The Golden Slave - Poul William Anderson (most interesting books to read .TXT) 📗

but the king explained it was forbidden to call on him unless one had been initiated into his mysteries. And thereafter: "But you can be instructed this winter, when we have come home, and I myself will stand as your sponsor. For our hearts are much alike, Eodan."

The Cimbrian was ready enough to go under the banner of Mithras, who was not only strong but consoling. He had been born of a virgin through the grace of Ahura-Mazda the Good, that all his followers might live in heaven after death—which seemed a better fate than that granted the puzzled quiet shades of the Greeks. Perhaps Mithras could even call Hwicca back from the night wind, though Eodan dared not hope it. The god's midwinter birthday was a cheerful occasion, where men feasted and exchanged gifts. One day, when evil Ahriman rose up for a last onslaught, all those warriors whom Mithras had been guesting in heaven would ride with him to battle.

Eodan thought sometimes that the North might welcome such a god, more humanly brave than the dark, nearly formless wild Powers of earth and sky. But it seemed unsure that he would ever again see the North.

"There, now! Shall we enter in the horseman's manner?"

Eodan looked up, blinking to awareness. The camp was in view, not very far ahead. "Indeed," he said, wondering where the time had gone. It was mid-afternoon. He signaled his trumpeter, and the call rang out, cold and brassy in the gray cold light; the wind made it ragged. But the troopers raised their lances and smote with their spurs. As one, they came a-gallop under streaming flags, through the tents and a burned village to the castle walls.

Eodan jumped to the ground and flung his reins at a groom. The captain of the watch saluted him before the gates. "Let it be known," said Eodan, "that the Cimbrian has returned from Ancyra as ordered and will see the king when the king pleases. May the king live forever!"

After quartering the hostages, he walked toward his own tent. There was much he did not like in Asia, he reflected, and this crawling before the high, in both words and flesh, was not the least. Mithradates deserved respect, yes, but a man was not a dog. Nor was a woman an animal, to be kept for breeding or pleasure alone. A few months of giggling Eastern wenches had shown Eodan how sheer tedium could drive so many men to catamites. He thought of Phryne, born a slave, less chained in her soul than the High Queen of Pontus. It is better in the North, he thought, overwhelmed by his earliest years. They are still free folk on Jutland's moors.

"Master!"

Eodan paused before his tent. Tjorr, who had just left him, returned quickly. A slave bent his knee to him. "Master, the great king would see the Cimbrian at once."

"What?" Eodan looked down at his mail, flowing trousers, spurred boots and flapping red cloak—all dulled with dust. Well, Mithradates was a soldier, too. "I come."

"What might it be?" asked Tjorr, pacing him as he hurried back under the grassy earth wall. "Has something happened?"

"Surely it has," said Eodan, "or the king would allow me a rest and a bite to eat first."

"Maybe a new war has begun somewhere?"

Eodan grinned with a sour humor. "We're not so important, you and I, that we're summoned in person to plan the royal strategy. I think this concerns us—me, at least—alone."

He paused at the castle gate to surrender his longsword. Tjorr scowled unhappily. "I shall wait here," he said. "Perhaps my hammer will fend off bad luck."

Eodan said, with the bleakness of wind and treeless uplands taking him, "I think our luck has already passed these doors and is waiting inside."

He crossed a flagged courtyard, where guardsmen drilled among the lesser buildings. The keep was a gloomy stone hall, sod-roofed and galleried. Beyond its entryroom was a long feasting chamber, where Mithradates had established his court. Fires burning in pits along the rush-strewn dirt floor gave some warmth, though not all their fumes went out the smokeholes. The king had added charcoal braziers and had hung his lamps from captured swords thrust into wooden pillars carved with gods. He sat in the canton chief's high seat, which was shaped like the lap of stag-horned Cernunnos. A robe of Sarmatian sable and African leopard warmed Mithradates' huge frame; his golden chaplet caught the unsure light like a looted halo. Around the room gleamed his unmoving hoplites; a few courtiers and some mustached Gauls huddled at one end, where a boy plucked an unheeded lyre.

Eodan put his helmet under his arm, strode to the king and bowed to one knee—a special favor, granted for his blood of Boierik. "What does My Lord wish from his servant?"

"Stand, Cimbrian." Eodan saw a troubled look on the heavy face. "Today there came an embassy." Mithradates leaned toward a runner who crouched under the secretary's feet. "Bring them in."

Eodan waited. The king said slowly: "You have been welcome at court and camp—not for your knowledge and tales of far places, though they delighted many hours of mine; not for your sword, though it has sung me a gallant song; but for something that is yourself. Whatsoever may happen, Eodan, remember what has been between us. The gods themselves cannot take away the past."

A door at the far end was flung wide. Two came through it.

One was a man in a toga; Eodan could not see his countenance by the dim unrestful light. But even through a long, hooded mantle he would know the shape and gait of the other. His blood pulsed with a quick unreasonable gladness; he forgot himself in the king's presence and ran toward her with his hands outstretched. "Phryne!" he cried. Reaching her, he grasped her by the elbows and looked down into the pale heart-shaped face and said in his lame Greek: "Now I can tell you with your homeland's speech how I have missed you."

"Eodan—" She shivered violently, as if winter had come with her all the way down from the north. "Eodan, my only gift to you is woe."

He raised his eyes, most carefully, and looked upon Gnaeus Valerius Flavius.

Eodan howled. He sprang back, snatching for his sword, but the empty belt mocked him. The Roman lifted an arm. "Ave," he said. His closed-mouth smile creased cheeks grown gaunt; Eodan could see how the bones stood forth in his face.

Eodan remembered the king, motionless on the knees of a conquered god. He choked back his breath; one by one easing muscles that had stiffened to leap at a certain throat, he wheeled and marched to the high seat and prostrated himself thrice.

"Great King whose glory lights the world," he said thickly, returning to the Latin he could best use, "forgive your slave. This Roman slew my wife. Give him to me, lord of all the earth, and I will afterward eat that fire for your amusement if you wish."

Mithradates leaned back. He considered Flavius, who saluted him with no more respect than a high-born Roman was allowed to show any foreign despot. Lastly his glance fell upon Phryne, kissing the floor beside Eodan.

"Who is that?" he asked. Then, with a sudden chuckle of pure pleasure—the laughter of a little boy shown some wholly unawaited novelty—"Why, it is the Greek girl who fled with the two men. This I was not told. Rise, both of you. Woman, explain your arrival here."

Eodan stood up. His jaws were clenched so they ached. He looked across a few feet at Flavius—no, he would not look—he shifted his eyes to Phryne. She stood before the king, her bowed head shielding her face, and said in Greek:

"Merciful Monarch, I am no one, only a slave girl named Phryne, who escaped from Rome with the Cimbrian and is now free by your grace. May the sun never set upon you. As the King has heard, this Roman came to Sinope with armed escort, saying he had a commission to bring back the Cimbrian. When he learned that Your Majesty was being served by the Cimbrian down here, he arranged for horses and rode with Pontine guides—for who would leave a Roman unwatched?—through Paphlagonia and Galatia to find you. It went as a diplomatic party, but its purpose is hostile, that the King may be deprived of the Cimbrian's services. All this I was told through the household. Some of Your Majesty's favor has come down to me; Your Majesty made rich gifts to all our party when we arrived, though I was not summoned to thank you. And then there were my earnings, and some gifts from the parents of children I instructed. With all this I was able to buy a strong eunuch to guard me. The captain of the Pontine escort kindly allowed me, on my plea, to accompany them—"

"Did you have that much money, besides the slave's price?" asked Mithradates dryly.

"I was to give him my eunuch when we reached the King's camp," whispered Phryne.

"And be alone and penniless among soldiers?" Mithradates clicked his tongue. "Cimbrian, you have a loyal friend indeed. I did not believe any woman capable of it."

He leaned forward. "Come here, Phryne. Stand before me." His hand reached out, throwing back her hood, then reaching for her chin to tilt her face up to his. Eodan saw how the blue-back hair had grown in the summer—still too short but softly gathered above a slim neck—yes, she was surely a woman!

"Why was I not told about you before now?" murmured the king.

Flavius said with a tone that gibed at Eodan: "Your Majesty, she would not speak to me all the trip, but when she found herself—as Your Majesty phrased it—alone and penniless among soldiers, with no way into the royal presence, it entertained me, as I hoped it might entertain Your Majesty, to offer her help and protection which she must accept. It was at my expressed desire that she was allowed to wait outside with me." He raised his shoulders and his brows. "Of course, it might have been more amusing to see what she would have tried to gain admittance. A woman is never quite penniless; she has always one commodity—"

Mithradates held Phryne's head, watching the blood and the helpless anger rise in her. Finally he released the girl. "The Flavius misunderstood me," he said. "We shall let you speak your case, Phryne." He nodded toward Eodan. "However, that the Cimbrian may know your mission, Roman, state it first."

Flavius' head lifted, as though on a spear shaft. His tone rang out, with more depth and harshness than Eodan had yet heard from him:

"Your Majesty, this barbarian and his associates are more than runaway slaves. They have murdered free men, even citizens. There is a wise Roman law that orders that if a slave kills his owner, then all the slaves of that owner must die. How else shall free men, and their wives and daughters, be safe?"

"No writ runs here but mine," said Mithradates calmly.

"Your Majesty," pursued Flavius, "the Cimbrian and his allies did still worse. They committed piracy. And that is an offense against the law of all nations."

"I have heard this tale," said Mithradates. "I feel it was more an act of war than of piracy." His teeth gleamed in the same child's delight as before. "But, if you are the very man whom the Cimbrian overcame, tell me your story. What happened on that other vessel?"

"We destroyed his mutineers, Great King, and rowed to Achaea, whence I returned overland as fast as horses would bear me. When the facts of this outrage were laid before the Senate, it was decided that the Cimbrian must be punished, did not Neptune strike him down first? But not until lately did intelligence reach me, who had been given charge of the hunt, that these outlaws had insinuated themselves into Your Majesty's grace. I came at once, to free your majesty