God of War

FIVE

AS KRATOS TURNED the key he had struggled for so long to get, the mystical seal evaporated-and a soul-piercing scream came from the captain’s cabin. He kicked open the door, expecting to find what commanded such potent protections. In this, he was not disappointed. Kratos found treasure beyond turquoise and gold.

The three girls were as lovely as any he had ever seen. Or perhaps they simply looked lovely by comparison to the blackened, rotting faces of the undead that ripped at them with taloned hands.

Kratos froze for an instant, paralyzed by incomprehension. How had the undead gotten in here? Through the locked door? The only answer that made sense was his own culpability. By opening the door he had released more than the locking spell. He had also released the undead magically sealed in this room to protect against intruders. The captain must have known how to prevent their release. Kratos had blundered in and put the women in jeopardy.

In an instant, his confusion whirled away like leaves before a gale. Such imponderables were the stuff of idle hours. Right now he was still in a fight, as two of the rotting legionnaires rushed him, swinging wickedly hooked swords. Kratos reached back over his shoulder, and the same motion that drew the Blades of Chaos also bisected each undead from crown to crotch. He moved into the room and with his next swing severed the legs of an undead strangling one of the slave girls. The creature fell, dragging the girl with it to the floor, and went on strangling her as though Kratos had not mutilated its legs.

Kratos hacked off its arms and crushed its skull-but the severed hands only tightened, throttling the life from the woman. Snarling, he bent to rip away the clenched talons, but the girl’s head tilted at a crazy angle. Her neck had been snapped like a twig.

Another undead held a struggling woman in the air between itself and Kratos, making her a human shield.

“Steel works better,” Kratos sneered as he jammed a blade straight through her torso, encountering only the slight resistance of internal organs, and then the tip crunched hard into the undead holding her. He twisted the blade and they both fell limp.

“Don’t let it kill me. I beg you, don’t-” The third woman died as the undead drove a bony hand against her chest, crushing her throbbing heart within her breast. Her pleas trailed to wet, gurgling gasps as she collapsed. Two quick steps brought Kratos within striking distance. Delivering a single accurate cut, he dispatched the undead with the beating heart still clutched in its hand. The undead fell and lay sprawled, the heart pulsating, slowing to a shiver, then finally stopping, as dead as the girl from which it had been ripped.

Kratos stepped back. The carnage seemed to reel around him. He reached out to brace himself against the bulkhead, and still he nearly fell. “Stop,” he growled fiercely at himself; he had no more tolerance of his own weaknesses than he had of others. “These are not… are not

…”

The women’s deaths were no worse than he had seen thousands of times-no worse than he had done with his own hand, without the thinnest sliver of regret.

But the cabin faded as darkness settled around him and the visions began.

Blades slashing through necks, driving into exposed bellies. Screams of pain and the ghastly rattle of death. Heads exploding in a spray of blood. And the old woman waving her crooked hand, cackling like a damned thing.

“No,” Kratos cried. “No!”

Limbs severed. Fields of corpses, crows pecking at eyes staring sightlessly at a leaden sky, maggots eating dead flesh. The blood pooling around bodies on the temple floor-blood pooling around bodies-blood…

And still the demented laughter and the wave of the crooked hand…

“No!” With an effort of will that left him gasping, Kratos wrenched open his eyes. He was not in the temple; he did not face the shrill cackle of the village oracle! He was here, at the far end of ten years, standing in the captain’s quarters of a slave ship, and the slaughtered girls on the floor were not… were not “Athena!” Kratos spun about in a full circle, then fled from the cabin. “Athena!” He dashed to the hatchway leading to the deck. As he burst out onto the gore-soaked planking, he saw again the wooden statue of Athena that had graced his now-sunken ship. The statue stood at the prow of his new ship as she had on the old, impassive wooden eyes judging his every crime.

“Ten years, Athena! I have faithfully served the gods for ten years! When will you banish my nightmares? When? The visions haunt even my waking life!”

With a soft silvery shimmer like water in moonlight, the statue flickered to life. Those impassive wooden eyes now gleamed with the level gray stare of the goddess.

“We require one final task of you, Kratos. Your greatest challenge awaits-in Athens, where even now my brother Ares lays siege.”

Kratos stiffened as new visions assaulted his senses. He smelled fresh blood and raw meat, saw fire and destruction and fields piled with dead. He heard death cries, and he tasted the ash of burning corpses. Kratos forced his eyes shut, but he could not escape the vision. He shared every death with every murdered Athenian. He felt their shades- his shade-ripped screaming from his body, not by the clean stroke of sword or spear but by the gore-crusted talons of Ares’s monstrous minions.

“Athens is on the brink of destruction,” said the goddess through her statue. “ It is the will of Ares that my great city should fall.”

Kratos could only try to endure as ever darker, more gruesome visions assailed him.

“Zeus has forbidden the gods to wage war on one another.”

Kratos felt himself charred with imaginary flame, flesh boiled from his bones-what remained of him twisted into the air, riding a violent whirlwind until he witnessed the death of Athens as it might be seen by a soaring eagle. Then the vision released him, and he fell with shattering force back into his own body on the deck of the slave ship.

“That is why it must be you, Kratos. Only a mortal trained by a god has a chance of defeating Ares.”

“And if I am able to do this,” Kratos said, once more standing firmly upright, as a man should, “if I can kill the god, then the visions… they will end?”

“Complete this final task and the past that consumes you will be forgiven. Have faith, Kratos. The gods do not forget those who come to their aid.”

The statue’s eyes closed, and the shimmer of godhead faded.

Kratos stood motionless for a very long time, feeling a desperately unfamiliar sensation. He marveled at it, this feeling. He couldn’t recall the last time he had felt anything like it.

He wondered if it might be hope.

– -

LATER, KRATOS PACED the length of the deck, taking note of damage and how repairs should proceed. He had a cage filled with slaves in the hold. They would crew for him in exchange for their freedom. Since Athena had entrusted him with the quest to save Athens from Ares’s army of Hades spawned soldiers, he would have no further need of a ship once he arrived at the Harbor of Zea at Piraeus.

The locked captain’s cabin where the three women had been killed hinted at how the former captain of this vessel had whiled away his hours, but Kratos would never again enter that compartment. Even if he had the slaves drag out the bodies and clean it from stem to stern, he would never step into that room again.

He dared not risk more visions.

But there was another room, also magically barred, lacking even a keyhole. The captain had kept concubines in his own cabin; what treasure would he have found precious enough to lock away even from himself? Kratos had little patience for idle speculation. The best way to discover the room’s contents was to break the door and enter.

Edging past the door to the captain’s cabin-he would not allow himself to so much as look at it-he stopped before the magical portal and began to examine it for any obvious way to open it. After all, if the room beyond held anything of real value, he might wish to be able to lock it away too. Finding no handle, lever, or keyhole, he tried simply to shove the door open. Corded muscle bunched in his massive shoulders, but he could not make the door so much as rattle. With a snarl he lost what little patience he’d had. He drew the Blades of Chaos and hacked at the door. Golden force flared, and the blades did not even touch the wood.

Fury rose within him, and outward from his bones surged the Rage of Poseidon. Power made him feel invincible, and the lightning of his fury burned the golden force away-and the door opened at a simple push.

Kratos stared in amazement.

In the middle of the room stood a half-naked woman whose beauty transcended anything in Kratos’s experience. She had her hands on cocked hips and had hair of flaming red more radiant than the sunrise, but this was not what Kratos noted. She was naked to the waist, a skirt swirling about the rest of her trim body. Her bare breasts were firm and high, capped by pink nubs that pointed at him in wanton invitation.

“Were you a slave on this ship?”

“Is the captain dead? I hope so,” the young woman said, leaning toward him with a beckoning finger. “I like your looks better.”

Kratos heard ominous creaking in the hull and looked around to be certain the vessel was not breaking apart. When he turned back, he blinked in surprise. The woman still stood in front of him, hands on her hips, hair wild and red and lustrous. But she was no longer naked to the waist. Rather, she wore a tunic-and had no skirt. She was naked from the waist down, when only an instant before…

“Is that why you were imprisoned with a magical lock? You’re a witch?”

“That’s not a nice thing to say. We aren’t witches!”

“We?” Kratos blinked. There were two women, identical in beauty, but one was naked above the waist and the other below. “What are you?”

“Twins,” they answered as one.

“The captain was a cruel master. He gave us only one set of clothes,” said the twin with the tunic.

The twin with the skirt showed a bit of a pout. “We shared the best we could. Do we not please you?”

“No, I-”

“No?” they cried in unison. “Then we’ll take off these offending rags!”

And they did.

Kratos was willing to admit that this improved the view. “I begin to understand why the captain kept you locked away. Identical down to the last mole and freckle.”

“Not so,” said the one on the left. “Lora’s mole is on the inside of her left thigh. See?”

Kratos did.

“Zora and I are completely different,” said the other.

“Do you do everything together?”

The twins exchanged a look, then moved forward with a single mind. Their answer became obvious as they stripped him of his clothing and led him to a wide, soft bed. The only complaint Kratos had was clumsily knocking over a wine bottle in the midst of their doubled passion.

Afterward, he awoke with a woman on his left and another on the right-he had lost track of which was Lora and which was Zora, but he knew better than to check their defining marks. That would only spark demands for more lovemaking, and he had a crew abovedecks to command. Athena’s demand must be met, and soon, from the vision of her city being laid to waste. “I want more wine,” he said, reaching over one redhead to get his hand around the bottle on the deck.

“We are your willing slaves, Captain Kratos,” one of them said.

The other added, “So long as you can keep us satisfied.”

“The captain had concubines in this cabin-” Kratos began. “Oh, yes, he kept girls of his own,” a twin said, a little sadly. “He never touched us.”

“Never?”

The other sighed. “He wasn’t man enough. After two or three of the crew died, he locked us away.”

“They… died?” Kratos couldn’t quite make sense of this. “So the captain locked you up? They died doing… what?”

“Us,” one said brightly.

The other contributed a perky nod. “He wanted to keep his crew safe. From us. We have been very lonely.”

Kratos said slowly, “I see.”

“And we’re so happy to have met you… and that you didn’t die. Really.”

“Likewise,” Kratos said. He reflected that this trip to Athens might be more interesting than he had anticipated.

The twin on his left stroked the bulge of muscle at his shoulder. “Are you a-”

“-king, Master Kratos?” finished the twin on his right side.

“I am only a soldier,” he said.

“A great soldier,” said one.

“A champion,” agreed the other.

“I have been given a quest by the gods.”

“That sounds-”

“-dangerous,” the twins said.

“We sail for Athens. There I will set you free.”

“We don’t want to be free. We want to be your slaves.”

“Forever,” said the other. “Or at least until you die. You’re very strong, master.”

“And so large.”

Kratos found himself without anything to say.

“We never wanted to go to-”

“-Attica. It’s a terrible, cold place, or so-”

“-we’ve heard.”

Kratos cursed the gods in his heart. If only he could be like other men and lose himself entirely in pleasures of the flesh. But even Lora and Zora could never drive away the nightmares and hold his madness at bay.

All he now lived for was Athena’s pledge to erase his visions and to quell the ghastly memories that plagued his every living hour. Removing the visions of death and horror, guilt and abject pain, was a reward far beyond anything Lora and Zora could offer, no matter how skillful they might be.

“This vessel must get free of the Grave of Ships,” he said, swinging his legs around and getting out of bed. The wine under his feet had turned as sticky as blood. He started to wipe it off, but the twins scampered lithely from the bed.

“Allow us to do that, Master Kratos.” They cleaned his feet lovingly, but he had no time for this. Ares’s Hydra was dead, but what other abominations might the God of War send to destroy him? Kratos did not want to find out, not trapped among the hulks of so many dead and discarded vessels.

“You can come on deck,” Kratos told the twins, “but dress completely.”

“There is nothing for us to wear in this cabin,” they said in unison.

“Find something,” he said curtly. He hesitated to have them search the captain’s cabin. The three women left there must have had clothing aplenty, but stripping it from their corpses was not something he anticipated would be greeted well by the twins.

“We will be there soon,” they said.

Kratos made for the deck. He was far from Athens, and once he arrived, he had a god to slay. Simply getting this slave ship free from the other hulks would be a daunting task.

On deck, the brisk wind and hint of rain warned of an impending storm. Trapped among the other ships as they were, the storm would toss them about and crack the hull like a walnut shell. He went below, to the slave hold, and peered at the miserable wretches. They whined and begged until he would just as soon have opened the scuttle cocks and let them swim away. Perhaps freedom would remind them what it was to be a man.

“I will free you. And you will work,” he said. “Work harder than you ever have. We sail for Athens.”

“Free us!”

“I have no need of slaves. I need a crew. Have any of you worked rigging before?” He saw a hand tentatively raised. “You are my first officer. The rest of you will listen and learn from him. His word is as mine. Go against either of us and I will feed your entrails to the sharks. Obey and you will be free once we reach Piraeus.”

There was some muttering among the caged slaves, but the one he had designated as his first officer rose to the challenge and spoke for the rest. “We will be free?”

“On my life, you will,” Kratos promised.

“Then let us out. The way this ship is wallowing about, a storm is rising.”

“What’s your name, First Officer?”

“Coeus.”

“Get them on deck and at their stations, Coeus. You were right about a storm brewing.”

With cuffs and kicks to the hind side, Kratos helped along the slaves who were strangely reluctant to leave their cage. When the last had made his way to the deck, the wind whipped along fiercely and sent tiny bullets of raindrops hammering into them.

“To the rigging. Get the sails lowered. There’s no other way out of this damnable watery graveyard,” Kratos bellowed. “We must run ahead of the storm or we are lost.”

He saw that Coeus knew the rudiments of unfurling the sails and lashing them securely for running, but trying to teach each of the crew aloft was impossible in the wind. One screamed and tumbled from the cross spar. Kratos watched the man vanish beneath the waves. He never surfaced.

Kratos felt the ship lurch, as a horse reluctant to race might give a false start. Coeus did what he could. Kratos had to find a steersman to tend the flopping rudder. He grabbed a slave by the arm and dragged him along up to the poop deck and the tiller.

“Take this. Move it left or right as I command.” The slave did as he was told, clinging to the beam as if his life depended on it. Which it did.

Once the man wrapped his arms around the tiller and began experimenting with the yield and resistance, Kratos went forward again. He stopped beside Athena’s statue. It remained dead, inert, unmoving, and unseeing.

“We are on our way,” he said softly into the teeth of the wind. Then he strained to lift the sea anchor that fixed them in place. His back ached with the strain, and veins stood out like cords of rope on his arms as he drew the heavy anchor up bit by bit. Once the huge iron hook had cleared the sea, the ship surged, free and floating.

“To the left, hard to the left!” His bellowed command was swallowed by the rising wind, but the novice steersman saw him gesturing and leaned into the tiller. Experiencing more resistance than he’d expected, the steersman redoubled his effort. And again.

Kratos let out a howl when the ship hove to and filled its sails with the heavy wind. Timbers creaked and the ship’s keel reverberated as it struck underwater debris. Once, a huge wave rose before Kratos and broke over his head. He lost his balance and was washed along the deck until a strong hand grabbed him. He looked up to see Coeus grinning like a fool.

“Watch yer step, Cap’n,” the first mate said. Then he shouted to those in the rigging above to lash down the sails more firmly.

Kratos got to his feet, thanking Athena for sending him one tried-and-true seaman to assist him. A huge gust of wind seemed to lift the ship from the water and sent it skimming the surface at the speed of thought. The prow touched every lifting wave and skipped forward, hardly descending into the deep troughs of the waves.

“Ware the sails,” Kratos yelled. His words were gobbled by the hungry wind. The corners of the canvas sails began to shred from the constant whipping. “Lash them down!”

“We need more men aloft,” Coeus shouted almost in his ear. “We’re lost if we don’t furl the sails. The wind’s too high.”

“Leave the sails as they be,” Kratos shouted back. The ship crashed into one piece of wreckage after another in the Grave of Ships.

“The mast will break. The storm will destroy us!”

“Full sail and ahead,” Kratos ordered. Coeus began to argue, but Kratos cut him off. The steersman valiantly clung to the tiller, but it kicked back too strongly for one man to restrain. Kratos pushed past Coeus and rushed to aid the steersman. As he crossed the quarterdeck, he grabbed a slave and dragged him along.

“No, don’t, let me be. We’re going to die. We cannot survive the storm. Poseidon will see us all in his watery graveyard!”

“Help the steersman keep the rudder straight ahead.”

“We’re going to die!” The slave fell to his knees. “By the gods, save us. I beseech you, gods of Olympus. Save us!”

“Help or get out of the way!” Kratos batted the man aside. The slave’s arms rose above his head, then the gusty wind captured his body and, like a gull, he became airborne. Kratos took no notice. The man had had his chance.

“You going to heave me overboard, Cap’n? Don’t think I got the strength left to fight the tiller.” The steersman sagged under the strain of holding the ship on a steady course in the fierce gale.

“Only if you fail.”

The tiller bucked like a thing alive, lifting the man off his feet. He clung fiercely to it, struggling for purchase. Kratos lent his strength to the task. The pair of them forced the rudder straight. Timbers creaked, and for a time Kratos thought the ship would tear itself apart.

When Zeus began sending his bolts dancing across the sky, Kratos saw gauzy lights of many colors sizzling on the spars, working up and down the mast and across the canvas, and he knew he had been given a reprieve. Athena protected him and the ship against the worst of the weather. The small globes of burning fire that did not sear were her message to him.

After what seemed to stretch to an eternity, the ship cleared the last of the hulks in the Grave of Ships and skated across open sea.

The wind remained steady, but the rain died away. Arms aching, back feeling as if it had been broken, Kratos sank to the deck.

“The sun, Captain Kratos, the sun’s shining!”

“Praise Apollo,” Kratos said. “Praise Athena.” He felt that at least three of the gods dwelling on Mount Olympus favored him now. Poseidon had thanked him and given him special powers-and had not claimed the ship and crew for his own watery realm. For the first time since boarding this ship, Kratos knew that he would once more step onto solid land. When he did so next, it would be in service to the goddess Athena.

“Steady course,” Kratos ordered.

“Even if I have to lash myself to the rudder, a straight course it’ll be, Capt’n,” the steersman declared. “I have a yearning for the countryside once more. The sooner we put into harbor, the sooner I can roll in the tall grass.”

Kratos left the man and once more descended to Lora and Zora’s cabin. He went into the cabin and closed the door behind him.

“Master,” they both cried.

He was tired to the point of exhaustion, but he could only gape at the pair.

“You disobeyed me,” he said. “You did not find suitable clothing.” Both wore only tunics and no skirts or pants.

“We must make amends then, master,” they said. “Will you punish us? Please?”

Though he did not find much rest in the bed he shared with the twins, the journey to the Harbor of Zea proved pleasant; their tender ministrations helped keep his nightmares at bay. But a full day before the great city topped the horizon, a vast column of black and swirling smoke warned him of the danger ahead.

Athens was in flames.