Tommy Nightmare(36)

“Yes, my king,” the old priest said. “Years of exercises at the temple have uncovered the reach of her divine touch—”

“I wish the girl to speak,” the king said.

“I can do as you wish.” Jenny’s voice was soft and low.

“A woman cannot win a war,” the advisor said. “Curses will rain down on us if we follow this course.”

“If I wanted to hear of curses, I would ask a priest or a magician!” the king bellowed.

“Magic and sorcery will lead us to suffering,” the advisor said. “Wars must be fought by men, with bronze and iron, on a properly blessed field—”

“What do you think of this?” the king asked the priest. “My advisor’s prattling?”

“It is clear the goddess favors my king,” the priest said. “Her blessings will be upon you.”

The advisor sneered.

“Before we proceed,” the king said. “I must satisfy myself with a demonstration of your abilities.”

“I will do as the king wishes,” Jenny said.

“Let us find a beast,” the priest said. “Great or small, as the king wishes.”

“I do not wish to send a plague among the beasts of Athens,” the king said. “But among the men.” He looked to his advisor, and a cruel smile appeared on his face. “Perhaps she might demonstrate upon a worthless general, who can himself offer no means of breaching the Athenian walls.”

“My king!” The advisor shuddered, looking sick. “You cannot mean this.”

“Lay your hands upon him, lovely girl,” the king said. “And see what the judgment of the goddess shall be.”

Jenny approached the advisor. He tried to back away from her, but he had already reached the wall of the tent.

“Surely you have made your offerings to Aphrodite Areia, and do not fear her judgment,” the king said.

Jenny reached for the advisor’s hands.

The man screamed and ran along the wall of the tent.

“Coward!” the king bellowed.

Jenny, wishing to make the king happy, ran after the advisor and leaped onto his back. She wrapped one hand around his throat, and slapped the other across his face.

The advisor squealed and fell to the ground. He writhed on the dirt while Jenny clamped her hands tighter on his head and neck. His skin turned feverish, the fever spreading to his fingers and down his legs, and then dark, bloody sores burst open all over him.

When he lay still, Jenny stood.

“Is he dead?” the king asked.

“Yes, my king, as you instructed,” Jenny said.

“Can my men touch him?” the king said. “Or will they grow diseased?”

“There is no contagion in the dead,” the priest said. “Unless she wills it.”

The king called a guard from outside the tent and instructed the young man to turn the plague-ridden corpse of the advisor face up, so that the king might look upon him. The guard looked at the body, and showed great hesitation at the order to touch it.

“You need not fear the goddess,” the priest said. “You will not grow sick.”

The young hoplite soldier hesitated a moment more, then laid his hands on the dead man’s green-edged tunic, taking care not to touch his skin. He turned the body, and the king smiled at the bleeding tumors that had arisen on his advisor’s face.





The jarring sound of a telephone woke Jenny from her sleep. She lay on her bed alone. It was daylight, and for a moment she wasn’t sure what century it was, or who she was.

The phone rang again. It hadn’t worked in two weeks.

Jenny pushed herself to her feet and stumbled groggily to the living room. She picked up the phone and mumbled a hello.

“Jenny?” asked the voice on the other end.

“Oh! Daddy! Hey!” Jenny said.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Jenny said. “It’s just the phone’s been out. All the phones.”

“I’ve been worried sick,” he said. “Couldn’t even get the answering machine after that first day.”

“Guess it’s working now,” Jenny said. “Where are you?”

“I’m driving home now,” he said. “The National Guard cleared out, left all the roads wide open.”

“Oh, good, they’re leaving!” Jenny said.

“I’d say they’re about gone. Haven’t seen one.”

“So it’s over,” Jenny said.

“I guess,” her dad said. “But nobody’s too sure what it was all about. What happened, Jenny? Did you see anything?”

“Um,” Jenny said. The last thing she wanted to do was tell him what she’d done. “It’s just been crazy.”