They sailed the next day in the hour after dawn.
Far, far away, Genvissa stood by a still pond, staring at the vision she could see in its mirrored waters.
A hundred black-hulled ships, sailing towards the Pillars of Hercules.
Closing her eyes and summoning her power, Genvissa called on the sprites of the water, Mag’s familiars, and stirred them into turmoil.
For all her kind words and reassurances to Brutus in her guise as Artemis, Genvissa intended to cripple this fleet long before it reached Llangarlia…and perhaps even finally rid herself of this mewling child Brutus had taken to wife.
Genvissa hated the way thoughts of Cornelia constantly filled Brutus’ mind. It was beyond time that Cornelia died. Brutus would have to survive without his precious son.
Late in the afternoon, landmasses to the north and south had closed in upon the fleet so that ahead lay only a relatively narrow strait of sea between two headlands.
Brutus, standing in the stem of his ship with the captain, Membricus, Deimas and two other experienced sailors, looked ahead, clearly worried. Then he glanced upwards towards the sky which had, in the past hour, clouded over until the boats were as crowded by low-hanging black clouds as they were by the headlands.
“So much for Artemis’ pledge for calm seas,” Membricus muttered, and Brutus threw him a dirty look.
“I have been through the Pillars of Hercules once before,” said the captain, Aldros. “It can be a perilous journey in the best of seasons, let alone when a storm threatens to close in about us.”
“How many ships abreast?” said Brutus. If he sailed the fleet through single file it would take hours to get them all to safety.
“Five, possibly six,” said Aldros, his grey eyes narrowed in his weather-beaten face as he stared ahead, “but even then the captains of the ships on the outer extremities will need to be careful. There are rocks there,” he pointed, “and there, and there.”
“Do we sail, or row?” said Brutus, now watching Aldros more carefully than either the sea ahead or the sky above.
“We row,” said Aldros. “At the Pillars of Hercules is the meeting point of two great seas: the central sea, which we leave, and the grey infinity that stretches to the west, into which we enter. Tides and waves pull and push in every direction. If we depend on sail, we are likely to be dashed on the rocks to either side of the pillars. The oarsmen must prove their worth if we are to survive. Ye gods, Brutus, I hope you trained the new crews well in the months we waited in Mesopotama.”
“Well,” said Brutus, “now we will find out. Aldros, will you organise the passing of instructions between ships? We sail five abreast, and we do it before night falls. Tell the captains to stow their sails, and to tie everything down that they can. The crews must to their oars, and passengers must huddle deep in the bellies of the ships.”
Aldros nodded, and hurried off to speak to some of his sailors.
The next moment the great sail started to come down.
“My friends,” Brutus said to Membricus and Deimas, “will you see to the people in this ship? Get them as low and as tightly packed as possible.”
As Membricus and Deimas moved off, Brutus picked his way towards the aft deck of the ship. Cornelia, Aethylla and two other women were sitting in the small space beside the cabin. They stared at Brutus, and sometimes beyond him to the grey seas between the Pillars of Hercules, their faces tense and worried.
Brutus saw Cornelia finger her belly briefly, and for the first time he began to truly worry about the trial ahead. He had so many vulnerable people in this fleet…
He reached the women, and smiled, but because the smile did nothing to wipe the concern from his dark eyes, none of the four women smiled back.
“We have seen the storm clouds and heard whispers of danger ahead,” said Cornelia. “Will we be safe?”
He hesitated, and then realised that because of that hesitation nothing he said would relieve the women’s anxiety. He shrugged, and decided to be truthful. “I don’t know. Normally a storm, even a bad one, would not concern me overmuch. But in these narrow straits, with these rocks, and with so many people packed into these ships.” He paused, sighed, and said again, “I don’t know.”
One of the women sitting with Cornelia and Aethylla, Periopis, gave a low moan of terror.
He glanced at Cornelia. She was obviously fearful, but calm.
“You cannot stay on the aft deck,” he said to the women. “It is too exposed should the sea rise and rage.”
“We will huddle with the others in the belly of the ship,” said Cornelia. “Do not worry about us, Brutus. We will be well.”
Brutus stared at her, surprised. He’d expected something other than this calm control. Tears, recriminations, childish temper…but not a composed, even discipline.
He nodded. “Wrap yourselves well in blankets—anything to keep you dry if the waves toss themselves over the side of the ship. And whatever happens, whatever you see or hear, stay where you are. There will be no greater safety anywhere else.”
“We shall wrap our arms about each other and tell each other childish rhymes,” Cornelia said, trying unsuccessfully to smile, “and we will not get in the way.”
Brutus grudgingly admired her composure. She could have made things hard for him; instead, it appeared as if she were going out of her way to make things easier, even though she was fearful herself.
He nodded. “Thank you,” he said, and then he was gone.
Cornelia watched him a moment, then she turned to the other women and began to urge them into the belly of the boat.
A half-hour later, just as the first lines of ships had entered the straits between the pillars, a storm of supernatural proportions bore down on the fleet.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Many years before, when he had been a child, Brutus heard the sound made by a massive block of stone falling fifteen paces on to stone pavement.
The noise that the winds made now, as they met in the centre of the straits, reminded him of that, although it was ten times more powerful, and accompanied by a shrieking and raging such as no mortal ear normally heard during its lifetime.
Whipped on by the winds, the seas rose into huge, jagged grey-green cliffs, plunging and swirling in such a manner that the entire world about and within the ships collapsed into swirling, drenching horror.
Brutus, who had tied himself to the stem post of the ship so that the seas would not sweep him overboard, screamed at the oarsmen—as within every one of the hundred ships in his fleet captains and officers screamed at oarsmen—to dig in and stabilise the chaotic spinning of the ships.
The oarsmen, fighting down their terror, dug their oars into the waters in the dip-and-hold manoeuvre they had practised a thousand times on dry land. They did well, holding their oars steady against the massive pressures battering both oars and ships, but no matter how well they managed to hold the manoeuvre, the ships would not stabilise.
Not in this sea, not amid this degree of rage.
Cornelia and her companions crouched as deep as they could within the belly of the ship, already drenched despite their thick covering of blankets, hardly daring to breathe in the extremity of their fear. Alongside Cornelia and Aethylla, Periopis had wailed and shrieked, sure that her life was near to ending.
The storm’s intensity increased, and ships were driven far apart. Brutus, watching half terrified, half enraged at his post, saw one of them lifted high on an immense wave, then plummet down its face to dash against the rocks at the base of one of the pillars.
There was a brief glimpse of bodies being hurled through the air, and then the swirling waters ate the entire ship and its people and cargo.
Within seconds there was no sign the ship had ever existed.
“Cursed be you!” Brutus screamed at the waters. He bared his teeth to the storm and shook his fist at the rain that sleeted down. “Cursed be you!”
As if in answer, thunder boomed through the air, res
ounding horribly within the flesh of everyone who heard it, then three gigantic streaks of lightning seared out of the grim sky: each one hit the mast of a ship.
All three masts exploded, sending bodies and cargo spinning helplessly into the wild seas.
Periopis, clinging to Aethylla and Cornelia, suddenly lost all her reason. She shrieked, tearing herself from their hands, and, rising to her feet as best she could manage amid the violent motion of the ship, fought her way towards the aft deck, perhaps thinking to shelter in the cabin.
Aethylla called after her, holding out hopeless arms, but it was Cornelia who rose and, carefully, inch by inch, made her way after Periopis.
Behind them, clinging to the stem post, Brutus glanced back and saw the two women. For a moment he could not make out their identity amid the dense sea spray and foam, but then he saw the distinctive shape of the second woman.
“Cornelia!” he screamed and, untying himself from his anchor, struggled towards them.
Genvissa lifted her head and smiled. Periopis would prove such a useful tool.
Brutus struggled through the length of the boat, tripping and falling several times as his feet caught first in those of one of the oarsmen, and then twice in the crevices between the huddled, terrified bodies crouching in the belly of the ship.
Before him he could see the two women on the aft deck, struggling and swaying in the violent motion of the ship.
And, in one moment when the spray cleared for an instant, and a gap appeared in the monstrous waves that surrounded the ships, Brutus saw that behind his ship another had been caught in the raging waters, and was dashed against the rocks.
“Artemis, aid me,” he whispered, and fought his way further aft.
“Eventually,” she whispered, “but not just yet.”
Brutus managed to reach the struggling women, realising that Cornelia was trying to pull Periopis back into the belly of the ship.
“Cursed bitch!” Brutus cried as he grabbed hold of Periopis.
She shrieked, trying to wrench herself away from both Cornelia and Brutus.
Brutus let go of her arm with one hand, dealing her a stinging blow to her face, hoping it was strong enough to knock her senseless.
Instead, Brutus’ blow only dealt Periopis strength. She pulled away from Brutus completely, then, stunningly, grabbed Cornelia and drew her towards the edge of the craft.
“Time for you to die, you plump-thighed whore,” Periopis said, almost conversationally.
Cornelia, horrified, tried to tear herself free, but Periopis suddenly seemed possessed of supernatural strength. Her hands tightened about Cornelia’s wrists, and, smiling calmly, all her previous terror apparently vanished, Periopis dragged Cornelia a little closer to the deck railing.
Above them a gigantic wave rose, then crashed down, washing the two women towards the very edge of their deaths, and Brutus back further towards the relative safety of the mid-deck.
Brutus was momentarily blinded by the stinging salt water, and knocked breathless by the force of its blow. When he managed to rub the water from his eyes, and blink some focus back into his vision, he saw that Periopis had fallen over the side of the ship, dragging Cornelia, who was desperately pulling back, almost completely over the railing.
Brutus could not find the breath to shout. All he could see was Cornelia’s terrified face, and her desperate cries as she tried to resist Periopis’ determination to murder her.
Without thinking, Brutus threw himself at his wife, wrapping his arms about her hips, and pulling her back with all his might.
“Let her go,” he finally managed to gasp at Periopis. “Let her go!”
“No,” whispered the demented woman, falling ever closer to the waves. “She’s mine now.”
Cornelia fell forward even further, and Brutus felt his grip on her hips sliding.
“Brutus,” Cornelia shrieked.
“Brutus,” Periopis whispered…and tugged at Cornelia’s struggling form so that Cornelia now hung almost entirely from the ship. Only Brutus’ grip on her robe kept her from going over completely.
“Brutus,” Cornelia whimpered, and, horrifyingly, Brutus understood it was a farewell.
From somewhere came a rage and a strength he did not think he possessed. Pulling himself upright, he leaned over the ship’s railing, grabbed Cornelia’s sodden hair in his right hand and with his left fist dealt a fearsome blow into Periopis’ face.
Her nose and cheekbones caved inwards, sending a spray of blood into the wind…and then her hands opened, and she was gone, and Brutus was dragging Cornelia back on deck.
As soon as Periopis’ body hit the water, the storm wondrously abated. Brutus and Cornelia, kneeling on the deck, looked up, wiping the sea water from their eyes and blinking in the sudden light.
A woman stood on the deck before them, dry and serene despite the wildness of rain and wind.
“Blessed goddess,” Brutus said, and Cornelia felt something turn to ice inside her at what she heard in his voice. “Thank you! Thank you!”
“It is enough,” the woman said, then turned her eyes to Cornelia, “if not altogether quite enough.”
Then she was gone.
Cornelia rubbed at her eyes—they were still filmy and sore with the salt water, and she could not see very well.
“Who was that?” she whispered. “Which goddess?”
He hesitated.
“Artemis,” he said finally.
No, a small, ancient voice said deep within Cornelia. That was Brutus’ night lover.
“No,” said Cornelia in a tight, cold voice. “That was the woman of your dreams.”
Genvissa lay very still, regathering her strength. She had accomplished most of what she had wanted—the crippling of Brutus’ fleet so that it would need to seek out a port in which to shelter for repairs—but she had not managed to murder Cornelia, and that frightened her more than a little.
Brutus had tried very, very hard to save Cornelia. Far harder than Genvissa had thought he would.
Her strength had given out just as Brutus had seemed to find some extra, and the silly Periopis had not managed to pull Cornelia over the side at all.
“Genvissa?”
It was Aerne, and Genvissa fought back a sigh.
“I have been trying to aid Og,” she whispered, “but I fear to have failed.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
None of the fleet had managed to come through the frightful storm unscathed, but only five ships had perished. The remaining ships limped through the straits of the Pillars of Hercules in various states of damage: many completely de-masted, others trailing broken or snapped masts through the water, still others with half the ship’s quota of oars washed away.
Over five hundred men, women and children had lost their lives. Brutus ordered that the few visible floating corpses be retrieved for a suitable cremation when they could reach dry land; the others, he supposed, would spend their eternity floating at the bottom of the straits. He asked Membricus to speak prayers for them, and to cast burning herbs across the waters to still their souls, and he hoped that they would find peace and not linger to draw others to their deaths with watery, bitter siren songs.
Night had set in quickly once the storm abated. Neither Brutus nor any of the fore-lookers could see any possible landing—and even had one been close by, Brutus would not have wanted to risk the ships on unseen rocks during a night landing. So he determined they should set anchor as best they could close to the northern shoreline, and spend a cold wet night on the ships—there was not a dry robe nor blanket among the entire fleet, and Brutus dared not allow fires to be set within the hulls of the ships.
The three ships that had sustained the least damage, however, Brutus sent sailing north-north-west, following the coastline. They were to seek a suitable bay where the fleet could anchor, the people disembark and see to their wet clothes, blankets and injuries, and a forest where they could cut new masts for those ships which needed them. There was still
an unknown time of sailing ahead of them, and Brutus wanted to be able to take advantage of the winds while he could.
He spent many hours consulting with his officers, and clambering from ship to ship to offer support and to assess damage, and did not return to his own ship until the dawn of the next morning. His robe was still damp, his cloak a sodden, useless mess, and by the time he sat down beside Cornelia on the aft deck he was shivering uncontrollably.
She had awakened at his return—or perhaps had not slept at all—and shifted slightly to make room for him at her side. When he sat beside her, sighing gratefully as he rested his back against the side of the ship, she hesitated, then leaned in close against him, offering him her warmth.
He stiffened slightly, then relaxed. He was too tired and heartsore to push her away at the moment, and, if he was truthful with himself, he did not want to.
“Is my son safe?” Brutus said, laying a hand on her belly.
“Aye. He is the warmest of all of us, I think.”
Brutus realised he was not the only one shivering, and after a momentary hesitation, pulled Cornelia as close to his body as he could. There were people to either side of them—Aethylla on Cornelia’s right, and an oarsman called Daedeline on Brutus’ left—but even as tightly packed as they were, their damp clothes and the night wind made for a miserable existence.
“What were you doing,” Brutus asked very softly, lest he disturb what slumber their neighbours could manage, “to risk yourself and our child like that? Rushing to save Periopis.”
He felt Cornelia shrug. “I did not think. I thought only to save her.”
“For the sake of the gods, Cornelia, she almost killed you.” Brutus truly did not know what to think about Cornelia’s actions in trying to save Periopis. Had Cornelia’s concern been genuine…or was it like her pretence at seductiveness? A ploy to win him to her so that he might not kill her or put her aside once his son was born?