The Burning Shadow Read online

For a heartbeat, the lion cub stared at him with big moon-silvered eyes: caught red-pawed in the ruin of his camp. Then it turned tail and fled.

  The lion cub didn’t understand what was happening. The human was barking and waving his forepaws. He seemed angry.

  Or was it a game?

  It didn’t appear to be; he was chasing her with a stick.

  Bewildered, she sped for the safety of the thickets.

  As she left the trees, she glanced back to see if he was still chasing.

  She stumbled. Suddenly there was no more ground beneath her paws and she was falling into the dark.

  Hylas burrowed into the ferns and willed himself to sleep.

  No use. Those faint, despairing yowls wouldn’t let him.

  “Oh, shut up,” he muttered.

  More yowls. That lion cub sounded desperate.

  Then it stopped, and that was worse.

  With a snarl, Hylas sat up.

  As the sky turned gray, he tracked the lion cub through the forest. It occurred to him that where there was a cub, there would also be a lioness—but then he remembered the skeleton he’d found the day before. That must have been its mother; Kreon had probably killed her, as he’d killed its father.

  It turned out that the cub hadn’t gotten far, it had fallen down an old mine shaft a few paces into the thicket. A buzzard was perched on the edge, peering down at it. Hylas shooed the bird away.

  The lion cub saw him and gave a plaintive mew. It was small, filthy, and shaking with terror.

  “Well what d’you want me to do?” he said crossly. “You should’ve looked where you were going!”

  The cub stopped mewing and stared up at him with great round golden eyes.

  Hylas threw down his axe, found a fallen sapling, and shoved it down the hole. “There. Now climb out and leave me in peace!”

  The cub wobbled onto the sapling and fell off. It tried again. And again. Hylas blew out. Lions aren’t the best climbers, and this cub was the worst he’d seen. It didn’t help that it seemed to be lame in one forepaw.

  It had wrought havoc with his kill, but he couldn’t leave it in there to starve, and the shaft wasn’t deep. Muttering, he shinned down the sapling.

  The hole was cramped, and stank of lion scat. The cub backed into a corner and hissed. Hylas grabbed it by the scruff, plonked it on the sapling, and gave its furry bottom a shove. “Go on, up you go!”

  The cub lashed out, raking him with needle-sharp claws. Then it fell off again.

  “You stupid beast, I’m trying to help you!” Picking it up, he slung it around his shoulders and gripped its paws on his chest, as if he was carrying a goat. The cub struggled and scratched. He flung it from him.

  “Well it’s not my fault you fell in!” he shouted. “D’you think I want to be down this stinking hole?”

  The cub cowered under the sapling. It was snarling and lashing its tail, but its flanks were heaving and it was trembling.

  Hylas rubbed a hand over his face. “All right,” he said quietly. “I know it wasn’t your fault. I mean, it was your fault, but you were just hungry.”

  The cub stopped lashing its tail and swiveled its ears to listen.

  It was about knee height, maybe three or four moons old. Like all lion cubs, its paws were too big for the rest of it, and the fur on its belly, legs, and haunches was paler, with fuzzy dark spots. Its pads weren’t black, like a full-grown lion’s, but a tender light brown. The tip of its nose wasn’t black either, it was a freckly pink, and just above was a long, bloody scratch. And lion cubs should be plump. This one was so thin Hylas could see its ribs.

  “All right,” he said again. Squatting on his haunches, he started talking in a low, soothing voice: Speaking nonsense, but letting the cub hear from his tone that he meant no harm.

  After a long wait, the cub edged closer and sniffed his toes. He kept talking.

  It tried to take his heel in its jaws. He flinched. It drew back. He kept talking.

  The Sun rose and the song of the crickets changed. Hylas kept talking.

  A little later, the cub approached and sniffed his knee. When he didn’t move, it rubbed its cheek against his shin. It licked his hand. Its tongue was surprisingly rough, but he stayed still, letting it become comfortable with his taste and smell.

  At last, the cub rested its head on his knee. Gently, he stroked behind its furry ear. It slitted its eyes and began to purr. Slowly, he gathered it up in his arms. It squirmed and scratched his chest a bit, but he could tell it didn’t mean to hurt him, it just hadn’t learned to sheathe its claws.

  Awkwardly, with the cub in his arms, he climbed out of the hole. “There,” he panted, setting the cub on the ground. “Now you really are on your own. I can’t look after you, I’ve got to go and find Pirra.”

  As he started back for camp, the cub limped at his heels.

  He shooed it away. It darted into the thicket. But as he entered the trees, it reappeared.

  Hylas stopped and stared down at the small bedraggled cub, and something shifted painfully in his chest. It was all on its own, and too small to hunt for itself.

  “Oh all right,” he said.

  The lion cub reached his shelter before he did. It sniffed the ferns where he’d lain, turned around twice, then flumped down and fell asleep.

  17

  Telamon felt a surge of pride as he galloped toward Mycenae. We’re not crows, he told Hylas in his head. We’re lions.

  The trail was wide enough to take two chariots abreast, and it climbed in a sweeping curve to the great citadel on the hill with the mountains at its back. Mycenae, rich in gold. The very heart of his clan.

  Telamon rode across the bridge that spanned the ravine, and past the huddled gravestones of conquered Chieftains. Ahead he saw the massive gates with the lions painted above. He told himself that he belonged here. He almost believed it.

  It was only a few days since he’d learned that Hylas was still alive, but it felt like moons. That first shock, joy, unbelievable relief—that he hadn’t killed his friend—had swiftly curdled to bewilderment and pain. His long winter of grief had been for nothing. Hylas and the Keftian girl had been making fun of him all along.

  His horse shied at the gravestones, and he checked it savagely.

  When he thought how he’d wept in front of Pirra, he burned with shame. She must have known that Hylas was still alive. Had they enjoyed fooling him? Had they put their heads together and laughed?

  Somehow, he couldn’t quite believe that Hylas was capable of such betrayal. But what about Pirra, with her clever black eyes that missed nothing, that seemed to spy out all his weaknesses and fears?

  Again the horse shied, nearly throwing him off. Angrily, he yanked its head around and dug in his heels, forcing it to skitter in tight circles until it halted, trembling and subdued.

  “There,” he muttered. “Now you know who’s master.”

  The guards at the gates sprang aside as he clattered into the courtyard. Tossing the reins at a slave, he strode toward the doorway.

  Behind him, the horse was blowing hard and its flanks were heaving; Telamon heard the slave cluck his tongue in disapproval. He spun around. “What was that?” he snapped.

  The slave turned pale. “Nothing, my lord.”

  Telamon nodded. “Keep it that way.”

  As he entered the lamplit passage, more slaves scattered. He tried to take pleasure in the storerooms on either side, crammed with wine and barley and wool; in the armory piled with bronze weapons and armor. Again he told himself that this was where he belonged.

  His father didn’t think so. When he’d received the message summoning Telamon to Mycenae, Thestor had refused to let him go.

  “Why?” Telamon had demanded. “He’s my grandfather, and I’ve never even seen him!”

  “You don’t know them as I
do,” Thestor had growled.

  “Then let me make up my own mind.”

  In the end, Thestor had given in, as he usually did these days, but Telamon had felt obscurely guilty. He hadn’t told his father the real reason he needed to leave Lykonia: That every rock and tree reminded him painfully of Hylas.

  That first night at Mycenae . . .

  He had sat on a bench among the warriors, stunned by the grandeur of the vast painted hall. Slaves had brought roast oxen and venison, and poured rich black wine mixed with crumbled cheese and honey. On the walls and pillars, Ancestors hunted boars and leaped from ships to slaughter their enemies. Everywhere, he’d seen the glint of gold. Compared to Mycenae, Lapithos was a peasant’s hut.

  He’d been relieved to learn that Pharax and Alekto had gone to join their brother on Thalakrea—but that still left his fearsome grandfather, Koronos.

  The High Chieftain sat like a spider on his great marble throne, drinking little and eating less. He was old, but when he spoke, hardened warriors blanched. Telamon had been horrified when Koronos had ordered him to tell how he’d retrieved the dagger.

  The hall had fallen silent. Haltingly, he’d begun, and Koronos had stared fixedly over his head. His gaze hadn’t wavered when Telamon related the death of his firstborn son, Kratos; and when the tale was finished, he’d raised his gold cup to his lips with a steady hand and said stonily, “I can beget more sons.”

  When the ordeal was over, Telamon had been glad that the talk had turned to the mines: something about a rite at the dark of the Moon, although by then he’d stopped listening.

  So he’d been startled when, as Koronos rose to leave, he’d addressed him again. “We’re needed on Thalakrea, grandson. Will you come?”

  What made it so frightening was that Thestor had foreseen this, and expressly forbidden him to go. Koronos must know that. He knew everything. He was making Telamon choose.

  The silence in the hall had gone on forever. Telamon had tried to speak, but his throat was too dry.

  “Think on it,” the High Chieftain had commanded. “Decide soon.”

  For two days, Telamon had agonized; but now, as he strode toward the hall, he suddenly knew what his answer would be. It was as if the gods were whispering in his head. Hylas is nothing to you now. You are of the House of Koronos.

  Telamon saw himself crossing the Sea in his grandfather’s splendid black ship. He saw the stronghold of his uncle Kreon rising above the waves. Yes. He would go to Thalakrea.

  On Thalakrea, he could put Hylas behind him once and for all.

  18

  For two days Pirra had been imprisoned with Hekabi in this windowless cell, listening to the crows cawing about the walls and wondering if Hylas was dead or alive.

  Soon after they’d reached Kreon’s stronghold, word had arrived of the cave-in. Shouts, uproar, a man bellowing like a raging bull. Later, Pirra had glimpsed a slave dragged into the next-door cell. It was the hook-nosed boy she’d seen at the pools. She’d caught snatches as they questioned him. “Pit spiders killed or buried alive . . . Beetle, Flea.” She’d fought to conceal her horror.

  “Are you going to eat that?” said Hekabi.

  Pirra stared at the bowl of mashed acorns and shook her head.

  She kept telling herself that if that boy could survive the cave-in, then so could Hylas.

  “You should eat,” mumbled Hekabi with her mouth full.

  “How much longer?” said Pirra. Their cell stank of urine, and she could feel things crawling in her hair.

  Hekabi shrugged. “He makes us wait to show his power.”

  He hardly needs to do that, thought Pirra.

  Everything about this stronghold shouted power. It was ringed by double stone walls each an arm-span thick, and could only be reached by a dizzying flight of steps hacked out of the raw red rock. It turned out that Kreon’s chariot was merely for show; the trail ended at the foot of the hill.

  Pirra remembered trudging up the steps in the noonday heat and the stink of burned flesh. She’d climbed past the charred remains of snakes: Were they offerings to the Angry Ones? And she’d shrunk from something that had once been a man. His empty eye sockets glared at the Sun, and his rib cage was black with crows, jostling and heaving like a dreadful mockery of breath . . .

  A warrior strode into the cell. With a start, Pirra recognized Ilarkos, the second in command of the Crow Chieftain who’d beaten her up last summer.

  To her relief, he didn’t recognize her. “On your feet,” he said. “It’s time.”

  “He hates light and has a horror of snakes,” said Ilarkos as he led them through a maze of passages. “Which makes what you’re planning—”

  “Did you get it?” said Hekabi.

  He signed to a slave, who handed her a lidded basket. “This is a mistake,” he muttered. “You’ll end up like the last seer.”

  “What happened to him?” said Hekabi.

  “You passed him on the steps.”

  Pirra’s belly turned over. But how could Hekabi cure Kreon, when she was a fake?

  “I hear he has visitors from Mycenae,” said Hekabi.

  “How do you know that?” Ilarkos said sharply.

  “People talk.”

  Pirra realized that Hekabi was speaking Akean. “I thought you didn’t speak Akean,” she whispered.

  Hekabi’s mouth twisted. “You must have misheard.”

  “So why make me come?”

  The wisewoman didn’t reply. She seemed undaunted by the prospect of meeting Kreon. In fact, she seemed excited: as if she wanted this.

  They reached a doorway covered by a scarlet hanging and flanked by two hulking guards. Hekabi handed the basket to Pirra. It hissed. Pirra was so startled she nearly dropped it.

  “They’re only grass snakes,” murmured Hekabi, “they won’t hurt you.”

  “What? But he said—”

  “Do as I say, and you’ll be all right.”

  Voices reached them through the hanging. “I don’t need your help,” growled a man.

  “I don’t care,” said another. “You’ve angered the Mountain, brother. There’s only one power strong enough to put that right.”

  “Thalakrea is mine! I will decide!”

  “Our father will decide,” a woman said coldly.

  “Get out,” said the first man. “Both of you!”

  “For now,” said the woman.

  The hanging twitched, and two people swept into the passage. Ilarkos yanked Pirra and Hekabi out of the way. “Stand aside for the lord Pharax and the lady Alekto.”

  Pirra saw at once that Pharax was a man who lived to fight. His tunic was plain oxblood wool, with a swordbelt across his chest. His powerful limbs were ridged with scars, and his left shoulder was calloused from carrying a shield. His dark gaze slid over her as if she were a piece of meat.

  Alekto was young. She wore a tight-waisted silk robe zigzagged in black and yellow, and her face was perfect and without blemish; she reminded Pirra of a beautiful wasp. Her dark eyes flicked to Pirra’s scar and she shuddered with disgust.

  When they’d gone, Ilarkos wiped the sweat from his brow. Then he squared his shoulders and drew aside the hanging. “I’ve brought the wisewoman, lord. Do you still—”

  “Bring her in.”

  Ilarkos pushed Hekabi inside, then Pirra, with the basket of snakes in her arms.

  The chamber was shadowy and choked with smoke. Pirra made out a reed screen covering the window, and a bronze brazier giving off a red glimmer and a reek of charcoal. On the walls hung bronze axes and spears. Armor glinted in a corner: greaves, breastplate, wrist-guards, an oxhide shield as tall as a man; a boar’s-tusk helmet crested with black horsetail.

  Kreon was pacing angrily up and down. He was as big as a bull, with the pelt of a lion slung across his shoulders. Through his long
dark warrior’s braids, Pirra caught the restless glitter of his eyes.

  “Well?” he snapped.

  “I’ve come to rid you of the pain,” Hekabi said fearlessly.

  “They all say that,” he retorted.

  “The difference is, I can.”

  Kreon ground his knuckles into his temples. “Snakes,” he snarled. “Crawling in my head, scraping my skull with their fangs . . .”

  “I can banish them,” said Hekabi.

  “Then do it,” he said thickly.

  Crossing to the window, Hekabi tore aside the screen. Moonlight flooded in, and Kreon flinched. “I should have you killed for that!”

  “But then you’d never be cured.” In a tone that brooked no opposition, she told Ilarkos to have the brazier removed and another brought that didn’t smoke.

  Ilarkos looked to Kreon, who gave an irritable nod.

  With the night wind gusting through the window and a clean pinewood fire brought in, the haze cleared and everyone breathed easier.

  Kreon flung himself onto a bench strewn with black sheepskins, and peered suspiciously at the basket in Pirra’s arms. “What’s that?”

  “Snakes,” said Hekabi.

  “Snakes?” He leaped to his feet. “What is this? Get them out!”

  Ilarkos made to obey, but Hekabi stopped him with a glance. “You dreamed that a snake bit you,” she told Kreon.

  He blinked. “How did you know?”

  She didn’t, thought Pirra. Most people dream of snakes from time to time.

  “That’s why you have pain,” said Hekabi. “They’re nesting in your skull. My slave will perform a snake rite to drive them out.”

  Pirra stared at her in horror.

  “Do it,” Hekabi told her in Keftian.

  Shakily, Pirra set the basket on the rushes. Its contents rustled and hissed. She took off the lid. Hekabi was right, they were grass snakes, but they didn’t enjoy being confined.

  “This had better work,” threatened Kreon, “or you’ll both be feeding the crows.”