Steven Saylor - Catilina's riddle

I remember foaming blood sprayed upon my face like the pounding surf of the ocean. I remember seeing Catilina, his face contorted into a terrible grimace, his sword arm slashing, with an arrow projecting from his left shoulder and blood spilling down his glistening breastplate. I remember seeing Meto rush to Catilina's side with grim determination on his face, hewing a path with his sword as if he had been doing such things all his life. I hurried after him but tripped over something solid and fleshy. As I spun around, I glimpsed Tongilius in the throng behind me, bringing up the eagle standard, for with Catilina leading we had cut our way deep into the enemy's line. I gained my footing again and looked frantically for Meto, who had disappeared in the chaos.

Then, from the comer of my eye, I saw the spear approaching. I remember watching, transfixed, as it came hurtling straight towards my forehead. It seemed to move very slowly, and everything in the world, including myself, came to a sudden stop awaiting its arrival; so slowly did it approach that I felt like a man on a pier waiting for a boat to arrive. It drew closer and closer, and when it was very, very close the world abruptly jerked back into frantic motion. The absurd thought struck me that I really should be doing more than I was to get out of the thing's way — then the spear struck its target with a peculiar sound of crumpled metal and all at once I was flying backwards through the air. Behind or above me — direction lost all meaning — I caught a glimpse of the eagle banner as it wavered and tottered and went crashing to the ground like myself, and then the blood-red world turned darkest black.

XXXIX

I sat on a hard rock surrounded by rough-hewn walls of black stone, with black stone underfoot and above my head. I thought at first that the place was a cave, but the walls were too angular to be natural, and the air was warm, not cold and clammy. Perhaps it was the old silver mine up on Mount Argentum, I thought, but that was all wrong. I was in the famous Labyrinth of Crete, of course, for peering at me from around a corner, its horns making a vast shadow on the wall beyond, was the Minotaur itself.

The thing was quite close to me, so close that I could see the glistening flesh of its great black nostrils and the glint in its great black eyes. I should have been mad with fear, but strangely I was not. All I could think was that the beast's nostrils, moist and porous and sprouting a few coarse hairs, looked very delicate and sensitive, and that its eyes were rather beautiful in a bovine way. It was a living creature, and amid so much hard, bloodless stone anything made of living flesh seemed precious and rare, something to be cherished, not feared. Even so, as the beast stepped from around the corner and drew closer, its two hooves clicking on the stone, I was a bit unnerved at the sight of a bull who walked upright and had a human torso. I noticed also that its tall, curving horns had very sharp points and were marked by a stain the colour of rust.

The Minotaur snorted, spraying steam from its dripping black nostrils. It stopped a few steps away and cocked its head. When it spoke, it was in a voice that seemed somehow disguised, for it sounded hoarse and unnatural. 'Who are you?' it said.

'My name is Gordianus.'

'You don't belong here.'

'I came here to find something.'

"That was foolish. This is a maze, and the purpose of a maze is to mislead.'

'But I've found my way to you.' 'Or did I find my way to you?'

I felt a quiver not of fear but of uncertainty, so profound that it made my head ache. I closed my eyes for a moment. When I opened them again, I felt that something had changed, and realized that the stone walls around me had faded away. Even so, it was still quite dark. I was atop a high hill beneath starlight, looking down on a country scene — a stream with a water mill, a stone wall in the distance, a road, a farmhouse. It was my farm, I realized, though I was seeing it from an unfamiliar angle. I seemed to be on a ridge, though not the ridge I was used to. The view was oddly tilted and askew.

We were no longer alone. I turned and saw three naked, headless bodies seated on tree stumps in a row with their hands in their laps, like, spectators at a play, or judges at a trial

'Who are they? What are they doing here?' I asked the Minotaur in a hushed, confidential tone, though the others were clearly deaf, blind, and dumb. 'You know, don't you?'

The Minotaur nodded.

'Then tell me.'

The Minotaur shook its head. 'Speak!'

The beast snorted through its great, black, steaming nostrils and said nothing. It raised a human arm and pointed at something on the ground beside me. I looked down and saw a sword. I picked it up and weighed it in my grip, pleased by the way it gleamed beneath the starlight. 'Speak, or I shall make you join them,' I said, pointing with the sword to the three headless witnesses.

The Minotaur remained mute. I stood and brandished the blade. 'Speak!' I said, and when the beast refused, I swung the sword with all my strength and cut clear through its great bullish neck. As its head tumbled away, I saw that the Minotaur was hollow inside; its body was only a costume, and its head a mask. The true head began to emerge from within. I stepped back, my temples aching from the suspense.

Then I knew the truth…

* * *

And then I awoke, with a hammering, blinding pain in my head. Someone touched my shoulder and spoke in a low voice. 'It's all right, don't move. You're safe. Can you hear me?'

I opened my eyes and shut them against the brutal light. If I kept still, the pain receded. I caught my breath and heard myself groan. I put my hand over my face and cautiously opened my eyes again, not to harsh sunlight as I had thought, but to the soft, filtered light of a tent. For a moment I thought I was back in Catilina's tent, and wondered how I had got there. If his tent still stood, if his camp was intact, then — I lowered my hand and saw a face so unexpected that I was cast into utter confusion. A shock of red hair, a spangling of freckles across a handsome nose, and a pair of bright brown eyes looking into my own: my friend the augur, Marcus Valerius Messalla Rufus.

'Rufus?'

'Yes, Gordianus, it's me.' 'Are we in Rome?'

'No.’

'Then where?'

'Far to the north, near a town called Pistoria. There was a battle—'

'Are we in Catilina's camp?'

He sighed in such a way that I knew no such place existed any longer. 'No. This is the camp of Antonius.' 'Then—'

'You're very lucky to be alive, my friend.' 'And Meto?' My chest constricted. 'It was Meto who saved you.' 'Yes, but—'

'He lives, Gordianus,' said Rufus, seeing my fear. "Thank the gods! Where is he?'

'He'll be here soon. When I saw you were stirring, I sent a man to fetch him.'

I sat up, clenching my teeth at the pain in my head. My limbs and torso appeared to be intact. I looked around and saw that there was no one in the tent but Rufus, unless one counted the clucking chickens who inhabited the cages stacked near the tent flap. Looking at them suddenly made me feel hungry.

'How long since the battle?'

"That was yesterday.'

'How did, I get here?'

'Your son is a very brave young man. When he saw you had fallen, he rushed to you and carried you out of danger, behind the lines, beyond the camp, up among the boulders in the foothills. He must have been utterly exhausted. Can you imagine how much you both weighed, wearing that armour? And you a dead weight? And of course he was bleeding from his own wounds—'

'His wounds?'

'Never fear, Gordianus, they were minor. He made sure you were far from the danger; then he must have collapsed from exhaustion. He was found unconscious beside you.'