FOR GUY, EMMA,
JEREMY, KATE AND TOM
Contents
BOOK ONE
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
BOOK TWO
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
BOOK THREE
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
BOOK FOUR
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
Chapter Forty-Four
Chapter Forty-Five
Chapter Forty-Six
Chapter Forty-Seven
Chapter Forty-Eight
book
ONE
Prologue
ON ITHACA
Penelope, queen of Ithaca, stood tall and stiff, staring at the door to the great hall. The muffled sound of voices came from behind its thick wooden panels, punctuated with frequent bursts of laughter. She knew they were waiting for her – to tell her news of the war that had reached its tenth year, and of her husband, Odysseus, whom she had not seen in all that time – but still she hesitated.
‘Should I go now, Mother?’ asked the boy at her side, whose auburn hair she was twisting nervously with her slender fingers. ‘I know children aren’t allowed in the Kerosia.’
‘This isn’t a gathering of the council, Telemachus,’ she replied, looking down at her son and smiling. ‘It’s a private audience with the men who arrived today. They have news for me, and I have questions for them.’
‘Then is it true they’re Ithacans, back from Troy?’
Telemachus looked at his mother and she caught a sudden glimpse of Odysseus in his clever green eyes. It made her catch her breath and the only way she could prevent the swell of tears was to avert her gaze to the gloomy, torch-lit corridor that led back into the palace. At ten years old, her son had inherited little or nothing of his father’s short-legged, triangular bulk. Instead, he was already showing signs of his mother’s height and lean build, as well as her dark, intelligent looks. But his eyes came from his father, and from time to time he would give her a shrewd look or cunning glance that brought memories of Odysseus into painful focus.
After a moment, she looked back at her son and nodded.
‘Yes. Eurybates is your father’s squire and Arceisius is a member of the royal guard.’
Telemachus’s face flushed and his eyebrows puckered angrily.
‘Why send a squire? Couldn’t he have come himself?’
‘No, my dear. His duty is to stay with the army until they defeat the Trojans and win Helen back from the man who took her. Besides, even if he could leave his men I don’t think he would.’
‘But why?’
Penelope looked at Telemachus and there was a deep sadness in her eyes.
‘Because he would never be able to go back. Now, come with me. I want Arceisius and Eurybates to see you with their own eyes, so they can let your father know what a strong and handsome son he has waiting for him at home.’
She pushed the door open and together they walked into the great hall. A fire burned brightly at its centre, casting a vigorous orange glow that fought against the encroaching shadows of night. Its light revealed colourful murals flowing across the white plaster walls, depicting figures of gods and men embroiled in acts of war and violence. Though each wall told a different story, they seemed to move effortlessly into each other, as if the struggles between gods and Titans, and the battles of men against each other, were but one continuous tale. Smoke from the fire coiled up between the four pillars that supported the high ceiling, while around the burning hearth were five chairs, four of which were occupied.
The men stood as Penelope entered.
‘Be seated, my friends,’ she ordered, circling the hearth towards the fur-draped chair that had been left for her.
They waited for her to sit before lowering themselves into their own chairs. Last of all, Telemachus settled on to a fleece at his mother’s feet, his inquisitive eyes roaming the faces of the men as he leaned his cheek against her knee. Penelope laid a hand on his head, drawing comfort from the softness of his hair as she, too, looked at the seated figures.
To her left was Mentor. His handsome face had a natural authority to it and his muscular physique would have marked him as a warrior, were it not for the leather-cased stump of his missing right hand. There was a warm smile on his bearded lips, but Penelope could sense the concern behind it. Mentor was her chief adviser and the closest thing she had to a friend, ever since Odysseus had sailed to Troy. He knew her calm exterior was a façade, hiding the anxieties and uncertainties that were suddenly teeming within her after the arrival of the ships from Ilium. She may have fooled others with her display of regal restraint – bottling herself up in the palace and refusing to follow the crowds down to the harbour to hear the news from Troy – but not Mentor.
Halitherses was to her right, his ageing bulk so tightly packed into the high-backed chair that it seemed the arms would snap off at any moment. He was a veteran soldier and had been a longstanding captain of the royal guard, though his mounting years and the scars of his many battles had prevented him from sailing with Odysseus to Troy. Instead, the king had given him joint stewardship of Ithaca, along with Mentor, to keep the island and its people safe in his absence. And they had not failed him, though the threats to the small kingdom were ever-present and growing. Over the years they had repulsed a handful of raids from the mainland, where groups of armed brigands were filtering down from the north and the rule of law was faltering in the absence of the Greek kings. And then there was the internal menace of Ithaca’s own nobles, whose increasingly audacious demands were voiced through the wealthy and treacherous Eupeithes. Odysseus had bought Eupeithes’s loyalty many years before with a place on the Kerosia, but neither Halitherses nor Mentor trusted him. Fortunately, the people were loyal to their king and the fear of Odysseus’s return kept Eupeithes and his followers in check. For now.
Penelope’s gaze turned to the other two men. She had already been informed of their names, of course, but could barely equate the battle-hardened warriors before her with the youths she had once known and had watched sail off to war. Eurybates, seated next to Halitherses, was an exceptional sailor who had been keen to make the voyage to Ilium and exact revenge from the Trojans for stealing Helen, the pride of the Greeks. Now, as he sat before her, his short body looked as hard as if it had been carved from rock, and his curly hair was grown long and had been drawn back into a tail behind his neck. His eyes were tough and uncompromising, though as they rested on his queen for the first time in many years there was a noticeable softness in them.
The other man, Arceisius, she had first known as a young shepherd boy with ruddy cheeks and a roguish grin. His father had been murdered by Taphian pirates, so Eperitus – Odysseus’s captain – had taken him under his wing to teach him the profession of war, eventually taking him with him to Troy. Now he was a man, scarred and deeply sunburnt, with eyes that had grown sharp from watching foreign horizons and witnessing horrors that no boy’s mind could survive. And yet his cheeks were still red and, unlike Eurybates, there was a light in his eyes that had survived the cruelty of war. It was like the glimmer of gold at the bottom of a pool, that still spoke of happiness and memories of music and dancing, and of young girls in the long grass of Ithaca’s meadows. It was then she noticed the garland round his neck and the petals in his hair, from the welcome the ships’ crews had received that morning. The sight brought a smile to Penelope’s lips.
‘Welcome back, Arceisius. Welcome back, Eurybates. I hope your journey wasn’t too perilous.’
‘Not nearly as perilous as being home again,’ Eurybates replied, looking around at the walls. ‘I didn’t realize how much I’d missed Ithaca, and the gods only know how we’ll bring ourselves to leave again and return to that forsaken country!’
‘We’ll do it because we’re loyal soldiers, sworn to obey Odysseus,’ Arceisius answered.
‘Aye, we will,’ Eurybates conceded with a nod. ‘But there’s not another man in this world that I’d do it for.’
‘Your words reveal more than the depth of your love for my husband,’ Penelope said. ‘The war, it seems, is not going well.’
‘Not going well, my lady?’ Eurybates replied. ‘That’s the problem – it’s not going anywhere at all!’
‘And you will tell us all about it,’ Penelope interrupted. ‘Every detail of everything that has happened since the last galleys were sent back five years ago. But I’m being a poor hostess. First we will eat; meat and wine will raise your spirits, and then you can tell us about the war and my husband’s part in it.’
She nodded to Mentor, who snapped his fingers behind his ear and brought a servant scurrying out of the shadows. A moment later the steward was running from the hall with his orders, to return a short while afterwards followed by a stream of slaves carrying tables, platters of food and kraters of wine. After washing her hands, Penelope led the libations to the gods by stepping up to the hearth and tipping a slop of wine into the flames. The others followed, muttering thanks to the Olympians as the liquid hissed and sent a puff of steam up into their faces. The rest of the meal was silent as the men helped themselves to strips of roast goat, which they picked up and wrapped in thin saucers of bread before washing it down with mouthfuls of wine, constantly replenished by the waiting slaves. Penelope ate very little, and that only out of politeness, as she watched the faces of her guests. Eurybates quickly lost his surliness as he forgot the war in the taste of Ithacan wine, while Arceisius was enjoying the flirtations of Melantho, the prettiest of the servant girls, who would brush seductively across him every time she refilled his krater and bat her long, dark eyelashes at him. They were men who had seen much hardship, but she could only envy them their trials because at least they had endured them alongside her husband. Indeed, the nearness of the two men – whose arrival had been totally unexpected – gave her a renewed sense of Odysseus, almost as if he were here with them, standing unseen in the shadows. Had they not spent the last ten years with him, listening to his soft voice, witnessing his feats on the battlefield and enjoying the embellishments he would add as they sat around the campfire later? For all the loss of their youth and naïvety, for all their hatred of the thought of returning to Troy, they had still not suffered as much as she had. She reached for Telemachus’s head again and was comforted by the touch of his hair beneath her fingertips.
‘Enough of this silence,’ Halitherses announced, his impatience finally getting the better of him. ‘Speak to us about this damned war. What in Ares’s name is taking Agamemnon so long? Doesn’t he have the greatest of all the Greeks in his army? What about that great oaf, Ajax, and Diomedes, and all those others? Why isn’t Menelaus tearing the walls down with his own hands? After all, Helen’s his wife and he should be leading the way. And what of Achilles? He’s the one they all had their hopes on, isn’t he?’
As Halitherses vented his frustration – built up by years of relative inaction at home – Mentor glanced at Penelope, then held his hand up to silence the old warrior.
‘What about Odysseus? I’d rather hear about our own king first.’
‘Thank you for your concern, Mentor.’ Penelope smiled. ‘As ever, you know where my heart is. But everything in its right place: first Eurybates can tell us about the war, leaving nothing out; and then, if Melantho can leave him alone, perhaps Arceisius will tell us about my husband.’
There was a pause in which the servants trooped out of the hall or faded back beyond the circle of firelight. Eurybates waited until the last sandals had stopped scuffing across the stone floor, then leaned across the arm of his chair and focused not on Penelope, but on the boy who had remained seated in obedient silence at her feet.
‘You must be Telemachus,’ he began.
Telemachus nodded.
‘Yes, now that I look at you I can see you have your father’s eyes,’ Eurybates continued. ‘I was there when he dedicated you to Athena on Hermes’s Mount, when you were just a few days old. He was so proud of you, Telemachus.’
‘Then why did he go?’
Eurybates’s eyes flicked up to meet Penelope’s. The queen nodded.
‘He left because he had to. He’s a king and no man bears more responsibility than a king – to his family, to his people and to his gods, but most of all to his gods. And, as you must already know, Odysseus was bound by a most sacred oath . . .’
Telemachus knew all about his father’s oath, of course – to protect Helen, queen of Sparta, which had been taken by all her suitors – and of all the things that happened because of it. But children love stories, especially when those stories involve themselves and the people close to them, and so he listened intently as Eurybates recounted how Helen had been abducted by Paris, a Trojan prince, while he was a guest in Menelaus’s palace. Supported by his brother, the powerful and ambitious King Agamemnon, Menelaus had called on the oath-takers to honour their promise. A great fleet was assembled and set sail for Troy, where, with Agamemnon as their elected leader, they laid siege to the city, intent on razing it to the ground and reclaiming Helen for Menelaus.
But the auspices had not been good from the outset. For one thing, Troy was not some poor city that would fall at the first attempt. Its walls were thick, high and strong, constructed by the gods and protected by all manner of prophecies. It was also a rich and powerful city and King Priam, Paris’s father, could call on vast, experienced armies of allies from far and wide. Indeed, after the Greeks’ first attempt to draw the Trojans out of their walls had failed, Troy’s allies had arrived in droves and under the leadership of Prince Hector had forced Agamemnon to make camp on the coast, a safe distance away to the south-west. Since then, countless battles had raged across the hills and plains between the camp and the city, killing and maiming thousands of men for little or no advantage to either side. Every strategy that Agamemnon tried, every ruse that Odysseus had thought up to defeat the Trojans, had been frustrated by Hector’s uncanny ability to anticipate their every move. In the end, Eurybates explained with a sigh, the Greeks were too numerous to be pushed back into the sea, while the Trojans always had the safety of their impenetrable walls to fall back on. And so the years had passed, filled with slaughter from spring until autumn, pausing during the cold misery of winter, and then resuming again with the first flowers of spring.
‘And now that spring has returned, the sacrifices of previous years need to be replaced,’ Penelope said, ‘hence your journey back to Ithaca with skeleton crews.’
Arceisius nodded. ‘Things have got bad. The longer the war goes on, the more bitter and brutal it gets. We used to be able to exchange our prisoners with the Trojans, but that was when both sides still had a sense of honour. Now most are murdered, unless they’re rich enough to fetch a ransom. The toll of war is growing and Odysseus hasn’t enough wealth to attract mercenaries to replace our dead – not when the other kings will offer them more. So we need to take as many men back with us as we can fit. The king wants them to be picked in equal proportion from the nobility and the peasantry.’
Penelope sighed. ‘There are problems with that.’
‘Yes,’ Mentor agreed. ‘Bandit raids from the mainland are becoming more common, and some of our own nobles are starting to show signs of disloyalty, especially with Odysseus having been away so long. We have to keep a standing force of soldiers.’
‘Nonetheless, Odysseus will have his men,’ Halitherses countered. ‘We can take care of the problems here; just let us know how many the king needs.’
‘The problem isn’t how many men we can provide,’ Penelope said, sitting upright and looking at her two advisers. ‘It’s with whom we send.’
The others looked at her, not understanding.
‘What do you mean, my lady?’ Eurybates asked.
‘I mean there are certain nobles who are not happy about sending their sons and heirs to Troy. They know why you’re here, of course, and they want to be allowed to send proxies in place of their own sons – in other words, pay another man to go to war instead.’
Halitherses snorted derisively.
‘Well, they can’t. In fact, I’ve a good mind to send the sons of the most troublesome nobles first.’
‘Perhaps that’s what they fear,’ Penelope replied. ‘Either way, Eupeithes approached me earlier today pleading their case. He says the nobles are angry and if their sons are chosen we could have a rebellion on our hands, but if we agree to allow paid proxies he might be able to calm things down again.’
‘How dare they!’ Halitherses exclaimed.
The others exchanged worried glances.
‘So I agreed.’
‘But my lady—’
‘No, Mentor. It’s too late. I’ve asked Eupeithes to tell the nobles I accept their proposal. The war in Troy can’t last much longer, and I won’t risk a rebellion on Ithaca while Odysseus is away. That has happened before, remember?’
Mentor nodded, followed by Arceisius and Eurybates as each one accepted the wisdom of her decision. At first Halitherses stared at the queen with a blank look on his face. Then a smile broke through his grey beard as he recalled the oracle that had been given to Odysseus before he had married Penelope.
‘ “Find a daughter of Lacedaemon”,’ he quoted, laughing to himself, ‘ “and she will keep the thieves from your house.” Now, more than ever, I understand the words of that old prophecy. Odysseus would be proud of you, my lady.’
‘He should be,’ Penelope replied. ‘Just as I am proud of him. And now, Arceisius, you can tell me about my husband, and Telemachus here about his father. Ten years is a long time to be apart, and yet he’s never far from my thoughts. He feels like a shadow, something ever present and yet insubstantial, always just beyond my reach.’
She sat back and shook her head, knowing her words had failed to express how she felt. And then she looked directly at Arceisius, silently awaiting his response.
‘He made me memorize a few words, my lady,’ he said. ‘I can’t match his voice or speak with his eloquence, but he said to tell you this: that the Walls of Troy will not outlast his love for you. An oracle led him to you, and though all the oceans of the world and Hades itself might lie between, he will come back to you.’
Chapter One
LYRNESSUS
Eperitus licked his pale lips, feeling the old lines where they had cracked again and again under a ruthless foreign sun. Ten years of that same sun had given his skin a leathery texture so that when he smiled, which was not often, his teeth were white against his deeply tanned face. With his braided beard and long black hair – combed tightly back and tied behind his neck – he looked more like a savage than the handsome man he had once been. And perhaps he was a savage, for the only trade he had ever known was fighting and there was little humanity in war.
His thoughtful brown eyes, red around the rims and creased at the corners, were fixed on the ridge ahead, waiting patiently for the next battle to begin. The accoutrements of his profession had been strapped and buckled into place long before dawn, each item as familiar and comfortable as if they were parts of his body. On his head was the same bronze cap he had worn since before his exile from Alybas twenty years before. Its battered cheek-guards were tied under his chin by leather cords, which he had tucked into his dirty woollen scarf to prevent them becoming untied in battle. Over his patched thigh-length tunic – once a vivid scarlet but now faded to a watery pink – was a close-fitting, oxhide corslet that bore the scars of countless hand-to-hand combats. Bronze greaves tied about cloth gaiters protected his shins, while hanging from a strap across his shoulder was his grandfather’s old shield. This was almost as tall as Eperitus himself and was shaped like two overlapping, convex circles – the broader at the bottom and the smaller on top – with a raised wooden crest running down the centre. Though the shield’s four-fold leather had been hacked and pierced innumerable times, and it was of an old and cumbersome style that had long since faded from battlefields, Eperitus refused to replace it, considering it as much a part of himself as his own name.
While his shabby collection of armour had saved him from the spear points and sword blades of countless enemies over the years, it was his weapons that were the tools of his trade. Tucked into his belt was the ornate golden dagger King Odysseus had given him as a token of friendship when they had first met. In a plain leather scabbard under his left arm was his double-edged sword, slung at a height where its silver-studded ivory handle could be found and drawn with ease. Finally, in his right hand was his primary weapon, a tall Trojan spear which he had plundered from its dead owner during a skirmish the previous summer, his own having been launched at a horseman whose mount had then fled, carrying its impaled rider and Eperitus’s spear with it. Without these heavy and brutal weapons he was not a warrior, and if he was not a warrior then he was nothing, a mere mortal without reputation or honour who would one day perish and be forgotten.
To Eperitus’s right stood Odysseus, king of Ithaca, the man he had followed to this sun-baked, mosquito-infested and scorpion-plagued country. With his short legs, heavily muscled torso and large head – almost devoid of a neck – Odysseus could never be considered a fine-looking man. His long red hair was tied behind his neck and his thick beard, flecked with grey, reached down to his chest. Like Eperitus, there was a tang of fresh sweat about him, mingled with the odour of wood smoke and roast mutton. His breastplate and shield were battered and dusty, while his bronze helmet with its nodding plume of black horsehair had been dented in so many places that its surface rippled in the early morning sunshine. Over his shoulders he wore the thick double-cloak his wife had given him at their parting ten years before. It was threadbare and heavily patched, and the purple wool had faded to a silvery grey at the shoulders, but he would no more replace it than Eperitus would his grandfather’s shield. It was all he had left of his beloved Penelope, whose vivid intelligence and bright company he still missed with all his heart, even though her beautiful face was little more than a memory now.
But if Odysseus’s appearance was undistinguished and beggarly compared to the other kings who had flocked to Troy, the fact that he was of high birth was unmistakeable. His intelligent green eyes – full of a ready humour – were stiffened by an iron will; his face appeared kind and approachable at most times, but there was an authority lying just beneath the surface that no man would dare cross lightly. More than anything, though, Odysseus’s power was in his voice. When he spoke, men listened. He could still a room with a simple sentence and sway even the most adverse opponents with his smooth tones and well-reasoned arguments. There was no other man in the whole Greek army – neither the great Achilles nor the noble Diomedes, the kind-hearted Menelaus nor the fearsome Great Ajax – Eperitus would rather serve.
Standing a little behind the two men was the Ithacan army, arrayed in six ranks of a hundred men each. There was a low murmur of conversation as they waited with bored patience for the order to advance. They had stood there since the first light of dawn, after beaching their ships on the sandy coastline and marching up to the low line of hills that hid the city of Lyrnessus, but they did not complain as their spears and oxhide shields grew heavy in their hands. They had endured much in the past ten years and were no longer the mixture of inexperienced farmers and fishermen who had first answered their king’s call to arms. Now they were true warriors, hardened by the long years of fighting that had sifted the weak from the strong. Only those with an instinct for warfare and a fierce anger in battle had survived; the remainder had been killed long ago, their souls conducted to the underworld by Hermes, the shepherd of the dead.
In the front rank were the men of the royal guard. These were the heavily armed elite who had once formed Ithaca’s standing army in the days before the war. Well trained and highly motivated, with a fearless devotion to their king, they were the pride of the Ithacan army. Unlike the scavenged weaponry of the levied masses behind them, each guard was equipped with greaves, a plumed bronze helmet with cheek-guards, a breastplate and an oval shield with a flattened bottom edge and a bronze boss. Swords hung from their sides and long daggers were tucked into their belts, while their main weapons were the two spears that each man carried. The guards were the first in every attack and the last in any retreat, a perilous duty that had taken its toll over the years but which they carried out with unquestioning loyalty. Their losses were filled by the bravest men from the rest of the army – those who had proved their courage, skill and thirst for glory during the numerous battles with Troy and her allies.
Odysseus had selected the best warriors from the royal guard to head the assault on Lyrnessus. Each was in charge of ten men with a tall, well-built ladder between them; twenty ladders in total. They would march to the city concealed among the ranks of the other Ithacans, then dash out to the walls, place their ladders and begin climbing. The first up, Odysseus had insisted as he explained the assault to the men of the guard, would be the leader of each group – a dangerous job, especially if the walls were well defended, but one which would bring glory in the eyes of men and gods alike. As he had expected, his words were greeted with a chorus of demands to lead. The loudest were from Polites, who, though normally a quiet man, had a voice to match his giant-like physique when he wanted to be heard, and from Antiphus, the best archer in the army and one of its longest-serving veterans. These two were stood in the centre of the front rank now, the heads of their ladders resting against their calf muscles as they waited with calm indifference for the day’s action to begin.
On either side of the Ithacans were the armies of Argos and Phthia: the ranks of the Argives to their left, four thousand men massed behind the tall and handsome King Diomedes, with Sthenelaus and Euryalus at his side; and the black-clad Myrmidons from Achilles’s homeland of Phthia to their right, three thousand of the fiercest and most ruthless warriors in the whole Greek army, formed up behind the stout and hardy figure of Peisandros. Like their Ithacan comrades, both armies were a mixture of irregularly equipped levies fronted by a core of hardened warriors. Large numbers of ladders had been evenly distributed through their ranks, ready for the assault. Standing behind them were the archers of Locris, two thousand men led by the short and angry figure of Little Ajax. These carried no shields and wore only leather caps and jerkins of layered cloth for protection, placing their trust in the wall of infantry before them and the long range of their bows and slings.
In the rearmost ranks of each army stood men carrying tall, bronze-tipped pikes, normally used for ship-to-ship fighting because of their long reach. From the upper third of each pole a canvas banner streamed forward in the breeze from the sea, fluttering and snapping over the heads of the men below. The flags had been Odysseus’s idea earlier in the war, to help warriors find their units in the dust and clamour of battle and for other commanders to identify where their allies were amidst the chaos. Each army had its own symbol. For the Ithacans it was a blue dolphin, while the Locrians’ banner carried the device of a coiled brown serpent, in honour of the snake that Little Ajax wore around his shoulders at all times. Diomedes’s Argives fought beneath a golden fox on a green field, which was now torn and filled with arrow holes from always being at the forefront of battle. In even worse condition was the banner of the Myrmidons, the tattered remains of which featured an eagle with a serpent in its beak.
The four armies had been chosen by Achilles, who had insisted on leading the attacks against Lyrnessus, Adramyttium and Thebe, the cities that guarded Troy’s supply route from the lands of Mysia and Lydia in the south. Knowing there was none better who could give him the victory he so desperately needed, Agamemnon had agreed to Achilles’s demand. Not that the King of Men expected either city to present a problem. The walls, gates and ditches that protected them were nothing compared to the god-built battlements that had defended Troy for so long. Most significantly, the once powerful garrisons that had deterred earlier attacks had been slowly stripped of their best men to feed the battles around Troy, company after company marching away until all that remained were local militias made up of old greybeards and men wounded in the war – no match for a force of nearly ten thousand Greeks.
‘I can hear horses,’ Eperitus announced quietly. ‘Three of them, approaching fast.’
His senses had been supernaturally sharp ever since he had been brought back from death by Athena nearly twenty years before, and he was easily able to filter out the murmur of the soldiers behind him to focus on the heavy galloping of hooves from the other side of the ridge. Odysseus could hear nothing beyond the hubbub of voices, but he trusted his friend’s ears and gave him an assured nod.
‘It’ll be Achilles, with Patroclus and Antilochus,’ he said. ‘And about time too.’
A few moments later the thudding beat was heard by every ear, and then with a whinnying neigh and a barked command three horsemen appeared in silhouette at the top of the ridge, surrounded by a billow of dust. The riders paused for a moment to survey the massed ranks below them, then with a shout of ‘Hah! Hah!’ the first drove his horse straight down the slope towards Odysseus, followed closely by his companions.
‘What news, Achilles?’ Odysseus called, striding out to meet the riders with his hands raised.
Achilles pulled his horse’s head aside with the reins and leapt from the animal’s back, landing lightly a few paces in front of the king of Ithaca. He swept his black cloak back over his shoulder to reveal a well-made bronze breastplate and a sword, hanging from a baldric at his side. He carried no shield or spear and his head was helmetless, so that his long blond hair shone in the sunlight as he offered Odysseus his hand.
‘Good news, my friend,’ he answered, his handsome face breaking into a confident smile as Odysseus gripped his wrist. ‘This little fight isn’t going to be as dull as I first thought. The gods have given us the chance of some real glory!’
‘What do you mean?’ Odysseus asked. ‘Has the garrison returned since Diomedes and I were here a few days ago?’
‘Lyrnessus won’t be a problem,’ one of the other riders announced, trotting up behind Achilles. Patroclus slid from his mount with an easy motion and stared down his long, pointed nose at Odysseus and Eperitus. ‘The battlements are no higher than two tall men and there’s only one tower, guarding the southern gateway – just as you reported. As for defenders, I didn’t count any more than five men on the walls in total. It’ll be a disappointing way to start the year’s fighting, I’m afraid, after such a long and tiresome winter.’
‘To Hades with Lyrnessus!’ Achilles exclaimed. He draped a tightly muscled arm over Patroclus’s shoulder and leaned his weight against his companion’s tall and sinewy frame. ‘We found something much more interesting than that pile of rubble. We found Aeneas!’
‘Aeneas?’ Eperitus asked, surprised to hear the name of one of Troy’s finest warriors. ‘What’s he doing this far from Troy?’
‘He didn’t give me the chance to ask,’ Achilles said, slipping his arm from Patroclus and pacing the ground before the two Ithacans. ‘We’d almost scouted the full circuit of the walls when we saw half a dozen horsemen coming over the ridge to the north of here. They could hardly have missed ten thousand Greeks waiting on the other side of the hills, so I gave Patroclus and Antilochus here a look and didn’t find them wanting.’
He nodded at the third rider, a long-faced youth with cold, grey eyes who was still growing his first beard. Antilochus was the son of Nestor, one of Agamemnon’s closest advisers, and had arrived at the Greek camp just a few days before, contrary to his father’s wishes. Impressed by the lad’s eagerness to fight, Achilles had persuaded Nestor to let him stay, on the promise that he would shepherd the lad through his first battle.
‘We weren’t going to let them reach the city alive,’ Achilles continued. ‘And that was when I recognized Aeneas – and he recognized me. I dug my heels in and set off after him at a gallop, and even with the head start he had he’d never have outrun Xanthus if he hadn’t ordered his escort against us. By the time we’d fought our way through them Aeneas was safely inside the city walls. Safe for now, at least.’
Odysseus stroked his beard and looked up at the line of hills, in the direction of Lyrnessus.
‘I don’t like it,’ he muttered, as if to himself. ‘Eperitus is right – what business would Aeneas have out here?’
‘Who cares?’ Achilles said dismissively. ‘The point is we have one of their best fighters bottled up in that city, and before the day’s done I’ll send his cowardly soul down to Hades.’
As he was speaking, Diomedes and Little Ajax appeared at Eperitus’s left shoulder. The Argive king was a tall, muscular figure, dressed in armour that befitted his wealth. He removed the gleaming bronze helmet from his head to reveal long auburn hair and a stern but handsome face, the only blemish on which was the faint trace of a white scar running down from the tip of his left ear and into his thick beard. Little Ajax, on the other hand, was a short, spiteful-looking man with a flat nose and pockmarked cheeks. A long brown snake was draped over his shoulders, its triangular head raised and its pink tongue slithering out from its lipless mouth, sending a shiver of disgust through Eperitus. Ajax’s dark eyes frowned up at Achilles from beneath his single eyebrow.
‘What’s the delay?’ he demanded. ‘I’ve been waiting all winter to kill some Trojan scum and my spear arm’s getting restless.’
‘The itching of your spear arm is nothing compared to the suffering of Helen,’ Diomedes rebuffed him. ‘If the fall of this city brings her freedom a step closer, then let’s get on with it. Zeus only knows what she’s gone through as a prisoner of Troy, kept from her husband and children and forced to endure the lustful attentions of Paris every night.’
‘Forced?’ Ajax scoffed. ‘That trollop wanted Paris between her thighs from the first moment she—’
He fell silent as the point of Diomedes’s dagger pressed against his throat.
‘If you say another word against the queen of Sparta, it’ll be your last,’ he warned.
Ajax met the cold stare of the Argive king with equal menace, but said nothing.
‘We’ve delayed long enough,’ Achilles said, taking Diomedes’s wrist and easing the blade away from Ajax’s neck. ‘The attack will begin immediately – unless Odysseus has any more misgivings?’
Odysseus shook his head.
‘Same plan as before?’ Diomedes asked, sliding his dagger back into his belt.
Achilles nodded, looking over his shoulder at the ridge. ‘The Argives and Ithacans will scale the western walls while my Myrmidons will take the southern gate. Ajax’s Locrians can hang back and shoot any Trojan who dares show his head above the battlements. There’s still the ditch, but the walls behind it are low and we have the ladders. Even if they’re alerted to our presence, nothing can stop Lyrnessus from being ours by midday.’
Without another word he turned and held his hand out to Xanthus. The horse answered his call immediately and soon Achilles, Patroclus and Antilochus were riding to join Peisandros at the head of the Myrmidon line. As Diomedes and Little Ajax returned to their own armies, Odysseus arched his eyebrows and turned to his captain.
‘I don’t like this, Eperitus. The Trojans have outwitted us too many times over the years, and if Aeneas is here then that spells trouble. He’s one of the best commanders they have – Hector wouldn’t send him down here without a very good reason.’
‘We can hardly turn around and get back in the ships now,’ Eperitus answered. ‘We’ll just have to climb the walls and see what’s inside.’
Odysseus smiled back at him. ‘You’re right, of course, and we might as well enjoy ourselves while we’re at it. Give the order.’
Eperitus turned on his heel and looked at the expectant faces of the Ithacan soldiers.
‘Shields ready. Pick up the ladders.’
Similar orders were barked out up and down the Greek lines, followed by a flurry of movement as shields were taken up, ladders lifted and spears readied. Achilles received his spear and shield from two of his men and moved to the head of the Myrmidon army. Raising the spear above his head, he pointed it towards the line of hills. There was a great cheer from the whole Greek assembly and the Myrmidons began to move.
Eperitus instinctively kissed his fingertips and placed them against the image of a white deer on the inside of his shield. He had painted it there to remind him of his daughter, Iphigenia, and though it was grimed and faded where he had repeatedly touched it for luck he felt reassured by its presence. Odysseus discreetly touched the image of Athena painted on the inside of his own shield, then, after a glance at Eperitus, turned to the ranks of Ithacans and waved them forward.
The long lines of warriors advanced with a steady tramp, the Myrmidons, Ithacans and Argives in the lead with the Locrians forming a wide arc behind them. At first the bronze of their helmets and shield bosses shone fiercely in the sunlight, but as they marched slowly up the hillside the dust raised by their thousands of feet shrouded them in a brown cloud that dulled the glimmer of their weaponry. Soon they were topping the crest of the ridge and looking out over a fertile, lightly wooded plain, dominated by a low hill at its centre. On top of the hill was a walled city, its sand-coloured battlements no higher than the scattering of windswept olive trees that surrounded it. A few two-storeyed buildings stood up above the level of the weathered parapets, but the only tower was at the southern end of the fortifications, guarding an arched gateway from which a narrow track wound down to the level of the plain. Here it met the main route from the city of Troy to its southern provinces, but as the ten thousand Greeks filed out across the western edge of the plateau, not a single traveller could be seen up or down the length of the road.
A handful of sentinels stared silently out from behind the walls of Lyrnessus and a low horn call vibrated out across the plain to greet the newcomers, but no reinforcements hastened to join their colleagues on the battlements. Instead, the sombre noise was followed by a silence, which was quickly devoured by the clanking of the Greek army as it spread across the plain like pitch spilled from a bucket, file after file marching relentlessly towards their objective. Soon the soldiers of Argos and Ithaca were in place at the western foot of the hill, a bowshot from the walls, while the Myrmidons straddled the road to the south, facing the gate. The Locrian archers formed a wide crescent behind them, where they began standing their arrows point-down in the grass, ready to be fitted to their bowstrings and fired at any enemy that dared show themselves above the parapets. As the dust cloud the Greek host had raised was carried forward on a gentle breeze to veil the walls of Lyrnessus, Odysseus looked left to where Diomedes stood at the head of his Argives. Diomedes raised his arm and nodded. In response, Odysseus looked right to Achilles and raised his own arm.
‘Ladders at the ready,’ Eperitus called out behind him, all the time keeping his eyes on the distant, golden-haired figure of Achilles.
Achilles dismounted and gave the reins to one of his men, who in return handed him a bright helmet with a black plume and a visor shaped in the likeness of a grimacing face. Achilles was the only warrior who wore such a helmet, designed not for additional protection but to distinguish him on the battlefield, his reputation being such that the mere sight of the helmet filled his opponents with terror. As the soldier led the prince’s horse away, Achilles put the helmet on his head and lowered the hinged visor into place, while Patroclus stood before him and tied the leather thongs beneath his chin. With all eyes watching him, Achilles took up his shield and raised his huge spear above his head. A moment later, the point fell and the Greeks gave a great shout, their voices rebounding from the city walls.
Chapter Two
STORMING THE WALLS
Odysseus did not cheer. Gritting his teeth behind sealed lips, he waved the Ithacan ladder parties forward. The scrambling of leather sandals on hard earth was followed by the sharp smell of sweat and the sound of cursing as the men ran past him, dashing quickly up the long, stony slope towards Lyrnessus. At their head were the groups led by Antiphus and Polites, the former with his bow slung across his back and the latter striding forward as if he would smash down the walls with his bare fists.
‘Something’s wrong,’ Odysseus said in a low voice as he watched the advance on the walls. ‘There’s not one man on the battlements. Even the soldiers we saw earlier have gone.’
‘They’ve probably thrown away their armour and are cowering in a temple somewhere, hoping their gods will protect them,’ Eperitus replied.
Odysseus shook his head. ‘If we’ve learned anything from this war, it’s that Trojans aren’t cowards. Some of them should be up there at least, trying to save their families from slavery or death. I think they’re not on the walls for a reason – either they’re expecting help from outside, or they’ve a better defence than we’re guessing. Eperitus, go and warn Ajax to keep a close eye on those hills to the north; I’m going to take the army closer in to the walls before—’
At that moment, as the ladder parties were nearing the ditch, a man climbed up on to the battlements and looked down in haughty defiance at the crawling mass of Greeks before the city. That his dark eyes and large, hooked nose belonged to Trojan nobility – if not royalty – was beyond doubt, and every Greek who looked up at his bearded face sensed that his appearance meant an end to their hopes of an easy victory. The man was tall and strong with enormous shoulders and huge fists that hung at his sides, big enough to kill a man with a single punch. As if to prove the point, though he wore a splendid breastplate of bronze scales and a massive helmet with a green plume, he carried no weapon. Instead, he raised a palm towards the advancing foes and called out in a loud voice:
‘Enemies of Troy, go back to your ships. Nothing but death awaits you here. Go back to your ships and sail home to Greece, before the vengeance of Apollo falls upon you. King Sarpedon of the Lycians has spoken.’
‘Told you,’ Odysseus said, arching his eyebrows knowingly at Eperitus. ‘The whole city must be filled with Lycians, just waiting for us to come and throw ourselves on to their spears. Aeneas is in there too, don’t forget, and I’ll stake my kingdom there’s a host of Dardanians with him.’
‘Then Hector must have guessed we’d try to take Lyrnessus,’ Eperitus said, watching the men with the ladders, who had halted their advance and were looking up at the walls as if death would sweep down on them from the battlements at any moment. ‘Either that or the information that the garrison had been stripped was false and we’ve been lured into a trap.’
‘It wouldn’t be the first time they’ve outwitted us,’ Odysseus replied. ‘And yet our spies told us Aeneas was inside Troy only the day before yesterday. If that’s true then he was sent here on purpose – and that means Hector must have known we were coming.’
As he spoke, Sarpedon stepped back down so that only the upper half of his body remained visible behind the stone parapet. A moment of quiet followed in which the ranks of Argives, Ithacans and Myrmidons shifted restlessly, while some of the Locrians fitted arrows and half drew their bowstrings in readiness. Then a slow, mocking laugh broke the silence. Eperitus looked around to see who among the Greeks could draw amusement from the shock of Sarpedon’s presence, and saw Achilles leaning on his shield and chuckling as he looked up at the Lycian king.
‘Sarpedon, you old fool,’ he called, shaking his head and smiling. ‘Do you really think we Greeks are going to return to our homes before Troy has fallen? And do you think that by standing on the crumbling walls of this old dung heap you’re going to stop me from knocking its worm-eaten gates off their hinges and killing every living thing that opposes me? Then let me make you an offer: any Lycian inside the walls of Lyrnessus, including yourself, who wants to return to his home now can do so, taking his armaments, his honour and his life with him. All I ask is your word that none will ever come back to the aid of Troy. But any who choose to remain will be slaughtered, without mercy, and his body left as carrion for the birds. Achilles, chief of the Myrmidons, has spoken.’
There was a roar of approval from the Greek ranks, but Sarpedon raised his hand again and they fell silent.
‘I am familiar with your reputation, Prince Achilles – as a butcher who knows no restraint, a murdering dog whose excesses are shameful even to the Greeks. You strut around the battlefield as if Hades himself cannot claim you, yet all the time the shadow of death is at your heels. Do you think we haven’t heard of your own mother’s prophecy, that you’ll die here in Ilium? Perhaps today your fate will catch up with you.’
Without warning, a spear flew towards the battlements and split the air where, a heartbeat before, Sarpedon’s head had been. Slowly, the Lycian’s shocked face rose back above the parapet to see Patroclus standing in front of Achilles, his arrogant features twisted with fury.
‘Your own fate will strike you down long before a drop of Achilles’s blood touches Trojan soil,’ he shouted. ‘If you ever see your homeland again, Sarpedon, it’ll be as a corpse, to be wept over by your wife as she curses the gods for their cruelty.’
Achilles placed a calming hand on Patroclus’s shoulder and pulled him back. Stepping forward, he raised his spear above his head then thrust the point towards the walls. Simultaneously, the lines of Greek warriors lifted their shields before them and began to move, closing ranks as they marched up the slope once more. At their head, the assault parties took up their ladders and resumed their advance, while to the rear the Locrians pulled back their bowstrings to their cheeks and waited for the enemy to show themselves.
They did not have to wait long. Sarpedon raised his hand again, but this time it was not to parley. A moment later the city’s defences were crowded with armed men – not the weak and badly outnumbered militia the Greeks had originally expected, but a force many hundreds strong, their spearheads blazing like points of fire all along the battlements.
As the Greeks stared up in awe at the defenders, Sarpedon’s hand fell. An instant later the air above the city walls was filled with a dark, hissing cloud of arrows that arced high above the heads of the assault parties to fall into the massed ranks of the main army behind. Thousands of men who had lowered their guard at the appearance of Sarpedon were suddenly scrambling to raise their shields above their heads again. Many did not succeed.
Odysseus nodded at Eperitus, who turned sharply to the crouching ranks behind him and barked out the order to advance at the double. More arrows dropped among them and more men fell, but the lull was over and their blood was up, so they came on with a grim determination that showed in every sweat- and dust-caked face. Eperitus felt a touch of pride at the sight of them, but his stern grimace did not falter as he turned and broke into an awkward run.
Odysseus was beside him, with his oval shield raised above his head and his spears clutched in his right hand. The two men had been in more fights together than either could remember and they drew confidence from each other’s presence as they ran into battle together, sweating in their armour while dozens of black-shafted arrows fell all around them.
At the top of the slope, the first assault parties had reached the ditch and were raising their ladders against the walls. A deadly rain of spears and rocks were cast down on their heads, felling many as they struggled to plant the feet of the ladders in the base of the ditch. Then, as the first ladders hit the wall, they realized something was horribly wrong.
‘They’ve deepened the ditch,’ Eperitus exclaimed, raising his voice above the whistle of arrows and the shouts and cries of men. ‘The ladders aren’t long enough to reach the tops of the walls.’
Odysseus stared at the tell-tale layer of fresh earth that crowned the top of the slope and watched in dismay as the men of the assault parties poured into the ditch, where only their heads remained visible. He and Diomedes had scouted the walls a few nights before, when the trench that circled the city was silted up by mud brought in by the winter rains. They had built the ladders accordingly, but the defenders had since re-dug the ditch and now the tops of the ladders were falling a spear’s length short of the parapet.
‘Damn it,’ he cursed, suddenly quickening his pace. ‘But by all the gods we’re not turning back now. We’ll take those bloody walls even if we have to climb them on the bodies of our own dead!’
Eperitus followed in the king’s wake, staring ahead at the rapidly approaching fortifications. At every point, desperate men were trying to reach the battlements with their outstretched arms, where the defenders speared them with ease or cut off their hands as they seized the parapets. Only one ladder reached the top of the wall, the foot of which was supported firmly in Polites’s lap to give it the extra height. Men scrambled on to his back and sprang up the thick wooden rungs, but were easily cut down as they reached the mass of defenders at the top. Antiphus had abandoned his own ladder and was crouching behind the cover of another man’s shield, shooting enemy after enemy from the walls.
‘It’s suicide!’ Eperitus protested, seizing Odysseus by his cloak and trying to stop him. ‘We need to fall back. We can attack again tomorrow, after we’ve made the ladders longer.’
‘Fall back yourself,’ Odysseus grunted, pushing Eperitus’s hand away. There was a fierce anger in his eyes, which Eperitus had become more familiar with as the years of the siege had dragged on. ‘I’m sick of the Trojans frustrating every attack we make. If we’re going to return to Ithaca, then we have to keep fighting until every last one of them is dead.’
‘Then join Achilles at the gates, where at least we have a chance of breaking into the city. It’s madness to attack walls we can’t even reach!’
‘To Hades with Achilles!’ Odysseus cursed. ‘And to Hades with you, too, if you won’t come.’
Scowling, he turned and ran the last stretch of the slope, where, with his shield held over his head against the rain of rocks and spears, he dropped down into the ditch beside Polites. A moment later his helmeted head was lost from sight as the ranks of the Ithacan army rushed past the lone figure of their captain, sweeping round him in their eagerness to reach the walls. As the final rank ran by, a sneering voice called out: ‘Lost your nerve, Eperitus?’
If the accusation of cowardice was not bad enough, the fact that it had come from Eurylochus was unbearable. The king’s cousin had never forgiven Eperitus for being made captain of the guard – a position Eurylochus had always coveted for himself, despite the fact that he was a spineless fool who was only ever to be found skulking at the rear of any battle, where the corpses provided rich pickings. Eperitus caught the man’s small black eyes staring at him from over his snout-like nose and multiple chins – maintained along with his ample stomach, despite ten years of camp rations – and felt hot needles of shame driven through his chest. But there were more important things than Eurylochus’s mockery to be concerned about.
Uncertain of how they were to scale the walls, his instinct for command took over and he ran up behind the press of Ithacan warriors.
‘Stay out of the ditch! Front two ranks kneel and raise your shields; rear ranks, throw your damned spears at those bastards on the wall.’
In response to his orders, the Ithacans began casting spear after spear at the defenders, sending many toppling backwards into their comrades. But more took their places, and among them were the archers who had been massed behind the city walls. With the armies of Ithaca, Argos and Phthia smashing themselves against the battlements, they had been ordered on to the ramparts to shoot directly down into the mass of attackers. But at the same time, Little Ajax had brought his Locrians closer up the slope, where they could pour an equally deadly fire into the crowded Lycians and Dardanians. Many fell screaming into the ditch below, where they were quickly silenced by the hacking swords of the frustrated Greeks.
Then a ladder rose up from the ditch where the Ithacan assault parties were massed. To Eperitus’s surprise, as he crouched behind his great shield to avoid the murderous rain of arrows, he saw that the top of the ladder reached just above the parapet. Another ladder of the same length followed it, and then another, and it was only as men began to dash up them with their shields held over their heads and their swords at the ready that Eperitus saw the answer to the riddle: someone was lashing ladders together with leather belts around the middle rungs, giving the extra length needed to reach the ramparts.
‘Odysseus,’ he said with a grin.
At that moment, he saw Aeneas appear on the walls above the Ithacan army. His rich armour flashed in the sunlight and left no one in doubt of his presence, as his bright sword cleaved the head of one of the attackers from its shoulders and sent the body plunging down into the press of men below. Eperitus’s eyes were not on the Dardanian prince, though, but on the warrior who accompanied him. He stood a head taller than the men around him, who moved quickly aside at the sight of his powerful physique, battle-scarred face and dark, merciless eyes. He placed his hands on the stone parapet and, ignoring the Locrian arrows, looked out over the seething mass of soldiers below, sweeping his hard gaze across their upturned faces until it fell on Eperitus. The faintest flicker of a smile touched Apheidas’s lips as he met his son’s eyes.
Chapter Three
THE TEMPLE OF ARTEMIS
For a moment Eperitus was aware of nothing but the face of his father watching him. The spears, stones and arrows that were sending men to their deaths on both sides of the struggle were no longer a concern. The clash of weapons and the screams of men faded from his hearing, just as the figures moving all around him and on the walls above became colourless blurs, like shadows in a dream. Now all that mattered was the face on the ramparts, the closeness of the man who had haunted his nightmares for two decades, whose death he had wanted for so long that the desire to kill him seemed to have tormented his thoughts for ever. And now, after ten years of searching for his father across the battlefields of Ilium, he was suddenly and unexpectedly a spear’s cast away. All he needed to do was pull back his arm and hurl his weapon and all the hatred and shame would end.
And yet he was unable to move. For the first time in many years he felt afraid. It was not the churning of his stomach before every battle, which soon disappeared after the first arrow was fired or the first spear was thrown; it was the fear of confronting something so integral to his existence for so many years that in destroying it he might destroy himself. Who would he be if his father was gone? Apheidas had murdered his own king to usurp the throne, and when Eperitus had refused to join him he had sent his son into exile. The shame of that treachery was the driving force behind Eperitus’s desire for honour and glory; his anger at his father’s terrible acts gave him his ferocity in battle; and the knowledge that the old traitor had given his service to Troy kept Eperitus’s own loyalty to Greece focused and sharp. Indeed, Apheidas made Eperitus what he was.
He looked up at the battlements and into the dark eyes that had controlled him for so long, and despite the fear and the doubt that were tearing at his insides he knew he must kill his father. It was the only way he could be free to discover his own self, to move on from his dark past and become whatever the gods had intended him to be. With heavy limbs he drew back his spear and threw it at the crowd of defenders on the walls above. The black shaft seemed to quiver as it flew straight at its target. For an unbelievable moment Eperitus thought it would strike home, then Apheidas leaned to one side and the bronze head thumped into the chest of a Lycian archer behind him. It tore through the man’s tunic of layered cloth, split open his heart and came out through his back, just below the shoulder bone. As he fell, one of his comrades stepped forward and aimed an arrow directly at Eperitus, but before he could release it Apheidas grabbed him by his shoulders and threw him from the walls, to be hacked to death by the attackers below.
With his spear cast, Eperitus felt the heaviness lift from his limbs and the old anger return. He drew his sword and barged through the ranks of soldiers who stood between him and the walls. Leaping into the ditch, he ran to one of the ladders and pulled aside a pale-faced soldier who was about to mount. A large stone thumped into the earth beside him and arrows whistled past his ears, but he raised his grandfather’s heavy shield over his head and began to climb.
The rungs were slippery with blood and his progress was awkward without the full use of his hands, but as more stones bounced off his shield and the points of half a dozen arrows nudged through the four-fold leather he felt no fear, only an iron-like determination to reach the top and get among the defenders. On either side of him as he ascended he could see the length of the ditch filled with the dead and the living. Doubled ladders lashed together with belts were being raised at every point now and under the cover of the Locrian archers hundreds of men were renewing the attack on the walls.
‘Eperitus!’ boomed a voice from a neighbouring ladder.
It was Polites.
‘Where’s Odysseus?’ Eperitus shouted back.
Polites shrugged and pointed to the battlements above, before resuming his ascent in silence. Eperitus looked up from beneath his shield and saw the parapet just ahead of him. As he watched, a pair of hands seized the top of the ladder and tried to push it sideways. The flimsy structure wobbled and Eperitus’s body tensed as he struggled to keep his balance, but a moment later he heard a scream and a body fell past him to the ditch below. The ladder straightened again and he quickened his ascent, steadying himself with his sword hand on the rungs before his face. As he reached the top a spear point jabbed through his cloak and scraped across the back of his leather cuirass. Eperitus hooked his shield over the parapet and instinctively lashed out with his sword. The obsessively sharpened edge found flesh and bone and a bitter cry of pain followed; his attacker’s spear fell down to the ditch below, a severed hand still gripping the shaft.
Climbing up on to the top of the wall, he found himself looking down at a dozen dark-skinned, bearded faces, eyes wide with fear and exhilaration and the knowledge that death was close. He kicked out at the nearest and sent him sprawling backwards, then jumped down among the others and buried his sword in the chest of a young spearman, killing him instantly. He tugged his weapon free and advanced. An archer tossed his bow aside and drew his short sword against the fearsome Ithacan, only to have his arm lopped off above the elbow. Eperitus barged him aside with his shield and – sensing that more Ithacans were jumping down on to the wall behind him – pushed forward into the mass of Lycians and Dardanians, all the time scanning for signs of his father.
By now the walls were crowded with men from both sides, jostling against each other in a struggle for mastery. As Eperitus sent another opponent tumbling from the battlements with a heave of his shield, he noticed for the first time the collection of simple, flat-roofed dwellings that both sides were fighting to possess: a homogenous sprawl of dusty houses, brightened here and there by the broader structure of a temple or by an open market square, but otherwise unremarkable and not worth the blood of so many brave men. Then he caught the flash of a bronze-scaled breastplate out of the corner of his eye and turned to see a Lycian noble pushing forward through his men. He carried the tall shield favoured by most high-born Trojans and wielded a huge, double-headed axe, which he swung at Eperitus’s head. Eperitus dodged the blow and punched out with his shield, knocking his attacker back into the press of his men.
‘Where’s Apheidas?’ he demanded, speaking in his opponent’s language.
‘Damn Apheidas! Fight me!’ the noble responded angrily, the spittle flecking his beard.
He sprang forward, cleaving the air with his axe. Eperitus ducked aside and lunged with his sword, forcing the Lycian to fall back and draw his shield across his body.
‘Tell me where Apheidas is and I’ll let you live.’
The Lycian laughed and brought his heavy axe down in another attack. The edge sparked against the stone parapet as Eperitus avoided the blow with easy agility. A moment later the point of the Greek’s sword found the Lycian’s groin and he crumpled to his knees, clutching at the wound in a vain effort to stop his lifeblood pouring out of his body. Eperitus kicked him to the stone floor of the battlements and placed his blade against the man’s neck.
‘I can kill you now or leave you to a slow death. Where’s Apheidas?’
The man looked up at him with pain-filled eyes, his warrior’s pride replaced by the humbling certainty that death was near.
‘He went back down into the city,’ the Lycian whispered through gritted teeth. ‘Now keep your promise and send me to Hades.’
Eperitus pushed his sword point into the man’s throat then glared at the remaining Lycians, who looked on in shock at the defeat of their champion. From every part of the wall now there came the sound of bronze beating against bronze, the calls and cries of men and the strange shuffling of leather sandals on stone as crowds of warriors fought desperately to kill each other. Then, as Eperitus raised his shield and readied his sword to attack, an arrow split the air past his right ear and stuck in the throat of a Lycian spearman, who gasped horribly as he struggled to gain control of his dying body.
‘Even you can’t take them all alone,’ said a familiar voice.
Eperitus turned to see the scruffy figure of Antiphus at his shoulder, with the bulk of Polites looming up behind him. A moment later Odysseus joined them, his face spattered with blood and his sword running with gore.
‘I knew you couldn’t stay out of things for long,’ the king said, his earlier rebuke seemingly forgotten. ‘It’s not in your nature.’
Then he raised his shield before him and ran at the Lycians, shouting his defiance. Eperitus and the others followed, sweeping all resistance before them until the will of the defenders cracked and many began to drop their weapons in surrender. The remainder fled back down the steps that led to the city streets, closely followed by streams of Greeks. As Eperitus joined the pursuit he caught sight of a fresh body of enemy spearmen and archers, standing in ordered ranks at the far end of a broad, heavily rutted street that led to the heart of the city. At the head of this unbloodied reserve were Sarpedon and Aeneas, their armour bright in the sunshine as they ordered the stragglers from the walls to join the solid lines of their comrades. Then, just as Eperitus was thinking that the battle for Lyrnessus was far from over, a great crash from the southernmost point of the city signalled the fall of the gates to Achilles and his Myrmidons. Soon the whole of Lyrnessus would be filled with Greeks. Realizing there was no hope of defending the city, Sarpedon and Aeneas suddenly began ordering their soldiers to fall back to the northern gate.
Eperitus jumped down on to the dusty, body-strewn street, closely followed by Odysseus.
‘They’ve given up,’ the king said, watching the hasty but well-ordered retreat. ‘Form the men into lines, quickly – I want to catch them while they’re still inside the city. If they get out on to the open plain most of them will escape back to Troy.’
Eperitus looked at Odysseus, whose stern eyes were determined to kill as many of the enemy as possible, and shook his head.
‘I can’t.’
Odysseus shot him a questioning look. ‘Can’t?’
‘I saw my father on the walls. He’s here, somewhere in the city. I have to find him.’
‘Apheidas is here! Are you sure?’
Eperitus nodded and Odysseus raised his eyebrows.
‘Then I’ll come with you. Diomedes and Achilles can lead the pursuit, and Antiphus can command the Ithacans . . .’
‘No, Odysseus,’ Eperitus replied. ‘Sarpedon and Aeneas will fight a hard rearguard and the men will need you to lead them. Besides, I have to face Apheidas by myself. You understand that.’
‘Of course,’ Odysseus answered. He gripped Eperitus’s shoulder and looked him in the eye. ‘Go and do what you have to, and may Athena protect you.’
With that, he turned and looked up at the walls, where Diomedes was giving orders for the captives to be properly treated.
‘Come on, you old war dog! Leave the prisoners to the guards; there’s still plenty of fighting to be had down here.’
‘And I’ll be in the thick of it before you are, you red-headed laggard,’ Diomedes shouted back.
Eperitus left them and ran after the fleeing Lycians and Dardanians, hoping for a glimpse of his father. The force under Sarpedon and Aeneas had already disappeared from sight, but here and there lone soldiers were still running from the walls, desperate to escape death or capture at the hands of the victorious Greeks. Ahead of him was a stumbling figure, covered in blood and clutching at the stump of his arm. Eperitus caught up with him and grabbed his shoulder.
‘Where’s Apheidas?’ he demanded.
The man stared at him blankly, his brown face pale from shock and loss of blood. Eperitus shoved him aside and ran on to where a young soldier, barely more than a boy, was cowering in a doorway. He shrieked as Eperitus sprinted up to him, sword still in hand, and could only shake his head in terror as the same question was pressed on him.
Cursing, Eperitus left him and ran on down the street, his heart beating fast with the fear that his father would escape. He had waited too long to face him and despite his earlier doubt he was now filled with an urgent need to confront Apheidas. He reached a turn in the street and saw a small market square ahead of him. The tail of the enemy rearguard was marching across it, heading towards the gate in the northern wall of the city. An archer recognized his old-fashioned but unmistakeably Greek shield and called to his comrades, who loosed a dozen hasty arrows towards him. They were hopelessly out of range, though, and the nearest bounced harmlessly off the wall beside his head.
Unfazed, Eperitus scanned the retreating army for sight of his father, but knew in his heart that he was not among them. Seeing a narrow side road, he dashed down it as more arrows sailed down to stick into the earth around his running feet.
Soon he was losing himself among the dark, deserted alleyways of Lyrnessus, hoping beyond hope that he would stumble across Apheidas among the shadows. But every door was closed and the windows he passed revealed only empty rooms, devoid of all removable possessions. The city’s population had abandoned their homes in a hurry, fearful of the slaughter, rape and enslavement that a triumphant Greek army would bring. Even the dogs had gone, leaving the streets and marketplaces temporarily bereft of the signs of civilized life.
But the void they had left was already being filled. Here and there Eperitus saw the stooping, misshapen figures of wounded men, fleeing the destruction at the gates and on the battlements and desperately seeking a place to hide from the wrath of the victors. Eperitus ignored them, knowing they would be too confused or frightened to be of any use in his hunt for his father. His sharp senses picked up the harsh shouts of warriors drawing in on every side, closely followed by the crackle of flames and the smell of burning. He emerged on to another broad avenue – which he guessed must run from the southern gate – and saw a dozen black-clad men to his right.
‘There’s one,’ a voice shouted.
A spear flew fast and accurate towards Eperitus’s head. He leaned to his left and flung up his shield, knocking the missile aside with the flat of the layered oxhide.
‘Hold, damn you,’ he shouted, as the battle-crazed Myrmidons readied their weapons to attack. ‘I’m Eperitus, captain of the Ithacan royal guard.’
‘Impossible! Achilles was first in the city, and we were right beside him as the gates fell. The Ithacans are still trying to take the walls.’
Eperitus gave a derisive laugh. ‘Odysseus and I were inside the city while you were still knocking on the doors. And if you still doubt who I am, then I know two of you at least are from Peisandros’s command. What Trojan would know that? Now get about your business and leave me to mine.’
He ran on, leaving the confused Myrmidons staring after him. He passed more groups of Achilles’s men and several bodies as he went. As the sky began to fill with dark palls of smoke he heard the heavy clash of weapons ringing in the distance. The fight with the enemy’s rearguard had begun, but whether Odysseus and Diomedes were leading the attack, or whether Achilles had caught up with them first, Eperitus could not guess. Then, as he reached an open space before a squat temple of yellow stone, a man stepped out from a doorway and lunged at him with a sword. Eperitus turned aside at the last moment, just as the blade passed beneath his arm and scraped against his cuirass. The sharpened upper edge slid along the soft skin beneath his bicep, burning like hot iron as it opened his flesh. Wincing with pain, he stepped away and threw his shield across his body as his assailant drew his arm back for a second thrust. The point jabbed at the oxhide, but was too weak to penetrate. Eperitus responded with a foot to the man’s groin, doubling him over. Before he could bring his sword down into the man’s skull, a second appeared from the same doorway and took the blow on the boss of his oval shield. A third man followed and suddenly Eperitus found himself facing three fully armed Lycians, with no inclination to retreat until they had taken their revenge on at least one Greek.
‘Out of my way,’ he warned them. ‘I’ve no quarrel with you.’
‘But we have with you, you Greek scum,’ the third man answered.
They fanned out around him. Eperitus saw the man to his right crouch, ready to spring, and immediately lashed out with his sword. The man lifted his shield, but too late to prevent the point of the blade slicing across his eyeballs and the bridge of his nose. He screamed in agony and fell to his knees, clutching at his face. An instant later his comrades attacked, screaming defiance as their swords beat down simultaneously against Eperitus’s raised shield. Using his great strength to throw both men back, he brought his sword around in a low sweep at the legs of the nearest. His opponent saw the attack too late and could only watch in horror as the blade hacked into his left leg below the knee. He collapsed on to his shield, thrashing about with pain and spraying blood across the dry earth of the street.
The remaining Lycian looked at his two colleagues, the first now unconscious and the second oblivious to everything but the pain of his wound, and decided he had seen enough. Throwing down his weapons, he turned and fled. Without hesitation, Eperitus placed his foot on the chest of his second victim.
‘Have you seen Apheidas?’
The man gave a great sob of pain and tried to twist free, but Eperitus leaned his weight upon him and slapped the flat of his sword against his cheek.
‘I said, have you seen Apheidas!’
The man reached out a shaky hand towards Eperitus, begging for mercy. Eperitus placed the point of his sword against the man’s throat and drove it through into the earth beneath. The Lycian’s lifeless head lolled to one side and he was silent.
‘I’m here, Son.’
Eperitus whirled round to see a figure standing in the shadowed portico of the temple. The dull gleam of a drawn blade shone at his side.
‘You fought well,’ he said. ‘If your grandfather was alive he’d have been mighty proud of such a display.’
‘Not as proud as he’d have been to see me run you through, traitor.’
Apheidas chuckled. ‘Still so angry, Eperitus? Come now, such excessive rage goes against nature and the will of the gods. You must leave it behind.’
Laying his blade casually over his shoulder, he turned and disappeared between the tall wooden doors of the temple. Eperitus felt a bead of sweat trickle down across his cheek. Swatting it away, he gripped his sword so tightly that his knuckles turned white, then he walked up to the pillared threshold. The familiar temple smell of perfumed incense and woodsmoke drifted out from the darkened doorway. In the blackness beyond he could see an avenue of painted wooden columns, fading to grey as the shadows swallowed them, and a floor flagged with stone slabs, worn to a black-edged smoothness by generations of worshippers. He stepped inside and instantly felt the warmth of the sun sucked from his flesh by the chill, stagnant atmosphere of the temple.
He paused and scanned the heavy shadows, waiting patiently for his eyes to adjust, relying instead on the acuteness of his hearing and the supernatural ability of his skin to sense the slightest movement in the air. It reminded him of the ruined temple at Messene, where he and Odysseus had once fought an ancient serpent placed there by Hera. As he recalled the terrifying battle with the giant snake he noticed two points of light at the far end of the temple. They gleamed like eyes in the darkness, and indeed that was what they were – not living eyes, but the glass eyes of an idol. Half his own size, the painted wooden effigy stood in an alcove behind the white-washed stone altar. It had been carved with an ankle-length chiton, large breasts and a golden bow in its left hand. Eperitus shuddered: he was in the temple of Artemis.
There was a movement in the shadows beside the altar. Apheidas stepped from behind one of the painted columns and laid his sword irreverently on the plinth where sacrifices were offered to the goddess.
‘How long’s it been, Son? Eighteen years?’
‘Twenty, and my hatred of you hasn’t faded, Father. When you killed Pandion and took his throne for yourself, you brought a shame on our family that can never be removed – except by your death. I intend to claim that honour for myself, now.’
He raised the point of his sword, lifted his grandfather’s shield higher and took a cautious step forward.
‘Don’t be hasty, Eperitus. You’ve waited this long; at least listen to what I have to say before you do something we might both regret.’
Eperitus took another slow step and saw his father’s hand edge towards the handle of his sword.
‘There’s nothing you can say to me, Father. Your shadow’s lain over my life for too long and now I’m going to set myself free of it.’
‘A man can change, Eperitus. Twenty years ago I was only a little older than you are now – I was young and impetuous, thinking with my heart and not giving my head a say. I made a mistake.’
‘And now you’re making another.’
Eperitus lunged, aiming above the leather breastplate at his father’s unprotected throat. With astounding speed, Apheidas seized his sword from the altar and brought it up to meet his son’s blade. Bronze scraped across bronze until the two hilts locked against each other. Eperitus stared into his father’s dark eyes for a moment, but instead of seeing a reflection of his own hatred he saw something infinitely more disarming. For the briefest moment, he saw the father he had known as a boy – a man fiercely proud of his son; a man whom he had looked up to and admired. Then he remembered that his childish admiration had been destroyed by an act of unforgivable evil, and with a snarl of fury on his lips he pushed his father back against the altar and brought his sword down upon him. Again Apheidas’s reactions were quicker than Eperitus had expected, meeting the blow with the edge of his blade and at the same time kicking out with his foot, catching Eperitus in the stomach and sending him sprawling across the stone flags. He landed with his back against one of the columns and a cloud of dust fell down over his head.
Springing back to his feet, he moved out to meet the inevitable follow-up attack. But Apheidas did not take the advantage he had created, and instead moved behind the protection of the altar.
‘Don’t be a fool, Son. Can’t you see I regret what I did in Alybas? Your older brothers were killed fighting at my side, but . . .’ Apheidas paused, as if struggling with the memory. ‘But worse even than that, I lost you. Don’t you realize you were always my favourite, Eperitus?’
‘That’s a lie!’
‘It’s true. Your brothers were fine lads, but you’ve a greatness in you they could never have matched. Your grandfather knew that.’
‘And he would have known I’d never betray King Pandion or tolerate his murderer to live.’
Slipping the shield from his arm, Eperitus leapt across the altar and swung at his father’s head. Apheidas twisted out of the way and the blow decapitated the idol in the alcove behind him, leaving the headless torso rocking on its plinth. A sudden fury lit Apheidas’s eyes and he lashed out with his sword, striking sparks from the stone wall as Eperitus ducked beneath the slicing blade. Without pausing to think that his father was now trying to kill him, Eperitus ran beneath his raised sword arm and rammed his shoulder into his chest. Apheidas’s spine jarred against the overlapping edge of the altar, causing him to cry out in pain, but he quickly recovered and deflected another swipe of Eperitus’s sword. A moment later the temple was filled with the ringing of bronze as the two men struck blow after blow against each other. Then the tip of Apheidas’s blade, deflected upward by the edge of Eperitus’s weapon, slashed the forehead of the younger man. At the sight of his son’s blood, Apheidas’s anger left him and he stood back.
‘Forgive me,’ he said through heavy breaths. ‘Forgive me for everything. As the gods are my witnesses, Eperitus, I beg you to let the past go!’
Eperitus felt the sting of the cut and dabbed at it with the palm of his hand. The blood was dark in the gloomy temple as he inspected it.
‘Why? You killed a good man because of your selfish ambition. If it wasn’t for you, Pandion might still rule Alybas today and I’d never have been ashamed of naming you as my father. What’s more, you’ve betrayed Greece to serve Troy. There’s no reason why I shouldn’t fight you to the death, right here in this temple.’
‘Yes there is. I’m your father, Eperitus, and you’re my son. As soon as I knew you’d be attacking Lyrnessus, I insisted on coming here with Aeneas and Sarpedon . . .’
‘You knew I’d be here? You knew about the attack?’
Apheidas smiled, realizing his mistake. ‘Yes, I knew, but don’t bother asking me how – unless you intend to come back to Troy with me.’
Eperitus grimaced. ‘Troy?’
‘Of course. That’s why I came to Lyrnessus – to speak with you, if I could, and convince you of my regret about the past. You’re a man of honour, no one can question that, so come and fight alongside me for a worthy cause, in defence of a noble people.’
Eperitus’s eyes narrowed. ‘Just because you betrayed your king and your country, Father, doesn’t mean I’ll betray mine.’
‘There would be no treachery, Eperitus. Do you think I fight for Troy because I was thrown out of Alybas, or because I’m a mercenary who’ll sell my services to the highest bidder?’
‘You fight for Troy because you’re a man without shame, who cares nothing for his own honour or the honour of his family! Your own father would have killed you for what you’ve done.’
Apheidas threw back his head and laughed.
‘You poor fool,’ he said. ‘It’s because of your grandfather that I’m here in the first place.’
‘Speak plainly,’ Eperitus replied, angered by his father’s mockery.
‘Even you know your grandfather wasn’t from Alybas,’ Apheidas answered, calmly, ‘that he killed the man who raped and murdered his wife – my mother – and was forced into exile, taking me with him when I was only an infant. You remember me telling you this when you were a lad? And yet you never wondered where he came from?’
‘He would only ever say he came from the east. From Euboea or Attica, I’d always assumed—’
‘Your grandfather was a Trojan, Eperitus. I am a Trojan, and but for your mother’s blood, you are too.’
Eperitus glanced at the square of intense light beyond the door, where he was vaguely aware of voices in the street. His mind was reeling from his father’s revelation, wanting to reject it and yet instinctively knowing it to be true. At the same time, part of him understood that it did not matter. Not now, at least. He was born and raised a Greek and had spent the past ten years killing Trojans. Apheidas’s news was not going to change that, and somehow he knew his grandfather would not have wanted it to.
He flexed his fingers around the handle of his sword and focused his gaze on his father.
‘You’re wrong. I’m a Greek. My grandfather was a Greek, too. When he arrived in Alybas, Greece became his new home – that’s why he let me believe I was a Greek through and through. What good does it do a man to split his identity? After all, look at you.’
Eperitus spat on the floor at his father’s feet, then, feeling the old hatred surge into his veins, he lunged forward. Apheidas parried the blow with ease, as if he had expected it all along, and swung his own blade across his son’s torso, forcing him to leap backwards. Eperitus attacked again, furious now, but Apheidas smashed his sword aside and brought the hilt of his own weapon sharply up into his jaw, throwing his head back. Eperitus caught his heel, staggered and fell. As if in a nightmare he heard the sound of his sword clattering across the flagstones, and a moment later his armoured body was crashing down on the hard floor. The back of his head smacked against a slab, dazing him, and the next thing he knew his father’s foot was on his chest, the point of his blade resting against his throat.
Chapter Four
THE GIFT OF THE GODS
‘Kill me, then,’ Eperitus said savagely, loathing the dark eyes that were staring down at him. ‘Kill me and put an end to it.’
The sword was heavy and sharp against his flesh, but the face above it was bereft of menace. Instead, there was a sadness in it – regret, perhaps, for what could have been.
‘Put an end to your anger and shame, maybe,’ Apheidas said. ‘But not mine. Though you hate me, Eperitus, you’re my son. You’re all I have left. I used to think a man found immortality in a glorious name, covered in brave deeds and built on the bodies of dead enemies. Like Hector, or your Achilles. Do you remember how I used to tell you such things when your grandfather and I trained you to be a warrior? Well, they were the words of a fool. A man is remembered through his children. His glory can fade, but not his offspring.’
Eperitus closed his eyes and thought of his own daughter, Iphigenia, the child of his illicit union with Clytaemnestra, the wife of Agamemnon. Had not Clytaemnestra said the same thing as she begged Eperitus to take her and their daughter to safety – that he should forget glory and let Iphigenia be his legacy? But this was not the same. He had failed to protect Iphigenia. Agamemnon had murdered her to appease the vengeful Artemis, and had lived with that regret for over ten years. But he had not brought shame upon her or sent her into exile.
‘Don’t look to me for your own immortality,’ he said, whispering as the point of the sword continued to press against the base of his throat. ‘I am no longer your son, Apheidas. You lost me when you killed King Pandion and brought dishonour on your family. So kill me now, for if you don’t you have my word I will hunt you down and slaughter you like a sick dog.’
Apheidas’s brow darkened for a moment, and then the sound of voices – growing louder in the street outside – distracted him. He looked through the doorway at the blinding sunshine, then stared back down at his son.
‘I’ll not kill you, Eperitus,’ he said, raising his sword and slipping it into its plain leather scabbard. ‘And you can forget thoughts of killing me, too. You’ve neither the skill nor quite as much hatred as a man needs to murder his own father. Look to your heart and you’ll know it’s true. And when the time is right, you’ll know where to find me – inside the walls of Troy.’
He took his foot from Eperitus’s chest and knelt beside him. Eperitus looked up at his father and saw his own features reflected back at him: the same oval face, the same straight nose and thin, almost lipless mouth, and the same dark hair. Only their ages and the lighter skin and thoughtful eyes he had inherited from his Greek mother separated them, and for the sake of his Greek blood he would never forget that difference.
Apheidas pulled his fist back and hit him.
When Eperitus awoke it was to the sound of a woman screaming.
He opened his eyes and looked up at the ceiling, on which he could see stars painted in gold against a sable firmament. They were smoke-stained and half lost in the gloom, but at their centre he could see a crescent moon, the symbol of the goddess whose temple this was. Raising himself on to his elbows, he dabbed his fingers gingerly against the bruised cheekbone where Apheidas’s fist had connected, then lifted them to the new scar on his forehead. It was deep, but the blood had already caked inside the gash and stopped the flow of blood. With the inside of his skull pounding, he looked around between the wooden columns and noticed for the first time the faded patterns of blue, yellow and red flowers that twined around them. His sword and his grandfather’s shield lay close together, halfway between himself and the door of the temple, but of Apheidas there was no sign.
Then another scream broke the stillness and he realized he had not been dreaming. Ignoring the pain in his head, he leapt to his feet and ran over to retrieve his weapons. The scream had come from the street outside, and as he squinted into the fierce daylight beyond the doorway he heard harsh laughter followed by another scream. He dashed out of the temple, blinking against the brightness, and saw a black-haired woman clad in a knee-length white chiton, surrounded by a circle of five men. None of the men was Apheidas, but Eperitus recognized them all the same.
‘Come on, my sweet, stop playing with us,’ said one of the men. ‘We only want a little fun.’
‘Leave me alone!’ she spat. ‘I’m a priestess of the temple of Artemis!’
‘A virgin, then,’ leered the man, wiping spittle from his beard with the back of his hand. ‘I haven’t had a virgin since I was a young shepherd.’
‘And she was one of his flock!’ said another, raising a laugh from his companions.
‘Have you no respect for the gods?’ she retorted, scowling at them. ‘Have you no fear of the gods?’
One of the others snorted, a fat man whose face was red and shining with sweat. ‘What are you talking about, girl? Don’t you know you’re a gift of the gods to us? You’re our reward for conquering Lyrnessus.’
He lunged at her and caught her wrist.
‘Let the girl alone, Eurylochus,’ Eperitus said from the shadows of the portico, his voice calm and even. ‘Let her go, now!’
Eurylochus’s surprise at the sudden appearance of the captain of the guard was short lived. Keeping his hold on the priestess, who had stopped struggling and was looking intently at the newcomer, he spat in the dirt and frowned at Eperitus.
‘So, the absent hero has returned,’ he sneered. ‘Though it looks like someone has given you a beating in the meantime. But if you think I’m going to let this little beauty go just so you can have your way with her, then you’ll be disappointed.’
Eperitus propped his shield against one of the columns and, sheathing his sword, walked out into the sunshine. Skeins of dark smoke were drifting up into the otherwise perfect blue skies and the smell of burning was thick in the air. He looked at the priestess, whose chiton he now saw was stained with dirt and had been torn open to expose a long, dark-skinned thigh; there were bloody scrapes on both elbows and forearms, and her lips were wet with fresh blood. As he glanced at her, she swept the tangled hair from her face to reveal dark, frightened eyes framed by long lashes. Her beauty took him by surprise and he had to forcefully shift his stare to Eurylochus.
‘I told you to let the girl go,’ he warned. ‘I won’t tell you again.’
Eurylochus’s face twitched with hatred. There was a moment’s indecision, then he shoved the girl into the arms of one of his cronies and pulled out his sword.
‘There’re five of us, Eperitus, and no witnesses. I tell you now, that girl’s a rare beauty in this godforsaken country and you’re not going to take her from me.’
Eperitus looked at the other four Ithacans who, except for the man whose arms were struggling to contain the priestess, had also drawn their swords and were fanning out in a crescent around him. He knew them all and none of them was any good as a warrior or as a man, but he left his sword untouched in its scabbard and instead fixed his eyes on each of them in turn. Finally his gaze rested on a skinny, rotten-toothed soldier whose red-rimmed eyes were quick to blink and look away.
‘I know you men,’ Eperitus told them in a slow, steady voice. ‘I know you for the weak-minded, back-stabbing scum that you are. Not one of you is worthy to call himself an Ithacan, and the only reason any of you are still alive is because you skulk at the back of every battle, furthest away from the fighting. How do I know that? Because I’m always in the thick of it, and I’ve never seen any of your faces at my side. So if you think you can take me – even five of you together – then come on. But if you do, then it’s to the death, and any man who pleads for mercy will be taken back to camp and executed. But if you put your swords back in their scabbards and walk away, I’ll forget I ever saw you here. Make your choice.’
There was a pause during which the nearby sounds of shouting, laughter and the crackle of flames were carried to them on the breeze. Then the skinny man with the red-rimmed eyes slid his sword back into its scabbard and turned away.
‘The girl’s all yours, Eurylochus,’ he grunted as he shouldered past him.
‘Yeah, enjoy her,’ said the man holding the priestess, pushing her towards Eurylochus and turning to follow the first man.
Eurylochus grabbed the girl by the elbow and pulled her to his side.
‘Where are you going?’ he asked, as the other two sheathed their swords and backed away. ‘What are you afraid of? He’s one man against five. Didn’t you seeing him holding back from the battle?’
‘There’s a difference between cowardice and refusing to march into a trap, Eurylochus,’ Eperitus said. All four of Eurylochus’s cronies had departed now, leaving him alone with the girl – no longer struggling – at his side. ‘And I’m sure you know a real coward when you see one. So what’s your choice? Shall I draw my sword?’
Eurylochus glowered at Eperitus, then slammed his sword into its scabbard and marched off in the wake of the others. The priestess watched him go, then turned to Eperitus.
‘And what do you intend to do with me?’ she asked in heavily accented Greek. ‘Rape me and cast me aside, as your countrymen would have done? Or take me as your captive, to be raped whenever you wish?’
‘Neither,’ Eperitus replied, meeting her hostile but enthralling gaze. ‘I’m not interested in captives or playthings. You’re free to go as you wish.’
Afraid to keep his eyes on her lest he should have a change of heart, he turned and walked back to the temple portico. As he picked up his shield and hoisted it on to his shoulder, he heard her naked feet padding along in his wake.
‘Go?’ she said. ‘Go where? To be found by more Greek soldiers and raped? No, my lord, I’d rather take my chances with you. At least you seem to be a man of honour, which is rare among the enemies of Troy.’
He turned to find her standing directly behind him.
‘A man of honour?’ he said, raising an eyebrow. ‘Can such a thing still exist in this war, on either side? But whether I am what you think or not, I can’t take you with me. I have to find my king.’
‘You must take me with you,’ she insisted, reaching out and seizing his hand. ‘My lord Eperitus – that’s what the fat one called you, isn’t it? – forgive me if I failed to thank you for saving me, but you can’t just turn your back on me now and leave me to the next group of common soldiers who come along. Take me as your slave. I promise to serve you well, even if you are a Greek.’
As if to emphasize the point, she knelt before him and threw her arms around his legs, resting her head against his thighs. Eperitus reached down and, taking her by the elbow, raised her to her feet. Though the features of her face were still edged with anger, the hostility had left them and as he looked into her eyes he realized she was as beautiful as any woman he had seen in many years. At that moment, shouts erupted from a side street and two men came rushing into the open space before the temple. One was old with snow-white hair and short, spindly legs that seemed too exhausted to carry him any further; the other was a youth of little more than sixteen, whose thin brown arms were desperately trying to help the older man. Neither wore armour nor carried any weapons, and at the sight of Eperitus in the portico of the temple towards which they were heading they stopped and seemed to quail with fear.
Then a group of a dozen warriors came rushing out of the side street after them, brandishing swords and spears. One carried a bow, to which an arrow was already fitted. As he saw the two men he drew the string back to his right ear and released the arrow, sending the younger of the two spinning to the ground. While the older man turned to his dead companion, Eperitus pulled the girl back into the cool darkness of the temple.
‘What are you doing?’ she protested. ‘Save him!’
‘Shut up and come with me,’ Eperitus commanded, taking her by the arm and dragging her deeper into the gloom. ‘Is there a back way out of this cursed place?’
‘But those are Greek soldiers. Can’t you intervene to save the old man’s life?’
‘They’re Myrmidons and they’re already drunk with killing. One sight of you and they won’t care whether I’m a Trojan or a Greek – they’ll kill me just so they can have their way with you. Now, if you really want me to help you, then tell me how to get out of here.’
‘There’ll be a side door somewhere. Behind a curtain, I think.’
‘You think? But you’re the priestess here – shouldn’t you know?’
A sudden scream announced the demise of the old man. Eperitus looked to the doorway, where he could hear the voices of the Myrmidons in the street beyond.
‘They’re going to come in here looking for something to steal,’ the girl said, her voice rising with panic. ‘Come on. There’s the curtain over there.’
‘And where does it lead?’ Eperitus asked, tightening his grip on her arm and eyeing her suspiciously as she tried to pull away.
‘To an antechamber. There’ll be another door leading out on to the side street that runs beside the temple. We must be quick.’
‘No,’ Eperitus replied, looking at the girl. Her eyes were pale and wide in the darkness where they stood by the altar stone, but as he heard the voices of the Myrmidons approaching he refused to move towards the curtain the girl was gesturing at or loosen his grip on her arm. ‘We’re going nowhere until you tell me who you are.’
‘I’m the priestess of—’
‘The priestess of this temple would have known immediately where the side door was. Who are you?’
The girl struggled against the strength of his fingers for a moment, then heard the metallic slither of a sword being drawn from its scabbard and saw the squat silhouette of a man in the doorway of the temple.
‘All right, I’m not the priestess here,’ she hissed. ‘I don’t even come from Lyrnessus. Now, can we leave before his eyes adjust to the darkness?’
But Eperitus was already pulling her across to the corner of the temple, whisking aside the heavy curtain and fumbling with the door. Fortunately, the room beyond was also in darkness and no sudden splash of light betrayed their presence to the soldiers who were cautiously advancing into the temple behind them. They crushed through the narrow doorway together, Eperitus awkwardly conscious of her soft, warm body pressed close to his, then he turned and closed the door silently behind him. Quickly scanning the tiny antechamber, which was lit only by a thin line of daylight coming from beneath a door on the opposite side of the room, he could see it was empty but for a straw mattress and some dishevelled blankets.
The girl looked around the room in disgust. ‘To be honest, I’m glad I’m not the priestess of this hovel.’
Eperitus dropped his hand to her wrist and led her to the opposite door. Already there were sounds of destruction coming from the temple behind them and it would not be long before the concealed antechamber was discovered. He threw open the door and together they stepped quickly out into the comparative brightness of the shady side street.
‘What’s the quickest, least conspicuous way to the north gate?’ he asked. ‘Assuming you know that much.’
She pulled her wrist free of his grip and took his hand in hers. ‘This way.’
Chapter Five
IN THE RUINS OF LYRNESSUS
‘So who are you?’ Eperitus asked the girl again as they walked through the shadowy alleys and rutted thoroughfares of Lyrnessus.
All around them were the sounds of pillage and burning, disrupted from time to time by the dying shouts of murdered men or the terrified screams of women in peril. The roar of flames was everywhere and a thick plume of smoke shrouded the city, filling their nostrils with its savoury reek. More and more bodies lay scattered around the streets – some still in armour, others stripped naked or left in their woollen tunics – and every now and then they would be forced to sink into the shelter of a doorway or slip down passageways between the ramshackle houses as they saw gangs of rampaging Greeks ahead of them.
‘My name is Astynome. I am the only child of Chryses, priest of Apollo on the island of Chryse.’
‘Why did you say you were a priestess?’
Astynome gave a bitter laugh. ‘Because I thought your countrymen might show some respect for the gods and leave me alone. I should have realized the Greeks have no reverence for the immortals.’
‘Then you’re not a priestess at all?
‘No,’ she answered, and with a backward glance added: ‘Or a virgin.’
Eperitus looked away, though he did not know why her admission had embarrassed him. He was not surprised: there was something worldly about Astynome that had seen suffering and knew how to fight – the grazes on her limbs and the blood on her lips showed that. He wondered whether she had a husband, but guessed that a married woman would not be alone in a besieged city.
‘I came to Lyrnessus to celebrate the annual festival of Artemis,’ she continued, as if reading his thoughts. ‘Then Aeneas and Sarpedon arrived with their brave Dardanians and Lycians behind them, saying Greek ships were sailing towards the shore and bringing an army to lay siege to the city. Those who were able took what they could and fled to Adramyttium or Thebe.’
‘But you stayed.’
‘I trusted in the men who had come to defend the city,’ Astynome retorted, a touch of angry pride igniting her pupils. ‘At home they say a single Trojan is worth ten Greeks and I believe them. A man who fights for a just cause – defending his homeland – is more than a match for any invader, especially one from such a backward country as Greece.’
Eperitus smiled at her zeal.
‘Then your trust was misplaced,’ he said. ‘Did many others remain behind?’
‘A few – the city’s militia, the old, the sick and the foolhardy. The two your countrymen killed before the temple were a wine merchant and his son. He stayed on to make some money from the Dardanians and Lycians after their victory, and now he’s dead and the Greeks will be drinking his wine for free.’
Before long they reached a small square with a large, two-storeyed house to one side. A dozen bodies were scattered around, all of whom had been disturbed by looters. Though the square was now empty, they could hear the hubbub of many voices coming from nearby. As they crossed, stepping over the debris of corpses, discarded weapons and broken armour, Eperitus asked Astynome how it was she spoke Greek.
‘I learned it on Chryse,’ she explained, almost stumbling as she looked around in horror at the bodies, some of which were hideously dismembered. ‘From the merchants who used to call there.’
‘So you were happy to buy Greek goods, and yet you clearly hate Greeks.’
‘I did not hate them then. The hate came later.’
‘And will you hate me, Astynome, even though you’ve begged to be my captive? Will you slit my throat late some night as I lie in my tent, before you steal back to Troy?’
Astynome turned to face her new master. ‘You have my word I won’t try to kill you, my lord. You’re not like other Greeks. You remind me more of a Trojan than a Greek.’
He lifted his hand to cup her chin, feeling the distinct cleft with his thumb before raising his fingers to touch her bottom lip. She looked at him intently and for a moment he was tempted by her nearness. Then he let his hand fall to his side and turned away again.
‘That’s not a mistake you should make again, Astynome. I am a Greek, in heart and mind. But there’s one more thing I want to know if I’m to take you under my protection – can you cook? All my men bring me is grilled mackerel and tunny, or goat’s meat that’s too tough to chew.’
She smiled broadly, the first real smile he had seen on her pretty mouth. ‘Yes, I can cook. Even if you have no other use for me, you’ll value me for my food.’
They left the square and followed a line of crude dwellings to the city walls. The sound of voices increased and soon they were at the edge of a large space filled with Greek soldiers. At the far end was a low gateway. Unlike the gates that Achilles and his Myrmidons had stormed, there was no squat tower defending the northern entrance to Lyrnessus; instead, the eastern wall doubled back on itself and ran parallel with the western wall for a dozen paces, so that the gateway was positioned between the overlap in the battlements. Though not as well defended as the southern entrance, it did mean an assaulting force was exposed to attack on both sides. The gates were fully open now, and from where they stood in the shadows of a narrow alleyway Eperitus and Astynome could see the gentle plains and wooded hills beyond.
Unlike the bands of men roving the city, the soldiers by the northern gate were still disciplined and acting under orders, giving Eperitus the confidence to lead Astynome out from their hiding place. There had been a battle here but it had long since finished. Some of the victorious Greeks were on the walls, keeping watch, while others were standing fully armed and ready for the possibility of an unexpected counter-attack. The majority, though, had stripped off their armour and weapons and were busily removing the bodies of the dead and stacking them in long rows on either side of the open space before the gates. When Astynome saw the scores of Lycians and Dardanians who had died holding the gates – while their countrymen escaped the pursuing Greeks – she fell to her knees and covered her face as she sobbed quietly. Eperitus looked at the lines of young men who had fallen, many with missing limbs or mutilated faces. It was a sight he had become familiar with since the start of the war, so he was surprised to feel a sudden pang of guilt. Was that Astynome’s presence, or the realization these men were not so different from himself, and could even have been his own countrymen but for the exile of his grandfather?
Eperitus lifted Astynome to her feet and allowed her to rest her head against his shoulder, where her tears fell on to his breastplate and mingled with the spatters of dried blood. As her arms wound round him and he stroked her sea of dark hair – watched by the envious eyes of the men in the burial parties – he noticed a young woman leaning over the body of a man, laid out among his dead comrades beneath the shadow of the walls. Her shoulders shook with a slow, mournful sobbing, and despite her red eyes and tear-stained cheeks it was clear she had a powerful beauty. Other than Astynome, she was the only woman present.
‘Who’s she?’ he asked.
Astynome lifted her head and gazed across at the stricken woman. More tears came to her eyes and she shook her head pityingly.
‘It’s Briseis,’ she answered. ‘Daughter of Briseus the priest. And that’s her husband, Mynes, she’s weeping over, with his brother Epistrophus beside him. They were princes of Lyrnessus and proud men in life.’
‘And brave men in their deaths,’ added a soldier, stooping beside them and lifting a corpse on to his shoulders. The dead man’s arms hung limply down the soldier’s back as he turned to look at Eperitus and Astynome. ‘Those two were at the heart of the rearguard, refusing to surrender or admit defeat. But Achilles slew them both and now Briseis is his captive.’
‘Was it a hard fight?’ Eperitus asked.
The man nodded. ‘It was worse here than at the walls, a real bloodbath. That Sarpedon commanded the rearguard while Aeneas got the majority of the Dardanians and Lycians out through the gate. And they fought like Furies! If it hadn’t been for Achilles they might’ve held us to a stalemate. But we beat them in the end,’ he added, patting the corpse over his shoulder as he saw Astynome’s chin raise a little. ‘Sarpedon only escaped at the last moment, and Achilles, Patroclus and Diomedes have gone out in pursuit of him and the remainder of his men. He’ll be a rich prize if—’
‘What about Odysseus?’ Eperitus interrupted.
‘He was in the thick of it too, as usual, but Achilles asked him and Little Ajax to stay here and put down the last pockets of resistance. They were surrounding a group of militia not far from here, last I heard.’
The soldier pointed in the direction of a column of smoke billowing up from behind a line of ramshackle dwellings to the west, then, with a final glance at the Trojan girl, turned and carried his burden towards the lines of dead.
‘Come on,’ Eperitus said, taking Astynome’s hand and heading towards the smoke.
The battle must indeed have been a brutal one, Eperitus thought as they weaved a path between the bodies of the fallen. The sun-baked, dusty earth was dark with innumerable bloodstains and here and there he could see small fragments of human remains: several hands; arms severed at the elbow; a sandalled foot; even a cleanly lopped ear lying in a wheel rut. As they passed the gates a wagon laden with bundles of wood squealed its way through the gates.
‘For the funeral pyre,’ Eperitus explained, seeing Astynome’s look of confusion. ‘We stopped burying the dead years ago – it took too much time and effort, and by the time we’d dug the pits the carrion birds had already taken the eyes and the softer parts.’
Astynome squeezed his hand tightly and he shut up. Before long they heard the crackle of fire and turned a corner to see a large, two-storeyed house surrounded by at least three score of warriors. Long orange flames flickered up from the windows and sent spirals of dark, ember-filled smoke up into the air. More smoke wafted out into the street, but Eperitus recognized Odys-seus’s squat, triangular form through the fine haze, with the colossal figure of Polites beside him. As he watched, two men appeared on the flat roof of the building. They were unarmed, but their scaled breastplates and plumed helmets marked them out as warriors. Both were waving their hands before their faces and choking on the smoke. They stumbled to the edge of the low wall that surrounded the roof and looked down at the Ithacans below. Odysseus shouted a command and a moment later there was a loud twang. One of the men staggered against the wall, clutching at the black shaft protruding from his groin, before slowly curling forward and plunging to the floor below. He landed with a dull thud and lay still. His comrade shook his fist blindly at the surrounding Greeks, then retreated into the consuming smoke.
Suddenly there was a hoarse shout and several men ran out from the doorway of the house. They were half-blinded by the smoke, but the dull gleam of their weapons showed they had no intention of surrendering. Odysseus, who had been awaiting their appearance with calm patience, now sprang into action, dashing forward and knocking a man’s head from his shoulders with a swift slice of his sword. Polites followed, a captured two-headed battle-axe in his right hand, and within a moment the rest of the Ithacans were behind them. The battle was brief, bloody and uneven, and with Astynome at his side Eperitus felt almost ashamed as he watched the massacre. Then, when the ringing of weapons and the shouts of men were over, he saw Odysseus come striding out with his bloodied sword hanging at his side. He looked strangely savage in the sunlight: his face grimed with ash and spattered with gore; his normally bright and thoughtful eyes red-rimmed from the smoke and filled with a forbidding anger. In his left hand he held a cloak which he had torn from the shoulders of one of his victims, and with which he was slowly wiping the mess from his blade.
‘Odysseus,’ Eperitus called.
The king looked at him in confusion for a moment, as if startled from a dream, then dropped his sword back into its scabbard and walked towards his captain, forcing a smile.
‘Eperitus!’ he answered, almost sighing as a great tiredness seemed to press down on his shoulders. ‘Thank the gods you’re all right. I was concerned for you.’
‘Since when have you needed to worry about me?’
‘It’s a king’s prerogative to worry about his subjects,’ Odysseus replied, wiping the sweat from his brow and leaving a streak of clean skin through the accumulated dirt. He looked at Astynome. ‘I see you’ve gained a captive during your absence.’
Astynome drew closer to Eperitus, eyeing the king of Ithaca with distrust.
‘She captured me, I think. I saved her from being raped and now she’s placed herself under my protection.’
‘Well, girl, the gods must favour you,’ Odysseus said, speaking to Astynome in her own tongue and looking at her with kindness. ‘Of all the thousands of men in the Greek army, you were found by the one warrior who still retains a scrap of decency and honour. Anybody else would have left you to your fate – or added to your misery.’
Astynome frowned but said nothing.
‘And what of Apheidas?’ Odysseus continued in Greek, addressing Eperitus. ‘Did you find him?’
Eperitus nodded and lowered his eyes a little. ‘We fought in the temple of Artemis, where he gave me this.’
He pointed to the cut across his forehead. Odysseus reached up and pushed aside a lock of Eperitus’s hair with his thumb. He stared at the wound and winced, but a moment later his face was transformed by a smile.
‘Then you defeated him. He’s dead.’
Eperitus shook his head. ‘No. He mastered me easily. In fact, I’ve never met a swordsman like him. We fought when I was a lad, of course, but that was in the training yard, not for real. Perhaps that’s why I’ve always assumed I’d be able to beat him, because I’ve never really seen him fight. But today I did, and he could have killed me any time he wanted to.’
‘So why didn’t he?’
‘Because he wants me to join him in Troy! I thought I was hunting him, but it appears he came to Lyrnessus to find me. He knew about the assault, Odysseus. He knew I’d be here.’
Odysseus frowned, suddenly serious. He glanced at Astynome, who looked away.
‘How?’ he asked. ‘How could he have known you’d be here, unless . . . ?’
‘Unless someone told him,’ Eperitus finished. ‘Until two days ago only the commanders of the army knew about the attack on Lyrnessus and who would be taking part in it. That means there’s only one way the Trojans could have sent an army here in time to meet us. There’s a traitor among us, Odysseus. A traitor in the heart of the Greek command!’
Chapter Six
ANDROMACHE’S WOE
Helen, formerly the queen of Sparta, now a princess of Troy, looked out from the lofty battlements of her adopted city. The sun had long since sunk beneath the far horizon of the Aegean Sea, leaving the broad plain before the walls and the hoof-shaped bay beyond it in darkness. The stars were abroad in the moonless sky and for a while Helen gazed up at them, taking simple pleasure from naming the constellations in her mind – both the Trojan names that she was first taught by Paris on the island of Tenedos before their marriage, and the Greek equivalents that she still recalled with a slight pang of homesickness. Out on the black waters of the bay a single light shone. It was most likely a lamp on a small fishing boat, the only vessels that dared to exist in the once crowded harbour. From time to time a merchant would risk the journey, bringing much needed luxuries to Troy at greatly inflated prices, but since the Greeks had taken to sending a galley or two to capture these ships they were now very few in number. And there were no longer any warships in the bay. The whole Trojan fleet had been burned at anchor ten years ago, and the handful that had been constructed since – either in the harbour or at one of the allied cities further up the coast – had all suffered the same fate. In effect, the Greeks had destroyed Troy’s power at sea and forced her to rely on supplies brought overland, via the long and arduous routes from the south and east.
Helen turned her eyes to the south-west, where by day she would have been able to see the humped shape of Tenedos, its wooded slopes blue in the distance. The island had been consumed by the night, though a handful of lights still flickered in the darkness. A little closer, in a wide bay further up the mainland coast, a hazy orange glow marked the fires of the Greek camp. They had been ensconced there since shortly after the start of the war, out of sight and far enough away to be safe from sudden attack or harassments from Troy, and yet close enough to bring battle to the city’s walls when they had a mind for violence. Mostly, though, they remained hidden away in their vast, makeshift camp with their hundreds of ships drawn up along the golden sand behind them. Whole weeks might pass without sight of the enemy, other than the occasional cavalry patrol along the banks of the Scamander, or neutral encounters at the temple of Thymbrean Apollo on the hills to the south, where both Trojans and Greeks would go to offer sacrifices and prayers. Sometimes, Helen would walk along the battlements of Pergamos, the high citadel of Troy, and look out at the sea shimmering in the morning light, watching the fishermen casting their nets, or the herds of wild horses running on the plains below, and she could almost forget that Menelaus and Agamemnon – her first husband and his power-hungry brother – were camped with an army of eighty thousand men a short chariot ride away. But they were there. They were always there.
She turned and leaned her back against the parapet, feeling the cold roughness of the stone through the wool of her long dress. Her husband was beside her, resting his elbows on the crenellated walls and looking out at the darkness. She reached across and stroked the backs of her fingers over his left bicep and down to the thick black hair of his forearm. He caught her hand and held it, then turned and smiled at her. Paris could never be described as a handsome man: he had pockmarked cheeks and an old scar that ran from his right temple, across the bridge of his flat nose and into his beard; his features were stern and battle-hardened, and carried an unquestionable authority. By contrast, Helen had beauty beyond the measure of mortal words. Her white skin was carefully preserved from the effects of the sun, and her long black hair framed a face that commanded adoration. Her striking blue eyes, so different from the common brown of all Trojan women, hid a fire that had the power to consume a man’s heart, and her body was the desire of men and the envy of women. Rumoured to be a daughter of Zeus, father of the gods, she had once been the queen of Sparta but had chosen to abscond with a Trojan prince – a man who could never hope to be king so long as his brother, Hector, lived and commanded the hearts of the people. But she did not care. Power was not her fancy; it was freedom she longed for, which for a while Paris had given to her. And though the armies of Greece had quickly imprisoned her again, she still loved him with all her soul and prayed for the day when Menelaus and Agamemnon would leave the shores of Ilium in peace.
‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.
‘Other than the fact young Trojan men will soon be dying in their hundreds again for my sake? Or that I’m the most hated woman in Ilium because of the misery I’ve brought to its shores? Or even that I ran away from Sparta seeking freedom and love, only to find myself locked up inside the walls of Troy for ten years, unable even to leave the gates for fear I’ll be snatched up by a Greek patrol?’
Paris reached across and took her other hand.
‘But you have love,’ he said, squeezing her soft palms with his rough fingers. ‘And soon the war will come to a head. My father is seeking new alliances with distant countries and, before long, strange and fearsome armies will come to our aid. The Greeks will be thrown back into the sea and we’ll be free again. As for being the most hated woman in Ilium, how can you say such a thing? The people worship you like a living goddess! Why do you think, in ten full years of war, they haven’t sent you back to Menelaus?’
‘Because your father won’t let them,’ Helen snapped, wilfully. ‘It’s Priam they worship, not me. All I’ve brought them is war and devastation.’
‘Nonsense. If anyone is to blame for this war, it’s me – and I don’t give a damn whether the people love me or hate me, just so long as they love you. Which they do.’
Paris pulled her gently to his side, where she could feel the warmth of his body contrasting the chill of the evening breeze blowing in from the sea.
‘Look at these men,’ he said in a low voice, pointing to the dozen guards stationed at intervals along the western ramparts. Each one was gazing out at the plain below, while straining to hear the conversation between Paris and Helen. ‘Do you know that each night the citadel guards throw dice over who will get the early watch on this part of the wall? Just so they can be here when you appear every evening after your meal, to be able to glance at your beauty. Did you also know that—’
A shout rang through the night air, cutting him short. He turned and looked at the tower guarding the entrance to the citadel, where an armed guard was pointing beyond the lower city to the plains in the south-east. Another soldier was leaning over the battlements and calling down to the guard hut just inside the gateway. Moments later dozens of soldiers were spilling out of its doors, hurriedly pulling on shields and helmets or looping scabbards over their shoulders.
‘What is it?’ Helen asked.
Paris held up his hand for silence as he strained to hear the shouts of the guard on the tower.
‘Someone’s coming,’ he said. ‘Horsemen, at speed, though I didn’t hear how many.’
‘Is it an attack?’
‘No, not at night and on horseback. Which can only mean—’
He set off at a run along the broad battlements. Helen followed, walking as quickly as her long, restrictive dress would allow. She joined her husband beside the tower, where he was leaning over the walls and peering down at the darkened streets below. A dozen horsemen were winding their weary way up from the east-facing Dardanian Gate, through the lower city to the entrance to Pergamos.
‘Isn’t that Aeneas?’ Helen enquired, leaning alongside her husband and straining to identify the faces of the men as they were met by the light of the torches fixed on the front of the tower. ‘And Apheidas, too.’
‘And Sarpedon,’ Paris added. ‘But why have they abandoned the southern cities?’
‘Abandoned?’ Helen asked in consternation. ‘What do you mean?’
Paris turned to her, his face pale and concerned in the darkness. ‘They were sent to defend Lyrnessus, Adramyttium and Thebe. We’d heard the Greeks planned to attack after we’d whittled down the garrisons, but—’
‘You mean the fighting has already restarted?’ Helen interrupted anxiously.
‘Yes,’ Paris replied. The sound of horses’ hooves on stone echoed from the gateway below. ‘And I must go and find out why they’ve returned so soon.’
He took Helen by the hand and led her down from the walls to where the horsemen were dismounting amidst a crowd of guards. As the horses were led away to be watered and fed – the sweat on their flanks showed they had been ridden hard to reach Troy – Helen could see that the newcomers were exhausted and filthy. To her alarm several of the men appeared to have lost weapons or parts of their armour, and three or four carried light wounds to their heads or limbs. As she appeared among them, white and excruciatingly beautiful in the darkness, every eye fell on her. She sensed the accusation in their tired gazes, the same silent condemnation that she had seen after so many battles in the past. Then Paris stepped forward and gripped Sarpedon by the shoulders.
‘What’s happened, man? Why have you come back?’
Sarpedon looked around at the faces of the citadel guards and shook his head. ‘Not here, Paris. Where’s Hector?’
‘In his palace, with Andromache,’ Helen announced, defying the looks on the faces of the men.
‘Then we must go there now,’ Sarpedon said. ‘We have news that concerns them both. If you’ll excuse us, my lady?’
The Lycian king bowed low, then with Paris at his side started up the sloping road to the royal palace, on the third level of the citadel. Aeneas, his youthful face almost unrecognizable beneath the dust and dried blood, gave Helen the glimmer of a smile before joining them. Apheidas gave her a curt nod before turning on his heel and following the others. His usual confident smile was strangely absent and of all the horsemen who had ridden in through the gate he looked the most preoccupied.
Helen began to follow, but her husband held up his hand and shook his head.
‘No, Helen. We must discuss this matter with Hector alone.’
‘And Andromache?’ Helen protested, feeling like a disobedient child.
‘Do not envy your friend, Helen,’ Sarpedon returned, his words thickly accented but clearly enunciated. ‘The news we have for her is not good. But I would be indebted to you if you could see that our escort are fed and rested.’
Helen watched the four men disappear up the cobbled street that ran between the magnificent buildings of Pergamos and felt a pang of dread tear through her insides. Thebe had been Andromache’s home before her marriage to Hector. Helen had never been there, but she almost felt she knew the city from Andromache’s homesick descriptions: a walled town in a green valley, beneath the wooded slopes of Mount Placus. Her father, King Eëtion, still lived there with seven of Andromache’s eight brothers; the eighth – Podes – was Hector’s closest friend and fought in the Trojan army. Of all the women in Troy, none had treated Helen with as much love and kindness as Andromache had, so if anything had happened to her family then Helen had to know. After all, the murderous Greeks were only in Ilium because of her own foolish iniquity. Every foul deed they committed was her fault, whatever Paris might say.
She turned to the captain of the guard and gave orders for the remaining horsemen to be fed and given beds. After the lines of soldiers had trudged off to the guard hut, she threw her hood over her head and disappeared into a passage between two high-sided buildings. The stars were bright in the narrow channel of sky overhead, forcing her to seek the shadowy obscurity of a nearby doorway. She listened intently for a moment, then clutched her hands together and bowed her head.
‘Mistress Aphrodite, why did you curse me with such beauty?’ she whispered bitterly. ‘What has it ever earned me but trouble? And what’s the use of fine looks if men still ignore me and exclude me from their councils?’
‘A woman’s body is a cage, sister,’ said a voice, ‘from which there can only ever be one escape.’
A figure emerged from the doorway opposite, draped in a black cloak that gave it the quality of deep shadow. A pointed white chin and pale lips were visible under the hood and for a shocked moment Helen thought it was Clytaemnestra. But her sister was back in Mycenae, of course, where Agamemnon had left her to brood over the murder of her daughter. Then white hands rose up to tip the hood back and reveal a beautiful but melancholy face, framed with thick black hair. Dark, unhappy eyes stared briefly at Helen, then glanced away to the street beyond the narrow passageway.
Helen sighed with a mixture of relief and irritation. It was Cassandra, her sister-in-law – a tiresome and gloomy girl who flitted about at the edges of palace life. She had a fondness for black clothing, just like Clytaemnestra, but there the comparison ended. For Cassandra had never been a widow, and where Clytaemnestra was stern and hard, Cassandra was detached and miserable. Helen was not aware that she had any friends at all in the palace, despite her alluring beauty and the fact she was a daughter of King Priam. Indeed, even her own father seemed to stiffen and go cold whenever she was near.
‘What are you doing here, Cassandra? I thought you were with Pleisthenes.’
‘Your son and his friends hate me.’ She shrugged. ‘So I came here to watch the men come back from Thebe.’
‘How could you know about—?’
‘I had a vision of them. I saw Mount Placus and Thebe below it, burning. There were soldiers everywhere, killing and putting houses to the torch. I saw Andromache’s father, too.’
‘King Eëtion!’ Helen exclaimed.
Cassandra nodded. ‘He was fighting a man wearing a strange helmet. It had a black plume and a metal mask, shaped like a scowling face. The king’s sons were lying all around him, killed by the man in the helmet.’
‘What happened to Eëtion, to Andromache’s father?’ Helen demanded, softly.
‘The man killed him, too.’
Helen’s eyebrows arched upward in momentary horror, before settling quickly into an annoyed frown. Some years ago, before she reached puberty, Cassandra had told Helen that she could see the future. It was a gift from Apollo, she claimed, and only an intermittent one, but when she had refused the god’s sexual advances he cursed her so that no one would ever believe a word she said. It was then that Helen realized she was party to a young girl’s fantasy, a clumsy attempt to gain a little credence among her betters. After failing to convince Helen, Cassandra had gone on to tell others, even resorting to offering them prophetic words as proof. But no one else fell for her story either and she quickly learned to keep her visions and dreams to herself, speaking only when compelled by the sheer force of some of her revelations. By then, though, she had lost all credibility and her rantings were generally ignored and usually forgotten altogether. Perhaps her vision of a burning Thebe was just another cry for attention.
‘Where are you going?’ Cassandra asked as Helen stepped out from the shadows and started up the road to the palace.
‘To find out the truth,’ Helen called back over her shoulder.
Her sandalled feet made small scuffing sounds on the flat cobblestones as she moved, but there was no one else on the broad streets of Pergamos to see or hear her. As she climbed the steep ramps from one tier of the citadel to the next, she passed between magnificent stone buildings that exceeded anything she had ever seen in Greece, though they barely caught her attention any more after all these years. On the second tier she passed between the temples of Athena and Zeus, monolithic structures that were almost as tall as the lines of poplars that grew either side of the road. Both were fronted by towering, brightly painted statues of the gods, but in the portico of the temple to Athena – most of them sleeping beneath their woollen cloaks – were a dozen soldiers. They were there to ensure the safety of the Palladium housed within, a small wooden effigy, crudely carved, that was supposed to have fallen from heaven when the temple was being built. It was said that as long as the image remained in Troy then the city would never be destroyed.
There were more guards at the foot of the second ramp, leading up to the compound before Priam’s palace. They moved aside as the princess approached, bowing, but not so fully that their upturned eyes could not feast on the greatest beauty Troy had ever seen. She passed between them like a ghost, silent and white, and drifted out into the broad courtyard where the fine earth had been trampled and scored by countless feet, hooves and wheels. Ignoring the grand portico of the main entrance, from which more guards were eyeing her, she crossed to a plain, single door in the right-hand wall of the compound and entered. Torches lined the long corridor beyond, their sputtering light throwing strange shadows across the walls and floor as Helen continued between them, not stopping until she reached a narrow passage to her left. She followed this to a low door, where she paused to listen.
After a moment, she opened the door and entered a small, square garden. It lay in darkness except for in the far corner, where a wide, open doorway spilled orange light on to a stone veranda. Voices were coming from within, speaking quickly and in competition with each other. Helen threw her hood back from her head to hear them better, then moved quietly across the lawn to a clump of bushes at the foot of the veranda.
‘And after they’d driven you from Lyrnessus and Adramyttium?’ said a hard, gravelly voice.
Helen peered between the waxy leaves to see Hector standing by the open doorway. He was an imposing figure whose black tunic and cloak reflected the mood written on his bearded face.
‘We retreated from Adramyttium in good order,’ answered a voice Helen recognized as Sarpedon’s, though she could not see the Lycian king from where she knelt in the damp grass. ‘Apheidas here fought a magnificent rearguard and we were able to reach Thebe with most of the army intact.’
Andromache appeared suddenly at Hector’s side and slipped her arms round her husband’s waist. She was a tall, handsome woman with an air of calm confidence about her, but as she clung to Hector and stared back into the hidden half of the room, Helen could see the fear written on her friend’s face.
‘Thebe, did you say?’ she asked.
‘Yes, my lady,’ Sarpedon confirmed. ‘Your father’s city has strong walls in good repair, and the Cilician militia are well trained and numerous. We had much more chance of defending Thebe than the other towns. Besides, most of the refugees from Lyrnessus and Adramyttium had already fled there.’
Hector placed a comforting arm around his wife’s shoulders. ‘What happened after you’d reached the city?’
‘I had hoped the Greeks would be delayed by their plundering, but I was wrong. The next day we looked out from the walls to see them marching across the plain with their banners trailing out in the wind; our own men were still exhausted from the previous battles, but theirs seemed fresh and keen to renew the fight.’
‘But you were behind defended walls,’ Hector countered. ‘There were two thousand of you.’
‘And there were ten thousand of them!’
‘They overran us with ease,’ added the voice of Aeneas, sounding bitter and angry. ‘We needed more men—’
‘We don’t have any more men!’ Hector snapped, silencing the Dardanian prince.
‘Then Thebe has fallen,’ Andromache said slowly, unwinding her arms from round Hector’s waist and falling to her knees. ‘What about my father, Sarpedon? And my brothers?’
There was a silence in which Helen could imagine Sarpedon’s face hardening to the news it was his misfortune to bring.
‘King Eëtion was a brave man,’ he began at last. ‘As were his sons. Their ferocity in defending their city would have put Ares himself to shame. For a while, even though the Greeks had scaled the walls and broken down the gates, I thought we would be able to drive them back out again. And then Achilles came.’
‘Achilles?’
‘Yes, my lady,’ said Apheidas from further inside the room. ‘He killed your father and your brothers, and the heart of the city’s resistance died with them. After they fell, defeat was swift.’
Helen buried her face in her hands, unable to watch any more. For a moment there was silence, an oppressed, threatening silence like the flatness in the air before a storm. Then she heard the flap of naked feet on stone and looked up to see Andromache standing on the top step of the veranda, her tear-filled eyes staring down at Helen with a mixture of grief and surprise. A moment later a great shout of fury erupted from the room behind her.
‘ACHILLES!’ Hector bellowed, his voice rolling out into the night air. ‘Achilles, you godless butcher! As the immortals are my witnesses, I swear upon my son’s life I’ll kill you with my own hands before this year is out!’
The door slammed shut, muffling Hector’s rage. Andromache burst into more tears and ran across the lawn. Helen ran after her, catching her as she slipped on the damp grass and pulling her into her arms.
‘Andromache! Andromache, I’m sorry! All this is my fault – your father, your brothers – none of them would have died if it hadn’t have been for me!’
She pressed her face against Andromache’s warm neck and felt the wetness of her own tears crushed against her hot cheeks. Then Andromache’s hands were on her arms, pushing her gently away as she looked into her eyes.
‘Don’t be foolish, Helen,’ she sobbed. ‘I don’t blame you! You didn’t ask for this war. No one did; it was the will of the gods.’
‘But your father and your brothers . . .’
‘My father was an old man,’ Andromache insisted. ‘I’m surprised he still had the strength to lift a sword, let alone use one – the gods would have claimed him soon anyway. And as for my brothers, I haven’t seen them in years. And there’s still Podes . . .’
Helen shook her head and turned away, unable to face her friend’s excuses for her.
‘Helen, you have to stop blaming yourself for this war,’ Andromache insisted. ‘If it helps, my tears aren’t for my father and brothers, but for Hector and our son.’
Helen looked at her friend in surprise.
‘You heard his anger,’ Andromache continued. ‘He hates sitting behind these walls while the Greeks destroy Ilium and all that he loves. But Priam and the elders have always advised this policy of waiting – waiting for the Greeks to give up and go home, or for the gods to deliver Troy from their grip. What else can we do? We don’t have enough men to drive the Greeks back into the sea. But that doesn’t make it any easier for Hector.’
‘You think he’ll do something rash?’ Helen asked.
Andromache nodded. ‘I’m afraid he’ll seek Achilles out in combat. And when he does—’
‘But Achilles is doomed to die,’ Helen cut her short. ‘His own mother predicted he’d be killed before the walls of Troy. And who in the whole of Ilium would stand a better chance than Hector?’
Andromache rose to her feet and pulled Helen up with her. ‘No one, of course. But if Hector faces Achilles, I fear it will mean his death. And then who will Troy have to protect her?’
Chapter Seven
REPLACEMENTS
‘Are you sure – absolutely sure?’ Odysseus asked, gripping the side of the galley and leaning as far forward as he could, as if to do so would help him see the distant ships more clearly.
Eperitus shielded his eyes against the noon sun, his body rolling naturally with the movement of the sea. The sail flapped noisily overhead and gulls were gliding beside the ship, their feathers brilliant white as they rode the undulating air currents. Astynome, looking pale and uncomfortable, sat curled up beside him with her back against the hull.
‘Yes, I’m certain they’re ours,’ he said. ‘And it looks like they’ve only just arrived – the prows have been driven into the sand and there are lines of men unloading sacks and clay jars.’
‘Did you say jars?’ asked Antiphus, who was manning the twin rudders. His left hand was against his forehead, blocking the sun as he strained to see the shore. ‘That can only mean one thing: they’ve brought wine with them! The gods be praised – I haven’t had Ithacan wine in years.’
‘It could just be oil,’ Eperitus suggested with a playful grin.
‘And if it’s Ithacan wine, then it’s the property of the king, for his use only,’ Odysseus added.
‘Not unless you want a mutiny on your hands,’ Antiphus replied.
Adramyttium and Thebe had been razed to the ground and Achilles was busy organizing a garrison to hold Lyrnessus – a task that would take a week or more to complete – so the ten ships of the Ithacan fleet had been sent back to carry news of their victories to Agamemnon and the Council of Kings. It was a fine spring day with hardly a cloud in the sky and they had just slipped around the seaward flank of Tenedos, catching their first sight of the Greek camp in a crescent bay further up the mainland coast. The vast sprawl of patched and weather-stained canvas, interspersed with ramshackle huts of wood or stone, spread thickly upwards from the edge of the ranging beach on to the deforested slopes above. Twisting grey columns rose from the countless fires that burned day and night, carrying the smell of woodsmoke, roast meat and freshly baked bread across the sea to the hungry Ithacan crews as they drew closer. The long, arcing beach that years ago had been scattered with small fishing vessels – used for catching the shellfish and oysters found in the bay – was now crammed with double rows of warships, their black hulls dragged up on to the white sand to lie bow-cheek to bow-cheek. These were the thousand galleys that had brought the Greek armies to Ilium ten years before in the hope of a swift victory, but which had lain there like stranded whales ever since. Only four gaps existed in the wall of ships: where the Locrians and Argives were camped on the northern sweep of the beach; at the southernmost point where the Myrmidons had their camp; and in the centre where the Ithacan ships were normally found. It was here that Eperitus had spotted the other two galleys of Odysseus’s fleet, back already from their recruiting mission to Ithaca.
By now, the Ithacan fleet had been spotted from the camp and men were abandoning their chores and gathering along the beach, anxious to hear news from the expedition. They looked like wild savages with their long hair and bearded, sun-tanned faces, contrasting markedly with the groups of men who had formed in two separate knots around the newly arrived ships. These were the recruits Odysseus had sent for from Ithaca, to replace those who had fallen in the past few years of the war. Many were cleans-haven and short-haired, with their new armour and bright cloaks marking them out from the veteran warriors who lined the rest of the beach.
‘Whom do you see?’ Odysseus asked, moving to Eperitus’s side.
‘Arceisius and Eurybates that I can recognize,’ Eperitus answered, squinting against the morning sun and scanning the faces of the newcomers. ‘The two score men who went with them. And a whole load of new faces, most of them pale with fear and homesickness.’
‘Then I pity them. It might be a long time before they see Ithaca again.’
Odysseus felt his oversized hands trembling at the thought of home and quickly grabbed the bow rail as soon as he noticed Eperitus’s eyes upon him.
‘You’re concerned about the news they might have brought with them?’
Odysseus nodded. ‘We’ve heard nothing since we sent Antiphus and Polites back for reinforcements five years ago. It’s my kingdom, Eperitus, and while I’m stuck here there are thousands of people at home who should be relying on me to protect them. Anything could be happening there in my absence.’
‘Everything’ll be fine,’ Eperitus reassured him. ‘Mentor and Halitherses will keep the kingdom in order, and you can rely on Penelope to pick up whatever they miss. Remember what the oracle said: a daughter of Lacedaemon will keep the thieves from your house.’
‘I haven’t forgotten,’ Odysseus said. ‘But I wouldn’t be much of a king, would I, if I didn’t worry? I’d be even less of a husband and father. And that’s what haunts me most of all. I miss my family every day, but I can barely remember Penelope’s face any more; and I can’t even begin to guess what Telemachus looks like. Ten years old and he’s never known his own father.’
‘Penelope will tell him all about you,’ Eperitus said. ‘Didn’t Clytaemnestra make sure Iphigenia knew everything I’d ever done, even though she didn’t meet me until she was nine years old? You can count on Penelope to do the same with Telemachus.’
Odysseus stared out across the white-capped waves. ‘But it’s not good enough, Eperitus. This war has me caught between two choices: be an absent husband and father, or dishonour my loved ones by breaking my oath to Menelaus. The first keeps me from the family and home I love, but the second would bring down a curse from the gods, on me and untold generations of my family.’
The identity of the two ships on the beach had become clear to the rest of the crew by now and their chatter was growing louder and more animated as they approached the shore.
‘Silence!’ the king ordered. ‘Keep your minds on your work.’
Astynome stirred at the sound of his barked command and looked groggily up at Eperitus. Odysseus had noticed a bond growing between the two of them in the week since the capture of Lyrnessus, something that was closer than the normal relationship between slave and master. She worked as hard as any of the other captives, but not out of a sense of subservience; in return, he treated her like an equal, giving her the freedom to come and go as she pleased, despite the fact that she could have run away at any time. And for the first time since the death of Iphigenia Odysseus had noticed a lightness in Eperitus’s spirit, the sort of lightness Odysseus had not felt himself since he had last seen Penelope – and one he would not feel again until she was back in his arms.
He slammed his fist down on the wooden rail.
‘Damn this war, Eperitus, and damn my own stupidity. For all my supposedly clever schemes for capturing Troy I was too blind to see why the Trojans have defeated every one of them. Why didn’t I realize there was a traitor?’ He lowered his voice as he looked into Eperitus’s eyes. ‘And it can only be someone in the Council of Kings. Someone at the very top has been selling our plans to Hector, and until your father’s slip at Lyrnessus, the Trojans have been far too clever to make it obvious.’
‘What do you intend to do?’ Eperitus asked.
‘Catch him, of course, and catch him soon. The quicker we stop the Trojans finding out all our plans, the quicker we can bring an end to the war.’
Eperitus glanced down at Astynome, who had closed her eyes again and lay back against the wall of the ship, then across at the benches where the crew were now quietly anticipating the approach of the shoreline and the imminent news from home.
‘But you don’t know who this traitor is,’ he hissed.
Odysseus smiled darkly. ‘Yes, I do. I’ve thought about it and there’s only one man I can think of. It’s Palamedes.’
Eperitus’s eyes widened briefly before contracting back into an unconvinced frown.
‘Palamedes?’ he whispered. ‘A week ago you weren’t even aware there was a traitor; now you’re convinced it’s Palamedes. How?’
‘I have an instinct it’s him.’
‘An instinct, Odysseus? But he’s one of Agamemnon’s inner circle, one of his closest advisers. This isn’t just because he humiliated you last winter, is it, bringing in a ship-load of grain when you hadn’t been able to find more than a few bags of mildewed corn in Thrace?’
Odysseus shook his head, slightly irritated at the accusation. Or was it that Eperitus’s guess was closer to the mark than he wanted to admit? After all, he had never forgiven Palamedes for exposing his attempt to feign madness when Agamemnon and Menelaus had called on him to honour his oath. Nor had he forgotten how Palamedes had frustrated his efforts at negotiating a peace before the war began. If it had not been for the weasel-faced Nauplian, he would have spent the last decade of his life at home on Ithaca with his family, ruling a peaceful and prosperous kingdom. But if his suspicions proved correct – as he was sure they would – and Palamedes had treacherously deprived the Greeks of victory, then his past anger would be as nothing compared to how he would feel then.
Eperitus crossed his arms and looked at Odysseus disapprovingly.
‘You can’t accuse an innocent man.’
‘I tell you he’s not innocent,’ Odysseus insisted. ‘I admit I don’t know why he’s doing it, but I have a strong suspicion how and I intend to prove I’m right. But if it makes you feel better I give you my word I won’t even accuse Palamedes until we can show the council he’s a traitor. Does that satisfy you?’
‘All right, then,’ Eperitus agreed. ‘I’ll help you get your proof, if you’re so certain.’
‘I am,’ Odysseus replied.
He stood up straight and signalled to Antiphus.
‘A little more to the left. As close in as you can get – there’re another nine ships to come after us. The rest of you,’ he added with a booming shout, ‘I want you in the water the moment we hit. Drag her up to the top of the beach so one of the others can get in behind us.’
‘Astynome,’ Eperitus said, offering the girl his hand. ‘Hold on to me. Quickly.’
She took his hand and he pulled her into his arms. A moment later the ship’s shallow bottom hit the soft sand beneath the waterline, sending a heavy judder through the thick timbers of the galley. Eperitus stood firm, his feet planted apart on the deck, while Astynome’s arms tightened around him. The next instant there was a shout of enthusiasm as, all around, men began leaping overboard into the knee-high water.
‘Leave the girl with Polites,’ Odysseus ordered, clapping Eperitus on the shoulder. ‘You and I are going to speak to Eurybates and Arceisius.’
Eperitus reluctantly gave Astynome to the giant warrior, before following Odysseus over the side and into the shallow water. The galley was surrounded by men who strained and grunted as they hauled her further up on to the sand. Then Odysseus and Eperitus heard a shout and saw Eurybates and Arceisius walking down the sloping beach towards them.
‘Greetings from Ithaca!’ Arceisius called.
‘We’ve brought gifts,’ added Eurybates. ‘Ithacan wine and cheese. New clothes for our noble king, made by Queen Penelope herself. And men – over eighty replacements!’
Odysseus greeted his herald with an embrace.
‘It’s good to have you back,’ he said, slapping him on the back. ‘You’ve already missed three good battles and I’ve got a feeling the gods are planning a lot more before the year’s out. I hope you’ve brought some decent fighters back with you.’
Eurybates looked uncertain. ‘They’re good fighters, all right, for the most part, but they won’t be what you or Eperitus were expecting.’
‘What do you mean?’ Eperitus frowned.
‘You’ll see,’ Arceisius said.
He greeted his captain with a tight embrace. Eperitus had taught him to be a warrior, and though he was no longer his squire, Arceisius was pleased to see his former master again after the weeks spent sailing to Ithaca and back. Then he turned to Odysseus and offered the king his hand.
‘I’m pleased the gods have brought you back safely, Arceisius,’ Odysseus said, pulling him into a hug. His smile stiffened slightly and the light in his eyes grew a shade dimmer. ‘But what news of home? Is Ithaca still as beautiful as I remember her? Am I still king?’
‘Mentor and Halitherses continue to rule in your name, my lord,’ he answered, though without conviction. Odysseus’s eyes narrowed slightly, but he said nothing so Arceisius continued. ‘And Ithaca is as lovely as it ever was. More so. It seemed to me as if hardly a stone had been moved from its place since we left her all those years ago, and yet . . .’
‘And yet?’
‘And yet I’d never really understood the beauty of my home until I went back. When I saw her outline on the horizon, with giant Samos beside her, I suddenly realized that my heart had never left Ithaca. All this time I’ve spent in Ilium I’ve been like a wraith, Odysseus, a soulless shade of my real self.’ He paused and then shrugged, as if his words were of no value. ‘I think it would have broken your heart to have returned, knowing you must come back here.’
There was a moment’s silence, broken eventually by Eurybates.
‘It was a lot colder than I remember,’ he said. ‘The wind coming off the Ionian Sea just seems to cut through anything. And it rained a lot, even for the tail end of winter. But cold winds and grey skies can’t dim the wonder of your own home. Arceisius is right – everything looks the same. It smells the same, too: the dung heap by the palace gates, the livestock in the marketplace, the scent of the pine trees wafting down from Mount Neriton; even the woodsmoke smells Ithacan. It made my heart ache just to hear the birds sing and see the first flowers of spring among the rocks and on the hillsides. The girls were wearing them in their hair as they waved us off.
‘And there’s another thing about Ithaca that has grown more lovely since we left. I don’t know whether it’s this gods-forsaken country and the lack of women around these past ten or so years, or whether the immortals have simply blessed Ithaca while we’ve been gone, but I’ve never seen so many beautiful girls. And they couldn’t get enough of a couple of battle-hardened old sweats like us. Arceisius here even got married.’
‘Married!’ exclaimed Eperitus and Odysseus simultaneously.
The usually pert and confident Arceisius was suddenly bashful, his naturally red cheeks turning almost crimson.
‘Is it true?’ Eperitus asked, the corner of his mouth rising in an amused smile. ‘The greatest womanizer in the Ithacan camp tamed at last? She must be a real beauty, this wife of yours.’
‘She is,’ said Eurybates. ‘And at least she’s Greek. There are too many men in the army taking Trojan captives as wives or concubines.’
Eperitus ignored the comment and offered his congratulations to his former squire. Odysseus took Arceisius’s hand again and gripped it firmly.
‘You have your king’s blessing,’ he said. ‘Marriage is good for a man – it gives him something to fight for. But who is this girl and where are you hiding her?’
‘It’s Melantho, my lord, Dolius’s daughter,’ Arceisius replied. ‘I insisted she stay on Ithaca. At least she’ll be safe there.’
‘I hope she will,’ Odysseus said. ‘But if Melantho’s the same little firebrand I used to know – though she was only a little girl back then – well, I’m sure she can look after herself until you return. But what of my wife? Tell me, Arceisius, is she safe? Are Telemachus and my parents safe? There’s something about you two that tells me all’s not well at home.’
‘Have no fear for your wife or family, my lord,’ Arceisius replied. ‘At least not for now. But if you want to know about affairs at home, don’t ask us; we weren’t back long enough. You should ask the replacements.’
He indicated the men who had been standing at the top of the beach as Odysseus’s galley had run aground. A few were now helping to haul the ships on to the sand, while others were sharing news of Ithaca with the eager crowds of men who had not seen their homes for over ten years. A sizeable group, though, had remained where they stood, aloof from or ignored by the rest. These were generally older than the other replacements and had the bearing of men who had seen battle and for whom war was a way of life. They were perhaps a score in number and at least half of them were tall and armed with long spears. Eperitus eyed the latter with alarm.
‘Some of those men are Taphians.’
‘I told you they wouldn’t be what you were expecting,’ Arceisius reminded him.
‘Did Mentes send them?’ Odysseus asked, referring to the Taphian chieftain. Though the Taphians had been enemies of Ithaca for many years, Odysseus had forged a friendship with Mentes that – though it had not brought friendship or alliance – had at least put an end to the hostility.
‘I only wish that had been the case,’ Eurybates answered. ‘Unfortunately, this isn’t a popular war with the nobility back home. The law has been changed, allowing those who can afford it to send a proxy in their place. Of the eighty-four men we brought back with us, twenty-two are mercenaries and twelve of them are Taphians.’
‘Then we should send them back again at once,’ Eperitus said, clenching his fists. ‘And when we get home to Ithaca we can settle matters with those nobles who’ve bought their way out of joining the army.’
Odysseus shook his head. He was concerned and angry that so many of the Ithacan nobility would dare snub his authority so openly, but sending the mercenaries back to Ithaca would only risk more trouble for Penelope and those ruling in his stead. His revenge would wait.
‘Let the mercenaries stay,’ he said. ‘The gods know we need experienced fighting men, and a quarter of the Greek army is made up of mercenaries anyway. Right now, I need to speak to one of these replacements, someone with a good head on his shoulders. Agamemnon, Menelaus and Nestor will be waiting to hear my news, but first I need to learn exactly how things stand at home.’
‘Then you’ll want to speak to Omeros,’ Arceisius suggested.
He pointed to a well-fed youth sitting in the tall grass at the top of the beach. His arms were crossed over his knees and his shaven chin was resting on his wrist as he watched the ships landing one after another and being dragged up on to the sand. His quick eyes were following the activity around the beaked galleys and remained unaware of the four men who were staring at him from among the crowds.
‘By all the gods on Olympus, it is Omeros,’ Eperitus said, shielding his eyes against the high sun. ‘I never imagined I’d see him here.’
‘Still a dreamer, by the looks of him,’ Odysseus said, smiling. ‘But if he’s as clever and observant as he used to be then he’ll know what’s really happening at home. Eurybates, Arceisius, get those replacements working on the ships – including the mercenaries – and have them ready for my inspection by sunset; Eperitus, come with me.’
As the others bowed and turned to the crowds milling around the galleys, Odysseus and Eperitus walked up the beach towards Omeros, kicking up small fountains of white sand behind them. Omeros only seemed to notice their approach at the last moment, when he stood in confusion and – recognizing his king – dipped into an awkward bow.
‘M . . . my lord,’ he stuttered. ‘My lord Odysseus!’
‘Welcome to Troy, Omeros,’ the king said, pulling him upright. ‘You’ve grown well since I last saw you.’
‘Outwards more than upwards, though,’ Eperitus added, grinning.
Omeros placed a hand on his large stomach and looked down at himself in concern, then back at the captain of the guard.
‘It’s nothing I can’t run off, my lord Eperitus,’ he answered. ‘And may I say that you’ve barely changed at all in ten years.’
Odysseus and Eperitus swapped a knowing glance. Since Athena had brought Eperitus back from death he had hardly developed a wrinkle or grey hair, and Omeros had not been the first to remark on this strange longevity.
‘But can you fight, lad?’ Odysseus asked, looking Omeros up and down and noting his slightly pampered appearance, compared to the lean, hardened figures that populated the rest of the Ithacan army.
‘I’ll fight with as much heart as any of those others,’ Omeros answered, nodding at the mercenaries and Taphians. ‘And what some of them have in training and experience, I’ll match in enthusiasm and loyalty.’
This broadened the smile on Odysseus’s face.
‘I’m glad to hear it, very glad,’ he said, placing his arm across Omeros’s shoulders and steering him in the direction of the sprawling camp, with Eperitus following on Omeros’s other side. ‘Without loyalty every other fighting quality is useless, especially to a king. And that’s what I want to talk to you about. I’ve been told some of the nobles on Ithaca have hired mercenaries to take their places. Is it true?’
The line of tall grass where Omeros had been sitting marked the furthest extent of the sea’s reach, and just behind it were the first tents of the huge Greek army. Most of the Ithacan part of the camp was now empty, though here and there groups of men were preparing food or carrying out other tasks that excused them from the work on the beach.
‘It’s true, my lord,’ Omeros said, ruefully. ‘Some of the nobles threatened rebellion if their sons were called to war. Eupeithes told Penelope he could calm their tempers, but only if the Kerosia allowed men of a fighting age to send substitutes in their place. Which meant that while the poor went to serve their king, the wealthy could stay at home and hire mercenaries instead.’
‘This doesn’t bode well,’ Odysseus mused. ‘Eupeithes is still a snake, even if a reformed one, and it’ll take all of Penelope’s skill to keep him in his place. The sooner we can finish this war and return home, the better.’
‘Forgive me, lord,’ Omeros began, ‘but if an army this size hasn’t defeated the Trojans in ten years, what chance is there of ever defeating them?’
‘He’s beginning to sound like a veteran already,’ Eperitus said with an ironic laugh.
‘It seems to me the men don’t have any appetite for victory,’ Omeros added, hesitantly. ‘And I think I know why.’
Odysseus cocked an eyebrow.
‘Really, Omeros? So what’s the secret of our persistent failure?’
Omeros’s chin dropped a little at the king’s chiding, but he did not back down.
‘Lord, I’ve been watching the army since I arrived and they look more like barbarians than Greeks: their hair and beards are long, their clothing is foreign, and half of them are equipped with Trojan armour and weapons. All the women in the camp are Trojan and the men speak to them in their own language. Shouldn’t it be the other way round? It’s as if this camp, this makeshift colony of tents and huts, has become their new home. And as long as they’ve forgotten who they really are and why they came here in the first place – to rescue Helen and return to Greece – then I don’t think they’ll ever take Troy.’
Odysseus looked at him with narrowed eyes and pursed lips. Then he shrugged his shoulders and looked away along the curved line of the beach.
‘You’re right,’ he conceded. ‘The Trojans have checked our every move for ten years and no army can fail to lose heart after so long. But perhaps you’re being a little too hard on us. Some may have given up the hope of victory and a return home, but the rest have just . . . forgotten, as you say. But it’s forgotten, not forsaken. We’ve forgotten what it’s like to stand on our own soil, or to have a solid roof over our heads and be surrounded by our families. All we need is to be reminded of those things and we’d return tomorrow, given the chance.’
‘Ithaca hasn’t changed much, my lord,’ Omeros said.
‘So I hear,’ Odysseus nodded, placing an arm around his shoulder and leading him into the armada of tents. ‘And I wouldn’t want it to. But how are my family, Omeros? Are my parents well? What about Telemachus? Does he look like me or Penelope? And how is my wife?’
Eperitus dropped back and let them walk on alone.
He watched them head in the direction of Odysseus’s hut, then returned to the beach to find Astynome.
Chapter Eight
HOME
Despite his youth, Omeros bore the burden of Odysseus’s desire for news admirably. As he described Anticleia’s sickening for Odysseus and the way she mourned her son’s absence as if he had died, quiet tears fell from the king’s eyes; and when he spoke of how Laertes would climb Mount Neriton every evening to look for the homecoming sails of his son’s ships, Odysseus just nodded his head and smiled.
‘And Telemachus? Is he like me? I mean, can you see anything of me in him?’
‘He’ll be taller than his father,’ Omeros answered, ‘and not so broad.’
‘Like his mother, then.’
‘Yes. Handsome like her, too, but with your eyes. Penelope says she can look at Telemachus and see you looking right back out at her.’
Odysseus laughed with unexpected delight.
‘He has your cunning too, my lord, but it’s kept in place by his mother’s principles. I’d think he could be a very naughty boy if he wasn’t so good.’
‘As long as he can still be naughty when he has to,’ Odysseus said as they reached the entrance to his hut. ‘A future king has to know when to lay aside his morals.’
They stooped as they entered the gloom of Odysseus’s quarters. A small fire burned in the hearth, filling the enclosed space with warmth and the smell of woodsmoke. Odysseus swept off his cloak and unbuckled his armour, before settling down on his haunches before the flames and indicating for Omeros to do the same.
‘What about Penelope?’
Omeros nodded to himself. This was the question that was at the heart of the king’s yearning, the question that would prove whether Penelope’s faith in him had been justified. He glanced at the king, whose eyes were fixed rigidly on the small tongues of orange and yellow flame while he chewed unconsciously at a thumbnail.
‘The queen is well.’
‘Well?’
‘As well as any queen can be without her king.’
Odysseus’s face twitched. A flicker of guilt, Omeros thought.
‘And how does she look now? Has she changed much since I last saw her? It’s been almost ten years, Omeros, and I can barely remember her face – as if she were nothing more than a dream. I sometimes wonder whether she existed at all.’
‘She exists, lord, and she’s hardly changed since you departed.’
‘Describe her, for me. Just as she looked when you last saw her.’
Omeros sucked in his bottom lip and swept his hand through his hair as he recalled the scene.
‘It was night time. No moon, just the starlight. It made her brown hair look black and her skin pale. She stood a little taller than me, dressed in a dark cloak with the hood down.’
‘And her face?’
Omeros, who had been staring at the king as he described Penelope, blinked and looked down at the fire.
‘She’s still beautiful. Not youthful beauty, like Melantho’s, or the powerful beauty I imagine Helen has, but something calm and reassuring instead. The sort of beauty you don’t think would laugh or sneer at you.’
Odysseus nodded as if recognizing the description, but said nothing.
‘My lord,’ Omeros continued, the tone of his voice more tentative now. ‘She asked me to give you a message.’
Odysseus looked up, expectation and anxiety flickering across his features in the shifting light from the flames.
‘What is it?’
Omeros closed his eyes and thought back to the starlit night on Ithaca when he had last spoken to Penelope. It was the night of Arceisius’s and Melantho’s wedding.
The great hall had been given over to the celebrations. Every table and chair in the palace – and more from the town – had been brought in and were now overflowing with food, wine and guests. The hearth blazed, bathing the hall and its occupants in golden light, supplemented by the numerous torches sputtering on the mural-covered walls. To one side of the central fire a square of the dirt floor had been kept free, bordered by tables on its flanks and the table and chairs of the bride and groom at its head: in this large space, dozens of cheerful – and drunk – young Ithacans were dancing to the music of lyre, pipes and tambourines, while on every side scores of onlookers cheered and sang. Leading the dance were Arceisius and Melantho: he in his battle-scarred armour that spoke of heroic deeds and the glory of war, and she with her white chiton and the first flowers of spring in her black hair. They smiled broadly at each other as they moved in time to the music, delighting in being the centre of attention. Omeros, watching from one side, was pleased for them. Though Melantho had been an immature girl when Arceisius had sailed to war, she was now a woman with all the beauty and allure of youth about her. Arceisius had fallen in love with her almost the instant he had set eyes upon her, and while it was well known on the island that her favours had been given freely to others before, Arceisius was blissfully unaware of the fact. As a soldier who had lived in the shadow of Hermes’s cloak, and who had known more than enough slaves and prostitutes in his time, Omeros thought it unlikely Arceisius would have cared anyway.
As he watched them, his poet’s ears offended by the loud, clamorous music, Melantho caught his eye and skipped over to him, dragging Arceisius behind her.
‘Come dance with me, Omeros,’ she pleaded, outrageously flirtatious with her pouting lips and large brown eyes. ‘Come on now.’
‘You know I hate dancing . . .’
‘Nonsense. You’re just jealous I didn’t marry you instead!’
‘No one hates dancing!’ Arceisius exclaimed. His eyes were bright with alcohol and love, and with an irresistible laugh he pulled Omeros from his chair and almost threw him into Melan-tho’s arms. ‘Now dance!’
Omeros really did not like dancing, but Arceisius’s happiness was infectious and the seductive beauty and heady intimacy of Melantho could not be denied. Eventually he was rescued by Eurybates, who took his place and sent the young bard to join Arceisius, who was beckoning to him from one of the crowded tables. As Omeros joined him, Arceisius pushed a krater of wine into his hand.
‘Are you concerned?’ he asked. ‘About the war, I mean.’
Omeros looked at him, surprised by the frankness of the question, and could tell Arceisius was not drunk. His red face was full of light-hearted cheer, and yet in the middle of his own wedding he could still spare a moment to discuss the anxieties of a lad he had not seen for ten years. Omeros was not sure how to reply.
‘Well, you needn’t be. You have a level head, Omeros, and it’s men like you who make the best soldiers. You’ll do well in Ilium, believe me, and, anyway, those of us who’ve seen a few battles will watch over you to start with. But if you want some advice, don’t spend the whole of your last evening on Ithaca in here. Go for a walk and say goodbye to the island you love. She’ll haunt your dreams while you’re gone and no amount of glory in battle can replace the joy of being on your own soil. Besides, you don’t know you’ll see the place again.’
Omeros nodded. ‘I will.’
He drained his wine and stood up, returning Arceisius’s smile. Then a thought struck him and he looked down at the seasoned warrior in his leather cuirass with his ever-present sword hanging at his side.
‘And what about you? Are you concerned?’
Arceisius’s eyes narrowed uncertainly.
‘I mean,’ Omeros continued, glancing over at Melantho who was draping herself about Eurybates and laughing merrily, ‘I mean you’re married now. You have more to lose on the battlefield.’
Arceisius gave a small laugh and shook his head.
‘Don’t worry about me. I can take care of myself.’
The large double doors were wide open as Omeros left the great hall. A slab of orange light lay at an angle across the wooden portico, reaching out far enough to illuminate the trampled soil of the courtyard where the wedding ceremony had taken place earlier. Omeros crossed to the gate in the outer wall, followed by the mingled noise of music, laughter and drunken voices. Arceisius had been right: while others could forget their fears and doubts in the company of wine and friends, it was better to leave the celebrations behind and spend the remainder of his last evening on Ithaca with his own thoughts. Tomorrow he would sail for war, but tonight he wanted to walk beneath the familiar stars, listening to the wind in the trees as he stared up at the dark, humped shapes of Mount Neriton and Mount Hermes. Omeros sighed; though he had volunteered to go to Troy, seeking adventure and glory on the battlefield, now the time was almost upon him to leave he found the place he most wanted to be in all the world was right here in Ithaca.
He stepped through the unguarded gates, intending to walk down to the harbour and look out at the straits between Ithaca and the neighbouring island of Samos. The broad terrace in front of the palace walls was covered with the tents of the men who had left their homes on Samos, Zacynthos and Dulichium to join the expedition. They were empty now, flapping in the wind that came over the ridge from the sea below, and their canvas was a ghostly grey in the light of the countless stars that circled above. Omeros filled his lungs with the briny air, then crossed to the houses on the other side of the terrace.
‘There you are,’ said a voice behind him.
He turned and saw the black shape of a dog running towards him from the gateway he had just vacated. He flinched instinctively as the animal reached his ankles, but it did no more than bark and sniff a circle around his feet, before pressing its wet nose against his thighs and beating the air with its tail. Omeros recognized Argus, Odysseus’s old hunting dog, and ran his fingers over his domed head. Then a tall figure stepped out from the shadow of the palace gates.
‘Had your fill of feasting and dancing already?’ Penelope asked, walking up to him and slipping her arm through the crook of his elbow.
‘I wanted to clear my mind, my lady.’
‘Thinking of Troy?’
‘I suppose I should be, but the truth is I was thinking of Ithaca. I’ll miss the smell of the pine trees and the sound of the gulls following the fishing boats back into the harbour. It’s all I’ve ever known, of course, and now that I’m leaving it behind I feel . . . suddenly uncertain. I don’t even know if the stars will be the same on the other side of the world.’
‘They will,’ Penelope assured him with a smile as they walked between the dark, silent houses of the town, Argus sniffing the ground in their wake. ‘And there are trees and gulls in Ilium too, just as there are here.’
‘But they won’t be the same. It’s just that I might not see Ithaca again. After all, I’m not a soldier. I’m just a storyteller.’
‘You’re stronger than you realize, Omeros, and you’re not a coward – although you think too deeply to be a natural warrior,’ she added, tapping her forehead. ‘Stay close to Arceisius, Odysseus and Eperitus: they’ll keep you safe.’
Omeros nodded, smiling at the thought of so many people seeming concerned for his safety. They walked on, following the broad path out beyond the edge of the town and down towards the harbour. For a while they said nothing, then, as they passed the town spring and the poplar trees that surrounded it, Penelope’s grip tightened about Omeros’s arm.
‘I want you to do something for me, Omeros.’
‘Yes, of course.’
‘I want you to give a message to Odysseus. I want you to give it to him in person, when he’s alone.’
‘Me? But Eurybates is Odysseus’s squire. Wouldn’t he . . . ?’
‘No, I want you to give it to him. Eurybates has spent the past ten years in Ilium; what can he tell Odysseus about Ithaca? But you’ve seen everything that’s happened here these past ten years. You can let him know everything that’s happened while he’s been away, in all the detail he could want. More importantly, you can tell him about Telemachus: how tall he’s getting, how strong he is, and how he’s always talking about his father. Tell him that . . .’
She paused. They could see the harbour below them now, where the two galleys had their sails furled, ready for the morning departure. Penelope stood watching them as they rolled gently on the black, starlit waves that swept in from the straits. Across the water was the vast bulk of Samos.
‘Tell him that sometimes I look at Telemachus and see Odysseus staring back out at me. And sometimes I can’t bear it. I want him back, Omeros.’
She turned to face him, and though her face was in darkness he could see the tears glistening in her eyes. He took her cold hand and pressed the palm, trying to offer reassurance and yet not knowing how to comfort a queen.
‘The gods will bring him back.’
‘The gods are fickle,’ she replied. ‘And yet I still pray and hope. When I saw those galleys a moment ago, I imagined they were his and that he had come home at last. I could almost see him climbing the road from the harbour, as if the past ten years had been an awful nightmare and that he had returned. But this isn’t a nightmare; it’s reality, and Odysseus is in a darkness that’s beyond my reach.’
Omeros lowered his eyes.
‘I’ll tell him for you,’ he promised. ‘I’ll tell him all about Telemachus and how much he needs his father. And I’ll tell him about you, how much you love him and need him.’
‘Thank you, Omeros,’ Penelope said, laying her hand on his arm. ‘But there’s something else you must make clear to him, something I will entrust to you alone. Tell Odysseus his kingdom is under threat again.’
Omeros’s eyes widened briefly, before settling into a frown.
‘If that’s true, then the ships should remain here. While you or Ithaca are in danger, our first duty is to defend you. It’s what Odysseus would have us do.’
‘No. If Eurybates and Arceisius don’t return he’ll fear the worst and do something rash. Tell him we’re safe for now, but the threat will grow the longer he is away. It’s Eupeithes again.’
‘Eupeithes!’
‘Yes. His influence has increased in Odysseus’s absence, but never such that he could be a threat. The Kerosia has always been too heavily weighted against him. He bought Polyctor’s support long ago, but he’ll never win over the rest of the council.’
‘Then what has changed?’ Omeros asked.
‘The arrival of the galleys was the catalyst,’ Penelope replied. ‘Before then, the people thought the war could not last much longer, but the call for replacements has crushed their hope. Now they are wondering if Odysseus will ever return, and with some of the nobles refusing to send their sons to Troy, Eupeithes’s confidence has grown. He’s pushing for his son – Antinous – to be added to the Kerosia, as a favour for persuading the nobles not to rebel. He won’t be allowed – not yet – but if he can gain support among some of the richest families we’ll find it hard to resist for ever.’
‘Will he try force again?’
Penelope shook her head.
‘Not outright: he lost his taste for that the last time. He’ll stick to what he’s best at – politics of the worst kind – and though I will defend my husband’s kingdom in every way I can, I’m not sure how long I can outwit a resurgent Eupeithes for. If he can somehow take control of the Kerosia, with me as titular head of Ithaca, he will be ruler of Ithaca in all but name. Omeros, you must tell Odysseus that if the war isn’t over soon he could lose his kingdom altogether.’
Omeros nodded and looked out at the wooded slopes of Samos across the water. If he ever saw his homeland again, he had a feeling it would not be the same place it was now.
Chapter Nine
CALCHAS
The sun was low in the west before Odysseus and Eperitus dismissed the replacements. The inspection had been delayed by Odysseus’s report to Agamemnon, where his news of victory had been questioned at great length by the King of Men, aided by Menelaus and Nestor. Now, as the men began to stream back from the beach and into the camp where the rest of the army were preparing their evening meals, the king of Ithaca and the captain of his guard stood looking at the Aegean Sea beyond the black hulks of the Greek fleet, contemplating the merits of the newcomers.
‘There’s not a man among them who’s fit enough yet,’ Odysseus said, his face sober with concern. ‘Those mercenaries will flag in a prolonged battle, but the lads from home wouldn’t even make it through a skirmish.’
‘They’ve been crammed on to those galleys for days,’ Eperitus replied. ‘It’s bound to have left them a bit weak and groggy. But I’ll make sure they’re put through their paces over the next few days.’
‘They need more weapons training, too,’ Odysseus added, looking up at the pink skies scored with lines of purple cloud as if great claws had been drawn across the heavens. ‘The hired men will be able to stand their ground, but from what we saw of the others the Trojans would cut them to pieces without breaking into a sweat.’
‘Did we expect anything else?’ Eperitus asked, raising an eyebrow and grinning at his friend as they turned and walked back in the direction of the camp. ‘But don’t worry – I’ll see they know how to fight, too, before we inflict them on the enemy. Besides, I’d trust our own countrymen more than I would those mercenaries. At least they have a sense of loyalty and honour.’
‘What good’s honour in this place?’ Odysseus said. ‘Omeros was right: remembering who we were and what we’ve left behind is the only thing that’s going to win this war – that and ruthless determination.’
‘Honour is the lifeblood of a fighting man,’ Eperitus protested. ‘Without it we’re nothing more than murdering brigands. You’re a king, Odysseus, you should know that.’
‘I’m a king of nothing unless this war finishes soon. And the longer we fight the Trojans the more our sense of honour and humanity is dying out anyway. You saw how the men were by the time we sacked Thebe – brutal and merciless, like wild animals. I’ve watched it growing in them as the years have passed, and the Trojans are no better. It’s despicable, but perhaps we have to abandon our notions of honour and become the worst kind of savages if we’re ever to see our homes again.’
‘If that’s what’s needed, then perhaps it’s best we never return to Ithaca at all,’ Eperitus said.
They walked between the weathered tents where the men were seated around small fires, eating smoked mackerel and bread washed down with wine from home. Eperitus looked at the new arrivals, sitting in twos and threes among the men for whom Ithaca was nothing more than a faded memory dressed up in nostalgia. For a short while they would listen to news from their homeland, of their loved ones and of the places they had once known as intimately as they knew their own bodies. Then the wine that had been fermented on Samos would help them forget and instead they would tell the newcomers stories of the war against Troy and of the kings and heroes whose names were already becoming legend. How long, Eperitus wondered, before the newcomers would also lose their identities as Greeks? How long before they became longhaired barbarians, carrying captured weapons and married to foreign wives who spoke a different tongue? How long before their honour faded and was stained with acts of black cruelty?
‘Well, I have no intention of dying here, with or without my honour,’ Odysseus said, looking determined. ‘You and I are going to prove Palamedes has been passing our plans to the Trojans, and once we’ve stopped him I’ll think up a new way to defeat Hector once and for all.’
‘That’s assuming Palamedes is the traitor, Odysseus. And I can’t see how you’re going to prove that.’
‘I’ll find a way,’ Odysseus replied confidently. ‘The gods will reveal it to me. But now I’m going to my hut; Agamemnon, Menelaus and Nestor tired me out with their questions, and I need time alone to think about this news from home.’
Eperitus watched him pick his way through the campfires to his hut, his shoulders sagging with the burden of what was happening back on Ithaca. It was hard for any man to be away from his family for so long, and whatever Omeros had told him had concentrated that sense of separation. But Odysseus was also a king, and the threat of rebellious nobles when he was trapped in a war on the other side of the world was not an easy load to bear. Unfortunately, it was not a load Eperitus could share, though he wished he could.
‘Eperitus?’
He turned to see Astynome standing behind him. She was barefoot, as usual, and her white chiton was covered by the green cloak he had found for her a week ago in Lyrnessus. In her outstretched hands was a krater of wine.
‘I brought this for you,’ she said, smiling. ‘It’s Ithacan. Perhaps it will remind you of your home.’
He took it and raised the dark liquid to his lips. After a long day with nothing but water the wine was cool and refreshing.
‘Thank you. Try some.’
He passed the krater back to her, but instead of taking it from him she placed her warm hands beneath his and lifted the cup to her mouth, watching him with her dark eyes as she drank.
‘It’s good,’ she said, removing her hands from his. ‘Polites gave me a whole skin of it for you. It’s at your hut, with the food I’ve prepared. Come.’
She led the way between the various campfires, walking with her head high and her long black hair cascading down her back. The Ithacan soldiers looked up as she passed them by, staring desirously at the fine, proud features of her face but looking away as soon as they saw their captain a few paces behind her. It was obvious they assumed she was more than just his slave, an assumption he was happy for them to make; after saving her from Eurylochus and his cronies at Lyrnessus, he did not intend to allow the rest of his men to force themselves upon her.
A large fire was burning close to his hut as they approached. Arceisius was stirring the contents of a large pot that hung over the flames, while Polites, Eurybates, Antiphus and Omeros sat around the hearth drinking wine and talking with animated gestures. Sparks and smoke rose into the air and the delicious aroma of stewed meat filled Eperitus’s nostrils, making him suddenly aware of how hungry he was. His comrades greeted him enthusiastically as he sat down beside them, while Astynome took the ladle from Arceisius’s hands and insisted that she be allowed to serve the meal she had cooked. She poured some of the stew into a wooden bowl and passed it to Eperitus, watching closely for his reaction. As the rich sauce touched his lips he thanked the gods he had been fortunate enough to find such an excellent cook and nodded his approval.
‘It’s good. Very good.’
Astynome smiled with satisfaction.
‘Of course it is,’ said Antiphus, holding up his bowl. ‘We’ve eaten better in the past week with Astynome’s cooking than we have during the whole of this war. Haven’t we, Polites?’
Polites nodded and watched as his own bowl was filled. Silence followed as the men ate, while Astynome passed them baskets of bread and busied herself mixing the wine. She filled Eperitus’s krater first and hardly took her eyes off him as she served the others. When she had finished, Arceisius insisted that she fill her own bowl and join them about the fire. She tried to refuse, claiming it was not right for a slave to eat with free men, but the rest would not accept her excuses and eventually she agreed, though awkwardly at first.
It pleased Eperitus to see how well his friends had taken to her, and he knew it was not simply because she was an attractive woman. Despite her display of humility about eating with them, there was a fire in her spirit that defied the fact she was a captive among enemies. She had a natural nobility that came not from birthright, but from her character. Eperitus had quickly come to respect her for it in their short time together, and it seemed the others recognized it too.
As darkness descended the men turned naturally to conversation. While Astynome slipped away to fetch bread and mix more wine, Antiphus made Arceisius tell them all about Melantho and how he had managed to fool the poor girl into marrying him. Next came the tale of the capture of Lyrnessus, Adramyttium and Thebe, which Arceisius and Eurybates wanted in every detail. Antiphus indulged them, while Polites and Eperitus contributed very little – Polites due to his natural quietness and Eperitus because he did not want to offend Astynome. Then it was the turn of Omeros, who fetched his tortoiseshell lyre and began to sing to them of Ithaca and the homes and people they had left behind. Astynome sat down at Eperitus’s shoulder, enchanted by the poet’s skill even though he sang about a place she had never seen and knew nothing about. Eventually, with the stars filling the sky and the conversations of other campfires slowly dying out around them, Omeros finished singing and declared it was time for him to sleep. The others nodded and unrolled their furs, while Astynome stood and walked to where her blanket lay beside the wall of Eperitus’s hut.
ТЕЛЕГРАМКанал с обзорами, анонсами новинок и книжными подборками
Книжный Вестник
Бот для удобного поиска книг (если не нашлось на сайте)
Поиск книг
Свежие любовные романы в удобных форматах
Любовные романы
О психологии, саморазвитии и личностном росте
Саморазвитие
Детективы и триллеры, все новинки
Детективы
Фантастика и фэнтези, все новинки
Фантастика
Отборные классические книги
Классика
ВКОНТАКТЕБиблиотека с любовными романами, которая наверняка придётся по вкусу женской части аудитории
Любовные романы
Библиотека с фантастикой и фэнтези, а также смежных жанров
Фантастика
Самые популярные книги в формате фб2
Топ фб2
книги