The Bull from the Sea by Mary Renault Page A

At last they understood that this was the end of war in Attica; that any man, unless he had killed with his own hand and paid no blood-price, could pass through his neighbor’s deme unarmed.
    It was not long after this, that I rode out to Kolonos, to take the omens of Poseidon.
    It is a pretty place, not far from the City, good for grapes and olives; young men in love go there to hear the nightingales. But the top is sacred to Poseidon Hippios; and even in those days, people let it alone. There was nothing to see, except broken boulders with a clump of fir trees; but if you stood at the top, below you was a round flattish dip, as if a great horsehoof had struck the ground, about as wide as a young boy can throw a stone.
    It was a thousand years, I daresay, since the god had stamped there; scrub and thorn had grown over, the shrine was small, the priest sleepy and fat. But it had made me angry, last time I went, to see the place neglected, for the god was certainly present; when I stood on the crest, my nape shivered, and a ripple like a cat’s ran down me. I asked the priest if he could not feel it, and he said he could; I knew he lied but could not prove it. Earth-Shaker himself did that within the year. The shock was nothing much; but the priest’s house fell down, and killed him in his bed. The people of the deme were half dead with fright, and sent posthaste to me, begging me to make their peace with the god.
    I drove out there in a three-horse chariot with a mounted guard. We had made our beasts fine, to honor the Horse Father; my team with red-plumed headstalls and braided tails, and all the rest beribboned. We brought the finest stallion of my herd, wreathed for the sacrifice. But the god had chosen otherwise.
    As we drew near, I looked out for the people who had so besought my presence. The road was empty. The feel of the god’s wrath was heavy on the ground; I was on edge, and wondered if he had struck again. Amyntor was riding on to see, but I waved him back. I could hear over the slope voices shouting, and a woman’s wail. I was angry now, and wanted to see for myself what they were up to. So I stopped the column and walked up on foot, with only a guard of four.
    As I got near, I heard the woman’s voice begging for pity, rising and falling with broken catches as she beat her breast. There were curses, and the thud of stones. Mounting the rise, I could see the village people stoning a man. He was crouching down, guarding his head with his hands; there was blood on his white hair. The woman, who was still young, was struggling to go to him, begging them to spare her father who had suffered enough. When they thrust her back, she gave a great cry, calling upon Poseidon. At that I stepped forth with a shout, and they turned round gaping, dropping their stones.
    The woman came running to me, sobbing and stumbling over the broken clods between the vine-rows; her clothes were torn, and bloody from her scratching her breast as she wailed. She looked old before her time, as peasants do, and yet not like a peasant; the lines had been drawn by other cares. She hurled herself down and clasped my knees and kissed them. I could feel her tears.
    I turned up her dust-smeared face, whose bones were noble, and asked what they accused her father of. But the village headman spoke first. This outlaw, he said, unclean before all gods, had touched Poseidon’s altar, trying when Earth-Shaker was already angry to bring death to them all. Meanwhile, hearing us speak, the man had risen to his knees. He held out his hands before him, seeking something, I suppose the girl. I saw that he was blind.
    “You can go to him,” I told her, and held my hand up to keep the others back. She went over and raised him, and put his stick into his hand and led him up to me. He was bleeding, but had no bones broken yet; and I could see by the way he got himself along that he had been blind a good while. She muttered in his ear, telling him who I was.