I.vii

Below us, the sea broiled. The water was a constant, turbulent swathe of gray, lit on the surface by flashes of light from the sky. It rolled and bucked underneath like a raging animal.

Above us, the clouds brewed. The sky swirled and moved slowly, lightning and thunder spilling over onto the earth and water below. The bolts were momentarily blinding and violent, and the claps of sound shook everything as if caused by some cosmically huge creature, too large to even be contained in this realm. The lords of the sea and the air waged war, destroying whatever they could that sits between them.

Niko cowered from this overload of sound and sights. He was not taught what I was years ago, the pull of ropes and the push of sails against wind and the knots and the balance needed to navigate a boat. He was too small then, and by the time he came of age, had hands that could be used to work and a mind sharp enough to grasp it, we were given swords and forced loyalties and new names. We were dripped in animals’ blood and reborn into Lycos, and the sea and its touch were forgotten.

Niko had been honed down to a feral core over years and beaten other men with iron and flesh. With my assistance he had learned that smiles give no ground on the island, and that laughter makes no friends. Men twice as old and almost as much his size had bloodied him until he learned by instinct what would keep him alive and what would not.

Yet this natural monster made him flee inward. Water lashed him like so many whips and piercing blades and thunder shook his bones and lightning blinded and illuminated his soaked, drowned form.

Lycos did not prepare him for a battle of the gods.

So with already aching hands and forearms I pulled rope and tried to keep our craft together over high dunes of water. The Lord of the Sea lashed out at us with many hands. We were insects in a windstorm.

“Helena,” he spoke. His voice couldn’t be heard over the monsoon. His lips seemed to move without sound, yet I felt them anyways, and turned to address him.

We had escaped the island together. After dark we met in the clearing facing the sea. In the rush of moving from training to mess to bunks, I had gotten myself lost in the fray, and hid in bushes around the area. The only place not heavily patrolled, it’s high cliff face and rocks like giants teeth discouraging entrance to the island.

Yet when the Lord of Music pulled his glowing orb below the trees, Niko did not appear.

And after tens of minutes passed, he still neglected to walk into the clearing.

I ran without him then. Still in the foliage one moment, and then crashing through the leaves and twigs next.

My feet did not carry me fast enough to escape the shame. It nipped at me as I ran then, biting the edges of my mind, drying my throat and mouth, twisting my guts.

Big eyes. Dark.

And as the harbor came into sight, my body recoiled and fell against the harsh bark of a tree as my throat closed. I wretched. Once. Twice. Two more times in quick succession.

With heavy, wide eyes, I stared at the ships swaying gently on still waters. Men roamed, clad in Lycon red and carrying blades at their hips, but a single person could slowly crawl through bushes and slither between shadows.

niko

A single thought, the length of a heartbeat. Another spent in stillness, watching the world but not looking. When the next came, my feet pounded on heavy, damp grass and I ignored the harbour retreating into the foliage behind me.

The aspasia were like the clearing: unguarded and lightly patrolled. Not for its fortification, but because the generals and captains preferred we learned to patrol ourselves. So with relative ease but tight muscles and a flitting heart I drew a guard into the bushes and struck him across the skull with a rock. 

The blood was black in the moonlight.

Niko was still awake in his cot. He grabbed nothing when he saw me in the door. He simply threw back his light cover and briskly walked to me. As he entered the silvery light, I saw he had been crying.

“I’m sorry.”

I said nothing. Just took his hand and guided him away. He spoke lowly the whole time. About how there was nothing he could have done, that the captains were always watching him, that he had no chance to escape.

Beneath the words, all I heard was that he was scared. That fear did not let him act. I shushed him then.

At the harbor we did what we could. The generals did not post guards on the bay to deter escape. The aspasia were orphans and bastards and lost children they found, or volunteers from the people of the island. The former stayed because they had nowhere else to go. The latter stayed for the glory brought to their family and city.

Because of this we did what I had almost done alone before. And when a man shouted behind us, we simply ran. We sprinted aboard a war vessel and cut down a life boat and heaved ourselves from shore.

So when he spoke my name softly and I turned to see what my little brother needed, I did not expect hands to meet my neck and pull tight.

We both fell, him on top. The rope flew from my hands, the sail taking whatever course it chose. He was heavier now, with a vague face filled with unplaceable features. Yet I knew it was still Niko.

The Wolf

niko

of Lycos.

---

Arash and I rode in silence. His arms were tentatively placed around my waist. Even through my tunic and leather pads, I felt the ginger touch of forearms on my sides and his chest on my back. Tension boiled my blood, set my muscles to wood and stone.

My eyes stung with fatigue. It felt as if the only way to keep the heavy lids from crashing down was to keep the muscles around them tensed, setting my eyes deep in my face and bulging them ungracefully away from myself. The strain flowed down me as water does from a mountain top to a lakebed. The tightness behind my eyes set my jaw like stone, which had the muscles in my neck wrapping like deadly fingers around the bone and my shoulders sitting high and unrelaxed. It made its way down to my fingers and toes, the digits clamped around the reigns and stirrups, the muscle around them burning.

The Lady of the Hunt mocked me when the stars brightened in the sky. Each night her blooming celestial eye looms, watching as my eyes fell shut, readying her deft hand to touch my mind as it drifted into sleep. Rest would come for a moment, it seemed, and then visions would soon wake me. In all of them sat Niko. Younger or older or smaller or larger, he looked upon me with dark eyes.

“We must stop for a moment.” Arash stated quietly. I took a singular, deep breathe in response. The horizon was pale blue and hearty green and wisps of white. Nothing of interest peaked over at me, no building tops or sails. Yet I knew the Wolf lay that way, and every minute that passed without a single step taken was wasted time.

“Why?” I inquired.

“As a wanderer, I’m sure you are no stranger to relieving yourself amongst the wilderness.” He said. A vague grunt is all I gave as I pulled the reigns tight and brought the horse to a standstill. Arash waited for her to whiny and huff and rise slightly before he slid off.

My stomach was suddenly very tight, the liquid fullness becoming apparent as I shifted and stretched my abdomen. It was like a gentle poke from a companion, reminding me of a necessary duty I’ve forgotten to fill. The act of sliding from the horses back tempered that need. If I landed wrong and fell to the dirt, my body wouldn’t let me rise again.

Arash whistled as he did his business, as men are wont to do. My head lolled back on my suddenly-soft neck, drifting skyward as his tune carried from behind a tree. My forearms came to rest on my thighs, and I was suddenly certain that they wouldn’t lift again.

Looking languidly into the blue void above, I caught the faint impression of the moon, a reminder of things to come tonight. My jaw tightened and my eyes closed, lids quivering.

“Shift back, if you may.” Arash said. My head half-swiveled and half-felol to catch his eye. He simply looked at me. Not expectantly. Not with an eyebrow cocked. Not knowingly. A plain look. Below that, concern did colour his features, almost hidden by the impassive gaze pasted over. It caused my jaw to set more, my teeth squeaking together and the bone and sinew aching from the renewed tension.

“No.” The word was not quite fully formed. I growled it, sounding somewhere between a man and a beast. At this, an eyebrow was raised.

“May I ask why?”

I simply stared at him. It was a noiseless gaze.

He didn’t feel the pull. The single cord binding me to a man thousands of steps away. The cord that must be cut to pay back the dagger held by another man but guided by Niko.

This was dead weight I didn’t need.

Below me, Arash looked back, more concern pulling his brow together, slight lines in the smooth plain of skin.

I breathed deep and then sighed. It came out as a steady torrent of boiling air.

“You’ll hold me back.” I stated.

He raised his chin at this. Concern, now mixed with pride.

For a few moments he said nothing. I stared back, unfazed and unblinking in my fatigue.

Then:

“I know the deadline hanging over your head, Helena.” He paused and looked at me once again. After a contemplative moment, he continued:

“I also know something deeper than that drives you. Whatever that may be, it will not assist you in moving past the weakness of your mortal form. You won’t be making any progress in this journey if you fall from the horse and have no one to take the reins.”

I breathed deeply as I turned skyward once again. The heaviness of my head fought me in every moment of the movement. Arash did not speak another word as I took one breath, then two, then three. The actions got shakier the more it progressed.

My fingers and palms gently gripped the flank of the horse. She was soft and warm and strong, unaffected by this conversation, simply waiting for the order to move forward. For a moment, I held on to her as I sat in place, trying not to sway as I brought my gaze to her neck.

Then I shuffled my ass back in small, sudden movements, balancing myself with my hold on the creatures sides. I felt the end of the saddle underneath me and settled in once again. Arash wordlessly, gently, took the dropped reins as he climbed on. With a sharp but quiet movement, he started the horse forward, beginning at a trot. The action didn’t dislodge me from the saddle, so I left my hands in my lap.

But as the pace speeds up, I begin to sway and lean. With still-remaining tension, I place my arms around Arash’s midsection, locking my fingers together against his stomach as we begin to really ride, keeping inches of space between the front of my form and the back of his.

Silence overtook us. My lips stayed shut out of necessity, as my eyes would not stay open to greet the sun, let alone my mouth to greet air. Arash kept his tongue as well, and his reasons stayed unclear to me.

Through the fatigue and tension I felt something similar emanating from him. A fog of negative energy, softly pulsing out and rolling over me as the wind pushed it back. Disapproval or disappointment or one of the many other dark reasons his muscles stayed lightly tense and his body pulled away from mine.

As we travelled my eyes fell shut and my mind fell blank. The anticipation of seeing his face and that island and whatever other visions the gods decided to bring me pulled my back from the brink. As the horse cantered I swayed and my mind fluttered and floated on the line between our world and the land of dreams. It was a gray, foggy place, and as sleep lets time pass in an instant, this void I found myself in made me aware of every second that passed. I felt every hoof beat, every breath from the man in front of me, every cloud that covered the sun and left us in a momentary chill.

Below the surface of this awareness the visions picked and clawed. They made themselves known simply by being the reason for this twilight-sleep. Because of them I could not settle into sleep, and I could not let sleep take me because I knew this. I was surrounded by warped memories in the one place I could have hoped to find nothingness.

Night fell. The sky blended into itself in my memories, like wet paint poured on wet paint, colour not really beginning or ending. Yet eventually I found the horse stopping beneath me. It huffed and whinnied once more, not angry or annoyed but simply making itself known.

“We don’t have the coin for an inn. If you have no qualms, I suggest one more night under the stars for us.” Arash said. The limits of Karos branched out before us. Unlike Mykon, with its impressive walls and armed men, the smaller town faded simply from grass to thick foliage to dirt to buildings.

I had no argument to Arash's suggestion. He roused the horse once more, who seemed to sigh tiredly, and we trotted softly to a spot a ways away from the Karos border. We had no want for an investigation by a worried band of villagers in the dead of night.

After he landed softly from the mare, Arash held a hand out in my direction. I ignored it. I dismounted sloppily on the side opposite to him and mentally waved away my roll. I forsook the usual proceedings of setting up camp to lie on the grass under a sturdy tree. If I died tonight because of it, it mattered not to me.

---

“Your nights are restless,” said Arash.

He was not lying. Once more I had felt the arms of unconsciousness slip around me for a humble few hours before flames and wolves and crimson visited me.

We sat parallel one and other in the same spot we had woken. Our horse was now tied sturdily to a slimmer trunk, and she grazed lightly in the afterglow of waking. Arash and I did the same, pulling bunches of bread from small loaves. Our food bag was light now, and only the mare would be pleased by that.

I had nothing to say to this. The statement had been made conversationally yet his eyes did not fail to meet mine in an instant. His gaze felt expectant of an answer. I gave a simple one:

“Yes.”

He paused a moment.

“This questions feels as if I’m overstepping our current dynamic, but may I ask why?”

In that moment I saw the fatigue in Arashs eyes, felt it finely layer his voice. In that moment his words grew heavy with whatever burden I may have shared with him.

“The Wolf.” I paused to eat a morsel of bread. Then:

“His death will bring me peace.”

“What does a man do to someone to take their peace such as he has yours?”

My eyes moved from the food in my hand to meet his. In them, I saw something I couldn’t read. His curious tone moved something wrong in me, and I gritted my teeth.

“This conversation is very familiar.” I said with such a tone as to blatantly and very plainly spell my discontent with the path this was taking.

“The last one left me dissatisfied.” He was faster on this retort than he had been with any other returning statement since we had crossed paths. There was a hardness in his voice that countered mine, very plainly spelling his discontent as well. Before I could respond, he continued with:

“I have agreed to take my payment in stories, yet you seem to hold them quite close.” With this statement he leaned forward slightly, eyes not leaving mine.

“That is why you follow then? Stories?” In those words I left an implication of gossip and intrigue, not the domain of a storyteller but a fame seeker. As I spoke I felt anger flare. It was primitive, an anger of a tribe scattered, of losing the group. Underneath was something dull that reminded me of Niko.

Something in my tone struck him, because he sat back languidly, staring at the space I occupied but not my actual person. He took a deep breath, and his face relaxed slightly as his eyes closed. When they opened, the pools inside were still.

“Let me grace you with a story of my own.”

He paused. I realized he was waiting for a response, so I slowly nodded. He returned the gesture as thanks.

“When I left Cyprus I did not have the foresight to see where I would be today. I did not know of my cart or my wares. My plan was almost nothing, but what was there was fluid and malleable. The one thing I knew to be set in stone was that I would see many people in my travels. In part, that is why I move as I do, yes; to gather tales and experience life. It’s a simple joy to me, to see the world not as a person or a village or even a city as large as Tirius sees it, but to encounter many different shades.”

He swallowed and took another deep breath.

“What I also knew was that despite how different travelers are, we come with only two sides in one matter: some offer a hand, and some do not. It is not something I judge people on. The world is hard and I have been bitten on many occasions. Yet given the chance, I will still put out my hand and hope it is taken.”

A few moments of silence passed after he finished. He finished his bread, now squished flat in his hand. 

Then, he stood, and heartily brushed his pants of dirt and grass and crumbs and looked at me.

“Will you allow me the pleasure of helping you find a boat, Helena of nothing?”

Once again I nodded slowly, and then I stood and made my way to the horse.

---

Karos sat still as calm water in the pale hue of the morning light. The sun had barely risen. Our conversation of the Wolf had been had under gray sky touched with pink. People had not yet risen for their days start. In a village of fisherman and people of the sea trade, the night holds too many discomforting mysteries despite how much light you hung on your vessel.

We did not darken an inns door with our forms. Our coin purses sat light on our hips. Our desire to stay longer than a day sat even lighter still. Instead we half-heartedly wandered as travelers do, seeing sights and feeling the land begin to warm as the Lord of Music pulled his celestial form from behind the horizons.

Before the ambush, before Diogenis and the Tirions, Arash would have lazily wandered his cart into the market before any had set up shop, and I would have followed. We would have simply waited in silence. People would come. They always did, when far-away trinkets were sold by a far-away man. Children would swarm with excitement, as they are inclined to do. Their parents would watch from afar, bearing the questions of what could be purchased and what could not, quenching innate curiosity with respectful distance.

He would mingle and chat, and info would be exchanged along with gold and product. Arguably more valuable than either. I would do my share, stood to the side, visible in the periphery, ready to move into vision if needed. We would have the gold we needed for a boat, and we would set sail.

Now we simply paced and waited for people to rise, for the market and the shipyard to populate. Arash sat beside the horse, legs folded, arms placed in the cup they created, eyes gently shut. I walked in circles, in triangles, in squares and crosses. If I joined him, the silence that followed would be telling. Despite whatever unspoken and tenuous state we had settled into after our short conversation this morning, things still stood unspoken between us, like a rock settled on the edge of a canyon. A single breath needed to tip over. He had left questions unasked to keep things as they were, and they would not remain behind his lips for long.

“You pace as if a fire sits in your core, and without movement it will cease to burn.” Arash states softly. I hear accusation in his tone. His face betrays that assumption, sitting calm and gentle as ever. In my head, then. Despite that, I huff and turn to him, like a bull or a dog.

“

It stays fatigue. And unawareness.”

“And why must you stay aware at a time such as this?” He asks.

“There is a knife meant for my throat.”

Arash inclines his head slightly at that, conceding the point with a loose purse of his lips.

“Then sit with your back to a wall. Shutting your eyes does not mean you lose your sense of the world.” I must have allowed a flicker of disbelief to dart across my face or my gaze. He raised his chin to me, a glint in his eyes now.

With a firm touch, he patted the ground to his left. When I simply stared, he did the same.

“Your dreams are restless.” He stated. I feel my face turn down at this remark. Whatever loss I felt an hour earlier remained fresh, despite its technical absence.

“Your form is restless as well. Your mind follows close behind what example your body gives. I too let others suffer irritability from things I did following interrupted slumber. It is a simple exercise. If you do not care for it, continue to carve canyons in the dirt.”

Slowly, I sat. People were beginning to filter out. Looks were given to us, two vagabonds unknown to the close knit community occupying the village. Curious, cautious, but none outright worried.

“Sit however gives you comfort. Then, you breath. Focus on it. Let the world fade behind it, but do not let yourself fall unaware to the comings and goings around you. Thoughts will enter your mind, but simply let them pass. Accept them and do not dwell.”

With that, he turned inward once again, arms draped over thighs, head drooping slightly. Attempting to do the same hunched me and pulled at my lower back. A small adjustment of the arms remedied that, the limbs pulled back further, resting closer to the stomach.

I breathed in. Felt feathers tickle my face, my arms, my calves. Ignored the sensations.

Breathed out. My nose itched, and I resisted the natural urge to move from my current position.

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

And then as Arash said, the thoughts began, like a river.

This morning, first. His face, more heated than I’d seen since we met. Wearing an expression unfamiliar on him, but like an old blanket on me. Words exchanged. None I had cared for. A feeling familiar to 

Niko.

In.

Out.

The boatyard across from us. The boat in question, vague in shape and design in my head. Small, but not fragile. The worry of not acquiring one. We could pay a fisherman his days wages to borrow it without much hassle or oversight. The coin purse on my hip silently disagreed.

In.

Out.

niko

The Wolf of Lycos

And as if a gate had opened, images. Words. Sensations of playing and wrestling and feeding and bathing and fighting and beating. Niko, young, dark, thin. Niko, older, dark, lean. A face unknown, now.

A knife above me, a silver spot in moonlight.

I opened my eyes then, and saw the market had gathered, stalls opening. Across from that, workers tending to boats. Men walked the stiff, slow gate that allowed the sloughing off of fatigue from joints and muscles and mind.

“It’s time,” I spoke. With what seemed like immense effort, Arash slowly opened his eyes, as if he was carefully prying himself from whatever world his mind had fallen into. He rose and dusted off his bottoms and loosely wrapped the horses lead around his hand, between thumb and forefinger.

A horse on the docks was a strange sight. Even years divorced from my last experience rigging sails and handling ships, I felt the languid clattering off hooves on stone on wood fracture the ambient cloud of working sounds easily. Eyes still crusted with sleep turned to us with curiosity. The same kind given to two strangers sitting cross-legged in the town square, seeming to have fallen asleep sitting up.

There was no particular sign I was searching for in a man to ask for his ship. It was a difficult task, culling out faces as we passed through the crowd, noting ones who should little concern. The men around us were burly and lean alike. Nothing much stood out to group them together as a cohesive unit. Some were small, some large, slim, fat, hairy, hairless. The only thing I saw was soft caution in their eyes as we passed. All these men had hurled wood and pulled ropes and hauled fish for years. Many had fought for fun or from drink or rage. Yet in their gazes washing over me, beneath the constant disapproval of the woman who dressed like a man, I caught something soon to hatch into fear.

Eventually, at the end of the docks sat a man, drinking water from a flask, washing away the taste of sleep and spitting it into the sea. He eyed us with curiosity but little of whatever had fallen over the others.

“Are you Lycon?” He asked.

For a single, regretful moment, my mind paused on that question. I hated it for that.

“No.”

He seemed to not notice or not care about the single missed beat in the conversation. He nodded in a vague accepting way at that, and raised his flask to us. After that token of appreciation, he took another swig and fed it to the salt water below.

“You two are searching for something, by your wandering eyes. How can I assist, so as to get you off my yard and away from my seemingly easily-startled men?” The man asked.

Arash had no response to this. With a momentary look at him by my side, his posture tells me it was intentional. My eyes returned to the owner of this yard. I swallowed. Not hard, and with little difficulty, but the action felt very apparent.

“We are looking for transportation across the water.”

To this, he gently cocked a single brow. He took another long sip from whatever sat inside the small container he holds. He seemed to ruminate on both the request and the liquid, softly moving the latter around as he stares at us. His cheeks bellowed and concaved in even intervals.

“And what brings you two across this small stretch of ocean?” He seemed to understand what the men around us already seemed to know as we entered, as his demeanor shifted from mild curiosity to strange paranoia. His stare hardened to what I saw in many eyes around us. At this, I sensed Arash stiffen slightly beside me.

“An Island lies across the way.” I stated.

“I am very aware, as the wolves who only just left this city have made me so. My question was not a prodding of your destination, but your intent.”

The statement was not a question, but it hung in the air like something unanswered. A man could only react so fast to another’s words. Noise must be processed and thought upon, and although this sequence happened in mere seconds due to the quick actions of the mind, the natural buildup of moments in this event brought a steadily rising tension to the air.

Yet despite the now-thickening state of the space around us, I felt nothing. No panic or anger or itch in my palm. A consequence of being accused between breaths of having much to hide, but inside keeping no secrets.

I duly noted, as well, that Arash did not step in to fill my ever-growing silence.

“The Lycons are our motive. They have something on that island. We are to acquire it.”

And on the tail end of that, Arash bookended with: “We harbour no particular adoration for Lycons friend, so I plead you to harbour no worry about our allegiance.” These two statements faltered his guard. The easy smile Arash casually gave brought it down entirely. Once again we were two people he wanted to assist to remove them from his workplace, although our simplicity of motivation is now in question.

Another handful of silent moments followed this. Not riddled by tension, but taken by the man to simply breath as a hard minute passed him by.

“We are not much of a transportation service,” he said, with what seems to be genuine sympathy for weary travelers in his voice and on his face.

“I only need a sail, a craft, and an oar.”

Arash must have felt this response inadequate, as he followed it up very closely:

“We have no need of luxuries. We require no men to assist in our travels, and we will be gone for only hours. There is no desire in us to sleep amongst wolves. The only amenity we will bargain for is a place that will care for our steed.”

“I can assist in both regards, then. I have what most would not even call a ship, freshly repaired. It has no storage, no specific area to rest your heads, but it does sail. As for your horse, I have a pillar to tie it to, and a wooden container that would be content enough to accept water for a handful of hours, if the creature does not startle easily at the sound of work.”

Arash accepted this as a merchant would. His face was a smile that told the man he had never been more pleased than in that very moment, and his hand firmly and graciously accepted another into it. The two shook. The man did not offer much to me but a glance. With that, I had no qualms.

As we carefully walked our mare through working men to the edge of a dock, where what seemed to be an amateurishly restored rowboat sat right-side up, the man continued to steal looks. Flicking between both of us, moment to moment, but settling on my form a half a second longer.

This restlessness was addressed when we arrived at the vessel. The man laid a hand on the curve of the hull, gentle as you would on a child’s cheek, and said:

“We do not get many mathos in our city.”

For a moment, I toiled with a response. Almost instinctually, I formed the beginnings of a denial, to tell him he still hasn’t. For whatever reason that thought started, it died for just as vague of one.

“Your price is not gold, then.”

He shook his head. Stared distantly through the docks and the city and the people, across the land. Then he shifted his head, inclining his vision across the water to the distant horizon.

“Do you consider yourself skilled, mathos?”

“Yes.” There was no urge to lie on my lips then. Lycos replaced whatever it took with violence and skill.

“A short while ago we sailed near that island freely. It was a sacred place to this village. Many along the coast shared that view. None of us knew why, but we all treated it as such without question. Said it was touched by the gods. We would dock and drink and merrily bask there.”

He took a moment to simply stare once again into the sun or the trees or the heavens. It was all done with a face of stoic stone, yet something lay underneath. Once gathered, he continued:

“They walk through our land as if it is theirs, and now they camp there, scaring away men and women with harm and death. So I plead with you to arrive at that island, and take the lives of every man wearing the stripes of Lycos. If this boat carries you as a servant of the Lord of Death, I will happily provide you with it.”

I did not even consider the words before they left my lips.

“It will be done.”

Once again Arash reacted somewhere beside me, so far in my periphery that I feel rather than see the slight movement. As we traded the reigns of our mare for the ropes of a ship, Arash did not relax. As we pushed off into the calm peach waters of dawn, he did not remove his gaze from my form for more than a handful of moments.