Oracle (10 page)

Spring dappled the walls and courtyard with pink petals.

It had been a difficult winter. Oh, there was food aplenty—for those within the walls of Mycenae at least—and warmth and comfort too. But being confined for so long in just two rooms—and those enclosed in city walls—made Nikko want to howl like a wolf sometimes.

He had spent most of his life out on the mountain. Even Thetis had always had the village to roam about, the hills to see above her. And now for months they had been closeted in two rooms, working, exercising…

Somewhere out there is the sea, thought Nikko, as he stirred the onion skins in the big bronze pot on the fire. Onion skins boiled with tin, a precious metal from far away in the Hyperborean lands, produced a yellow dye for wool—and Dora’s hair. Orkestres said that you could glimpse the sea from up in the high palace. You could see half the world, he said.

Surely, Nikko thought, no one would notice two children, not if they kept their faces down and looked like they were servants. Or maybe they could climb the walls early, when only the sentries were about. The sentries liked Dora: she passed them up hot possets when
it was cold. Maybe they’d let her take him and Thetis up onto the walls one dawn, before most of the palace was awake.

The door opened. It was Dora, bringing back their morning meal from the kitchens on a wooden tray covered with cloth. ‘How is it looking—?’ she began, then stopped, and stared around.

‘Where is she?’

‘Thetis?’ Nikko blinked. ‘She was combing wool a little while ago. She must be in the next room.’ Thetis didn’t like to use the chamber pot when anyone was looking.

Dora shot him a look he couldn’t interpret. She stuck her head around the inner door, then looked back.

‘She’s gone.’

‘She can’t have gone!’

‘She has, right enough.’ Dora lowered her bulk onto one of the stools. ‘She’s been gone before. Times you were sleeping—and she thought we were sleeping too. Slipped out on her ownsome.’

Nikko stared, guilt spearing through him. It was his job to look after Thetis. How could he not have noticed?

‘I never said anything—she was never gone for long. I know it’s hard for a child, cooped up in here with all that’s new going on outside. But she’s never vanished during the day like this. Fool that I am. No more sense than a plucked pigeon!’

‘But what can we do?’

‘Wait. If either of us went looking for her—or Orkestres either—we’d just draw attention to ourselves. You don’t know what it’s like, my lamb. All anyone inside
these walls has to talk about is themselves. Gossip flies faster than an eagle, and just as vicious. No, she’ll be back soon—’

The door opened. Dora heaved herself to her feet, her face clearing.

But there were three figures at the door, not one. Orkestres, holding Thetis’s hand and, on the other side of her, the Chamberlain.

The man was just as round as when Nikko had seen him all those moons before. But he was dressed more richly now than when he had been checking the arrival of the tributes. His kilt had so much embroidery it was hard to see the colour of the cloth below; his belt was silver, carved with lions’ heads. The rolls of polished fat on his bare chest pushed against the opening of his cloak.

He smiled. It’s a wolf’s smile, thought Nikko, as though he’s showing his teeth before he leaps.

‘Look what I have found.’ The Chamberlain gave Thetis a small push on her back, so she lost her grip on Orkestres’s hand and stumbled inside. She ran to Dora and half hid behind her wide trousers.

‘She was up on the battlements above the high palace, peering down at the High King’s feast like a baby hawk. One of the guards brought her to me—he has seen her before, it seems.

‘I had quite forgotten the two children.’ The Chamberlain’s voice was light and cold. ‘Such valuable children too, worth twenty goats and as many bags of grain. And so I thought, it is time His Majesty had value for his lost tributes.’

‘They’re not ready to perform yet,’ said Dora hoarsely. ‘They have great talent—but they must be trained.’

‘They have had, what, five months? Time enough to eat the worth of a gold chain. Time enough to learn a dance or two.’ The voice was chilly as the frost that had rimmed the walls of Mycenae midwinter. ‘You do not make use of His Majesty’s tributes to buy yourself the children you never had, Orkestres. The girl and boy will perform this afternoon.’

‘No—’ Orkestres’s voice was desperate.

‘This afternoon, when the sun is two fingers above the horizon. You know the way to the feasting hall…you do remember, don’t you?’ There was venom in the voice now. ‘It has been so long since the High King has called for you. I will send a servant to bring you, in case you have forgotten, and torches to show you back.’

He smiled again. His bare feet—the toenails were painted red, and the heels rouged too—made no sound as he padded back up the courtyard.

‘This afternoon.’ Orkestres’s voice was bleak as the fields after the harvest had been taken.

‘We can work out a dance for them…a simple one. A few leaps, handstands and the double somersault. They’re good enough not to shame themselves, and such pretty lambs. Surely the High King will call for them again.’

‘Could we use the sword?’ put in Nikko eagerly. Thetis was able to stand on the sword now, without it cutting into her feet, though she still hadn’t learned how to leap onto it. ‘If Thetis stands on the sword then I can lift it, and twirl it around, then she can leap off, onto my shoulders, and—’

‘No!’

Nikko started. He had never heard that note in Orkestres’s voice before.

‘You do those tricks only when you are sure nothing,
nothing
, will ever go wrong. Do you know what happens if a sword sheds blood before the King?’

Nikko shook his head numbly.

‘The person dies. Once a sword has tasted blood it needs a life. Death will seek out whoever is nearby.’

‘So if Thetis cut her feet…’ began Nikko slowly, while Thetis watched wide-eyed.

‘Even a trickle of blood would mean the guards would kill her, there in front of the King, as soon as it was spotted. Do you know what happens if a performer falls, and cannot get up again?’

Once more, Nikko shook his head.

‘Again, they are killed where they lie, a sacrifice to the Mother. No.’ Orkestres’s voice was firm. ‘All you can do tonight is what you have rehearsed time after time.’

‘But will that be enough to please the High King?’ cried Nikko desperately.

Orkestres shrugged, carefully avoiding Dora’s gaze. The old woman’s eyes were full of tears. But Orkestres’s were empty.

They practised all morning. It was a simple act in the end, one that would rely on the youth and grace of the performers to charm the High King. But at least it was one they could do with no mistakes.

It felt strange to wear nothing but thin leather, almost like being naked. It would feel even worse with a hundred pairs of eyes watching him—all the grand lords of the palace as well as the High King.

Orkestres carefully outlined the children’s eyes with charcoal and darkened their brows. He lifted up a tiny glass pot and pulled out the stopper. It was filled with beeswax, strangely red and smelling of spring flowers. He dipped in a finger and rubbed some onto Nikko’s lips and cheeks and heels and then onto Thetis’s, then another smear of charcoal on their eyelids.

Dora ran her hand over their plaits, small ones tied together in a ball at their necks. Long hair could blind an acrobat.

‘You’ll be wonderful,’ said Dora, a little too loudly. ‘You’ll show them all. Now remember: smile. A smile is worth a thousand somersaults! Bow to the King when you enter the hall, your face to the floor, and don’t rise till you hear his voice.’

‘How will we know it’s him if our faces are on the floor?’

‘You’ll know,’ said Orkestres shortly. He stared at them, first at Nikko, and then at Thetis. ‘Whatever happens this afternoon,’ he said at last, ‘I will know you’ve done your best. I will be proud of you.’ He bit his lip. ‘Just you remember that.’

The servant came as promised, as the sun hovered nearer to the walls than the midday sky. Already the smell of freshly roasted meat floated around the walls, with the scent of bread and pastries.

Nikko drew his cloak around him. Thetis too was cloaked, her tiny form looking like a roll of cloth. Dora wore her best: trousers of her own weaving, and a bright red shirt that tied up the front, leaving only a glimpse of her big bare breasts. Bracelets almost hid her arms and her toes were covered with rings.

Orkestres had dressed more plainly, his hair freshly dyed, a silver brooch on his tunic. He headed up the road after the servant. The others followed him.

They went up one road, past a four-ways where paths met. This new road was different from any Nikko had seen before: white rock so smooth it must have been polished and raised above the ground, but with no walls enclosing it. It circled around the hill, with gardens either side, rising up to where the palace stood against the cliff.

The doors were open—wooden doors, each as wide as the huts back in their village. No thatch on the roof, but stone welded together somehow so it didn’t fall.

More servants came to meet them.

They were led up a flight of stairs, so high they were almost a mountain. Down a hall, the floor of smooth tiles, as many as the stars in the sky, creating a pattern of warriors chasing cattle. Even the ceiling was patterned. On one wall, painted bears and wolves and deers were pursued by a great lion. On the far wall the lion stood on top of the dead bodies of its prey, its mane gold and its mouth red with blood.

Another doorway. The servants stopped, making Nikko and the others stop as well. He peered between them, trying not to gasp.

The feasting chamber was bigger than their village and many times larger than the hall of the lord they’d visited on the way to Mycenae. Lions snarled from three stone walls, while the fourth was made of wood, with great doors open to show glimpses of a massive, green plain, fuzzed in the distance. Shells and stars glimmered on the ceiling in the light from a great fire raised on giant rocks—pure white, despite the smoke and coal, and surrounded by white pillars. Above the fire the smoke hole was the size of the square outside Orkestres’s rooms. It needed to be, for the fire was almost the size of their room.

And the people! Servants in short blue tunics, their hair tied back in one neat knot; black men who looked like guards, dressed in leopard skins, with leopard skin across their shields; and dancing girls who fluttered through the crowd, their tunics thin as mist, but more revealing.

And then there were the lords of Mycenae, their jewellery brighter than the flames, skins polished, waists
nipped in with belts of gold. Some sat on long benches, others on smaller benches made it seemed for only two, or on stools of polished stone with soft embroidered cushions, or stood talking among themselves.

And at one end of the room, the High King. He sat on a dais, above the crowd. His throne looked like carved gold, and was balanced on two golden lions that had red jewels for their eyes. But even without the throne you would have known he was the King.

He was young—younger than Nikko’s father. Somehow Nikko had always assumed a king must be old. His beard was curled, and trimmed to just below his chin; his cheekbones wide, his chin and ears and nose thin and long. His kilt was purest white with a gold border; his chest was bare, shining and hairless, his nipples gilded. He was the only person not wearing jewellery. It seemed it was enough to be the King. He stared around the room as though half listening to the Chamberlain whispering to him on one side, and half listening to the harper playing in the corner, an old man with blind eyes as white as his long beard.

Something moved on the King’s lap. It was a lion cub, as gold as the throne, except for its eyes. The King’s hands idly stroked its fur. Nikko had seen cats curled in the arms of the ladies on the walls around the city. Cats came from Egypt, the kingdom across the Great Sea. He had never seen anyone hold a lion cub.

But of course, this was Atreus, High King, lord of the Lion Throne. It seemed even lions obeyed the High King.

The Chamberlain bowed to the King, then beckoned. The servants stood back against the walls as Nikko took
Thetis’s hand and stepped into the room. He was vaguely aware of Orkestres and Dora, peering from the doorway, their faces pale with hope and fear.

The Chamberlain bowed again before the throne, pressing his chin onto his chest, with one hand on his heart. Should we bow like that? thought Nikko. Orkestres had said to press their faces to the floor.

But already Thetis was on her knees, and then her whole body was stretched out as though in adoration. Nikko followed her quickly.

‘You may get up.’ The King’s surprisingly high voice sounded bored. ‘I see what you mean,’ he added to the Chamberlain. ‘Mountain savages by the look of them. The girl may be beautiful when she is older, with a bit more flesh on her, and the boy is handsome enough. But nothing special. And you tell me the girl is dumb? What use is a slave who cannot speak? What was Orkestres thinking of?’

He shrugged. ‘Perhaps it is time to stop sending him even to the villages. Well, let’s see what they can do.’

The Chamberlain smiled. The High King waved a hand at the harper. The chatter stopped, and then the music. The old man sat, his fingers in a motionless caress on the harp’s frame.

The Chamberlain nodded. ‘Begin.’

Nikko got to his feet, as gracefully as he could. He moved back a few paces, into the clear space before the throne. He parted his feet, as Orkestres had shown him.

Thetis leaped to stand with a foot on each of his shoulders. She did a half somersault and braced herself in a handstand, still on his shoulders.

The gossip that had ceased for a few seconds began again. Thetis stood on one hand now, her legs high and slim, and then she leaped off Nikko’s shoulders, one somersault and then another till her feet at last touched the floor…

Nikko glanced at the High King. He no longer watched them. A woman had entered the room. Women never attended a feast, of course, except for the dancing girls or flute girls, who didn’t count. But this woman was no flute girl.

She was about ten years older than the High King, her dark hair coiled under a golden diadem. She wore a green skirt painted with golden stems of wheat, and a gold belt. The apron of a priestess of the Mother covered her breasts, and a green and gold-flecked shawl floated about her shoulders: it was made of some cloth that shimmered like the flames. This must be the High King’s sister, Xurtis, the most powerful woman in Mycenae—powerful enough even to come to a men’s feast. She and the High King were laughing, perhaps at something the King had said.

It was time for their most difficult piece. Nikko threw himself down, standing on his hands, trying to keep his legs steady in the air. He felt the whisper of air as Thetis flew, her hands grabbing his feet, so she too stood upside down on her brother.

Thetis gave a final somersault, landing behind Nikko. Nikko lowered his feet to the ground. He bowed toward the King as Thetis leap-frogged across him once again.

The show was over. They stood together, hand in hand before the throne, their heads bowed politely,
waiting for the High King to look at them, so they could prostrate themselves in front of him.

The High King ignored them, his face averted, listening as Xurtis talked. The harper began to play again. A few of the dancing girls got up from whatever laps they’d been perched on, and began to sway again through the crowd.

We’ve failed, thought Nikko, as he waited for the High King to notice them again, and remember to dismiss them. Their act was capable, but it wasn’t enough. Not nearly enough to attract the attention of a King. The dance Orkestres saw up on the mountain had been a game, not a performance for a palace. We’ve failed Orkestres too, he thought, and Dora.

Would they send him out to herd the King’s goats now? And Thetis. His heart lurched. What would they do with Thetis?

Suddenly Thetis let go of his hand. He glanced down at her.

But she was gone.