24. Οdysseus

24

Οdysseus

A year had passed since we’d arrived on the island of Aeaea.

Circe had seen to it that the rest of my men were also turned into pigs. The women, she turned into birds. “Freed from the slavery they were so clearly in,” she claimed. No matter that they were now forced to dig worms from the dirt with beaks that were once their mouths.

All the women, that was, except for Odette.

Odette, Circe had decided in front of all the remaining animals in the clearing that night, was to be her maid, someone to braid her hair and provide companionship, comfort, conversation. While I, under threat of transfiguration, was expected to warm her bed at night. I knew then that she had seen me cutting off Odette’s hair, that she knew I cared for her. That she would keep Odette as a woman if only to keep me on a leash, and it grated me that it worked.

For twelve months I had warmed that witch’s bed. Whatever she had laced into the wine that first night had worked as she’d intended, and I’d been compliant, if unwilling, while my cock remained hard enough for her to ride. It made me think of Odette, and the other Trojan women in the war. But I clenched my jaw and got through it.

Circe must have also given herself a fertility tonic of some kind that night, for she immediately fell pregnant with my son, Telegonus. He now lay in a crib beside me, slobbering on a wooden horse the size of my palm that I had carved for him one evening in the clearing where we had first landed on Aeaea. I had hoped Odette would meet me that night, in the clearing under the full moon, while Circe was busy with her spells – and whatever else she did at the witch’s hour that she felt absolved her of her behaviour – but Odette never showed.

We had only been able to meet half a dozen times at best over the last year, clandestine meetings with whispered words in code, on our guard, alert to the tiniest movement.

I missed her.

I know that before we arrived here, I had wanted to distance myself from her. I had believed in the strength of that, and then I had been brash in my actions to protect her, to the point she probably hated me for what I had taken from her, given she had little. But now, without the men and in the presence of a witch with access to power I could not fathom, I bitterly regretted the trajectory of my actions and my thoughts.

I missed Odette’s snarky remarks, the snort she couldn’t help but make when she found something I said amusing in an unironic way, and the eyeroll that accompanied it. I missed the way she knew she could predict my moods and movements. How she provided comfort when I thought myself alone; a general who could not turn to anyone, not even fellow generals, for fear of being seen as weak.

Even when Odette had been withdrawn from me, when we had first come to know each other, and whenever something was working around in her little mind that caused her to retreat into herself, it was still better than the shell of the woman who now shuffled around the cottage.

Odette had only withdrawn into herself further after Telegonus had been born. I knew she thought of her own son, Lykas, who would have started school by now. My own firstborn, Telemachus, would be ten and two this year, beginning his journey into manhood.

The thought of not being there for it made me feel like less of a man, less of a father.

I still thought of Penelope often, too. I wondered how she was coping with raising a son, and undoubtedly having to fend off suitors trying to convince her I was lost – or worse – dead at sea.

Although, as I looked at Odette’s gaunt face once again as she pottered about keeping the hearth warm while Circe and I sat at the table, I wondered, not for the first time, if this was a fate worse than death. Some cruel trick by the gods, where slavery begot slavery.

“Odette, take Telegonus for his bath, please,” Circe interrupted from her seat by the fire, one hand stroking her already swollen belly. No sooner had Telegonus been born than Circe had me drink that vile wine once again, and now she was certain we would have a daughter. How she could tell so soon confounded me, but that was witches for you.

“Yes, mistress,” Odette acquiesced, brushing the needles of bark from her hands, wiping them on her apron and then turning to scoop up my son in her arms, paying me no mind whatsoever.

I wish she would, but I understood why she didn’t when Circe was around.

I caught the witch smiling slyly at me as she watched the interaction.

“So handsome, our son, isn’t he, Odysseus? I’m sure he will make a fine warrior one day, just like his father.”

I grunted, lifting my wine cup to my lips for something to do other than respond.

“And our daughter, too. She will be as pretty as me, no?”

“Still so certain it is a girl? Careful, Circe, or you will have everything you need from me and you’ll have no reason to deny my request to return to Ithaca,” I murmured, my eyes downcast to my drink, trying to hide my smile behind the rim of the cup.

Circe returned a wide smile of her own, her teeth flashing a brilliant white. “Oh, my dear Odysseus, do you not remember what the prophet said to you upon your jaunt to the Underworld? Between the Sirens and the Scylla, you would not survive the journey home.”

Sirens and Scylla . They were no monsters of the deep - they were the women in front of me. Odette, the siren I so desperately wished to hear, so much so that I could feel my body falling forward in her presence, just desperate for her to simply talk to me again as she once had. That I might hear her thoughts or musings on anything Circe said without having to question in my own mind the choice of her words. There were so many fascinating things about this island, Circe, the creatures - enough to fill a book full of colour, and yet Odette had barely strung more sentences together than digits I had on my hands. I felt as though I was bound to this very chair I sat in. Bees swarmed about my head, cutting me off from ever truly hearing her, ever truly seeing her again, beeswax dripping into my ears.

I wondered if Circe had laced the honey on my bread.

In comparison, the witch before me was Scylla herself, the six-headed monster. For whenever I met one of her demands, another seemed to crop up in its place. First, a maid to keep her company. Then, to become lovers. Then a son. Now a daughter. What would be the other two demands, I wondered? Or perhaps Circe was more like Charybdis, the giant whirlpool, and I was merely the sailor caught up in her schemes.

At least I had been able to bury Elpenor, the first man of my crew who had stumbled across Circe, when I found his body. She had struck him down where he stood, murdered him, for he had found her when she was bathing naked, or so she claimed. He’d obviously gone scouting away from the rest of the men, for the others had found her later in her hut, and because she’d been expecting them, she’d turned them into pigs. Called their behaviour vile and rude, worthy of the creature.

Had I not been to the Underworld, had Elpenor not told me of his plight, I would not have expected murder from Circe. Witchcraft, yes. But, murder … Well, unlike Odette, I doubted I’d be able to talk the witch out of it.

“Has this truly been so terrible a place to live?” She raised one perfectly arched dark brow at me, her straight black waist-length hair rippling as she adjusted herself to gesture around the room.

Vines and herbs curved around the wooden rafters and decorated the windowsills, the wooden benches either side of the walls well oiled, as was the large wooden table we sat at in the centre of the room. The brick wall, under which the hearth stood, broke up the monotony of the wood in the main room we all shared, the fire a good focal point for when I couldn’t stand to look at Circe, or when I needed to will myself not to watch Odette.

Of course, there were other rooms in the cottage, a garden out front, the sty for the pigs - men – out the back, a barn for the cows and chickens. In other words, it was the domestic bliss I had craved during war; the simple life I had longed to live. Just not with the one I wanted to live it with. Not like this.

So, I did not even have to consider my answer. “No.”

For, in truth, it hadn’t been. The cottage had no want for homely comforts, from the solid wooden chairs with supportive lumber for my back, to the steel tub where I could bathe when I wanted hot water to soothe my aching muscles after chopping wood. Even walks in the forests were a balm, to have bare feet on earth that was not soaked with blood, sweat, piss and shit. Birdsong in the morning - charming, if I didn’t think too hard about the birds. Warm drinks, good wine (when it wasn’t spiked), an iron-framed bed whose comforter was made up of more than a pallet, though that had taken some getting used to, my body not what it once was. Fresh fruit and warm broths, nothing that had to be rationed or fought over.

In truth, the greatest gift was being relieved of the responsibility over the men, but I would never confess that thought aloud.

Circe’s smile widened as if she’d heard my thoughts. “Well,” she said, slowly rising to her feet, using the back of her own chair as leverage to hoist herself up, the babe in her belly growing bigger by the day. “I shall go and complete my rituals. Will I return to find you in our bed?”

I took another sip of wine and grunted. There was nowhere else I could sleep. The times I had tried, sitting upright in the chair by the fire with my arms crossed and my head rolled forward, thinking I could get away with it under the guise of exhaustion, my feet somehow found their way to the bed, no matter how hard I tried to force them to walk a different way.

“I may take a walk to clear my head of this wine before bed,” I told her. That way, she wouldn’t come looking for me.

“Very well, I will see you shortly.”

When I was certain she was gone, I allowed several more slow minutes to pass, listening only to the sounds of the fire crackling, before downing the rest of my wine and heading out the door and towards the clearing.

She was here.

I could have sworn my soul sighed at the sight of Odette by the ocean. Though it had been a year since we had sailed, the gods knew how I had prayed that we would find permanent land, and there was something about Odette by the shoreline that made me think of freedom.

I crept around the edge of the clearing, placing my feet carefully with each step so as not to startle her. Her shoulders were tense, and her posture seemed unnaturally still, like a statue teetering on the edge of collapse. I paused for a moment, just watching Odette as the ocean breeze tugged at her hair, her knuckles white from clutching her cloak. I wondered what haunted her thoughts.

“Telegonus?” I asked, my voice low.

“Asleep,” she replied, not turning to face me. “Being watched over by the birds.”

“And yourself?”

She exhaled, but the sound was more like a tremor than a sigh. “Alive in a cage of my own creation.”

She always said that, and refused to reply whenever I tried to pry more from her, but there was something darker in her words this time. I could hear the tremble, the tenor of fear in her tone. Usually, when she said that, I would attempt to comfort her, and she would offer me a small smile, as if I were a young boy trying to sweet-talk a grown woman. It was one of those sad, all-knowing smiles that finds your naivety a kind-but-useless balm. Then she would shake her head, tell me it wasn’t for me to worry about, tell me whatever other piece of information she thought important for me to know – gathered from listening to Circe – and walk away.

But tonight, she surprised me.

“I cannot keep doing this, Odysseus,” she whispered, and I swore I saw her flinch at my name, like speaking it might summon Circe herself from the shadows.

“I will find us a way …”

“And I will lose my mind while you try.” Her voice cracked. “Circe always watches, already knows . I know she knows.”

“Odette, I?—”

“I can’t stay here. Not with her watching. Not with this … this madness clawing at my mind.” She stepped back, shaking her head, as if trying to shake off the thoughts. “Circe … The power she has over both of us … We won’t escape it. We’ll be stuck here forever.”

I reached for her, but she recoiled, her fingers twitching nervously at her sides.

“Just a little bit longer, until?—”

“Until what? Until your next child is born? Your son will begin hitting his milestones before the turn of the season, and while I have tried my best while he is but a babe, the change in him …” she trailed off. “Would you really have me stay here until your son surpasses Lykas in age?”

I sighed. “No, I would not.”

“And you cannot get us off this island.”

She said it with such finality, it knocked all arguments from my lungs.

Before I could gather the breath to implore her, she turned, as she always did, and walked away.

I had tried everything to convince Circe to free us from this island.

Everything, except the one thing I swore I never would. But with Odette on the brink of breaking, pride was a luxury I could no longer afford. Not if I wanted her to survive.

“Odysseus, what are you doing?”

She was amused. I was on my knees by our bed, and she was amused.

“Circe, I have done all that you have asked of me. I have sacrificed all that I have, given all that I am, gifted you children. What else must I do to be free to return to Ithaca once again? Tell me, please, tell me what I must do.”

Her stone-grey eyes, usually so hardened unless they were revelling in my misery, grew wide as I looked up at her. “You do not wish to be here?”

She had to be toying with me. Here I was, my knees pressed into the stone floor of her chamber, the weight of the year spent on Aeaea grounding me down to … this . “No,” I gritted out.

Circe’s eyes softened with a sadness I hadn’t expected. “Odysseus,” she murmured, her voice carrying a trace of regret. “I truly thought you would find happiness here. Just as I did, in time.” She reached out, her fingers brushing my cheek, and for a moment, I saw the loneliness she tried so hard to mask. “I was miserable when I was first exiled to this island. I thought, in time, you would understand. That you would enjoy making a life here, as I did.”

Her words stung, not because they were false, but because they weren’t. Part of me had wondered if this was how it would end, if I would be trapped here, losing myself to her and this cursed paradise.

But then, there was Odette. Odette, who had withered in this place, whose spirit had been crushed under the weight of her own despair. I could not, would not, let that be our fate.

“Please, Circe,” I whispered. “Let us go.”

She withdrew her hand, her gaze hardening as she retreated into the role of the witch once more. But even then, I saw the cracks in her armour – the flicker of hesitation, the pain she concealed so well. “Us?”

“The men, the women, all of us who wish to return to Ithaca.”

“You mean Odette,” she accused.

I kept my head bowed, begging, praying to the gods that something would be able to sway her.

Circe laughed and a cold dread settled in my chest. “You think her heart is bound as yours is – but it is not. There are whispers that cling to her, promises made that cannot be broken. I cannot speak of it, except to say that saving her will cost you, and despite what you may think of me, I know you, Odysseus. This is a cost you will not want to pay.”

“Tell me, Circe. Let me be the decider of that.”

She sighed, and when she eventually spoke again, her voice was quiet, almost resigned. “You will not understand until you experience it, I suppose. Such is the way with mortals. Very well. If you wish to leave, Odysseus, you may do so if you make this one vow,” she said, her tone now firm. “Swear that when your journey is done, you will return to me.”

She gave no date; there would be loopholes to work around this vow.

“Very well, I swear it.”

“And … a final sacrifice,” she said, her tone testing, as if she was trying one last time to get me to stay. As if she truly cared. “Six of your men and women must remain here. The rest I will return to you, to help man the ship that will take you back to Ithaca.”

My head remained lowered, the enormity of her demand sinking onto my shoulders. Would I really sacrifice six lives for my own freedom? For Odette’s?

Gods forgive me, I knew the answer.