Conspiracy of the Islands (The Age of Bronze)

by Diana Gainer

  Dáuniya listened with tears flowing over her face. As the qasiléyu spoke, his eyes no longer saw the woman in his arms, but viewed the battlefields of his past. "That is the worst moment," he told her earnestly, "when you are faced with that forest of blades. Each lance seems pointed straight at you. The enemy's men march forward, side by side, and you cannot yet see their faces, so you do not know whether any of them are afraid. They are shouting the names of their gods, making a great sound. You feel the earth shake a little under the feet of so many. Of course, you are shouting, too, and pounding your spear against your shield, making a show of courage even if you have none in your heart. It is only a little better in a chariot. You have the horses between you and the enemy, but you know that they see your face rising above the foot-soldiers. You know they will come at you first, lusting for your animals as well as your bronze.

  "Your shield may have seemed stout and strong when you first took it up. But with the spears of the enemy closing in on you, the leather looks thin and you know it is puny protection. It will ward off a glancing blow. But a single direct thrust from a spear will pierce it as easily as if it were only linen. You can almost feel the sharp bronze slice into your skin. Sweat pours off of you, getting in your eyes. Your mouth becomes so dry, it seems full of wool. Your hands are cold and you can hardly hold the spear shaft. I have seen men urinate on themselves at that moment. They are not always the untried, either.

  "Sometimes it is worse for the experienced warrior. You remember all the wounds you saw inflicted and you wonder which way you are fated to die. Will it be a quick death from a spear that cracks your skull? Will an arrow skirt your shield and pierce your heart? Or will you have time to suffer, bleeding to death when your arm is cut to the bone? Or the arrow may hit your lungs and you will drown in your own blood. Or a blade may catch you in the belly, between your navel and your groin, where pain is the worst."

  He could not go on for a moment. Closing his eyes tightly against the bloody memories, he ground his teeth and buried his face in the woman's black hair. Dáuniya could feel his whole body trembling. Her tears still came, his every word wounding her further. She pictured each injury that he described, as if he were the man struck, and felt the anguish of his loss even though he was still beside her. She clung to him with desperate strength, feeling his spirit slip away from her, fearing that he was in her arms for the last time.

  With a deep, shuddering breath, Diwoméde regained enough control to go on. "There is only one thing that a man fears more than a painful death, Dáuniya. Because of that fear, he will stand and fight, no matter what the cost. The one thing that is worse than death is the loss of areté. If you panic and run for your life, you lose all of your honor, in the eyes of other men. I know that women do not like to hear about areté. They say that it is not a true virtue and that the war god is pure evil. But he is not. Arét is just, because the man who turns from the fight endangers his fellow soldiers. If he runs away, he leaves a gap where the enemy will enter to kill one of his brothers. If one man deserts, others will follow him, and soon the whole army is routed. With their backs turned, they are slaughtered like sheep.

  "Do you understand me, Dáuniya? It is hard enough to go into combat as it is. I have enough fears of my own to deal with. I do not want to hear about yours. I have gone on many campaigns. I have done this before. I can do it again. If you want to make it easier for me, stop crying. Tell me that you understand."

  Dáuniya wiped the tears from her face. With a tremulous smile, she gazed up at Diwoméde. "Yes, beloved," she said dutifully, with a sinking heart. "I understand. I will be all right. And you have been practicing, building up the strength of your spear arm. You will come home from Mízriya without a scratch. The omens have all been favorable, I know. I am just a silly woman. Do not listen to me."

  "That is better," Diwoméde responded, though his body still shivered under the warm sheepskins. He kissed the top of his woman's head and asked, "What would like me to bring you from Mízriya, as a prize?"

  She wanted to say that he need only bring himself, but she knew that he would not like that. "Another amulet to keep the Evil Eye from the baby," she suggested. "I have heard that Mízriyan amulets are especially powerful."

  Calmed by the shift of topic, Diwoméde gave short laugh. "Odushéyu must have told you that. But an amulet, Dáuniya? Ai gar, I gave you one of those before, did I not? No, I will bring you something special from Mízriya. They are famous for their linen, woven of such fine threads that you can see through it. I will clothe you in this Mízriyan cloth when I come back, and make you my wife." So saying, he rolled over on top of her and kissed her hard on the mouth. She wrapped her arms around his neck, pressing her full lips against his, and wound her legs around his hips.

  "Lie with me one more time before I go," he whispered, his voice husky with passion. He felt between her legs for her moist warmth.

  "One more time," she repeated with a gasp of pleasure as he entered her body.

  aaa

  As summer began, with yet another meager harvest behind them, the men of Ak'áiwiya set sail for Mízriya. The women of Tíruns and the surrounding countryside watched them go, from the shore and the citadel tower. Waving their hands above their heads, the women gave their ululating cry to stir the hearts of their departing men. They continued waving and watching until the ships disappeared over the watery horizon. Then they released the tears that they had kept hidden from their menfolk. The sacred groves and caves were soon filled with weeping mothers and wives, bringing small offerings to the gods and goddesses. Laying bread or figs on the horned altars, or lengths of undyed cloth, they prayed fervently for the safety of their kinsmen.

  Dáuniya stood at the small altar in the palace courtyard, weeping. At her throat was a small, golden eye, inlaid with ivory and lapis lazuli. The amulet's inlays were surrounded with black ebony and a post and curlicue fell from the lower lid of the eye. She poured wine into the hollows of the paving stones and placed a small, round loaf on the table beside the gate. Next to the bread she placed the amulet, Diwoméde's parting gift. "O Mother Diwiyána," she prayed, saluting the sky, "bring Diwoméde back to me. You must love my children, since you have taken every one. Look at my offerings, great lady. I give you the amulet that would keep this baby from you. Take this emblem of the Evil Eye. And take the child in my womb. But bring my beloved back from Mízriya. Send him back to me alive, I beg you."

  In the grove of olive trees at the foot of the citadel's hill, Lawodíka made her own sacrifice to the goddess of fortune. Her serving women scurried about the road that led from the port to its guarding fortress, trying to catch one of the queen's fat geese. As they chased the big birds, their wings clipped to prevent them from flying away, the wánasha prayed beneath the trees.

  "Lady Diwiyána, hear my prayer. See that Puláda is killed in Mízriya. Take this P'ilísta from my house. Free me from this creature of lust and ambition. Let me be a queen like Penelópa was, ruling in her own right. Do this and I will offer any sacrifice you desire, in your sanctuaries. Only give me a sign in the liver of the goose I offer you. Do you want cattle for your offering? Or do you want men?"

  A breathless serving woman brought her a honking, struggling goose, as Lawodíka finished her prayer. The youthful queen took the bird by the head and deftly wrung its neck, twisting the head around several times, till the bones snapped and it finally came off. She accepted the bronze knife offered by a second servant. Laying the dead goose on the ground, she slit open the belly as the legs still kicked spasmodically.

  aaa

  Ak'áiwiya sent out less than half the thousand boats and ships that Agamémnon had once led. But when the many square sails appeared on Mízriya's northern horizon, the people of the southern empire took up their possessions in a panic and streamed inland. Thhe Ak'áyans took this as a most auspicious sign and they prepared to haul their longboats up out of the water to assault the cities on land.

  To the lawagétas' surpr
ise, Odushéyu strongly advised against this move and discounted every omen. "The Mízriyans are one nation," he warned, as the troop leaders gathered in Puláda's lead ship.

  "You cannot know that," the young overlord objected and most of the others agreed.

  But Ainyáh sided with the It'ákan. Grimly, he pointed out, "These people may be running away from us, but, at the same time, they are also running toward something, some place they think is safer. They are leaving the coast for the interior, something they would not do if there were nothing but bandits on the roads." Along with Odushéyu, then, Ainyáh urged them to remain in their ships.

  "Do not try to pull your vessels up on shore," the Kanaqániyan strongly advised. "That would leave you vulnerable to attack, for there is no wood to speak of in this land. There is nothing with which to build a protecting palisade. Instead, you must leave your ships anchored in the river's channel and the warriors must all remain aboard. If you are attacked by too large a force, every son of Diwiyána can run out his oars and quickly row for the open sea."

  Odushéyu agreed. "This is excellent advice. The Mízriyans are notoriously poor sailors, and the main part of our army would make a sure escape. Then we could return the next summer with additional allies, to try again."

  Despite his suspicions, Diwoméde spoke in favor of this plan. "But we should break with another practice, in addition," he told the assembled troop leaders. "Do not remove the sails from the masts. Only bind them to the yard with ropes, to keep them from catching the wind and tearing the ships loose from the anchors. Also, in the basket on every mast, a lookout should be posted at all times."

  Demop'ówon advised Puláda to make preparations for success as well as for failure, though. He suggested that they have a portion of the army go ashore and plant grain. "Let us sack just one walled fortress and we can keep some men in the country for the whole year. They can take shelter behind the walls if the Mízriyans are too threatening. They would only need a source of food to withstand a siege until reinforcements could come from Ak'áiwiya. So, have the men on land sow a barley crop as soon as the season permits. Then, if Mízriya cannot pin them in their fortress, they can harass the land during the winter, softening up our enemy to make next year's work easier."

  The overlord of the Ak'áyans had broken with many traditions. He agreed to give the word for the troops to remain on board ship, for the vessels to be kept at anchor, for the sails to be tied to the yards, and for lookouts to be posted. He further agreed to send a few men ashore. They set up leather tents above the Aigúpto River's waters and they began raiding the countryside to feed the army. But Demop'ówon's final suggestion was another matter. Maintaining a siege throughout the winter was simply unheard of. This the high wánaks would not do. It would be going too far, carrying the war to excess. The gods could be angered by excess and they dared not get the deities against them.

  Nor would the Argive king listen to Diwoméde's objection when Ainyáh went ashore with a handful of picked men, to spy out the countryside. "The Kanaqániyan may have been our enemy at one time," Puláda argued. "But he is a mercenary before anything else. That means he is loyal to T'esprotíya and today that makes him our ally." He would not hear any further objections.

  Ainyáh returned to the ships with encouraging news and a surprising visitor. Peirít'owo, son of the deposed king of Kep'túr came to the longboats. "I have contacted some of my kinsmen serving in the Mízriyan army," the Kanaqániyan told the assembled troop leaders, on Puláda's ship. "The new king is named Ramusís, like his noble ancestor. He is still young and has ruled for only a few years, most of those only as co-regent. That is good news. An inexperienced leader can easily lose a war even when backed with a large army. His father, Sitnak'át, spent most of his short reign reconquering the land and he died immediately after his final triumph. Some say he was poisoned. That, too, is good news for us. It means the royal family still has many enemies.

  "The Mízriyan army is not as large as I had feared, either. Ramusís has not yet regained the lands of the Káushans in the south. The Libúwans are still independent for the most part, also, and they hold at least a third of the northern delta, perhaps more. The eastern delta is not secure, either. Ramusís defeated a great army there, just two years ago, or perhaps three. They were not the simple nomads whom the Mízriyans usually fight, either. These were trained spearmen and archers, men from Assúwa. His great army could only have been weakened by such a hard fight. My kinsmen are ready to desert Ramusís, now, because he has not paid them for their services since that battle in the eastern delta."

  Peirít'owo had respectfully waited for the older mercenary to speak. But now he came forward. "Many Ak'áyans remained in this land after my father's army was defeated, years ago. My kinsmen, too, have served the southern empire as mercenaries. They are as eager to desert Ramusís as the Kanaqániyans are. What Ramusís gains in every battle goes to the priests of his ram-god and to his own royal household. Mízriya has treated my people as if they were slaves. For that, Ramusís must be made to pay."

  Odushéyu listened with growing impatience. "My recommendation is this," the It'ákan announced urgently. "Let us sail south right away, to where the river's streams come together. There is a great city there, Manufrí, where every Great King of Mízriya is crowned. It is richer than all the fortresses in Ak'áiwiya put together, and holy to the Mízriyans. Sack it and every man among you will be wealthy beyond imagining! I swear it! Burn Manufrí and the people will see that the gods are against them. Foreigners and natives alike will turn against their new king, then, even if he is another Ramusís. That illustrious name will not save him from our wrath. You can pay Mízriya's mercenaries with the booty from Manufrí, you see, and then the mercenaries will join our side. At that point, we will be able to sail up and down the Aigúpto River at will, burning every town and village, just as they did in Ak'áiwiya last year."

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  AIGUPTO

  Dawn came, already oppressively hot, as the fleet from Ak'áiwiya lay at anchor, deep in the meandering streams of the Aigúpto delta. Aboard the longboats, men slept curled up and lying half upon one another, in the cramped holds of their vessels, or on the rowing benches. The lookouts dozed at their posts, high up on the masts of Argo's ships.

  Ainyáh alone was awake and alert at the northern end of the fleet. He had kept watch through the night, insisting that his good friend, Odushéyu, stay among the men of Kanaqán and Wilúsiya, enjoying eastern-style hospitality. At first light, Ainyáh roused the men in his ship with curses and blows. His shouts, and the loud cries of his roughly awakened men, roused Odushéyu from an uneasy sleep. The It'ákan came from the small shed on the stern platform, glancing nervously about.

  "Keep your muzzle shut," Ainyáh curtly warned the aging exile. "Peirít'owo has already gone ashore."

  Odushéyu shuddered. He broke into a sudden sweat and returned to the little shelter where he had spent the night. "At'ána be with me," he whispered, his eyes tightly shut, cradling his head in his arms. "Goddess, help us all."

  At the southern end of the Ak'áyan fleet, king Meneláwo dozed on the largest of the Lakedaimóniyan ships. A small flock of ducks rose from the reeds by the riverbank. The lookout on the royal longboat started awake and nearly fell from his precarious post, catching the flimsy rim of his basket just in time. Glancing around, the bare-skinned watchman shaded his eyes at the brightness of the sun rising in the east. He made a cursory salute to the orb, his hand raised to his heart and the sky, struggling to clear his mind from the fog of sleep. Blinded by the light, he blinked several times before he could make out something moving over the waters to the south. His vision was obscured by the bright after-image of the sun. But there seemed to be a thicket of basket-topped masts in the distance. Calling down to his leader, the lookout shouted, "I think there is someone coming up the river! I cannot make out who it is. I do not see any sails."

  Meneláwo was awake instantly. "Mízriyans!" he gasped, c
lutching at his chest where his heart had begun pounding. "Sound the alarm, men!" the king cried. "Blow the conch!" A sudden flight of arrows swept overhead from the eastern shore of the river, as he spoke. His watchman raised a large seashell from the floor of his basket and put it to his lips. Taking a breath, he prepared to blow. But an arrow struck him in the neck before he had filled his lungs with air. The conch dropped into the sluggish river with a splash, followed shortly by the man's corpse.

  Men in the ships near the Kanaqániyan commander had stirred sleepily at Ainyáh's cursing. They had called up, lazily, to their lookouts. Had they seen anything? What was all the noise about? At the rush of arrows they began to scramble about their crowded longboats, shouting and confused. Watchmen at the northern end of the Ak'áyan contingent could not distinguish the masts of the approaching vessels from those of their fellow sons of Diwiyána. Someone was shooting at them from the eastern shore, it was clear. But that was all they yet knew.

  Mízriyan archers were arrayed on shore with their backs to the rising sun, to take advantage of the shining disk that blinded their enemies. The lookouts on the Ak'áyan ships were the first target of the bowmen on the riverbank. One after another, Ak'áyan watchmen collapsed in their high baskets, or fell upon their unarmed brethren on the partial decks below.

  "To your oars, men!" the ships' commanders shouted. "To your oars!" Responding to the call, warriors in the holds rose up in a tangle of arms and legs, making for the rowing benches, trying to push their paddles out into the water to make a run for it. Navigators scrambled for the stern platforms and took hold of their long steering oars, only to fall victim, in turn, to the rain of arrows from the land.