Read Online Ilium by Dan Simmons - Free Book Online Page B

exclusion become inevitable contours. Do you understand now, Hockenberry? Do you understand how this applies to quantum space, to time, to the War below, or to your own fate?”
    “No, Goddess.” My voice does quaver this time. I can’t help it.
    There is a rustling of silk and I glance up long enough to see the most beautiful female in existence rearranging her fair limbs and smooth thighs on the couch. “No matter,” she says. “You—or the mortal who was your template—wrote a book several thousand years ago. Do you remember its content?”
    “No, Goddess.”
    “If you say that one more time, Hockenberry, I am going to rip you open from crotch to crown and quite literally use your guts for my garters. Do you understand that ?”
    It is hard to speak with no saliva in your mouth. “Yes, Goddess,” I manage, hearing the dry lisp.
    “Your book ran to 935 pages and it was all about one word— Menin —do you remember now?”
    “No, Go . . . I’m afraid I don’t recall that, Goddess Aphrodite, but I am sure that you are correct.”
    I look up long enough to see that she is smiling, her chin propped on her left hand, her finger rising along her cheek to one perfect dark eyebrow. Her eyes are the color of a fine cognac.
    “Rage,” she says softly. “ Menin aeide thea . . . Do you know who will win this war, Hockenberry?”
    I have to think fast here. I would be a pretty poor scholic if I don’t know how the poem turns out—although the Iliad ends with the funeral rites for Achilles’ friend Patroclus, not with the destruction of Troy, and there is no mention of a giant horse except in Odysseus’ comments and that from another epic . . . but if I pretend to know how this real war will turn out, and it is obvious from the argument I have just overheard that Zeus’s edict that the gods must not be informed of the future as predicted by the Iliad is still in effect—I mean, if the gods themselves do not know what will happen next, wouldn’t I be putting myself above the gods, including Fate by telling them? Hubris has never been an attribute gently rewarded by these gods. Besides, Zeus—who alone knows the full tale of the Iliad —has forbidden the other gods from asking and all of us scholics from discussing anything except events that have already occurred. Pissing off Zeus is never a good plan for survival on Olympos. Still, it seems I’m exempt from nanocyte disruption. On the other hand, I believe the Goddess of Love completely when she says that she will wear my guts for garters.
    “What was the question, Goddess?” is all I can manage.
    “You know how the poem the Iliad ends, but I would be defying Zeus’s command if I ask you what happens there,” says Aphrodite, her small smile disappearing and being replaced by something like a pout. “But I can ask you if that poem predicts this reality. Does it? In your opinion, Scholic Hockenberry, does Zeus rule the universe, or does Fate?”
    Oh, shit, I think. Any answer here is going to end up with me being gutless and this beautiful woman—goddess—wearing slimy garters. I say, “It is my understanding, Goddess, that even though the universe bends to the will of Zeus and must obey the vagaries of the god-force called Fate, that kaos still has some say in the lives of both men and gods.”
    Aphrodite makes a soft, amused sound. Everything about her is so soft, touchable, enticing . . . .
    “We will not wait for chaos to decide this contest,” she says, her voice shedding all sound of amusement. “You saw Achilles withdraw from the fray this day?”
    “Yes, Goddess.”
    “You know that the man-killer has already prayed to Thetis to punish his fellow Achaeans for the shame that Agamemnon has heaped on him?”
    “I have not witnessed this prayer, Goddess, but I know that it follows the path of the . . . the poem.” This is safe to say. The event is in the past. Besides, the sea goddess Thetis is Achilles’ mother and everyone on