Back | Next

CHAPTER 10

The next day Ariadne learned the source of the quarrel that had tarnished the joy of the Mother's awakening. Phaidra trotted up to the shrine to report that there had been a truly royal battle between the king and the queen when they returned to the palace and that it had been settled by Minos giving permission to Pasiphae to build a temple in which to worship the Bull God. That was interesting, but didn't really touch Ariadne.

"But they had quarreled before the rite, hadn't they?" she asked.

"Yes, well that was all part of the same thing. It started when mother decided to dress Asterion in cloth-of-gold." Phaidra shook her head. "Well, you know how he is about being covered. And now that hair is growing over his chest as well as his back, he's even worse." She shrugged. "And, of course, he doesn't like mother. Well, he began to whimper as soon as she came in, and when she told the nurses to dress him and they tried to obey her, he began to roar." Phaidra shuddered delicately. "I hate when he does that. He sounds like a beast, not like a child—and certainly not like a god."

"He's only a baby," Ariadne said. "He just yells when he's annoyed or frightened. He doesn't care how he sounds as long as he gets what he wants."

Phaidra shrugged again. "I tried to tell mother that Asterion didn't like to be dressed, but father came and asked what was wrong. He didn't wait for an answer, though. As soon as he saw that cloth-of-gold tunic, he told mother that she couldn't bring Asterion to the rite."

"She intended to bring Asterion to the Mother's rite? Why?"

"Because, she says, he's the god of Crete and all worship must be to him or through him." Phaidra looked uneasy. "She told father that Asterion must be seated between the sacral horns and their chairs to either side."

"But the rite is for god and goddess to be united by the Mother so the cycle of life may begin. There's no place for a babe or even another god . . . true or false."

"That's what father said, but mother insisted that the Bull God must be first in Crete." Phaidra sighed. "And all this while Asterion was bellowing like the bulls of Baoshan so that father and mother had to scream to be heard. Then mother tried to pick Asterion up to quiet him and he almost got his teeth into her again. Maybe that convinced her or the fact that father said if she insisted on bringing Asterion he wouldn't attend and that Asterion could sing the responses."

"Which he cannot do . . . and may never be able to do," Ariadne remarked flatly.

"But then in the morning he agreed to build her a temple for Asterion," Phaidra said.

Ariadne nodded. "Father is arranging safeguards. If Asterion is a god, he has shown piety by building him a temple and giving him his place and times of worship. If he is not, his worship won't intrude on that of the true gods."

A place was chosen, at the foot of the palace adjoining the road to the caravanserai. There was plenty of room for a crowd to gather in front of the temple, and the crowd would be clearly visible from the shrine near the top of Gypsades Hill. Ariadne wondered whether that fact had influenced her mother to choose that place. Did she hope to make Dionysus angry, to drive him to abandon Crete by showing how eagerly the people came to work on the Bull God's temple, how they brought offerings even before the temple was finished? Dionysus had said he didn't care about the worshipers or the offerings, that he cared only for his chosen priestess, but as the ten-days passed and nothing came of her belief that he had come to watch her dance, Ariadne began to wonder.

The building of the temple proceeded apace. It wasn't a complex or elaborate structure, merely a large rectangular building with a rear and two side doors, fronted by a deep porch supported by four typical columns, narrower at the base than at the top. Perhaps to compensate for the simplicity of the design, ornamentation was lavish. Centered between the pillars was a large opening to the dark interior surrounded with carved and gilded bulls' horns. To either side, murals of charging bulls confronted each other. Between the murals and framed by the dark opening was a gilded throne, with arms ending in bellowing bulls' heads as well as a tall back carved with charging bulls.

It was on the throne that Pasiphae intended the Bull God to appear in glory, but for a time Ariadne wondered whether her mother could accomplish her purpose. Asterion wasn't cooperative. He screamed and fought against the clothing Pasiphae wanted him to wear. He wouldn't sit on her lap on a pretend throne, striking at her and snapping as if he wished to tear out her throat. But his instinctive rejection of the trappings of majesty seemed to increase rather than quell the queen's determination. She had him seized and bound, then covered the ropes with a golden cape so that she could bring him to the blessing of the temple grounds. His bellows she interpreted as roars of welcome.

From then on he screamed as soon as he saw her, but he was not yet capable of the speed or agility to escape and she forced his presence for several ceremonies. By the time he was six months old, however, he was walking and as large as an ordinary child of two and her original methods of coercion would no longer work. Doubts would certainly be aroused in worshipers about the powers of a "god" who seemed to be permanently immobile, so Asterion could no longer be bound and carried. The fact that Pasiphae overcame his resistance and succeeded in her purpose in the end was the final proof to Ariadne that Asterion wasn't a god but only the poor deformed victim of Poseidon's spite.

Her pity kept her from abandoning the child, even after he had been moved from the nursery to the over-ornamented quarters Pasiphae had originally created for him. He was now served by "suitable" male attendants—strong ones, armed with "rods of office" that could also be used to hold Asterion off or administer a stinging blow—but not one of them seemed to remember how young he really was. His physical development remained phenomenal; at the next winter solstice when he was a year old, he looked five or six.

Perhaps it was Asterion's size and strength, or her own desperate need to believe, that drove Pasiphae to insist he was a god. There was no other sign of godliness about him: he didn't, or couldn't, speak; he still wet and fouled himself; he didn't seem to understand even the simplest commands. Nonetheless he had been trained as one trains a beast by a mixture of bribery (with portions of raw meat, which was his favorite above all other things) and punishment to cease trying to attack Pasiphae and to allow a golden crown to be placed around his now-prominent horns and a golden kilt to be strapped around his waist.

He also learned to sit on the throne, which had been completed long before the building was ready so that it could be used for his training, and to endure a belt of gilded metal mesh to hold him in place. He didn't like that, but could be distracted from the confinement. Ariadne had inadvertently shown her mother how to get him to sit still. Remembering he was only a baby, she brought him toys, brightly colored blocks and sparkling gewgaws that turned in a breeze or moved by pulling a string. When she piled the blocks upon one another and allowed Asterion to knock them down or jiggled the sparkling toys, he would sit quite still to watch in fascination.

Pasiphae, coming upon them playing, didn't, as Ariadne feared, order her away from Asterion. The queen, almost in despair for a way to make the child climb onto the throne and sit, seized upon the idea that Asterion could be induced by amusement and enlarged it.

Priests and priestesses were promptly selected to serve the Bull God by dancing before his altar, and Pasiphae ordered Daidalos to design garments for them that would glitter and move to bind mind and spirit. The votaries in their shining, animated finery would perform all sorts of acrobatic feats, such as climbing into a pyramid, which they would allow to collapse into a heap of sparkling glitter at a wave from Asterion, or they would increase the pace and convolutions of any dance in accord with his gestures.

Ariadne never attended any of the ceremonies, which brought about a sharp clash with her mother on the day before the winter solstice that would mark Asterion's second birthday. Pasiphae confronted her daughter, who had just brought Asterion a box of bright new toys to mark the day. He could speak a few words now, and his happy shriek of "Ridne," which was as much as he could pronounce of her name, had apparently alerted her mother to her presence.

Asterion, who had been rushing forward to embrace his sister, stopped short when Pasiphae appeared in the doorway, his bull-like lips curling back from a predator's teeth, which looked even more menacing in the bovine muzzle. Snarling, he backed away and Ariadne, who had seen the reaction before, put down the box of toys and turned to Pasiphae.

The queen looked at the carved horse and cart, with its bright-painted wheels set with bits of shining metal that would glitter as the wheels turned when the cart was moved, at two whirligigs and several tops, all also bright with sparkling bits. The toys acknowledged that Asterion's agility and manipulative skills were the equal of the ten-year-old he seemed to be. Her eyebrows lifted.

"So you acknowledge the Bull God's power," Pasiphae said, smiling. "What two-year-old could use such toys?" She laughed aloud. "And since you curry favor with the Bull God with such trinkets, you can dance for him on his birth day and join in our worship."

"No," Ariadne replied. "I dance only for the Mother. I worship only Her and Dionysus."

"Dionysus is gone from Crete!" Pasiphae exclaimed. "He abandoned you as soon as the Bull God appeared in the flesh. Don't be a fool. Dance for the Bull God and I'll allow you some portion of the offerings that come to his temple."

Ariadne smiled slowly. "Dionysus isn't gone from Crete. Don't the vines flourish? Aren't the grapes full and sweet? Isn't the wine the equal of the greatest in Crete's past?"

Fury thinned Pasiphae's lips. Not only was what Ariadne said true but Pasiphae had made a few mistakes in the early months of the Bull God's worship. Then, when she felt her most pressing need was to divert worship from Dionysus to Asterion (and when she still believed that Asterion had power she could direct), she had threatened several nobles who continued to send offerings and lesser members of their families to Dionysus' shrine with the blasting of their vines. The threat had been shown to be toothless. When Phaidra reported what Pasiphae had done, Ariadne made sure that those nobles had the richest crop of grapes and the sweetest on the whole island.

Now Pasiphae confined her threats to matters she could control. If she prophesied misfortune for a family, it was the kind of misfortune that could befall at the hands of armed and masked men who wore no house badges and disappeared after the damage was done. And if she prophesied good fortune it was the kind that political or trade favors could produce. She didn't use the device often. Minos wouldn't stand for it and her own political sense constrained her from excesses. But the crown of her glory would be to bring Dionysus' priestess to acknowledge the Bull God.

"That is by the Bull God's will," Pasiphae said loudly. "It is nothing to do with the blessings of a little godling who has abandoned his priestess. I demand that you dance at the Bull God's ceremony at dawn."

"At dawn I will be performing the ritual to Call Dionysus to the vineyards," Ariadne said steadily, although her throat was tight with unshed tears.

"Which your petty godling will ignore!" Pasiphae spat. "Which all Cretans will ignore! You'll be alone with your ancient priests and priestesses and six little children who bitterly regret being consecrated to a dead godling and wish fervently to come down the hill to the Bull God's temple."

"Be that as it may, Dionysus is not dead, as our wine attests. He's my god and I'll worship only him and the Mother, who is above all, even the gods."

"I am your mother and your queen!" Pasiphae shrieked. In the background Asterion bellowed, but she ignored him. "I command you to dance for the Bull God. You must obey me."

"No," Ariadne said. "Only Dionysus can command my service."

"Dionysus is gone! Dead! I tell you if you don't dance for the Bull God, I'll have your shrine razed to the ground. I will—"

Ariadne laughed in her face. "And I will blast the vines of the king and queen of Knossos so they will never put forth another leaf. Only the vines of the king and queen. All others will flourish as never before."

Pasiphae uttered a scream of rage and ran forward, raising her arm to strike Ariadne. Asterion bellowed again and one of his attendant shouted a wordless warning. There was a crack, as of wood against flesh. Asterion screeched in pain and Ariadne whirled about to see what had happened to him. A thin streak of blood marked his muzzle, a male attendant was on the floor, scrambling to rise, and Asterion, teeth bared, hands clawed, and murder on his bestial face, was charging toward Pasiphae bellowing, "No hurt Ridne!"

"No, no," Ariadne cried, catching her brother by the arm and pulling him around to face her. "No one is going to hurt me, love. You know mother shouts a lot. Never mind her at all. Come, love. Come play with your new toys. Come and make the tops spin. You know I can never do that as well as you can."

He strained against her for a moment, but she put her arms around him and kissed his cheek. His mouth closed and he blinked his beautiful eyes. "No hurt Ridne?"

"No one will hurt Ariadne." She kissed his cheek again.

He looked across his shoulder—and over hers, and Ariadne realized he was almost as tall as she—and a strange noise, not unlike an animal's growl rumbled in his chest when he caught sight of his mother. Ariadne saw one of the attendants sidling along the wall toward where Pasiphae had been. The growling and tension faded from Asterion's body and Ariadne hoped that the attendant had convinced Pasiphae to leave. She pulled again at Asterion's arm.

"Come, sit here on the floor beside me," she suggested, tugging at him gently. She reached into the box of toys. "Look. Look at this golden top. If you spin it, you'll see red lines run up and down it."

He butted his head against her. "Love Ridne," he said, and spun the top so quickly and dextrously that the red lines raced over the toy and sparkles Ariadne hadn't known were there flashed brightly.

"Well, that was very interesting," Bacchus remarked, lifting his head from the bowl in which he'd been scrying.

Wincing, Silenos turned his heavy body to its side on the couch on which he was lying. His face and the untidily draped himation showed him to be thoroughly bruised. Seeing he was attended, Bacchus described the scene he'd just witnessed between Ariadne and Pasiphae.

"I think you must mirror it for him," Silenos said, studying the handsome blond, whose beauty was marred only slightly by too-small, red-rimmed eyes. Then, before Bacchus could produce a stinging retort, he went on hurriedly, "You know I agreed with you when he first entangled himself with her. But now I think differently."

"You certainly did agree," Bacchus snapped. "You spent half of every night whining to me about what we should do to get him to leave her and come back to his usual ways."

"Well, I thought it was for his own good." Silenos groaned as he levered himself upright. "I remembered what happened when the first one he was so fond of died, and I thought soonest over, soonest mended, so when she defied him that way, it seemed reasonable to harp on her disloyalty and disrespect and turn him against her. I thought he might kill her—or get her killed—mourn a little, and then forget her."

"He never really forgot the other one," Bacchus said. "He thinks this is she, reborn, a special gift from the Mother." His lips twisted on the last word.

Silenos nodded. "I think you're right. And he isn't mending, Bacchus, he's getting worse."

"Do you think he will really go completely mad?" Bacchus asked, his voice now uncertain.

"How far is he from that?" Silenos asked. "He let the maenads turn on me. On me! And he laughed."

There was a long silence while Bacchus looked down into the scrying bowl again. "He didn't let them kill you," he said at last, sounding as if he almost regretted it.

"You'll be next," Silenos hissed with unaccustomed energy. "You think he doesn't know what we did. Well, he does. He's uncaring about most things, not stupid."

Bacchus bit his lip. "But this may be far worse. She makes him care. The little people we use for our games are her kind. I think he intends to bring this one here. And she'll watch more closely what we do than he ever did. That's why I worked so hard to wean him away from her."

"Bring her here?" Silenos echoed, staring. "Watch her grow old and wither and die . . . here?"

"He doesn't intend this one to wither and die," Bacchus snarled. "Don't you remember that he `convinced' Persephone to grant immortality to his mother—oh, very well," he added in response to Silenos' wordless protest, "to intercede with the Mother to grant Semele life as long as an Olympian's?" He rose and paced the room. "But it was Persephone who did whatever was done to Semele. Why is it necessary to him always to say the power came from another?"

"Because it did," Silenos said quietly. "And that's one way in which he's wise. Perhaps he Sees Her . . . If you want to forget that we . . . they—" his eyes glanced toward the part of the house in which Dionysus lived "—are not gods, he doesn't, and I don't. Too many of them are like you. The Mother overlooks much, but one day . . ."

"Oh, be quiet. We have troubles enough of our own, without foreseeing doom for all." Bacchus paced a little longer, then came to stand before Silenos. "He thinks there are the seeds of the needed power in this priestess. Remember that she's blessed the fields for two years without him and the vineyards are as rich as if he'd been with her. No other priestess has ever done that, not even his old favorite."

Silenos' eyes widened. "Is that so?"

"I watched her through the scrying bowl." Bacchus grimaced. "I thought he'd be angry all over again when I showed him what she was doing, but he wasn't. He looked through me—you know how he does when he Sees something he understands—and he smiled. Are you sure he knows we kept reminding him of her defiance for our own purposes rather than out of indignation for his sake?"

Silenos laughed and lay down again. "Why do you think I am all swollen and black and blue? At first his hurt and rage because she wasn't absolutely, mindlessly, his, because she could defy him, didn't let him think, but that's worn away. He has been thinking. You'll be next to be chastised. And one of these times his rage will take him over completely and he'll laugh as we are torn into bloody gobbets and strewn over the vineyards to make them fertile."

"You're saying I must tell him that she's learned her lesson and worships only him and mirror for him her defiance of her mother?" Bacchus' lips turned down into a petulant pout. "But she'll turn him into a model of sweetness and light. They'll run together—" he sneered "—laughing and singing. We won't be invited—and the good times, the drinking and coupling, will roll no more."

"They're ended for me anyway," Silenos said very softly, closing his eyes. "There's been too much blood, too much killing, for me. Even if I didn't fear I would be the next sacrifice, I'd withdraw from these `blessings.' When it happened once or twice a year in widely different lands, it was exciting." His jaw set for a moment as a remembered thrill passed through him. "Now I'm only sickened by the pain and blood. I'll crawl away and live as I can without him."

Bacchus stood looking down at him for a little while. He thought Silenos a soft old fool. The pain and blood always added an orgiastic pleasure to the wild coupling for him, but if Dionysus lost himself entirely to the madness that always coiled in him and allowed the maenads to turn from sexual excesses to killing . . . Dionysus had barely managed to save Silenos, and he was truly fond of the old idiot. And if Silenos was right and Dionysus suspected that he had interfered in the relationship with this priestess, he might, indeed, be next to be beaten instead of futtered.

Worse, if Dionysus was as far gone as Silenos believed . . . The old fool was right, Bacchus thought, his brow creasing as he tried to recall Dionysus' behavior before he had taken this priestess as his Chosen. Yes, there had been a lot of killing in the last two years, and more and more recently. Could he be next? Gnawing at his lip, he glanced toward the door, then he picked up the scrying bowl and carried it carefully with him.

As he moved, he glanced about the apartment he and Silenos shared—two bedchambers and a luxurious bathing room adjoining a large central chamber. The walls were alternately hung with tapestries depicting merry orgies, everyone laughing and coupling in twos, threes, and fours with cups in their hands or flasks spilling wine. He stared for a moment at the lively works; it hadn't been like that for a long time.

Between the tapestries were shelves filled with wine flasks, goblets of precious glass or jewel-set metal, and pretty bibelots—and books, many scrolls and clay tablets. They were dusty; Dionysus hadn't asked to share the merry tales with Silenos . . . for a long time. The furnishings were lush, cushioned couches and chairs, carved tables of precious woods, of ivory, even of silver, set with delicate porcelain or with game boards and pieces of equally precious materials. Those, too, hadn't been used in far too long.

Silenos must be really frightened to leave all this, he thought. Likely none of the other great ones would take him in. What would he do? Not expect Bacchus to provide for him. He wasn't that much a fool. Doubtless he would take a little room above a shop in the Agora and tell stories for food and a few coins, as he'd done before Dionysus had bade him guest with him. Bacchus shuddered.

He started toward the door knowing there was no help for it. He would have to tell Dionysus that his priestess, if not mindlessly his, was utterly faithful and mirror the scene between her and her mother in the scrying bowl. Better too much sweetness than broken or dead. He hesitated as he stepped out the door into the short corridor and turned his back to the extension that led to the servants' rooms. All was not lost. If he could keep Dionysus from bringing the woman to Olympus, there might be a workable compromise.

Smiling now, he went down the corridor to the central atrium, which one would swear was a sunlit forest glade. Pillars of rough brown marble that could have been trees, except for being cold stone instead of bark, seemed to divide into branches that held up a roof in which that strange, clear substance only Hades could produce let in the sun and glimpses of sky and clouds. In that light flowers, shrubs, trellised vines, and even small trees grew, a fountain played, and more vines bedecked the pillars and balustrades.

Bacchus looked around while passing through but saw at once that the benches and sets of chairs and tables in the arbors were empty. His smile disappeared. It was too early for Dionysus to have gone out, so he must be brooding in his own apartment. That wasn't good. When he had nothing to occupy him, he Saw too much and too often. At least while he was with the priestess he had had only one Vision, and that had been related to her.

Another corridor led from the atrium to Dionysus' rooms. Bacchus breathed a sigh of relief when he saw that the door to the antechamber was open. At least he wasn't closing himself away from all contact, as he'd done the first few days.

The antechamber was empty, as always. In Dionysus' case, it was a useless room. The other great ones sometimes received suppliants—not all the inhabitants of Olympus had real power. Most, in fact, were ordinary folk who herded flocks, tilled fields, threw pots, and performed the tasks that let the great ones live in comfort. Those people often had favors to beg, especially from Aphrodite and Athena and Hermes. Sometimes even from Zeus. But not from Dionysus. They were terrified of him. If he asked for something, it was delivered immediately and without charge.

Bacchus wrinkled his nose. He could have done very well out of requests to jewelers, weavers, and suchlike, but Dionysus wouldn't permit it. He would watch men torn apart and laugh, but wouldn't seize any lesser offering like gold and jewels. Unconsciously, he snorted.

"You may enter, Bacchus."

He barely suppressed a start strong enough to slop the wine out of the scrying bowl, set his teeth for a moment, and then entered Dionysus' sitting room. This, Bacchus thought inordinately gloomy. The walls were of dark green malachite, polished to a gloss that didn't hide the natural mottling, which by some artifice gave the appearance of a thick canopy of leaves. Shutters covered the windows, carved into vine patterns through which bright flowers of Hades' translucent artifice peeped. Had the shutters been open, the room might have seemed a soothing, enclosed bower of peace, but of late Dionysus had kept them closed, allowing only the light that came through the flowers and that of lamps to light the room.

Bacchus moved slowly to allow his eyes to become accustomed to the gloom and he soon perceived Dionysus lying on a padded couch. Clearly, since he had spoken directly to him, Dionysus knew he was there, but he hadn't turned his head to look at him. He seemed to be staring across the chamber at the dark opening into his bedchamber, his eyes fixed and protuberant. Silenos was right, Bacchus thought, the madness was closer to the surface than ever.

"I've seen something very interesting in the scrying bowl," Bacchus said, setting the bowl on a table and moving a chair behind it. "I think it's something you should see yourself. If you'd come here, I'll mirror it for you."

"If it's another flood of offerings, just ask Hermes to collect them. Tell him to take what he wants in payment. I don't care."

He finally turned toward Bacchus, coming fully into the light of the lamp beside the couch, and Bacchus saw that one of Dionysus' eyes was blackened and nearly swollen shut and his arms and shoulders were deeply scratched and almost as bruised as Silenos's. He must have had an even more difficult time wresting Silenos from the maenads than Silenos realized, which meant they were more out of control than Dionysus had expected. Bacchus suppressed a shudder.

"They fear you, my lord," he said. "They hope the offerings will appease you."

"And that if they give enough, I will come no more." Dionysus laughed—so ugly a sound that Bacchus swallowed, but before he could find a soothing comment, Dionysus added, "Knossos made offerings to draw me to Crete . . . But they don't want me any more either. They have their priestess and their new god."

He turned his head to stare into the dark again, and Bacchus felt a horrible mingling of rage and despair wash over him. The misery that engulfed him confirmed Silenos's fears. He bit down hard on his lip. The pain freed him enough to be able to speak.

"It's true that the offerings have all but ceased from Knossos and that most of the people go to the temple of the Bull God . . . But not your priestess."

Dionysus sat up, now fixing his gaze on Bacchus. Did the eyes have more sense in them Bacchus wondered? But Dionysus' voice was sharp and bitter when he said, "What? Has she stopped cuddling that misbegotten monster?"

"No. She still visits him often and treats him kindly, bringing him little toys—wagons and tops and suchlike—but I've just learned she doesn't accept him as a god and won't give him her service as priestess. Come, my lord, let me mirror for you her defiance of her mother, who demanded she dance for the Bull God."

Dionysus rose slowly with some care for his bruises. "So she wouldn't dance for the Bull God but still dances for the Mother?" Despite a wince of pain, pleasure hummed in his voice.

Relief urged Bacchus to confirm the news that had eased Dionysus' mood. "She said she worships only you . . . and the Mother."

"I gave her leave to worship the Mother," Dionysus said quickly, and seated himself before the scrying bowl.

Bacchus drew a deep breath and closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them, they were fixed on the scrying bowl. Scrying was his gift. He could see what anyone, anywhere, was doing, if he knew some characteristic of the person on which he could fix. That permitted Dionysus—or anyone else for whom he scryed—to know what was happening in distant temples even when the priests and priestesses could not Call their gods.

Unfortunately he was not alone in his talent. Quite a large number of Olympians, who had no greater Gifts, could scry and mirror what they'd seen. Like Silenos, he had been eking out a living, mostly scrying for the least powerful mages and sinking his frustrations in drink and women, when Dionysus had come across him. His wholehearted enjoyment of Dionysus' indulgence in wine and wild fertility rites had made him welcome as a companion. Later his ability to scry and keep Dionysus in touch with his mostly unGifted priests and priestesses brought him an invitation to be a permanent assistant and guest.

Under Bacchus' gaze the surface of the wine clouded, then cleared, to show an image of Ariadne turning to face Pasiphae, who had just stepped inside the doorway. The entire scene unfolded, ending with Asterion spinning his top and carefully butting his head against Ariadne so that the sharp horns wouldn't touch her. "Love Ridne," the misshapen mouth pronounced.

"Hold that," Dionysus said.

Obediently Bacchus froze the image of Ariadne and Asterion together. Dionysus continued to stare down into the bowl, studying first the monstrous bull's head, with its beautiful bovine eyes turned up to Ariadne, and then her face, the huge black eyes shining with tears, the mouth turned down just a little with pity and . . . distaste. Dionysus sighed.

"The poor creature," he muttered, and the brilliant blue of his too-large, too-bright eyes misted to softness with tears. "No one loves him. No one ever will, not even his Ridne." He shook his head. "He's so pitiful—in a way so innocent. I understand now why she must protect him, but the cost . . ." He looked away, this time at the bright flowers that starred the carved shutters, and gestured for Bacchus to cut off the vision.

When Bacchus saw Dionysus' thoughtful expression as his gaze fixed on the bright beauty that Hades had created, his mind leapt to what Hades's wife Persephone had done for Semele. His suspicion that Dionysus was thinking again of giving an Olympian's length of life to a native who would "love" him intensified—and he liked the idea less now than when it first came to him. He did not want that woman here, but he could think of no way of approaching the subject that wouldn't spell disaster for him. Dionysus had turned his head back to the scrying bowl and was staring into it, although nothing but a dark mirror showed.

Apparently his mind was still on the bull-headed boy, for he said, "Yet, if he doesn't die soon, he'll stain Crete with blood. I've Seen it. My Mouth has spoken it. I don't know what to do."

"What's a little more blood? You usually water the earth with human blood to feed the vines, so—"

Dionysus looked up at him. No wild emotion followed that gaze, but Bacchus took warning and swallowed what more he'd been about to say. Then Dionysus smiled at him and there was a reminiscent delight in his expression that had nothing to do with him and that Bacchus didn't like.

"You wouldn't understand," Dionysus said, a tinge of contempt coloring smile and voice. "Crete is clean of blood and has been for a long time. There's no human sacrifice there. In the bull dancing, if a dancer should be gored, it is considered a bad omen, a failure of the ritual that must be expiated and explained by the queen/goddess—and the bull is driven away into the mountains as not fit for sacrifice. I remember now. It was my own priestess, the first Ariadne, who changed the old ways. She was queen and had the power."

"Power? Doubtless she drained you to bless the vineyards without lust or blood." Bacchus tried to sound indignant.

Dionysus laughed, and his expression now held a softness of joy in it that almost sickened Bacchus. "She gave to me, not I to her," he said. "She went with me as this Ariadne did, running and laughing. She was old, but the Mother gave her strength and she gave it to me. I could feel the power pour out of me and into the vines, and though we shed no blood and incited no lust, Crete had the best wine in the whole world." He drew a deep breath and nodded. "Yes, it was a lesson, but I didn't understand it then. Now I do understand. If I had taken Ariadne with me—"

"Do you think she would be happy here?" Bacchus interrupted quickly. "You remember how the great ones treated Semele. She didn't stay."

"My mother didn't know me. She was afraid of me." Dionysus hesitated and looked toward the dark for a moment; then a faint smile bent his lips and his eyes went back to the bright flowers. "That, as I know too well, will never be Ariadne's problem. And I should have known that my Ariadne wouldn't touch death. She's all life."

Bacchus' heart sank. Clearly the reminder that his mother had demanded to be sent back to the Underworld rather than live in Olympus hadn't turned Dionysus' mind from planning to bring his priestess to Olympus. Trying another gambit, Bacchus asked, "Will she be willing to leave the bull-head?"

Dionysus frowned, but in thought, not hurt or anger. "Not yet. She won't turn her back on him nor on the trouble he'll bring to Knossos. I know that. She has a caring heart—perhaps that's what makes her Mother-blessed."

The evidence that Dionysus was thinking instead of just feeling and acting made Bacchus even more unhappy. He didn't want Dionysus reasonable and acceptable to others; he didn't want Ariadne sharing Dionysus' house and changing the being who had satisfied all his lusts into a singing, laughing idiot. He would almost rather see Dionysus completely mad. It would wear off; he was sure the grief and rage would wear off. So, if Dionysus committed what to this stupid native was an unforgivable sin, she would withdraw herself.

"If the monster died by some `accident' and she didn't know you were involved . . ." Bacchus ventured.

Dionysus shook his head. "I don't think I could do it now. Before he was a person, I could have stopped his heart to save everyone hurt and pain. Not now. I saw how the poor creature craves love, how hurt it is already . . ." Dionysus sighed. "Besides, she would know. There's something within her that touches me."

"Women always pretend—" Bacchus stopped abruptly as Dionysus got to his feet.

He stared at Bacchus and the corners of his mouth tucked back. Bacchus' mouth went dry. He held out a hand in a placating gesture, but he knew that Dionysus did know what he'd done, had weighed and measured him and found him worthless. He didn't dare speak and anyway nothing he said would matter, so when Dionysus waved him away, he took up his scrying bowl and fled.

When Bacchus was gone, Dionysus stared at the door he had closed, but he wasn't thinking of Bacchus. As soon as Bacchus' irritating presence was gone, Dionysus had dismissed that self-absorbed animal's existence from his mind. He had a more important problem—how to reestablish contact with Ariadne.

"I don't See anything," he said to the bright flowers Hades had set into his shutters to keep him, Hades had said, from shutting himself off in the dark.

He smiled, thinking of the passionate devotion of Hades and his wife Persephone. So much love flowed between them that it overflowed, bathing those hungry for it in warmth and understanding. Ah, if he could convince Ariadne to come to him, even the dark would be bright. But it would be useless to try before the problem of the bull-head was solved. Why could he never See what he needed to See? he asked himself impatiently.

Had an answer to the problem of the bull-head come in a Vision, Ariadne would have Seen it also and known what to do. He thought back. The Vision had shown the bull-man killing, not being killed. His offer to end its life was a mistake and his Mouth had rightly rejected it. His lips thinned as he remembered how he'd allowed Bacchus to make more trouble between him and Ariadne.

"I won't travel that road again," he said aloud to the empty room. "I'll make my peace with my priestess. I know the bull-head, poor creature, must die. When she Sees it too . . . but not by my hand or hers."

Back | Next
Framed