song.
âDawn wonât be long coming. We may as well sleep on the shore,â said Lysander.
âYou can,â said Chilonis. âBut Iâm going there.â She pointed to a house where a light still glowed. A sign was painted over the door. âIt says they have rooms to let.â
Lysander tried to work out how the letters fitted together, but his brain was tired.
The innkeeper asked no questions when Chilonis said they were brother and sister. Lysander was too tired to say a word. She showed them to a bed of straw in the stables and gave them some stale bread and cold stew. After theyâd eaten, Lysander lay back in the straw and listened to the scurry of mice.
He longed for sleep to overcome him. Finally, out of the darkness, Chilonis spoke.
âLysander, about your grandfather. Iâm sure you arenât truly to blame.â
Lysander fought against the images that came into his mind â Sarpedon, plunging the sword into his own chest. Lying pale-faced on the deck of Vaumisaâs ship. His body on the pyre.
âYou donât know what happened.â
âMy great-grandmother always said that the Fates take you when itâs your time. They spin your life on a thread and snip it when the Gods command. Your heart stops when the scissors close.â
Lysander fought against tears in the gloom.
âI think they might already have come for me,â he said. âThereâs nothing left in my heart.â
Chilonis edged closer to him, and he felt her warm palm rest over his chest, where the Fire of Ares used to lie.
âYou still have a heart, Lysander. Donât wait for the Fates to decide your future, seek it out for yourself. Whatâs past has gone. Your grandfather wouldnât want you to stop living just because he has.â
Lysander was grateful for Chilonisâ words, but he couldnât help pushing her hand away and rolling over on to his side. He stared out into the darkness. Beyond the walls of the stable lay the hills where he would find the Oracle and beg for help.
No, not beg
, he thought to himself.
Iâll have to pay her
. Was the boatman right? Was he being a fool, looking for consolation amongst the hills? Lysander had no way of knowing. All he knew and felt was the ache in his heart that had not gone away since the death of his grandfather.
I have to do something
, he thought, as he closed his eyes.
I have to hope.
Right now, hope was all he had left.
Chapter 7
âGet in line!â shouted the attendant priest. To Lysander he looked more like a soldier, with broad shoulders and arms thick as saplings. âYour time with the Oracle will come soon enough. Form a queue.â
âWhat a thug,â said Chilonis.
A chill wind rustled the leaves of the trees as they joined the line of supplicants. Evidently, Lysander and his new friend werenât the only people keen to see the Oracle. Despite their boat ride through the night, crowds had already been thronging the hills when theyâd arrived. Now, the colours of the morning were muted, as though Aphrodite, Goddess of Love, had left a veil draped over the mountainside. In front of Lysander was an elderly couple â from their rough sheepskin shawls, Lysander guessed they were farmers, shepherds perhaps. They stood in silence, leaning on each other like the collapsed columns of a ruined temple.
âDonât worry,â whispered the woman. âWeâll find theanswers weâre looking for.â
He wondered what they needed to see the Oracle for. Had they lost something precious? Had their meagre crops failed, leaving them starving and without hope?
Bleating cut through the silence, and Lysander turned to see another attendant dragging a black ram on a thin cord. The animalâs hooves skittered on the rocky path and it strained against the tether, eyes rolling back in its head.
âPerhaps it knows whatâs coming,â whispered Chilonis.
The
Conrad Anker, David Roberts