The Song of Troy

by Colleen McCullough

  A public augury involved the personal attendance of every officer in the army senior to those who commanded mere squadrons. They gathered in the space set aside for assemblies, perhaps a thousand of them ranged behind the Kings, all facing the altar; most of them, of course, were related to the Kings, some closely.

  Only Agamemnon was seated. As I passed in front of his throne I made no attempt to bend the knee to him, and scowled fiercely. It was noticed; every face grew rigid with concern. Patrokles even went so far as to put a warning hand on my arm, but I threw it off angrily. Then I found my place, listened to Kalchas say that the plague wouldn’t lessen until Apollo was given his due, the girl Chryse. Agamemnon must send her to Troy.

  Neither he nor I needed to do much acting; we twisted in the web woven by Odysseus and hated it. I laughed and jeered at Agamemnon, he retaliated by ordering me to give him Brise. Shoving the frantic Patrokles aside, I left the assembly ground to make my way to the Myrmidon stockade. After one look at my face Brise said nothing, though her eyes filled with tears. Back we went in silence. Then in front of all that great company I put her hand into Agamemnon’s. Nestor volunteered to care for both girls and ship them to their fates. As Brise walked away with him she turned her head to look at me one last time.

  When I told Agamemnon that I was withdrawing myself and my troops from his army I sounded as if I meant every word. Neither Patrokles nor Phoinix doubted my sincerity for an instant. I stalked off to the Myrmidon stockade, leaving them to follow.

  The house was full of echoes, empty without Brise. Avoiding Patrokles, I slunk about it all day, alone in my shame and sorrow. At the supper hour Patrokles came to dine with me, but there was no conversation; he refused to speak to me.

  In the end I spoke to him. ‘Cousin, can’t you understand?’

  Eyes filmed with tears, he looked at me. ‘No, Achilles, I can’t. Ever since that girl came into your life, you’ve become someone I don’t know. Today you answered for all of us in something you had no right to decide on our behalf. You withdrew our services without consulting us. Only our High King could do that, and Peleus never would. You’re not a worthy son.’

  Oh, that hurt. ‘If you won’t understand, will you forgive?’

  ‘Only if you go to Agamemnon and retract what you said.’

  I drew back. ‘Retract? Are you insane? Agamemnon offered me a mortal insult!’

  ‘An insult you brought on yourself, Achilles! If you hadn’t laughed and derided him, he would never have singled you out! Be fair! You act as if your heart is broken at being parted from Brise – did it never occur to you that perhaps Agamemnon’s heart is broken at being parted from Chryse?’

  ‘That pig-headed tyrant has no heart!’

  ‘Achilles, why are you so obdurate?’

  ‘I’m not obdurate.’

  He struck his hands together. ‘Oh, I don’t believe this! It’s her influence! How she must have worked on you!’

  ‘I can see why you’d think that, but it isn’t so. Forgive me, Patrokles, please.’

  ‘I can’t forgive you,’ he said, and turned his back on me. The idol Achilles had toppled from his pedestal at last. And how right Odysseus was. Men believed in trouble made by women.

  Odysseus slipped in the next evening very quietly. I was so glad to see a friendly face that I greeted him almost feverishly.

  ‘Ostracised by your own?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes. Even Patrokles has wiped his hands of me.’

  ‘Well, that’s maybe to be expected, eh? But take heart. In a few more days you’ll be back in the field, vindicated.’

  ‘Vindicated. An interesting word. Yet something has occurred to me, Odysseus, that ought to have occurred to me at the council. It didn’t. If it had, I could never have agreed to your scheme.’

  ‘Oh?’ He looked as if he knew what I was about to say.

  ‘What will become of us all? We naturally presumed that after the scheme succeeded – if it does! – we’d be free to tell of it. Now I see that we can never tell. Neither the officers nor the soldiers would condone such an expediency. A coldblooded means to an end. All they’d see are the faces of the men who must die to fulfil it. I’m right, aren’t I?’

  He rubbed his nose ruefully. ‘I wondered which one of you would see it first. My money was on you – I win again.’

  ‘Can you ever lose? But have I made the correct conclusion, or have you worked out a solution that will make everyone happy?’

  ‘There’s no such solution, Achilles. You’ve finally seen what should have been screaming at you in the council chamber. A little less passion inside that rib cage of yours and you would have seen it then. There can never be a revelation of the plot. It must remain our secret to the tomb, each of us bound by the oath Agamemnon was moved to suggest – thus saving me the trouble, not to mention some questions I would have found it difficult to answer,’ he said soberly.

  I closed my eyes. ‘So to the tomb and beyond Achilles will seem a selfish braggart, so puffed up with his own importance that he allowed countless men to perish to feed his wounded pride.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I ought to cut your throat, you twisted conniver! You’ve saddled me with a load of shame and dishonour that will forever cast a shadow on my name. When in future ages men speak about Achilles, they’ll say that he sacrificed everything for the sake of his wounded pride. I hope you go to Tartaros!’

  ‘No doubt I will,’ he said, unworried, unimpressed. ‘You’re not the first man to curse me, nor will you be the last. But we will all feel the repercussions of that council, Achilles. Men may never know what really went on, but the hand of Odysseus is bound to be suspected somewhere. And what of Agamemnon? If you seem to be the victim of overweening pride, what will he seem? You at least were wronged. He did the wronging.’

  Suddenly I realised how foolish this conversation was, how little even men as brilliant as Odysseus had to do with the plans of the Gods. I said, ‘Well, it’s a form of justice. We deserve to lose our stainless reputations. In order to get this ill-starred venture started, we consented to be parties to human sacrifice. It’s for that we pay. And because of it I’m willing to continue this idiocy. My greatest ambition is forever denied me.’

  ‘What ambition is that?’

  ‘To live in the hearts of men as the perfect warrior. It’s Hektor who’ll do that.’

  ‘You can’t say for sure, Achilles, though your great-grandsons might. Posterity judges differently.’

  I looked at him curiously. ‘Don’t you hunger to be remembered by many generations of men, Odysseus?’

  He laughed heartily. ‘No! I don’t care what posterity says about Odysseus! Or even whether posterity knows his name. When I’m dead I’ll be rolling the same boulder up some hill in Tartaros, or leaping for the water flagon forever out of my reach.’

  ‘With me alongside you. For all our talk, it’s too late.’

  ‘And there you have the right of it at last, Achilles.’

  We lapsed into silence, the curtain drawn against intruders who wouldn’t come to commiserate with their hubristic leader. The wine jar stood upon the table. I poured our cups full to the brim and we drank reflectively, neither of us willing to part with his private thoughts. No doubt Odysseus experienced the prettier reverie, since he didn’t expect rewards from posterity. Though he seemed to believe in nothing beyond eternal punishment, I thought it marvellous that he could contemplate his fate with his confidence unimpaired.

  ‘Why did you come to see me?’ I asked.

  ‘To apprise you of a strange occurrence before someone else does,’ he answered.

  ‘A strange occurrence?’

  ‘This morning some soldiers went along the banks of Simois to fish. When the sun rose they saw something rolling in the water. The body of a man. They ran to fetch the officer of the watch, who brought the body in. Kalchas. He died, they think, not long after nightfall.’

  I shivered. ‘How did he die?’

 
‘An excruciating head injury. An officer of Ajax’s happened to notice him walking along the clifftop on the far bank of Simois as the sun was setting. The officer swears it was Kalchas – he’s the only man in our camp who wears long, flapping vestments. He must have stumbled and fallen headlong.’

  I stared at him as he sat looking soulful, the light of the godly shining out of his beautiful grey eyes. Could it be? Was it? With a shudder of sheer terror I found myself wondering if he was weighed down with a fresh sin on the long list of sins he was already whispered to carry. Add murder of a high priest to sacrilege, profanity, blasphemy, aetheism and ritual murder and you had a list which outdid Sisyphos and Daidalos combined. Godless Odysseus who was yet beloved of the Gods. Mortal paradox, knave and King rolled in one.

  He read my thoughts and smiled blandly. ‘Achilles, Achilles! How could you think such a thing, even of me?’ A chuckle erupted. ‘If you want my opinion, I think Agamemnon did it.’

  23

  NARRATED BY

  Hektor

  No news of Penthesileia came; the Amazon Queen lingered in her far off wilderness while Troy hung in agony, a city’s fate depending on the whim of a woman. I cursed her and I cursed the Gods for permitting a woman to remain on any throne after the death of the Old Religion. The absolute rule of Mother Kubaba was gone, yet Queen Penthesileia reigned undisturbed. Demetrios, my invaluable escaped Greek slave, informed me that she hadn’t even begun to summon in the women of her countless tribes; she would not come before winter closed the passes.

  All the omens spoke of war’s finishing in this tenth year, yet my father still dithered, humbling himself and Troy to wait on this woman. I gnashed my teeth at the injustice of it, I railed at him in the assemblies. But his mind was made up and he refused to budge. Time and time again I assured him that I stood in no personal danger from Achilles, that our crack troops could hold the Myrmidons at bay, that we could win without Memnon or Penthesileia. Even when I told Father what Demetrios had reported about Amazonian tardiness he remained adamant, saying that if Penthesileia didn’t come before the winter, then he was content to wait until the eleventh year.

  Now that the whole Greek army was on the beach we had taken to walking the battlements again, looking at the various standards fluttering atop the Greek houses. On the flank of Skamander at a place where an internal wall split off some of the barracks there waved a banner I hadn’t seen before, a white ant on a black background holding a red lightning bolt in its jaws. Achilles the Aiakid, his Myrmidon standard. The face of Medusa could not have thrown more fear into Trojan hearts.

  Obliged to listen to petty business when my loins burned for battle, I attended every assembly. Someone had to be there to protest that the army was stale and overtrained, someone had to be there to watch the King turn his notoriously deaf ear, to watch Antenor, the enemy of all positive action, smile.

  I sensed nothing different about the day which changed our lives, went morosely to the assembly. The Court stood about chatting desultorily, ignoring the throne dais, at the foot of which a plaintiff was outlining his case – really earth-shaking litigation to do with the drains emptying Troy’s storm waters and excrement into unclean Skamander. His new apartment block had been refused access to the drains, and he, the owner-landlord, was very angry.

  ‘I’ve better things to do than stand here contesting the right of a pack of mindless bureaucrats to thwart honest taxpayers!’ he shouted at Antenor, who, as Chancellor, was defending the city drainage authorities.

  ‘You failed to apply to the correct person!’ Antenor snapped.

  ‘What are we, Egyptians?’ asked the landlord, waving his arms about. ‘I spoke to my usual man, who said yes! Then, before I could make the connection, a squad of enforcers arrived to forbid it! A man would fare better in Nineveh or Karchemish! Somewhere – anywhere! – that the bureaucrats haven’t managed to paralyse with their stupid regulations! I tell you, Troy is almost as inert as Egypt! I’m going to emigrate!’

  Antenor’s mouth was already open to wade into the fray in defence of his beloved bureaucrats when a man burst into the hall.

  I didn’t recognise him, but Polydamas did.

  ‘What is it?’ Polydamas asked him.

  The man groaned with the agony of breathing, licked his lips, tried to speak and ended in pointing wildly at my father, who was leaning forward, sewers forgotten. Polydamas helped the fellow to the dais and sat him on its bottom step, signalling for water. Even the irate landlord sensed something more important than effluent in the offing, and moved away a little – though not far enough to prevent his hearing whatever was going to be said.

  Water and a few moments’ rest enabled the man to speak. ‘My lord King, great news!’

  Father looked sceptical. ‘What?’ he asked.

  ‘Sire, at dawn I was in the Greek camp attending an augury called by Agamemnon to divine the cause of a plague which has killed ten thousand men!’

  Ten thousand men dead of disease in the Greek camp! I almost ran to stand beside the throne. Ten thousand men! If my father couldn’t understand the significance of that, then he was blind to all reason, and Troy must fall. Ten thousand less Greeks, ten thousand more Trojans. Oh, Father, let me lead our army out! I was about to say it when I realised that the man wasn’t done yet, that he hadn’t told all his news; I held my peace.

  ‘There was a terrible quarrel between Agamemnon and Achilles, sire. The army is split. Achilles withdrew himself, his Myrmidons and the rest of Thessalia from the war. Sire, Achilles will not fight for Agamemnon! The day is ours!’

  I clutched at the throne-back for support, the landlord whooped, my father sat white-faced, Polydamas was staring at his man in disbelief, Antenor was leaning limply against a pillar, and the rest of those in the room seemed turned to stone.

  A loud, bleating laugh rang out. ‘How are the mighty fallen!’ my brother Deiphobos brayed. ‘How are the mighty fallen!’

  ‘Silence!’ my father snapped, then looked down at the man. ‘Why? What caused this quarrel?’

  ‘Sire, it was over a woman,’ the man said, more collected now. ‘Kalchas had demanded that the woman Chryse, given to the High King out of the spoils of Lyrnessos, be sent to Troy. The Lord Apollo was so outraged at her capture that he arranged the plague and wouldn’t lift it until Agamemnon gave up his prize. Agamemnon had to obey. Achilles laughed at him. Jeered at him. So Agamemnon ordered Achilles to hand over his own prize out of Lyrnessos, the woman Brise, as compensation. After Achilles gave her to the High King, he withdrew himself and all the men under his banners from the war.’

  Deiphobos found this even funnier. ‘A woman! An army split in two over a woman!’

  ‘Not quite down the middle!’ said Antenor sharply. ‘Those who have withdrawn can’t number more than fifteen thousand. And if a woman can split an army, never forget that it was a woman brought that selfsame army here in the first place!’

  My father rapped his sceptre on the floor. ‘Antenor, hold your tongue! Deiphobos, you’re drunk!’ He returned his attention to the messenger. ‘Are you sure of your tidings, my man?’

  ‘Oh, yes. I was there, sire. I heard and saw everything.’

  A great sigh went up; the atmosphere lightened in an instant. Where before gloom and apathy reigned, now smiles broke out. Hands clasped hands, a murmur of delight swelled. Only I mourned. It seemed we were fated never to meet on the field, Achilles and me.

  Paris strutted up to the throne. ‘Dear Father, when I was in Greece I heard that the mother of Achilles – a Goddess – dipped all her sons in the waters of the River Styx to make them immortal. But as she held Achilles by the right heel something startled her – she forgot to change her grip to his left heel. That’s why Achilles is a mortal man. But fancy his right heel being a woman! Brise. I remember her. Stunning.’

  The King glared. ‘I’ve said that’s enough! When I rebuke one son, Paris, the rebuke extends to all of you! This isn’t a matter for jest. It’s of paramo
unt importance.’

  Paris looked crestfallen. I watched him and pitied him. During the last two years he had aged; the coarseness of the forties was creeping inexorably into his skin, blighting its youthful bloom. Whereas once he had fascinated Helen, he bored her now. The whole Court knew it. And knew that she was in the midst of an affair with Aineas. Well, she’d get little satisfaction there. Aineas loved Aineas best.

  But it was never possible to read her. After Father’s sharp words to Paris she did no more than shake Paris’s hand off and move a small distance away. Not a flicker of emotion showed in eyes or face. Then I realised she was not quite enigmatic; a touch of smugness had settled about her lips. Why? She knew them, those Greek Kings. So why?

  I knelt before the throne. ‘Father,’ I said strongly, ‘if we are ever fated to drive the Greeks from our shores, the time is now. If it was genuinely Achilles and the Myrmidons held you back when I asked before, then the reason for your reluctance has vanished. They are besides ten thousand men less from plague. Not even with Penthesileia and Memnon would we stand the chance we do right at this moment. Sire, give me the battle orders!’

  Antenor stepped forward. Oh, Antenor! Always Antenor!

  ‘Before you commit us, King Priam, grant me one favour, I beg. Let me send one of my own men to the Greek camp to verify what this man of Polydamas’s says.’

  Polydamas nodded vigorously. ‘A good idea, sire,’ he said. ‘We ought to confirm it.’

  ‘Then, Hektor,’ King Priam said to me, ‘you’ll have to wait a little longer for my answer. Antenor, find your man and send him at once. I’ll call another assembly tonight.’

  While we waited I took Andromache up onto the ramparts at the top of the great northwestern tower which looked directly at the Greek beach. The minute speck of banner still fluttered above the Myrmidon compound, but in the tiny progress of men about the camp, it was significant that there was no traffic between the Myrmidon compound and its neighbours. Unable to think about eating, we watched all afternoon; that visible proof of disunity within the Greek camp was all the sustenance we needed.