The Gates Of Troy (37 page)

‘He’s mine,’ Agamemnon whispered, drawing the bowstring back to his cheek and preparing to stand.

But before he could move, his brother stood and launched the long spear from his hand. It spun through the air, its imperfect shaft twirling behind the bronze tip as it flew towards its target. A moment later it skimmed the shoulders of the hart and buried its point in the mud-caked roots of the tree.

The hart raised its head, saw Menelaus and bolted in the opposite direction. Odysseus stood and cast his own spear, aiming at the flashing white of the animal’s hindquarters as they disappeared through the undergrowth. It fell short.

Agamemnon also stood, but unlike the two spearmen knew he had a few moments more to take aim and release his shot. Closing his left eye, he squinted down the shaft of the arrow and focused on the triple-barbed point, aiming it slightly ahead of the fleeing deer. Snatching a half-breath and holding it so that the movement of his lungs would not disturb his aim, he released the shaft.

The bow hummed and Agamemnon leaned his head to the left, hoping to see the white form stumble and fall, but the animal had already disappeared among the trees.

‘Missed it,’ Menelaus announced, almost gleefully.

‘Thanks to you, you buffoon. I told you to leave it for me.’

‘What? And let you take all the glory, as usual,
King of Men
?’

‘Quiet,’ Eperitus ordered, momentarily forgetting he was talking to the two most powerful men in Greece. ‘I can’t hear its footfalls any more. It’s stopped running.’

‘No man could hear that well,’ said Talthybius.

‘Come on,’ Odysseus said. ‘Let’s see if you’ve hit your mark, Agamemnon.’

They dashed into the undergrowth; twigs snapped loudly beneath their sandals and brittle stems whipped against their shins. They ran past the spears of Menelaus and Odysseus and forged on to the place where they had last seen the hart’s white flanks. The trees were thinner here, allowing more sunlight to illuminate the woodland floor, but they could see nothing.

‘You were wrong, Eperitus,’ Agamemnon said, with clear disappointment in his voice. He stopped and looked about himself. ‘It’s gone. The glory will go to no man now.’

But Eperitus merely shook his head.

‘No, my lord, I’d still be able to hear its feet beating the ground now. And I can smell fresh blood.’

Odysseus, who had continued following the course of the deer, suddenly called for them to join him. He stood near to the edge of the wood, where the trees filtered out into open fields and the light was almost unbearable to look at. As they ran to join him they saw the carcass of the white hart at his feet, shining like silver through the screen of ferns. Agamemnon’s arrow still protruded from its neck.

Eperitus knelt and ran his hands over the soft, warm fur, feeling the ridges of the ribcage beneath his fingertips. This close, the animal was as magnificent in death as it had been when he had seen it in the small clearing, bathed in golden sunlight. He looked up and saw Agamemnon standing above him. The face of the sun glittered in the intertwined branches behind his head, and with the richly decorated breastplate he wore he looked like a god.

‘A magnificent shot, my lord,’ Eperitus said, reaching to stroke the still-warm flank of the hart.

Agamemnon laughed, a triumphant look gleaming in his sunken eyes as he smiled down at his prey. ‘Artemis herself could not have done better!’

And as the words left his lips the sunlight about them seemed to flare out brightly for a moment, then shrink back again. Though they could not yet see it, grey clouds were massing rapidly on the eastern horizon. Before long they were rolling across the skies like a conquering army, swirling and twisting in their tortured agony as they crossed the blue expanse. By the time the men emerged from the wood with the dead hart over Agamemnon’s shoulders, the first grey outriders of the approaching storm had blotted out the sun altogether. The hunters looked up in fear and the hills echoed with a boom of thunder.

book

THREE

Chapter Nineteen

T
HE
S
TORM

T
he rain lashed furiously against the forest of tents, drenching the flaxen sheets until they hung heavily upon the wooden poles beneath. Inside, men shivered against the unseasonable cold and pulled their woollen cloaks tighter about their shoulders, longing for the day when the unending storm would lift and allow them to sail for Troy. But if any man opened the flap of his tent, all he could see was grey clouds from horizon to horizon, pressing down on the camp like the belly of a great monster as the rain fell and the wind howled.

It had been this way for three weeks. Night flowed into day and day back into night, so that the only change was from Stygian blackness into melancholy gloom and back again. The only real light any man saw was the glitter of lightning inside the ever-shifting mantle of cloud, or the occasional bolt stalking across distant horizons. And all the time their ears were assailed by the monotonous groaning of the wind as it passed between the avenues of tents, tearing at pennants and tugging at guy ropes, a constant worry to the men inside. Many a shelter was blown away in the storm, and most others were made unbearable by the wind that whistled through the gaps in the walls. Once inside, it would drive out any warmth until the flesh of every soldier was chilled to the bone and each man was ready to give up the expedition and return home. But with their ships wind-bound in the straits below, they had no choice but to sit tight and pass the time grumbling against the gods and, above all, their leaders.

There were few who did not blame the slaying of the white hart for their present troubles. Agamemnon had shot a creature precious to one of the immortals, and now this unidentified god was making all their lives a misery because of their leader’s sacrilege. The King of Men, keen to set sail, was the most frustrated of them all. He had offered repeated sacrifices to all the gods, but to no avail. On every occasion, as he had stared up into the rain with fresh blood streaming down the dagger in his right hand, his desperate prayers were met with deep rumbles of displeasure from the skies above. And as the fleet remained holed up between the mainland and Euboea, the pressure on its leader grew.

He sat on a heavy wooden chair with a high back. It was covered in a thin layer of tin and had been draped over with furs, which were soft beneath the naked skin of his thighs and calves. His new breastplate felt stiff and awkward, pressing into the flesh beneath his armpits and at the tops of his legs, but he refused to remove it because of his constant fear of assassination. The double cloak over his shoulders was warm and light.

Agamemnon drummed the fingers of his right hand repeatedly on the table before him, trying to drown out the constant pattering of the rain on the high roof of his tent. The thumb and forefinger of his other hand were busily massaging his aching temples as he studied the map Odysseus had placed on the table. It depicted a rough representation of Ilium and its surrounding islands.

‘If this distance is correct,’ said King Nestor, leaning across and tapping the point between the walls of Troy and the line of beach between the Scamander and Simo¨eis, ‘then it’s too risky to make the landing so close to the city.’

‘Nonsense,’ Menelaus said. ‘If we land the ships here we can cross the plain in no time. The Trojans will be taken completely by surprise, and before they know it our army will be streaming through the city.’

The two men were among a handful that had joined Agamemnon in his tent after the nightly feast, a time when the leaders of the expedition would sacrifice to the gods and share food together. Tonight, though, the atmosphere was more affected than usual by the sombre weather. Achilles had departed with the Ajaxes and Teucer, all of them intent on brightening their mood with wine. Many others had returned to the familiarity of their own camps, hoping to wake the next morning and find clear skies. Only Idomeneus, Diomedes and Odysseus had joined Nestor and the Atreides brothers to discuss a strategy for the attack on Troy, and were now poring over the rough map that the Ithacan king had made from memory.

‘Your eagerness to rescue your wife is blinding you to the realities of war, Menelaus,’ Nestor countered. ‘If the Trojans are prepared for us, they can meet us on the beaches and massacre us as we leap down from our ships. If they are not prepared but are able to meet us in force on the plain, they could check our advance and throw us back into the sea before we have time to organize a proper defence. And if we don’t take the city in the first attack and have to lay siege to it, any determined attack they make could reach our camp with ease.’

‘Do you doubt our army’s ability to beat the Trojans?’ Agamemnon asked, cocking an eyebrow towards his trusted adviser.

‘No, but just as many battles are decided by the gods as they are by feats of arms. If the prophecy of the snake and the sparrows was interpreted correctly, then we can be sure the gods won’t give us Troy in the first attack. And I’ve seen too many battles on open ground to want to risk our ships on that beach. If it’s my advice you want, Agamemnon – and that was the reason you asked me to join this expedition – then you won’t gamble everything we have in such a place.’

‘Nestor’s right,’ Odysseus agreed. ‘The plain is too exposed. If we attack there the war won’t last ten days, let alone ten years.’

‘Then where
do
we attack?’ asked Idomeneus.

‘Right here,’ Nestor answered, tapping a point on the mainland north of Tenedos. It was one of the large bays Odysseus’s ship had passed on its mission to Troy. ‘It’s wide and sandy, ideal for beaching a large number of ships, and it can’t be seen from Troy because of the distance and this ridge. That means we can land unopposed and form up our armies before marching on Troy. Then, if the gods are against us and we are forced back, we can use the ridge as a line of defence.’

‘That places the Scamander between us and Troy,’ said Diomedes, running his finger over the line of the river. ‘Even if there’s a ford, it’ll be easier for the Trojans to defend it against . . .’

He left the sentence unfinished as all seven men turned to look at the soldier who had just entered. His cloak was soaked through and his polished armour streamed with rivulets of rain that dripped onto the furs beneath his sandals.

‘Sorry, my lords, but it’s the Trojan priest. He wants to see the King of Men – says it can’t wait.’

‘Another one of his wine-induced dreams, no doubt,’ Menelaus sniffed. ‘Send him away, Ixion.’

‘No,’ said Agamemnon, shooting a glance at his brother. ‘Bring him in. It might be important.’

The soldier disappeared and a moment later Calchas came hurtling in through the same elaborately embroidered flap of cotton, to land in a damp heap on the piled furs and fleeces. His customary hooded cloak was absent, and his white priest’s robes were soaked through, revealing his nakedness beneath. He raised himself up on his hands and looked at the gathering of kings, swaying slightly and reeking of wine. His staring eyes were red-rimmed and filled with fear.

‘What is it, my friend?’ Agamemnon asked, forcing a smile to his lips. ‘Do you have a word for us from the gods?’

‘Yes, King of Men!’ Calchas replied, raising himself to his knees and shuffling forwards with his hands clasped together like a suppliant. Then he looked around at the other kings, as if he was seeing them for the first time, and pulled back with an angry look on his face. ‘No! I have nothing for
these
, only you. You must send them away.’

‘Show some respect or I’ll send you to Hades, you wretch,’ Diomedes warned, putting a hand to the hilt of his silver-studded sword.

‘Don’t be offended, Tydeides,’ said Agamemnon, using the familiar form of address for the son of Tydeus. ‘He’s half out of his mind at most times of the day, but even more so when he’s had one of his visions.’

Odysseus looked up.

‘Have there been others we haven’t heard of?’

‘Nothing of importance,’ Agamemnon responded, meeting Odysseus’s intelligent eyes. ‘And nothing that has upset him as much as whatever’s on his mind now.’

‘In the name of Apollo, send them away!’ Calchas implored, tears of anguish and frustration rolling down his cheeks. ‘Lord Agamemnon, I
must
speak to you alone.’

Idomeneus thumped the table in frustration, the annoyance clear on his handsome features.

‘Calchas may bring word from the gods themselves, but what we’re discussing could decide the fate of the whole expedition. Send him to the guard tent, Agamemnon, and call him in when we’re done.’

Diomedes and Menelaus voiced their agreement with the Cretan king, while Odysseus and Nestor both looked at Agamemnon in a way that left him in no doubt of their feelings on the matter.

Calchas turned on them in disgust. ‘What good are your strategies and tactics if the fleet is stuck at Aulis?
I’m the only one who knows how to lift the storm
, and unless you listen to me your ships will remain here until their timbers rot and their crews die of old age.’

‘Come now, my lad,’ said Nestor, leaning down and patting the distressed priest’s shoulder. ‘If you know how to appease the god we’ve offended, then tell us so that we can do whatever we must.’

‘Whatever, King Nestor?’ Calchas replied with a mocking smile.
‘Whatever?
Even a brave man like you would pale at what needs to be done. And that’s why I can only tell the King of Men.
He
must decide whether to pay the terrible price that is demanded of him, or abandon his dreams of conquest and go back home.’

‘You’d like that wouldn’t you, you Trojan dog?’

‘Enough, Menelaus,’ said Agamemnon, though his eyes did not leave Calchas. ‘If this vision is for me alone, and if it’ll show me how to send these winds back to where they came from, then I must ask you to return to your tents. We can carry on our discussion at noon tomorrow.’

The kings paused and looked at Agamemnon for a moment, then Odysseus went to the table by the entrance and picked up his purple cloak, throwing it about his shoulders and fastening it together with the golden brooch Penelope had given him. The others followed, gathering up their cloaks and helmets before leaving without a word. Odysseus was the last to go, but before he lowered the embroidered flap of the tent behind him, he looked back to see Calchas with his arms around Agamemnon’s knees, crying like a child.