In the Shadow of Heroes Read online

  Cadmus said nothing. Her nails pressed into his skin just a little more.

  ‘Do you have it?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Do they have it?’

  ‘No. It wasn’t there.’

  Eriopis groaned.

  ‘But . . . it has to be. You must have looked in the wrong place. I saw it. The Hecate showed me. The fleece was in your hands.’

  ‘It must have been the fake you saw,’ Cadmus suggested. ‘The grave was empty. Apart from her.’

  He was about to mention about Medea’s eyes when a bright, orange blaze suddenly illuminated both of them. One of the tents on the far side of the camp had gone up in flames. Orthus started barking. Eriopis let go of Cadmus.

  ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘Fire.’

  Another tent began to burn, then another, then the commander’s pavilion at the centre was alight. An accident? Perhaps the mutiny had started already. There were confused cries from the legionaries who were still in the camp. Men began running towards the fires with pails of water, and in a few moments the quarters nearest the grove were emptied of men.

  Cadmus heard whinnying and an irregular thump of hooves. The silhouettes of a dozen horses galloped in front of him, their slender legs casting a strange and complex dance of shadows. Someone had released them, and they were fleeing from the flames in terror. They split and merged and split again like a flock of birds.

  One of the Roman horses made its way towards the prison. There were two people in the saddle.

  ‘Found him,’ called a familiar voice.

  Cadmus squinted against the glare of the fire.

  ‘Tog?’

  ‘This is him, isn’t it?’ she said. ‘Old and bald?’

  ‘Master?’

  Clutching Tog around her waist was Tullus, his skinny neck protruding from a thick, fur-lined cloak. He managed a weak smile.

  The wave of relief nearly overwhelmed Cadmus. He began laughing when Eriopis’s cold hand clasped around his wrist again.

  ‘Beware him,’ she said.

  ‘Who? Tullus?’

  ‘I know him.’ She sounded frightened. ‘I remember now. He comes with murderers, through the flames.’

  ‘Nonsense!’ Cadmus tried to laugh again. ‘This is my master. He’s a good man.’

  ‘I know him.’ She let go of him and clasped her own head, as she often did. ‘The flames . . . He comes through the flames . . .’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ said Cadmus. ‘Master?’

  Tullus looked at his hands, then at Cadmus. Whatever he knew, words failed him.

  Tog growled in exasperation. ‘Are you finished? I am trying to rescue you all. Talk later.’

  Behind them, the legionaries were still trying to bring the blaze under control. They hadn’t noticed the prisoners escaping at the opposite end of the camp, but now more men were beginning to emerge from the woods, drawn away from the shrine by the sight and the sound of the fire.

  Tog jumped down from her horse and approached the cage.

  ‘It’s only made of wood,’ Cadmus said. ‘You could break it. Like you broke Tullus’s front door.’

  His master looked up suddenly and spoke for the first time.

  ‘You broke my front door . . . ?’

  Tog threw her shoulder at the cage once, twice, three times. On the fourth try, two of the bars split. She and Cadmus worked together to loosen the others and made a hole large enough for Eriopis to climb out of. Just as Cadmus was helping her down to the ground, he heard another shout from the woods, different in tone and volume. Someone had spotted them.

  ‘I’ll take her on the other horse,’ Tog said quickly. ‘You ride with your master.’

  ‘What?’ Tullus spluttered. ‘Cadmus can’t ride a horse!’

  ‘A few things have changed since we left Rome,’ said Cadmus, climbing up into the saddle in front of him.

  A handful of soldiers ignored the fire and charged them, swords drawn. Orthus met them head-on, barking and snapping at their legs and arms. Cadmus watched in horror as they took swings at the dog, but he leapt and ducked around their blades and held them at bay long enough to settle the horse.

  ‘If we’re going, we’re going now!’ shouted Tog.

  ‘Wait!’ said Tullus. ‘I’ve just remembered! My notes!’

  ‘It’s too late,’ said Cadmus. ‘They’ll be up in flames.’ It pained him as much as Tullus to think of it. Years of work, gone in an instant.

  His master protested, but Cadmus didn’t listen to him. He wheeled his horse around, drove his heels into its flanks, and took off into the night.

  XXVIII

  They flew through the darkness, Tullus gripping Cadmus’s waist a little too tightly and complaining frequently about the recklessness of his riding. But Cadmus didn’t slow down. The shapes of two horses, four human beings and a dog flitted across the island under the light of a full moon. When they reached the straits between Mona and the mainland, Tog drew up her mount and stared over the water.

  ‘The tide is in,’ she said. ‘We won’t be able to cross.’

  Cadmus spoke to Tullus over his shoulder. ‘How did you get here? Is there a bridge?’

  Tullus shook his head. ‘We forded at low tide, but that was a long time ago. Even then, the water nearly swept the wagons away.’

  ‘Then we’re trapped.’

  Tog thought for a moment. ‘We should go as far as we can from the road and find somewhere to hide. I let all their horses go, so they’ll be slow looking for us. We can cross in the early morning.’ Without waiting for agreement, she turned around and set off along the shore.

  They came to the western edge of the island, where the straits opened up to the sea. The full, bright moon was a blessing for finding their way, but also threatened to reveal them to anyone who came looking. Here they found a narrow path down to the beach and huddled in a cave among the cliffs.

  They built a small fire, which struggled to produce anything apart from a steady stream of grimy smoke, but the embers glowed enough to reveal the faces of their bedraggled little band. Tog had taken one look at Eriopis’s snake and clutched her mouse protectively to her chest. Eriopis had gone completely silent, and visibly winced whenever Tullus spoke. That was odd. What had she meant, back at the camp? Why would she think his master a murderer?

  Tullus himself steepled his fingers and looked at nothing in particular.

  ‘Well,’ he said. ‘Here we are.’

  ‘Here we are,’ Cadmus agreed.

  In the silence, the hopelessness of the situation settled upon them like a cold, wet blanket.

  ‘I can’t believe you came all this way,’ said Tullus.

  ‘I can’t believe I came all this way,’ said Cadmus. ‘For nothing.’

  Tog looked up from her lap, where her mouse was scurrying in the sand. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘The fleece,’ he said. ‘It wasn’t there.’

  Her face fell. ‘Did someone get there before us?’

  Cadmus thought about this. The moment he had touched Medea, she had turned to ash, so the tomb couldn’t have been raided earlier. ‘I don’t think so. The body was undisturbed when I found it. More than that. It was perfectly preserved. Unnaturally preserved, I’d say.’

  He looked at Eriopis, hoping she might offer some insight. But her face was a mask of confusion. The question that had been pounding the inside of his head since he’d left the tomb was now fighting its way out of him. That shining circle of gold rose before him again.

  ‘I did find something, though,’ he said.

  The others leant into the dim glow of the fire, and suddenly Cadmus felt nervous.

  ‘Her eyes,’ he said.

  Tullus and Tog waited quietly for him to elaborate. But the priestess gasped, suddenly brought to life.

  ‘Eyes?’ she said. ‘What about her eyes?’

  ‘They looked exactly like mine.’

  Eriopis shook her head.

  ‘No, no, no, no, no,
no . . .’

  ‘I’m telling you,’ said Cadmus. ‘I’ve never seen anyone with eyes the same colour as mine. One was dark. One sort of golden. It was like looking in a mirror.’

  Eriopis groped blindly for him and grabbed his wrist in her thin, strong fingers.

  ‘Ow! What are you doing?’

  Something had changed. The priestess’s breath was quick and trembling, and her lips moved in sudden spasms, as though she were mouthing silent words. Tullus got to his feet, unsure of what to do. Tog simply looked on, bemused.

  ‘You never told me . . .’ Eriopis said, and seized him by the front of his tunic.

  ‘Let go! You’re hurting me!’

  ‘Look at me,’ said Eriopis, as he struggled to free himself from the snares of her fingers. ‘Look at me.’

  She let go of his wrists and thrust her fingers into her thick, dishevelled hair. Cadmus edged away from her. She began untying the fabric from around her head.

  Very slowly she lowered the blindfold. Her eyelids were red and raw, he could see, and fluttered as though the smoke and the light pained her. But even so she drew herself closer to him, and to the flames. Then, for the first time, he saw what had been concealed all this time. They were just like Medea’s. Just like his. One dark. One the colour of gold.

  ‘She was descended from the Sun,’ she said. ‘We all carry a piece of him with us. An echo of his light.’

  The fire spat in the darkness.

  Cadmus hung his head dumbly. He could barely connect two coherent thoughts. So much information had been thrown at him he felt almost punch-drunk.

  ‘So, what? Are we related?’ he said. And then, looking again at her bizarre clothes and the snake coiled around her neck, he added: ‘Distantly, I mean?’

  ‘Not just related.’

  No one had expected to hear Tullus speak. They all turned to look at him. He was smiling sadly. He had never looked older, Cadmus thought.

  His master took a deep breath and spoke again: ‘She is your sister.’

  There was a moment’s silence, broken only by the wet hiss of the embers. Cadmus looked from face to face to face. Then he burst out laughing.

  ‘My sister?’ He shook his head, and his laughter disappeared as soon as it had come. ‘I know we all need cheering up, Master, but that kind of joke is in pretty poor taste.’

  ‘It’s not a joke, my boy.’

  Cadmus had to close his eyes to try and stop his head from whirling.

  ‘But . . . that’s nonsense. How would you know? You’d never seen her before Athens.’ A pause. ‘Had you?’

  Tullus’s silence said a great deal.

  ‘You knew I had a sister? You knew I had family and you didn’t tell me?’

  ‘I thought she was dead. I thought you were the only one left.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Cadmus could feel his confusion turning to pure, hot anger. ‘You told me I was abandoned on the side of the road! You said you knew nothing of my family!’

  ‘I know,’ said Tullus. ‘Because the truth was too awful to even try and explain. I was going to tell you when we were in Nero’s palace, because I knew I probably wouldn’t get another chance. That was why I summoned you. But, as usual, I spent too long thinking and never got around to it. And now here we are, at the end of everything. It’s too late for me to wait for the right time, or the right words.’

  ‘The right words are the simplest, Master,’ said Cadmus. ‘That’s what you always taught me.’

  Tullus nodded once. ‘Then I shall be plain and clear.’

  He spent a while considering where to begin.

  ‘Fourteen years ago,’ he said, ‘I was asked by the Emperor Claudius to find the Golden Fleece.’

  ‘Claudius? He was looking for it too?’

  ‘Oh, yes. The Sibylline prophecy has been known for decades. Every emperor has tried to get his hands on the fleece – in secret, at least, for fear of public mockery. At the time I was the most able scholar and mythographer in Rome, and I was delighted to accept the emperor’s commission. I had a map, just like Silvanus did. The result of years of research. Decades, even. It directed me to a prophetess who lived outside Athens. The prophetess was your mother.’

  A sound escaped Eriopis’s lips, a murmur of fear relived. It seemed to strike Tullus’s heart, and for a moment he closed his eyes and paused.

  Cadmus didn’t move, didn’t speak, didn’t blink. His every thought was bent on the old man’s next words. Nothing else existed apart from their four souls, in this ring of firelight. Even Orthus was curiously still.

  ‘Believe me – both of you – I approached her with all the respect and courtesy she deserved. You see, I knew of her lineage. I knew she was a descendant of Medea. But most importantly, I knew she had the Golden Fleece itself.’

  ‘He’s lying,’ said Eriopis. ‘Lying, lying, deceitful . . .’

  ‘It is the truth. Your mother probably never told you. You were only a very young child, and Cadmus here was a baby.’

  ‘But the oracles . . . The goddess told me, the fleece resides with the remains of Medea.’

  Cadmus remembered the inscription on Medea’s tomb, and something clicked. ‘Hoi loipoi,’ he said.

  Tullus looked at him. There was a hint of a smile on his weary face.

  ‘Go on,’ he said.

  ‘Those were the words on her sarcophagus. Everyone has misunderstood it. It doesn’t mean “remains”, like a body. It means “that which is left behind”. Or rather, “those who are left behind”. Her children. That means you, Eriopis.’ Then he added, very quietly. ‘And me.’

  ‘Very good, Cadmus,’ Tullus said. ‘We’ll make a scholar of you yet.’

  It was a joke that Tullus had always made when they were at Rome, but now the words sounded foreign and unfamiliar. Sad, not funny. A memory of a past life Cadmus couldn’t return to.

  ‘My mother had the fleece, then?’

  ‘She did. It had been passed down every generation since Medea herself.’

  ‘I’m assuming she wasn’t happy to just hand it over.’

  ‘No,’ said Tullus. ‘I wanted to be civil with her. I respected her. But Claudius’s men had other ideas. They thought only of their reward. When your mother didn’t give them answers, they threatened to burn her house down, with her children inside. And when she still refused, they went ahead and did it. I was too weak, too much of a coward to stop them.’

  Tullus’s eyes were shining with tears. He looked at Eriopis.

  ‘Forgive me. I should never have come to the house. But I swear, by all the gods, it was never my intention to harm any of you. When they took your mother away, I stayed behind to try and save you. Both of you. I couldn’t find you, my dear, but I heard Cadmus crying. His cradle was devoured by flames, but he – he was unharmed. Wrapped in his blanket. Cool to the touch.’

  He looked at Cadmus meaningfully.

  And that was when Cadmus saw the truth of it. It was like in the old heroic poems, when the gods remove the mortal veil from the hero’s eyes, and showed them the world as it really was.

  ‘It’s been in my bedroom all this time, hasn’t it?’

  Nobody spoke for a few moments. Eriopis was open-mouthed. Tullus looked almost embarrassed. Tog was the one to break the silence. Cadmus’s Britonnic hadn’t improved much since he had met her, but he was fairly sure he knew when she was swearing.

  ‘I thought it would be the last place anyone would look for it,’ Tullus said in a hurry. ‘And you deserved to keep it, as the last of Medea’s descendants.’

  ‘Why was I the last? Why couldn’t you have returned it to my mother?’

  He knew he answer before he had even asked the question. But he had to hear it, out loud.

  ‘She died, Cadmus. In captivity. When I returned to Rome I stopped my research and put my efforts into raising you. It was the very least I could do. When Nero forced me into his service, I knew you had to stay behind. I wasn’t going to put you in danger. And I certainly wasn
’t going to take you back to the ruins of your old house.’

  They all sat in total silence. Words and tears now seemed a poor and tawdry currency.

  ‘But why come all the way out here?’ asked Cadmus, finding safe ground in practicalities.

  ‘To lead them in the wrong direction! I’ll admit, the fake had me confused for a while – I thought I had made a mistake, all these years. That was why we went to the library, boy. I needed to know if I had missed something. But once I knew it was counterfeit, I was sure of what I had to do. I encouraged Nero to make every mistake, pursue every misinterpretation. Because I knew every step was taking them further away from you, and keeping you out of harm’s way.’

  Cadmus stared at Tullus. Again he felt the slow simmer of anger in his stomach. The old man had known all along and had said nothing.

  ‘Well, thank you for filling us in, Master,’ he said. ‘Your timing has been impeccable.’

  ‘I tried to tell you in Nero’s palace,’ said Tullus. ‘But I couldn’t find the words. Then there was the dinner. I would have told you in the baths, but . . . you know what happened. Cadmus, I—’

  But Cadmus was on his feet, walking away down the beach. The sea was a sheet of beaten silver under the moonlight. He looked out to the horizon, calmed by the steady shush of the waves. The heat of his anger faded. Away from their feeble fire he got very cold very quickly. He should have been happy, he thought. He had found his family. His sister. His master. The fleece. Why this hollowness, then?

  A warm tongue rasped over his fingertips. He looked down and saw Orthus’s grizzled head at his side.

  ‘He always loved you.’ Eriopis’s voice floated over his shoulder from nowhere. ‘He used to guard your cradle when you were a baby.’

  Cadmus scratched Orthus behind his ears, but said nothing. What was there to say?

  ‘I am ashamed,’ said the priestess. ‘A dog was able to see the truth, and I, a handmaiden of the Hecate, was blind to it. My own brother, hidden from me. I was wrong about everything.’

  ‘Not everything,’ he said. ‘Back at the farmhouse you said the thing I was seeking was in Medea’s grave. You were right about that. I found what I wanted. It just wasn’t the fleece.’

  He tried to smile. He was glad she couldn’t see how forced it looked. They were silent. Under the moon, the sea spread veil after glittering veil over the sand.