Stonehenge

BOOK ONE
1
Britain, 1480 B.C.
The wind swooped out of the wooded hills to the north, driving a scud of fine snow before it. It rushed through the tall, dark trees of the forest, rattling the bare twigs and bending the tops of the evergreens. Here and there in the endless forest it crossed clearings, man made, with short stubble in the frozen furrows and squat buildings leaking feathers of smoke to be snatched away by the wind. Over a ridge it moved and down into an open-ended valley well cleared of trees. Here the wind pressed close to the ground and moaned about the squat sod buildings and tore fragments of reeds from their roofs.
Lycos of Mycenae walked with his chin bent into his chest to keep the stinging snow from his face, wrapping his white wool cloak more tightly about him. His conical helmet of rows of boats' tusks offered protection from sword blows but not from the weather. He stopped under a low lintel and pushed open the door of the last building. The air inside was as cold and damp as that outside, and it stank.
"What happened?" Lycos asked.
"We don't know," Koza said. A gray-haired and scarred warrior, his bronze half armor bore the traces of much hard use as did his sharp-pointed bronze helmet. He squinted in the dim light as he looked down at the man who lay bubbling and moaning on the dirt floor of the hut. "One of the boys saw him at the edge of the forest and told me. He was unconscious, just like this. I dragged him in here." A short, compact man in stained, brown garments. Dying.
"Do any of them know who he is?" Lycos asked from the doorway, not interested in entering the foul-smelling hut.
"He's not one of them, he's an Albi," Koza said. "That's all they can say. They're frightened. One of them thinks he may have seen him before, but he doesn't know his name. They're all stupid." The small boys crouched together in the boxlike bunk, among the matted furs, looking on fearfully, their eyes round white splotches in their dirty faces. They shrank even further when Koza talked about them.
Koza did not like this. He poked his toe into the man's ribs with no effect. The man's eyes stayed closed and a pink froth dribbled from his lips. Fresh moss had been pressed into the great wound in his chest, but it could not stop the flow of blood that oozed out and snaked in thick streams down his ribs. Koza had fought in a great number of battles and had seen many men die, so it was not the familiar presence of death that troubled him now.
"Leave him," Lycos ordered and turned to go. He halted and pointed at the boys, who shied away at the gesture. "Why aren't they working?"
"One of the tin streams has been flooded," Koza fell into step to the left and slightly behind Lycos. "We can't dig in it until the water goes down."
"Then put them to work on the charcoal kilns or to pounding ore; there's plenty for them to do."
Koza nodded agreement, uncaring. They were justDonbaksho boys sold into bondage by their parents in exchange for a few gifts. The wind whirled the snowflakes about them; spring was coming late this year. The sun was a glowing cold eye close to the horizon. They strode through the half-frozen mud and long drifts of white ashes to the welcome heat that surrounded one of the furnaces. Under the lean-to a pile of burning charcoal, mixed with the ore, had been heaped into a cupped depression in the ground. It needed a forced draft, and when Lycos appeared the two boys, who had been half-heartedly leaning on the pair of bellows, began to apply themselves with great energy; sparks glowed and scattered wide. The bellows, each made from a length of wood fastened to an entire pigskin with its legs kicking in the air, squealed with restored life.
"This one will be finished soon," Lycos said, squinting into the pile of red coals with a professional eye.
"I don't like that Albi coming here like this, wounded. None of them live that close. Why ... ."
"They fight with each other and die. Has nothing to do with us."
This was dismissal enough. Koza reluctantly left the heat and went to his own quarters to get his bronze-studded shield and sword. A dagger and half armor were safe to wear in the security of the settlement--but nowhere else. A foot beyond the protective embankment a man had to be armed and walk with caution. There were bears out there that would attack if they were disturbed, and wolves, often in packs, that considered men just another welcome source of meat after the long winter. Boars, savage killers in the thick brush. And men, the most dangerous killers of all. A stranger was an enemy. Once you left the home circle all men were strangers.
Mirisati was sitting on his heels just below the top of the embankment that had been thrown up to seal off the end of the valley, his heavy shield at his side while he traced circles in the dirt with the tip of his sword.
"I could have killed you," Koza growled. "Squatting down like you're enjoying a good bowel movement."
"No, you couldn't," Mirisati said with the indifference of the young for the concerns of the old. He sat and stretched, then climbed to his feet. "I heard you coming one hundred paces off with your knee joints squeaking and your armor rattling."
"What have you seen?"
Koza squinted through the thin curtain of falling snow. The land before him was bare the full width of the narrow valley that held the settlement, tufted with grass now brown and dead. Beyond this were heather bushes backed by the dark curtain of the forest that covered the Island of the Yerni from east to west, from the sea-washed beaches of the south to the fogs and swamps of the far north. The valley was wrapped in silence. The only movement was a flock of crows that rose up and swept away out of sight.
"I've seen just what you are seeing now. Nothing. No one is coming here. I wish they would. Butchering a few of these savages would be a change."
"Nothing? What about the one with the hole in his chest the boy found?" The dying man's presence still troubled Koza.
"Who knows? Better, who cares? They just like to kill each other. And I can understand that. What else is there to do in this cold land?"
"The Albi don't fight."
"Tell that to the dying one. If you want to talk to me, tell me about the sun-warmed stones of Mycenae. What a distance we have traveled from that happy place! My arms ache just thinking about it, but I would start rowing tomorrow if it meant we could return. Fifteen days across the green water of that cold ocean to the Pillars of Herakles. Thirty days more on the blue waters to the Argolid. The first olives will be ready for the pressing by then."
"We'll leave when we're ordered to leave," Koza grumbled.He had no more love than the other for this Island of the Yerni. The wind drew the falling traceries of snow aside for a moment and he saw the dark silhouettes of the birds settling down into the forest. They were roosting for the night--but why had they moved? Had something disturbed them?
"You better go back and start the boys in the hut working again. Orders from Lycos. And when you see him, tell him that the underbrush is growing up here again. We'll have to clear it back."
"Always looking for new labors, Koza?" Mirisati was in no hurry to return to the camp.
"We've had attacks here before. The Yerni stay away now because we killed all of the ones that tried. And they'll try again someday. That brush is protection for them. Men could lie out there, get close."
"You have bad dreams, old man. My dreams are of a superior sort, of warm sun and olive groves and cool wine. Fine Epidaurian wine, so rich you must thin it twenty times with water. And then a girl, not one of these Donbaksho sluts whose wrappings you have to cut away to be sure it isn't a boy or an old man, but a honey-skinned girl who smells of frankincense."
"You won't find any of that out here," Koza said, gesturing at the shadow-filled forest.
"No, I don't think I will. Is it all like this--the whole island?"
"The parts I've seen. We went out there two summers ago; Lycos had dealings with the tribes. Forest everywhere, too thick to get through except on the high downs. Almost a five-day march to reach the tribes where the big stones are. Dig like moles, these Yerni, circles and banks and hills and burial mounds, then stand these stones around, great ugly things."
"Why?"
"Ask them. This one tribe, Uala's, where we went that time, they have them in a big double circle, blue stoneswith their tips painted red like big pricks stuck in the ground. Dirty-minded people ... ."
"What was that?" Mirisati pointed his sword at a clump of heather in the darkness below the beach trees.
"I didn't see anything." Koza stared hard, but nothing was clear in the fading light.
"Well, I did. A fox, perhaps a deer. We could use a little fresh meat in the stewpot." He climbed to the top of the embankment to see better.
"Get back here! It could have been anything."
"Don't fear the shadows, old man. They can't hurt you."
Mirisati laughed and turned to jump back down. A sudden, whispering sound cut the air. The spear buried itself deep into the side of his neck, hurling him over and down with a clatter. His legs were spread wide, his eyes wider with surprise. He reached up for the wooden shaft and died.
"Alarm!" Koza shouted. "Alarm!" over and over, beating his sword against his shield.
There were no more spears. But when he looked cautiously over the top of the ridge, he could see the men running forward now from the shelter of the forest, silent and fast as wolves. Naked, even in this weather, except for short leather kirtles. One man, ahead of the others, held a spear which he hurled at Koza, who dodged it easily. There were no more; they used spears only for hunting. The others came on, round shields on their left arms, brandishing stone battle-axes in their right hands. Some had daggers about their necks; all had whitened hair and stiff white moustaches. There were a great number of them. As they reached the foot of the ridge they cried out, Abu-abu!, piercingly, a scream meant to drive fear into their enemies so they would flee. Koza stood firm.
"Yerni!" He bellowed it out and heard the alarm being shouted behind him. They would fight now. His heart beat strongly in his chest as he saw more and more of thenear-naked men emerging from the shelter of the trees. The snow had stopped and he could see their mass stretching the width of the valley. Never before had he seen so many of their warriors together at one time. This was an entire tribe or more.
Heavy running footsteps sounded behind Koza and he knew he was no longer alone. Well, then, this would be a battle.
When the first of the warriors were puffing up the slope, he leaped to the top of the embankment and shook his sword at them.
"Sons of goats! Come meet a Mycenaean!"
He raised his shield so the battle-ax bounced from it, then plunged his sword into the man's stomach. Not too deep; he was too experienced for that. A twist and a pull had it out. Even before the first Yerni had dropped, Koza's sword was chopping the neck of another man, his shield pushing aside an ax. Then another and another, until the blood ran wetly from his sword onto his arm. Something struck sharp pain through his leg so that he almost fell; with the edge of his shield he knocked that attacker away. But others were behind him. Many of them. Too many of them. They ran by on all sides, howling in high voices.
He fell only when his legs were too butchered to support him, and even then he rolled and chopped upward with his sword, wounding and killing those he could, only stopping when his helmet was torn away and an ax crushed in his skull. A dagger was pressed to his neck, sawing through it, severing his head from his body.
More and more of the screaming tribesmen ran by, and the snow was trampled by many feet and soon stained and splashed with red.
2
Mycenae
In the gray dawn the city was as sharply etched as a silhouette against the sky and the blur of distant hills. Its presence commanded the valley all about it; the paths between the trees and fields led to it. The hill on which it sat was gently rounded at the base, but angled up steeply at the top to the thick-walled and impregnable city. As the first light colored the stone, the great gate under the rampant carved lions was swung open by invisible hands. Threads of smoke from the many cooking fires within the walls rose straight up through the motionless air. A boy leading a goat came slowly along the rutted road between the fields: men and women with baskets of produce appeared down the lanes. They halted when they reached the road, stopped by the sound of sudden hoofbeats, staring with dumb curiosity at the two-horse chariot as it rumbled by them.
In the open gateway high above, the guards looked down with interest as the horses clattered on the stones of the ramp leading up to them. The charioteer was in a great hurry. One of the horses slipped and nearly fell; the rider lashed it forward. Since the sun was only newly risen the man must have been riding by night, a dangerous thing to do, and one that evidenced a most unusual need for haste. One didn't hurry in Mycenae; the seasons came and went, the rain dampened the earth and crops sprang up, the animals were slaughtered and the young ones grew. There was no reason for unseemly haste by night, no reason to risk crippling and killing a sacred horse.
"I know him now," a guard called out. He pointed his bronze-bladed spear. "It is Phoros, cousin of the king."
They drew aside, raising their weapons in salute to his rank as Phoros came up. His white cloak was black with blown spittle from the stumbling horses, and he appearedno less tired himself. Looking to neither right nor left he drove the exhausted animals through the tall opening of the gate, under the carved lions, and past the royal grave circle into the hilltop city of Mycenae. Slaves hurried out to hold the horses while Phoros climbed stiffly to the ground. He staggered at first, his legs so fatigued from the ride, and had to lean against the great stone wall. The ride was a nightmare better forgotten; he was no charioteer and he entertained a secret fear of the noble beasts. But he had driven the creatures, despite this fear, just as he had driven his rowers that last day along the coast, forcing speed from them despite their exhaustion. The king must be told. There was a trough here for the horses and he bent wearily over it and filled his cupped hands again and again, splashing the water over his face and arms. It was still cool from the night, and it washed away the dust and some of his fatigue. Water dripped from his hair and beard, and he wiped at it with the tail of his cloak as he climbed the steep ramp to the residential part of the palace city. The muscles in his legs loosened as he went along the paths by the kitchen gardens, past the workshops and houses where the people were just stirring. They came to their doorways and looked on curiously as he hurried by. Then he was at the great palace itself, climbing the smoothly dressed stone steps to the entrance. The door with its hammered bronze covering was open, and the oldest house slave, Avull, was waiting, bowing and clasping his knob-knuckled and shaking hands together. He had already sent a slave running with word to the king.


Perimedes, war king of the Argolid and master of the House of Perseus at Mycenae, was not at his very best this morning. He had slept fitfully the night before. The wine perhaps, or the dull ache of old wounds or, more surely, Atlantis.
"Oh, the bastards," he muttered to no one and to everyone, slumping low in his great chair and reaching forthe figs in the basket on the table before him. He chewed on one, and even its rich sweetness could not sweeten his mood. Atlantis. The name alone stung like a thorn or a scorpion's lance.
Around him the day's work of the great megaron was already beginning. With the king awake no one sleeps. There were occasional hushed voices; no one dared to speak too loud. On the elevated round hearth in the middle of the chamber the fire was being built higher to cook the meat, the fire he himself had kindled years before when the palace and this megaron had been first built. The thought did not warm him today, just as the figs could not sweeten him. Under a nearby canopy his two daughters and some house slaves were carding fleeces and spinning the wool into thread. They stopped talking when he glanced their way, turning their attention more closely to their work. Though his face was set in anger, Perimedes was still a handsome man, heavy browed, with a thin-edged nose above a wide mouth. He was well into middle age, yet his hair and beard were still as brown as in his youth, and there was no thickening of his waist. The white scars of old wounds made patterns on the tanned skin of his arms, and when he reached out for another fig it was obvious that the last two fingers were missing from his right hand. Kingship was something hard won in the Argolid.
The slave, Avull, entered at the far side of the megaron and hurried over to him, bowing low.
"Well?"
"Your cousin, the noble Phoros, son of ... ."
"Get him in here, you son of a chancred goat. This is the man I have been waiting for." Perimedes almost smiled as the slave hurried away to usher in the ship's captain.
"We need you, Phoros. Come here, sit by me, they'll bring us wine. How was your voyage?"
Phoros sat on the edge of the bench and looked at thepolished marble tabletop. "Uncle Poseidon in his might drove our ship quickly all the distance."
"I'm sure of that, but it is not details of the seafaring that I care about. You have returned with the ingots of tin?"
"Yes, but a small amount, less than a tenth of a shipload."
"Why is this?" Perimedes asked quietly, a sudden premonition darkening his vision. "Why so little?"
Phoros still stared at the table, ignoring the wine in the gold cup that had been set before him. "We arrived during a fog; there is much fog off the coast of the Island of the Yerni. Then we waited until it had cleared before we could sail along the coast to the mouth of the river we know. I beached the boat there and left men to guard it, then followed the overgrown path to the mine. We came to the place where the tin is stored, but there were no ingots there. We searched nearby and found some, but almost all were missing. The ingots are kept close to the mine."
Phoros looked up now, staring squarely at the king as he spoke.
"This is not the word you wish to hear. The mine is destroyed, all there are dead."
A wave of quick whispers died away as those nearest in the megaron passed the word backwards as to what had been said. Then there was silence and Perimedes was silent as well, his fists clenched, the only movement a heavy pulse that beat beneath the skin of his forehead.
"My brother, Lycos, what of him?"
"I don't know. It was hard to tell. All of the bodies had been stripped of armor and clothing and had been there many months. The animals and birds had done their work. There had been hard fighting, a battle with the Yerni. All the heads gone, not a skull. The Yerni take heads, you know."
"Then Lycos is dead. He would never surrender or becaptured by savages like that."
Anger burned a knot of pain in his midriff and Perimedes kneaded it with his hand. His brother, the lost tin, the dead men, the Atlantean ships, all coming together; these were dark, unhappy days. He wanted to shout aloud with this anger, to take his sword and kill something, someone--tight back. He might have done this once, when he was young, but a wisdom had come with the years. Now the anger stayed inside of him and he squeezed it with his fingers and tried instead to think what should be done. The pain did not go away.
"Is it true? My kinsman Mirisati is dead?"
Perimedes looked up at the angry man before him. Qurra, first among the chalcei, the workers in metal. He must have come directly from his furnace when he heard the news, because he was wearing his leather apron, burned by many sparks, and soot was on his arms and smeared across his forehead. Forgotten, the stubby tongs were still clasped in his right hand.
"Dead, certainly," Phoros said. "Everyone at the mine must be dead. Mycenaeans do not become slaves."
Qurra, an emotional man, shouted aloud in pain. "What ruin is upon us! The mine is gone, our people killed, my kinsmen slain." He shook his tongs angrily. "Mirisati is dead, to whom you promised your younger daughter when she comes of age ... ." The words ended in a fit of coughing. The chalceus always coughed from breathing his metal fumes, and many died because of it.
"I did not kill him," Perimedes said. "Nor my brother Lycos. But I will see that they are avenged. Return to your furnace, Qurra, you serve us best there."
Qurra started away, but called back over his shoulder.
"And tell me, noble Perimedes, how long will my furnace burn with the mine closed?"
How long? This was the question that gnawed at Perimedes' vitals the most. Had he been too ambitious? Perimedes thought. No, there had been no other course opento him. As long as the Greek cities of the Argolid warred one with the other, they remained weak. Lerna fought Epidaurus, Nemea sank the ships of Corinth. While at the same time the ships of Atlantis sailed freely where they would and grew rich. Only the united power of the cities of the Argolid could challenge that ancient power. The rocky plains of home had been tilled and bore fruit, but never enough. Across the sea were the tempting riches of many lands, and his people already had a taste for these riches. Bronze-armored warriors with brazen weapons could take what they willed. Bronze made them. They ate bronze and drank it because they would be nothing without it. Soft golden copper was everywhere, but that was not enough. With a technique known only to them, the chalcei blended the copper with the gray tin in the burning throats of their forges. The result was noble bronze. Of this bronze Mycenae forged weapons to conquer, more weapons as gifts for the other cities of the Argolid to bind them all together.
Without bronze, this loose union would fall apart and they would war with one another as they had always done. The sea empire of Atlantis would rule as it had always ruled. Atlantis had all the tin they needed. Their camps and mines were along the Danube. Mycenae had tin; not as much, but they had tin. They had to travel the length of the warm sea to the cold ocean beyond, to that distant island, to get it, then bring it home the same distance. But they had it, and Mycenae had bronze.
Mycenae no longer had bronze.
"The mine. We must reopen the mine."
Perimedes spoke the words aloud before he saw that another had joined them, a short, brown man. Inteb the Egyptian, now wearing a robe of thin white flax instead of his usual rough working clothes. Gold thread was set into the edge of the robe and there was a collar with precious stones about his neck; his black hair was oiled and glistening. Looking at him, Perimedes remembered.
"You are leaving us."
"Very soon. My work here is finished."
"It is a work well done, you must tell your Pharaoh that. Here, sit, you will eat with me before you leave."
The women quickly brought plates of small fish fried in oil, cakes drenched with honey, salty white goatsmilk cheese. Inteb picked delicately at the fish with a gold fork taken from his pouch. A strange man, young for his work, though he knew it well. He came from a noble family, so in a sense he was the ambassador for Thuthmosis III, not only a builder. He knew things about the stars, as well, and could read and write. He had supervised the building of the new, massive outer wall of the city. As if this were not enough, through his craft, he had erected the great gate and mounted above it the royal lions of Mycenae. It was well done indeed--nor had the price been too high. There had been agreements. Thuthmosis III, busy with his wars in the south, would no longer be troubled by the Argolid raiders who sank his ships and burned his coastal towns. An arrangement between kings.
"You seem troubled?" Inteb asked, his voice bland, his face emotionless. He freed a fish bone from between his teeth and droped it to the floor.
Perimedes sipped at his wine. How much had the Egyptian heard about the tin mine? There should be no stories going back to Pharaoh of Mycenaean weakness.
"A king always has troubles, just as Pharaoh has troubles; that is the way of kings."
If the comparison between the ruler of this brawling city state and the mighty ruler of all Egypt troubled Inteb, he did not show it; he took a honey cake in his fingertips.
"I am troubled by the dung-flies of Atlantis," Perimedes said. "Not satisfied with their own shores, they come here and cause dissension among us. Their ships appear along the coast with weapons for sale, and our little squabbling princes are only too eager to buy. They know little of loyalty. Mycenae is the armory of the Argolid.Some forget that. Now there is an Atlantean ship at Asine in the south, a floating bronzesmith's shop, doing business in out waters. But it will not be there long--nor will it be returning to Atlantis. My son Ason led our men against it as soon as we heard of its presence. You may tell Pharaoh of this. You have my gifts?"
"Safe aboard my ship. I am sure Pharaoh will be pleased."
Perimedes was not so sure. He talked of equality among kings, but in his most innermost thoughts he knew the truth. He had seen Egypt, the cities of the dead and living, the teeming people and the soldiers. If that power were turned against Mycenae, his city would cease to exist. Yet there was power and power--because Egypt was so great it did not follow that Mycenae became small. It was the first city of the Argolid and the mightiest, and that was something to be proud of.
"We will walk together before you leave," Perimedes said, rising and buckling on the square-shouldered royal dagger of Mycenae. Graven on its long and narrow straight-edged blade was the scene of a royal lion hunt, incised with gold and silver and niello. Its pommel, a peculiar rounded cap of solid gold upon a golden stem--another royal insignia, this one vegetative.
They walked side by side, with the slaves rushing ahead to open the coffered doors of bronze. It was not by chance that they passed by the roofed mushroom beds just inside the palace walls. Perimedes paused and looked on with a critical eye while the gardeners prepared a fresh bed, laying down the layer of cow dung, then scattering the tree bark over it. As they moved on, Perimedes bent and picked a mushroom, twisting it in his fingers as he walked. It was white crowned and pale stemmed, with lacy edges. He broke off a piece and sampled it, extending some to Inteb. The Egyptian also ate it, although he really did not like the musty flavor. He knew everyone else thought it delicious.
"This is history," Perimedes said, pointing to the dungand the mushroom beds, and Inteb, being a diplomat, managed not to smile. He knew that the mushroom was held in great esteem here. Myces they called them; they shaped their sword and dagger hilts to their form and had even named their city after them. Mycenae. Though he found it hard to understand why. Perhaps because of the maleness of the shape of the things, always an important concern with these kinds of people.
"The royal mushrooms," Perimedes said. "Perseus found them growing here and named the city for them. We have a long history, just like Egypt, and like Egypt we have those who can read and write and keep our records."
Perimedes paused before a wooden door and hammered on it until it screeched open. The elderly slave peered out, blinking into the sunlight, a soft clay tablet in his hand. An Atlantean, from the look of him, no doubt captured; so much for Mycenaean culture, Inteb thought. He, who had visited often at the library in Thebes, with its papyrus scrolls neatly shelved in a complex of rooms larger than this entire palace, pretended interest in the tottering piles of baskets filled with unsorted tablets. He tried to ignore the squashed ones on the filthy dirt floor. Probably vital records of cauldrons and wine jars and fire tongs and footstools and other things of equal importance. He doubted if he would tell Pharaoh of this.
But before they could pass through the doorway, there was a cry, and they turned to see two men in armor half carrying a third man between them. He was coated with dust mixed with blood, his mouth gaping in the agony of near exhaustion.
"We found him this way, crawling on the road," one of the men said. "He has word; he is one of those who marched with Ason."
Once again the coldness possessed Perimedes. He could almost hear the words the man would speak--and he did not wish to hear them. This was a day of evil. If there were a way to remove this day from his life, he would. He seizedthe man by the hair and crashed him against the wall of the archive building, shaking him until he gaped like a fish drawn from the water.
"Speak. What of the ship?"
The man could only gasp.
One of the slaves came running with a jar of wine and Perimedes tore it from his hands and dashed the contents into the exhausted man's face.
"Speak!" he ordered.
"We attacked the ship--the men of Asine, there ... ." He licked at the wine that streamed down his face.
"Asine, what of them? They fought by your side, they are of the Argolid. The Atlanteans, tell me."
"We fought ... ." He choked the words out one by one. "We fought them all ... . Asine fought with Atlantis against us ... . They were too many ... ."
"My son, Ason, in command. What of him?"
"He was wounded. I saw him fall--dead or captured ... ."
"And you returned? To bring me this word?"
This time the king could not control the anger that flooded through him. With a single motion he drew his dagger and plunged it into the man's chest.
3
Tiryns was already dropping behind them, with only the tops of the buildings set on the hill behind the seaport still visible. The sea was smooth here in the Gulf of Argos, and the ship moved easily on its way under the quick dip and pull of the oars, echoing in their motion the slow beat of the drum. On the starboard side the coastline slipped by, bright green with new growth. But the touch of the sun was welcome, gentling the morning coolness of the air.
Inteb leaned against the rail, staring unseeingly at the bubble of foam and rush of water beneath the counter, unaware as well, of the brawny form of the steersman a few paces away. It was spring, and the storks would be crying in the reeds along the Nile, and he would soon be home. Home after three years' absence, to the heart of the world and of civilization, away from the dirt and the petty bickering of the barbarian Mycenaeans. He had done his duty, as distasteful as it had been at times. Some men were great generals and fought wars, serving their Pharaoh in that fashion. Though violent death was the usual reward, it was still an easy thing to do. Soldiers tended to be simple men because of this, and a little brutal, which was only natural, considering that butchery was their trade. Thuthmosis III had need of these men. Yet he also had need of Inteb. Victories can be won without wars, and they both knew it. It was this knowledge, despite his natural feeling of revulsion, that had forced him to bow to his king's will and voyage to the barbarian world. His personal cost may have been high, but the victory had been a cheap one for Thuthmosis. Inteb did not begrudge him that victory. For the services of one noble--a few slaves, a handful of gold, some gifts--a war had been averted and the coastal raids on Egypt stopped. Mycenae was the stronger for his having been there; but he felt that these years had been plucked from his life and lost to him.
But not completely. In all those months of musty wine, winter rains and scorching summer sun he had found one thing, one memory that it would not be a distinct pleasure to forget, one man whom he could call a friend. The friendship had been perhaps one-sided, since Ason knew him only as one of the very many who dwelt in the palace, and gave him no pride of place. Strangely enough this did not bother Inteb; love did not have to be returned to still be love. He had been happy to sit at the feasting and wine drinking, sipping his own while the others swilled, watching them grow nobly drunk. They were a rough, unruly,violent group of men, the nobility of Mycenae, and Ason could hold his own with any of them. Yet he was something more, a man destined to be a king, who had inherited his father's sharp turn of mind, who was more than just a foul-mouthed barbarian. Perhaps Inteb had imagined all this, but even that did not really matter. It had made the years bearable. Though he had not said so, he had been as shocked by the news of Ason's death as had been Perimedes. The strength of Atlantis had brushed aside this great warrior and crushed him like an insect. It was faintly disturbing that he would soon be in the land of his friend's murderers. Aroused by this thought, he saw that Tiryns had now fallen from sight astern and the gulf had opened out. They were rising and falling in the heavier rollers of the open sea. The captain had just emerged from the cabin and he signaled to him.
"What is your heading?"
"We change course east into the rising sun, lord, as soon as that island you see there is abeam. Beyond that is another and yet another, the Cyclades they are called, though I don't know the names of all of them. They reach all the way to the coast of Anatolia; we are never out of sight of land, though always in deep water. After that we follow the coast. There are few hazards as long as the weather is calm, and there are many friendly ports we can reach if there are storms."
"Neither my safety nor comfort is under discussion at the moment, captain. Do not presume. I have done my share of sailing, so it holds no horrors."
"I did not mean--forgive me ... ." The captain's fists were calloused and scarred; the crew lived in fear of his ready blows. Yet now he moved his shoulders in greater fear of this nobleman, friend of the Pharoah.
"What I would like to know is whether we will pass the Atlantean island of Thera on this course?"
"Yes, surely, it will be clearly off to starboard after Ios falls behind us; it is one of our landfalls."
"We will go there."
"But just this morning you told me Egypt; those orders you gave me--"
"Were for the ears of the men of the Argolid who report back everything that is said to Perimedes. You sail the ship, captain. I will deal with kings. Set sail for Thera."
The ship heeled over as they reached Spetse, and its wake cut a great white arc in the blue water. Perimedes would not know that he was on his way to the court of Atlantis, son-killing enemies of Mycenae. He would be angry if he discovered it, and the years of labor to effect the friendship with Egypt would be in danger. Therefore the polite ruse. On the other hand, Atlas, sea king of Atlantis, might be slightly annoyed if he discovered that his Egyptian visitor had recently been dining with an enemy. He would probably be more astonished at the bad taste displayed. The tiny warring states were like fleabites on the thick hide of Atlantis, to be either scratched or ignored. Singly or together they did not pose any threat to the countless ships or the home islands of Atlantis. Atlantean vessels sailed where they wished in these seas, along the mainland shore, trading as far away as Egypt. It was even said that the glories of their court were on a par with those of Egypt, but Inteb would believe that after he had seen it for himself. As much as he wanted to return home, he had welcomed the message in the boxed scroll that the captain had given him. Its waxen seal had been impressed with the cartouche of Thuthmosis III, fifth king of the Eighteenth Dynasty, by his own hand. The orders were simple: a state call at the court of King Atlas, a renewal of the ties of friendship. There were gifts aboard the ship for the king, long elephant tusks of ivory to be presented with great display, as well as fine textiles and pots of spices, gold work and scarabs, and little blocks of white veined alabaster and amethyst from which court artisans cut the official seals of the far-flung Atlantean bureaucracy. Of more importance to both Atlas and Egypt were the bales of papyrus, smoothand white. It was only the year before that the first papyrus had been sent to Atlantis, along with scribes who knew the practiced use of reed pens and ink. By now the Atlanteans would be aware of the superiority of papyrus over the clumsy clay tablets for record keeping and would welcome the new supply. But gifts were a two-way thing, and Inteb had instructions to mention in the right places that timber would be well received in treeless Egypt, cypress wood in particular. This would be done.


On the third morning the round bulk of the island of Thera lifted out of the sea. Inteb had dressed carefully in his best white flaxen robe, jeweled collar, and gold bracelets, then had sat quietly as the slave had oiled and combed his hair. This was to be a state occasion. The captain was wearing a clean tunic as well, and had made some attempt at a rough toilet; clots of blood spotted his face where he had shaven with a none-too-sharp blade.
"Have you sailed here before?" Inteb asked.
"Once, lord, many years ago. There is nothing like it in the whole world."
"That I can believe, if the reports are true."
The island was a green gem rising from the blue sea. Groves of olive trees and date palms marched in ordered rows down to the shore, with freshly planted fields set between them. The white buildings of the villages could be seen among the trees. A fishing village stood on the shore, in a cove with red sand beaches where small fishing boats were drawn up. For a moment, in a gap between the hills, Inteb had a glimpse of a city on a hill far inland, colorful buildings rising one above the other. Then the helm was put over as they headed west around the island.
"Down sail," the captain ordered.
There was an ordered rush at this command. Some of the sailors untied the lines where the bottom corners of the large square sail were secured to the siderails; it spilled the wind with a great flapping, and the ship slowed. Othershad released the horsehair-and-hemp hawser that ran to the masthead, that had acted as a backstay to the mast. This ran through a greased hole in the top of the mast. When they had eased off the hawser the sail lowered in great flapping folds. After it had been tightly wrapped about its yard, then laid the length of the deck, the captain ordered that the mast be unstepped and taken down as well.
"What is the reason for this?" Inteb asked. He had never seen it done before at sea.
"The island, lord; you'll see." He was too busy to say more, and Inteb restrained his curiosity and did not bother him.
Massive oaken wedges kept the mast secure in its socket, and they had to be knocked free with heavy mauls. There was much shouting, as well as a good deal of cursing in a variety of languages, before it was lowered safely and secured in place beside the sail. In the meantime, the ship wallowed in the troughs of the waves with a decidedly uneasy motion that produced equally uneasy sensations in Inteb's middle. He muttered a quick prayer of thanks to Horus when the men finally clambered back to their rowing seats and unshipped their oars. They were sunder way again and turning a rocky headland of the island when a great cleft in the shore came into view. It was as though a god had struck it with a giant war-ax and cleaved the soil and stone. Its sides rose straight up, and deep into the land it ran. The captain stood by the steering oar, guiding them around the headland and into the cleft itself.
The thin clear note of a horn sounded above the hissing of the waves as they broke against the stones of the channel wall. Inteb shaded his eyes with his hand and could make out the forms of helmeted soldiers on the cliff high above, dark against the sky. Lookouts certainly, to herald the approach of any ships. And more than that. It took very little imagination to see the rows of boulders that could be levered over to fall on any unwanted ships in the channelbelow. There might be buckets of burning pitch, as well. Atlantis could defend herself here.
Another turn and the sharp cliffs fell away suddenly, as though they had passed a barrier, and the channel became narrower and very straight. There were tilled fields close by on each side, and the peasants stopped work, leaning on their mattocks to gape at them as they glided slowly by.
"A canal?" Inteb asked. The captain nodded, looking ahead and resting one arm over the steering oar.
"So I have heard said. They brag a lot, these Atlanteans. But it could be true. That cleft through the hills, they couldn't have done that, but this part would be easy enough to dig, given enough time and men."
Straight as an arrow's flight the channel ran, towards the rising hills inland. There was no sight of the city now, but another ship came into view in the canal ahead. Seeing it, the captain ordered in the oars and steered for the bank. The other ship approached swiftly, until they could clearly see the jutting horns above the bow and the glare of the yellow eyes painted beneath them. It was an Atlantean trireme a full 40 paces long, its banks of white oars dipping and rising in perfect unison like a great bird's wings. Then it was upon them, sweeping alongside, towering over them. The drum was like a heartbeat, the oars moving in time with it. There must have been fifteen or more oars in each bank, far too many to count as the ship slid by. A sailor in the prow looked at them curiously, as did two more on the mast, but otherwise they could have been invisible. The officers, magnificent in bronze armor set richly with enamels and gems, with high plumes on their helmets, ignored them completely. As did the fat merchants sitting under an awning on the stern deck, laughing together, lifting golden cups with jeweled fingers. Wealth and strength on easy display. The high stern and great steering sweep moved by, then a flurry of foam marked the ship's wake. It was past and gone, and they rocked in the waves raised by its passage.
"Fend off that bank," the captain shouted, and the ship was under way again. He pointed ahead. "There, lord, you see why we unstepped the mast."
A black hole opened up in the hillside before them. The canal ran into it and vanished. The rowers became aware of it, too, and looked over their shoulders and muttered together and missed the beat. The captain raised both fists over his head and swore at them in a harsh voice that could have been heard the length of the ship during the most savage storm.
"Sons of noseless whores, lice upon the stinking hide of beetles in a sun-blown corpse! Tend your rowing or I'll flay every one of you alive and make a sail of your poxy skins. We are coming to a tunnel, no more. I have been through it and it runs straight, but is narrow. Watch your rowing or you'll be breaking oars, or worse. We'll be through quickly enough if you don't fear the dark."
The black mouth swallowed them up. It was most frightening for the men who were rowing because they saw the tunnel entrance fall behind them and grow smaller, all light vanishing with it. The earth could be engulfing them, the underworld consuming them. The beat of the drum echoed from the rock around them, rolling and fading with the sound of thunder.
From the rear deck, the far entrance was clear once their eyes grew accustomed to the darkness; a bright beckoning disc. The captain steered for it, shouting encouragement to his men, but stopped when his voice echoed back like mad laughter.
The moments of entombment passed quickly enough, and they slid out into the sunlight again, amused at their fears now that the tunnel was behind them. Inteb blinked in the light, and all but gaped at this scene they had burst upon so suddenly.
They had entered a circular and land-locked lagoon. Inteb realized for the first time the complexity of the island. Thera was really a hollow mountain, perhaps an ancientvolcano that vomited out its lava and left an empty center for the ocean to fill. But there was a circular reef within the crater--they had penetrated it in the tunnel. And here, at the heart of everything, lay a lagoon. It was rimmed by low hills on all sides that ran down in gentle slopes to the water. Grapes grew richly in this sheltered bowl, and the green shoots of the spring-sown crops were already high. Porticoed villas as well as simpler dwellings were half shielded by the tall trees. In the lagoon was an island, connected by bridges to the shore, almost filling it so that the lagoon became a moat of surrounding water. Moored on this island were the ships of Atlantis, row after row of them, almost too many to count. Triremes and beaked warships, fat-bellied merchantmen and swift galleys. Behind the ships were the busy docks and warehouses, while beyond them rose up the hill and the citadel that Inteb had only glimpsed for a moment from the sea.
This was the metropolis and royal city of Atlantis.
The rowers stopped, gaped, the ship drifted, and Inteb felt the same awe and wonder that they did. Up the side of the conical hill the buildings climbed in wave after wave of color, tier upon tier of neat three-storied cubical mansions. They were faced with decorative tiles in a dizzy mixture of blue and white and red, luridly trimmed with shiny horizontal bands of precious metals, roofed with sparkling white cupolas. All of these nestled at the foot of the palace that held mastery of the summit, its lengthy bulk colorful and dazzling in the sun. Brilliant red pillars, tapering downward in the Atlantean style, rose above rank after rank of stepped-back loggias. The roofline and porticoed state entrance were adorned with outsized bull-horn emblems, glinting a blazing metallic red. They were sheathed with orichalc, that noble alloy of gold and copper.
"Who are you and what is your business here?" a hoarse voice called out in bad Egyptian. "Speak!"
Inteb looked down over the rail at a guard boat whichhad approached unseen while they were gawking at the city. A dozen rowers slumped over their oars and on the high stern deck were armored and greaved warriors, as well as an official in a white but badly stained smock. He had some bronze badge of office about his neck that was almost completely hidden by a straggling gray beard. His head was bald and sun-reddened, and he squinted up out of a single eye, the other being only a raw wound in his head. As he opened his mouth Inteb spoke first, leaning over the rail so his jewels and gold bracelets could be seen. He had heard Atlantean slaves talking in Mycenae and the language was not too different from Mycenaean, so he spoke in that tongue.
"I am Inteb of the household of Thuthmosis the Third, Pharaoh of Upper and Lower Egypt. I come here at his bidding to bring his words to your master. Now you will speak."
There was more than a hint of anger in these closing words and it had the desired effect. The man abased himself as best he could on the tiny deck, while trying to look up at the same time.
"Welcome, welcome, lord, to these waters and to these sacred precincts and the court of Atlas who is king of Atlantis, master of Thera and Crete, Milos, Ios and Astypalea and all the islands within a day's sail, and of all these ships in these waters. If you will follow, I will lead you to a berth for your ship."
He muttered something to his rowers, and the guard boat darted away with the Egyptian ship following slowly behind. Around the island they went, towards what appeared to be another tunnel. Only when they had entered it did they see that it was a channel cut through the land and roofed over with heavy timbers. Bars of sunlight lanced down from square openings in the wooden ceiling above. The captain pointed up at them.
"More defenses. They have boulders up there, right atthe edge. A ship trying to get through here gets holed and sunk."
This passage was shorter than the first tunnel, and the other end was close at hand. From above they could hear the rumble of chariot wheels and the clatter of hooves and stamping feet. Then they emerged into yet another ringlike body of water that sat like a moat around the islet that was the heart of Thera. They tied up at a mooring where great steps of black and red stone led down into the water. Standing above it was a colorful wooden canopy, shielding the landing from the sun. It was painted a bright crimson, and in the center a pair of enormous, gilded bull's horns stretched out, stylized like those atop the palace building. Inteb saw the waiting ranks of warriors and the litter chair and knew that the word of his arrival had been passed swiftly ahead. As the mooring lines were thrown, he spoke to the captain.
"Break out the gifts from Pharaoh and have slaves bring them after me. Don't let more than half your men ashore at one time. If you must drink and whore yourself let it be known aboard where you are."
"How long will it be before we sail, lord?"
"I don't know. Days surely. I will send a messenger when I am ready."
More horns roared like the god of bullfrogs when Inteb stepped ashore, blending with the thunder of great wooden drums with the hides of bulls across their ends. He was bowed to and led to the palanquin, which was lifted by eight slaves as soon as he was seated. There were running sores on their shoulders where the poles cut, and their skins dripped with sweat as they climbed the winding steps up the hill, but Inteb noticed none of this. He was looking at the people and the buildings of this city so different than any he had ever seen before. Thebes was grander, but in a different way. Atlantis was a clash of color that almost hurt the eyes, of brilliant paintings on white plaster thatmade a jungle of unreal birds and leaves. There were living creatures in this jungle as well, bluish-furred monkeys climbing on the rooftops and porches. Inteb had seen these strangely human beasts before, but never ones of that color. From where did the Atlanteans import them? Other animals too, donkeys bearing loads, cats watching from the open windows. Most curious of all were the elephants, which seemed to roam at will. They were totally unlike the great African war elephants that he knew; these were as small as horses and far lighter of skin. The people made way for them and occasionally would reach out to touch their thick hides for luck or for blessing.
Then they were on the summit of the acropolis, and the soaring white masonry walls of the palace rose before him in a majesty that did indeed rival that of Egypt. As his chair touched the pavement, the lofty state doors of bronze swung open and he was bowed through by servitors in royal blue robes.
Within was a vast colonnaded hall lined on both sides with ranks of ebony-black Nubian guards, another Egyptian export, holding upright spears and dressed in leopard skins. Ahead, another great hall that ended in a broad stairway, all dimly lit with soft light that filtered down from clerestories above. There was chanting in the distance and the smell of incense and a half silence broken only by the burden-heavy steps of the slaves who followed him. Strolling by were slim-hipped men, dressed in tight-fitting short garments, who looked at him as curiously as he did at them. On the walls were frescoes of these same youths clutching the horns of charging bulls, dancing in the air above them. More paintings of odd fish and many-armed squid, as well as waving underwater plants--then flowers and birds. Women passed, as strangely attractive as the men, wearing many-colored skirts arranged in tiers, tiny hats perched high on their elaborately curled and combed hair, their bare breasts full and cupped out before them, nipples tinted blue. There were other women who weredressed for the hunt; the royal hunting preserve was well known, and they would be on their way there. They wore calf-high leather boots that were brightly painted, and short green skirts ending above the knee and held at the waist by a wide, bronze-studded leather belt. A supporting strap from each side of the belt crossed in the middle of the chest and passed over each shoulder. Since they wore no upper garments, this served to outline their bare breasts and draw attention to them. Inteb thought it slightly disgusting. Then there was sunlight again as they emerged into the roofless megaron at the heart of the palace.
Word of Inteb's arrival must just have reached King Atlas, who appeared to be holding court, seated on a high-backed alabaster throne against the far mural beyond the hearth. Clerks with clay tablets were being hurried from his presence while a prisoner in wooden fetters was being pushed out by his armored guards. Inteb drew back into the shadows until the disorder ceased, to make a proper entrance as befitted his rank and mission. The prisoner, naked except for a breechclout, was bruised and filthy with caked-on blood. One of his guards thumped him in the ribs with the pommel of his sword to move him faster, and the prisoner stumbled, then looked back over his shoulder to curse the man.
Inteb stood stunned and unmoving.
It was Ason, son of Perimedes, prince of Mycenae.
This time the guard hit harder and Ason slumped and was half dragged from the atrium.
4
"This is a very fine wine, my dear Inteb," King Atlas said, patting him on the arm at the same time, as though to assure him of the truth of the words he spoke, his fingers ringed and jeweled, fat and white and swollen like thick sausages. "It is from the fields on the south slopes behind Knossos. The skins are left in the ferment to provide that rich purple as well as the indescribable flavor. It must be thinned by water ten times, that is how strong it is."
The tall amphora, half as high as a man, was tilted so the wine would pour out slowly, not taking with it too much of the oil that floated on its surface to seal it from the air. A beaten golden bowl decorated with scenes of the capture of a wild bull was filled part way, then one of the serving slaves bent over it with a sponge to sop up the golden globules of olive oil. Only then was it placed on the low table beside Atlas who, as honor to his guest who sat at his right hand, poured the cool water into it himself and then filled a cup for Inteb, who sipped and nodded.
"A pleasure to drink, royal Atlas, and doubly pleasurable taken from your own hands."
"You shall have some for Pharaoh. Ten amphorae--no, twenty--a more significant number and one with greater power."
Atlas nodded, smiling, and sipped at his wine, pleased with himself. A great, quaking jelly mountain. As a young man, Inteb knew, he had been a bold sailor, taking his ship to the Golden Horn and into the Eastern Sea beyond, and up the river Danube that ran into it, further yet to the north where the trees grew high and close together and blocked out the sky. Where men fought with stones and were covered with fur and had tails like animals, or so it was said. If that bold warrior was hidden somewhere inside the present bulk, there was no sign of his existence. Rollsof doughy flesh, white as that of a drowned corpse, hung like wattles below his neck and drooped from his forearms. He was hairless as a shaven priest, lacking even eyebrows and eyelashes, and his eyes, almost hidden behind the swelling fat, were of a color between green and blue. His mouth smiled a lot, though his eyes never did. His lips drew back into red-painted bows, disclosing a dark mouth containing only a few browned stumps of teeth. As a final touch, as though the gods had shaped this man in some mysterious humor of their own, his cheek and one ear were colored an inflamed reddish purple, though luckily this was his left side, now facing away from Inteb. He must have surely been one of the bravest, when young, to have survived with these multiple marks of heavenly displeasure upon him. In Egypt, even though of noble birth, he would never have lived, but would have been cast adrift on the Nile soon after birth for the most sacred crocodiles to eliminate.
"Tell me of Egypt," Atlas said, looking slyly out of the corners of his eyes, then quickly away.
Inteb was sipping his wine, and he smacked his lips loudly afterward to show his pleasure. And thought quickly. Just because this man was as white-larded as a sacrificial swine did not mean that his thoughts were fatty too; he had ruled the sea empire for three decades. Few men had ever done that. He knew something, or he guessed something, which meant that truth would be the best concealment. Inteb was well versed in court intrigue and took pleasure in dipping into it once again after all the desert years.
"I do not have much to tell, royal Atlas; I have been traveling and have not seen my home for many months."
"Really? Very intriguing. You must tell me of these travels."
"They would bore you, for I was among barbarians much of the time."
"Tell me in any case, for there are pleasures and interestseverywhere. Rough wines are good on the hunt, fresh-killed boar fine when roasted over a campfire." The cold eyes flicked sideways again. "Young boys with sweet round bottoms good anywhere, hey? And big-bellied, big-breasted girls almost as good."
Inteb had speared up a morsel of meat with his golden fork, dipped it into the savory sauce and was chewing on it. The truth, there was no way to avoid it.
"Most of the months were spent in rock-girt Mycenae on an errand for my Pharaoh."
"Building their walls high to battle Atlantis, Inteb?"
He did know, Inteb thought, and has been leading me on.
"Surely not to fight Atlantis, great Atlas, who rules the seas and the shores wherever she wishes to venture. You can certainly have no interest in this miserable tribe on a sun-baked rock, who rear up walls only for battle with the other tribes and squabbling villages. But you know of this already. You must have the godlike eyes of Horus."
"No, only spies who can be bought for goat droppings. You would be surprised of the word they bring me."
"After the glories of this court, nothing could surprise me," Inteb said, bowing his head as he spoke. Atlas laughed and seized up an entire roast chicken, dripping with honey.
"Your Pharaoh is well served, Inteb. I wish I had men in this court who would do my bidding just as well." He tore the chicken in half with a single pull, then chewed while he talked, bits of meat falling from his lips, honey running down his chin. "Perimedes can sting like a horsefly. Your Pharaoh was wise to buy him off with great walls and gates that Mycenae's own slaves had to labor to build. His ships raid elsewhere now because of this."
"But not in Atlantean waters?"
"Of course not--I did not say he was stupid. So I am not troubled by your labors in Mycenae. Though I surely hope you bathed well after leaving that cesspit ... ."
"And anointed myself with sweet oils and burned the soiled clothing I used there before venturing to mighty Atlas' court."
They both laughed at this, and Inteb felt relieved--but still on his guard. The young Atlas who had been captain and warrior was still concealed inside the gross bulk beside him, the only sign of his presence the coldness of those tiny eyes. But now he wielded more weapons than simple force of arms; there was a smell of intrigue about the megaron of Atlantis that was faint, yet clearly detectable. The rich merchants and shipowners lolled at ease on the cushion-covered stone benches set against the walls of the room, beneath a colorful and realistic fresco of sportive dolphins. They bent forward casually to take a drink or a bite of food from the tables placed before them, calling aloud to each other. Yet they were never relaxed. Like lions resting after the hunt and the kill, they were still ready to spring up again at any instant. And all the time they talked, their eyes moved about so they would miss nothing, returning time and again to the bulk of Atlas on his throne against the wall, the center of concern for them all.
The head clerk from the archives was reading a list of royal receipts to the king, speaking loudly enough for all to hear. No court poet in rich Atlantis, but a clerk instead to chronicle the larder.
" ... and three ewers, six tripod cauldrons, and three wine jars, oil, barley, olives, figs, stores of wheat, livestock, wine and honey; all these gifts of the merchant, strong Mattis, just returned from a lengthy voyage."
The merchant referred to--strong must have meant his appetite, because he was round as a melon--stood and bowed towards the king, who raised his wine cup in salute. The list went on.
"Then six wine-mixing goblets, three boiling pans, one ladle, two fire tongs, eleven tables, five chairs, fifteen footstools ... ."
It was endless, and Inteb paid no heed, although the others listened with half an ear, nodding when something out of the ordinary was mentioned. More food was brought to them in pretty dishes, the latest of many. First had been the flying things, tiny grilled birds just a mouthful each, as well as larger fowl, then meat from the chase. Now the ocean was giving up her bounty: blue-black mussels in their shells, squid in their own ink, tiny grilled fishes, great boiled ones. Fish was a great favorite in this sea kingdom--and almost as attractive as the women. The guests found their attention divided. Some Atlantean women dined here as well, their bare breasts a little sticky at times from the appreciative caresses of the diners. They were almost forgotten now as the seafood courses arrived.
While Inteb was looking at the diners, examining them, he realized suddenly that he was being watched in the same manner himself by the youth who sat to his right: Themis, Atlas' third son. Inteb smiled into his wine cup and felt himself already being enmeshed in the intrigues of this court.
Themis was a handsome youth and obviously knew it. Slim hipped and wide shouldered in the Atlantean tradition, he wore the tight, short wrappings about his loins that showed the muscles of his legs to their best advantage. His chest was bare, smooth and hairless, yet strongly muscled as well. Despite this proudly displayed strength there was a sensitivity to his face, the thin, arched nose and full lips, that showed he was less of the animal and more of his father's son. A hammered-gold band held back his straight, dark hair and disclosed a well-formed forehead. When he caught Inteb's eye, he raised his drinking beaker in greeting.
"You seem to be examining our court with critical eyes, lord Inteb. I imagine it must be far inferior to the fabled glories and wealth of Egypt that you are so used to?"
"I am more used to dung and rancid oil of late--but you misunderstood. That was admiration in my eyes, evenwonder. Without speaking ill of Egypt I can still say that your city, this palace, are a miracle to behold. Your paintings almost shock my eyes. We like order in our art and feel secure and rested by the forms and decorations we know. But your painters drown me in a sea of birds, flowers, plants, animals, fish--there is no end to the variety. And there, those bull leapers, I feel they could spring down from the wall and turn cartwheels at my feet, or that great mottled bull might leap and gore me."
"You have seen the bull dancers then?"
"Never. I hope to some day. You are a bull leaper yourself?"
"You can tell?" Themis laughed and shrugged his shoulders so his muscles moved smoothly under his skin, well conscious of Inteb's admiring eyes upon him. "And more than that. I am the first boxer in this city."
"I do not know of this; even the word is strange to me."
"Then you must see this noble sport before you leave. Imagine, two warriors, stripped, with their bodies glowing with oil. They face each other, solid leather wrappings about their fists, strike and defend themselves from blows that would kill an ordinary man." Themis drank some wine, then picked up the conical beaker from the low table before him. "Do you know this game?" he asked, shaking the beaker so that it rattled loudly, then upending it.
"We have it in Egypt, though perhaps the rules are different."
Themis lifted the beaker to reveal the three dice.
"A six, a three and a two, not bad. The rules are simple enough. The highest number wins. The best you can get is an Aphrodite, three sixes, and the lowest is a dog, all the ones. Shall we play?"
Before Inteb could answer he became aware that King Atlas was addressing him, and he turned to him as quickly as any other would in that great room.
"Look, my dear Inteb, have you ever seen a more unwholesome sight than that?"
Inteb looked at the prisoner who stood before Atlas. Wooden shackles weighted his arms and legs; a guard stood on either side of him. Battered, filthy, bloody, naked, a ruin of a man. Ason, son of Perimedes, prince of Mycenae.
For the entire evening Inteb had been preparing himself for this. That single glimpse of Ason that he had had, unknown to Atlas, had warned him of what would surely come. He knew that Atlas would never resist the opportunity to parade this prisoner, whom Inteb would surely know, from the city he had left so recently. So Inteb's s reaction was no sudden thing, but had been carefully considered and weighed. He looked Ason up and down, and his expression did not change in the slightest.
"It appears to be Ason, son of Perimedes. Is there any reason why a man of noble rank is being treated in this manner, great Atlas?"
Silence followed instantly as the smile oozed away from Adas' lips and his face sank into cold and deadly lines. He stared at Inteb, his gaze as fixed as that of a poisonous serpent. Inteb looked back no less steadily. Atlas was Atlantis and ruled supremely--but Inteb was an Egyptian, sent in friendship by Pharaoh, and a reminder of this was not out of order. Egypt was at peace with both Atlantis and Mycenae and was above any differences they might have. Atlas seemed to realize this, too, because he did not speak at once. When he did the smile had returned ever so slightly. There was, however, nothing except cold hatred in his eyes.
"Noble? Noble cock on a mountain of stable sweepings perhaps, but nothing in the eyes of Atlantis, my little Egyptian. Yes, he is of that quarrelsome hill tribe that we talked about earlier ... ."
"You--here!" Ason said in a cracked voice, recognizing Inteb for the first time. "Traitor ... ." He tried to leap forward but was pulled back and forced to his knees by theguards. Atlas rumbled with laughter, his bulk quivering with the strength of it.
"Do look, Inteb. The creature does not even understand what you say, that you attempt to take its side. That was very brave of you, Inteb, but you waste your bravery on something like this. Filth-ridden barbarians."
"As good as your get of pigs!" Ason shouted, coughing, writhing in the grip of the guards.
The room roared with laughter. This display was too funny for words, and even Inteb smiled slightly to show that he was as civilized as they were, enough to appreciate a good joke. Atlantis and Egypt, they were civilization, art and culture, completely different from the animal people outside their gates who scratched in the dirt for their food with pointed sticks and who were inferior in every way. Perhaps the rockpile of Mycenae was lord of the other rock-piles and dungheaps-but that meant nothing here. With every angry word from his mouth Ason proved them correct, and they laughed the louder, and Inteb had to smile as well.
"Kill ... ." Ason spluttered.
"Kill swine as long as they are not armed or armored," Themis shouted, and they laughed anew.
"Good as any dog digging in the garbage heap," someone called out, and through the laughter Ason tried to turn to face his new tormentor, grating his teeth in frustrated anger.
"You ...all of you ...whoresons! With my sword, I'll kill ... ."
"Sword?" Themis raised his eyebrows in mock astonishment. "We would give you a sword--but how would you hold it with your paws?"
The laughter was overwhelming now, and Ason tried to shout over it but his voice could not be heard, and the sight of his working mouth and blood-engorged face only sent them into greater paroxysms of pleasure.
It ended suddenly. One of the slaves, bearing a great glazed bowl of fish stew, passed down the row of diners. Ason, fettered and bound as he was, managed to get his legs under him and, as the slave passed, he sprang forward dragging his guards with him. The slave went down, the bowl struck and burst asunder, drenching Themis with its burning contents. Slave and guards tangled together, and from their midst Ason burst, falling across the low table, crushing it with his weight and reaching as far as he could to lock his fingers onto Themis' neck.
There was shocked silence for an instant--then shouts of outrage burst out. The two guards kicked the slave aside and seized Ason, clubbing at him, trying to pry his fingers from Themis' throat, where they were sunk deep into the flesh. Almost unconscious, Ason still gripped tighter, until a wildly swung sword pommel caught him in the temple, and he shook all over and was still. Then he was dragged face down out onto the floor and one of the guards held his short sword in both hands, blade down, and raised it high in the air to plunge the point down between Ason's shoulderblades.
"Wait," a hoarse voice said, and the blow stopped.
Themis stood up, rubbing at his throat while gobbets of fish fell from his stained clothing.
"He is not going to die that easily. He attacked me, so he is mine to kill. Am I right, father?"
Atlas drank his wine and dismissed the entire matter with a wave of his hand. The entertainment was over, and he had had his fill of the hill barbarian. Themis turned to Inteb, still shaking with fury.
"You asked about boxing. Tomorrow I will demonstrate this skill to you. In the open arena, in fair combat, I am going to beat this creature to death before your eyes."
5
Ason awoke to darkness, not knowing if it were night or day in the black hole where he had been imprisoned: not caring. The various aches in his body had now merged into one gigantic pain of outrageous proportions that seemed to be centered about his head. When he started to sit up the agony leapt upon him like a waiting animal, dropping him back to the unyielding stone floor. The next time he tried he was more careful. He now knew the pain as an enemy he would defeat. He ran his hands over his body and could find no new wounds, or rather none of any importance. Then, with utmost care, he touched his fingers to the throbbing pain in his temple, to the contused swelling there.
Now he could remember, the banquet, the taunting--the attack upon the most annoying of those buzzing insects. He smiled into the darkness. The head was well worth it; what a pleasure it had been to lock his fingers into that throat.
It was night. It must be night if he were imprisoned in the same place he had been before. The acrid reek of dung was in his nose. The same place, the bull pens. The lion of Mycenae trapped in the stables of the bull of Atlantis. But not dead yet. He dragged himself painfully across the floor to the trough of running water in the rear. It was cool and he buried his face in it, then his entire head, holding his breath as long as he could while it leeched away some of the pain. Then, a bit at a time, he managed to work himself up until he was sitting with his back against the cool stone wall.
He must have slept in this position, because more time passed, and when he opened his eyes again there was a ring of light about the great wooden door and he could hear the scraping of the bars being pulled back. There was time to close his eyes and shield them with his arm before thelight lanced in as the door swung open. Heavy military sandals tramped in and he blinked up at the dim forms that stood over him. There was no point in resisting now, and he permitted himself to be hauled to his feet and to be dragged from the pen. Death was very close; he wondered vaguely why he was still alive after this length of time. But the pain in his head destroyed all capacity for thought and he went where he was led.
What happened next was most surprising. He had heard of the Atlantean baths--many stories were told of the wonders of this city. But this one at least proved to be true. Well guarded, with two armed men before and two after him, and one on each arm, he was taken to a lustrous chamber where light filtered in through clerestoried openings in the walls high above. A terra-cotta tub, higher at one end than the other, stood in an honored place in the center of the floor. An attendant came forward bowing and waving him towards the tub while the guards drew back to the entrance.
"Here, sir, if you please, use this step." He stripped Ason's loincloth off with practiced skill and held his arm while he climbed into the empty tub and sat down. The attendant clapped his hands sharply and a slave brought in an immense jar of water, freshly heated and steaming, and set it in the hole in the clay counter next to the tub. With a dipper the bath attendant poured water over Ason in soothing streams, his words coming as steadily as the water.
"Water, such perfect water. Atlantis is blessed with flowing springs that are guided close by through channels and pipes, a wonder to behold. Hot springs and cold, sir, which are blended here."
There was a sponge in a niche in the wall which he used to scrub Ason with, ever so gently, removing the dirt and clotted blood, then pouring more water over him as a rinse. The water cleansed Ason's wounds, and his aches were washed away along with the caked-on filth. He stoodwhen he was instructed, climbed out to lie upon a cool slab of stone where the attendant poured scented oil onto his skin and hair and worked it in with supple fingers. The soreness was kneaded from his muscles while more oil was applied to the still-open cuts. Under this treatment, the worst of the pain had ebbed away by the time the man began to shave him with a sharp obsidian blade, and he was half asleep when someone else stamped into the chamber and stood over him. Ason opened his eyes to see a face of unsurpassed ugliness. The nose had been broken, apparently many times, one eye was almost closed by scar tissue, both ears torn away as well as part of the lower lip, so that the man's clamped teeth peeked through. His hair was gray and cropped short enough to reveal even more scars.
"Do you know about boxing?" the man asked in a harsh voice that exactly matched the face. Ason blinked, then shook his head no: he had no idea of what the man was talking about.
"No. I didn't think one of your kind would. Then you had better listen to old Aias and everything he says. Learn fast. If you don't make a good show out there, last awhile before you are killed, it will be my head as well. Do you hear me, stranger?"
Ason did not bother to answer this time but closed his eyes instead. A sudden agony of pain lanced through him and he sat up, pushing the attendant to the floor, clutching his side and expecting to see a gaping wound there. Nothing was visible except a reddening area of skin. Aias smiled down at him--an ugly sight with the hanging flap of lip--and clenched one great fist and held it out.
"That is boxing. Your first lesson. In boxing the hands are closed to make fists and with your fists you hit the other man. In the arena you will have the leathers around your fists to make them harder and to protect the knuckles, which break easily." His own were knobbed, scarred, and deformed. "There are many good places to hit a man, but I have no time to show them all to you. For you it willbe best to try for the middle of the body or the head. Now--stand and make a fist and hit me."
"Give me a sword and I'll hit you."
"No swords here, mountain man. This will be done the Atlantean way, and you will be killed with great style by Themis, who is a master of this sport."
His fist lashed out suddenly and caught Ason a light but painful blow on the point of his jaw, rocking back his head and sending the pain surging through it again. Roaring with anger, Ason jumped for the man, swinging a powerful blow that the boxer easily ducked.
"No, not like that; you're not hacking with a sword. Throw your fist as if you were throwing a spear. Better, better, but still not good enough. Don't leave yourself so exposed so that I can do this. Hurt, didn't it? Themis will do worse. I hear that you poured hot food on him and tried to throttle him. Themis is not a man to take an insult like that lightly. He will butcher you, mountain man."
Ason backed off, his fists still before him, still wary.
"Is that the man who wishes to fight me? Isn't he a son of Atlas?"
"He is. But also a mighty boxer, which is more important to you at this time. Do you wish to die out there like a quaking slave or like a man?"
"I wish to kill Themis. Show me more."
There was too much to learn--and no time to learn it in. The guards looked on and laughed while Ason pursued the squat form of the boxer about the chamber, flapping and swinging his arms like a crane's wings, getting little result for all his efforts other than an occasional lazy blow to his ribs. But the exercise had cleared his head, and when the boxer left he poured a jugful of water over his head, laughing when his guards cursed at the water slopping about their feet. He made no protests when he was once more dried and rubbed with oil. The attendant dressed him in a high-waisted, tight-fitting breechclout of layeredleather, then strapped on boots of the same hard leather that reached up to midcalf. There were no manacles this time, but all the guards had their swords out when they led him from the chamber.
"Put up your swords," he said to them. "We have the same destination. I wish to meet your worm-infested prince in combat."
He meant what he said. He would have preferred to fight with bronze dagger or sword, even the war-ax these Atlanteans favored. But a weapon was just the means to the end; it was the battle he lusted after. There was no thought of defeat--or rather there was always the thought of death. It was not to be feared or welcomed, but was eternally there. You killed the man who fought you. If you wounded him deeply he would die in any case, so it was only right to finish the battle that had been started. When two men fought; one died. Sometimes both of them. The weapon was of no importance. The battle was.
For Ason the world was a simple place and his pleasures equally simple. He seized the opportunities that life presented just as they came, taking the same sharp pleasure from the hunt and spearing of a wild boar as from the possession and embrace of a woman. Both were over with quickly. He always had good friends to drink with, who would fight beside him. It was in battle that he found the greatest pleasure of all. Nor was there any shortage of conflict in the Argolid. Ason's earliest memories were of screaming men outside the walls, of wounded men, dead men, and of blood-drenched bronze swords. His first toy had been a small sword--and it was not a toy. He had not had it a day when he had chased and killed a shoat and brought its bedraggled body to his father in triumph. Soon there was larger and more dangerous game to pursue, and finally, after he had come of age, the most dangerous game of all. He had a spear, and he had poked it in under the lip of an Epidaurian helmet and through the man'seye. His only reaction had been surprise at how easily the man had died, far easier than some of the stag he had killed.
Women found him attractive, as did men. His blue eyes were clear, his skin unwrinkled. His brown hair and beard, when trimmed and combed as they were now, were very much the color of amber. If his nose was slightly large, it was no more a deformity than the beak of a hawk, which it did resemble. His teeth were white and sound; they could be little else on the simple Mycenaean diet. A jagged scar across his chin was one with its many fellows that lay a white tracery over his tanned body. In the past he had walked--and run--for a day and night, and had still been able to do battle at the end of that time. He had the muscles for it, smooth, tough muscles that moved easily under his skin, that were not knotted and protuberant like those of men well past their prime. That he was intelligent could not be doubted. In that he was like his father, Perimedes. But he used his wit only to enable him to fight better. He never thought to question at all why he was fighting. Some day he would have to, when Perimedes was dead and he was king of Mycenae, but as yet he had no reason to. Now there was another battle ahead, and he walked to it as easily as he had walked to any other conflict during his twenty-one years of life.
"Stand here," one of the guards ordered as they seized him by his arms. There was an arched opening ahead, through which he could see a large courtyard covered with sand. Then the scarred boxer came up carrying a large handful of leather straps.
At that same moment a far-off rumbling sounded, as if some monstrous animal stirred deep in the earth. It shook the ground beneath their feet. The walls moved, columns quivered, and bits of plaster twinkled down in dusty motes.
Ason jumped forward, towards the safety of the open air outside. Strong hands grabbed and pulled him back.
"Don't be frightened, mountain man, you're not dead yet." The guards laughed while Aias began to lace the leather straps around Ason's hands in a practiced manner. "Atlantis is too well built to fall down when Poseidon Earthshaker causes a little rumbling in the terrestrial guts. You'll live to fight Themis and he will kill you, so your moment of destiny is not quite yet."
Their obvious lack of fear relaxed Ason for the moment. He knew that many of these islands had quakes that threw the buildings down, even flows of molten rock that burst from the ground and buried them. These stirrings in the ground must not be rare if they thought so little of it. He watched while his fists were sealed in a casing of thin leather. Then a lead plate was fitted and bent into place over his fingers and knuckles, secured there with a broad band of thicker leather.
"It's called the hammer," Aias said as he put another strip of lead into place on the other fist. "Even with leather fists it takes some time to kill a man. This is when the hammer is used." Shrill horns sounded from outside and he hurried to finish the wrappings. "That's the signal. They want you now. Die well, mountain man. Many would consider it an honor to fall before the fists of a prince of Atlantis." He smiled a twisted grin as he said it.
Ason's hands hung heavily, as clumsy as dumb hooves. He looked at them and thudded them together. He would have preferred other weapons, but these would have to do.
"Out," one of the guards ordered, stepping forward and prodding Ason in the back with his sword.
Without turning, Ason swung one of his fists behind him into the man's middle. The guard gasped and folded over, his sword clattering onto the stone flags. Before the others could move, Ason walked forward, alone, into the arena.
The courtyard was immense. The palace surrounded it on three sides, while the fourth was cut off by a low wall with a drop of some kind beyond. A large stairway brokethe central wall, flanked by bright red wooden pillars that were wider at the top than on the bottom. More pillars framed the balconies and openings above, many of them adorned at the top with the gleaming golden double ax of Atlantis. A colorful crowd, both women and men, were at all the balcony and window openings, but Ason was only distantly aware of them. What he saw were the sword and ax men around the wall of the courtyard, near every doorway. And the man who stood alone on the sand.
Themis. Dressed just as Ason was, and shining with oil--with his fists hanging at his sides in swollen clubs. He started towards Ason, pacing slowly, and Ason went to meet him.
"I shall not talk to you, just kill you," Themis said and swung his fist.
Ason jumped backward, lessening the force of the blow so that it bounced from his shoulder. He swung his own fist in return, a mighty blow that would have killed a bull had it connected. But it whistled, harmless, in the air as Themis dodged it.
Then bright pain shot through Ason's side, and he sprawled helplessly back onto the sand. There was the distant roar of voices.
"Stand up," Themis said. "That was only the beginning."
Ason rose shakily and the slow butchery began.
Blow after terrible blow struck him, bruised him, shattered him. He could not hit the wavering form of Themis, nor could he reach him. Just once he fell forward and managed to clutch the other man, to strike a single heavy blow in his side, then he was hurled away and the hammering attack to head, arms, body, chest, went on. Ason had no way of measuring the time; it was long, just long, and still he swung ineffectually, and the clublike blows struck in return. Blood ran from his face into his eyes and was salty in his mouth. Blood covered most of his body, and the yellow sand stuck to it when he fell. Then a blowstruck him down, even harder than the others, hit in the middle of his body and paralyzed him so he could only lie there like a fish on the shore, gasping for air. Themis turned to the king and the crowd watching above.
"This is the sport," he shouted. "Every blow struck where it was intended and in the manner desired. But that is over. Now it is the time of the bone-breaker. I shall snap his bones as I wish, his arms and his ribs, and then I shall blind him and destroy his face and only then, when he knows what has been done to him, shall I kill him."
His final words were drowned in the sea of hoarse voices. Yes, they wanted to see this, see this skill and sport to remember it and talk about it in years to come. This was a very good day for them all.
All except one. Painfully Ason rolled over and pulled his knees under him, fighting the pain and shaking the blood from his face, and rubbing his eyes with his forearm so he could see. No way out. No way to bring this man down with him. This was not how he preferred to die, and this thought hurt more than all the blows.
Under his knees the ground shook, and he dropped forward onto his hands to steady himself. The voices roared even louder in his ears. Had he weakened that much?
When he saw a section of the great building tear loose and slide to the ground, he realized that the great sound was outside of him and that the world was shaking beneath them all.
This was no tremor. This was an earthquake of the kind that rocked cities and leveled them.
Still not comprehending completely, Ason blinked up at the shaking wall and crumbling columns. People were screaming in panic, some dropping into the courtyard, some falling heavily from the upper windows. Brass sheathing ripped and tore away, while pieces of stone cornice broke free. A massive length crashed into the sand near Ason, broken fragments biting into his skin.
It was happening. All hesitation vanished in thatinstant, and he sprang forward, getting his clumsy fists under a carved length of stone as long as his forearm. With all his strength he heaved at it, muscles hard as the rock itself, lifting it into the air and over his head. Themis was coming towards him again, arm back to strike a killing blow.
But Ason struck first. Even the raised, padded fists could not stop the falling stone. Down it came, crushing into Themis' head, felling him in that instant, stretching him out silent and unmoving, with the jagged end of rock buried deep in his skull. But even as Ason turned to flee he heard his name bellowed above the thunder and screams, and looked up to see Atlas leaning from the balcony above.
"Kill him for me! Kill that Mycenaean!" he shouted, and a young noble in bronze armor sprang from the box, falling heavily to the sand with the weight of all his metal. He stood, drawing his sword, starting towards Ason. Two of the warriors in the arena were also running towards him--the others were lost in the mob--and Ason did the only thing he could do. He turned and fled.
The dark opening of a doorway was before him, and Ason fell through it. Clouds of dust made it difficult to see; he stumbled over the fallen debris on the floor. Around him the palace groaned like a living thing. There were sharp cracks as the heavy beams built into the stone structure bent and snapped. Rubble filled the stairwell ahead, so he turned and with his clubbed hands followed a wall that led to a larger room full of wreckage but clearly lit by the sunlight that poured in through the fallen ceiling above. He circled the mound, climbing the wreckage, looking for an exit. There was none. There was a harsh cry as the first of his pursuers appeared in the doorway, blocking his escape.
Bronze helm with high, blue, horsehair plume. Bronze shoulder guards and breastplate over heavy leather, aleather kirtle and bronze greaves on his lower legs. And a heavy, glinting, sharpened and deadly bronze sword raised high to cut him down.
Bloodstained, near naked, Ason ran to attack.
The warrior stood waiting, coldly, then brought the sword down in a sharp cut that would catch Ason at the base of the neck, half decapitate him, kill him.
Ason raised his bare left arm, as though to ward off this unstoppable blow that had all the other's weight behind it.
The sword struck his fist.
At the same instant, Ason's right fist swung around in a hammer blow that caught the man on the side of his head, below the helm, felling him like an ox. He moved, tried to stand, and Ason struck again and again with his right hand--his left arm now hanging limp and dead--striking the same spot on the helm, bending and denting the solid bronze until the man lay still.
He scrabbled at the fallen sword with his gloved hand, but could not pick it up. He was tearing at the leather and laces with his teeth when the other two men appeared in the doorway. Ason backed away slowly as they came after him, one slightly behind the other. There would be no escape this time. With a sword he would have fought them, but not fist against swords. They came on.
The second man shouted aloud in pain, writhed and fell, and Ason saw that someone was bent over him, pulling a dagger from the man's back. At this the first Atlantean turned, uncertain, and Ason hurled himself upon him, driving him down by the weight of his body, beating at him with his right fist. The man roared and struggled to pull away, to free his sword, and managed to writhe clear. Raising his sword arm in just the right manner to allow the already reddened dagger to slip up through his side, between his ribs and into his heart. Ason rolled over, still ready to fight, to look up at the Egyptian.
"Inteb!"
"We have to get out before all Atlantis falls about our heads."
"Cut these damn things from my hands first so I won't have to bear them to the grave with me."
Inteb did not pause to argue. His dagger was well tempered and razor edged, slipping easily through the bindings on Ason's right hand. The leather fell away, and Ason stretched his numbed fingers before reaching over and seizing the wrist of his dangling left arm. While he had been fighting for his life he had forgotten this arm. It felt as though it had been split down to his wrist. Which it might have been. The sword had hacked through the glove, and Inteb cut the few remaining strands of leather and pulled them away.
The hand was swollen and inflamed--but uncut. Inteb held out the lead plate, which was deeply scored but not chopped through. This and the thick leather had stopped the sword before it reached Ason's hand. Ason worked the fingers back and forth, ignoring the pain this produced, but could find no broken bones.
A greater tremor shook the building. They heard the tumble of falling masonry and thin screams in the distance. More of the ceiling tiles fell in on the far side of the room. Inteb quickly wiped his hand and the bloody dagger on the tunic of a dead Atlantean, then pointed to the mound of rubble.
"We might be safer climbing out here instead of trying to get out through the building, the way we came."
"Help me to get this armor off first," Ason said, pulling at the thongs that held the dead man's greaves in place.
"We don't have the time ... ."
"This is full armor, the best. No one will stop us when I am wearing it."
There was truth in this--and Inteb knew that arguments would avail him nothing. So there, in the center of thetoppling palace, they stripped the corpses and Ason put on his armor.
"Here, take this other sword," Ason said. "And the man's helmet. Quick."
"What good to me? I'm no warrior type."
"You killed these two."
"From behind. Cowardice. I have no knowledge of these things. I've never killed anybody before."
"Yet you followed me here, fought beside me, saved me."
"I didn't mean to. It's just that ...I didn't plan anything. Sitting there and watching Themis batter you to death ... . When you killed him, instead, and these men went after you, I went after them."
"Why, why?"
Inteb smiled at that. "Why? Because I respect you, Ason. You are a fellow prince. You in your realm, and I in mine."
They climbed the mound of stone and plaster at its highest spot. Inteb succeeded in bracing himself against a fallen beam while Ason clambered on his shoulders and clumsily, one handed, pulled himself through the opening. With his good hand he easily pulled Inteb up after him. Around them was the ruined palace, walls still collapsing as the quakes continued. A hot wind blew through the skeletal ruins, while pieces of ash fell from the sky, burning their bare skins.
"I have an Egyptian ship here," Inteb said. "If we can reach it we are safe."
"Show me the way."
They were the only living things in the ruins. The Atlanteans had fled, though an arm sticking from the rubble and the occasional crushed body were evidence that not all had escaped. They scrambled through the broken remains of the palace, avoiding the gaping holes that dropped to lower stories, and finally reached the now deserted courtyard. Steps led down from it to a lower garden where redcolumns and stylized bull horns lay fallen among the flowers and trees. From this terraced garden, atop the hill of the acropolis, all of the island of Thera could be seen below them. Stretching down the hill were the ornate buildings and temples--now mostly fallen in a jumble of ruins--with smaller buildings below. Then the ring of water of the inner harbor where ships were pulling from the shore, coming together in the mouth of the canal that led through the ringlike island to the wider outer harbor. At this distance little damage could be seen there, though there was the same jamming of vessels into the canal that led to the open sea.
From the far northern slopes of the island there rose up a white cloud, a climbing mountain of smoke that was already drifting overhead and dimming the sun. It billowed and rose, higher and wider all the time, brightened with rapid flashes of lightning. Thicker, evil-looking black smoke boiled about the base, bursting with explosions that sent arcing streamers of white out in all directions. One of these smoke trails shot towards the acropolis with powerful speed. The black dot at its tip, a gigantic boulder, grew to huge size in an instant before crashing down to blast into more rubble the already shaken ruins of the buildings. Horrified survivors ran down the hillside. Below them harbor waters were seething with fallen pumice.
There were other people here, in the dockside ruins of the town, dead in the streets, or digging out from their collapsed houses. Through the crooked nightmare streets of chaos the two men ran, headed always towards the waterfront and safety. Others were also fleeing in that direction, and at times they had to struggle through the jam of people in the narrow alleyways.
The docks themselves were empty of life. All the ships and boats had gone, and the people who had not sailed were fleeing across the bridges to the doubtful safety of the outer part of the island.
"We came this way," Inteb shouted. "My ship is mooredon the other side of those buildings."
One of the large buildings had fallen and completely blocked the main thoroughfare, and they had to detour around it, climbing carefully through the tottering ruins of smaller structures. A small elephant lay crushed by a fallen wall, almost dead, just the tip of its trunk moving helplessly from side to side. Then they were back at the water's edge by the collapsed ruin of the great ceremonial mooring. The roof had fallen in, and the gilded bull's horns drooped like lowered spears into the water.
The mooring was empty. The Egyptian ship was gone.
6
"There!" Inteb shouted "I see it going into the tunnel, out to sea, the last ship."
It was low in the water, loaded heavily with passengers, and a sheen of armor was visible on the stern deck. The captain had fled without Inteb--or had been forced to leave at sword's point. It did not matter which. Ason pointed.
"To the bridge, then. We'll have to follow the others."
Inteb raised his fists in impotent fury as the stern of his ship vanished into the covered canal, then he turned to follow Ason. They stayed along the shore, which was relatively clear of rubble, lowering their heads and shielding their faces against a sudden fall of hot particles of ash. The wind was blowing more strongly now and they leaned into it. There were moans of pain and shrill cries for help from a dock they passed, but they ignored these as they had all the others they had heard since leaving the palace. But one of the voices rose above the others and Ason stopped suddenly.
"Mycenaean--I call to another Mycenaean!"
Ason stumbled out onto the wooden dock towards the wreckage of a long, narrow galley. It was half underwater and had been abandoned. The galley slaves, clamped to their benches, had been left to die. It was one of these who had called to Ason, who stood on the dock above, looking down at the man.
"You are Tydeus, son of Agelaos. We have fought together."
Tydeus looked up, filthy and naked, the water almost to his waist. He had to shout to be heard above the wail of the other slaves, who were howling at Ason in a half-dozen tongues.
"I was taken at Asine, as you were, and prisoned here since. A wooden clamp is upon my right ankle; your sword can cut it."
Ason drew his sword, but Inteb pulled him by the arm and he stopped, angry. He could not leave a Mycenaean here to die. But Inteb was interested in more than a single life.
"This galley is only half foundered. If it can be bailed out we have a ship."
"Little chance of that," Tydeus said. "We were loaded, heavy, ready to leave, when great boulders fell from the sky. The biggest struck near the stern there, right through the bottom. They panicked and fled. Left us here." He laughed humorlessly. "The overseer was the last one off, tried to get by me. I grabbed his leg, pulled him back. We choked him and passed him along to stuff into the hole. Not much of a man alive, not a very good plug dead."
Inteb looked at the body that was submerged up to its shoulders. The man's head bobbed as small waves rocked the galley, mouth wide open and eyes still staring with horror.
"He appears to be a fat man," Inteb said.
"A pig," the nearest rower said.
"Then he will close the hole well, even better when he starts swelling up. And we can push cloth in around him for a better seal."
Word had passed in quick whispers and now all the slaves were silent, staring at Inteb, awaiting his word.
"That seems to have stopped the sinking. I'll take care of the plugging, the rest of you start bailing. We may have a ship that can get us away from here, at least to Anafi or los, the nearest islands. Shall we, Ason?"
"Of course. There'll be no other ships for us." Ason jumped into the galley and let Tydeus guide his sword to the shackle that held his ankle.
No time was wasted now in freeing the other rowers. They bailed with their hands where they sat. Tydeus ran to the ruins of the nearest buildings and returned with buckets, clay pots, anything that would hold water. He brought flaxen sailcloth, as well, from a looted ship's chandler; Inteb cut it into lengths with his dagger. He wadded the rags and pushed them into place around the corpse. It bobbed and gaped sightlessly at the hurried activity until finally it fell over as the galley was bailed out. Some of the galley slaves were dead; those in the prow had been drowned when it had gone under, and one in the waist had been brained by a falling stone. The surviving slaves ignored them and bailed frantically, hunched over beneath the fury that exploded in the sky above. The air was thick with dust and almost unbreathable. With painful slowness the galley rose in the water while the hot wind sent it banging into the dock.
"Enough," Inteb finally said. "Some can keep bailing. All the others must row now while we are still in smooth water."
Ason hacked the bow line with his sword, then ran back the length of the ship, between the slaves who were unshipping their oars, to cut the one at the stern. The figure of a man loomed suddenly above him and Ason raised hissword until he saw the other was unarmed. His face and head were caked with dried blood. Ason slashed at the line.
"There is room for one more aboard your ship, mountain man.
It was Aias, the boxer. Ason slashed with his sword but the man jumped nimbly back.
"Stay and die, Atlantean, we don't need you."
"No Atlantean, but a slave from Byblos. Used as a punching sack by the nobility. I see dead men aboard. Let me take one's place and row with you."
The line fell free and the galley began to move out.
"Come, mountain man, I did you no harm other than to tie your leathers and show you how to box. The palace fell on me and I was left for dead, but my head is too hard for that."
As Ason turned away and the oars dug in, Aias leaped and fell sprawling on the foredeck. He grinned up out of the red mask of his face as Ason spun about.
"Kill me if you wish. I would be just as dead if I stayed on shore."
"Take an oar," Ason said, dropping his sword into its slings. Aias laughed hoarsely and seized the nearest corpse, hurling it from the rowing bench to the deck, using it as a footrest as he slid the oar into its socket.
They were the last ship to leave. The sky was dark as dusk now, the hot wind sending waves before it across the water so that the rowers had to bend all their strength to their oars to move the galley against it. Only when they reached the canal was the force of the tempest cut off. The galley moved quickly through its dark length, while falling rock crashed and rumbled on the wooden covering above their heads. Then they were through and out into the choppy waves of the outer harbor.
It was like the aftermath of a naval battle. On the far shore three ships had been beached, half sunk, holed by falling rock. One had been careened already and men wereworking desperately on repairs. A mast projecting above the surface showed that at least one other had not been so lucky. Further on, the last ships, at least half a dozen, were jammed into the entrance tunnel of the canal. Oars crashed together and were broken as they fought to reach safety.
"Slow the beat," Ason called out when he saw what was happening, and Tydeus, who had taken the dead overseer's position at the drum, dropped the count.
They could do nothing until the ships had struggled free of each other and opened the way for them. And with every passing moment the volcanic eruption and earthquake worsened. Stones of all sizes were falling almost continuously now and the water foamed with their impact. Still worse was the hot ash now darkening the sun and falling in suffocating clouds. It coated the decks and formed thick mud in the bilges, making it almost impossible to catch a breath. Heavy sulphur fumes rode with it, and the men coughed and spat as they breathed it in.
"Look!" someone shouted, and they turned to see a fat-bellied merchant ship destroyed in an instant. It had pushed its way forward by weight alone and was at the mouth of the tunnel when the rock descended, half the size of the ship itself. In that brief moment, as the unstoppable mass struck the ship and plunged into the water, it was turned into broken fragments that vanished from sight in the maelstrom the rock's fall had caused. A black wave of water surged out, crushing the nearest ships, bearing swiftly down on the galley. They were thrown up and up to its summit then down into the trough as it passed at rushing speed. Water poured over the sides. Then they were level again, bailing frantically.


There were no longer any ships blocking the tunnel. Wreckage and half-foundered ships bobbed and scraped against the rock wall. A single ship, low in the water, limped into the tunnel and was gone. The galley went after it, pushing through the wreckage and the cries ofdrowning men. One man swam to the galley and clung to an oar, reaching up to the gunwale, holding on. The nearest tower, still clamped in his foot stock bent double and sank his teeth into the fingers, ground down hard until they vanished. Then they were into the tunnel and darkness closed around them.
"The tunnel's blocked, fallen in!" a man shouted, and Ason called out even more loudly above the panic-stricken voices.
"No--I can see the other end. It's the sky that is dark, but the tunnel is still there."
They went even slower, feeling their way when the oar tips brushed the rock walls. Then a gust of mephitic air laden with ash blew over them, and they knew they were almost through. Finally the canal opened out ahead, and beyond that the safety of the open sea.
The men at the oars did not seem to mind what was happening now, and Ason took no notice of the banks on each side, but to Inteb this was in many ways the most terrible part of a nightmare journey. For there were people there, whole families, lining the banks. They had come running from the farms and the villages seeking some escape. Their wailing was louder than the thunder in the clouds above as they reached out their hands, clutching towards the ship sailing by so closely, so unreachable. While all the time the volcanic ash fell in silent torrents from the sky until each of them, man, woman, child, was coated with it, until they were all the same: dusty, yellow figures transformed into living statues. Mothers held their children out to be taken; the ship continued on by. The other Atlantean ship was ahead of them in the canal, and there were wails as it, too, passed them by. Some people hurled themselves into the water to reach it, but few could swim. Only one man was afloat when the galley reached him, but an oar struck him full in the face and he vanished from sight.
On and on they went, between the endless rows of staring,yellowed figures, some still shrieking, others struck dumb with despair, and Inteb tried not to see them, longing for the escape of the dark cleft in the hills ahead. Waves were surging and splashing against the rock walls here, while the ocean beyond would be even rougher.
"Stop the oars," Ason ordered. "Step the mast and break out the sail."
They did it quickly. The sail was not a large one, meant more to aid the rowers than to move the ship by itself, but it would be vital in the open sea. As soon as it was rigged, the beat started again, and they sailed from the rift into the sea and away from Thera.
Into a growing storm. There was rain now mixed with the volcano ash; the sky wept thick mud upon them. The wind increased and they had a fierce struggle with the mud-coated sail, taking in two reefs to keep it from blowing away. Behind them Thera belched out ash and stone and thundered at their escape.
"The wind is wrong," Ason said, hammering his fist on the rail. "From the north. It will wreck us on Crete if we are not careful, and we'll all be dead or back in Atlantean hands." He squinted at the sky and at the dimly visible disc of the sun. "It will help if we sail northwest, or even west. But we'll have to row as well."
By sunset the wind had not lessened; if anything it had increased. Half the men rowed while the others slept, sprawled in the mud. The ship had been well provisioned and nothing had been touched when the crew and passengers had fled. They drank water, pouring it down their dry throats, ate bread, cheese and dark green olives. Ason collapsed on the cot in the tiny cabin and lay, unmoving and exhausted, while Inteb rubbed sweet oil into his cuts and bruises. Now exhaustion and pain overwhelmed him; his left hand was swollen like a melon, the fingers like sausages. He cradled it against his chest and dropped instantly into the black well of sleep.
He awoke to darkness and the frantic movement of theship; the creaking of the timbers around him and the howl of the wind outside. A hand was on his shoulder and Inteb spoke, shouting to be heard.
"We are close to shore. The breakers, we can hear them on the rocks. The rowers are exhausted, I don't know how much longer we can keep on."
Ason shook his head, trying to drive away the dulling pain and fogginess, then staggered to his feet and felt along the wooden ribs for the amphorae lashed there. His fingers found the silver cup tied by a thin chain to the handle of one of the tall containers. He plunged it in and drank deep. It was wine, not water, but he drained the cup twice and felt the better for it.
On deck the wind struck like a hammer. The rain seemed to have stopped, but the wind was stronger, tearing off the tops of the waves and sending the scud flying before it. Nothing could be seen in the enshrouding darkness, but between gusts a distant booming could be heard off to port.
"It seems to be louder now," Inteb called out.
"Is the sail still holding?" Ason asked.
"We had to lower it before it blew away."
"Raise it again. Oars alone will never hold us off that shore."
One man was lost overboard when they raised the sail; there was a single wail as the wind caught him and hurled him into the ocean, then nothing more. That is how close the end was for all of them, just the strength of their arms and the thin wooden hull of the ship keeping them from the hungry sea. A single reef was all that could be let out of the sail, but it helped. This and the labors of the oarsmen kept them off the unseen shore.
The night was endless. The men rowed to the point of complete exhaustion, then rowed still more. When there was no strength left in their arms to pull the heavy oars, they bailed until they were able to row again.
Dawn came upon them unaware. Because of the layersof clouds, there was no color in the sky, just a growing awareness that forms could be dimly seen. Then, in shades of gray, the water-logged galley appeared to view with the men slumped over their oars. Far fewer than had been there at sunset the night before. Tydeus stood solidly at the steering sweep, where he had been all night. Aias looked up from his oar and grinned his hideous gap-lipped smile at Ason. For all his years, he was one of the few men still rowing, slowly but steadily.
Off to port, no more than 20 stadia away, the dark bulk of Crete rose out of the sea. Behind them it was black and jagged and still topped at the horizon, but ahead it seemed to be cut off abruptly. Inteb looked up from bailing when Ason called to him, pointing off the port bow. Inteb blinked to focus his red-rimmed, totally exhausted eyes.
"There, is that the eastern tip of the island?"
Inteb joined him on the deck, trying to make out details in the half light.
"It's hard to tell. It might just be a headland. We'll know soon enough."
"Once we clear it we will have sea room and we can run before the wind if we must. No chance of being wrecked on that shore then."
Even as he spoke there was a sharp crack, and the line that raised the sail and acted as a backstay broke and snapped loudly over their heads. It had borne the increasing pressure of the wind all night against the sail. It had finally been too much. Without this support the mast bent dangerously, pulled over by the bellying sail.
It happened in an instant, and there was a stunned moment before the exhausted men could react. Ason was the first. He pulled his sword and ran for the bar-tight lines that secured the foot of the sail. Before he could reach them there was a splintering crash as the mast snapped like a dead stick and began to fall.
Ason hurled himself aside and the mast crashed pastwhile the sail buried him in its folds. By the time he fought free it was all over.
The mast, though still attached by the lines, plunged over the side of the ship, pulled by the weight of the sail, splintering the rail and crushing one rower as it went. Now, with the sail gone and the rowing stopped, the wind was carrying them down towards the rocky flank of Crete where the spray from tall waves could already be seen leaping high into the air.
7
Once more, from the depths of their strained bodies, they had to find the energy to seize the blood-stained handles of the oars. To row again. The wind was driving them towards the rocks, and now they could no longer count upon the sail for any aid. They rowed. The dead weight of the mast and sail in the water slowed their progress--but also made it more difficult for the wind to drive them ashore. They left it all there, hanging clumsily over the side, and bent to their oars.
They rowed. Heads down, pulling, not stopping, rowing for survival. They were moving slowly along the shore--yet it was rushing closer towards them all the time. Details could be seen: rocks standing out in the surging surf, trees overhanging the edge high above. They rowed. One, then another, falling from exhaustion, unconscious, only to awake and seize the hated oar again. The headland reached far out into the sea, a gray arm waiting to seize them, and the final few minutes were the worst. They were actually in the surge of breakers from the rocks, white foam all about them, when they struggled by.
Ahead was the open sea, with the island of Crete cutting sharply away from them in an immense bight, curving outto a distant, smaller headlead. They could weather that one easily.
"Cease rowing," Ason called out, his voice cracking with the dryness of it, too weary to rise and get a drink.
"And now, mountain man?" Aias asked from the seat opposite, where he leaned on his oar. "We are both a long way from home."
"Now?" Ason stood and stretched his aching muscles. "Now we drift. Unless you can think of something better."
Aias shrugged and looked at his palms. Even his leathery hands were blistered and bleeding after the night of ef fort. "I've had enough rowing for awhile, I'll say that much." He leaned over the sides and let his hands drop wearily into the water.
They ate on the rear deck, mixing the wine with water, then drinking it greedily. Someone had brought up a pithos of olives, which they dipped into and ate by the handful, and there was a wheel of hard cheese that they tore chunks from and chewed. Basic fare, no more and no less than they were accustomed to. They ate greedily. Even Inteb had his share, his hunger masking for the moment the pain of his flayed palms. Tydeus was relieved at the steering sweep and he dropped down beside them on the deck, sprawling as exhaustedly as the others.
"You are the seaman, Tydeus," Ason said. "Your father, Agelaos, had a great ship; you must have sailed on it?" Tydeus nodded, his mouth filled with cheese. "What is our course-and what do we do next?"
Tydeus squinted at the sky and the receding shore.
"We don't return to Mycenae this way," he said.
"That I was sure of. What lies in this direction?"
"Deep water, monsters that eat ships, nothing."
"There is always something. We can't even row to Crete to surrender--if we should want to--we are well past the island. What other islands lie in this direction?"
"None."
The word was coldly said and drew a responsive shiver from the circle of listening men. To sail a ship meant to sail along a coast or, as in the closely spaced Cyclades, to sail from island to island. One island was always in sight ahead before the last one dropped astern. At night, or in case of storms, the ship could be pulled ashore on some beach. What else could be done? The ocean was a vast waste, more empty of landmarks than the emptiest desert. If you sailed out upon it how could you return? A man could tell directions from the sun--but what happened on cloudy days? To leave the security of a shoreline was madness. And now they were leaving Crete behind, the undying wind forcing them away from its shores. If a man were to look ahead he would see nothing except heaving water, nothing at all.
"Then we are lost," a rower said. "And will die out hete."
"The wind will die first and we can return."
"And if it does not?"
"A moment," Inteb said, and their voices stilled. He took out his dagger and knelt, drawing on the wooden deck with its point.
"I am no ship's captain, but I do know about the parts of this world. I am learned in mathematics and geography. I am also an Egyptian, and I sailed from Egypt, and I will show you how it was done. We sailed along this shore here, in a line like this. Past cities and islands until we reached the Argolid and the port of Tiryns here." He had scribed a half loop upon the deck, a half circle, and now he pricked the boards at the center of the loop.
"From Tiryns we sailed to Thera, and now we have passed Crete and are going in this direction, into the emptiness of the sea." They watched in silence as he slid the blade further on until it touched the spot where he had started.
"There you see it, Egypt and the Nile, Thebes. They are all there, somewhere on the far side of the water, in thatdirection." They followed the direction of his pointing knife, saw nothing, and turned back to him with widened eyes.
"But--how far?" someone asked. Inteb shrugged.
"Forty skene, eighty skene. I don't know. But if we continued south far enough we shall come to that shore. And it seems we have very little choice in the matter. We cannot return, even to Crete and the Atlanteans, not against this wind. Crete will soon be out of sight--and then what do we do? Ride before the storm, that is all, and instead of praying for the wind to die pray that it blows until we reach the African shore."
There was nothing else they could do. The sea was rough and the storm continued with frequent heavy rain squalls passing over them. But the sail and broken mast acted as a sea anchor in the water so that they rode easily before the wind. Ason stayed awake with a few others, to steer and bail, while the others slept where they dropped. The day passed, and the night, until by dawn of the second day the wind had fallen and the seas died down. Ason was still awake, leaning on the steering sweep, when the sky lightened in the east. Stars appeared through rifts in the scudding clouds. Inteb came on deck a few minutes later, blinking at the strange red light that lit the sky and bathed everything in a bloody glow.
"What is it?" he asked. Ason shook his head.
"Sunrise. But I have seen nothing like it before."
In the growing dawn the entire sky was aflame. Not only in the east where the orange globe of the sun was rising above the horizon, but wherever its rays struck. The disappearing clouds were on fire, burning and vanishing in their own combustion. They all watched silently, and only when the sun was higher in the sky did the consuming display lessen and disappear.
"I have seen something like that once, in the desert," Inteb said. "It was during a sandstorm and the sun was as red as that coming through the clouds of sand. Perhaps thedust thrown up by Thera. But so much, impossible to believe."
"I believe what the gods will, they will. It is their sky." Ason drooped tiredly, half supported by the sweep, the phenomena in the sky forgotten in his weariness. Inteb looked at him, concerned.
"How is your hand--and the wounds?" he asked. Ason flexed the fingers of his left hand. The skin was purple and black, but the swelling had died down.
"Better, everything better. The cuts have caked in their own blood the way they should, and even my head does not bother me this morning. There are other things to think about. No wind."
"We can begin rowing then."
"In which direction?" Ason asked.
"That is for you to decide. There are still light airs from the north. If we return we must row against them all the way. Towards Crete. While ahead lies Africa."
"How far?"
"I can only guess, no one knows. Further, closer, who can say? A decision will have to be made."
"I have already decided. We go south."
With the sun to port they began the long row.
The tangled mass of sail and mast was cut away and drifted astern. Watches were assigned and an inventory of their supplies begun. If the men had any doubt about the wisdom of this decision to go on they kept it to themselves. Half of them were slaves and the sons of slaves, capable only of taking orders, knowing nothing else. The rest were fighting men, warriors from all the cities and countries that bordered on the sea empire of Atlantis. Men from the Argolid, Mycenae, Tiryns, Asine, from the far islands of Ikaria and Samos, and even more distant Byblos and Tyre. They spoke different tongues and were of different races, alike only in one thing: Each of them had fought Atlantis and been defeated, captured and enslaved, shackled to this galley. Destined to labor hard on poor food for a fewyears until they sickened and died and were cast overboard. Ason had freed them from this and saved them from destruction on the exploding Thera. In doing this he became their leader and, being simple men, they would simply follow where he led. Spitting on their palms, they bent to their oars.
Inteb sat in the open doorway of the cabin and scratched marks onto a fragment of broken pottery, recording his inventory of the ship's supplies. Sitting here he could also keep track of the galley's course, marking how the shadows fell across the deck outside, telling him both the time of day and the direction of their sailing. When they ventured too far to the east or west he would call out instructions to the steersman to point them south again. Ason had slept well and now sat inside with his bronze sword and a whetstone, working out the nicks and putting a better edge to it. A cup of wine mixed with honey sat nearby, as well as some raisins.
"Raisins," Inteb said, ticking off his list. "Barley meal and cheese, olives, olive oil, and some dried fish with the worm in it. We won't starve. Wine and water, though some of the water is beginning to stink already. There are ship's supplies: thread, cloth and needles to mend the sail we no longer have, tar for caulking and wood for repairs. But there is nothing we can do with them until we reach a shore. The overseer has swollen nicely and is still making a fair plug, though he is beginning to smell more than the water, and no one will sit near him when they row. Some chests that belonged to the bronzesmiths who had deserted, and to the captain."
"What's in them?"
"The chalcei's tools for working bronze, the usual thing. Some jewelry, a lot of clothes, then a chest with a seal that I broke. It has three swords and four daggers in it, part of their stock in trade. Nothing else of real importance."
Ason looked into his cup. "How much wine andwater?" he asked.
"We won't be thirsty for awhile yet."
"How long?"
"If we are careful ten, maybe twelve days. But the fish will have eaten away the overseer and we'll have sunk by then."
"You are in a cheerful mood today, Inteb. Will we reach land before that happens?"
"Hawk-billed Horus may know, or your gods who watch from Olympus--but how can I tell? The sea may be too wide to cross, we may go in circles forever, a storm may come and swamp us. Could I have some of that wine? I feel a need for it."
Ason handed over a silver cupful and Inteb buried his nose in it, drinking deeply, hoping the strong fumes would burn the thoughts of death from his brain. He stared into its depths, seeking some omen there, then drank again. Ason looked up at him, aware of the sudden sadness.
"Do you feel the end so close? Yet you were the one who told us how we could go on."
"To speak of a decision in the abstract is one thing, to do it is another matter. When I am asked to build a wall or a tomb I draw a plan. I do not have to build the thing myself. I may even turn my design over to another builder and go away. He will see that it is built. I do not have to be personally involved with what I design. So to design a voyage that has never been done before is one thing, I am very good at that. To take the voyage is something completely different."
"That is a new way of looking at things."
"Different from yours, strong-thewed Ason. To you, I imagine, the thought and the deed are one; the thought of the battle begins with the battle."
"You begin to sound like my father."
"Perimedes leads the Argolid, as well as Mycenae, because he thinks of more than just the battle. He thinks ofalliances and high walls and bronze for the swords men must fight with." Sudden memory struck Inteb, and he looked up. "Your father's brother, Lycos, I heard of him before I left the city. He is dead."
"How could you know? He was far away--I cannot tell you where."
Inteb glanced out at the deck, then shouted a course change to the steersman before he answered, wondering how much of the truth he should tell.
"You have known me for three years, Ason. Do you call me friend and think of me as a friend of Mycenae?"
"Yes, I suppose I do. But you were in Atlantis ... ."
"Sent by Pharaoh, on his mission. I told them nothing of my work in your city."
"I believe you. My belief is strengthened by the two men you killed to aid me. But why are you asking this now?"
"Because I know far more about your city than you may realize I do. The megaron of your father covers all Mycenae. People gossip and talk; nothing is secret long. I know there is a mine on a distant island in the cold sea and that all of your tin comes from there. Your uncle Lycos was killed there and the mine destroyed. Perimedes did not take the loss lightly."
"No, he would not. My father is a maker of mighty plans. His holy bronze is a big part of them. Poor Lycos, what a cold and wet place to die. I sailed with him, when he went back there, but I returned on the ship with the tin. He stayed on, swearing no one could root the tin from the earth as he could, but it looked simple enough. There were others to do the work. Did many die with him?"
"All. Your cousin Phoros returned with the word."
"Old Koza, he showed me how to use the sword. Mirisati, we were friends. They should be avenged, ten to one at least, put the whole island to the sworn. Ason thought deeply about it, forgetting even the wine while the shadows lengthened.
They rowed all that day and into the early evening when the stars came out. Inteb pointed out the guide stars to the steersman and told him to keep them always behind him, but the sky clouded over soon after and they had to take in the oars. Then, except for the man on watch, they slept, and were awakened at dawn by heavy seas and rain. This storm lasted for two days, and it was all they could do to stay before the wind, bail out the galley and keep it from foundering. On the third day the storm blew itself out, but the seas were still high and the sky clouded over. A feeling of despair, as dark as the clouds above, hung over the galley. That was when Ason had to kill the slave from Aleppo.
He was a dark man with olive skin, as dark as an Egyptian, with long black hair that he kept tied in a knot on one side of his head. Where he was born there was nothing but hills and a river, with dry desert beyond, stretching away to the end of the world. Until the Atlanteans had captured him, he had never seen the sea, and until this voyage had never been out of sight of land. There was wine mixed with the water now--he had never tasted that before either--and it did strange things to his head. When they did not row, and water poured over the side and sloshed over his legs, something seemed to swell up inside of him, bursting out of his mouth as a scream, driving him to his feet.
"Row!" he shouted. "Go back. To Crete, the Atlanteans. We will die here."
"And which way is back?" Ason asked, looking down on him from the deck above. "We will row only when we know which way to go."
"Now, we must--"
"No."
The man from Aleppo jumped to the walkway and swung the heavy bailing bucket at Ason, catching him on the thigh and sending him staggering back. Ason was unarmed, his sword in his cabin, but Inteb was close by. He seized the Egyptian's dagger and, when the man raised thebucket again, he reached out the dagger like a shining deadly finger and drove it into the man's throat, twisting it so that the major blood vessels were severed. A push sent the man over the side, and only his blood rose again to the surface. Ason went and put on all his armor and sword and did not take them off again.
That day was the worst, because the sky did not clear. But soon after dark the stars came out and they rowed, looking at the stars that marked the north above the stern, and told each other how to find them, shouting at the steersman and cursing him thoroughly if he strayed from the proper course.
The overseer's corpse lasted two days more before its obvious state of decay became too intolerable. And the hole was beginning to leak around the edges. A thin and broad-shouldered young man named Pylor from the island of Kea said that he had much diving experience after the sponges that grew offshore there, and he volunteered to look under the galley. A line was tied under his arms and he dived and came up quite soon after.
"Lots of fishes," he reported. "And not much of that whoreson left below the waist, except for hanging bones. He's been used up."
Tydeus, who had experience in patching ships at sea when they could not be properly careened on a beach, showed them how to make a mat that could be slung outside the hull. They took the largest piece of sailcloth they had and sewed rope ends and rags torn from good clothing to one side of it. Lines were attached to the four corners of this and, with much shouting and pulling and a number of dives by Pylor, it was passed under the galley and over the hole and the truncated corpse of the overseer. The rags and rope ends faced the hull and would mat together to form a temporary patch. Once this was in place, all that remained was to pluck the corpse from the hole and put a wooden cover inside the ship. Boards were cut and shaped for this and held together with bronze pins, but there werefew volunteers to remove the noisome plug.
"I'll take one arm--who'll have the other?" Ason asked. Some of the men actually leaned away when he looked around at them, and Inteb managed to be out of sight in the cabin.
Aias laughed at their squeamishness, and pushed them aside and went to stand beside Ason. "I've hugged women and boys and sheep to my body, mountain man," he said. "This will be the first time for a stinking corpse, but I have a mind to try it to see what it is like."
A single strong heave did it, and the overseer's corpse bobbed astern in a flurry of fish, while Ason and Aias washed their arms over the side. Very little water came in around the patch, and the wooden cover was quickly secured in place and sealed with pitch. After that only a slight amount of water leaked in. No one wanted to think what would happen to these makeshift repairs in case of a storm.
One day was very much like another after this and Inteb recorded their passing by making marks on the inner wall of the cabin. He measured out the water and food himself while Ason stood close by, or slept in the doorway so no other could enter. There was no more open rebellion, though sometimes the men whispered together after dark. One of them tried to talk to Aias, but the boxer struck him on the side of the head and he was unconscious the best part of the day.
The water began to run low and tasted increasingly foul and Inteb mixed more and more wine with it, of which they had a greater supply. Most of the men were unused to this, and with the heat of the sun many babbled and others fell down and had to be propped over the benches with their faces out of the bilges so they did not drown.
It was on the twelfth day that they sighted the dark line of what might be clouds low on the horizon before them. They rowed then, all of them, without being told, and the line grew darker and larger and was not clouds at all.
"The coast, it must be," Inteb said, and the galley rocked wildly as the men stood to see for themselves. Ason settled his sword in its slings over his shoulder for the first time since the man from Aleppo had been killed. They were as one again, drinking and laughing together, and any thoughts of mutiny were left behind in that trackless sea. There was a shore ahead, land, any land, it did not matter. The endless voyage was over and the boldest were already bragging about it to each other. They were already remembering it as being twice as long as it had been, and their memories would improve with age.
It was Tydeus, at his accustomed post at the steering sweep, who first saw the sail. A dot to begin with, perhaps a rock, but as it grew clearer he called to the others. They crowded up to look until Ason ordered them back to the oars. But Aias remained on the deck, staring at it as though it were a face he remembered, even tugging away the drooping scarred flesh over his eye so he could see better.
"That dark sail, the way it is set. I know them. The men of Sidon."
"I know the Sidonioi," Inteb said. "They are traders, silver bowls and fine textiles, I've bought from them myself."
Aias had the scarred rocks of his fists clenched, crouching forward.
"Yes, they trade with Egypt," he said. "And Atlantis--because they have to. But we know them in Byblos and they are known all along the shores of the sea wherever they sail. Traders when they must be, pirates by choice."
"They'll butcher us for the stores of the cabin and the wood in the hull."
8
The ship moved swiftly towards them, swooping down to the attack like a dark bird of prey. This was something that Ason felt he could take care of. No armored fists here, or sinking ships to deal with, but the straightforward threat of arms that could be met in the same way.
"Inteb, open the bronzesmith's chest and give weapons to those who know how to use them. The rest of you, quickly now, bail water into this ship."
They did not stop to ask why but did as they were told. The orders were definite, and as the dark ship came closer the galley sank deeper in the water. The men with the swords bent low and hurried to conceal themselves in the stern cabin and under the narrow foredeck, while those who had the daggers sat on the rowing benches and hid the weapons beneath them. Aias refused the offer of a sword and held up a clenched fist.
"My weapons are with me always," he said, dropping onto the bench nearest the cabin. "What will you have us do?"
"Take them by surprise," Ason said. "Put your ankles back into the stocks and close them, as though you were locked in. Take in most of the oars. Look sick, that should be easy enough. Look dead if you are afraid to play-act. The mast and sail are gone, the ship waterlogged, you are slaves who have been deserted. Let the men of Sidon see a ripe fruit easy for the plucking so they will be unprepared. When I call to you we will all attack at once. We will not stop until they are dead. One ship will leave here, one crew alive. It will be ours."
Aias, perhaps from his many battles in the arena before the crowds, gave a fine performance. He had boxed with nobles whom he could have slain in moments, yet had managed to lose to them, and in doing so proved their superior skill. Now he collapsed on the bench, callinghoarsely to the approaching ship, while whispering at the same time to the men in the cabin.
"They're coming on steadily, using oars with the sail furled. Men hanging over the sides, pointing and shouting. Helms on some of them, but no armor that I can see, swords and spears. They're taking in the oars now, drifting close."
There were guttural shouts from the dark ship that loomed above them, drifting down upon them. High stem posts rose fore and aft, darkly painted, and just as dark was the sail now furled, angling across the mast in the high lateen rig. There was more shouting and laughter, and then the galley shuddered as the ship bumped against them. Feet thudded onto the cabin roof while another Sidonioi jumped down to the foredeck with a line, bending to tie it securely. Others boarded once the two ships were lashed together, tall dark men with black hair and beards, their hair held back by a circlet about the head. And Ason still waited. Until now they had ignored the galley slaves, and he wanted as many of them aboard as possible before he made any move. Then a man appeared in the doorway whose robe was dyed purple, unlike the plain white of the others, and he held a richly decorated sword in his hand.
Ason plunged his own sword into the man's middle, kicking the body out of the way as it fell, seizing the sword from the limp fingers, roaring the lion roar of Mycenae.
The rowers rose up and killed the men nearest to them. Aias lashed out a fist as a dark-bearded warrior turned towards him, hitting him so hard that he crashed into the next man, toppling them both over; before they could recover Aias hurled them both into the sea.
After the first surprise attack the men of Sidon rallied and stood back to back with their weapons drawn. They were bold fighters and did not retreat, but shouted instead for help from their ship. More men climbed over the sides to join them, and the fighting became fierce and deadly.
Ason's sweeping sword cleared the rear deck and then, instead of joining the battle in the ship below, he mounted the rail and clambered up the side of the black ship. A spear stabbed down, but he lowered his head and it glanced from his helm. Before it could be drawn back for a second blow he stabbed upwards with his sword, impaling the man, then pushed his body aside to climb to the deck above. Seizing up the spear to use in place of a shield, he shouted aloud again so everyone could hear him, then, like a farmer cutting grain, began to scythe his way slowly down the deck.
A warrior in full armor cannot be stopped. Another armored man may fight him, and the better will win, but no one else. Spears rebound from his chest, swords from his helmet, the solid bronze of his greaves keep his legs from being cut from under him. Ason was made for killing, as methodical and unstoppable as waves crashing on a shore, looking from under the rim of his helm and putting his sword into the soft and unprotected bodies of those who stood before him.
He thrust and cut and moved steadily down the deck. The men who had attacked the galley tried to return to save their own ship, but were cut down from behind when they did. A wail of despair went up from the survivors, yet they did not stop fighting. Powerful men and good swordsmen, they fought on, singly and together, fewer and fewer of them, the last man fighting as ably as the first, dying with guttural curses on his lips.
It was finally done, the last drop of blood shed, the last corpse stripped and heaved over the side. The men of the galley had suffered, but not heavily. The simpler cuts were washed with oil and sea water until they closed. But a heavily bearded, silent man from Salamis had been cut deeply in the stomach, and he held the lips of the wound together to keep his insides from falling through. He made no attempt to stop the blood. Bleeding to death was the least painful way to die and they all knew it. They broughthim wine, although he could only touch it to his lips, and sat and talked and joked with him until his eyes finally closed and he slumped.
Ason had mixed the wine himself and saw to it that they all had some. Then, while they were still laughing and cursing, filled with victory, he called to them from the high rear deck. His own mind had been made up ever since they had first sighted this ship, and he had waited only for this moment to tell them.
"I know this shore," he called out. "I sailed here once. In that direction, some days sail, is Egypt. You can go there if you want to, you can have your share of what we find aboard this ship and the galley."
There were excited shouts at this, because looters had already plunged into the holds and come up with cloth and flasks of oil, even ivory carvings, which were highly valued everywhere. Ason could feel the rise of their emotions, and at its peak he called out again and pointed his dripping sword in the opposite direction, west along the shore.
"You can do as you will--but I am going that way, to the west, and I ask the best of you to come with me. Past the Pillars of Herakles to the Island of the Yerni, to avenge my uncle and my kinsmen who were killed there. We will bring back tin, enough to fill a ship, tin that is more valuable than gold or silver--and you will have your share. So now I ask you, men who sailed the ocean where no one has ever gone before, who battled and killed the men of Sidon, are you afraid of anything? Will you sail with me to the lands few men have ever seen--to return home rich? Who is with me?"
There could be only one answer, a roared cheer, again and again. How could they refuse? They could do anything, they knew it, anything! Ason dropped his sword to the deck and threw the spear into the air with his other hand, catching it as it dropped in his right, drawing it back farther and farther. Then he threw with all his strength, hurling the spear west towards the low afternoon sun. Upit arched, thrumming as it flew, with the sun driving golden light from its bronze head, as though it would reach the sun itself. It was only a speck when it hit the water and vanished, and the men were still cheering.
Ason bent to pick up his sword, and when he straightened up he saw Inteb looking at him with a half smile on his lips.
"You planned this, didn't you?" he asked.
"Yes. I have been thinking about it ever since you told me about Lycos and the others. A ship will have to go to avenge them and get the tin--and we have a ship right here, along with a crew. It would take weeks to return to Mycenae and set out again, and why should we? We are well on our way to the western sea. My father has talked enough of tin, so even I know that Mycenae must have it and now, soon, at once, while Atlantis still licks her wounds. They lost many ships and warriors on Thera, perhaps even Atlas himself is dead, though that is too much of a blessing to expect. Now we must fight them--now we can fight them. For that we must have the tin."
"When you say that you sound like Perimedes."
"He is the king and I am his son. But what about yourself, Inteb? I don't think I heard you cheering with the others."
"You will always have my cheers, Ason; they do not have to be delivered at certain times. We are close now to Egypt, where my home is, and I have high honors due from Pharaoh. Shouldn't I return there?"
"Should you? You could come with us. You have become like my right hand, and I love you like a brother."
"And I love you, Ason, but not like a brother." He took him by the forearms and leaned his cheek against Ason's rough cheek, damp with sweat and specked with drying drops of blood. "I love you and I will go with you wherever you wish me to go."

Copyright © 1972, 1983 by Harry Harrison and Leon Stover. Portions of this book were formerly published as Stonehenge.