The Hittite

by Ben Bova

  He brandished a many-thonged whip. He was a big man with powerful bare arms, but a potbelly hung out through his leather vest. Shaved bald, he had a thick bushy beard the color of cinnamon and a livid scar running down one side of his ugly face.

  The woodcutters were guarded by five spearmen in leather jerkins studded with bronze bolts. Their spear points were bronze, I saw. Probably the short swords hanging at their sides were, too. Each of them wore little conical helmets that looked, at this distance, to be leather rather than metal.

  Off in the hazy horizon the setting sun was tinting the clouds with flaming red. Beyond the edge of the forest and a bare dusty plain that stretched on the other side of a meandering river, I could make out the battlements of a walled city.

  Troy!

  The city was built on a dark bluff, and beyond it I could see the glittering silver of the sea. It had to be Troy, it could be no other, I told myself. We had reached our destination at last.

  Five armed soldiers keeping watch over fewer than a dozen woodcutters. The soldiers looked young, callow. I decided we could afford a peaceful approach.

  “On your feet, all of you, and follow me,” I said to my men in a low voice. “That’s Troy there in the distance. We’re almost there.”

  Magro huffed with disbelief. “Don’t tell me we’ll sleep under a roof to night.”

  I grinned at him as I hefted Zarton’s spear. “Come on.”

  The young spearmen stiffened with surprise as we stepped out of the foliage and presented ourselves. They gripped their long bronze-tipped spears and backed away from us a few steps. We were twelve to their five.

  The loudmouthed whip master fell silent. The woodcutters stopped their work and gaped at us. They were sweating, filthy, bare to the waist, mostly emaciated old men barely strong enough to lift an ax. They stared about wildly, as if they would break and run at the slightest excuse.

  “Is that city Troy?” I asked, pointing with my right hand. I gripped the spear in my left, of course.

  “Who are you?” one of the spearmen demanded, his youthful voice cracking with surprise and fear. “What are you doing here?”

  I barely understood him. He spoke a dialect that I had never heard before, heavy and guttural. It had been many months since anyone had spoken Hatti to us; we had learned the local language as we trekked across the land.

  “We are Hatti soldiers, from far to the east. We seek the city of Troy.”

  It took some while, but gradually I made them understand that we meant them no harm. The young spearmen told me that Troy was under siege by a huge army of Achaians, kings and princes of a hundred cities from the far side of the Aegean, or so he claimed. They themselves were part of the besieging Achaian army, sent out to guard this pitiful band of foragers who were gathering firewood. A pretty poor army, I thought.

  “You can’t enter the city,” the young leader of the spearmen told me. “The High King Agamemnon would never allow trained warriors to pass through his lines.”

  We had arrived in the middle of a war. Where my wife and sons might be was anyone’s guess.

  “Then I must see this Agamemnon,” I said.

  “See the High King?” the spearman’s voice squeaked with awe.

  “Yes, if he is the leader of your army.”

  “But he’s the High King! He speaks only to princes and other kings.”

  “He will want to speak to me,” I said, with a confidence I did not truly feel. “I am an officer in the army of the Hatti. I can be of great service to him.”

  In truth, the spearman was little more than a beardless youth. The thought of going before his High King seemed to fill him with terror. At last he called one of the wood-loaders, a scrawny, knobby-kneed old man with a mangy, unkempt dirty gray beard and bald head shining with sweat.

  “Poletes,” the youth commanded, his voice still fluttering slightly, “take these men to the camp and turn them over to the High King’s lieutenant.”

  The old man nodded eagerly, glad to be free of his heavy work, and led us down toward the slow-flowing river.

  “That’s the plain of Ilios,” said Poletes, pointing to the other side of the river as we followed its winding bank.

  His voice was surprisingly strong and deep for such a wizened old gnome. His face was hollow-cheeked beneath its grime, with eyes that bulged like a frog’s. He wore nothing but a filthy rag around his loins. Even in the fading light of the dying day I could see his ribs and the bumps of his spine poking out beneath his nut-brown skin. There were welts from a whip across his back, too.

  “You are Hittites?” he asked me as we walked slowly along.

  “Yes,” I said. “In our tongue we call ourselves Hatti.”

  “The Hittites are a powerful empire,” he said, surprising me with the knowledge. “Have you come to aid Troy? How many of your army are with you?”

  I decided it was best to tell him nothing. “Such things I will tell your High King.”

  “Ah. Of course. No sense blabbing to a thes.”

  That word I did not know. “Where are you from?” I asked.

  “Argos. And I wish I were there now, instead of toiling like a dog here in this doomed place.”

  “What brought you here?”

  He looked up at me and scratched his bald pate. “Not what. Who. Agamemnon’s haughty wife, that’s who. Clytemnestra, who is even more faithless than her sister, Helen.”

  It must have been obvious to him that I did not understand, but he went right on, hardly drawing a breath.

  “A storyteller am I, and happy I was to spend my days in the agora, spinning tales of gods and heroes and watching the faces of the people as I talked. Especially the children, with their big eyes. But this war has put an end to my storytelling.”

  “How so?”

  He wiped his mouth with the back of his grimy hand. “My lord Agamemnon may need more warriors, but his faithless wife wants thetes.”

  “Slaves?”

  “Hah! Worse off than slaves. Far worse,” Poletes grumbled. He jerked a thumb back toward the men we had left; I could still hear the distant chunking of their axes. “Look at us! Homeless and hopeless. At least a slave has a master to depend upon. A slave belongs to someone; he is a member of a house hold. A thes belongs to no one and nothing; he is landless, homeless, cut off from everything except sorrow and hunger.”

  “But weren’t you a member of a house hold in Argos?” I asked.

  He bowed his head and squeezed his eyes shut as if to block out a painful memory.

  “A house hold, yes,” he said, his voice dropping low. “Until Queen Clytemnestra’s men booted me out of the city for repeating what every stray dog and alley cat in Argos was saying—that the queen has taken a lover while her royal husband is here fighting at Troy’s walls.”

  I raised my hand to stop our march. Even though the sun was setting, the day was still broiling hot and the river looked cool and inviting. I sat down on the grassy bank and, leaning far over, scooped up a helmetful of clear water. The men did the same. A few even splashed into the river, laughing and thrashing about like boys.

  I drank my fill while Poletes slid down the slippery grass into the water and cupped his hands to drink. Watching the brown filth eddying from his legs, I was glad that I had filled my helmet first.

  “Well,” I said, wiping sweat from my brow, “at least the queen’s men didn’t kill you.”

  “Better if they had,” Poletes replied grimly. “I would be dead and in Hades and that would be the end of it. Instead I’m here, toiling like a jackass, working for wages.”

  “That’s something, anyway,” I said.

  His frog’s eyes snapped at me. Still standing shanks-deep in the river, he grabbed at the soiled little purse tied to his waist and opened its mouth enough for me to peer in. A handful of dried lentils.

  “My wages,” he said bitterly.

  “That is your payment?”

  “For the day’s work. Show me a thes with coin in his
purse and I’ll show you a sneak thief.”

  I shook my head, then got to my feet and motioned my men to do the same.

  “Lower than a slave, that’s what I am,” Poletes grumbled as I lent him my arm and hauled him out of the water. “Vermin under their feet. They treat their dogs better. They’ll work me to death and let my bones rot where I fall.”

  7

  Muttering and complaining all the way, Poletes led us across a ford in the river and toward the camp of the Achaians, which stretched along the sandy shore of the restless sea. It was protected by an earthen rampart twice the height of a grown man running parallel to the shoreline. I saw sharpened stakes planted here and there along its summit. In front of the rampart was a deep ditch, with more stakes studding its bottom. There was a packed sandy rampway that led up to an opening in the rampart, which was protected by a wooden gate that stood wide open, defended by a handful of lounging spearmen. If this is a sample of Acha-ian discipline, I thought, a maniple or two of Hatti soldiers could take this gate and probably the whole camp with it.

  We trudged up the ramp and through the open gate, unchallenged by the men who were supposed to be guarding it. Once inside the gate, I saw that what they called a camp looked more like a crowded, bustling noisy village than a military base, and smelled like a barn despite the breeze coming off the sea. People milled about, all of them talking at once, it seemed, at the top of their lungs. There was no hint of military or ganization or discipline among these Achaians.

  They had pulled their long, pitch-blackened boats up onto the sandy beach and raised tents and even sizable huts of wood next to them. Between the boats stood roped-off corrals where horses neighed and stamped, and makeshift pens of slatted wood for stinking goats and sheep that bleated and shitted endlessly. Noise and filth were everywhere; the stench almost gagged me at first.

  It grew chilly as the sun sank below the flat horizon of the dark blue sea. They have been here for some time, I realized, as we made our way through the confused jumble of the camp. Men were gathering around cook fires; pale smoke wafted away on the wind. Dirty-faced slave women in rags stirred big pots of bronze while men sat close by, cleaning weapons, binding fresh wounds, jabbing daggers into the pots to yank out steaming half-cooked chunks of meat. The noise of men shouting back and forth and beasts yowling was enough to make my head hurt; the stench of dung and animals and smoke hung in the air like a palpable cloud.

  There were plenty of women in the camp: slaves tending their masters’ cook fires, carrying heavy double-handled jugs of wine on their shoulders, polishing armor with the resigned, hopeless patience that slavery teaches.

  As instructed, Poletes marched us to the camp of Agamemnon, High King among the Achaians. The old man pointed out the two dozen boats that Agamemnon had brought to Troy, all pulled far up on the sandy beach, side by side, each decorated with a golden lion painted on its prow. Agamemnon’s quarters was the largest wooden lodge I had yet seen, its main door guarded by no less than six armed warriors in shining bronze armor and helmets.

  Poletes spoke to one of the guards, who walked off into the lengthening shadows of the noisy, busy camp.

  “How long has this war been going on?” I asked Poletes.

  Clutching his thin arms over his bare chest to try to ward off the growing cold, Poletes told me, “For years, now. Of course, much of that time has been spent raiding the villages and farms nearby. It took awhile for these mighty warriors to work up the courage to attack Troy itself.”

  “The slave market …” I started to say.

  But Poletes ignored me as he continued, “The city’s walls were built by Poseidon and Apollo, they say. No one can breach them. Yet Agamemnon and the other kings are determined to continue their siege until—”

  “You there!” a haughty voice stopped Poletes as if his tongue had been ripped out.

  I turned and saw a sour-faced man approaching us, with the guard Poletes had spoken to trailing a few paces behind him. The man wore no armor, but his straight back and sharp tone told me he was accustomed to giving orders. Even in a rough wool chiton he looked like a soldier.

  Ignoring Poletes, he marched straight up to me, looked me up and down, then cast a baleful glance at my men.

  “I am Thersandros, captain of the High King’s guards. Who are you and what do you want?” he demanded of me.

  My men snapped to attention, spears erect. I, too, straightened the spear in my hand and answered, “I am Lukka, commander of this squad of Hatti troops. I want to offer my services to your king.”

  The corner of his mouth ticked once. I could see there was gray in his thick beard and shaggy hair.

  “Offer your services to the king, eh? More likely you’re looking for a free meal.”

  “We are trained Hatti soldiers,” I said evenly. “We can be of great help to your king.”

  He planted his fists on his hips. “A dozen more mouths to feed, that’s all I see here.”

  I drew myself up to my full height, several fingers taller than he. “Are you going to announce our presence to your High King or not?”

  He tried to outstare me, but soon blinked and looked away. “To the High King? You must be mad. I’ll tell his chief steward, he’s the one who’s always sending boats back to Argos for more warriors.”

  “Fair enough,” I said, deciding to accept his decision.

  “You, thes,” he growled at Poletes. “Get back to the work gang, where you belong.”

  Poletes turned to me, his big frog’s eyes silently begging, like a sorrowful puppy.

  “He’s with me,” I heard myself say, even as I thought it was foolish to be so softhearted. A Hatti soldier should be made of sterner stuff.

  “Him?” Thersandros guffawed. “He’s nothing but a worthless thes.”

  “He’s my servant,” I said evenly.

  “You can’t—”

  “He’s my servant,” I repeated, with more iron in it.

  Thersandros shrugged and muttered, “Suit yourself, then. Find yourselves a fire for the night. Over there will do.” He pointed to a handful of men sprawled around one of the cook fires. “Tell them Thersandros said they should share what they can with you.”

  I tried to hold back the anger that rose in me. Sending a pack of strangers to soldiers already huddling by their evening fire and ordering them to “share what they can” is an excellent way to start a fight.

  Yet even as I stood before Thersandros, struggling to keep my temper, my eye chanced on the line of women who were carrying food and drink into Agamemnon’s cabin.

  They were slaves, I knew. Most of them were young and slim, some were even pretty.

  The third one in the line was my wife.

  8

  I started to call out to her, but she disappeared into the cabin before I could gather my wits and utter a sound. I started toward the lodge, but Thersandros grabbed my arm.

  “You can’t go in there!” he snapped, frowning at me. “That’s the High King’s quarters.”

  “That woman is my wife,” I said.

  His frown changed into a look of sheer disbelief. “Those are slaves, Hittite. The High King’s slaves, at that.”

  I pulled free of his grip. “She’s my wife,” I insisted.

  Thersandros pointed to the guards in polished bronze armor standing on either side of the hut’s doorway. “They’ll spit you on your spears if you try to go in there.”

  “Then you go in and bring her out to me.”

  “Me?” He broke into a bitter, barking laugh. “The High King doesn’t give up his slaves, Hittite. Not to me and certainly not to the likes of you.”

  He dragged me away from the cabin, back toward my men. “I’ll ask about her for you,” he said, grudgingly. “Don’t expect a miracle.”

  My blood was hot. I gripped the pummel of my sword, thinking that I could slice this Thersandros’ liver out of him before he knew what hit him. Then, with my squad of men, I could break past those guards and take my wi
fe out of Agamemnon’s lodge, out of slavery.

  And then what? I asked myself. Twelve men against the whole Achaian camp? Madness. And where were my sons? What would happen to them if I started a brawl here in the camp? How could I save them, protect them, if I were killed battling like a hotheaded fool?

  So I forced myself to remain silent, to walk slowly away from Thersandros and back toward my waiting men, seething with rage, trembling with the effort to control myself.

  Aniti is alive, I told myself. A slave, but still alive. Where are my sons? I wondered. A bitter voice in my mind answered. Already dead, most likely. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to silence that voice.

  Poletes broke my train of thoughts. Pointing to the Achaians gathering around their fire, he said, “Let’s get something to eat before everything’s gone. My stomach is as shriveled as a dried prune.”

  As boldly as a free man he walked up to the knobby-kneed Achaian standing by the cook pot and said loudly, “Thersandros says that you must share what you have with these men.”

  The Achaian didn’t hesitate an instant. He cuffed Poletes with a backhand swat that sent the old storyteller sprawling.

  I stepped up to him, Zarton’s spear still in my hand. “This man is my servant. What you do to him you do to me.”

  With my free hand I hauled Poletes to his feet. His lip was cracked and bleeding.

  The Achaian eyed me up and down, took note of my spear and the sword at my hip, the shield strapped to my back, my travel-stained leather jerkin and iron helmet. He wore only a ragged wool chiton, belted at the waist. His hair and beard were dark and thickly curled, matted with sweat and grime. His bare arms and legs were lean but wiry, roped with muscle.

  “And who in the name of Hades are you?” His voice was low, gruff.

  The men who had been eating out of wooden bowls were looking up at us. Several of them got slowly to their feet. I knew my own men were drawing themselves up behind me.

  “I am Lukka, of the Hatti. Hittites, in your tongue. I’ve offered the services of my men to your High King.”