The Hittite

by Ben Bova

  “That’s why I came to you,” I said. As I spoke the words I realized that they were true. It was the one decent thing I could do in the midst of this mad, murderous day. I had broken past Troy’s lofty walls. I had killed the man who had abducted Helen. Now I would see that she herself would not be slain, not even by her rightful husband.

  “Priam is dead,” she said, her voice muffled and sobbing. “His heart broke when he saw the invaders coming over the wall.”

  “The queen?” I asked.

  “She and the other royal women are in the main temple, just on the other side of that door. The guards outside have sworn to go down to the last man before allowing Agamemnon and his brutes to enter here.”

  I held her and listened for the clamor of the fight out in the corridor. It didn’t last long. A final scream of agony, a final roar of triumph, then a thudding as the Achaians pounded against the locked doors. A splintering of wood, then silence.

  “It would be better if you went in there,” I suggested, “rather than forcing them to break in and find you.”

  Helen pushed herself away from me and glanced at Apet, still hovering in the shadows. Visibly struggling for self-control, Helen lifted her chin like the queen she had hoped to be. At last she said, “Yes. I am ready to face them.”

  I went to the connecting door, unlatched it, and opened it a crack. Agamemnon, his brother Menalaos, and dozens of other Achaian nobles were crowding into the temple, goggling at the gold-covered statues taller than life that lined its walls. The floor was gleaming marble. At the head of the temple, behind the alabaster altar, loomed a towering statue of Aphrodite, gilded and painted, decked with flowers and offerings of jewels. Hundreds of candles burned at its base, casting dancing highlights off the gold and gems. The victorious Achaians focused their attention on the richly draped altar and the old woman lying upon it.

  I had never seen Hecuba before. The aged, wrinkled woman lay on the altar, arms crossed over her breast, eyes closed. Her robes were threaded with gold; her wrists and fingers bore turquoise and amber, rubies and carnelian. Heavy ropes of gold necklaces and a jewel-encrusted crown had been lovingly placed upon her. Seven women, dressed in the ash-gray robes of mourning, stood trembling around the altar, facing the sweaty, bloodstained Achaians, who gaped at the splendor of the dead Queen of Troy.

  One of the older woman was speaking to Agamemnon. “My mother took poison once the king died. She knew that Troy would not outlive this evil day, that my prophecy had finally come true.”

  “Cassandra,” whispered Helen to me. “The queen’s eldest daughter.”

  Agamemnon turned slowly from the corpse on the altar to the grayhaired princess. His narrow little eyes glared anger and frustration.

  Cassandra said, “You will not bring the Queen of Troy back to Myce me in your black boat, mighty Agamemnon. She will never be a slave of yours.”

  A leering smile twisted Agamemnon’s lips. “Then I’ll have to settle for you, Princess. You will be my slave in her place.”

  “Yes,” Cassandra said. “And we will die together at the hands of your faithless wife.”

  “Trojan bitch!” He cuffed her with a heavy backhand swat that knocked her to the marble floor.

  Before any more violence erupted, I swung wide the door of the sanctuary. The Achaians turned, hands gripping the swords at their sides. Helen stepped through with regal grace and an absolutely blank expression on her beautiful face. It was as if the most splendid statue imaginable had taken on the glow of life.

  She went wordlessly to Cassandra and helped the princess to her feet. Blood trickled from her cut lip.

  I stood by the side of the altar, my hand resting on the pommel of my sword. Agamemnon and the others recognized me. Their faces were grimy, their hands stained with blood. I could smell their sweat.

  Menalaos seemed to be stunned with shock. Then he suddenly stepped forward and gripped his wife by her shoulders.

  “Helen!” His mouth twitched, as if he was trying to say words that would not leave his soul.

  She did not smile, but her eyes searched his. The other Achaians watched them dumbly.

  Every emotion a human being can show flashed across Menalaos’ face. Helen simply stood there, in his grip, waiting for him to speak, to act, to make his decision on whether she lived or died.

  Agamemnon broke the silence. “Well, Brother, I promised you we’d get her back! She’s yours once again, to deal with as you see fit.”

  Menalaos swallowed hard and finally found his voice. “You are my wife, Helen,” he said, more for the ears of Agamemnon and the others than for hers, I thought. “What’s happened since Paris abducted you was not of your doing. A woman captive is not responsible for what happens to her during her captivity.”

  I thought grimly that Menalaos wanted her back so badly that he was willing to forget everything that had happened. For now.

  Agamemnon clapped his brother on the back gleefully. “I’m only sorry that Paris didn’t have the courage to face me, man to man. I would have gladly spitted him on my spear.”

  “Where is Paris?” Menalaos growled.

  “Dead,” I answered. “His body is in the square by the Scaean Gate.”

  The women started to cry, all except Helen. They sobbed quietly as they stood by their mother’s bier. But Cassandra’s eyes blazed with unconcealed fury.

  “Odysseos is going through the city to find all the princes and noblemen,” said Agamemnon. “Those who still live will make a noble sacrifice for the gods.” He laughed at his own pun.

  I left Troy for the final time, marching with the Achaian victors through the burning city as Agamemnon led the seven Trojan princesses back to his camp and slavery. Menalaos walked side by side with Helen, which somehow stirred a simmering anger in me. His wife once more. Thanks to me. I brought them this victory and she goes back to him.

  I shook my head, trying to clear such thoughts away. To night I claim my sons and my wife. Tomorrow we leave Troy forever.

  And go where?

  A guard of honor escorted our little pro cession, spears held stiffly up to the blackened sky. Wailing and sobs rose all around us; the air was filled with the stench of blood and smoke.

  I trailed behind and noted that Helen never touched Menalaos, not even to take his hand. I remembered what Apet had told me, that being a wife among the Achaians, even a queen, was little better than being a slave.

  She never touched Menalaos, and he hardly glanced at her after that first emotion-charged meeting in the temple of Aphrodite at dead Hecuba’s bier.

  But she looked back at me over her shoulder more than once, looked at me, as if to make certain that I was not far from her.

  IV

  HELEN’S FATE

  1

  The Achaian camp was one gigantic orgy of feasting and roistering all that long afternoon and into the evening. There was no semblance of order and no attempt to do anything but drink, wench, eat and celebrate the victory. Men staggered about drunkenly, draped in precious robes pillaged from the burning city. Women cowered and trembled—those that were not beaten or savaged into insensibility.

  Fights broke out. Men quarreled over a goblet or a ring or, more often, a woman. Blood flowed and many Achaians who thought they were safe now that the war had ended learned that death could find them even in the midst of triumph.

  Above it all rose the plume of black smoke that marked Troy’s funeral pyre. The whole city was blazing now, up on its bluff. Even from the beach we could see the flames soaring through the roofs of the citadel and temples.

  It was nearly sunset by the time I arrived back where Odysseos’ boats were lying on the sand. My men were nowhere in sight, although Poletes was sitting there glumly by the cook fire, still with my armlet hung ridiculously around his scrawny neck.

  “Have you seen Odysseos?” I asked as I took it from him and fitted it back on my bicep.

  “He and the other kings have gone to Agamemnon’s cabin. To night the H
igh King will offer solemn sacrifices of thanksgiving to the gods,” he said. “Many men and beasts will be slaughtered and the smoke of their pyres offered to heaven. Then Agamemnon will divide the major spoils.”

  I looked past his sad, weatherbeaten face to the smoldering fire of the city, still glowing a sullen red against the darkening shadows of the evening sky.

  “You will be a rich man before this night is over, Master Lukka,” said the old storyteller. “Agamemnon cannot help but give Odysseos a great share of the spoils and Odysseos will be generous with you—far more generous than the High King himself would be.”

  I shook my head wearily. “All I want are my sons and my wife.”

  He smiled bitterly. “Ah, but wait until Odysseos heaps gold and bronze upon you, tripods and cooking pots of precious iron. Then you will feel differently.”

  There was no point arguing with him, so I said merely, “We’ll see.”

  I decided to go to Agamemnon’s part of the camp and get Odysseos to ask that my family be returned to me. But before I could go more than a few steps Magro and the other four remaining men of my squad came staggering drunkenly across the sand toward me, followed by more than a dozen slaves tottering under loads of loot: fine blankets and boots, beautiful bows of bone and ivory, colorful robes. And behind them came a half-dozen women who huddled together, clinging to one another, staring at their captors with wide fearful eyes.

  Magro halted his little pro cession when he saw me standing there, my fists on my hips.

  “Is this what you’ve taken from the city?” I asked him.

  He wasn’t so drunk that he couldn’t stand at attention, although he weaved a little. “Yes sir. Do you want to pick your half now or later?”

  It was customary for the leader of a squad to take his choice of half the spoils, then allow the men to divide the remainder among themselves.

  I shook my head. “No. Divide it among yourselves.”

  Magro gaped with astonishment. “All of it?”

  “Yes. You’ve done well to stick together like this. To night Agamem non divides the major spoils. The Achaians may want a share of your booty.”

  “We’ve already put aside the king’s share,” he said. “But your own …”

  “You take it. I don’t want it.”

  “Not even a woman or two?”

  I scowled at him. “I’m going to find my wife, Magro. And my two sons.”

  He nodded, but the expression on his face made it clear that he thought I was being foolish. And I realized that there was only one woman in the camp that I wanted: beautiful, forbidden Helen.

  Shaking my head at my own madness, I left them there by the water’s edge and started again toward the part of the beach where Agamemnon’s boats rested on the sand.

  Before I got halfway there I saw scores of slaves and thetes toting armfuls of driftwood, timber, broken pieces of furniture from the looted city toward three tall pyres that they were piling up in the center of the camp, each one taller than the height of a man.

  From the other side of the pyres Nestor led a band of priests decked in fine robes taken from Troy in a pro cession through the camp, followed by Agamemnon, Odysseos and all the other chiefs—all in their most splendid armor and carrying long glittering spears that seemed to me more ornamental than battle weapons.

  “They are preparing to make their sacrificial offerings to the gods,” said Poletes. I hadn’t realized he had tagged along behind me until he spoke. His face looked solemn, gloomy.

  “Then Agamemnon should be in a mood to reward me,” I said.

  Poletes shrugged. “Who knows what mood the high and mighty king will be in?”

  I watched as Nestor led the parade through the camp, singing hymns of praise to Zeus and the other immortals. The sacrificial victims were being assembled by the pyres: a whole herd of smelly goats and bulls and sheep, hundreds of them. Horses, too. They kicked up enough dust to blot out the sullen embers of burning Troy up on the bluff. Their bleatings and bellowings made a strange counterpoint to the chanting and singing of the Achaians.

  Standing off to one side of them were the human sacrifices, every man over the age of twelve who had been captured alive, their hands tightly bound behind their backs, their ankles hobbled. I recognized the old courtier who had escorted me to Priam’s palace. The victims stood silently, grimly, knowing full well what awaited them but neither begging for mercy nor bewailing their fate. I suppose they each knew that nothing was going to alter their destiny.

  Then I saw a different group, women and boys: slaves from the camp. They were going to be sacrificed, too, I realized. Agamemnon had no intention of bringing them back across the sea with him. Gold, yes. Fine robes and weapons and jewelry that would add to his treasury. But not the slaves he had kept at camp, except for the royal Trojan women.

  I ran toward them, seeking Aniti and my sons. A cordon of Achaian guards surrounded them, armed with spears.

  “My wife!” I shouted at the nearest one. “I’ve got to find my wife.”

  Like any soldier, he bucked me to his commanding officer, a stumpy, thickset Achaian named Patros. He listened to me with some impatience and told me to get one of the High King’s servitors to bring an order releasing my wife and sons.

  “Let me find them,” I pleaded. “Let me see them so they know I’ll save them.”

  Patros looked me over. He was a grim-faced old veteran with a dark bushy beard and a no-nonsense attitude.

  “I’ll hold your sword while you search,” he said.

  Gladly I gave him my iron sword and plunged into the crowd of women and boys, shouldering through them, looking for Aniti.

  At last I found her, sitting on the ground amid a sad, bedraggled group of other women, mostly older than she.

  She looked surprised to see me. Scrambling to her feet, she said, “Lukka! You’re here!”

  “Where are the boys?” I demanded.

  “The boys? What of me? They’re going to kill me!”

  “I’ll get them to release you. Where are my sons?”

  “Back at Agamemnon’s boats. I left them with one of his serving women.”

  “Good.” I turned and started toward the guards ringing the victims.

  Aniti grabbed at my arm with both hands, sinking her nails into my flesh. “Wait! Take me with you!”

  “The guards won’t let you pass.”

  She was suddenly frantic. “Take me with you! Don’t leave me! They’ll kill me!”

  Other women began to crowd around us, each of them pleading, beseeching. I swatted the nearest with a backhand that knocked her to the sand and the others cringed backward.

  To Aniti I said, “I’ll be back with one of the High King’s men. I’ll get them to free you.”

  “No!” she screamed. “Don’t leave me here!”

  Pulling free of her, I repeated, “I’ll be back in time to free you.”

  At that instant one of the pyres lit up with a roar. Flames shot skyward. I could feel the blast of heat on my face.

  Aniti sank to the ground, sobbing. “Don’t leave me, Lukka. Please, please, take me with you.”

  I knew it was fruitless, but I bent down and lifted her to her feet. “Come on, then,” I said, as gently as I could.

  Several of the other women followed behind us. Sure enough, Patros, still holding my iron sword, stopped us.

  “You can go, Hittite. She cannot.”

  Two of his spearmen moved toward us. One of them jabbed the butt of his spear at the crowd of women that was gathering behind us and they gave way.

  “This one is my wife,” I said to Patros.

  He shook his head. “Orders. The sacrificial offerings are to stay here until the priests come for them.”

  Aniti seemed frozen with shock. She stood at my side, eyes wide, mouth half open, clutching my arm.

  I said to Patros, “You can keep my iron sword. Just let me take my wife with me.”

  He was a decent enough man. He knew he could
n’t back down from his orders, not even for a sword of iron. But he sent one of his spearmen to find a priest. I waited impatiently. I could see that Aniti was trembling, her eyes darting everywhere, panting with fear.

  The spearman brought a priest, a young, apple-shaped fellow with smooth cheeks and oiled locks hanging down to his shoulders. His robe of sea-green was richly embroidered with gold thread: spoils from Troy, I reckoned.

  Before Patros could say a word, I fixed the chubby young priest with my sternest glare. “This woman is my wife. I am a Hittite and so is she. She was included in the sacrifice by mistake. I’m taking her with me.”

  He looked shocked. “Take one of the victims intended for the gods? Sacrilege! Be off with you!”

  “The High King was to return her to me,” I insisted. “She’s here among the victims by mistake.”

  “The gods don’t make mistakes,” he answered smugly. “You must accept their judgment.”

  My hands clenched at my sides. I held my temper, but just barely. No sense starting a brawl when my sword was in the hands of the guard and he had a pair of spearmen backing him.

  “I’ll be back with the king’s messenger,” I said to the priest. “If anything happens to my wife I’ll hold you responsible.”

  The flames of the pyre cast flickering red highlights across his bloated face. “I serve the gods,” he said, his voice quavering slightly. “What happens is their doing, not mine.”

  “And I’ll serve you on a spit if my wife isn’t here and unharmed when I return.”

  With that I grabbed my sword out of Patros’ hand and headed off for Agamemnon’s cabin.

  Aniti wailed, “Lukka, wait! Take me with you!”

  I lowered my head and broke into a trot. There was no time to waste.

  The second pyre burst into flame, and the ritual slaughter began. First came the animals, from a few doves to raging, bellowing bulls that thrashed madly even though their hooves were firmly lashed together, arching their backs and tossing their heads until the priest’s ritual stone ax cut through their throats with showers of hot blood. Horses, sheep, goats, all were being led to the sacrificial altars.