Poul Anderson - The Shield of Time

The scheme had been precarious at best. Now it looked ridiculous. Well, maybe a fresh notion will occur. He grinned, largely a snarl. An action too unsubtle for them, same as yesterday only more so.

He went out into sunlight that briefly overwhelmed vision. “I think already I felt the god’s nearness, strengthening me,” he said weightily. “I believe I am doing what he wants, and you are, Dolon. Let’s not go astray.”

“No, no.” In a hasty mutter, the caretaker cautioned him against defiling the temenos—there was a privy on the far side of the grove—and hobbled back to shelter.

Everard sought the corner where the women sat. Fear no longer stared up at him. Instead he saw grief dulled by fatigue and despair. He couldn’t bring himself to greet them with “Rejoice.”

“May I join you?” he asked.

“We can’t forbid you,” mumbled the old woman (forty years of life behind her?).

He lowered himself to the ground beside the young one. She had been good-looking a day or two ago, before her spirit was shattered. “I too await the will of the god,” he said.

“We only wait,” she answered tonelessly.

“Uh, my name is Androcles, a pilgrim. You live hereabouts?”

“We did.”

The crone stirred. For a minute, a bitter vitality flickered. “Our home was downstream, so far that we didn’t get warning till late,” she told him. “My son said we must load an oxcart full of what we could take off the farm, or we’d be beggars in the city. Horsemen caught us on the road. They killed him and the boys. They ravished his wife. At least they didn’t kill us also. We found the gates shut. We thought the Earthshaker might give us refuge.”

“I wish they had killed us,” the young woman said in her dead voice. The infant began to cry. Mechanically, she bared a breast and gave suck. Her free hand stretched a fold of sleeve across to screen against the sun and the flies.

“I’m sorry” was all Everard could think of. That’s war for you, the thing that governments do best. “I’ll name you in my prayers to him.”

They didn’t reply. Well, numbness was a mercy of sorts. He raised his hood and leaned back. Poplars gave scant shade. The heat in the wall baked through his cloak.

Hours passed. As often before during a long and uncertain wait—though oftenest in future centuries—he withdrew into memories. Occasionally he drank some lukewarm water, occasionally he catnapped. The sun trudged up the sky and started down.

—clouds racing on the wind, light stabbing between them to blaze off the waves, cordage a-thrum, chill salt spray as the ship plunges through seas that thunder green, gray, white-maned, and “Ha!” Bjarni Herjulfsson shouts at the steering oar. “A gull,” promise of the new land ahead —

The end came slowly at first, then in a rush. Everard heard noises grow, hoofbeats, voices, clatter. His flesh tingled. Instantly alert, he pulled the hood further forward to shadow his face, lifted his knees, and slumped his shoulders to look as apathetic as the women still were.

Respecting sanctity, the Syrians dismounted outside the grove. Six of them, armed and armored, followed a man into the temenos. Like them, he went in mail and greaves, sword at side, but a horsehair plume stood tall on his helmet, a red mantle hung from his shoulders, an ivory baton was in his hand, held like a swagger stick, and he overtopped his followers by inches. The features within the iron were as if carved by Praxiteles in alabaster.

Dolon hurried down the steps and prostrated himself. When Alexander prevailed over Asia, the Orient took Hellas over. Rome would have the same experience, unless the Exaltationists aborted its destiny. They won’t. One way or another, we’ll stop them. Energy blazed from Buleni-Polydorus. But Christ if they give us the slip again, with this experience for a lesson—

“You may rise,” said the aide of King Antiochus. He glanced at those who hunched in the angle of the wall. “Who are they?”

“Fugitives, master,” Dolon quavered. “They claim sanctuary.”

The splendid one shrugged. “Well, let the priest decide what to do about them. He’s on his way. We require the temple for a private conference.”

“Certainly, master, certainly.”

Obedient to snapped orders, the soldiers took stance on either side of the entry and beneath the stairs. Buleni went inside. Dolon joined Everard and the women, keeping his feet, nervous, perhaps finding comfort in even such wretched company as was theirs.

Yeah. Nicomachus spoke to the authorities inside Bactra. He may or may not have needed a little help from Zoilus; Theonis would take care of that. The priest must go out and see to his temple. Best would be if a ranking enemy officer could meet him there and they discuss terms more precisely. Neither side in the war wants to offend the Earthshaker. Heralds negotiated. It went easily. Among other considerations, King Antiochus knows his ADC Polydorus is in league with a disaffected element inside the city, and this will establish the espionage link.

More noises, less arrogant. Again Dolon went flat. Dignified in a white robe that must have complicated his muleback ride from town, Nicomachus paced through the entrance. A slave boy trotted at his side, upholding a parasol. A soldier followed, obviously a Syrian assigned as escort. He and the boy halted while the priest went into the building, after which they hunkered down and relaxed.

Everard was barely aware of them. He sat as if blinded by sun-blaze off the thing he had seen on Draganizu’s breast. It wasn’t big, a medallion hung on a chain, but he knew what was on the obverse, he’d have known that thing in a coal bin could he have touched it. Athene’s owl. His own two-way communicator.

The world steadied around him. Why not? he thought. Why surprised, even? They’re maintaining radio silence for the time being, but they’ll want to get in touch right away, should the need arise. Buleni’s bound to have one on his person somewhere. Patrol issue is superior to anything they likely brought with them, and wearing this is typical Exaltationist swank, and there’s no reason why a priest of Poseidon shouldn’t pay Athene honor. In fact, it’s a tactful gesture, considering how often those two are at loggerheads in the Odyssey. Ecumenicism— He strangled a laugh. What startled me when I saw?

The knowledge came forth. He understood he had seen what might be his death.

And yet-—and yet, by God!

He’d have a fighting man’s chance of pulling it off. His prospects of survival were poor in any event. This way, he stood to nail yonder bastards, and maybe, maybe—

I needn’t commit right this minute. Let me think, let me marshal my memories elsewhere than in this oven of a courtyard.

Everard rose. He was stiff and he hurt after his long immobility. He started slowly toward the gateway.

A trooper drew blade. “Halt!” he barked. “Where are you going?”

Everard stopped. “Please, to the privy behind the temenos,” he said.

“Now you just wait—”

Everard loomed at him. “You wouldn’t make me befoul the holy ground, would you? I hate to think what the god would do to us both.”

Dolon tottered over. “He’s a victim of robbers, the Earthshaker’s given him refuge, he’s Poseidon’s guest,” the caretaker explained.

The soldier swapped looks with his mates and sheathed his sword. “All right,” he agreed. Stepping to the entry, he called to the pair who watched the horses beyond that this fellow had leave to go. The women’s gazes trailed the large man wistfully. He had given them a kind word.

Everard sauntered among the trees, savoring their shade. Not too slow, he reminded himself. I don’t imagine Buleni and Draganizu will be inside any longer than it takes them to update each other. He didn’t need the shack as such, but it screened him while he did a few exercises to limber his muscles and took sword in hand beneath his cloak. On the way back, he did drag his feet. That would seem natural enough to anyone who noticed. With his height, he could look over the wall into the temenos.