As Sure as the Dawn by Francine Rivers Read Free Book Online Page B

at him through her tears. “May God forgive you, for I cannot!” With one last look at the child, she fled, sobbing.
    Atretes strode over and watched her run down the steps and across the courtyard. He kicked the door shut before she reached the gate.
    Discomforted, he looked down at his son’s reddening face and felt a moment’s doubt. He touched the black hair and smooth cheek. The baby stiffened in his arms and screamed louder. “Scream all you want. You’re mine,” he said gruffly. “Not hers. You’re mine!” He held his son closer, rocking him and pacing the floor. The child didn’t cease crying.
    “Lagos!”
    The servant appeared almost immediately. “Yes, my lord.” Atretes wondered if he had been lurking around the corner, listening to every word.
    “Summon the wet nurse.”
    “Yes, my lord.” Lagos had never seen his master look ill at ease, but now, with a squalling baby in his arms, he looked almost comically devoid of confidence.
    When the servant brought the woman to the atrium, Atretes was all too eager to hand the wailing infant to her. “Take him. The woman said he’s hungry.” She took him from the chamber, and Atretes breathed a sigh of relief as the sound of his screaming son receded.
    Lagos saw the pouch of coins in the water. “She would not take them, my lord?”
    “Obviously not.”
    Lagos moved to fish the pouch out, but jerked his hand back quickly when Atretes barked at him, “Leave it!” The servant knew by the dark look on Atretes’ face as he turned and strode away that his master would spend the day in the gymnasium.

3
    A servant awakened Lagos late that night. “It’s Atretes’ son. The nurse is worried.” He rose groggily and followed the serving girl down the corridor. As he came nearer the kitchen he could hear the baby crying. He entered and saw the wet nurse pacing with a bundle in her arms.
    “He will not nurse,” she said, her face filled with anxiety.
    “What do you want me to do about it?” he retorted, testy from being awakened in the middle of night.
    “You must tell the master, Lagos.”
    “Oh no. Not I,” he said, shaking his head. “It’s enough that you’ve awakened me in the middle of the night. I won’t knowingly put my head in the lion’s mouth.” Yawning, he scratched his head. “The babe will nurse when he gets hungry enough.” He turned away.
    The baby was her responsibility now.
    “You don’t understand. He’s been crying since the master gave him to me!”
    Lagos paused in the doorway and turned around. “So long?”
    “Yes, and I tell you, I can feel him growing weaker in my arms. If he goes on like this, he could die.”
    “Then you had better do something!”
    “That’s what I’ve been telling you! I’ve done everything I know how to do. An infant this small needs milk.”
    “Has yours gone sour, woman?” he said angrily, knowing nothing of these matters. How was he going to tell the master the wet nurse was dry?
    Vexed, the woman responded testily. “There’s nothing wrong with my milk. He’s pining for his mother.”
    “Oh,” he said grimly. “His mother doesn’t want him.”
    “Pilia said she was waiting outside the gate.”
    “The woman who brought the child to Atretes is not his mother,” he said, having overheard the conversation in the atrium. “And the master wants her to have nothing to do with the child.”
    “Oh,” she said and then gave a sad sigh. She placed the baby in a box-bed near the cookfire. “Then perhaps it’s the will of the gods that he die. A pity. He’s beautiful.”
    Lagos felt a cold chill. “Do you mean to leave him there?”
    “I’ve done everything I can.”
    Considering the efforts and risks Atretes had taken to reclaim his son, Lagos doubted he would accept the babe’s death in so calm a manner. “I’ll tell the master of the situation as soon as he awakens. As for you, woman, if you value your life, I suggest in earnest that you keep trying to get that baby to