Ariadne(69)

The first, terrible year passed and I dared to believe that I was beginning to emerge from the dim mists. I felt hope creep in amidst my misery, bit by bit. Theseus left and a few weeks passed when I thought I might know happiness once more. And then, the morning came when a servant brought me a plate laden with bread, cheese and honey for breakfast and my stomach heaved at the sight. Nausea curdled my hunger and to my horror, before I could do anything to prevent it, a thin stream of vomit splashed upon the floor. I stared at the foul puddle, a terrible knowledge starting to form in my mind.

I was desperate to believe it was a sickness, any kind of illness except that which I knew it truly was. But it continued too long, accompanied by a hideously familiar weariness in my bones. However much I willed it, no blood came with the new moon. It was to my disbelieving horror that I realised I was with child again, and despair threatened to pull me under once more.

The pregnancy passed like a nightmare. I felt trapped beneath the smothering weight of obligation, drudgery and exhaustion. My second son was born. His birth was easier than the first, but again when they handed me the baby, I felt nothing. That pull I had felt towards the sea, when I had embraced Theseus by the city walls, that surge of possibility was a distant memory. Naxos was only beyond a short stretch of ocean but it seemed as far out of my reach as the stars fixed in the night sky.

Ariadne had never come to find me. Never thought to let me know that she lived, after all. Now that she was married to an immortal, did she shrink from her human family? Had she risen above the stink of our curse, the snarling beast that had weighed us all down? Did she soar free of us now?

I wanted to find my sister, but the caterwauling demands of both of my children kept me anchored, rooted to the spot in those first few years. And I had yet to discover the other secrets that Theseus had kept; one secret in particular that would bind me faster still to Athens before I could go to her and see my sister’s face again.





25


Ariadne


Years had passed since I had seen such a ship. Maenads came to join our band of followers on rowing boats or rafts, the oars pulled by strong young women: young maidens seeking refuge from marriage to old and shrivelled men; wives tired of the grinding nature of every day tending to every need but their own; clever and passionate women who scrubbed floors and tended fires and wove cloth and pounded soiled linen on the banks of the rivers whilst men played dice in the squares and talked at length of philosophy, drinking wine in the afternoon sun and arranging the world to suit themselves. These women took to the wide blue sea in their rickety vessels, searching for something better that they had heard they would find with us.

Dionysus was not an exacting leader at all. With a lazy sweep of his hand, he would invite the women to drink of the wine and please themselves. I saw their processions weave into the mountains, their hair loose and streaming behind them as they laughed. The altars to my husband smoked with incense, and the sweet fragrance of the flowers heaped upon them hung over the island in a heavy haze. It pleased me that he did not demand of them great sacrifices. He did not care for the plagues and the barren wombs and the untimely deaths that the other gods visited so carelessly upon their worshippers, interspersed every now and again with a small but precious miracle – a rainfall, one baby amongst a dozen that lived, a field of crops that flourished – so that they would continue to pile up gifts to the vain and undeserving immortals, as though their futile hopes would reach the very top of Mount Olympus itself. Such games were not Dionysus’ way. He allowed his followers to celebrate him as they wished. So long as the wine flowed, he took little interest in his cult.

Should I have wondered what happened on those nights when he led the women through the forest, beyond where my eyes could see? I had trusted him always. I had held my faith that I was enough for him, this god who was not like other gods. Now there crept in a moment of uncertainty as I saw the blood flow from the maenads’ robes into the stream, lines of fatigue newly carved into their fresh faces. Did something take place there of which I had no knowledge? I wavered for a moment, a strange and unfamiliar sense of dizziness threatening to swamp me, as though I found myself unexpectedly at a precipice when I had thought I walked upon a safe and familiar path.

I knew that Dionysus had men follow him, too; satyrs they called themselves. I had heard tell of their drunken parades and lascivious exhibitions, but they did not trouble our quiet island with their raucous celebrations, and I did not think Dionysus to be like them at all. They certainly did not sail mighty ships whose great mast blotted out the sun itself as it drew near to our beach.

I tore myself away from the maenads and their grisly washing and hurried to my rock; the same boulder to which I had clung as I had watched the pirate ship that first brought Dionysus to me. Tauropolis squirmed in my arms as I leaned further over, reckless in my impatience to see more. I soothed him – a fretful infant these past few months since his birth – and I stepped back, momentarily paralysed by indecision.

Dionysus was away on his travels. He left more frequently now, which troubled me a little, but he was never gone for long. He wandered the world to spread the knowledge of his wine and the happy wisdom shared by those who followed him, but his divine feet would propel him swiftly back across the waves to see us and to dandle his beloved children in his arms. He drew his worshippers from among those who sought the simple pleasures of wine and song, making their veins flood with the rich intoxication that such happy companionship could bring. It was they who brought glory to Dionysus.