02 - Shield of Thunder

by David Gemmell

  They stopped at the brow of the hill and looked down into the valley beyond. They could see a fierce red glow, and the acrid smell of smoke assailed their nostrils. As their eyes adjusted, they could see flames leaping from a group of buildings. The sounds of animals in distress reached their ears.

  “Fire!” Kalliades shouted. “The farm is on fire!” Dark figures moved across the flames, and they could hear the clash of swords and the cries of wounded men.

  Piria started to run down the hill. “Andromache!” she cried.

  Unsheathing their swords, her two friends followed.

  For a moment only Andromache froze. Then she heard a voice call out: “There she is! Kill her!” She saw a bearded swordsman pointing at her. Cheon, sword in hand, ran at the first of the killers, swaying aside from a sword thrust and plunging his blade into the attacker’s face. The man fell back. Cheon followed in, but an arrow ripped into his side. Other dark-garbed men rushed in, hacking and slashing at the dying Trojan.

  Another arrow flashed past Andromache’s face. Leaving Cheon’s body, five men ran at her. Spinning around, she raced across the open ground toward the hillside. Then she heard a woman’s voice cry out.

  “Andromache! Come to me!” Even through her fear she recognized the voice and glanced up.

  There was Kalliope on the steep hillside above her, a bow in her hand. There were two warriors with her, one tall and dark, the other powerful and blond, wearing a leather cuirass covered with gleaming bronze disks. “Look out!” the tall man shouted. Andromache spun away once more. A bearded assassin was closing in on her, a dagger in his hand. “Got you now, bitch!” he snarled.

  Andromache leaped at him, her foot cracking against his chest, knocking him from his feet. More attackers were close behind. An arrow from Kalliope’s bow lanced into the throat of the nearest, then the blond-bearded warrior ran past Andromache, blocking a sword thrust before sending a backhand cut into the face of an assassin. Blood sprayed from the wound. He shoulder charged another man, then rushed in to the following group, his sword hacking and cutting. The tall warrior raced in to fight alongside his comrade. Andromache saw more assassins, some nine in all, converge on the two men, and it seemed they must be overrun. Beyond them one of the youths who earlier had been trying to tame the stallion staggered to the doors of the blazing barn and managed to raise the locking bar. Terrified horses came thundering out, racing in panic away from the flames.

  “Come to me, my love!” Kalliope shouted.

  Andromache ran up the hillside toward her. Kalliope was still shooting arrows at the attacking men. As she scrambled up toward her lover, Andromache caught sight of a bowman some fifty paces distant. He loosed an arrow. Andromache hurled herself to the ground.

  But the shaft had not been aimed at her.

  She saw Kalliope stagger back, her bow falling to the grass, a black-feathered arrow jutting from her chest.

  Anger, fierce and cold, swept through Andromache. Surging up, she ran to Kalliope’s side, sweeping up the bow and notching an arrow to the string. The bowman loosed another shaft, which slashed through her white robe, scoring the skin of her hip. Ignoring the pain, she took aim. The man, suddenly fearful, dashed toward the protection of the trees. Andromache gauged his speed, altered her aim, and let fly. For a heartbeat she thought she had missed, but the arrow drove into the side of his neck. His legs gave way, and he fell.

  Taking another arrow, she swung to see the two warriors standing back-to-back and fighting furiously. The bodies of four assassins lay close by. Another killer cried out as the sword of the tall man lanced into his chest. Then one of the assassins at the rear darted around the fighting men and sprinted toward Andromache.

  She let him come, then sent a shaft ripping through his lungs. He staggered on for several steps, then, in a last desperate attempt to complete his mission, hurled his sword at her. It did not come close, and he pitched forward onto his face.

  Below her she saw the blond warrior stumble, but his comrade stepped in to block a sword thrust and hauled him to his feet. Six bodies now lay around the pair, and the two surviving attackers suddenly turned and fled, heading out past the blazing barn. Andromache shot at one of them but missed. Then they were gone.

  Hurling aside the bow, Andromache dropped to her knees alongside Kalliope, who struggled to rise but fell back with a cry. The two warriors came then, the tall man casting his sword aside and also dropping to his knees. Andromache saw his anguish.

  A sense of unreality flowed through Andromache. This is a dream, she told herself. Kalliope cannot be here, and if she was, it would not be in the company of men. Assassins could not have attacked Hektor’s farm, so close to the city. I will wake, she thought, still on the couch. Just a dream!

  Then, as she moved, pain lanced through her hip. She glanced down at the blood on the slashed white gown.

  Kalliope’s hand touched her arm. “I came for you,” she said. “Don’t send me away! Please don’t send me away!”

  “I never will!” Andromache cried. “Never!”

  Once again Kalliope tried to rise. The tall warrior gently lifted her into a sitting position. “Rest your head on my shoulder, Piria,” he said, his voice breaking.

  “Am I hurt?” she asked him.

  “Yes, you are hurt, sweet girl.”

  Kalliope’s left hand reached up, her fingers finding the arrow shaft. Her eyes flared wide with fear, then she smiled and sighed. “He killed me, didn’t he? Tell me the truth, Kalliades.”

  Andromache saw the man’s head bow down. “I promised to see you safe,” he said. “And I failed you.”

  “Don’t say that! You did not fail me, Kalliades. Not once. You gave me my life back. You and Banokles. Your friendship restored me.” Her gaze shifted to Andromache, who leaned in close and kissed her. “It was Melite,” Kalliope said, her voice fading. “She told me wicked men would come for you. I… I had to… be there.”

  “And you were,” Andromache whispered.

  Kalliope fell silent. The huge blond warrior leaned in close, and Andromache saw there were tears in his eyes.

  “You are all so sad,” Kalliope said. “I am not sad. All the people… I love… are with me.” Her eyes fastened on the bright moon above. “And there… is… Artemis…”

  Then she was silent.

  Andromache stared down at the pale, still face of her lover and heard again the words of Aklides. His vision had been true but misinterpreted. He had seen Helikaon with one sandal and Hektor rising from the ground covered in the filth of pigs.

  But he had also seen a figure coming to her in the moonlight with blood and pain. And, seeing the short hair, he had mistaken that vision for a young man. Reaching out, Andromache lifted Kalliope’s hand, kissing the fingers. “You are my moon,” she whispered, tears filling her eyes. “Stay with me, Kalliope. Please!”

  Banokles laid his hand on her arm. “She has gone, lady. The brave girl has gone.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  THE TREACHEROUS HOUND

  The sandy shoreline beneath the high gray cliffs of Ithaka lay silent save for the cry of gulls. The group of wooden huts that housed fishermen and their families seemed deserted under the hazy afternoon sun.

  The old galley Penelope, her exposed hull heavily barnacled, was pulled up high on the sand. Forgotten and neglected, her once-gleaming timbers were bleached now by the blistering sun, her planks warped and twisted.

  From the shaded portico of her palace the queen of Ithaka gazed at her namesake with sadness. For three long years the ship had been abandoned there, forsaken by Odysseus in favor of the war galley Bloodhawk. Though ideal for a cargo vessel, the Penelope was no fighting ship. For one season only she had continued plying her trade for an Ithakan merchant, but the bloody war on the Great Green had made trading by sea increasingly dangerous, and the galley had been discarded in favor of smaller, faster ships that risked the triangular run between Ithaka, Kephallenia, and the mainland or northwest toward the di
stant settlement of Seven Hills.

  Penelope drew her blue shawl around her and peered out to sea. It seemed so calm today, yet far beyond the line of her sight there would be men dying in despair as their ships foundered or their villages burned. In lands all around the Great Green wives and mothers would be weeping for the lost, their dreams impaled on the spears of angry men. The seed of new hatreds would be spread with every raid, planted in the hearts of those who survived, children who would grow into men filled with a desire for vengeance.

  Yet even with the knowledge of the evils of war, she had supported Odysseus in his actions. “You could do no less, my husband,” she had said when he had returned to her three years earlier, cursing and fuming still over his insulting treatment in Troy, “for such slights cannot be ignored.”

  In her heart she wished they could have been. If the kings of the world were reasonable men, clear-thinking and far-sighted, such wars would never occur. Yet reasonable men rarely ascended to thrones, and when they did, it was even more rare for them to survive for long. Successful kings were brutal and greedy, men of blood and death, warriors who believed in nothing but the power of sword and spear. Penelope sighed. The husband she loved had tried to be a reasonable man. Yet beneath the affable surface there had always lurked the warrior king.

  He had spent that first winter with her, nursing his anger through the long nights, then in spring had left to go raiding in the lands of his new enemies. The name Bloodhawk now inspired fear from the coasts of Thraki down the great isles of the eastern mainland to Lykia in the south. She had last seen her king early in the year. After being forced to winter on Kypros while his damaged ship was repaired, Odysseus had hurried back to Ithaka for a brief visit. Penelope smoothed down the front of her dress, remembering the few precious days and nights they had spent together.

  Her sadness grew with each passing season, for each time he returned to her, he seemed to be moving backward in time. At first he had entered the war with some regrets, spurred on by anger and pride. But now she knew he was reveling in reexperiencing his youth. Odysseus the bluff genial trader, sliding slowly into comfortable old age, was gone, replaced by Odysseus the reaver, the cool and calculating planner, the strategos. Her heart ached for the man he once had been.

  Shading her eyes with her hand, Penelope saw movement on the horizon, and a line of ships appeared there. They were heading straight for the island. Her heart leaped for a moment. Could it be Odysseus? The hope lasted mere heartbeats. She had heard only days before that the Bloodhawk had been seen heading north from the Mykene settlement on Kos.

  She could see now that it was a large fleet with one great ship plunging through the waves far ahead of the others.

  The Xanthos! A warship that size could be no other.

  She heard running feet behind her and turned to see Bias. The old warrior had a sword in his left hand. A round wooden buckler had been clumsily strapped to the stump of his ruined right arm.

  “Lady! It is the Xanthos! We must make for the hill fort.”

  Behind him fisherfolk were emerging from the huts, and the men of the small garrison of Ithaka, many of them merely boys or ancients, were racing down to the beach, some faces grim, many frightened. Odysseus had left a force of two hundred to guard his fortress and his queen. Penelope studied the fleet. Thirty-one ships she counted. Close to two thousand fighting men.

  She said to Bias, raising her voice so that the soldiers could hear, “I am the queen of Ithaka, wife to the great Odysseus. I do not hide like a frightened peasant.”

  The Xanthos was heading toward the shore at ramming speed, its great prow carving the waves with the speed of a running horse. Penelope could hear the lusty chant of the rowers and clearly see the bearded face of a sailor looking over the prow.

  “Hold!” came the bellowed order from the ship, and the chanting ceased suddenly as oars were raised. There was a moment when the Xanthos seemed suspended above the beach; then she crashed onto the shore, her keel ripping into the sand and spraying gravel on all sides.

  As the huge galley lurched to a halt, sluicing water from her planks, the queen turned to her small force. “Go to the fort and prepare to defend it. Now!” For a moment they stood unmoving. “Go!” she repeated. Reluctantly they retreated past the palace and up the hillside to the ephemeral safety of the wooden stockade. Bias did not move.

  “Does the queen not have your loyalty?” she asked him.

  “She has my love and my life. I’ll not hide behind wooden walls while you risk yours.”

  Anger touched her, and she was about to order him back, when the round buckler slid from his shriveled stump and clattered to the sand. She felt his embarrasment and his shame.

  “Walk with me, Bias,” she said. “It will be comforting to have your strength by me.”

  They strode side by side down the beach. Penelope had never seen the Xanthos before, and she marveled at its size and beauty, though her face remained serene.

  A rope was thrown over the side, and Helikaon climbed down to the beach. Penelope looked with sadness upon the notorious killer who once had been a boy she loved. He was wearing a faded linen kilt, and his black hair was pulled back with a leather thong. He was bronzed dark by the sun and bore a stitched, barely healed scar on one thigh and a recent unhealed one on his chest. He glanced at the hulk of Odysseus’ old ship as he strode up the beach, but his face betrayed no expression.

  “Greetings, lady,” he said, bowing his head slightly. She looked into his violent blue eyes and saw tension and tiredness. Why was he there? To kill her and her people? She realized she knew nothing about him now save his reputation as a killer without mercy or restraint.

  She avoided looking at the other ships as they sailed toward the beach and forced a welcoming smile.

  “Helikaon, greetings! It is too many summers since we last welcomed you here. I will have food and wine brought down. We can talk of happier times.”

  He smiled tightly. “Thank you, lady, but my ships are well provisioned. We enjoyed the hospitality of old Nestor and his people on our way here. We have food and water for many days.”

  Penelope was shocked, although she would not show it. She had no idea Pylos had been attacked. How many dead? she wondered. She had many friends there and kinsmen.

  “But you will break bread with me, the way we used to?” she asked, ruthlessly dismissing from her mind thoughts of the dead of Pylos. She could not help them; she could only save her own people.

  He nodded and gazed assessingly at the old fort and the armed men who now lined the stockade walls. “Yes, lady, we will break bread.” He turned to Bias. “I heard you lost that arm at a battle off Kretos. I am glad you survived.”

  The black man’s eyes narrowed. “I hope you burn, Helikaon,” he said coldly, “and your death ship with you.”

  Penelope gestured for him to move back, and the old man, staring balefully at Helikaon, retreated several steps. The queen turned to him. “I am in no danger now, Bias. Return to the fort.” Bias bowed his head, glared once more at Helikaon, then strode away.

  Servants brought a blanket to lay on the sand, and Helikaon and the queen sat down. Though the sun blazed in the sky, Penelope ordered a welcome fire lit, as was the custom when entertaining friends. Wine and bread were laid before them, but they ate and drank little.

  “Tell me news, Helikaon. Little reaches us here in far Ithaka.”

  Helikaon looked into her face. “The only news is of war, lady, and I’m sure you have no genuine wish to hear of it. Many are dying up and down the Great Green. There are no victors. Your husband lives, I am told. We have not encountered each other. I have no recent news of the Bloodhawk. I came here for one reason, to pay my respects to you.”

  “I know the reason you came here,” Penelope said angrily, leaning forward, her voice low. “To show Odysseus that you could. You threaten his people—”

  His face tightened. “I have not threatened you, and I will not.”

&nbs
p; “Your very presence here is a threat. It is a message to Odysseus that he cannot guard those he loves. Your first words to me were to boast of attacking my kinsmen at Pylos. I am not a fool, Helikaon. I was queen here when you were a babe in arms. I know why you are here.”

  “He left you poorly guarded,” he said, gesturing at the small Ithakan force.

  They sat in silence for a while. Penelope was furious with herself. Her first priority was to save her people from attack. Antagonizing Helikaon was more than foolish. She could not believe he would set his killers on her people, yet tension etched into the skin around his eyes told of unresolved conflicts in his mind.

  Calming herself, she asked pleasantly, “How is your little son? He must be three now.”

  Helikaon’s face lightened. “He is a joy. I miss him every day I am away. But he is not my son. I wish that he was.”

  “Not your son?”

  Helikaon explained that the queen had been raped at the time of a Mykene attack and the boy was the result. “I had hoped it would remain secret—for Halysia’s sake. But such things rarely do. There were servants who knew, and the whispers began.”

  “How does Halysia feel about him?” she asked.

  Helikaon’s face darkened again. “She cannot look upon him without pain. To see him merely reminds her of the horror of the attack, her own child set ablaze and hurled from the cliffs, her body brutalized, raped, and stabbed. Such are the men your husband is now allied to.” She saw him struggling to contain his anger.

  “But you love the boy,” she said swiftly.

  He relaxed again. “Yes, I do. He is a fine child, intelligent, warm, and funny. But she cannot see that. She will not even touch him.”

  “There is so much sadness in the world,” Penelope said. “So many children unwanted and unloved. And women who would give everything they possess to have a child. You and I, we have both lost those we loved.”

  “Yes, we have,” he said sadly.