The Elementals (11 page)

Read The Elementals Online

Authors: Morgan Llywelyn

BOOK: The Elementals
13.72Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
“You'd never see anything like that on the mainland,” Hokar said. “My cousin Tereus would consider it an invitation to rape.”
Meriones was shocked. “She is merely sharing her beauty! To ignore her would be rude, but it would be ruder still to abuse her as a result of her generosity.”
“Hmmm.” Hokar dug his unpolished fingernails into his beard, scratching. “I suppose it's this Cretan worship of beauty that creates such a good climate for artisans, so I shouldn't joke about it. We're given opportunities here we would receive nowhere else. I devoted years of my life to obtaining an invitation to come to Crete just as an apprentice goldsmith, whereas in Thrace I was already considered a master.”
“What is Thrace like?”
“Rugged country. Breeds rugged people. We have no patience with effeminate manners in Thrace.”
“We are not effeminate,” Meriones protested, stung at last by the other's patronizing tone. “We are an
elegant
people. You mainlanders don't understand elegance.”
Hokar grinned. “Not in our heads, perhaps. But watch me at work and then tell me my hands don't understand elegance.”
That night over their meal Meriones spoke to his wife about Hokar. “He's a gruff sort of fellow, devoted to his work. He keeps to himself, mostly. But I know he has a kind heart, and he's a brilliant artisan. It's a treat to watch him, it truly is. I wish you could see him take those big paws of his and move them this way and that—and then something delicate and exquisite emerges. I could watch him for hours.”
Sundown had marked the beginning of a feast day, and Tulipa had purchased a small kid in the marketplace. The remnants of the meal, still redolent of spice and honey, lay on their plates. She picked idly among the bones. “You are always trying to make friends with the most unlikely people, Meriones. If you must attach yourself to someone, why not to someone important who can do you some good?”
“But I like Hokar. He was nice to me, in his way, and I take it as an honor. Did I tell you he used to make sword hilts for the warrior princes on the mainland?”
Tulipa sniffed and wiped her greasy fingers on her forearm, working the grease into the skin to keep it soft. It was a habit of the
lower classes, one no court lady would have allowed herself. But Meriones made no judgment. After all, as she so often reminded him, her uncle had been a person of importance.
“You fasten yourself onto someone who doesn't care if you're alive or dead,” she continued in an aggrieved voice, “while I sit home alone, fading away for lack of entertainment. If you made some really important friends perhaps you could get me invited to the palace.”
“If we had children you wouldn't be bored,” he ventured. “Shall we … go upstairs now?”
“No. I don't want to. Listening to you rave on and on about some common Thracian has given me a headache. You are so thoughtless, Meriones.”
“I'm so sorry! I didn't realize.” Meriones jumped to his feet. “I'll go dip a cloth in cool water and vinegar to put on your head,” he promised, hurrying away.
As the days passed, Meriones continued to play in the chamber of the goldsmiths. Hokar gradually accepted his patiently proffered friendship. They began taking a daily stroll together in the gardens, though as long as the heat wave continued even Meriones, who dearly loved sunshine, had to make a conscious effort to keep his step fashionably brisk.
“No one can remember it being so hot for so long,” he once commented. “I used to think it could never be too sunny, but now I wonder. Is it hot in Thrace, Hokar?”
“In the summers it is. But we pay no attention.”
Hokar enjoyed talking about his homeland, so Meriones constantly plied him for details. The Thracian spoke glowingly of the mountains of his boyhood, and of things he had seen in his travels as an apprentice goldsmith. He alluded to the growing power of the citadels of Mycenae, and described chariot races so vividly Meriones could almost see them. Inflamed by his own words, Hokar embossed a scene of chariots and charioteers into the rim of a platter he was making for The Minos' table.
At last the heat broke. The brief Cretan winter arrived, bringing raw damp air that bit into a man's bones. It was the Season of the Dying God. In the House of the Double Axes the chambers were divided into smaller, more heatable rooms by means of sliding wooden panels. These rooms were heated by bronze braziers. Fires
were built in the central hearths of the megaron. Meriones enjoyed staring at the bright tongues of flame, children of the sun. His grandmother, who remembered the Islands of Mist as being always cold, had taught him an appreciation of fire.
Meriones personally tended the fire in the brazier in the goldsmiths' chamber.
He never tired of watching his friend at work. Once Hokar had begun on a piece he tolerated no distractions and would lash out at anyone foolish enough to disturb his concentration. Meriones learned to time his music to the rhythm of the Thracian's work pattern.
Melding with the music, Hokar so lost himself in his art that it seemed no man was involved, just a pair of skilled hands taming the molten gold, the melted sun, turning it into exquisite jewelry and tableware and ornaments for the palace.
To Meriones, Hokar's gift seemed like magic.
“The queen is very pleased with the work coming from the goldsmiths now,” Santhos reported to Meriones. “You may become a permanent fixture here.”
In the Season of the Borning God Meriones invited Hokar to come to his house for dinner, to celebrate the arrival of spring.
“Will I be able to get home afterward before dark?” the Thracian inquired.
“Where do you live?”
“In a little house at Arkhanes, in the shadow of the Hill of Tombs.”
Meriones whistled. “It depends on what time you leave my house, then. That's a goodly distance. We can loan you a lamp. Or you can spend the night with us. My wife will make up a pallet.”
As they talked, the two men were standing side by side in one of the gardens, eating their bread and cheese and watching a pretty girl play with a chained monkey. “Do you have a nice place?” Hokar asked.
Meriones beamed. “I think so. It was a great piece of luck, getting it. For some reason the old Minos—the one before this, that is—took a fancy to my music toward the end of his reign. He had grown quiet, and I think he liked me for playing softly. He chose me alone to play for him on Last Day, so for a brief time I was very
important at Labrys. My reward was enough to buy my house, and Tulipa married me.”
“Tell me about Last Day, Meriones. What was that like? We have no such custom in Thrace.”
“It's the sight of a lifetime! The final day of the Nine Years' King must be more spectacular than any that has gone before, to show our gratitude to him for a prosperous reign. The Bull Dances are better than ever. Outstanding teams of Bull Leapers compete with each other for the honor of performing on Last Day, and the bull who proves to be bravest and most agile in the Bull Dance is sacrificed to Poseidon at the end of the day.”
“You always offer a bull to Poseidon?”
“We make many offerings to the sea god, but it is the gift of the mightiest creature on earth that pleases him most and keeps him from shaking the land.”
Hokar nodded. “I've heard that Poseidon Ennosigaion ripples Crete from time to time, though I've yet to experience a bad earthquake here.”
“Ah well, they do happen,” Meriones admitted. “But we build to allow for them, and we do those things that keep us in good favor with the gods. And with a joyous spirit!” he added quickly. “That is the Cretan way—with a joyous spirit!”
“Tell me about the sacrifice. Would it make a good scene to depict on a gold bowl?”
Meriones hesitated. “I don't like to talk about sacrifices, really. I never enjoy seeing blood spilled. But if you want the details … the priest of the Double Ax, the two-faced ax that faces both toward this world and the netherworld, sacrificed a huge pied bull in the Central Court, and its head was brought to this very chamber, to have the horns gilded.”
“Was the old Minos sacrificed too?”
Merioned recoiled. “Of course not! What a ghastly idea!”
“I just wondered. It is the custom in some lands, sacrificing the king at the end of his reign. It's supposed to restore fertility to the soil.”
Meriones was quite pale. “How grim.” He swallowed, hard. “No, we don't practice human sacrifice on Crete. It is unbearable to imagine.”
“Yet the sign of the Double Ax is everywhere in this place,” Hokar pointed out. “It must have some significance beyond the killing of bulls.”
“Ah, well, er … I suppose it is a symbol from the olden times. Long ago … but surely not now …”
“This is a huge place. There could be rites carried out in Labrys that you would know nothing about, Meriones.”
“Oh, I hardly think so, not the way people love to talk. You are very bloodthirsty, Hokar.”
“I'm not, I'm realistic. We Thracians are earthy people, that's all. But if this bothers you, tell me instead about what happened to the old Minos.”
“Ah, yes.” Meriones looked relieved. “I stayed with him until the end, playing the music he liked. Then the priestesses took him to the Chamber of Robes and removed all his finery, sending him out naked to his women. How they sobbed, his queen and concubines! But that was just part of the ritual, there was nothing to be sad about, really. They wrapped him in a simple robe and led him away. I stopped playing just as the priest brought forward the new Minos, a young man at the peak of his strength, naked, freshly bathed, and took him into the Chamber of Robes. There he was dressed in the royal clothes, still warm from his predecessor. That's important, the warm part,” he added.
“And the former king?”
“I saw them bringing a covered sedan chair from the Zeus Gate to take him away. I believe he was taken to a distant palace such as Phaistos to live out his life in luxury, for he had been a good king and we prospered during his reign.”
“But do you know for certain if he's still alive? Has he ever been seen since?”
“Oh no. At the end of his nine years a Minos must disappear from the sight of his people forever.”
“I see.” Hokar nodded. His eyes were on the omnipresent sign of the Double Axes, depicted over the nearest doorway.
On a languid blue evening when the rusty voices of the gulls had ceased and bronze lamps of welcome burned in residential windows, Hokar dined with Meriones. At the conclusion of
the meal he wiped the crumbs from his beard and belched appreciatively.
Tulipa sniffed. The man was crude. His hairy face offended her. Men should be clean-shaven and polish their nails. But at least he had brought her a present. For the sake of the silver bracelet he had given her, she would try to overlook his rough edges.
Now the two men lolled at their ease beside the table in the courtyard, watching idly as Tulipa cleared away and brought a fresh pitcher of wine.
“Your wife is a good cook,” Hokar remarked when she had gone back into the house. “I never had birds stuffed with barley before, or those little shellfish.”
“And raisins soaked in fruit juice,” Meriones said. “They were especially good. Did you like them?”
“Mmmmm. Does she always cook like this?”
“Always,” Meriones was proud to say. There was no faulting Tulipa's cooking, even if she hated domestic duties otherwise. “Have you never married, Hokar?”
“Never. Though at a time like this, I can see some of its advantages. But I've always been devoted to my work. That takes my energy, I have no time left over for women. My art is my life. My only passion.”
“Ah now. Ah now.” Meriones smiled a sly smile and waggled a forefinger in front of Hokar's eyes. “That isn't true. I've seen how you look at the girls in the palace, particularly those young ones, the new Bull Leapers.”
“Any man would look at them, but looking is all I want to do. Can you imagine trying to catch hold of one? They are all muscle, those girls. And they have hardly any breasts. They look like the boys.”
“They have to be slim and strong. It's a very hard thing to do, the Bull Dance, and demands the greatest athleticism. Bull Leapers are recruited from every land, you know. It is a high honor to appear in the Bull Court.”
“Recruited? Kidnapped, you mean. In Thrace we heard of young people who were seized and taken aboard Cretan ships and never heard of again. Rumor was, they disappeared into the bowels of Labrys.”
“You make it sound as if something awful happened to them,”
Meriones protested. “But they were taught a high art instead. Dancing with the bulls, leaping over their horns, somersaulting in teams through the air while a bull charges beneath you … it is not only beautiful to watch but it tests the courage of both human and bull. The best Bull Leapers become famous.”
“If they live long enough,” Hokar commented. “What about the ones who are killed learning this ‘art'?”
“Killed?” Meriones raised his eyebrows. “I've heard of no one being killed.”
“I suppose you wouldn't,” said Hokar. “I suspect it's kept very quiet. Like the old Minos.”
A shiver ran down Meriones' spine. “You're just saying that.”
Hokar relented. “I enjoy teasing you,” he said. “I mean no harm by it, forget I said anything.”
The rest of the evening went well. At one stage, Meriones went next door to bring Phrixus over to meet the goldsmith. “He's very important at Labrys, you know,” the musician said under his breath to his neighbor.
“I hear you had an important visitor from the palace yesterday,” Dendria said with barely concealed envy when she met Tulipa at the well the next morning.
Tulipa affected nonchalance. She yawned, she patted her hair, she studied her nails. “Oh, yes? My Meriones knows everyone who matters.” Balancing her filled water jug on her head, she walked away, swaying her hips.
Several days later, Hokar mentioned that his cousin Tereus, who was captain of a sizable trading vessel, should be arriving in the Cretan harbor soon. “You would enjoy meeting him, I think. He's very full of life, is Tereus; he's been everywhere and seen everything and he tells great stories.”
“We'll invite him to my house for dinner,” Meriones decided, flushed with his recent social success.
Tulipa was not hard to convince. She was wearing Hokar's silver bracelet, which she had shown several times to Dendria and Lydda. This Tereus might bring her something even better.
On the appointed evening, Hokar came straight from the palace with Meriones, and the two settled in the courtyard to await Tereus. They did not wait for long. A brawny man with a jutting jaw pounded on the outer door. When Tulipa opened to him, he
scarcely noticed her. Looking past her into the interior of the house, he bellowed, “Hokar! Where are you?” At an answering shout from the courtyard, he pushed past Tulipa and found his own way to the rear of the house.
She trotted after him, wide-eyed with indignation.
Hokar got to his feet as Tereus appeared in the doorway. “Meriones, this is my cousin Tereus, captain of the
Qatil
out of Byblos,” he said.
Tereus filled the doorframe with his broad shoulders. Vitality radiated from him like heat from a brazier. He made Meriones feel insignificant, and when his brilliant blue eyes swept over her household Tulipa received a distinct impression of contempt. This was a man who demanded much. Whatever life was lived in the house of Meriones, the musician was insufficient for his appetites.
He was polite enough in his unpolished way, however, and thanked Meriones—though not Tulipa—for receiving him. As the three men sat at the table Tereus had great tales to tell of ocean voyages and sea monsters and terrifying storms. His stories were so vivid Meriones often forgot to eat, sitting with his mouth agape and the food congealing on his plate.
When Tulipa finished serving the men she drew up a chair to the table for herself, so she could listen to Tereus. His accent was no thicker than Hokar's, and she understood most of what he said.
She understood very clearly when he remarked, “Only on Crete do women dare sit at the table with the men. Elsewhere they know their place and keep it.”
Tulipa's cheeks burned. She looked to Meriones, expecting him to defend their customs, but he only stared at his plate and toyed with his uneaten food.
Snatching up her husband's plate, Tulipa strode furiously into the house.
“That's better,” said Tereus. “Women get in the way of serious conversation. Meriones, my cousin tells me you have served in the house of The Minos for a long time.”
“Since I was old enough to take off my waist-shaper.”
“Then you have good knowledge of the place, of its staffing, the habits of its purchasing agents, and so forth?”
Meriones had been surprised, and secretly, guiltily pleased at
Tereus' handling of Tulipa. And he was flattered at the way the ship's captain made him feel important, privy to the inner workings of the House of the Double Axes. “Oh yes,” he said, waving his hands. “I know all the stewards, the keepers of the stores, everyone.”
“Hokar said he thought you might. You are the very man I need, then.” Tereus leaned forward, folding his thick arms on the tabletop. His voice dropped to a more confidential tone. “I have a very special cargo from my last voyage and I would like to sell it here, to the household of The Minos. A sea king can afford the kind of price which would give me enough money to buy my own ship at last, and not have to bow my head to some Syrian owner who never sets foot on deck.”
There was something about the emphasis Tereus put on his words that made Meriones nervous. “If you have a valuable cargo I suppose the quartermaster already suggested the best market when you cleared it through him? And the ship's owner—a Syrian, you said—will he not get the profit?”
Tereus and Hokar exchanged glances. The goldsmith gave a barely perceptible nod. “Meriones is all right,” he said softly.
Tereus dropped his eyelids halfway over his eyes so their expression was veiled. “I have not discussed this particular cargo with the harbormaster, Meriones. Do you understand? Nor will it be reported at Byblos. There is a bit of profit in it for you, too, if you keep your mouth shut and put me in contact with the right buyer. Would you not like to have a bit of wealth to impress your wife?”
Meriones felt his mouth go dry. “What is your cargo?”
Tereus smiled lazily and leaned back, resting his broad shoulders against the plastered wall behind his chair. “My last voyage was through the Pillars of Herakles and then north, following the coast,” he said. “A dangerous trip into unpredictable waters. Not many are willing to make it. Our final destination was to be the lands at the edge of winter, where people collect lumps of raw amber on the seashore after storms. To trade for amber, we took flint from the Islands of Mist.”
“You have been to the Islands of Mist?” Meriones asked in an awed whisper.
“Of course. We started from Byblos with timber and jade, and
pearls from Dilmun. These we traded along the way for obsidian, for copper, then for Nubian ivory, and that in turn went for textiles and bronze which we traded in the Islands of Mist for tin and flint and, on the westernmost island, gold.”
Meriones' existence was circumscribed by the luxurious, enclosed atmosphere of palace life. But Crete was the land of the sea kings, so he had heard tales of the far places beyond the horizon, tales of Ugarit and Mitanni and Assyria, of wild Iberia and fabled Babylon. Now he was looking at a man who had personally sailed to the very kingdom of winter, where blond giants farmed steep fields and amber lay free for the taking on rocky beaches. Meriones strained to envision a land of deep fjords and long blue silences.
But he was more interested in the Islands of Mist. “My grandmother came from the Islands of Mist,” he said.
Tereus lifted his eyebrows. “As a slave? Then you understand what sort of cargo I brought this time. I hope you won't be offended when I say the best slaves are from those rainy islands. Their skin is very white and they are highly prized throughout the Mediterranean. I try to pick up a few good ones each voyage, to sell privately.”
Meriones suffered confused emotions. Slavery was very much a part of life, and central to Cretan economy, as it was everywhere in the Mediterranean. Thousands were traded each year at places like Kythera, where men dealt in nothing else. But, remembering his grandmother, he found it hard to think of people like her as if they were merely cargo, so many cattle to buy and sell. “Is that this special, valuable cargo, then?” he asked Tereus. “Captives taken from the Islands of Mist?”
“Yes. Five of them, three females and two males. The females are young, very pretty. They would be valuable anywhere. But the men … that is, one of them … ah, this one is something very special.
“If your grandmother came from those islands, what do you know about them?” Tereus asked Meriones.
“Only a little. How green they were, how mild the climate. How many lakes and rivers they had.”
“It is the inhabitants who are interesting,” Tereus said. “They are strong and brave and are ruled by warrior princes. In some ways they remind me of Thracians. But they live intimately with gods I
do not know: water gods, weather gods, gods of the wild places. And they build stone ritual centers with as much engineering skill as the Egyptians, though in a very different style. I have seen nothing anywhere that raises my hackles like the great stone circles in the Islands of Mist.
“One of the slaves I brought back with me this time is some sort of priest. Not such a priest as you have here. I believe theirs is a fading race, though once it may have been very powerful. Their sorcerers can still do things to freeze a man's marrow. This old fellow should be worth a fortune as a worker of magic, or at least a royal diviner. For all I know the old man can predict the shaking of the earth, which would make him beyond price, eh? And even if he fails in that he can do a lot of other tricks.”
Meriones was shocked. “You would take a priest and sell him as an
entertainer?
”
“I would sell the woman who bore me if she were still alive and the sale would enable me to buy my own ship and be answerable to no man.
“Your mother would cheerfully cut your throat if you tried such a thing,” Hokar interjected.
“My mother was a proud woman and a warrior in her own right. She would have understood my desire to be my own master.”
Meriones was frowning. “I just don't like the idea of selling priests as slaves. Angering the gods is dangerous.”
Tereus said, “His gods aren't our gods, I told you that. Besides, if I can turn over a cargo twelve times in a voyage and avoid the pirates of Mycenae, I fear nothing.”
“But—”
“Never mind, just do as I tell you and fortune will smile on us. The gods of whatever land support the successful, have you not noticed? Put me in contact with someone at the palace who is empowered to purchase slaves—expensive, unusual slaves, by private treaty—and I will present my treasures for his inspection. Here, at your house.”

Other books

Thursday's Children by Nicci French
Cellular by Ellen Schwartz
Manly Wade Wellman - John the Balladeer 05 by The Voice of the Mountain (v1.1)
The Bombmaker by Stephen Leather