The Beast’s footfalls were irregular things. A clip clop of the horse. Then, the familiar sound of dog nails on tile. Its breath was constant, though. Wet and warm on Taras’s heels. Taras was bolting from door to door, pounding on them.
“Help me! By the gods, help me!”
Every knock and detour brought the Beast closer. Taras knew the great, awful thing was faster than him, but it had yet to strike. It hung back, allowing him to stew in his own fear. It let him run. Taras could hear its steps. Deceptively slow. It’s fur drug on the ground, swishing like a tunic after each plodding step.
He saw the Temple of Nike just as he gave up on Aerpos’s door. His last hope. Taras turned towards his goddess, gathered his remaining strength, and ran. The Beast followed with no haste. Its breath came out in humorless chuffs. The temple’s columns grew on the horizon. Bright white fingers reaching into the air, holding up shelter above a head buried in the soil.
Taras ducked in and behind a column. He could no longer hear the Beast. Its breath no longer on his neck. Taras let out a sob. He was saved. The Beast feared the gods. He slid down, back wet with sweat.
Drip. Drip. Drip
There was something warm dripping onto his head. He had no time to react before the Beast opened his skull.
———————————————————————————————————————
“Welcome! Welcome! Please come in, come in.” Aerpos herded his guests in while his wife gestured for the servants to bring out refreshments. She hopped between instructing the serving girl and pressing gifts, silks, gold, vases, into their visitors hands.
Newly rich from her marriage to Aerpos, Sophia was singularly focused on placing herself center in Athenian society. She needed to be liked by these families. No, adored. She rubbed her abdomen, a habit she had taken up a few days into their marriage, and a month into her pregnancy.
But they were whispering. About her? About her stomach swelling too fast? About her unpracticed manners? Or maybe they thought the food was rustic, beneath them. Then she caught the name ‘Taras’. Taras was killed. His skull was split in the Temple of Nike. She turned to ask more. Her husband crowded himself with the other men in the corner of the room. They call women gossips but these men cupped each other’s ears to whisper this or that macabre detail.
“I need to go.” Aerpos called to her.
“Aerpos, please-”
“Your identity as a hostess is truly more important to you than preventing more deaths?”
“Please let me-”
“I need to go.”
“When will-”
“I. Don’t. Know.”
The men shuffled out. Cuddled up together and left their wives behind. One of the wives touched her hand.
“You’ll hardly be lonely with us around. A husband is nothing to a sister.”
“I just…”
“You just what?” Another woman asked.
“I’ve never lived like…this.”
“It’s hardly difficult, dearest.”
———————————————————————————————————————
Aerpos was shoulder to shoulder with a few thousand other men. Taras was only killed the night before, but thousands had poured into the city almost immediately. The miasma of a killer could quickly ruin the prosperity in Athens. At least that was Aerpos’s perspective. But a sophist had stood up to speak on the human aspect. This was a human crime, and it needed human solutions. This was not supernatural, at least in the sophist’s opinion. Athens had a killer.
“Hmm. A killer that shatters skulls like a beast?” Aerpos interupptd. “Be reasonable, men. This is a matter for the gods. We’ve turned to the oracle in our times of need. We will not verge off-”
There was a woman howling, screaming.
Aerpos was the first out, and there, neatly tucked into the steps, was a slave woman. She was in the fetal position with her arms tucked under her chin as if in prayer. Her legs hid her stomach. But her stomach was where the viscera began.
Peaked between her legs was blood. Fresh. It pooled like water around her, climbing its way towards Aerpos. He could feel it warm between his toes. His mouth grew dry. His stomach churned. The crowd behind him was dead silent
A physician, Basil, shouldered his way through the other men. They were statuesque, unreactive to the intrusion. Basil hardly glanced at Aerpos before lowering himself to the woman. He pushed her onto her back and both physician and farmer knew she was dead. Her abdomen was empty, bleeding, but empty. Her spine was a clear white trunk made visible and clean. It matched the white of her eyes.
“Dead.” Basil whispered. His words whipped through the assembly, and it dawned on them all at once.
“Someone, visit the oracle. Go. There’s no time. Taras. Now this woman. It’s in the gods hands now. We must have offended them.” Aerpos was monotone. One young man, new to the ecclesia nodded quickly and ran off, towards the oracle.
The men were near motionless, they stared at the slave woman. One man would cough and be wuickly shushed. This was violence hardly seen in battle, let alone in the heart of the polis. Aerpos wasn’t sure if they were still for just a few minutes or a few hours. But the boy he sent out returned with news.
“This is justice-” huff “-for-” huff “not” huff “respecting” huff “Artemis. This is a punishment.” The young man took a few deep breaths.
“The oracle says we just need to show our respect, our honor to her.”
Aerpos turned to the men. “Simple then. Have your daughters gather. Worship Artemis. We will suffer no more casualties.”
The visiting sophist opened his mouth to interject. Basil stopped him.
“We are beyond the realm of man.”
———————————————————————————————————————
As the women gathered to pray, the men patrolled. Something to do while their daughters dealt with the cause. Aespos had yet to speak with his wife. He crawled into bed every night, but neither dared to mention the Beast.
Aerpos was accompanied by three slaves and five other members of the ecclesia. All were armed with swords to defend themselves if the need arose. Aerpos was looking backl at his own home when he crashed into the back of a slave. He was shaking.
The Beast was before them. It was furred. No, it was scaled or feathered. It was small. It was large. It had long deadly claws. It had hooves like a horse. It was horned. It wasn’t. It was solid and muscled. It was gaseous.
The slaves accompanying them scattered. They were not apt to die for strangers or even their masters. Left alone, the man to Aerpos’s left raised his sword. It’s shine showing neither the blade nor its wielder had ever faced battle. It never would. The Beast bit down on his legs before any of the men could strike.
Aerpos watched the Beast lift its prey further and further up. Then it shifted its bite. It no longer held, it devoured. The Beast flung back its head and took the man down like a snake, whole. The man was clearly outlined in the Beast’s long neck. The creature, satisfied, turned away. The men dared not follow.
———————————————————————————————————————
A man and a woman were taken each night. The cult leaders. Visitors. Slaves. There was no mercy for women or children. Many, including the members of the ecclesia from greater Attica, attempted to leave.
Aerpos helped his wife up onto her horse. He supported her swollen ankle. She would be riding astride. Her abdomen was full, but not yet so large to not travel. They had yet to speak. Perhaps if they didn’t speak, they would not acknowledge the Beast. It would not be summoned. It couldn’t hurt them. Sophia had a father just outside the city, less than a day’s travel. Aerpos gripped the horse’s reins. He glanced up at his wife. She looked everywhere but his eyes. They would never speak of the violence, of what they saw.
They set off at dawn. One foot in front of the other for hours. The scenery didn’t change. They didn’t speak of it. The river that bordered her fathers home They didn’t speak of it. The sun was setting when Aerpos spotted a structure in the horizon. It was Athens. They had walked for hours, and they were back in Athens. Sophia broke down. Snot and tears fell from her face.
Aerpos didn’t dare to look at her. He led the horse back to their home, helped his wife down, and broke down.
They never tried to escape again.
———————————————————————————————————————
Death came every night for weeks. The Beast was followed by starvation.
It came for Aerpos and Sophia halfway through the third week of its unholy siege.
They held themselves in their room, tucked between the bed and wall. The servants were long gone. No man is loyal enough to stay and serve through this. Aerpos pulled his wife closer, their unborn child pressed between its parents. Sophia placed her left hand on the back of his neck. She pressed their foreheads together.
“My dearest, you have held me for long enough. You’ve kept me safe. Let this Beast not separate us, even in-”
Aerpos cut her off. “Please, my heart, speak not. We will survive. We have aligned ourselves with Athena. We have been loyal. We will be saved. The gods have not abandoned us.”
The beast leaned into the doorway. Its claws pressed into the stone sides. It crumbled. Its furry, scaly, smooth, winged, not winged body pulled into the room. It leaned over the couple.
The beast spoke. “The gods are dead. Man is left.”