as the sleeping room, but there was nobody over ten in the garden. It was far too cold to linger out of doors unless you were young enough to hurtle around in a chasing game. Hermes turned to me as I was snicking my jacket closed. The clouds had parted and the winter stars shone clear and cold above us. Hermes didn't seem to feel the cold at all, though he was naked. I was almost knocked over by two of my young cousins, who dashed past me racing to be first to slap their palms on the herm. Hermes looked at them wryly. “I take it I don't have any other children here. That you know of?”

“Not that I know of, no,” I said, flustered by the question.

“Only Alkippe?” The hurtling children broke around us as a wave breaks on a rock, and re-formed on the other side of us.

“Yes.” The affirmation came out much too quietly. I felt slightly sick and a little lightheaded. I took a deep breath and swallowed, which helped.

“I didn't know she existed until now.” He frowned, staring over at the herm where the children were still dodging and squealing. “This is all terribly awkward. I was intending to pay court to your sister.”

Plato has extremely harsh things to say about jealousy, which I repeated to myself. I was struggling hard with this in my soul, as well as feeling all the physical symptoms, heat flushing my cheeks and hands and my stomach tightening. Then Pytheas appeared beside me. One instant he wasn't there, the next he was, as if he'd taken a step from nowhere. He didn't look the way he did in his statues—he was dressed normally, for one thing—but he didn't look like the old man he'd been when I saw him a few days before. He looked not so much young as ageless. Yet I recognized him immediately as my grandfather.

“I thought you were in Alexandria,” he said, frowning at Hermes.

“Moving rapidly is my specialty,” Hermes said, with a teasing smile.

“Yes, but—”

“I'm here now,” Hermes said.

Pytheas was still frowning. “Well, it's good that you came, you can test something for me. I was going to find Porphyry, but you'll be better.”

“Let me finish with this first.”

“No, it's important,” Pytheas said.

“So is this.”

“What, dallying with my granddaughter? Surely that can wait.” Pytheas smiled at me.

“We weren't dallying,” I protested. My voice sounded strange in my ears.

“Necessity has me by the foot,” Hermes said.

I instinctively looked down at his feet. He had wings on his sandals. He hadn't had those when I'd met him before. As I was looking down, the children noticed Pytheas and came running up, crowding round him asking questions.

“Joy to you, yes, I'm here, yes, but go inside now. You can tell everyone I'm here and I'll come in and talk to them, but I need to speak to my brother first.”

They protested, of course, but Pytheas shooed them inside, some laughing and some crying. He closed the door and turned back to us. The garden seemed very dark and quiet without the children and the bar of light from the door. I realized that Pytheas was much better lit than anything else, as if the starlight were concentrating itself on him.

“Necessity?” Pytheas said to Hermes, as if there had been no interruption.

“Your step-granddaughter Marsilia is the mother of my daughter Alkippe, but I've never been here before today. So I need to discover how this came to be and set it straight.”

Pytheas winced. “I appreciate how uncomfortable this is, but—” he began.