Secret of the Oracle Read online

  When I surfaced, Thrax was swimming towards a grassy bank with Selene in his arms. I caught up with him and we lifted her up on to the grass.

  ‘Is she all right?’ I said.

  ‘She’s unconscious. I think she’s swallowed a lot of water.’

  He nodded at the twin cliffs looming above us. ‘We’ve landed somewhere outside Delphi. I think this pool must feed the famous Castalian spring. You go and fetch help, Nico. I’ll stay and look after Selene.’

  I started off towards Delphi, struggling to walk in my wet, torn chiton. It was late afternoon, almost sundown, and the city was humming with new pilgrims come to consult the oracle. Yet no one gave me a second look as I waddled up the hill towards Selene’s farm and opened the gate.

  Selene’s mother was feeding the goats as I came down the path. Her eyes grew wide the moment she saw me and the bag of feed slipped out of her hands.

  ‘Selene?’ she cried. ‘Have you found her? Is she alive?’

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Thrax Explains

  Glykon the magistrate reclined on a couch in his andron, picking nuts from a small dish decorated with silhouettes of robins in flight.

  ‘Dear boys,’ he said. ‘Your master told me all about your adventure in Corinth on our trip to Kirrha. Have you been involved in another mystery, here in Delphi?’

  ‘They certainly have, sir,’ replied Master Ariston. ‘It’s astonishing what these two manage to get up to behind my back. Although I have to confess that this time I played a small but crucial part in the drama too...’

  When Selene’s parents had brought her home from the pool under the cliffs, we had rushed back to the country house. We found Master Ariston both worried and angry.

  ‘You have been gone for nearly two days,’ he wailed. ‘I was starting to think you’d run away.’

  We filled him in with all that had happened since Belos set the tree house on fire.

  ‘These are serious crimes you accuse Abantes of,’ he said when we finished. ‘We must go and see Glykon the magistrate at once.’

  So here we were, in Delphi’s finest andron again, seated near the archon himself.

  ‘I am afraid,’ said Master Ariston, accepting a cup of wine from a slave, ‘that the implications of this case are far-reaching, sir...’

  ‘Let the boys tell me themselves,’ said Glykon, sipping his wine as if he were about to enjoy an entertainment at a symposium.

  ‘We have uncovered a crime, sir,’ said Thrax. ‘Possibly two, committed by the same person.’

  The archon’s eyes grew wide with interest and he leaned forward on his couch in anticipation. ‘Tell me all.’

  ‘As you know,’ said Thrax, ‘we are staying in a country house on the outskirts of Delphi while Master Ariston is writing a play.’

  ‘It’s called The Dolphins,’ announced Master Ariston. ‘It’s based in holy Delphi itself. It starts with...’

  The archon glared and raised an eyebrow at the interruption.

  ‘We have our food and wine delivered every morning by a farmer’s family who live nearby,’ continued Thrax. ‘The eldest daughter, Zoe, usually brings the supplies. There is a second girl, Selene, who is considered a bit strange and often gets into trouble with local kids who see her as a target for their pranks.

  ‘One morning our food was not delivered as usual and when Nico and I went to collect it, we found the family very upset. It seemed Selene had run away after a furious argument with her father. The mother begged me to find the girl and bring her back. I couldn’t turn down a grieving mother, so Nico and I agreed to take on the case.

  ‘I soon deduced that Selene had not left of her own free will, as her father suspected. She had been kidnapped. There were some savings and a precious amulet hidden in Selene’s room, which she would have taken with her if she’d run away.

  ‘So now Nico and I were faced with three important questions. Who had kidnapped Selene? Why? And where was she being held?’

  ‘And I should think there was a fourth question,’ said the archon. ‘Could you bring Selene back home?’

  ‘Of that I had no doubt, sir,’ replied Thrax. ‘I was determined to bring her back. I myself come from a family that was torn apart and I understand the pain such separation causes.’

  ‘But you had no guarantee that you could,’ argued the archon. ‘The girl could have been kidnapped by mountain bandits and dragged off into slavery.’

  ‘I had a hunch that she was still on the mountain, sir,’ said Thrax. ‘And that was confirmed when some goatherds told us bandits haven’t been able to use the mountain pass on Mount Parnassus for months. It has been blocked by a rockfall.’

  ‘We do have occasional earth tremors in Delphi,’ said the magistrate. ‘I remember one last winter, in fact. Perhaps that caused the rockfall.’

  ‘I had a strong feeling that the kidnapper was from Delphi,’ continued Thrax. ‘Nico and I made enquiries at the agora and we found out that Selene is a seer. She uses knucklebones to tell people’s futures. Her mentor is a woman who has a similar gift, except she uses pebbles for her fortune telling. She works up in the Corcyian cave. People call her Mother Kessandra.

  ‘We visited Mother Kessandra and learned that Selene had consulted her about a recurring nightmare she’d been having. A bad dream in which she is chased along a dark river by a man on a turtle.’

  ‘Surely you did not base your investigations on a dream?’ gasped Glykon.

  ‘Some people believe that dreams are messages from the gods,’ said Thrax. ‘I think the messages come not from the gods but from somewhere deep inside our minds, to help us deal with things we are scared of. I believed Selene had actually met this man in real life and the hidden part of her mind was warning her that he was very dangerous.’

  ‘But a man on a turtle is such a fanciful thing,’ said the magistrate.

  ‘As it turned out, Nico and I did meet a man on a turtle just outside Kirrha,’ said Thrax. ‘His name is Milo and he was on his way to Delphi with his father, who wanted to consult the oracle.

  ‘There were things about Milo that made me suspicious at once. He had bruises on his face that had clearly been inflicted by some other man. And what man of his upbringing gets into fistfights? I became even more suspicious when he was introduced to Abantes, the priest at your symposium. The two pretended not to know each other. But I had seen Abantes and Milo together at the agora the day before. Abantes had his face hidden in a hood but there was no mistaking his limp, which later I learned was the result of a battle wound.

  ‘That made Nico and I think that Milo might be the kidnapper. But that was not the case. Milo is involved in the mystery but he didn’t kidnap Selene.

  ‘And then I remembered that I had seen the man on the turtle in Delphi itself. Not a real person but a golden one. On a fibula, hidden under a boy’s himation. This boy is called Belos. He’s the baker’s apprentice and he’s a thug. He’s made it one of his life’s missions to bully Selene. I got into a scrap with him on our first night in Delphi and that’s when I saw the fibula.

  ‘During your symposium, Abantes mentioned that he’d bought a new fibula for his chlamys because he’d lost his old one, a pin his father had made using a symbol of Aegina, the island of turtles, but Abantes hadn’t lost the pin. He’d given it to his son. Belos.’

  The archon sat up, spilling wine on his couch. ‘Abantes has a son?’

  ‘He had to keep him a secret,’ said Thrax, ‘because when Belos was born in Delphi, Abantes’s wife in Aegina was still alive. As you know, it is a crime to be unfaithful to your wife. The moment I realised there was a connection between Abantes and Belos, and that Milo was not the kidnapper, everything fell into place. I realised who had actually kidnapped Selene and why.’

  ‘My dear boy, you have me in a spin,’ said the archon, taking more wine and signalling a slave to hand out nuts to the rest of us. ‘How can Milo be a victim and also be involved in committing a crime?’

  Thrax con
tinued. ‘Milo’s father is a merchant from New Sybaris called Gorgias. He came to Delphi seeking advice from the oracle about a precious ring he’d lost. This was no ordinary ring. It was a priceless piece of jewellery decorated with harpies. Gorgias’s dying brother had made him promise that he’d give it to his long-lost daughter. The gods would put the curse of the harpies on Gorgias if he failed to give his niece the ring.

  ‘Gorgias had lost the ring and he’d come to ask the oracle where he might find it. Two days ago, Nico and I trailed Milo to a disused farm outside Kirrha where he had a secret meeting. The men he met were part of a gang. He owed them money. That’s when I realised Gorgias hadn’t lost the ring. His son Milo had stolen it to pay off some of his gambling debts. He was desperate to stop his father from finding out about it. So he had come to Delphi to make sure the oracle did not reveal his guilty secret.’

  The magistrate’s put down his cup down. ‘How could he do that?’

  ‘It is my understanding,’ said Thrax, ‘that when the Pythia is possessed by the god, she speaks in his mysterious language. She herself does not understand it. Only trained priests like Abantes know what the words mean and they write them down on a tablet, which they give to the pilgrim. I believe Milo came to Delphi to bribe the Pythia’s priest to lie about the ring, to write down something other than the truth. It was a desperate plan made by a desperate person but he got lucky. Abantes accepted the bribe.’

  ‘My boy,’ gasped the magistrate, ‘are you aware of what you are saying? Accepting bribes to twist the Pythia’s message is a serious crime. If word got out that the oracle is corrupt, that it is not the absolute word of Apollo, it would ruin Delphi, and perhaps oracles all over the Hellenic world.’

  ‘The crime didn’t happen,’ said Thrax. ‘Because something went wrong with the plan. On the day Gorgias was expecting to consult the Pythia, an important general from Sparta arrived and Gorgias lost his place in the queue. Milo and Abantes were not expecting this. They were forced to postpone their plan for another month.

  ‘And then another complication arose. While Milo and Abantes were talking about their plan, someone overheard them. Selene. Abantes had no choice but to get rid of her before she told anyone what she’d heard.’

  The archon rose to his feet. ‘These are very serious accusations, young man. But there is only one way to find out the truth. We must speak to Selene herself.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

  Messages from the Knucklebones

  We all hurried to Selene’s house right away. She was sitting up in Zoe’s bed, her mum insisting she eat some hot stew.

  She confirmed that Thrax was right. After her visit to Mother Kessandra in the winter, she had spotted Abantes during one of her secret trips to the agora. She had noticed his turtle fibula and wondered if he was the man in her nightmare. From then on she started shadowing him at every opportunity, hoping to discover more about him. Two days before Gorgias tried to consult the oracle, she had eavesdropped on Abantes and Milo discussing their dastardly plan in the agora. She thought no one would notice her hiding place in a nearby doorway. But she was wrong. Abantes had spotted her. And he had persuaded Belos to help him kidnap her. Belos had told her as much when she was chained to the wall in the king’s treasure chamber.

  The magistrate listened closely to Selene’s story. When she finished, he got to his feet and sent a city guard to arrest Belos and Abantes. ‘My dear young woman,’ he said, ‘Delphi owes you a big apology. But it is very important that news of this debacle stays within these four walls. I have been told that you are a seer yourself. Delphi has had old Pythias for many years now. Perhaps we should go back to the ancient times and have a young priestess to speak the words of Apollo. How would you like to be the oracle’s new Pythia?’

  Selene accepted at once and her mother also took the opportunity to try and pay Thrax, which he refused.

  ‘I agree with the young man,’ said the archon. ‘Keep your hard-earned money, woman. The city of Delphi will reward these two young men for their bravery... and their loyal silence.’

  * * *

  Selene spent the next two days preparing for her new life as the Pythia. Zoe came to see us on the sixth day of the month. She brought an invitation from Selene. Would Thrax and I like to watch her first communication with the god?

  The ceremony to consult the oracle was long and full of ritual. The Pythia, attended by the priests of the oracle, purified herself in the Castalian spring, then lead a small crowd of attendants and temple officials along the Sacred Way to the sanctuary.

  Here, at an altar, a young goat was sprinkled with salt and sacred water. It trembled, a sign that the god was present. The animal was sacrificed, the smoke from the altar a sign that the oracle would speak.

  Then Selene entered the temple, where a light burned at a smaller altar dedicated to Hestia. Here the pilgrims, including Thrax and myself, offered a honey cake, a token of our gratitude to the oracle. Selene retreated to a restricted chamber at the back of the temple, the adyton, where only priests and priestesses are allowed. She removed her veil. In the light of Hestia’s fire, she did not look like a child any more, but a messenger of the gods, full of their power. People say that the Pythia is the most powerful woman in the Hellenic world. Looking at Selene now, I knew she was also going to be one of the most respected.

  Selene took her place on a three-legged stool and gazed into a dish full of water from the sacred spring. Close to her was the round stone known as the omphalos. It was guarded by two enormous statues of eagles, both covered in gold.

  The temple filled with smoke, almost hiding Selene and her attendants from view. It became difficult to breathe, and my eyes stung. Selene started rocking back and forth on her stool. A long, keening sound came out of her mouth.

  A priest brought in the first pilgrim. Gorgias.

  ‘Do you seek the wisdom of sacred Apollo?’ asked the priest.

  ‘I do.’

  ‘Then ask your question.’

  ‘I seek a precious ring that was lost. Where should I look for it?’

  Selene closed her eyes. Her moaning turned to wailing and she writhed like the wounded Python, the dragon whose name she had inherited.

  Suddenly she opened her eyes wide and I was shocked to see they had turned purple. She spat out a string of wild, scary-sounding words. Then she slumped forward and two attendants rushed to save her from crashing to the ground.

  The priest, a replacement for Abantes, wrote down her message on a wax tablet, which he handed to Gorgias. The merchant did not look at it but held it close to his chest. He bowed to the Pythia and left the temple. We left with him.

  * * *

  Selene’s father invited us to a meal at his farm that night, to celebrate Selene becoming the Pythia, and to thank us for rescuing her. We ate in the kitchen but afterwards Selene asked us to join her in the shed. She wasn’t sleeping in it any more. As the Pythia, she now lived in a grand house in the centre of Delphi. But – she explained – she would keep coming here when she wanted to be on her own, away from the pressures of her new position.

  ‘I will now read the knucklebones for you,’ she said, as we all squeezed into the small room. She pulled a small bag from her chiton. ‘It will be my payment to you for saving my life.’ She opened the bag and let the knucklebones cascade on to the floor. ‘You throw first, Nico.’

  I gathered the knucklebones and scattered them again. Selene looked over them carefully, moving a finger from one bone to the other.

  ‘You have a bright future ahead of you, Nico. People will enjoy your stories. They will bring you fame and fortune. But do not be disheartened if at first you do not find favour with the public. Your gift will be recognised in due course.’

  She scooped up the knucklebones and dropped them in Thrax’s hands. ‘Now it’s your turn.’

  Thrax blew on them as if he were throwing dice at a game and let them fall to the floor. ‘May luck be with me.’

  Selene brough
t a lamp closer. ‘You seek someone you lost a long time ago,’ she said. ‘Someone you still love very much. She is out there, waiting for you, for her heart tells her that you are still alive. But your quest will bring great and terrible danger, both for you and the woman you seek. May Apollo and Gaia, the ancient earth goddess, protect you both...’

  CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

  A New Adventure

  The day after the oracle had spoken, Zoe helped Thrax and I clean the country house. Once it was spotless, we packed our belongings. Master Ariston had received great news and was eager to leave Delphi. He had been invited to stage his first play – at Corinth.

  ‘It’s not even finished yet,’ he crowed, holding tight his small statue of Apollo, ‘and I am already a great success. The oracle was right.’

  Thrax and I were overjoyed to be going to Corinth too. We would meet up with the other members of our secret society, Fotini and Gaia. We had a lot to tell them about our adventure in Delphi, and perhaps we would solve another mystery with them there.

  After supper, we went to say goodbye to Selene and her family. Selene’s mother gave us some sausages for the journey. ‘But make sure you have some yourselves,’ she said. ‘Don’t let your master eat them all.’

  Zoe, who’d been delivering honey cakes around Delphi, had lots of news. The city guards had found Belos hiding in the cellar under the bakery. He’d been thrown in prison.

  No one knew where Abantes was. Some said he’d been spotted in the harbour, bribing a sea captain to take him back to Aegina. Others insisted that goatherds had seen him on a mountain pass, a heavy sack on his back.

  ‘Can we speak to you alone?’ Thrax asked Selene.

  Selene showed us to her shed, where we all squeezed inside again.