Part 2
Not at all satisfied with his partner's ambling pace, Hercules cut short
this particular journey by lifting Iolaus bodily and bringing him down to
where a few friends, and a few gods and immortals waiting. "We haven't got all
day for this, Iolaus, at least, not yet!"
" ... not yet ... that's a good one, Herc." Iolaus giggled.
"Who were you talking to, over there? I don't mean Ares. Who was the
girl?" the son of Alcmene demanded to know.
Now it was Iolaus' turn to be amazed. "You mean you really don't ... You
really haven't seen her at all?"
"If you mean by that my prospective bride, no." Hercules grumbled. "That
was Hera's major condition and I agreed to it ... like I said before, to seal
the peace."
"But you're none too happy about it. I can see that. Look, my friend, I
understand you agreed to this, but didn't they tell you anything about
this young woman?"
"Plenty. Hera hid her away as a baby. She says Zeus was as close to being
crazy at the time as she's ever seen him. That's part of the reason she
had an affair with some petty king somewhere near Sparta, and most of the
reason, Hera says, she left the infant with the midwives, there ... to keep the
child safe.
She told the king to keep the child hidden, even from her, from
Hera, change her name, move her about the countryside ... all the usual tricks
of the trade. He more than took Hera at her word. The girl grew up believing
herself a mortal, and that her mother died in childbirth. She was a
woman grown before Hera knew of her again, with children of her own.
She had a gift for keeping hearth fires alive ... but otherwise no idea that
she was special, different, much less a half goddess. And being Hera's daughter
by a mortal, she's no kin to me ... not that that sort of thing bothers
most Olympians." Hercules sighed and sat down next to his best friend.
"It would bother you, buddy. A lot."
"Anyway, the wedding feast comes after we take care of you becoming
immortal. I told Zeus, and the others, you had proved yourself a thousand times
more worthy of a reward like this than half the immortals I could name! "
"Callisto, for example?" Iolaus laughed.
"Callisto, for example." Hercules gave his friend the first genuine smile
the hunter had seen since coming back up the mountain.
"Then let's get this over with!" Iolaus demanded. "We've got a wedding to
celebrate, so I hear.." The two heroes walked a bit further down the
hall, to where Jason, Alcmene and a handful of friends waited on them. In another
moment, several priestesses and priests of Hera and Zeus, those whose
devotion had won them eternity on Olympus joined the group.
"What do we have to do?" Hercules demanded. "And I don't want to hear
about any trials, or troubles or puzzles to solve beforehand."
"Yeah, " Iolaus agreed, "been there, done that, you might say."
"No trials. Just a brief ritual. "the chief priestess promised, looking
Iolaus over. "Hunter, you are, or have been at some point dedicated to
Artemis, the Huntress."
"Yes, around the last time through, I guess, she saw fit to claim me."
"And while you remain mortal, I still do." the Huntress answered,
appearing in the garb of an Amazon, through a shower of green and silver light.
"And as you have been mine, I preside. Stand before me, Iolaus of Thebes and
of Corinth, Iolaus of Attica and Macedon, Iolaus of Greece and Thrace and
Sumer, and the East. And stand still, you would be no hunter, if you didn't know
how to do that"
Smiling, but feeling some of the Huntress' solemnity flow through him.
Iolaus nodded and stood as still as if he watched a big horn ram grazing a yard
away. Taking a deep breath, he met the Huntress-Goddess gaze, "Mortal or
immortal, Lady Huntress, I will be yours to claim."
"That is the right and honorable way to respond, Iolaus. I expected
nothing less. No, I will not have you bowing. It is not in your nature. Hold out
your hands to me. Cup them together, as closely as you may."
Obeying, Iolaus found himself holding a cup rough woven of stems,
branches and leaves, the kind he might fashion himself to catch water out of a
lake, a waterfall or mountain stream. Only with this being Olympus, he couldn't
help noting, this 'cup' was washed with silver and filled with a shining fluid
that gave back the light and shadows above it like no pool he'd ever
seen. And this the Huntress gazed into deeply like any of her servants scrying
in a pool, a stream or any kind of mirror.
"A village of amazons, a she-demon, an indestructible warrior woman, no,
two of them...that's four and then truly the ugliest jumped-up Anatolian by
way of Sumer wannabegod fire demons I've ever seen!" one of Artemis'
priestesses murmured to the Huntress.
"By my count, that's five good solid hits ... Never mind all the
try-outs." Ares, much to Iolaus' surprise joined them to add his opinion.
"That's the problem right there. Any one of those should have done the deed. Why
didn't someone let us know about this little glitch decades ago?"
"Little glitch?" Iolaus finally heard himself asking. "What do you mean?
Is there something keeping me from becoming immortal? Not that I'm
particularly interested, but it is Herc's condition on his upcoming nuptials."
Artemis shook her head of dark-red, silver shot hair at the hunter. "We
didn't know. I didn't know. You were dedicated to me as a boy, and I
didn't know. You're exactly right, Iolaus. There is something keeping me
from making you immortal. Something I must say none of us expected. The Fates
have decided the issue."
"Wait just a ... wait!" Hercules interjected. "Artemis, what's going on?"
I gave my word on this condition."
"Well, then you'll have to go find the titans, Rhea, possibly or great
grandmother Gaia, perhaps. One of them must have already put this into
play, aeons ago. We can't make Iolaus immortal now."
"But why?" the heroes demanded together.
"Because my dear brother, and my dearest hunter, Iolaus already is
immortal. The problem that came in, each of these times it seemed so
certain he had died ... was that no one in the living world, including Iolaus
himself, and no one on Olympus, including Zeus knew. Iolaus of Corinth
and Thebes, of Sparta and Attica, of Sumer and the East ... You were, you
have been and you always will be immortal. It's just as simple as this: Iolaus
athanatos esti."
"Who knew?" Iolaus and Hercules turned to each other to ask, each man
unsure whether to scream or laugh at the sheer folly of the warlords, thieves,
monsters and other trouble makers who'd done their level best over
something like 100 years to change this one certainty... and so they went on.