Vengeance at Aulis (The Trojan Murders Book 2)

by Peter Tonkin

  ‘Back to Ithaka? Now?’ Odysseus snapped. There was very little respect in his tone.

  ‘Kalkhas predicts that this weather will likely last, and some of the local seafarers agree, so he says. Not that he needed consult them. He has lived on both shores of our sea – born and raised in Troy before he emigrated to Achaea; because he foresaw my attack on the city and the great victory it will bring. Apollo revealed it all to him, so he says. Victory and riches to us, ruin and destruction to his birthplace, so he was wise to move out if what he says the God predicts is true. In any case, we’re still stuck here and not going anywhere for a while longer. It’s a perfect opportunity! Are you telling me you can’t do it?’

  ‘Of course I can do it, Agamemnon! Even in this weather!’

  ‘Good! Because it’s starting to give a bad impression if one of my senior lieutenants hasn’t managed to organise his fleet or his army yet, especially amongst the commanders and their troops who are stuck here day after day!’

  ‘I can leave Thalassa beached where she is and get across to the west coast on horseback or by chariot!’ snapped Odysseus with unaccustomed vexation. ‘It won’t take long to organise the fleet – it’s only a dozen ships after all. Then if it looks as though a slow voyage back is in prospect I can come ashore and return by horse or chariot. My Cephallenian fleet has enough competent captains to do without me on the voyage round here to Aulis. But it means I’ll be away for ten nights, maybe longer.’

  ‘In the unlikely event that we’ve left by the time you return, you and your Cephallenians can catch up. You know where we’ll be headed!’

  ‘And the situation the High Priestess of Artemis has asked me to look into?’ grated Odysseus. ‘What about that?’

  ‘Give the details to Prince Palamedes,’ ordered Agamemnon dismissively. ‘He’ll take over. Besides, I have a further mission for you if you’re going by road. King Tisamenus of Thebes still hasn’t arrived with the army he promised me and he can make it in spite of the weather. He just has to march - where everyone else has to sail; and it’s not a very long march either! You did such a good job tracking down Achilles, perhaps you can give him a nudge as well.’

  ‘Palamedes. You’d send Palamedes into the Temple of Artemis? Palamedes?’

  ‘He doesn’t have to go anywhere near the Temple of Artemis. He has to find the name of the man who hunted that god-cursed deer and accidentally killed that stupid little bitch who, you now inform me, actually threw herself into the path of the arrow on purpose. So in spite of what the High Priestess and her Oracle seem to think, it’s not a case of murder at all. It’s self-slaughter. This Nephele creature clearly had some kind of wish to join her goddess at the earliest possible moment and the hunter – whoever he was – just helped her fulfil it!’

  ‘It’s more than thirty stages there and back,’ said Odysseus sometime later. He was talking to Elpenor back at his tent but I was close by as usual. One stage was equal to 160 stadia; that would make it 80 leagues each way. A considerable overland journey followed by a short voyage; no wonder he thought it would take at least ten days. ‘But we only need to pack for five nights or so; we can restock when we get home. I don’t want to overload the chariot or slow us down with pack-animals. Half a dozen competent riders as escort should do – you pick them and see they’re well provisioned and very well armed. We’ll leave Eurylocus in command of Thalassa while we’re away. He’s level headed and reliable if unimaginative, which is probably a good thing too. We’re going via Thebes on the road west to boot King Tisamanus into action; better do that after he’s given us a bed for the night. We can stop at Onchestus, Cyparissus and Crisa as well, they’re all a day or so’s journey apart along our route. Then we can take a ship either from Chalcis or Calydon. Thank the gods he didn’t want us taking messages to his Queen Clytemnestra in Mycenae on the way!’

  ***

  ‘But why, Captain? Why send you away now?’ I asked later still as he oversaw the final preparations for his departure. ‘He knows you haven’t organised your fleet earlier because he sent you and King Nestor searching for Prince Achilles! He knows that! And it’s only eleven ships other than Thalassa. He’s got more than a thousand out in the bay already…’

  Odysseus looked at me with an expression I recognised – I had seen my father use it when I or one of my brothers said something embarrassingly naive. ‘I suspect that in the final analysis his decision has been motivated by Nephele’s death and the Goddess’ reaction to it,’ he explained patiently. ‘The outcome of any investigation has the potential to be disturbing and quite possibly destructive both to the army’s morale and the High King’s authority. Especially as he has the better part of fifty complete armies sitting here, bored, restless and on the lookout for trouble. Would he really dare order one of his royal generals to bring one of their children here as a blood sacrifice in recompense for a dead priestess and a sacred stag as Karpathia and Pythia say the Goddess demands? No. Such a demand would probably start a civil war here at Aulis when he wants to fight Troy. So whoever is found to have done this must either be someone of no account, someone with no children or someone who is not associated with the army and preferably never was. He doesn’t trust me to make sure the investigation goes the way he wants it to, so he’s sending me away and handing it over to someone who will discover exactly what the High King wants him to discover!’

  ‘But isn’t that a bit short-sighted, Captain?’ I wondered, shocked at the barefaced dishonesty of it. ‘Prince Palamedes’ investigation won’t satisfy the High Priestess unless it discovers the truth. Unless the right man is unmasked and the right child sacrificed, it won’t appease the Goddess either.’

  ‘No, it won’t. So let us hope that the Goddess is actually far less interested in the actions of we puny mortals than the High Priestess and her Oracle would have us believe!’

  And that was that – or so I thought.

  In spite of the fact that he was unhappy at the thought of leaving Palamedes in charge of his investigation, Odysseus was clearly excited at the prospect of seeing Queen Penelope and young prince Telemachus again, even if it would only be for a short while. The route west he was proposing was the logical one – though to be fair there was another that branched to the south at Thebes and ran down through Corinth if he had actually wanted to take a message to Agamemnon’s court in Mycenae for any reason. Messengers had been coming and going between the High King and his Queen on a regular basis ever since we arrived. Odysseus wasn’t by any means the only husband and father missing his beloved wife and children.

  Later still, Odysseus turned from his final conferences with Prince Palamedes in his bivouac beside his Euboean army and acting captain Eurylocus on board Thalassa and caught sight of me still lingering at his tent. ‘Ah,’ he said. ‘There you are. I’ve been thinking about our earlier conversation and I have a mission for you.’

  A shiver seemed to go down my spine at his words and the hair on my good arm stirred.

  ‘I assume you thought you’d be able to stay at your father’s house in the city with your feet up, eating your mother’s cooking and growing fat while I was away…’

  ‘I had thought I would stay aboard Thalassa and compose some epic songs in your absence, Captain…’ I did not manage to sound wounded by his jocular accusation, I was too excited by what he had just said about having a mission for me.

  ‘Hmmm. Well, I have asked King Diomedes to keep an eye on you instead. Neither has a rhapsode with them. He will often be in attendance on Agamemnon for one reason or another. I want you with him at every possible opportunity. I have asked him to give me a detailed report when I get back on what Agamemnon’s plans are as near as he can discover them. But from you in particular I want to know what Prince Palamedes has been up to. I don’t trust him and I don’t like the fact that he’s been put in charge of finding out who killed the priestess and the sacred deer.’

  ‘So,’ I said, ‘you are concerned about the Goddess and whether she real
ly needs to be satisfied after all!’

  ‘As I’m sure your father has pointed out sometime in your over-active youth, you can never be too careful.’

  ‘A sentiment I rather wish I had borne in mind that night on the docks at Troy,’ I said ruefully.

  ‘But even that experience, dreadful though it was, might betray the hand of the Goddess,’ he observed gently. ‘If you had been more careful that night in Troy, you would not be here now – and then who would I be able to trust to keep a secret eye on things at the heart of power during my absence?’

  iii

  Sometime earlier in our acquaintance, Odysseus and I had a discussion about murderers. I expressed surprise when he suggested that the most successful murderer will be someone who does not even remotely appear to be a murderer. Anyone who is obviously a murderer is unlikely to get away with it for long, if at all, he maintained. I told him that I could hardly believe that the Gods would possibly allow such a creature to exist, and he said they manifestly do, indeed they take the lead in the matter of disguise. Zeus himself, for reasons of desire rather than murder, appears in the shape of a swan, of a bull, of a shower of gold, hiding his true nature from the people he wishes to deceive. It is by no means beyond mortal ingenuity to imitate the gods. Events soon after we had this conversation proved Odysseus’ observations to be true as he unmasked a murderer who did not appear to be in the slightest like a murderer.

  I was already beginning to discover that his observations were also true in the matter of spying; the most efficient gatherer of intelligence was someone who did not appear to be doing so at all; in fact someone that hardly anyone even noticed.

  One afternoon some days after Odysseus had departed for Ithaka, King Diomedes came and found me on Thalassa where I had taken up residence. ‘Agamemnon is holding a feast tonight,’ he said. ‘But it appears that he has sent his rhapsode away to carry a message to his wife. Nestor suggested that you would be a good replacement; he says your epic songs are particularly entertaining.’

  ‘Possibly because they are about people he knew in his youth and occasionally feature him alongside them, Majesty,’ I observed. But I was flattered that he had made the recommendation. Or I was until I realised that Odysseus had almost certainly asked him to do so as part of the plan we had discussed. This was a realisation driven home by Diomedes at once. ‘Remember,’ he said. ‘You are not only Odysseus’ rhapsode; you are his eyes and ears. You will have access to places Agamemnon would hesitate to let either myself or Nestor into; you will hear conversations he would never hold in front of us. He doesn’t fully trust either Odysseus or Odysseus’ friends.’

  ‘But a rhapsode, of course, is of no account and easily overlooked,’ I said. ‘Little more than a piece of the furniture.’

  ‘You must have been talking to Palamedes or his crony Aias,’ he chuckled. ‘That’s just the way they see their soldiers, slaves and servants!’

  I spent the rest of the day practising and perfecting the epic song I proposed to perform. It was an old favourite, the first that Odysseus had ever heard me sing. One that was particularly apt for this occasion as it dealt with an earlier attack on Troy by Hercules and his piratical gang of heroes. It was also one which Nestor knew so well that he must – I prayed – have already told every story it reminded him of. Then I changed my chiton for a clean garment and put a formal himation over it, took up the leather bag in which I carried my lyre and went up the hill as the sun sank westwards on my left shoulder and the watch fires, lamps and candles were ignited like earthly stars all across the camp and the distant city in the purple-shadowed valley beyond it.

  There was no wind, of course, but as I neared the High King’s tent I smelt the odour of roasting meat. Thalassa’s crew and I subsisted on a diet of coarse barley bread, olive oil and fish. At first the scent was so overpowering and sweet that I could think of nothing but my salivating mouth and rumbling stomach but as I came nearer so my head began to clear. The army’s main meat supply – certainly for kings, princes and generals – was a combination of mutton and goat liberally mixed with a range of fish and fowl. Some had been brought in the various armies’ supply trains but the vast majority of it had been traded with Father and his local colleagues; the shepherds, goat herds, fowlers and fishermen of Aulis. But, dim though my eyes might be on occasion, my ears and nose seemed sharper in compensation. And a very few more breaths made me realise that what I could smell was neither kid, lamb, goat or mutton. It was venison. And venison could only have come from the wooded hills behind the city, where the Groves of Artemis stood.

  ***

  High King Agamemnon’s tent was a smaller, leather-walled, linen-lined version of his citadel in Mycenae, which I had not seen but knew to be similar to those I had visited in Phthia and Skyros, if reputedly more magnificent. It was also, I realised, disturbingly similar to the Temple of Artemis. The formally guarded entrance led into an ante-room where visitors could divest themselves of cloaks and so-forth if the weather was cold or wet. Here they could also be requested to deposit any weapons they might be carrying. But the guests tonight appeared to be Agamemnon’s most trusted allies, so there were no swords or daggers to be seen out here. Next, there was a reception area where guests could mingle informally, drink and hold social conversations. Further in still was the big, square, formal megaron, already set out to feast the High King and his guests. Four great columns supported the pinnacle of the tent’s roof and stood around the great circular fire beside which the festive victuals were being ceremonially prepared. Beyond and behind the megaron were the domestic sections which, in the palace at Mycenae would house Queen Clytemnestra and the children, Agamemnon’s son and heir Prince Orestes and his beloved daughters the Princesses Electra, Chrysothemis and Iphigenia. Here, the area was much smaller, of course – just enough to house the High King, his staff, his personal servants and his slaves.

  Hardly surprisingly, I was lost amongst the kings and princes who thronged the reception area, but King Diomedes had been looking out for me. He took me through and put me into the keeping of Oikonomos, the High King’s chief steward, who in turn showed me where my place at table would be and where my stool would be positioned when I was called upon to perform. Beyond that, there was nothing for me to do. I could not possibly sit before the guests were assembled, in their places, until Kalkhas had said the ceremonial prayers to the gods and the High King had directed us to be seated.

  It looked as though the main section of the dinner was going to be the venison I had smelt on my approach, whose odour now filled the megaron like a miasma. There were birds of various sorts roasting at the fire beside it and what looked like a large fish – perhaps a shark. But this was basic battlefield fare, even though it fed kings. There were olives, cheese and flat breads made of white wheat flour on the tables but the venison would clearly be the backbone of the meal.

  The tables were arranged around the walls, with a throne at the centre of the high table for the High King to sit in, then the boards ran across one side and down the two at right-angles to it. There was seating for perhaps twenty, counting myself. As I tuned my lyre and rehearsed my song silently in my head, I amused myself by trying to work out who would be seated where. But before I had come to any conclusions, Agamemnon led his guests through from the reception area and I saw for myself who went where. Agamemnon in the central throne, of course. His brother Menelaus, the jilted and cuckolded King of Sparta sat at his right shoulder with Prince Palamedes of Euobaea, on his. Aias of Locris close beside his friend and neighbour, Locris and Euobaea being parted only by the narrow bay running north between Aulis and Phthia. Then came the King of Athens Menestheus, Elphenor King of the Abantes, Leonteus of Argissa and a couple more I did not recognise. On Agamemnon’s left sat King Nestor of Pylos, the oldest man present, with King Diomedes of Argos, among the youngest, beside him; then Agapenor of Arcadia, Idomeneus of Crete, the massive Ajax of Salamis, golden Achilles Prince of Phthia, and of course Patroklos beside
him, almost as close in their association as Palamedes and Aias. The end of one line was brought up by the soothsayer Kalkhas who would perform the priestly rituals and the other by the physician Machaon. And finally, of course, me.

  The feast proceeded in the formal manner favoured by the High King who wished to emphasise his importance and authority over restless generals and a fractious army. I studied the leader of this vast undertaking as the choicest cuts of all the creatures roasting by the fire were carved from the carcases, piled on a great platter and carried to Agamemnon first. He was a square man of middle height and middle years. Others here were taller, stronger, better-looking, younger, more virile, older and wiser. But there was about Agamemnon a sense of power that was so great it hardly needed to be expressed or emphasised. He was in many ways, it seemed to me on this my first chance to study him at length, like the great lion that his hair and beard made him so much resemble. His heavy-lidded eyes were golden. His straight nose flared into broad nostrils and his lips were straight and thin, tending to turn down rather than up at their ends. It seemed simply inevitable that the steward and his assistants should carry that great, smoking platter to him first above all. To the High King of all Achaea who, as was his royal right, made his selection, which Oikonomos sliced off for him, with a few regal gestures.

  After Agamemnon was satisfied, the pile of steaming meat was separated onto two lesser platters. One was offered to Menelaus, his elder but lesser brother; and the other to Nestor. So the diminishing piles of food moved step by step down the ranks of those present until at last an all-but empty platter arrived in front of me. All that was left upon it was a charred and unappetising-looking shank which was bent into a hook-shape. But it was venison and I was hungry so I took it. I laid it on the flat bread which was there for the purpose. Had it been larger, I would have taken out my cheap, wooden-handled dagger and cut pieces off it as most of the other guests were doing. But it wasn’t really big enough to warrant it. So I picked it up as I would have picked up a chicken leg and bit straight into it.