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Part I | Part II | Part III

In the Kingdom of Horses

by Mary Morgan

Part I

She is dreaming the dream. She does so most nights. The dream of the beginning. In daylight, when all court her, all obey her, she denies to herself that this is the beginning. Why this moment and not that? Why this event and not another? Why what she did and not what was done to her? In the night, though, and especially now, in this unnatural heat, when the air is still and stifling, this is the dream which torments her.

She stands in the cavern again. It is hot in its darkness, but she wears a thick cloak. The guards who came with her have gone, leaving their torches behind. She is holding the shed skin of a snake, a comb from her palace's hives, a mole's mummified paw. Something from those creatures which crawl on the earth, something from those which fly above it, something from those which burrow under its surface. Things dear to this power, brought to invoke and petition. Scales tickle the skin of her palm, claws scratch it, honey coats it with sweetness.

She sets these things down on a rough slab of stone which serves as an altar, then takes out some others. Chanting, she lays these down too. A small pile of salt. A skein of dark, tangled hair, too coarse to be human. A vial blown from glass the colour of oil, containing a few drops of fluid she knows to be pale. A signet ring, heavy and golden, bearing this crest: a horse reared on its hind legs, so that its forelegs can pummel the air. A sheet of blank parchment. She keeps up her chanting. As she watches, the hair seems to knot and unknot, the glass bloats and wanes, the horse stretches and shrinks, but the parchment stays blank, though stains seem to cross it. The light has turned fitful, for the torches have started to smoke, their flames leaping and flaring.

Sometimes she wakes at this point. She calls hoarsely for light and for water, throat raw from the chanting, as it was then. Just the words, she believes, just the weight of the words does the damage. She works after that, until morning, dousing the dream in state papers. Tonight she dreams on. She sees herself waiting. Only one sound can be heard. It comes from the torches, which sizzle and flap. She watches the shadows they cast crawl over the floor and the walls of the cave, slide through niches and cracks. She grows hotter and hotter. Sweat coats her skin, soaks her clothing.

Then the flames gutter. Wreathes of thick smoke emerge from the cressets, wind down the poles which support them, snake over the floor till they come to the altar, coil themselves round it. The light dims still further, the shadows begin to turn red. Tongues sprout from the smoke, climb onto the altar, lick over the parchment. Marks form on its blankness, build letter by letter till they make words. The woman moans in her dreaming, hearing again the voice which spoke to her then. A voice which is female, deep-toned and smoky, saying, "Yes."

The woman wakes now. She is covered with sweat. She tries to get up but feels herself bound to her bed. Her sweat chills, but she swallows her scream. After a moment she summons her slaves, who bring water and light, making no comment. When they have gone, she frees her legs from the tangle of bedding, walks to her desk and its papers. Before she can settle, a door slams in the palace, someone runs down a passageway yelling and laughing. He never sleeps now, she believes.

She sits at the desk, trying to focus, hearing the voice in the cave saying, "Yes." She admits there was more in its tone. Hints of regret and of warning. At the time she ignored them, intent as she was on taking the paper. Now she remembers, and the words she heard next. "Speak this when you do it. Keep the scroll after that. Lose it, and you'll lose what you make."

She groans. She can't do this thing. She cannot. Some other must do it. She stands, so abruptly she tips over her chair. It falls with a clatter. A slave opens the door, his face white with fear. She waves him away and strides to the window. The sky at the horizon is pale; day is near. With it will come the woman she summoned. Her mouth thins and twists as she battles her feelings, surprised at their strength, surprised at the effort it takes to subdue them. By the time she is calm, the day has arrived, as has Xena.

---

Hesiod is sulking. The Queen has left his place, beside her at the high table, unoccupied, but he cannot bring himself to take it. His pride will not let him. Is he not the Kingdom's chief bard? Is he not its chronicler? How then can he sit in front of the court when he will not be speaking at this banquet, when the bard will be some other person? He feels that to rise, to take a step forward, will snap him in half, so intense is his sense of having been wounded.

His eyes sting with tears of self-pity, and he squeezes them tight, willing back the moisture, refusing to raise a hand to his cheek and draw attention to his plight. You stupid old man. Weeping in public. Like any granddad in his dotage. Instead he plants one fist on each of his knees and stares straight forward, jutting his jaw so that the curly white beard looks like a prow. He will not show weakness. Not he.

But that another bard will speak tonight. And that bard a woman. A woman. He cannot bear it, this shame. He sucks in a breath and rams down the thoughts, tries to stifle their nagging. Are you a child? he rails at himself. This will pass. Everything passes. Yes, this will pass soon. He smiles in anticipation. How the howls of scorn will ring out; he can't wait to hear them. It would happen anyway, of course, whatever tale she told, but he has made sure that the woman bard's humiliation will be complete.

"What tale shall I ask her to tell, Hesiod?" the Queen asked, barely an hour ago. Wanting to placate him, he knew. Some stupid, female thought like, "Let us all be friends," in her head, no doubt. The Queen must, he admits, have something of a man in her to be able to rule as she does, yet in the end she is only a woman. And a woman whose action has brought the kingdom to this pass. The blasphemy of it, to defy the Fates and their decree in so crass a way. Oh yes, he guesses only, but he does not need to know. He is sure.

Xanthippe is queen, however, and the mother of the Kingdom's heir. He knows his duty, he has all his life. He'll do that duty, in honour of Zeus' daughter, the goddess of doing what's right. He basks in the thought of his virtue.

"The story of how our Kingdom came to be, Majesty," he answered her, having considered and swiftly discarded the notion of suggesting the story of the oracle which hangs over them all. She will not know of it. None outside the Kingdom do.

"So be it," the Queen replied, though with a trace of doubt in her voice.

Probably aware her visitor's pet will be out of her depth, Hesiod thinks now. It will embarrass Xanthippe too, a voice prods at his conscience. Let it. This is her fault really.

And so it is. After all, wasn't it Xanthippe who invited that still greater abomination, that female warrior, back to the Kingdom? He remembers her arrival. How she strode up the road which leads from the town into the palace without glancing to right or to left, how she declared to the Queen, "Xanthippe, my greetings." No title. Just "Xanthippe." Like an equal, in front of the whole court.

The Queen bore it without even a frown. "Xena," she said to the woman, "you are most welcome. It is good of you to come here and offer us your help." As though this woman, this warlord and pirate, had not, two decades ago, half murdered her husband and driven the land to its knees.

"Such help as I can give is yours," the warrior returned to that, though one eyebrow was quirked, just a little, and her tone was dry.

"Rest first and bathe. Then eat with us this evening. We will talk more in the morning," Xanthippe said, concluding the courtesies. "Send your slave to the kitchen: we will find work for her there. My slaves are yours while you are here."

And that was the error for which Hesiod is paying. In the silence that followed, the air seemed to grow colder and the daylight to fade. "My friend, Gabrielle," the warrior said, leaning on every word, "is a bard. If you are very lucky, she may share one of her stories with you later."

It was only then, Hesiod thinks, that anyone looked at the person who stood in the warrior's shadow. Small, is all he really recalls. A small woman, who flushed at this point and stepped closer to Xena, laying a hand on the warrior's arm.

"Tonight," Xanthippe said, with barely a pause. "We will be honoured if she will do so tonight." And so now he must sit here and hear this female bard slaughter the tale of their Kingdom. Perhaps after all he should have suggested a different subject, something less likely to offend should it be mangled. No. Let her be put in her place as quickly as possible. In the kitchen, as the Queen suggested.

At least Pelagos isn't here. The thought catches Hesiod off-guard, he has been so absorbed by his anger. But he should be. Tomorrow the Prince will come of age. Tomorrow he will become King. However, it is always a relief when the boy is not present — so perhaps he should wish him in the female bard's audience. Hesiod tries to imagine the result. Knowing Pelagos, nothing he might expect. If only Polybos had lived. This is what happens when a woman raises a child on her own.

Now the eating has finished, and the woman has risen, has moved so she can be seen and heard by everyone. "I sing," she says, and Hesiod winces loftily at the crude provincialism, outmoded even before he left Greece, "of Hippios, son of Midas, King of Lydia." He closes his eyes and prepares to endure.

The little bard stops talking, just for a moment. Hesiod is aware that the hall is silent. He opens his eyes for a moment. He looks across the breadth of the hall, through air which is heavy with heat and thickened with sweet-scented smoke from fine, beeswax candles. The woman, Gabrielle, seems to be looking back at him, but her eyes are unfocused. There is a small smile on her lips, and her colour is heightened. She is as rapt as her audience, he realises. And so, he is astonished to admit, is he. She begins again.

Hesiod blinks. The story is done. Of course, it lacks a fit ending. He always closes by listing the name of each King descended from Hippios, the Son of the Sea. Nevertheless, he cannot hold this against the young bard. He has seen every scene of the tale in his head, as clearly as if he has witnessed what happened himself. He looks about him. The spell of her telling still holds the court silent. Yes, he concedes, this was well done. A fair man, he cannot deny it. She has made a very old story seem like one which is new.

In a moment, he realises, the silence will have lasted too long. The small woman will not know if she has pleased or offended her audience. He glances at Xanthippe. She is impressed, he can see, though few others could do so. The Queen never makes a display of her feelings. She is like Xena in this. The warrior also wears her face like a mask.

A pang stabs his heart. How long has it been since he held the court so entranced? Has he ever? Perhaps long ago, when he was young, when he tended his sheep high on Mount Helikon, and was blessed by the Muses. Yes, he remembers telling tales to his friends in the Inn, during long winter evenings. He created such silences then, but it has been a long time since those days. And he has had more to do than merely spin stories. Teaching good farming practice and recording the birth of each God, such things are much more important. Are they not? They have earned him respect, anyway.

Then why does he wish they had earned him one second of silence?

Now someone is clapping. It is Xanthippe. The court follows suit. Gabrielle has flushed to the roots of her hair, has retreated a little. She stands with her back pressed close against Xena. Hesiod wishes she was smirking and waving her arms, or shrieking with glee at her triumph, but no. She is modest. He cannot despise and dislike her, though he wishes he could. She is a woman and has taken his place, but he can't hate her. Instead she has baffled his wits and set him off balance. Hesiod rises at last and joins in with the clapping. He fixes his eyes on the bard and applies the full force of his will. In a mere moment, she turns and looks back. When he is sure she can see, he nods, just once, in approval.

---

Xena is not sorry that the banquet has finished. Now she and Gabrielle are free to return to the suite they have been given. She can see her partner is tired. After the journey, after the excitement of the evening, this is hardly surprising. They walk from the Hall along corridors that lead through a succession of enclosed courtyards. They are following a slave who bows and is gone as soon as he brings them to their destination. Out of old habit, she pauses before entering, making Gabrielle stand behind her as she pushes the doors open and looks inside. There is a woman inside, a girl really. She wears a long white robe trimmed with gold. A slave of some value, and therefore a mark of respect. She stands and waits, head bowed, for Xena to give her an order.

"You can go," is all that Xena says.

"The Queen has commanded me..."

"To do whatever I say. I'm telling you to go." Xena's voice is curt.

Gabrielle steps forward. "It's okay. We'll explain if need be. And this is what Xena wants, you know."

The girl looks confused.

"Go get a good night's sleep. We want you to," Gabrielle prods her.

The girl examines this order. She still looks doubtful, but then she shrugs. "Well, thanks...I think." She leaves, closing the door behind her.

"Goodness knows what they'll be saying about us," Gabrielle says, grinning.

"That we don't want a slave." Xena is already stripping off her armour. She has her back turned to Gabrielle; she is testing her feelings. Better, she thinks with relief. The odd awkwardness which has arisen between herself and the bard has mellowed, for now at least. She cannot guarantee that it will not return, since she never knows what brings it into being. But it has gone for the moment. A truce? Between two sides of her own nature? She suspects there is more to it than this.

"If we're lucky. More likely that we are a pair of uncivilised bar..." Gabrielle's voice trails off. She is looking about her for the first time. Xena watches her covertly. She is not disappointed. "Wow!" the bard says. She has shaken off her tiredness for a while and has gone to one of the walls, is examining closely the scene painted on it. "Hippios' first meeting with Poseidon." She turns and smiles delightedly at Xena. "Can't you just see how surprised he is not to have been petrified? I knew that must have been how he felt. I knew that at some level he must have sensed Poseidon was really his father."

She paces the room, looking at scene after scene. Then she turns from its walls and takes in its contents. There is a table and chairs, the legs gilded and carved into paws, the arms into lions' heads, roaring. The bed is huge and crafted from the same wood, cedar of Lebanon. Its fragrance hangs in the air. On every surface there are soft throws which glow crimson and turquoise in the light of the candles. Beeswax of course, for Xanthippe will have only the best in her palace. "This is terrific!"

"Not bad," Xena returns. She shrugs her shoulders, pleased to be free of bronze and leather, at least for a time.

"This is a big hearth." Gabrielle has stopped beside it. It is laid with logs and tinder, topped off with fir cones. "Do they think we're going to get cold tonight?" She raises her eyebrows and grins.

"It's normally cold here at night. At this time of year, anyway. And the winters are bitter, they say." Xena smiles back at her partner. "Hard to believe, I know."

"Phew. You can almost cut this air with a knife. Half the time I feel I'm being smothered in hot blankets!" Gabrielle is still smiling, but cannot quite hide her distaste for the climate.

"It has to break soon. No one can remember a hot spell which has lasted so long so early in the year." Xena shrugs. She herself is indifferent to climate, and to landscape. Gabrielle, she knows, is not.

"My heart was in my mouth this evening." Gabrielle has gone back to look at another of the paintings. She reaches out a hand and, delicately, runs it along the back of an ebony stallion. She shakes her head, smiling a little. "I mean, they must have heard that one thousands of times. But I think it went off okay." Her voice rises as she says this. It is really a question.

"Yeah." Xena is careful to sound off-hand, to keep her pride in the bard out of her voice. She is curious, though, so she adds, "You aren't usually so anxious."

"Didn't you see him?" Xena quirks the eyebrow. "At the back of the room," Gabrielle goes on. "The old man with the beard. That was Hesiod himself."

"I thought he was dead," Xena says dryly. She waits for an instant, then adds, in unison with her bard, "The rumours of his death are greatly exaggerated." It is an old joke, rooted in less happy times. But they have survived, and are together. Their eyes meet and they laugh.

Xena settles in one of the chairs, stretching pleasurably. "Well, he seemed to like you."

"You think so? I was scared silly. Hesiod was the only poet my father approved of, you know." Gabrielle finishes her second circuit of the room and comes to sit down beside her. "I'd get in from a day's work, lambing, shearing, standing wolf-watch, whatever, all blisters and strains, and he'd recite some bloody passage about what we'd have to do tomorrow." Her eyes half close, partly in memory, partly because sleep is not far from her.

"'Plough right through, whatever the weather, wet or dry, Rising at dawn to get a good start, so your fields Will brim with grain.'"

Gabrielle shakes her head ruefully. "Works and Days was the first poem I learned by heart. And I have to say, when I got in, too tired even to want to eat, Hesiod's blasted to- do list was the last thing I wanted to hear."

"I can imagine," Xena says. And she can. She has seen what it's like, for the peasants who spent their hoarded, greasy coppers in her mother's tavern. Whose stores of grain and oil and wine she looted often enough in her past. Whose livestock she slaughtered to feed her troops, though she knew the farmers' families might starve because of it.

Gabrielle nods. Her featured have softened and flushed with sleepiness so that she looks once more like the girl Xena first met. Tears sting Xena's eyes, but she blinks them back so that she can go on watching the bard, whose voice is dreamy. "There was just us, Mum and Father, Lila and me. Mum and Father tried till it made her too ill. So there were no sons to help do the work, and lots to be done. Hesiod was right about that. It's a struggle, earning a living from Greek land. Well," she admits, "he was right about most things." Gabrielle swallows a yawn.

"That it is," Xena agrees. Gabrielle has never talked so much about her childhood before. 'Boring,' is usually the most she will say when asked, so it must be the old man. He must have sparked the memories. The warrior can see why Gabrielle would not normally dwell on them. Some childhood. Some father. How did she survive it? She thinks how much easier she had it, with a mother who ran an Inn, two brothers, and most of the work which got allotted to her indoors and out of the sun and the rain. Not that she did it. Almost all of her childhood memories are of being outside, in the sun, playing, fishing, beating up the village boys. It was fun. She suspects Gabrielle rarely had fun.

Gabrielle's voice breaks into her thoughts. "Hey, don't look like that." She reaches out a hand. After an instant's hesitation, so slight only Xena could notice it, she touches Xena's arm. It grieves the warrior, though Xena knows Gabrielle is just honouring her own edgy desire for more distance, and so is grateful as well. "It wasn't that bad. Hesiod included holidays in the schedule, and Father observed those as well." Gabrielle lifts her eyebrows and grins. "And he let me study what I wanted and grill wandering bards for their stories and philosophers for their thoughts. Yeah, he thought it was a waste of time, but he never denied it was my time to waste."

"I just wish I had been there," Xena hears herself say. "You'd have had a lot more fun." Guilty, she realises. I feel guilty, and angry, and I want to make it up to her.

Gabrielle smiles at her. "If I missed anything," she says, "you've made it up to me, and more."

They smile at one another, saying nothing for a time. Xena feels her breathing quicken, watches Gabrielle's do the same, watches the bard swallow, lean towards her a little. Her own mouth waters, and she swallows as well. She nearly reaches out for her partner. She misses her so. Her Gabrielle. Even her skin craves their familiar contact. But something restrains her.

A small line puckers the fair skin between the bard's brows. Xena tries to decipher her look. Angry? Disappointed? Resigned? Yes, all that, and hurt, too. It is gone in a moment. Gabrielle sits straighter, gives her head a small shake. "Anyway," she goes on, "Hesiod was a really big deal in our house, as you can see. His was the voice of authority, so to speak." Her own voice is not quite steady. Xena suspects she has made herself speak solely to dispel the awkwardness.

I'm sorry, Xena wants to say. I don't know what's making me act this way. It hurts me too. But she says nothing, of course. She drags her mind back to the subject of their conversation.

"Yeah. He's a bit dour. And he doesn't stop to notice the flowers. Not like a certain other bard of my acquaintance." Xena lets both apology and affection colour her tone, watches a smile shape Gabrielle's lips fondly.

"It drove Father so mad. 'Wasting your time on looking at things. Woman's nonsense, girl.' That's what he'd say, when he wasn't telling me that women couldn't be bards, and even if they could, they shouldn't be, because they'd just waste good paper on romantic rubbish. That my job was to do my duty and get him a son by marriage to a man he picked out. And then grandsons."

She smothers another yawn. Then her attention is distracted by the table, or rather by the bowl of fruit it supports. "Apricots!" she says in surprise, taking one and sniffing at it. "However did they get them ripe this early? Didn't you say it's normally cold at night at this time of year round here?"

Xena shakes her head. "The stables," she adds helpfully, "lots of horses." She keeps her face straight, watching the bard freeze, look again at the fruit, then direct a shocked glance straight at her.

"That's the nobility for you," Gabrielle says, surprising Xena as usual. "We slaved just to put bread on our table, and they waste labour and manure on this sort of thing." She rubs the fruit's skin, and takes a bite, looking thoughtful. "At least he didn't walk out on me," she says softly. Then she yawns once more.

She's really tired, Xena thinks. Worn out. "He was enjoying himself," she assures Gabrielle aloud. "Trust me." She sometimes forgets how easily her partner can lose self confidence.

"He's a great bard," Gabrielle tells her. "Perhaps the greatest. But he really doesn't have a good word to say about women." She smiles ruefully. "I could have done without him in the audience."

"You should have said something," Xena teases her. "I'd have made sure he was otherwise engaged."

Gabrielle chuckles at this. "Next time, perhaps," she says. Her eyelids are drooping, but there is obviously something else on her mind. She is fighting off sleep. Xena waits for Gabrielle's next question. She must be wondering about Xanthippe. However, the question which comes isn't the one she expected.

"Where was Pelagos, do you think?"

Xena blinks. Is Gabrielle being subtle? She's concerned. I should tell her everything. She knows I'm keeping something from her. Apart from myself, that is. It's back. That need to push Gabrielle away. Even to hurt her, to make her stay away. Why? What's going on with me? Xena tries to rationalise. She hates not feeling sure of herself. She hates being evasive. But she hates the sense that she owes the bard an explanation. It makes her feel - cramped. Yes, that's it. It's a passing thing. But for now, I need my space. Though she hates this too, because she knows how it hurts Gabrielle, as well as herself. Isn't this what she hates most of all, however? This tie between them which she cannot control, which provokes feelings which she cannot explain.

A little too late, she replies, "He's a young man. He must be, what, 16 by now. I daresay he had better things to do."

"So Xanthippe really does rule here, still?" Gabrielle's voice is indistinct. Xena guesses she is stifling yawns by sheer force of will. Perhaps she has missed the lack of candour in the warrior's replies.

"Evidently." Xena is afraid she has been too abrupt. She makes herself go on. "He must be almost of age, though." In fact, now she thinks of it, she suspects this must be about to happen. Perhaps it is even one of the reasons for her presence.

"But when you first met her, she wasn't the ruler then, was she? I mean, her husband was still alive."

Ah. We're getting there. "Yes, Polybos was still alive. But he was ill." He'd been badly wounded. I wounded him. "Xanthippe was really in charge, anyway. She was the Queen, the descent of Hippios. Polybos was her consort." Unbidden, an image of Xanthippe strides into her mind, eighteen years younger, tall, outrageous in garments woven with gold, cascades of black hair gleaming blue. Her eyes. Yes, she remembers her eyes. Black again, and voracious.

Xena waits for Gabrielle's next question. When it doesn't come, she thinks that perhaps she has escaped for now, that perhaps the bard is asleep. But no. When she looks over at her partner, it is to meet a steady, considering gaze. What's she thinking? Come on, Gabrielle, it's not like you to keep quiet. Though in fact this is no longer true. Gabrielle has been keeping some of her thoughts to herself for quite a long time now. Especially recently, over the weeks of their journey to this place. My fault. I've done this to us.

After a while, Gabrielle blinks, and then shakes herself. She gives Xena a smile. And takes her by surprise again. "Okay, I'll let you off the hook. For now. But I want all the answers, tomorrow."

Perversely, Xena feels slightly let down. She nods, filled with that mixture of chagrin and gratitude she has become very familiar with since she first met the bard. I don't know how it is, but I swear she can read me like a book. Thank the gods.

Gabrielle is yawning once more. She tries to get out of her chair, but gives up half way. "Woo. It's not as though I drank much..." She looks at Xena owlishly as she says this, with both an apology and a plea behind her words.

"Up you come." Xena grins as she hoists Gabrielle up, hitches her more securely in her grasp, and carries her over to the bed. "You've had a big day."

"Yeah. That I have. Fancy me telling a story to Hesiod. Fancy him listening!"

But the bard sobers again. There is a fleeting shadow in the look she gives Xena. She's giving me space. Unexpectedly pierced, Xena leans close. She sweeps a wisp of reddish gold hair from Gabrielle's forehead and whispers her promise again: "Tomorrow, my bard."

---

Xanthippe is in her private chambers. The shutters are open, in the hope that some breath of air will be tempted within. She hates this weather. She finds it distastefully perverse. Here they are, in a Palace built by the sea, yet all their weather comes from the land. Has done for months, or so it seems. Hot and heavy and humid with the foul mists from the low-lying marshes round the estuary to the west, with the baked dust of the steppes which stretch on for league after league to the north. She has been told they stop only when they come to vast forests of black pine which swallow them whole. As they disgorge the broad, sluggish river.

The Queen is standing in front of the long, polished shield which serves as her mirror. It is almost as tall as she is. She examines her reflection as it floats in the coppery burnish. Her hair has faded a little. It no longer has indigo tints. She knows this, as she knows that the planes of her face are less smooth than they were, and that her skin is webbed with fine lines. But she is a good-looking woman still, well-featured, her body enticingly rounded. Her lovers always tell her so, and it would be false modesty to doubt them.

So it's Xena who's changed, the Queen thinks. Now it is Xena's face which floats in the metal before her. She appears hardly to have aged in terms of her face and her body. The changes lie elsewhere. Xanthippe recalls the woman she knew, all ambition and pride, wilful, demanding, quick to arouse. Someone who took all she was offered, then wanted more, whether in bed or in battle. Not stupid, however. Xanthippe almost made that mistake at the time, assuming the woman was driven by greed and planning to use it against her. The Queen remembers the chill that she felt when Xena's eyes sharpened, sensing a trap, how her long, rangy frame gathered itself, ready to pounce. She knows what would have befallen herself and the kingdom had she not altered course at that moment, abandoned seduction and offered alliance instead.

The Queen's gaze goes inward. As is her habit, she begins pacing. The folds of her night-robe hiss in time with her steps. She is intent on her problem. Such an old one. She remembers when it began, when she first heard the oracle. During her wedding. The priest swallowed the potion, asked how fortune would favour this man and his wife, got that impossible answer. She scorned it in public, but it nagged her in private. She sensed it meant Xena as soon as the warrior's ship sailed into view. The woman's rout of the army, her maiming of Polybos only confirmed it. Since then, every thought has been framed, every deed undertaken in order to thwart it.

Yet that fate is still here, and about to engulf them. She will not permit it. Xanthippe is fixed in her aim. Her mind turns to Xena; how can she ensure that the warrior woman will do what might need to be done? I must succeed. Failure would mean not just death but the loss of the Kingdom. Hence her summons to Xena - who can act where she cannot, who has the strength and the will, but who no longer desires her.

How then can Xena be bent to the purpose?

By different means than before. She still senses raw need in the woman, but now it has focus and aim. And there is more. Something has changed deep inside her. Perhaps it is simply the discipline needed to keep such desires under control. Xanthippe senses a greatness. She's learned better. She's learned the greatest rewards come from different choices. She wants other things now. Unknown to the Queen, her right hand has lifted, and is cupping her jaw. She is close to an insight. I wonder what happened. What made her a hero? Now Xanthippe stops. She is back at the mirror. Or rather, who happened?

She is close to the answer, she knows it, but at this moment someone knocks at her door. It is Iopus, her steward. She stills the rebuke on her lips, but waits with blatant impatience. Iopus swallows, then says, "Majesty, you wanted to know..."

"He's back," she says flatly. In an instant, she changes. Her head droops, as do her shoulders. Something dulls in her eyes, her skin pales.

"Just now. He's," Iopus pauses, hunting for words, "not as wild as he can be."

Xanthippe snorts. "Then, wherever he's been, the wine must have been mixed with poppy juice."

Iopus shuffles, spreads his hands. Not fair, Xanthippe thinks to herself. He's out of his depth, and embarrassed. Aren't we all. "Thank you," she says, "you can go now." She smiles a sour smile as he leaves. Just a bit faster and he'd be running. She wishes she could deal with the problem this way.

Pelagos. My handsome, strong son. Looking, everyone says, exactly as Polybos did at his age, though he is just a bit taller than Polybos, her husband, had been. Black hair, blacker eyes. Graceful, well muscled. Let him throw on a tunic, a peasant's rough, hessian tunic, and it will settle over his shoulders as if tailored to fit him. So clever, and such a musician, though no art is beyond him. A superlative swordsman as well, no guard in the army can match him. Surely Pelagos is just what is needed. Polybos perfected; a prince without peer, a fit heir to the throne.

Where has he been this time? Xanthippe suppresses a shudder, straightens her spine, hearing footsteps approaching. She goes to the room's centre, seats herself in the ebony chair which is placed there. She takes a deep breath, settles herself, raises her head, and waits for the door to re-open. I'm not afraid, she answers a taunt deep inside her, he's my son.

Though this is the root of the problem.

Pelagos enters the room like a dancer, wearing no more than a tunic, a wreath of wild olive askew on his head. Every movement he makes is so graceful, it almost disguises his insolent rudeness. She swallows her sarcastic, "Why don't you knock, just for a change?" He will smile if she says it, bat his impossibly long lashes, and not bother to answer. What does he want? He has come to a halt, no more than two paces distant. Now he is standing. Other boys of his age would be shuffling their feet, looking shifty, even if all they were hiding were shame-faced embarrassment. Not Pelagos. When the silence has stretched to more than a minute, he still looks at his ease. Perhaps he thinks time should say sorry for passing, Xanthippe thinks wryly.

Then she thinks, He looks old. Calmer now, she looks at her son. His hair is still black as the night, his skin is still smooth, but there's something about him... What is it? This impression of age. Or rather, this feeling that time has run out.

"Where have you been?" she asks, knowing her son will not tell her. He always wins at this game, she always speaks first. She hasn't the steel to tough out the silence. Not facing Pelagos.

"You didn't need me tonight, Mother," Pelagos answers, shifting his pose just a little. He rubs his right thumb over each nail of his left hand, then repeats the same thing in reverse.

"You are the Prince. Soon you'll be King. Just a few hours from now. Greeting high-ranking visitors is something you need to do. They need to know you, and know how to treat you. As their equal." Xanthippe has said this before.

"I know all this. I know it already. When the time comes, they will treat me just as they treated my Father. Believe me." Pelagos is still absorbed in his nails. "Would he have been proud of me, Mother?"

Xanthippe shrinks from the scorn his voice. She snatches a sentence to say. Any sentence. "I wish he could have seen you." Why not yes? Why can't I say yes? Xanthippe rails at herself. But she cannot.

"Poor mother." Suddenly he is close beside her, moving with that swiftness which has always been his. He lifts a hand, runs it parallel to the sweep of her hair. "Don't worry. I'll be here when you need me." Now his hand touches her cheek. "Tomorrow night. When you give Poseidon his horse. When the moon is full. When I am 16. When I become King. Just like my father."

He puts a stress on the word, leans closer to say it. His breath stirs the hair over Xanthippe's ears. She looks into his eyes. In this light, she cannot tell iris from pupil. It is as though he has no eyes. It is as though she is looking at the vacant sockets of a skull. She grows cold and shivers with terror.

"The moon's a bit like a skull, isn't it, Mother?" Pelagos leans in still closer. They share the same air. He lets the back of one finger smooth her lips, very gently. She can feel each hair as it passes over the sensitised skin. "Dear Mother," he says, dreamily smiling. Now she grows warm, but still trembles.

Then he steps away, and begins to pace the room. He makes one circuit, another, then another. Like a caged beast protesting the bars which confine it. She has closed her eyes, is calming herself, is listening to his steps become more and more rapid. When she can stand it no longer, she says, "Stop it!" But she has kept her voice quiet and low, filled it with the resonant tone which still, sometimes, works with the man she calls son.

He stops. He is standing behind her. She opens her eyes, watches his shadow dance on her wall. Even his shadow is graceful. "What will happen, Mother?" His voice sounds much younger. "Do you think my giving Poseidon his gift will break the curse on the Kingdom?"

"Yes, yes. Of course." She says this quickly, because she wishes to think it. But she does not.

Pelagos knows it. They share too many of the same thoughts. He speaks her next one. "The elders say that I am the curse."

"That's superstition. Who says it? I'll show them. I'll teach them."

"Will whipping them bloody take the words back?" Pelagos' voice is soft now. Almost gentle. He comes back to face her, kneels down before her, like the child he has never, really, been. After a while he says, softer still, "Well then. I'm having fun, you see. Enjoying myself while I can. You can't blame me for that. Not when time's running out."

Then he has risen and gone. Xanthippe stays in her chair, strangely shrunken. Her shoulders are bowed, her face is covered by her hands. Tears slip through her fingers.

---

Gabrielle is angry with herself. She has slept too long, yet again. She awoke alone, the sun already high. Now she is hurrying through the rooms of the palace, trying to find the stable yard, having deduced that Xena must be there. But she is lost. How can the place be this big? She turns another corner, finds herself in a room identical to one she left only minutes before. I'm going in circles. But how is this possible? The palace is a single storey affair, with the stables at the back. She should be there now.

t's a maze, she thinks in despair. Like the country. She hates it. Not just the heat, but the heaviness of the air, the dampness, the way she can never see as far as the horizon because of the haze. She loathes the limp expanses of grassland, baked to one shade of slime-green. She longs for Greece, for its mountains and steep valleys, for its groves of wild olive and carpets of wildflowers. There'll be violets everywhere now. Then there's the shore. What sort of coast line is this? she thought in disdain, when she first saw it. She will have nightmares, she knows, of meandering waterways heavy with silt, snaking through reed beds higher than Xena's head. Just a maze. She shivers but keeps going, almost at a run.

Eventually she arrives back at their rooms. She stands in the doorway, observing their bed, the neat stack of Xena's armour, which she has left behind today. Oh Xena. Where are you? I can't find you. Her hands clench and she grips the wood of the door frame as hard as she can. Calm down. Calm down. Don't lose it. She heaves a shuddering sigh, turns round, carefully works out the lay-out of the palace again, starts walking. Slowly, take it slowly. You'll find her.

But instead she is found. She turns a corner and there is a tall, dark haired, youngish-looking man. He reacts to her arrival calmly, as if he has been waiting for her. "Ah, so you're Gabrielle."

"Excuse me, but I'm late," she answers. She wants to edge by him, to get away as fast as she can. She wants to reach Xena. But this is stupid. He must live in the palace; he can tell her how to get to the stables. And yes, perhaps Xena sent him to fetch her. She wants to ask this, but the words stick in her throat. There is something about him which makes her afraid. Something which makes her want to run away from him. Instead, she cannot even move back a step.

"Very nice," he says. He seems to press even closer. His head tilts to the left, and he looks her all over, taking his time. "Very nice indeed," he repeats. Suddenly he snakes out one hand and tips up her chin. "You've the sea in your eyes." He dips his head, looks straight into them.

Sweat springs out on her forehead, gathers on her upper lip. She feels hot and then cold. What is it with this guy? There is a sort of haze around him, bending the very air they breathe, like heat rising on a hot summer's day. Her skin burns where his hand touches it. In spite of this, she can see every detail of the ring on his middle finger, of the rearing horse emblazoned on it, very clearly. She wrenches her jaw out of her grasp and manages to step back at last. "Leave me alone," she demands.

"But I can give you whatever you want, Gabrielle," he says. He looks at her, then leans forward, nostrils flared, inhaling deeply. "Whatever you're missing from Xena," he whispers, after a moment. He smiles knowingly.

She feels herself blush with embarrassment, but says, steadily, "No, you can't give me that."

He does not seem abashed. Instead, his smile broadens, becomes blinding with charm. "Perhaps. But what about the Queen? Aren't you afraid Xena's with her now? At this very moment? Shouldn't you be thinking about getting your own back?"

Gabrielle shakes her head. No, she thinks fiercely. She is sure Xena is not. But she cannot say it. She backs off some more, begins to run away down the passageway. Stops to collect herself when she realises he isn't following her. She hears him laughing and looks back. The man's head is reared back. His hair flows in snaky black locks, like the mane of a galloping horse. His eyes flash black as a stallion's. Even from here she can smell his arousal. "Very wise, little bard," he says between chuckles. "I'm a monster, you know. Your friend's here to kill me."

Gabrielle wakes. She is drenched in cold sweat, entangled in bedclothes. She has no idea where she is, but she knows she's alone. "Xena!" she cries. No one answers. She makes herself breathe. You were dreaming. Calm down, Gabrielle. The sun is already quite high and she sees that, in one way at least, her dream has come true. She's slept far too deeply and now she is late. She drags herself up, pours water into a ewer, washes the sleep from her eyes. Slightly calmer, she looks round the room, spies a note propped on the pile of her clothes.

"Xanthippe's an early bird. I'll be in the stables." Xena's hand, black and firm. Gabrielle dresses, tucks the note into her belt, and sets out to join her. The route is easy enough to work out. It was only a dream, she says to herself. But there was truth in the dream, she cannot deny this. After all this time, I'm still scared she'll leave me behind; I'm still scared I'll lose her. In fact the fear has grown again recently. Which is why she's been giving Xena more space, is trying not to get on her nerves. It has seemed a wise move, given the warrior's tenseness of late, and the feeling Gabrielle has that she is withdrawing from her in some way, withdrawing within herself. She's bound to get like this sometimes; I just have to be careful. Especially with Xanthippe around. An early bird? What in Hades is that supposed to mean, Xena?

Gabrielle rounds a corner, comes to a halt. Someone is standing there. She has almost run into a tall, dark-haired shape. She catches the trace of a scent; sandalwood. Xanthippe wears it, she smelled it last night. The shape, clad in a tunic and breeches, turns and looks back at her. "There you are," Xena says. Her voice, her face, both are void of expression. "I thought you'd got yourself lost. The stable's this way." She strides off. After a moment, Gabrielle follows.

» Continued in Part II of III