"I was honored to serve the Great King, but it cannot be any more. Let
me go out upon the Axylon."
Flavius caught a gasp between his teeth. Mithradates drew his knife
in a hand that shook. The slaves at the room's end cowered back into
shadow; some half-sensed ripple went along the lines of guardsmen, and
all their eyes swung inward toward Eodan.
"I must thank the Roman," he went on. "I would have let her die out
there, or worse than die. He showed me my shame. I am not certain why
she is gone: it may be a spell cast on her or it may be of her own
choosing, for some reason I do not understand. But she watched over me
while I slept among foemen. I cannot offer her less now than my own
help."
"You--would bring her back--here?" Mithradates said it with a
stubbornness that dug in its heels. He would not believe anything else.
"Well, perhaps so--"
"With the Alan kept hostage for his return, Your Majesty," put in
Flavius.
Eodan shook his head. "Tjorr has nothing to do with this, My Lord. That
is why I ask leave to depart the King's service. I do not think it
likely Phryne wishes to return hither."
"And you would set her will above mine?" asked Mithradates in a stunned
voice.
"What I would like," said Eodan, "is that you give her freely into my
hands, so that I could bring her back here and let her do or not do
whatever she wished. But I have no art of wheedling; I ask merely for a
dismissal."
"You will get your head on a gatepost!" exclaimed Flavius in a blaze of
victory.
Mithradates stood stooped, his breath rattling in his lungs. His head
swung back and forth, as though he were a bull looking for a man to
gore.
Suddenly he leaped forward, and his knife flashed. Eodan stepped aside.
The knife struck a pillar, drove in and snapped off short. "Guards!"
bellowed the king. "Seize this traitor!"
Eodan stood quietly. Hands fell upon him, spears touched his ribs.
He glanced at Flavius. The Roman laughed aloud, bent close while
Mithradates screamed and shredded his cloak, and whispered, "Did you
think, you fool, he would let you go? You have all but said before
his household, Phryne left because she would not be taken by him. You
insulted more than the king's majesty, you insulted his manhood!"
"I knew what I said," Eodan answered.
Mithradates raged up, flung Flavius and a guardsman aside, and smote
the Cimbrian's face with his hand.
Eodan shook a ringing head, licked the blood that ran from his mouth
and said in Greek, "I did not know it was the custom of civilized men
to strike a guest."
Mithradates fell back as though from a sword thrust.
Then for a while he paced, snarling and mewing. Flavius began to talk,
but a lion roar silenced him. "Wine!" said the King at last. A slave
hurried up with a flagon. Mithradates snatched it, kicked the kneeling
man in the stomach, drained the cup and crumpled its heavy silver
between his fingers.
"Another," he commanded.
It was brought him. He drank it with more care. He flung himself onto
the high seat, slumped for a while, looked up into the darkness above
the rafters and finally began to laugh. It was a raw, barking laugh,
with little humor, but at the end he stood up and spoke calmly.
"Release him," he said. The guards fell back, and Eodan waited.
Mithradates folded his arms. "After this," he continued, almost in
a light tone, "you will not care to stay. It is a delicate question
whether you are my guest, my soldier or my slave, but civilized people
must be generous. Let the Cimbrian take the horse, the arms and the
monies he got from me. Let him ride off wherever he wishes, so he come
not back to this army." The wind piped around the hall; the fire-pits
roared. "Well, begone!" cried Mithradates.
Eodan bent his knee and backed out, as though he were leaving on some
royal errand. And would the Powers it were so, he thought dully,
knowing a wound took hours to feel pain.
He heard Flavius say, in a voice that quivered: "Great King, will you
also let this guest depart?"
As if from immensely far away, the voice of Mithradates came: "There is
a destiny here. I would stand in its way if I dared--but I am only a
man, even I.... Tomorrow at dawn, when we march north, you may quit the
camp." An animal scream: "Now leave my eyes! All of you! Every man in
here, leave the King to himself!"
They streamed out, almost running, terror written beneath the bright
helmets; for the king sat at a heathen god's feet and wept.
Eodan saw Flavius stalk toward his own tent. They exchanged no words.
He went to his place, clapped for a groom and donned his Persian
war-garb. A saddled gray stallion was led forth. Eodan sprang upon it
and trotted quickly from camp.
He would follow the highway south, hoping for a sign.
An hour afterward, when the Pontine army was only smoke on a gray
horizon, he saw the dust cloud behind. It neared, until he could see
the black horse that raised it, and finally he heard the drumbeat of
its hoofs--and Tjorr's red beard flaunted itself in the wind.
"Whoof!" said the Alan, pulling up alongside him. "You might have
waited."
Eodan cried aloud, "It was not needful. You should have stayed where
your luck was."
"No--now, what luck would come to a man that forsook his oaths?" said
Tjorr. "I was weary of Pontus anyhow. Now we will surely drink of my
Don again."