Timonides dwelled in thought while life and industry went on about him. The sun climbed and breezes blew from the Euphrates. Presently, he said, "Do you know ... I am not even sure I am Greek. I was abandoned as a baby and a Greek widow took me in. She gave me my name and taught me her language and culture. She apprenticed me out to an astrologer when I was six, and when she died, I was sold into slavery. Sebastianus's father bought me and I have been serving his family ever since. Nestor was the only human being in this whole world that I was connected to by blood. He was more than my son. He was my universe. And now I am lost ..."
He reached for the wine and when Ulrika saw how his hand trembled, she thought: He is a tangle of dark emotions. He cannot think straight.
And an idea came to her.
"Timonides, when I taught myself the skills of meditation in order to tap into my spiritual gift, I found that a side benefit was a feeling of peace and serenity afterward. Perhaps if I showed you how ..."
He squinted at her. "Meditation?"
"It is really very simple and requires little effort, only concentration. And it is not unlike the way I have seen you prepare yourself before you read your star-charts. A clearing of the mind. A way to focus. Would you like to try it?"
"To what end?"
"To bring peace to your soul, Timonides."
"My soul does not deserve peace."
"Then do it as a favor to me. I have never taught the technique to someone else. I want to know if it is possible."
He shrugged.
"Have you an object that is precious to you? Something you can grasp in your hand and hold onto, like an anchor."
Timonides did not have to think about it. He was inside his tent and out a moment later, holding a long wooden spoon that Ulrika recognized as Nestor's favorite.
When he resumed his place on the stool, Ulrika saw, for the first time, a spark of hope in his eyes, as if just holding Nestor's spoon brought consolation. "Now hold an image in your mind," she said, "a familiar and comforting one."
A faint smile curled his lips. "A bubbling pot of stew. It is how I remember my son best."
"Create that image in your mind as you hold onto this spoon. Focus on it. Make it real in your mind. Now whisper words that hold meaning for you. Repeat them, over and over."
Timonides studied the spoon in his hands, his shoulders curved and bent. Then he nodded, as if he had come to an agreement with himself. "Stars are destiny," he murmured.
Ulrika showed him how to breathe, to sway, to focus. She spoke softly, instructing him, her simple words and subdued voice guiding him into a sensitive realm. "As you hold onto the anchor, send your spirit out ..."
But even as she spoke, she saw his eyes moving behind his eyelids, the creases growing deep in his forehead, and she knew he was struggling.
"I cannot!" he finally cried in exasperation. "Dear child, this is not going to work!"
But she saw how lovingly he caressed the spoon, and she sensed the hope within him. Timonides did not want to kill himself, he did not want to join his son in an imagined hell. But how to save him?
Ulrika thought for a moment as she watched, in the distance, a new caravan arriving from the west, a line of weary beasts and men entering the terminus. And it came to her that her personal meditation was designed to find external places. Timonides's sickness was of the spirit. It was internal. With renewed hope, she said, "Do not try to send your spirit out, Timonides. Instead, go deep inside yourself. Find the landscape of your soul. Explore it. Do not be afraid. Tell me what you see."
He closed his eyes again, clasped the spoon, bringing it up to his chest. Breathing slowly. Swaying. Whispering, "Stars are destiny ... stars are destiny ..." Until he began to tremble and the chanting ceased. The breath stopped in his chest as Ulrika watched.
"Blackness," he said in a tight voice. "I see a large gaping hole. Cold winds. Isolation. My soul is lost and lonely!"
"Timonides," Ulrika said gently. "Hold a silent dialogue with your soul. Do not reveal it to me. Talk to your spiritual self. Ask questions. Ask what it wants, how it can be saved."
As she watched the old astrologer withdraw deeper into himself, his posture relaxing, the wrinkles easing on his face, Ulrika saw Sebastianus walking back through the camp, a scowl on his face. He was alone. He had not found an astrologer who would come with him.
Ulrika placed a fingertip at her lips, so that Sebastianus joined her and Timonides without making a sound.
After a few more moments of silence, Timonides finally opened his eyes and said, "I cannot do it. Ulrika, it is easy for you. You are young and agile. But my soul is old and creaks like my joints."
She leaned forward. "Many times I watched how you prepared yourself for a star-reading. I saw you close your eyes and whisper a prayer. Why did you do that?"
"To open my soul to the stars, to let their wisdom pour in."
"Then do so now."
With a doubtful look, he settled back on the stool, firmed his grip on the spoon, closed his eyes and took the first deep, cadenced breaths. "Stars are destiny," he whispered, and told himself he was preparing to do a reading. But rather than journey inward to his soul, as Ulrika suggested, Timonides knew he must send his thoughts outward and up to the sky, for that was where he belonged. As he slowed his breathing and imagined the aroma of bubbling stew and felt the precious wooden spoon in his hands, the old astrologer felt himself relax, gradually, giving up the stress and strains of his fleshly life so that his spirit could be set free and soar up to the heavens he had so loved all his life.
Soon, Timonides was flying among the forty-eight constellations, familiar friends now seen close up: boastful Orion, bested by a small scorpion and frozen forever in the heavens with his club raised, doomed never to fall. Andromeda, the chained virgin to whom Timonides now uttered the famous words of Perseus, her rescuer: "Such chains must only bind you to the hearts of lovers." And Cassiopeia, placed upon her celestial throne by spiteful Neptune, who had seated her there with her head towards the north star so that she spent half of every night upside down.
Timonides mounted winged Pegasus and rode the four winds. They neared the sun and Timonides felt the blessed radiance on his unworthy face. He saw an icy comet streak past. He tasted the moon's sweet dew.
He began to cry. So much beauty. So much divinity. And he had sullied it. For the sake of filling his miserable stomach he had soiled everything he loved and held dear. Cherished beliefs and heavenly bodies were cast aside for fear of a salivary stone.
"I am sorry!" he cried out as meteors and planets raced past him. "Forgive me!" he shouted as asteroids hurtled all around him. "Perseus, Hercules, I did not mean to disrespect you! I am but a humble man, a web of weaknesses and fears and dreads. I am nothing compared to your greatness. Give me a second chance, I beg of you!"
And then he saw the sparkling nebula, a cloud of compassion and color—the collective consciousness of the void—materialize before his eyes. It rolled toward him like a fog, obliterating stars, planets, sun, and moon until Timonides was engulfed in pure sweetness. He felt every fear and dread melt from his body as if his very flesh were dropping from his bones. He wept with joy.