|
XXXIX. THE CHASE BACK TO ROME
The Cumaeans provide their fastest ship. It is a military bireme whose brass ram gleams like the forehead of Pallas as she rips through the waves. It almost seems the angry goddess stands in the sky, which is gray as her eyes, as she directs the sail to billow to groaning fullness. The waves that roll by, curling onto the sandy shore, are small compared to the bow-wave of this naval attack ship called West Wind. Two ranks of slaves row, and four coxswains crack their whips in the air. On either side of the ship, a big drum pounds on the sea, and you can well imagine how the sea gods and goddesses stir in their slumber as the shadow of this Argive warship passes overhead like a deadly shark heading for the kill. To chase one evil slave who has stolen a scroll, the Cumaeans send twenty of the finest marines in glittering armor, and they never take their eyes off the northern horizon seeking blood to wash their iron swords.
But the merchant ship is also fast, and only once or twice do you think you spot the Etruscan’s burgundy sail on the wine-dark water. Twice the lookout yells down from his high perch, pointing to a faraway triangle whose canvas is filled with sunlight, filtered into colors like barley and garnet.
A full day you run like this, with rainy squalls on the west wind driving past your eyes to the Tyrrhenian shore. Long vistas, galleries of palm trees, mirror images within mirror images of waves crashing on the sand, and here and there Poseidon’s dolphins play in the surf, the way Zeus’ hunting dogs might play in the snow footing Olympos. One day, these empty forests will be cut down to make way for the villas of the augusti and their oligarchs, but for now the shores of Italy are pristine as those from which Homer’s heroes went down to the sea in ships.
Overnight, you lay up on shore and rest impatiently, while overhead the Milky Way rolls out its epic tapestry telling of the gods and how they toyed with the fates of men. The Fates raised some up to godlike heroes while casting others down to be chattering ghosts on the far side of Lethe (the river of forgetfulness near the entrance to the Underworld).
On the morning fresh, the sailors sing loudly and the rowers respond with chanting. The marines clash their swords and spears on their shields, and their cloaks fly in the wind, while they look with plumed helmets toward the homeland of the Tyrrhenoi. The drum beats with every brush of the winds, on which the hunting seabirds stand with waiting wings looking down to the glittering armor of Neptune’s sea-fish. The oars strain, so that the water is frothy. Waves bang on the wooden hulls like fists. The ship’s prow shivers left and right, and above it the images of Hera and Zephyrus look vengeful.
However, somehow, during the night, the purple-sailed ship slipped away. Guided by silver moon sprites, it avoided the clipper-rocks offshore, nesting haunts of deathly-white birds, who are said to be the ghosts of sailors lost at sea without a proper burial.
On the prow of West Wind, a priest from Cumae burns incense and offers rituals and prayers to appease the sea gods. The birds nesting high on passing cliffs fly out all at once, circle over the ship in ways that only the priest knows how to read, and return to their haunts in the barren rocks. Their cries drift on the water as the warship pounds on, and the men’s throats rage with a justified thirst for blood that overcomes their reverence and fear for the gods whose faces look up from the waves.
Ustia, port of the Tyrrhenoi, boasts a round castellum that bristles with spears as the Argive ship drops her sail and the oars cease their driving heartbeat. For the first time in two days, the big drums are still, and the coxswains’ hoarse throats are still. The rowers rest on their arms in blessed stillness.
The captain of West Wind, two officers, and a squad of hoplites (lightly armed, running infantrymen) accompany you through the rumbling surf. Wet up to your necks, you and Darwin stagger ashore. He does not look good, you notice, helping him walk by placing one chill, limp arm over your shoulder and supporting him by your other hand on his trembling ribs.
Amalthea runs ahead. The water weighs down her Greek-style chiton, revealing the lean strength of her admirable limbs. The Etruscans, who honor women, receive her before the captain gets there, as if she were the head of the expedition. It’s just as well, because she blurts the dire story of how Polybius stole secrets from the Sibyl’s golden cupboards. The Etruscans, who know well the Sibyl and dread the holy portents that issue from her mouth like the fire that steams from Cumae’s fields, excuse the Greek invasion on their land. Soon, two squads of naked hoplites run like dark shadows, Etruscans and Greeks, competing to see who will reach the seven hills first. The twenty hoplites run like wild stags have run into the wilderness seeking Polybius and the sacred scroll.
You notice a strange thing. The men run, with their open hands flashing back and forth, and their thighs glistening with sweat. Their hair dances in the sun, and their heels flash as the sand flies. As they sprint east toward the forest on a bend in the Rumo, they fade away like smoky ghosts, and are no more. For some moments the air is filled with golden dust, which sparkles in the sunlight, before falling to earth, and then you see only the dark forests on the marshlands. You know that Time is at work, making corrections. Just as quickly, you forget the unfortunate but glorious heroes who have gone to their Elysian Fields beyond pain or harm.
From the fort, Etruscan horses and cavalry come, and soon enough you and Darwin and Amalthea are riding on the Salarian Way that you first took coming from Ostia to Rome a thousand years in the future, and over which you lightly flew sipping your demitasse yet another 17 centuries later in a wondrous Alitalia Boeing 747.
At the Tiber Island, you find the old river captain again, and he leads you across on his boat. On the other side, where Larth held sway, now Quirinus’ men rule. You find Marcellus, who is now a man of arms as well as a man of letters. You describe what has happened, and Romulus, father of all the Romans, orders a great pursuit.
Darwin collapses on the sand, and you carry him into the shade. Several Romans offer to carry him up into the hills, to the temple of Dius Pater on the Capitolium, where he will receive the best care they know how to offer. "Good luck," he says. "I’m sorry, but I do not think I will be able to get much farther." He silences your protests. "No time for that now. Go with Amalthea, you two, and find him before he can give the scroll to Carinus. It foretells his fate as Augustus, and therefore some tiny bit of the fate of Rome. It’s knowledge that must not fall into his hands, because he might somehow defy fate and alter history, which Time itself cannot allow."
Leaving Darwin with tears and fond embraces, you and Amalthea, together with Marcellus and several Romans, hurry toward the hillside where one day Ulpian’s library will stand. There, amid bramble bushes on a hillside propitiously attended by the sacred animals who make their home here, stands Polybius. He is wrapped in an otherworldly aura and stands in rapt attention with his face and eyes cast toward heaven, and his arms extended, palms up, either ready to offer himself, or else demanding that the gods deliver heaven itself to him in his hubris. Once again, you see the cloaked figure of Petasus standing on a distant hillside watching these gestures and follies with darkly brooding attention.
Amalthea cries "Stop!" and runs toward Polybius. Marcellus and several Romans run behind her, all crying out for Polybius to be reasonable and begging him not to insult the gods further.
Polybius turns suddenly, with a terrible laugh, and throws a spear. The shaft runs through Amalthea’s beautiful torso and comes out on the other side slick with gore. She stands in midair, like someone falling backwards, and her arms and legs are sprawled while her face registers a final look of understanding that comes when a warrior looks on the face of Hades and sees the great warriors of the past beckoning to him, or to her. Hair flying in the wind, she pitches down from the cliff and crashes to her final gasp on the boulders down below.
"No!" You raise a spear stolen from a Roman and yell in outrage. Your throw twirls in the air. The spears of a half dozen others fill the air. Polybius, however, is wrapped suddenly in the cloak of so deity defying reason and order in this mad game. Your guess is that Carinus has a hand in this.
Marcellus confirms your fears. "Carinus has assembled the most powerful foreign soothsayers and casters of evil spells. He has unified their powers to extract this ultimate prize from the ancient Sibyl, using the fool Polybius as just one more tool." Marcellus pushes you. "Go!" No time now to long for the company of Amalthea and Darwin, she already gone to the gods, the other on his way. Marcellus has sworn to stay and be a free man, which you can understand. His fellow early Romans would not want to see what will become of their glorious democracy--especially not what Marcellus has lived in, the bloody-red twilight of a mighty empire whose rulers are more evil than the hissing and fire-spitting Hydra with her many writhing snake-heads.
You stumble forward, and pass through a whirling kaleidoscope of winds and solar effects, where your breath is sucked from you, and your eyes bulge, while your skin breaks out in scales of frost. Within a Roman foot of death, you are thrown down on the marble floor of Ulpian’s villa. Amalthea was right: only one got through. Actually, Amalthea was almost right, as you now see in the blur of traveling forward from 753 B.C. to 284 A.D., a span of 1,037 years. You notice in a corner of your eye that a shadow hovers to one side, keeping up. It is Petasus, the mysterious figure with the broad peasant hat and staff, wrapped in his thick cloak that reminds you partly of voluminous wrappings like those of a classic toga, and partly of wisps of cumulus cloud. The observer from some other time and place moves right along with you. Now, for the first time, he speaks to you, saying: "Where is the scroll? We must take back the scroll that Polybius stole."
|
