13 Chapter 14

From the journal of Ellen Lambert:

* Greece - The Journey

For many years I wandered with little care to belongings save for the flask of the transformation elixir given to me by Nyree.I kept that hidden on my person.I followed the migrations of various nomadic tribes, finding this the easiest way to make my conquests and then move on without arousing suspicion.From my victims, I took whatever they had on or with them, these articles used to trade and sell for other goods and supplies.Sometimes, to my excitement, I found gold and silver coins, those much-valued commodities honored everywhere.I traveled with a servant woman named Tirafa who had come to Egypt with her husband Olajuwan as Nubian slaves.

At the Luxor palace, Tirafa worked as a scullery maid while Olajuwan assisted in cutting the massive stones that would become Pharoah Hakor's elaborate tomb.One day, a stone slab loosened from its tethered mooring and plunged to the ground, crushing Olajuwan beneath it.Now as a widow, Tirafa had nothing to bind her to Egypt except her indentured servitude.When I asked her if she wished to travel with me, she gladly agreed.I had been the first person to ask rather than command, and she felt grateful for the opportunity.I had no trouble wresting Tirafa away from her service to the royal family.I simply took her with me in the dead of night.

Tall and big-boned, Tirafa had strength to carry our belongings if we had to walk, but we preferred to travel by donkey or camel when available.She wore the sarong of her native land, the fabric dyed in graduating colors of red, yellow, bright purple and green.Around her long neck she wore a leather cord strung with carved beads and several sharp animal teeth, a wedding present from her husband.For travel, she wrapped her tight raven hair in a linen turban.Unlike me who had to shade my skin from the sun with a full head scarf, Tirafa welcomed its rays on her smooth sable flesh.

As an intelligent, observant, and astute servant, it didn't take her long to inquire about my particular habits, why I rarely dined with the other travelers, and why food stuffs traded and bought were procured mainly for her alone.I knew I had to reveal the nature of my existence and what I had to do to maintain it.Surprisingly, Tirafa showed no outward signs of shock or disgust at my revelation, but seemed to accept my strange existence.When I told her that sometimes my "food" did not survive and I had to either bury or burn the body, she never flinched at such a loathsome and barbarous practice.

With my existence revealed and accepted, I asked her if she wished to stay with me on a permanent basis.I could make her an immortal as well, although the process was complex, arduous, and fraught with dangerous side effects if they transformation did not progress properly.With Tirafa, I knew it would be an easy metamorphosis, for she possessed the sturdy body and fortitude needed to withstand and embrace the change.She agreed but with one proviso:she wanted to live no more than one hundred years.

"I don't want to live forever," she told me in that matter-of-fact tone of hers."Although I lost my husband, I still love him dearly, and I want the chance to see him on the other side as regular mortals do.To live forever means I'll never see Olajuwan again.So, promise me you will kill me when I say the time has come."

I had to agree if only to placate her, although one hundred years would be a mere drop in time to an immortal.In turn, Tirafa vowed never to reveal our true nature and how we maintained our existence.Thus, in the same manner I had died, I stabbed Tira with a long blade and then quickly gave her the elixir.In two days' time, she drank the nectar of the gods-the blood of an itinerant peddler to be exact-and became an immortal like me, her transformation smooth and effortless.

Before we continued on our journey, I gave her a small filigree ring with twin hidden sharp needles that extended when she wanted to feast.The needles pierced the skin and provided a nice gush of nourishment.This ring would become her invaluable tool, since the old way of teeth on flesh often proved difficult and messy.

We traveled at will, at whim and where the sands of time took us-Babylonia, Byzantium, Assyria, Phoenicia, Persia, Judea and Mesopotamia-all the while taking the bounty of those we plundered.We heard from other travelers about my old homeland.Nepherites had inherited the kingdom but had ruled only a short time as Pharaoh.The Romans had invaded Egypt, burning and sacking the palaces and looting our sacred tombs.Those of the royal family who hadn't escaped the invasion were systematically beheaded.I thought of Tadu, and knew she had not survived.No doubt the same fate had befallen Darshak, my old love.The Romans despised the Egyptian priests and scribes because they represented the false idols we considered our gods.

Soon the Roman Empire would extend far and wide, but I avoided the annexed territories when I heard about the cruelties inflicted upon peaceful people by the barbaric Roman troops once they had conquered and subdued a region.I refused to be such a victim, subject to the harsh whims of others; in fact, the very idea repelled and even frightened me.

Luckily, Tira and I had been able to amass enough money to settle down for an extended length of time and in a place free from tyranny.I chose Greece for its open society. The Greeks had no taboos, superstitions or strict rules of moral conduct.The Greeks also valued music, poetry, drama and art, and I came to value such artistic endeavors as well as science and philosophy.In my new persona as Evadne, I posed as a widow who had come from Thermopylae to start a new life with her servant, Tira.

We settled in the Attica region and in the thriving city of Athens, chosen for its sophistication and prosperous economy.Because Greece was a patriarchal society, I could not own property outright, so I made the acquaintance of a money lender and property dealer by the name of Philemon, a barrel-chested man with a thinning ring of gray-black hair around his bald pate.He helped me acquire a small rental house under the name of my fictitious dead husband whom I called Demetrius.

The house had an open floor plan with tall stone pillars and niches for busts of gods and goddesses, the few pieces of furniture that came with the rental functional in nature but certainly not aesthetic or eye-pleasing.The full-length windows in the bedroom opened to a balcony that offered a panoramic vista of the green hills above the city proper.My first view in the morning, of those verdant hills, set my mood on a happy, positive path for the rest of the day.

As a widow who collected her military husband's pension, I lived a discreet and somewhat modest life-at least on the surface.My household staff included Tira and a young servant girl named Lakshmi.Through Philemon, I acquired the best in furniture, fabrics, tableware and artwork, transforming the house into my lovely and comfortable home.

Within six months, I acquired lovers, although I made sure to be discreet about our meetings as well as my association with them.I took four in total including Philemon.The others were Lysander, a high-ranking military officer; Thaddeus, an important member of the council of elders and a textile merchant; and Nicomedes, an artist and philosopher.I allowed Philemon and Thaddeus-both middle-aged and paunchy-to shower me with jewelry and trinkets as a trade-off for their lack of physical beauty and prowess, while I enjoyed the muscled, hard body of Lysander and the lean, dreamy-eyed form of Nicos.

Thaddeus' generosity extended to a tutor by the name of Kastor who helped me improve my Greek and increase my vocabulary.In addition, Kastor-an accomplished lyre player-taught me how to play the lovely, stringed instrument. Since I learned to play quickly and fairly well, Thaddeus presented me with my own lyre of polished, sleek Cypress that I kept it on a stand made of the same wood.

I had one hard and fast rule:I never feasted on the men whom I engaged in sex.Instead I trolled the back alleys and byways for homeless souls and travelers who would not be missed.Tira became adept in procuring and disposing of the detritus of our meals.Her services were invaluable and I would miss her dearly should she choose to end her existence sooner than expected.For now she remained my loyal and devoted friend, an ally as well as a servant.

In my position, I had to take additional and often special steps in order to maintain my livelihood and provide decent living arrangements not only for myself but for Tira as well.We never took chances, but calculated the risk and added an extra measure of security.Our lives-by the sheer enormity of what we had become-took perilous turns from time to time, but we always managed to set the course of action in our favor...sometimes doing whatever necessary to secure our survival.We could never for one instance let our guards down and become vulnerable.