"
When the worm could grow no more, it released chemicals that took over the cricket's brain. The chemicals turned the water-fearing cricket into a suicidal diver seeking puddles or streams. As soon as the cricket hit water, the horsehair worm tensed its strong muscles, ripping through the cricket's body wall, and twisted free, leaving the plundered vessel to sink and die." - David George Haskell
In the outskirts of Phrygian capital city, Gordium -- 333 BCE.
The undulating horizon gave way to a city in the distance. The horse in steady forward momentum, brought the walls arising from the dust. Bare olive bushes scattered about him, as his horse stamped closer to the city-limits amidst a dry expanse. A gust of sand whirled his traveller's robes in a daise as he disembarked near a weathered clay hut. The old man watched through permanent wrinkles, as the traveller drank from a lung, tilting it entirely vertical for the few remaining drops.
The traveller introduced himself as Alexandros, and brought news of fire and conquest from the Eastern miles behind him. The old man nodded wearily, his hardened ears tiring from many years of diced politics. It was news that rose and fell like sand dunes in the wind, each passing caravan spoke of monuments built and pyramids crumbled. The traveller sighed, and requested water. The old man gazed toward the village centre, where the dirt path lead towards an ancient well.
Only a few townsfolk rustled among the shacks which lined the dusty worn road. The city stretched the backdrop of the town, like a mountain range of plain buildings and tall spires; ever in the distance and opaque beneath the humid yellow air. Small beads of sweat rolled over his cheekbones and down his bearded jawline, as the traveller waited patiently for the old man to rise. With a hushed rasp, the old man spoke as slowly as he walked.
The city in the distance was the capital Gordium, and was named after it's King, Gordias. Violently he ruled the city, until two weeks prior; when King Gordias succumbed to madness with suicide.
It is told that the horse he feasted on was the finest raised in all of Macedonia. Bred as a war horse, his flesh was strong and lean, sustained by the blood of many battles and harvested upon the death of his rider; the famous Paladin, Attis. The horse was slaughtered, broiled and spiced for King Gordias's sixth wedding banquet. The new bride was young Cybele, sister to the slain Paladin Attis; both sharing the same golden maize hair and eyes a sorrowful blue.
"
With this rich wine, and proud meat, I toast to a thousand years of glory! May the Gods themselves be envious of my great metropolis, Gordium!" Roared the King at his marriage feast. The juices of the horse steak erupted in pulp red grease, as King Gordias's knife cut with greedy determination. His young bride sat to his left, with her head hung low, still in mourning of her handsome brother as the banquet hall cheered and bathed in clarimdous waterfalls of excess wine.
The madness came gradually, as if a seed in timid budding. For weeks, the king grinned gluttonously as he ate fat brahmen and exotic camel in celebration for his newest wife. He fucked her frantically with sweaty groans. Her agonized cries rippled throughout the merchant streets, as desperate blotches of ruby innocence dripped with each rising of the moon.
The traveller stopped and wiped his brows with his dusty robes. He looked up and squinted at the brazen sun. It was ceaselessly unforgiving in the shedding of its hazy swelter. The old man placed his leathery hands on the long bridge above the horse's muzzle. He felt the tired horse breath deeply, and calmly. The old man and the horse had travelled a great distance and their pulses beat in close rhythm.
The old man looked towards the well, and the city looming in the background. Both were closer now. The old man explained that Gordias was once a lithe and graceful young Prince. His dark locks as rich as his eager and youthful eyes. Prince Gordias's father was a just and firm king, who surrounded himself with a council of the wisest Philosophers. Prince Gordias feared his father during adolescence and rejected the idea of ruling in his place. He preferred to consume himself in the biology and astronomy taught by his guardian Philosopher, Diogenes of Sinope. He lost himself in the mystical folklore told by his mother, and proved worthy in athleticism, with a penchant for swift and intelligent tactics during wrestling. He laughed like a boy and learned like a scholar, he competed and grew tall as the wind lured in the rain and the sun rose humidly with every brisk cloud of locust.
The first fires erupted in the border villas of the far east. Messengers arrived bloody and exhausted with horror tales of skinning, rape and destruction. The council of Philosophers were at first sceptical and cautious with their attempts to grasp the situation. Tempered dialogue fell victim to heated debate as sunken, starving villagers from the eastern territories began to arrive in fleeing droves.