Monsters of Greek Mythology, Volume One (55 page)

Indeed, for some weeks he did go about muttering passionately to himself about the nymph he had seen diving through the pearly light of dawn. He kept grieving in verse until he met an oak dryad who had no jealous father and who taught him to forget the river nymph. He never forgot the giant turtle, though, and for the rest of his life avoided rivers and streams and bathed only when he was caught in the rain.

The next suitor came to the river at noon. He was no fragile poet but a big, burly young man wearing breastplate and helmet, bearing sword and shield. He beat sword against shield, making a great clamor, and shouted, “Naiad! Naiad! Naiad!”

A spout of mist rose from the water. It thickened into the shape of an enormous fish, but such a one as the suitor had never seen. A horn grew out of its head, a long curved ivory blade, and the suitor realized that he was looking upon the sickle-fish, a creature most rare, of which dreadful tales were told.

Hanging in its column of mist, the fish slithered toward a willow tree that grew on the shore, its boughs dipping gracefully toward the water like a maiden washing her hair. The fish flailed its body; the ivory blade sheared the willow branches as neatly as a scythe. The boughs fell into the water and slowly floated away as the young man stared in amazement.

But he did not run. He never ran before an enemy. Instead, he about-faced and marched off—firmly, but not too slowly. He didn't look back. It was an orderly retreat, and he never returned.

For other, more dangerous-looking suitors—and there were many who courted his daughter—Castelos put on the third and most deadly of his transformations. He would rise from his depths as a whip-snake—a hundred yards of living muscle, encased in sliding leather scales, tougher than bronze, and edged along its entire length by a murderous ridge of spines. In this form Castelos could hover over an entire troop of armed men. He would crack his body like a bullwhip and simply sweep the phalanx away, crushing them like beetles in their armor. If a princely suitor survived the massacre of his royal guard, he would run for his life, vowing to forget river nymphs and marry the rich, ugly princess his mother had chosen for him.

Some powerful princes, however, came even more heavily escorted. They arrived with squadrons of battle-trained spearmen and archers, who stationed themselves on both sides of the river, ready to destroy anything that threatened their leader. For such suitors Castelos would forego his transformations. No giant snapping turtle, no sickle-fish, no whip-snake would appear from the river, but the river itself would rise.

Castelos would crouch in the depths, stirring, making the river swell higher and higher until it overflowed its banks and rolled across the fields in a seething brown flood, sweeping away everything that stood in its path, drowning every living creature that did not flee to high ground. Only when the countryside had been swept bare of anything that might call itself a suitor did Castelos recall the waters.

Thus it was that Castelos kept his daughter from marriage. “I've stopped those rancid old hags in their tracks,” he muttered to himself. “No three monster grandsons shall I have hunting along my shores and fouling my waters with the blood of their kill. Yes, I've thwarted the Fates so far and must continue to do so.”

But for all his self-congratulation, Castelos did not permit himself to get befuddled by success. He kept his wits, kept studying the situation. He knew that boys and girls who wanted to meet each other became more slippery than eels and managed to elude the strictest parental vigil. He remembered how a king of a nearby country had sought to thwart a prophecy that he would be killed by his own grandson. He had imprisoned his only daughter in a door-less, windowless brass tower, and thought he had found a foolproof way to keep suitors out—until, one day, passing the tower, he heard the sound he dreaded most—a baby's cry. He ordered his slaves to break down the walls of the tower and found his daughter seated calmly amid the rubble nursing a day-old child. She informed her father that the babe was sired by a god who pierced the tower as a shaft of light. The boy did indeed grow up to kill his grandfather, accidentally, it was claimed, but sufficiently to fulfill the prophecy.

“So …” muttered Castelos to himself. “It is not enough to drive away suitors, which I'm getting very good at. I must stop her from even thinking about marriage and children. I'll have to find a way to make her put these things out of her mind forever.”

S
everal days passed. The river god was in the great underwater cave that formed his palace. Clad in his royal cloak of crocodile hide, wearing his opal crown, he sat on a rock that made a natural throne. His daughter, Calliroa, knelt at his feet, threading periwinkle shells into tiny necklaces for her family of dolls. Although tall and ripe, she was still childish in many ways, and clung to her toys. Castelos stared at her, trying to think of a way to say what he had to say without making her cry. For of all things in the world, only his daughter's tears could move the huge, brawling river god.

“My dear child,” he said. “You may have wondered why I have been driving away those who would wish to marry you.”

“I know you must have your reasons, father.”

“Ah, you're a dutiful daughter, my pet. And I love you very much.”

“But I must marry sometime, mustn't I father?”

“No, you must not.”

“Really not?”

“Really.”

“Never?”

“Never.”

“Father … I may be about to cry.”

“Please don't.”

“But you're saying sad things. I don't care so much about having a husband, I don't think, but I have to have one to have babies, don't I? And I do want those. I've wanted a baby of my own ever since I stopped being one myself.”

“Let me explain, my darling. And you'll see that I'm doing only what I have to.”

She flowed to her feet, slid into his lap, and began to play with his beard. “All right, tell me,” she whispered. Feeling even more keenly that he couldn't bear to hurt her, Castelos began to tell how he had offended the Hags of Fate and of the heavy curse they had laid upon him.

But he changed things a bit in the telling. He did not say that she, his daughter, was fated to bear three monsters but that the Hags had decreed that she would marry a monster who would do monstrous things to her.

“But father,” she murmured, “he would have to love me to marry me, wouldn't he, so why would he want to do me harm?”

“A monster has a monstrous nature; it likes to hurt other creatures.”

“Even his wife?”

“Maybe even especially his wife,” replied the river god. “Only another monster can survive being married to one.”

“Did those old hags tell you what he'd be like?”

“Not exactly, but I can assure you that all monsters are big and horribly ugly.”

“Maybe not. Maybe it's mostly rumors. I've heard a lot of people say that you're a monster, daddy. But I, who know you best, see how kind and good you really are, even if you do sometimes change into other things and frighten people. So you see …”

“No, I don't see. What's all that have to do with anything? And if I'm so kind and good and you love me so much, why are you in such a hurry to leave me? No, don't cry! Please don't; I can't bear it. I'll tell you what. I'll go steal a baby somewhere. Maybe even a
couple
of brats. I'll bring them back here and you can take care of them. Will that do?”

“Think how sad their mothers will be if you steal them.”

“Oh no, my sweet, dear, innocent child, not everyone's like you. Some of these poor peasants have more little ones than they can afford to feed. They'd be happy if someone took a few of them off their hands. If you like, I won't steal them; I'll buy them, pay more than they're worth. How's that?”

“Thank you, dear father, but I wouldn't know how to take care of their children. What would I do with them down here? I'd have to teach them to breathe underwater, and if I didn't do it right they'd drown.”

“Children can learn anything if they start young enough. And if they drown, I'll get you some more.”

“Oh, you're too good to me, and I do love you,” said Calliroa. “But let me think about it a little.”

“And you won't try to run off and get married in the meantime, will you?”

“I won't. I promise.”

4

The War God

Rumors spread through Thessaly and beyond of the ferocious river god and his beautiful naiad daughter. The news reached Mount Olympus, where the high gods dwelt, and came to the attention of Ares, Lord of Battles.

Now, Ares, like his father, Zeus, was interested in nymphs of every variety—naiad, dryad, Nereid—and when he wasn't making war, he was hunting them through the woodlands and waterways of the world. Nevertheless, his appetite for fighting was even greater. While he very much liked what he heard of the beautiful Calliroa, the idea of fighting her father intrigued him even more.

All the gods are big, but Ares was the biggest. In full armor he looked like a tower of bronze. The blade of his battle-ax was as large as a millstone. The shaft of his spear was an entire ash tree, trimmed. His spear point was longer than any ordinary sword. Eight black horses drew his enormous war chariot. They had been sired by Apollo's fire-maned stallions who drew the sun-chariot across the blue meadow of the sky. They were larger than elephants, and swifter than stags.

Ares happened to be between wars when he first heard of the river god's daughter, and he was eager for adventure. He leaped into his chariot and shouted “Go!” Ares never had to use a whip; his voice was enough. The stallions galloped down the slope of Mount Olympus, the great brass chariot trundling behind them, crushing rocks under its wheels. The horses thundered onto the wide Thessalian plain, then headed east by south toward a bend in the river where Castelos and Calliroa dwelt.

S
ounds change as they pass through water, and the sounds now drifting down to the cave of Castelos were not muted but filtered, made musical. What the naiad heard was unlike anything she had ever heard before: a clanging as of a great gong being struck, again and again, growing louder as she listened. Her father had always warned her to remain in the cave when she heard strangers approaching, but this time she had to see for herself. Swiftly, before he could tell her not to, she slipped out of the cave and slid to the surface. She hid herself among the reeds along the shore and peeked out.

A great, dazzling shape swelled against the tree line. It was as if a piece of the sun itself had fallen and was rolling toward the river. There were horses; she heard bugling, heard someone shouting, but everything was lost in the huge brightness. The clangor grew louder and louder; it was like being inside a bell.

Calliroa squinted, trying to pierce the brightness. She saw a chariot, larger than any she had ever known, drawn by eight gigantic black stallions. They were rearing up at the riverbank, huffing and snorting. She saw a giant dismount and stride to the edge of the water. The sun bounced off his helmet, his breastplate, his greaves. He was a pillar of fire.

Calliroa knew that he had come for her and she was seized by terror. The very sight of him was too much to bear. He seemed to be crushing the life out of her, just standing there on the shore.

But the god didn't call for her; he called for her father. He put his huge, gauntleted hands to his mouth and bellowed. His voice seemed to roll off the hills, filling valley and plain: “River, river, give me your daughter! River, river, I want her now!”

Ares stood on the shore, waiting for the river god to answer his challenge. He was beginning to boil with the joyous rage he always felt before battle. He hoped that Castelos would not choose to yield his daughter peaceably but would fight for her.

Ares was not disappointed.

Out of the river rose Castelos in the first of his transformations: the giant snapping turtle. Like a living discus it spun toward the war god. The enormous creature skidded onto the bank, poked out its leathery head, and advanced. Ares laughed and struck with his spear haft, trying to smash the turtle's shell. To his amazement, it violated all rules of turtle behavior by leaping off the ground, catching the spear haft in its jaws, and snapping it in two.

But the war god's reflexes were incredibly fast; he actually thought with his body. He dropped his spear, shifted his grip, and swung his battle-ax. It struck the turtle and split its shell. He struck again with the flat of the ax. But the turtle scuttled free of its shell, and moving as swiftly as a lizard, slithered into the water, unharmed.

Ares waded in after it, but stopped when he saw a gigantic sickle-fish rising to the surface. The war god was in a battle fever now, moving faster than his size would seem to allow. His bronze-gloved hand shot out, seized the curved horn blade that gave the sickle-fish its name, and whipped the fish up and down, smacking its body against the water. The horn snapped off. Ares took it up and flung it like a javelin, but missed, for the fish had already slid down into the depths.

Ares climbed back onto the riverbank and jeered, “Is that the best you can do, Castelos? Slimy little reptiles and freakish fish? Come on out and fight in your own form!”

But before he could finish his challenge, Ares found himself knee-deep in water. The river had begun to rise. Castelos had gone into his worst rage, which no one had ever survived. He was in flood.

Ares heard his stallions neighing. They were hock-deep in the rising water and could not gallop away because the massive chariot had begun to fill with water, making it too heavy to budge. Ares raised his ax and with one blow slashed the traces, freeing the horses. He leaped onto one of them, and the whole string galloped off toward high land. The river rolled in pursuit, bending trees, tossing huge boulders like pebbles, raging after the fleeing war god.