The Glitter of Stone

The Glitter of Stone

A tale of the prehistoric Aegean

Thomas Boyd

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, events, incidents and public or private entities either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Smashwords edition. Copyright © 2014 by Thomas Boyd

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or distributed in any printed or electronic form without the author’s written permission.

Cover design based on an original photograph by Patrizio Martorana. Used by permission.

Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

To Elizabeth and Cecelia, with love and gratitude

It seems that the land we now call Greece was not securely settled in antiquity. Instead, people were migratory and readily abandoned their settlements when forced to do so in the face of greater numbers.

—Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War

Prologue

Stone Age relics found in southern Greece

Amalgamated News Syndicate

Amanda Thayer, ANS Science Correspondent – Wed Aug 9

HALIA, GREECE – With a well-used dental pick, graduate student Leigh Osborne delicately scrapes bits of hardened earth from an unexpected discovery.

Like other artifacts uncovered during these archaeological excavations, the small fragment of obsidian—volcanic glass, actually—provides a clue to the prehistoric culture that left it behind.

It’s an amazing opportunity to look back in time, Osborne says during a break from her painstaking work.

By now, the joint Greek-American team is in its final week of exploratory work at the site of ancient Halia, located near a popular vacation destination on the Aegean coast.

Professionals, assisted by student volunteers, have sifted through centuries of human occupation, recovering not only stone tools but also pottery fragments, figurines and even tiny bits of carbonized grain.

An obsidian blade of this particular type is good evidence that Halia was occupied in the Neolithic period, says Stavros Arvanitis, the dig's Greek director. It's exciting. Until now, we had no idea humans inhabited the site that early.

Chapter 1

The island of Keht‘ena, 4460 BC

A cold, salt-tinged wind blew in from the sea and tore at the frayed edges of the hunter’s deerskin cloak. Unlike hunger, the biting chill was temporary and so he paid it little mind. A glance at the early morning sky gave him a small measure of cheer, for he could see it was one of those days when the sun god would part the clouds and begin warming the land. Spring had returned to Keht‘ena, his island, to banish the cold and damp of winter, and for that he was grateful to Mother. But with hunger nagging his belly again today, he had little other cause to offer thanks.

He was a tough and uncomplaining individual, a product of the hard life to be had on this thin-soiled island. Approaching his middle years, he reckoned his age as the fingers and thumbs of both hands, three times over. His wide-set eyes sat deep in his angular face, and in keeping with the custom of his tribe he wore his dark hair in a series of thick braids. Normally he would be clean shaven, but it had been many days since he’d last scraped his face with greased bladestone.

There had been a time when each year’s cycle of renewal nurtured the natural reservoir of optimism in men like him. For generations, Keht‘ena’s inhabitants had subsisted well enough on their small herds of goats, their terraced fields of barley and the fish that abounded in the sea around them. Then, just as winter showed signs of relenting, the world of the Island Sea had been torn apart. Now hunger’s unforgiving imperative drove him in a relentless quest to keep his mate and his son fed.

Ahead of him on the rocky hillside a large thicket shuddered with each gust of wind. As likely a place as any to set his first snare of the morning, he decided. A single hare would go a long way toward sustaining his family for another day, and his mate would welcome the pelt as something to help ease her shivering in the damp of night.

He heard a voice calling over the wind. Lan‘ta! There’ll be nothing for our snares up here. It was Hak‘un, an older, one-eyed man who trailed the hunter a short distance below him on the slope. Did you hear me? he added when he got no immediate reply.

I heard, Lan‘ta said over his shoulder, but that thicket looks promising.

It’s a waste of effort, Hak‘un said, and I don’t like it up here. It’s too dangerous. Too exposed. He scanned the rough landscape with an exaggerated turn of his head to compensate for his missing eye. Stay up here if you like, but I’m going back to lower ground. Without another word he turned and headed down the hillside toward the sea.

Lan‘ta watched him go. After a moment he considered calling out to remind the old man of the long line of cliffs below them, for it would be all too easy to misjudge the sudden drop-off. Then, realizing he probably wouldn’t be heard over the wind, he turned back to his task.

He and Hak‘un had been little more than acquaintances until the terrible events of the recent past had thrown them together. Perhaps it was the man’s age, or perhaps it came from having just one eye, but whatever the cause he found Hak‘un to be disagreeable by nature. The advice about hunting so high up on the hillside might have been well-intended, but Lan‘ta shrugged it off. Given a choice, he would just as soon hunt on his own.

He took his time approaching the thicket, treading softly, intent on circling it. The sight of scattered pellets of fresh dung greeted him on the far side. So Hak‘un was wrong—there were hares up here, just as he’d hoped from the outset. He glanced down the hillside and saw the one-eyed man disappear behind a line of scrub juniper, then dismissed any further thoughts of him. Right now he had more pressing things to worry about.

For his first snare he chose a mature thorn bush at the edge of the thicket. He pulled up a handful of fresh weeds and rubbed them between his palms and fingers to disguise his scent, then settled on his heels. Next, a spring-arm. He grasped a stout branch and watched it closely while bending it toward the ground. Good, he thought, feeling how it resisted and seeing that it wouldn’t crack or break under the strain. He released it slowly, then reached for the rough cordage he carried for fashioning snares.

The bolt of searing pain that exploded on his left shoulder at that same instant sent him sprawling. He struggled to shake off the sudden confusion, his heart thudding and the taste of fear filling his mouth. Instinct took over and screamed at him to fight off the pain and get to his feet. Something at the back of his mind told him that a buzzing noise from somewhere behind him had preceded the blow. He stumbled away but in the opposite direction, regained his balance and began running as hard as he could over the rough terrain.

Even without looking he knew who had attacked him: marauders, the ones his kind called Painted People. Some of his fellow survivors said the invaders used slings and could down a man from far away with a stone a mere two fingers across. Now he knew firsthand. He heard a shout behind him and then another, a different voice. So there were at least two of them.

Mother, it is I, Lan‘ta! Make me swift enough to leave them behind!

He gathered his wits as he ran, determined to do everything he could to lead them as far from his camp as possible. He knew with frightening certainty that in the end the invaders would root out the few remaining members of his tribe. Only by some gift of Mother herself would a path to escape show itself, and so far she had revealed nothing. And so he ran north, away from where his family and his people huddled in constant danger of discovery.

He flinched when he heard the low-pitched whir of another stone. This time the missile ricocheted off a limestone outcropping just ahead of him.

Mother! Give me the strength to stay on my legs!

Gasping for breath, Lan‘ta turned and ran headlong down a gully, brambles tearing at his cloak. More shouts behind him signaled that his pursuers had split up to outflank him, but then a tributary to the gully offered another route. Fighting the pain in his shoulder, he took a chance and backtracked into it, charging hard through the brush. The new path soon thinned out and left him exposed. Another shout: the marauders were still in pursuit. He ran at breakneck speed now, losing elevation in spite of himself. A large thicket loomed and he dove into it, hoping to use it to screen a change of direction. When he emerged on the other side he nearly bowled over the man who had been accompanying him on the hillside just a short time ago.

Hak‘un! Into the bushes, he hissed between gasps for air. When the old man hesitated Lan‘ta used his good arm to wrench him to cover in the thicket.

What are you doing? Hak‘un demanded.

Painted People. Two of them. Now stay down!

Where are they?

Higher up. One has a sling. Lan‘ta’s heart was still pounding, as much from fear of discovery as from exertion. What now? he wondered, for one-eyed Hak‘un was doubly vulnerable. At his age the old man could never outrun the marauders. A plan formed in his mind, a simple one, but it would have to do. It was also a terrible risk.

They think there’s only one of us, he said, wrestling Hak‘un deeper into the dense brush. Do you understand? They don’t know you’re here, so stay down. Don’t make a sound.

I don’t have—

Quiet! I can’t explain just now. Lan‘ta pulled off his cloak and wadded it tightly. It left him with only his heavy goat-hair undertunic, but it would be easier to run like this. Keep this for me, he said, thrusting the cloak at the old man.

You’re not leaving me here, are you?

Lan‘ta, listening for the marauders, silenced Hak‘un with an impatient gesture. He heard nothing that told him how close the Painted People might be, but he had already made up his mind. The one-eyed man’s safety, indeed the survival of all their people, might depend on this one decision. Habit made him touch his talisman, the small, triangular piece of yellow stone that hung from a thong around his neck. He whispered a prayer to Mother, then burst out of the thicket and ran northward as hard as his tired legs would allow.

A yip came from somewhere behind him, followed by the sound of another sling bullet. It missed him by a small margin and ripped into the scrub just as he reached the edge of a steep ravine. A mass of huge boulders sat in the streambed. He careened down toward them, and then crouched among them to catch his breath and replenish his half-empty waterskin. Remembering his stone knife, he checked the pouch tied around his waist. The shiny black blade was still there. Although ideal for skinning and dressing game, it was too thin and fragile to make a potent weapon. His axe with its heavy blade of dark, fine-grained stone would have served him better in a close fight, but it was not what he carried when hunting hares or rock partridges.

He heard a shout from one of his pursuers. Replacing the wooden stopper in his waterskin, he began snaking through the boulders to find a safe route back into the hills. Further upstream the terrain rose sharply, and when he reached a patch of scrub oak he used its cover to clamber unseen up the side of the ravine.

At the top he looked back and saw the two marauders below him, darting this way and that among the boulders, searching. When one of them looked up to scan the hillside, he stepped into the open and kicked a stone down the slope as if to say, Here I am! This way! In response the slinger raised his weapon and twirled it about his head. Lan‘ta ducked out of sight and waited a few heartbeats. He heard the projectile fall short. When he peered again he saw the pair running toward him. They had taken the bait. Now he had the advantage of higher ground and the opportunity to lead them on a fruitless chase, far from his peoples’ place of refuge.

By midmorning Lan‘ta found himself near the northern tip of the island. He’d used the rough terrain well, perhaps too well, for now he was uncertain whether the marauders were still on his trail. There was a good chance they’d given up by now, he figured, for it was a long trek from here back to the eastern part of Keht‘ena where the invading Painted People had established themselves. But they might be persistent, and so he decided it would be best to seek shelter until it was safe.

After a time he came upon a line of sweet-smelling pines, their trunks twisted from years of clinging against the blasts of winter storms and the hot, relentless winds that sometimes blew across the Island Sea during high summer. He could go no further, for the pines marked the top of a ragged precipice overlooking the sea. He scurried along its edge and before long spotted a shadow-draped ledge a short distance below. Gingerly descending the cliff face, he found it just deep enough to allow him to fold his frame inside and out of sight.

Shelter me from them, Mother. Let me live to return to my people!

His shoulder throbbed where the marauder’s sling bullet had left a deep bruise. Hunger gnawed at his stomach and he shivered without his cloak. He ran a hand through his tangled braids and forced his mind away from thoughts of food. He concentrated instead on listening for his pursuers, but for now the only sounds came from the wind, the seabirds and the rhythmic breaking of waves against the rocks far below.

Chapter 2

Why, Mother? Have our sacrifices not pleased you? Have we not always set before you the best of our meager crops, the first of our hunt and the finest of our catch taken from the sea? Have we Madi Keht not always respected what is sacred to you? Yet these invaders, these marauders covered with strange marks, still pursue us. Why?

Lan‘ta shuddered when he recalled how the Painted People had destroyed the age-old way of life on Keht‘ena. No two accounts agreed on how it all began. Some maintained that the invaders came unprovoked and intent upon slaughter. Others told differing versions of a trade gone bad, and that accusations of cheating and a desire for revenge were behind the invasion. None of it mattered to Lan‘ta. Whatever the cause, the Madi Keht had lost their island.

Just two individuals witnessed the invaders’ first appearance and managed to survive: Ko‘o, the tribe’s short, balding keeper of days, and a younger cousin. The strangers descended on the island’s eastern coast early one morning, the keeper said, just as winter began releasing its wet grip on Keht‘ena. For once it was a calm day, and a bank of fog hung over the water. By chance, they saw a fisherman and his son heading out to take advantage of the conditions. Such a sight was ordinary enough and hardly worth noting, but a short time later they heard faint cries of alarm. Looking back, they faced a stream of long, narrow boats emerging out of the fog, their occupants paddling hard for shore. There were two hands’ worth of vessels, Ko‘o said, and each carried about two hands’ worth of men. As swiftly as they came, the newcomers swarmed up from the beaches, all of them armed. From there they raced toward Keht’ena’s nearest hamlet. Later, Ko‘o and his cousin found it the scene of a brutal slaughter. And that was just the beginning.

Painted People, the surviving Madi Keht came to call them, for none of the islanders had ever seen men who decorated their skin with dark, crooked lines crossing their chests, strings of dots around their arms and jagged stripes encircling their eyes.

Only by good fortune and the grace of Mother had Lan‘ta, his mate and his son survived that terrible day. They’d left their hut early that morning, intending to shore up rain-damaged terrace walls that supported their barley fields on the slopes above their farmstead.

Get down! Get down! Lan‘ta remembered hissing