by Jo Graham
We stopped and traded a little, but for the most part the villages were scarce. Perhaps there were settlements inland, but we did not see them. At one tiny place, scarcely more than a collection of five or six houses and a couple of boats, we were ashore trading for fresh bread. I was walking Markai. He fretted sometimes, and we were walking along the edge of the field.
“See the flowers?” I picked one red poppy, golden centered, and held it up for his grasping hand. “Red is pretty.”
Now, She whispered behind me. Now. You must sail up the coast. Now.
It was like the night in Pylos before the ships came, a dreadful certainty that something was about to happen. Now.
With the flower still in my hand I all but ran back to Neas.
“We must sail,” I said.
He took one look at me and turned to his men. “Everyone back to the ships! We sail immediately!” Xandros looked up in the middle of the trade, one eyebrow rising. Then he concluded it as quickly as possible.
“Where are we going?” Neas asked.
It embarrassed me a little to see everyone running for the boats as though an enemy were at large. “North,” I said. “North until She tells us to stop.” I shifted Markai on my hip. “I don’t know why. I’m sorry, Neas.”
“Your word is enough for me,” he said simply. “Xandros! Get Dolphin loaded! We sail!”
North, with a following wind. We sailed for two days without stopping, without beaching at night. And the shore passed beside us, golden and ripe.
The second night a fog rolled in, and we could not have seen Seven Sisters and Pearl if we had not all hung lamps at our sterns, something we had learned in Egypt.
Neas called over, and soon we all three came alongside.
Wordlessly, I handed Markai to Tia, and Xandros swung me across the gap between ships.
Kos climbed over Seven Sisters’ rail on the other side. “We can’t go on like this,” he said without preliminary, and I thought how far he had come from the first council he had attended, when he had been too shy to speak. “I can hear surf off to my right. I have no idea how close it is, or how steeply the coast draws away. At this rate we’re going to run up on rocks. We need to anchor and wait out the fog.”
Xandros nodded. “I’m out on the seaward side, but I don’t like this running without being able to see either. And there’s a strange current here, closer inshore. I think we should wait.”
Neas looked at me. “Lady? Prudence dictates that we wait, and seamanship demands it. What do you say?”
I felt nothing. She did not speak. The sense of urgency that had been pushing me was gone. I reached, and there was quiet. “We should wait,” I said. “I do not see any danger in doing so.”
Neas nodded, and Kos gave a visible sigh of relief. They had been willing to go on if Neas asked it, but they were glad not to. “Drop anchor!” Neas yelled. “We’re going to wait out the fog!”
“It should go in the morning,” Xandros said. “As warm as it’s been, the sun will burn it off in no time.”
Bai took the watch. Xandros came to stay beside me in Dolphin’s bow cabin, and while Markai slept, made love to me as quietly and gently as one can when trying not to disturb a sleeping baby a handbreadth away. Afterward, I curled onto his shoulder, and let the sea rock us both.
Perhaps it was the quiet, or the release of lovemaking after long waiting, but Xandros slept past dawn. I left him sleeping, Markai curled up in a little bundle near him, faces wearing identical expressions of repose. It was almost funny, I thought. They looked so much alike in sleep, damp black hair clinging to their foreheads. I went out on deck.
Dawn was coming and the sky was streaked with pink. The fog lifted off like a veil.
We stood out from a river mouth where a broad stream met the sea. It flowed between banks green with summer, and behind it rose slopes thick with trees, rolling hills and the shades of distant mountains on the far horizon. Seagulls cried on the winds. They dodged and dove as the sun rose above the hills, golden and brilliant. I watched, my heart leaping at the sheer beauty.
Neas stood on the deck of Seven Sisters, his arms upraised, the light gilding him.
Not wanting to wake people by calling, I climbed across to him. He saw what I was about and caught me under my arms, lifting me when the ships swayed apart. For a moment we stood like that, his arms around me, feeling the sun lift us both.
“Look!” he said. “That’s not a water bird. What is it?”
Something large was winging toward us, scattering the seagulls in their diving. It flashed across us at mast height, its shadow dashing over Neas.
“It’s a young eagle,” I said.
The light caught its talons as it turned inland, flashing like gold.
Neas looked at me and I at him. “Yes,” he said.
I nodded. “We should go upriver, my king.”
As soon as the rowers were all awake we started upriver, Seven Sisters going first and very slowly, sounding the way ahead with a knotted rope weighted with stones. The river wasn’t terribly wide, but it was deep enough and smooth enough for us to glide along. Away from the seashore there were trees and meadows, limbs bending down over the stream.
I stood with Xandros in the stern of Dolphin, for he would trust no hand but his on the tiller in the confines of the river. “Look there!” I said. “It looks like smoke from cooking fires.”
Ahead, beyond a turn in the river, there were a few thin streaks of smoke.
Seven Sisters halted and drifted against the current, and Xandros yelled for our oars to still. We were within easy calling distance of Seven Sisters and Pearl behind us.
“Water’s getting shallow,” Neas called back. “We’re going to try to find a channel on the left-hand side.”
They crept forward again, only two oars beating.
“It’s the dry season,” Xandros said. “See along the bank there? The water is higher at other times. This river’s perfectly navigable if it’s still possible to get a warship up here in dry weather.”
Neas found the channel, and we followed.
Along the bank the trees gave way to fields of barley and grain, ripe and waiting for the harvest. A vineyard was behind, grapes heavy on the vines, purple and dark. Beyond were patches of other vegetables, all unharvested.
“There’s something wrong,” I said. “Where are the people? The grain is sitting ripe in the field and there are no reapers.”
Xandros nodded. “There.” He gestured with his chin.
One small corner of the field was mown, the stalks broken off haphazardly, as though by clumsy workers who took little care. Beyond it, an orchard of almond trees showed green in patches. Some of the trees had been burned.
They were shipping oars on Seven Sisters, gliding into the bank. As we came near we saw what they had seen. There was a fortified town just ahead. Before it docks came down to the shore, and gray stone walls rose up. It was a small place, no larger than Pylos, perhaps, with a plain wall and a pair of watchtowers no greater than four times a man’s height. A few tendrils of cooking smoke rose, and I could smell bread baking. The gates were closed.
“Not again,” Xandros said. He smiled at me. “I’m getting tired of coaxing people out to trade who think we’re here to loot them and burn them out.”
Neas and several others went over the side of Seven Sisters and walked back to us. “Think we should trade?” he asked.
Xandros nodded. “They seem to have plenty of food.”
I leaned over the rail. “Neas, something is wrong. Why haven’t they harvested? With that fog last night you’d think they would have wanted to get everything in before the damp comes.”
The rest of the men were getting down from Seven Sisters, arms at the ready in case there was a misunderstanding. It had happened more than once, that we’d had to stand to arms before it was clear we wanted trade.
Neas looked across at the fields, and it occurred to me that he and Xandros had probably never actually
harvested grain. They were seamen, not farmers. “You’re right,” he said. “It’s strange.”
There was a glint of metal on the walls, light glancing off helmets.
“Arm up,” Neas said, and went back to Seven Sisters for his equipage.
I helped Xandros fasten his breastplate, his new sword at his side, his new shield on his arm.
Tia came and stood beside me. “What’s going on?” she asked.
I showed her what we had been looking at, at the fields unharvested and the partially burned orchard.
Our men formed up. Xandros was calling something to the walls. I could see several armed men upon the wall, but they did not reply. Perhaps the language here was too different from Shardan.
“Why would the fields be unburned if they were attacked by an enemy? And if they haven’t been raided, why aren’t the fields harvested?” I wondered. “It doesn’t make sense. Why haven’t they done it?”
Tia gripped my arm. “It’s the women. They haven’t got enough men to harvest. So they’ve done only that one little corner. Someone attacked and they’re planning to come back, like leaving a rabbit warren where it is and using it to trap a few when you want them. Why burn the fields and lose the food? They can leave them and come back for them when they’re ripe. It’s not like they can go anywhere!”
“Yes! I think you’re right.” I swung Markai against me and climbed over the rail, splashing into the mud and hurrying up to Neas.
He was not in bow shot of the walls, but he looked irritated with me. “Sybil, you’re in too close. Back up. They’re not answering our hails, and that fellow over there keeps shaking his spear at me.”
“How many men do you count?” I asked him.
“Five on the walls,” Neas said. “I’m guessing the rest are massed behind the gate and are going to come rushing out at any minute. You need to get back. And Tia too.” He glanced behind me where Tia had followed, Kianna on her shoulder.
“I don’t think there are any more men,” I said. Quickly I explained what Tia had said.
Neas shook his head. “You may be right. Or you may not be. But they’re not acting like they want to talk, and if they’ve got the number of men a settlement like this should have, we’re outnumbered if they charge us. Get back on the ships.”
“We have to talk,” I said. “Let Xandros go forward and try again.”
“They’re not answering him,” Neas said. “If he goes into bow shot he’s going to get hit.”
“Then let me go,” I said, raising my chin. “They can see what I am. I’m a woman with a baby, and not an enemy who can attack them if they let me get close. Let me go with Xandros.”
Neas opened and closed his mouth.
Xandros came up quietly. “Gull, are you sure?”
“Yes,” I said with a quick glance at Tia. “I’m sure.”
I arranged Markai on my shoulder so he was more visible, and took a step forward.
“Me too,” said Tia. She stood beside me, Kianna on her hip, her long bare legs dangling. “If one is good, two are better.”
“Those are your children,” Neas said, and I could not tell if his voice was disbelieving or indignant.
“Yes,” I said. And we started forward.
Xandros followed bare-handed, his shield against his back, ready to swing forward and cover me and Markai at his expense. “Oh love, you’d better know what you’re doing,” he whispered.
Lady, I thought, I hope I do too.
We approached the beetling walls. Xandros called out in Shardan, “People of this place, we mean you no harm! We are traders, honest men with families, as you can see! We want only to speak with you! Let there be no misunderstandings between us!”
There was a long silence. We saw them talking together on the wall, heads bent close. Then a voice called back in Shardan, though the accent was strange. “We see you and your children. But we do not want to trade. You have nothing we want. Get in your ships and leave.”
Xandros looked at me.
I raised my voice. “We have men who can harvest your crops, and will trade their labor for a share of the grain.”
They bent their heads to one another again. It seemed they conferred for a long time. “Is there one who speaks for you and will come within and treat with our king?”
“Yes,” Xandros replied. “Our king, Aeneas, is here. He will speak with you.”
Tia went back and changed places with Neas while Xandros and I waited with Markai. Neas laid aside his sword and his helm and came forward.
He cocked an eye at Xandros. “Go back,” he said. “I need you in command out here. You’re my second and we can’t both go in. And take Markai with you. Sybil goes with me. Her Shardan is better than mine.”
Xandros gathered the baby from my arms. “You’ll guard her.”
“As if she were my own wife,” Neas promised.
Xandros raised an eyebrow.
“It will be well,” I said, and settled Markai in his arms.
And then Neas and I walked forward. The gates creaked open and we entered the city.
IT WAS a small city indeed, with dirt streets and low houses with tile roofs, one street wide enough for a chariot leading straight back, toward where presumably temples and the palace were. Two boys ran forward and shut the gates behind us, dropping a bar into place. They were only twelve or thirteen years old, not men under arms, and I knew that Tia was right.
A man in breastplate and antique greaves had come down from the wall, along the plank walk and staircase that ran along the inside. It was he who had called to us from the wall, and as he came near I saw that his left arm was missing at the elbow. I had not seen that at a distance. Three other men followed, and they seemed hearty enough.
“This way,” he said. They surrounded us and we went quickly down the main street.
The palace was a long, low building with a roof of red tile and a portico held up by stone columns along the front. Smoke drifted up from a hearth hole in the middle of the building. The courtyard was dirt, not stone. Most of the houses were wood, on stone foundations. It was a very modest place.
And yet a weeping almond spread its boughs over the porch, and the temple across the way had a certain grace. The sky above was blue, and the ends of the roof were ornamented with fancy tiles.
We went inside. Autumn sunlight poured in through the hearth hole, illuminating a generously proportioned room with a floor of painted stone, a lion hunt picked out in colors. Blinking at the sudden darkness of the room around it, I saw motion along the walls, the movement of skirts. Before the hearth was a carved wooden chair. In it sat the king.
He was perhaps fifteen years Neas’ senior, but his dark hair was already streaked with white. His robes covered his lap and limbs with folds of white linen and scarlet wool, but I thought there was something strange about the way he held his left leg, that the heel of his foot did not quite touch the floor. “You say you are traders,” he said. “And yet I think you lie.”
Neas raised his head sharply. “I am Aeneas, son of Anchises, King of Wilusa That Was. I do not lie.”
“And yet you have come only to trade?” The king’s gaze was sharp, and I knew him for a true ruler, a man worth reckoning upon.
“We have come to trade, yes,” Neas said. “We have goods from many ports, and we are lately come from Egypt.”
The king glanced at me. “And yet the woman there has said you will trade the labor of your hands for food.”
“We do not disdain honest labor,” Neas said. “And we are willing to trade that labor for food. We have our families with us, as you have seen, for Wilusa is no more.”
There was a stirring behind me, but I could not turn to see.
“Well we know that Wilusa is no more,” the king said. “We have heard so from men who fought with the Achaians in the great fleet that sought to loot the cities of Egypt. And we know that you fought for Pharaoh in that battle.”
“Does that mean there is blood between us?
” Neas asked. “For my part, I have no quarrel with you or your people. I do not even know the name of this city or its king.”
“This city is called Latium,” he said. “And I am its king. Latinus is my name, as it is the name of all who rule here. We did not send men to the great fleet. We have no need of mercenary enterprise here.”
“Sir,” Neas said politely, though there was steel in his voice, “politeness is an old virtue, and I had not heard that it was valued less in this land. We are mercenaries through hard cause. A king must do what is necessary for his people, no matter how few they are.”
“Indeed he must,” Latinus said, and he sighed. He seemed to come to some decision, for he leaned forward. “But sometimes answers may come in dreams, or the future be divined from the flight of birds by men who are skilled in reading such things. This morning I saw a young eagle flying up the river toward me, and he came and stood upon the roof poles of this house, and there he devoured a fox that he had caught. What do you make of this?”
Neas did not look at me. “I saw the same eagle as I stood upon my ship, and we followed it. But it is not I who am skilled in understanding such things. That is the role of Sybil, who stands here with me.”
The king looked at me. “I had rather thought she was your wife.”
“My wife is dead,” Neas said. “My son and I are alone in the world.” He glanced around at the hall. “And so are you, it seems. Where are the warriors who should guard your throne? The sons of your house who should wait at your side?”
“The sons of my house are dead,” Latinus said, and his voice was steady and fierce. “They were killed by the Rutoli when we met them in battle, when I was sorely injured and the warriors of my people were slain.”
Neas nodded. He could not have failed to mark the number of men, no more than ten all told, and perhaps as many youths. I had marked it well.
