All things are taken from us, and become
Portions and parcels of the dreadful Past.
—Alfred, Lord Tennyson,
"The Lotos-Eaters"
Jerry glared at the shore. Odysseus, plain to see, was up to his usual tricks.
The sun burned down. Heat reflected off the curving beaches like a whiplash. The wind that had carried the black pentekonter this far was still. Odysseus' vessel lay like a painted ship in a sun-bleached painting. Its artistic merit was enhanced by the two dragons lolling in the water beside it.
All very nice, thought Jerry sourly. The only problem was . . .
Liz put it into words. "The Nile seems to have shrunk, Odysseus," she said sarcastically, looking at the sliver of a stream that split the beach ahead.
Odysseus shrugged. "This is the coastline of Libya, Sorceress. Egypt lies a few days' sailing along it. We have made landfall some distance to the west, that's all. We need fresh water. And it would be good to cook a meal and get some rest on land. The local inhabitants are a peaceful and hospitable people. They will have food for us.
"fS'about time we ate," said Smitar, lazily flapping his crest of tasseled crimson spines.
"Yefs. What'fs for lunch, Lamont?" demanded Bitar, flattening his vermilion and purple crest. The two dragons might be in the service of the sorceress, but their affection, by way of their stomachs, had been usurped by Lamont and Cruz. Besides, Cruz was the only human they'd ever met with enough strength to give a dragon a good scratch with an oar.
Any wariness Jerry had felt about the small aboriginals on the shore had long faded. They'd seen the ship land and come down to it with cheery smiles and broad-leaf trays of sticky yellow sweetmeats, obviously pulp of some plant and gods alone knew what else. Definitely flies. Now what was worrying Jerry was straight morality. There was no doubt that the aboriginals would end up as slaves. Probably after the Achaeans had swiped their sweetmeats. The little guys didn't even seem to be selling the things. They were certainly eating occasional ones themselves. Odysseus made a great show of taking a whole sweetmeat in one bite.
Jerry attempted to refuse. The little guy was hurt. "Is good! Is sweet. Is nice. Eat, traveler, eat." The loincloth-clad man took one himself, and chewed it with obvious gusto.
Heaven knew how many fly feet had walked over this stuff, but Jerry tried to look on the positive side. If he ended up dead, he'd end up home. The yellow-fruit base was not very nice. Even honey did little to hide that. The stuff was resiny.
"Well, I'll be dipped in shit." Cruz grinned, looking at his half-eaten sweetmeat. He sniffed it. "These are hash cookies. No wonder the locals are smiling."
It all clicked into place. Jerry realized instantly that Odysseus was pulling another trick. "Lotophagi!"
The little aboriginal nodded happily. He pointed at the sweetmeats. "Lotus." He pointed at the yellow-fruited trees on the hill slope behind the beach. "Lotus bean. Plenty plenty."
"And the green plants in between them are Cannabis sativa," said Henri with a nod.
Maybe it was the half a hash cookie in his empty stomach, but Jerry began to giggle. No wonder the locals encouraged the visitors to eat. Two or three of these cookies and you would probably forget your own name, never mind forget that you had a home to return to. It was indeed a magnificent defense. Raiders would eat first, knowing that they'd have plenty of opportunity to take slaves later. It wasn't poison because the locals ate it too. Only the locals ate quite a lot of it, and were habituated to it. Raiders weren't.
It could very well turn into a case of the raiders being the victims in the end. And Jerry was willing to bet that Odysseus, cunning Odysseus, hadn't actually eaten that sweetmeat.
"Hey, Odysseus!" yelled Jerry. "Prince Odysseus. These sweetmeats are great. You have another. In fact, have two. Sergeant. Help him to some."
Odysseus backed off. "I'd love some. But lotus . . . they give me terrible indigestion. Honestly. You have some more for me. Enjoy."
Jerry laughed. "Ody, you're a slimy bastard." Man, that hash must be strong! "But I've read all about you and your whole life. I know what happens in the land of the lotus-eaters. I knew all about the Cyclops. I know about your wife, and Telemachus, and how you survived Circe."
Odysseus looked startled. "I am in a book? Written, as they do for stores tallies?" It took the Achaean some time to come to terms with this. Then he strutted. "You hear that, Eurylochus? I'm famous!"
"For your bad breath, probably," muttered the henchman.
"Ha. Jealousy makes you unpleasant. Tell me which of my great adventures you know about, barbarian. Do you know how I slew twenty Thracians, including their King Rhesus?"
"It was only twelve. And Diomedes killed them, while they were asleep. You just ran off with the horses."
Odysseus gaped. "How . . . " he asked weakly.
"I told you," said Jerry scornfully. "I read about your 'adventures' when I was a child. But I thought you were a hero, not a louse. It was only when I came across Euripides that it even occurred to me you weren't the perfect hero."
Odysseus looked annoyed. Put a hand to his sword. "Who is this 'Euripides'?"
Jerry shrugged. He was definitely feeling the hash. "You rippa dese you buy me a new pair . . . He's either long dead—or if we really are in your time, not yet born. You see, we're from your future. Even our children learn about you and your family."
There was a silence. Then Odysseus asked: "I went to Hades to consult the blind Theban, Teiresias. He told me that my wife Penelope was being courted by over a hundred suitors. Is this true?"
Sympathy welled up in Jerry. "Yes."
Odysseus slapped his fist into his hand. "And their servants too?"
"Yes." Why should that matter?
Odysseus ground his fist into the opposite palm. "I've got to get home! Those wastrels are eating MY food. Feasting at MY expense! They're impoverishing MY kingdom!"
Jerry looked at the man in disgust. "So the fact they're pulling a train with your wife isn't important to you?"
The translation spell dealt with this one somehow. Odysseus looked like he was about to explode. Jerry thought he'd finally gone too far. Finally Odysseus almost spat out, "Without paying!?"
The Odyssey came to Jerry's rescue. "No, she demanded rich gifts from the suitors." That was true enough anyway, even if the reasons were different.
"Oh. That's good. But I still need to get home. As my friend King Agamemnon says, you can't be too gentle with women or trust them too much. A man can see all the gold he's looted disappear if he stays away too long."
Suddenly, Mac lurched to his feet and grinned broadly. Uneasily, Jerry realized that the young corporal had eaten at least two whole sweetmeats.
"Hey, Jerry!" he boomed. "What was that son of Ody's name? Telemachus, wasn't it?" The corporal swayed a little. "Yeah. He's probably pulling a train with some of those suitors too, Ody. Keeping them off your wife's back."
This didn't seem to worry Odysseus much. In fact, he started mocking McKenna. "Ha! If I was a pretty boy like you, I'd have taken on all hundred every night. Eurylochus says you can hardly cope with three."
McKenna lunged forward and grabbed Odysseus. In a split second, the corporal was thrown to the ground. Hard. The Odysseus of legend was a wrestler of note. And whatever else the Achaean prince might be, he was tough as nails and not at all reaction-slowed by cannabis. Jerry had the sudden realization, as Odysseus landed on the corporal's back, that McKenna might just have gotten himself into a fight where he could get killed.
Odysseus' crew must have been expecting this, Cruz understood immediately. They'd boxed Mac and Odysseus. Shit. The kid was gonna get killed before the sergeant could get there. Cruz pulled the nunchakus from his belt. It had come to this . . .
Then Lamont spoke, loudly and clearly. "Mac, you're an idiot. Telemachus got married in the book. He gave all the goats to the girl he was in love with."
McKenna felt the terrible hold on his throat and the scissors on his ribs slacken slightly. "My goats! Never!" Odysseus bellowed, outraged.
"He didn't know that you were in love with them," snapped Medea.
"And the pigs too," said Jerry calmly.
"What?! Impossible!" Odysseus had forgotten about throttling Mac, at least temporarily.
Jerry shrugged as Liz stalked closer. "Why? You've never been around to bring the child up properly."
That bag weighed about seventeen pounds. It had reinforced metal corners. Liz gave it a full overhead arc, before it hit Odysseus across the side of the head. And then Cruz was there, with a weapon that the Achaeans had never encountered. Mind you, Odysseus might have been better off being hit by the nunchukus.
It was instantly a battle royal. And it would have been very short and nasty except that Bitar and Smitar had not eaten more than three or four sweetmeats each. Or if the Achaeans had not planned to take them alive.
Mac, having barely gotten to his feet, found himself bowled over. A dragon tail flailed overhead. He had just time to see Jerry duck, allowing two Achaeans to crash headlong.
Liz writhed. Those arms holding her from behind were like steel hawsers. She stamped with all the force at her disposal on the sandaled foot.
"Yeeeow!" But the crewman didn't let go. And then a dragon mouth closed over both of them. The gums were toothless but viselike. Her captor let go of her in haste, just as Smitar spat them out. "Phtpt. fSorry, Liz."
There was a smack of wood on flesh and Cruz barreled through, to Lamont's aid. Medea had taken up a position on a washed-up stump and was walloping heads in the melee. Then there was the amazing sight of fat Henri delivering a two-footed flying kick into Eurylochus' abdomen.
"To the ship! To the ship! Quickly!" shouted Odysseus.
The reason stood black along the ridgeline. The Lotophagi had been happy enough to make no moves except to peacefully offer hash cookies around. But when it seriously looked as if the merchandise could turn itself into hamburger, they decided to intervene a bit more directly. By sheer numbers alone they'd even overwhelm the dragons. For the moment, the little internecine conflict was forgotten in the scramble to get the black ship launched and to escape a common enemy.
If it hadn't been for the psychological effect of the dragons, they would never have managed it. But the first Lotophagi warrior to advance got the full force of Smitar's tail. He was batted a good twenty feet in the air to land on top of the mob. A couple of those he landed on still had their spears ported.
Mac made a face as he helped to shove the black ship into the waves. "If you're going to land on a spear, I guess you should try and do it headfirst."
"Jump. Up. UP! To oars!" yelled Odysseus.
Soon the only sign of the close encounter was a few Lotophagi spears falling short and dimpling the water.
"Thofse fsweetmeats have given me a funny flying feeling," said Bitar.
"Yefs. Did nothing for the hole where my tummy ufsed to be, either," grumbled Smitar. The red-tasseled dragon was, if anything, the greedier of the two, although this was a marginal difference. Only Henri really competed in the same league.
"You can start with Odysseus," said Medea grimly.
"We still have our weapons, Sorceress." Odysseus touched his bronze sword meaningfully.
Maybe Jerry was still a bit stoned. Or maybe he was just mad. He certainly had a prize black eye from the little exchange of pleasantries back there on the beach. He stood up and planted himself in front of the Prince of Ithaca. "Showdown time. I'm sick of being nervous about you every time I go to sleep, Odysseus. You and your crew are going to be chained up."
"And how are you going to make us accept chains, little man?" sneered Odysseus.
"Can you swim back to shore from here, Odysseus?" It was a long, long way. The better part of a couple of miles, at least.
"Are you going to throw me overboard, weakling?" Odysseus barely suppressed his laughter.
"No." Jerry smiled sweetly. "I'm going to jump. And so are the rest of us. We Americans swim like fish. We'll take our chances dodging Lotophagi. It beats dodging you." Well, they'd all seen Liz and McKenna swimming. They did indeed both swim like fish. "Then Bitar and Smitar can sink this tub of yours and we'll see who has the upper hand."
"You wouldn't! The sea is full of sharks and monsters," sneered Odysseus. But there was no conviction in that sneer.
"Watch me. Compared to you, cunning Odysseus, sharks and monsters are pretty decent. Choose. Chains or swimming? We'll let you go once we reach Egypt. Let's say once we're at the pyramids? And remember—we have never broken our promises."
"But—"
"Choose. Choose now." Jerry pushed his way into Odysseus' personal space.
"You don't have any chains," said Odysseus sulkily.
"We have a couple of sorceresses," said Jerry with supreme confidence.
"Have you been taking an assertiveness course?" asked Liz dryly.
"From you." Jerry held onto the bench so that they wouldn't see how his hands had begun to shake.
She shook her head. "I think the pupil just wiped the floor with his teacher."
"The pupil was stoned and is now into nervous reaction. Let's hope like hell Medea can do her chain trick."
"I've just figured out why Ody is taking this so easily," said Jerry later, very quietly.
Lamont looked across at the Achaeans, ankle-chained and then with two running chains snaking through the rowing benches and ankle chains. Medea had "magicked them up" out of loose odds and ends in the soldiers' rucks and Liz's handbag.
"Why?" he asked.
"Because a hundred and eighty feet of fine iron chain is worth a damn sight more than this ship. He was looking for angles—until Medea started her tricks on the chain. Then suddenly he shut up. He hit Eurylochus just as he started to say something. I thought he just didn't want trouble. Ha. He'd outthought me. They can pull those benches up in two seconds."
Lamont looked at the captive Achaeans. "They'd still have to come at us in single file."
"Three jerks together and they'd snap that bowsprit stave. Or the chain."
Lamont looked at the solid oak bowsprit stave they'd attached one end of the chain to. "Maybe not so easy. But you're right."
"What are you guys gossiping about?" Liz had squatted down next to them. They explained.
Her eyes narrowed as she looked at the chain. "Hmm. Are you sure, Jerry? About the chain being worth an arm and a leg, that is?"
Jerry nodded. "Absolutely certain. Look at the fights and effort that went into recovering any of the 'arms' of a hero in the Iliad. We've got no conception of just how valuable wrought metal was, and a piece of work as fine and uniform as that chain . . . "
"Okay, okay. Now I get what you were saying earlier, about Cruz and Mac carrying a fortune in metal with them." Liz pursed her lips, to stop them twitching into a smile. "I wonder. Do you think this tub has drainage bungs?"
Jerry blinked. She thought like a jackrabbit. "I don't know."
"Hmm. Must have, I guess. Maybe back near the steering oars. I'll take a little swim this evening," she said, with a wicked little chuckle.