Now the wind scatters, p.12
Now The Wind Scatters, page 12
“Wake up and end this cycle. Avenge them. Avenge yourself. Avenge me.”
The path of the blade had never been more clear.
xi
with divine countenance smiling
Sensation was the first mystery. It always had been, ever since that moment all those years ago that she discovered that she was alone in her pain and always would be. Her mother hadn’t been looking; Clytemnestra had been talking to a slave about some trivial matter, and Iphigenia had been toddling behind her, unnoticed as she attempted to scale an outcropping of one of Mycenae’s massive walls. When she’d slipped off with hardly a gasp, dashing her head firmly against the hard packed dirt of the palace courtyard, she’d immediately looked for her mother, to see if she’d seen, if she’d felt what she’d felt. When Clytemnestra didn’t turn, scoop her into her arms to fret over her frantically, she wailed, not from the pain, but from the sharp realization that her mother hadn’t felt that hard jolt against her own skull. Only then did Clytemnestra turn to her, gently prodding at the spot on her skull where a lump was already swelling into existence. It had been too late, of course; that magical hold of infancy, that enduring myth of being one with the mother, had been extinguished forever.
Nothing had come close to that blinding realization of sentience until this moment. She was three years old again, sobbing against her mother’s skirts as she realized that she was alone in each and every feeling. There had been blistering pain, and then nothing — and then feeling returned, flooding her nerves as if a great dam had failed, releasing its violent deluge onto an unsuspecting valley. The curse of consciousness had reared its ugly head again. Everything ached, every part of her rebelling against life itself. She couldn’t move, couldn't see, but damn if she could feel. Her mouth was heavy with the taste of salt; her jaw ached with its gritty weight. It was bitter, and it was even more unbearable than the sharp pain at her throat. Spitting provided no relief — it was as if it were cemented in her mouth, all the way back to her tonsils and up into her sinuses. She longed for water to wash it away, to wash her away, anything to escape the suffocating pain, but there was no trickle of a stream, nor roaring of a river. Her only companion was the soft melody of birdsong.
She must be Tantalus reborn, the way her suffering yet endured. The unfortunate nature of her blood had not been lost on Iphigenia; it had always been in the background, on her walls, in the songs of the maids and the prayers of the priests, but for her to be the next Atreid to bear the family curse? It had all been over, finished, and yet here she was, breathing the air of what had to be some fresh agony. She had offended no gods, wronged no man, and yet still the sins of her ancestors had not even allowed for the small kindness that would have been oblivion.
Something warm pressed at her lips, its heady scent fragrant with and sweet. She parted her mouth hoping to quench the burning thirst, but as the bowl tipped and liquid began to flow, she was met with something far more delicious than water. The first taste was electric; passion and desire danced on her tongue in ways that rivaled Aphrodite’s most tender charms. The liquid hummed as it passed from her lips to her throat and beyond, warming her better than the finest wines the vineyards could offer. All traces of salt were washed away.
She was gulping now, greedily sucking the drink down. Every synapse and vein in her body was desperately screaming for more, more, more. A hand squeezed her shoulder.
“Iphigenia,” a woman’s voice murmured, and then the bowl was removed. The utterance of her name, something she’d been dangerously close to forgetting, went nearly unnoticed. The bowl was the more pressing issue here. Iphigenia whined, lifting her head in an effort to reunite with the most intoxicating beverage she’d ever had the pleasure of imbibing.
“Give it back,” she gasped, voice hoarse. She longed to take it into her own hands, to drain the bowl dry, to lick at the rim until it gleamed.
A hand stroked her face, and she was suddenly aware she lay cradled in the crook of a woman’s thighs, her arms bound behind her back.
“Too much, too soon,” the same voice from before replied, just above her. “Any more and it might drive you mad.”
Something cold and sharp pressed against Iphigenia’s leg, and she jerked, the fear of further bloodshed sobering her. Instead, there was the sound of fabric being sheared, and suddenly she had usage of her arms again. As blood flowed hot into her limbs, Iphigenia immediately set to pawing at her face to snatch away the dry rotted fabric tied tight around her eyes.
She looked at the tattered remnants of the fabric, a bundle of pale orange bunched up in her hands. They’d blinded her with her own veil. She let it slide from her grasp and turned her gaze skyward. Instead of her father looming over her, she was greeted by a thick green canopy of trees with gray clouds breaking in through their gaps. A woman stared down at her, her bright eyes shining with concern but, strangely enough, brimming with triumph as well. Freckles painted her cheeks, and despite the lack of sunlight, a twinkling silver circlet sat upon her dark hair.
“This can’t be real,” Iphigenia rasped. She felt what little strength she’d gained slipping right back out of her. She lay here, alive, in the lap of a goddess — the very same one that had threatened her father.
“This is as real as real can be,” Artemis murmured, and then there was a slender hand on Iphigenia’s cheek. “Do you know who you are? Do you remember?”
She wished she didn’t. Iphigenia wanted to scream, to pull away. Something terrifying lurked beneath the visage of the woman before her, no matter how gentle her words or soft her caresses. Still, it wasn’t as if she had the strength to fully express her fear. Despite her somehow still drawing breath, she was exhausted. It took all her energy to even force out the few words she’d uttered, let alone to get up and flee. She settled for the one thing she could manage.
“How?” she asked.
“Let me show you.
The tender hand on her cheek moved over her eyes, encasing them back into that suffocating darkness. When she opened them again, she was floating; bodiless, as light as the open blue sky surrounding her. She looked down at where her hands should be, and saw nothing. An attempt at a flex of fingers yielding nothing — sensation had fled just as quickly as it had reappeared. Maybe this was death at last?
“Forgive me,” and to what she assumed to be her right (it was hard to tell, considering her sudden lack of a physical form), hovered Artemis, as resplendent as she’d been that night in the woods. “The conjuring of sights is my twin’s forte, not mine. Don’t be afraid; your body is safe where you awoke.”
It could hardly be called a reassurance. Iphigenia was sure she’d heave if she had the stomach to do so, but something far more dizzying than a lack of a body lay below the pair of them.
It was a vivid vision of a vivisection; rivulets of blood raced from pale flesh onto even paler marble. Even from here, the torn ligaments and tattered skin made a horrid sight. It was repulsive, and only became more so when Iphigenia realized just whose battered, broken body she was gazing down at.
There she lay on that hilltop altar, surrounded by hundreds of silent men. The wind howled as they gazed at her still form. An awful gash ran from her neck down her chest and into her abdomen. The gore piled at one man’s feet, and she seethed. Agamemnon stared not at the corpse of his daughter, the one he’d lured to her own demise, but eastward.
Towards Troy, Iphigenia bitterly thought.
“Am I dead?” Iphigenia asked after a long silence.
“No. Far from it.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Look,” Artemis said, pointing down at the altar.
The girl’s body seemed to flicker in the sunlight, her mangled body shifting between itself and that of a great doe. The deer’s eyes were glassy with the film of death.
“I took you —” Artemis paused, like she was struggling to find the proper words. “I wasn’t expecting you to be in that state. I was going to set you in the stars, but something in you still clung to life. I traded that doe’s life for yours, and preserved you in its form. Those men will go believing they took your life there. Us gods, we can enchant the eyes to see only what we allow — whether it be in slumber or a waking dream.”
Waking dream. Hazy memories of her own dreamlike state in a body that was not her own came unbidden to Iphigenia. More like waking nightmare. She scowled. “And who’s to say that this isn’t an enchantment itself? That you’re just showing me illusions?”
“Not an illusion, but a memory. I will never lie to you,” Artemis said. “It’s the least I owe you.”
Iphigenia bristled. She wanted to strike her, to lash out, to make her feel even a tenth of the pain she was feeling. Her life had been stolen in the name of this goddess, all for Agamemnon’s ambition, but she was supposed to be satisfied with simple assurances of truthfulness?
The men were leaving the altar now, streaming towards the beach and the ships awaiting them in the channel. Only a few remained to clean up as the wind whipped at their hair and clothes. The funeral pyre was already ablaze, bright sparks jumping in the sunshine. Within Iphigenia, rage frothed like the foamy surf that the men were splashing into with abandon. How dare they?
Artemis seemed to sense her discomfort. “They’ll say you went bravely to the altar, that you made the choice to die for your countrymen with dignity.”
“They’ll speak only lies. There was no choice,” Iphigenia spat. She averted her eyes from the scene below. She couldn’t bear to watch them heave the doe that looked like her onto the flames with all the other spent corpses, to watch as its flesh contributed to the black smoke already choking the air. To those men, she’d been just another sheep or goat to sacrifice in the name of war, in the name of glory in bloodshed. She wanted them dead — if only she could be the one to do it. A fantasy of tearing out their throats with her own teeth came unbidden.
The world changed. Another beach, another camp, but the sea had mirrored itself, and a towering citadel rose out of the distant plain. Tents once again littered the camp, but they were fewer and farther in between. Men lay moaning on makeshift pallets, grievous wounds bleeding out onto the sand. A smug satisfaction flooded into Iphigenia. Good, she thought. Let them suffer.
The sound of jeers redirected her attention, and Iphigenia felt her blood run cold. Her father was being teased by his men as he dragged a girl towards his tent, a girl that looked so similar to her that they could be twins.
“This is not a memory, but a vision across the sea,” Artemis spoke, her voice solemn. Iphigenia watched in stunned silence as her father and the girl disappeared for a time. When they emerged, Agamemnon was readjusting his belt. He didn’t bother sparing a glance to the bitterly sobbing girl next to him.
“This is what my blood has wrought?” Iphigenia shut her eyes, unable to watch as the girl collapsed at the feet of several women who looked as if they knew all too well what she’d just endured.
When she opened her eyes again, they had returned to the forest, the blue skies of Aulis replaced by leafy green. She was firmly back in her body; the aches and pains were evidence enough.
“I want to see my mother,” she said, trying to prop herself up. “Show her to me.”
“Calm down. The nectar has healed you far faster than even I could have imagined, but you’re still weak. Do you have any idea how long you’ve lain here?”
“I don’t care. I need to see her.” The last she’d seen of her mother, she’d been knocked unconscious in the dirt. Iphigenia had to somehow get a message to her, one that let her mother know she yet lived.
“Watch yourself. I like you, Iphigenia, and I saved you for a reason, but do not forget who you’re talking to.”
Iphigenia slunk out of the goddess’ lap and onto the forest floor. She hadn’t forgotten. On the contrary, she recognized the goddess for who she truly was. Agamemnon may have committed the crime, but she’d been the arbiter of the punishment.
She struggled to her knees, wheezing with the exertion of it. It was as if she’d somehow aged a hundred years.
Artemis stood and placed a hand on her bare shoulder. “Calm down. Everything in its due time. You need to rest.”
“I don’t want—” and before she could say anything more, a bowl of that intoxicating liquid was being coaxed into her hands. Iphigenia couldn’t help herself: she immediately set to drinking. The liquid felt like strength itself, warming all the aches, little and great, within her. When the bowl was finished, she felt her eyes growing heavy as if she’d just downed a kylix of rather potent wine. In front of her, Artemis stood with open arms. She glanced between the goddess and the ground and sighed, easing her way into the embrace. The two of them descended slowly to the grass; as they did so, Iphigenia was convinced she heard Artemis hum triumphantly.
A finger traced its way down her cheek, and though she longed to lean in to the comfort, Iphigenia tugged her head away. “Sleep. We will talk more when you’re in a better state. You can trust me.” As sleep overwhelmed Iphigenia’s senses, her last thought was that she wasn’t sure if she could even trust herself.
***
“This is my place,” Artemis said, placing a hand on a crumbling stone pillar while looking up at it fondly. “It's one of my most sacred. My happiest days were spent right here.”
Iphigenia ignored her, arms wrapped around her knees as she gazed into the fire. Her lips felt numb and her limbs buzzed as if she’d held them in one position for far too long. Yellow and red flames jumped, and though the heat’s radiance felt like the rays of the sun, she’d never been more cold. Waking up not to Electra’s familiar grumbling, but to the rustling of the creatures of the forest had been a shock, but not as great as the remembrance of just what had brought her to this place. It sickened her to think about longer than a few seconds, all the blood and gore and her mother and Iset, poor Iset ran through with a spear, never to see the light of her homeland again. Regret coursed through her at the way she’d treated her — and now she would never have the opportunity to properly apologize. How could she have ever atoned though?
She wracked her mind for memories of that time in between, when she’d sworn she’d heard Iset’s voice, the only distinct one among the multitude. No matter how desperately she tried to hang onto those memories, they were disappearing as swiftly as the winter sun. The only thing that remained was an overwhelming lust for blood, for eradication. Is that what Iset would have wanted? Iphigenia snapped her head up as a terrible trembling struck up in her. She needed to ground herself, find something real to focus on.
When she’d first awoken, she hadn’t had a chance to get a decent look at the clearing they were now in, but after her forced slumber, she realized that she had been here before. There was the carved stone of an altar, and just behind it, a rushing creek, its rocks worn smooth by the force of its current. Artemis had brought her to the very same place Agamemnon had confronted the goddess.
Artemis had built a fire and somehow procured the material to construct a small shelter. Fresh game roasted over the flames. She had even laid out a chiton smelling of sweet flowers and new grass next to her. Iphigenia had hastily thrown it over her head as soon as she’d noticed it; the heat may have finally broken, and it wasn’t particularly cold, but Iphigenia was loath to reveal any more of herself to the goddess than she had to. She’d noticed the way the other woman constantly sneaked peeks at her; it wasn’t dissimilar from the way she herself had looked at the various serving girls throughout the palace. Amazement, maybe, sometimes jealousy, but there was always something else, lurking just beneath the surface. Iphigenia had blushed hot with shame as it dawned on her what she’d inflicted on those poor girls was her own clumsy desire.
Now it was Iphigenia’s turn to stare as Artemis poked at the rabbits cooking on the spit. She couldn’t figure her out. Artemis was the one who had basically ordered Agamemnon to kill her. Why had she let her live, and more importantly, why was she treating her with such tenderness?
Artemis must have noticed her staring. She gave Iphigenia a small smile and a wave. Iphigenia tore her eyes away. They weren’t friends.
“Tell me what you want,” Artemis said, drawing near. “Is the fire too hot? Are the clothes not to your liking?”
“I need my mother,” she mumbled, drawing the rough blanket tighter around herself. This wasn’t a silly sleepover like the ones she, Electra, and her cousin Hermione had had — she was this goddess’ captive. “I need her, and Electra, and little Orestes too.” She thought back to Mycenae’s great walls, and the incredible hustle and bustle they contained. “I want the loom, and Iset’s songs, and the chickens pecking in the dirt.” She wanted the familiar routines, the daily flutter of the birds living in her wall, the constant tripping over her siblings underfoot, the daily lectures from Sitamun. She wanted her walks through the forests, and her chest of herbs and draughts, and above all she just wanted to be where she understood how the world worked. “When will you take me back to them?”
Artemis’ smile had faltered, and she spoke a single word as if her mouth had been stuffed with reeds. “Can’t.”
Iphigenia had figured as much, but to hear it voiced so callously, as if it were a comment about the weather — it was too much. The tears came hot and fast. “I want to go home!” She began furiously wiping at her eyes, fighting against the ugly sobs that threatened to fill the grove. The goddess was not and would not be her savior. She forced herself to stand.
“Where are you going?” Artemis asked, eyes narrowing.
“Home,” Iphigenia wheezed, heading towards the slope. Her body still ached, and her limbs were heavy with weakness, but damn it all if she weren’t going to get out of here. Just up the ridge and down again, and she’d be at the road. They weren’t far from Aulis. If she was lucky, the caravan may have even stopped by the riverside again for their return to Mycenae. There’d surely be no singing or dancing, not after what had happened, but the mass of people would be impossible to miss. “My mother, she needs me. I’ve served my purpose. Whatever quarrel you have with my father is resolved.”
