The Amazon and the Warrior

by Judith Hand

  She looked at Pentha and saw that, for the first time since their reunion, Pentha’s face seemed relaxed and calm. Derinoe peered closer. Extraordinary transformation! Her sister obviously carried out her days, seemingly so competent, so in control, but with a weight on her spirit, carefully hidden, that was enormous. She had laid it aside briefly now, here in this dim and quiet place.

  Derinoe reached out and held Pentha’s hand.

  60

  DAMON APPROACHED THE CREST OF THE HILL OVERLOOKING landscape open enough to fly Dia. Wolf paced just behind his heel, between Damon and Bias. Bias carried Dia in her travel cage. Trusis trudged uphill on Damon’s other side, and a contingent of twenty armed men followed. Although he had promised Trusis this outing, Damon wondered once more at the man’s motive. Trusis had so far shown no real interest in Dia.

  They were passing nearby a last, dense stand of oaks. Bushes and brush smothered the slope ahead, but the hill’s crest was barren save for rocks and grass and a few sturdy wildflowers, summer survivors. The soldiers brought food on these outings and enjoyed not only watching the falcon perform but also the chance to have some hours at ease. Trusis peered into the oak stand, then perhaps sensing that Damon had noticed, snapped his gaze once more toward the crest.

  Damon said, “Did you see something?”

  “No. No. Nothing.”

  Damon stared at Trusis, an uncomfortable itch at the back of his mind. “You don’t seem yourself today. Why so quiet?”

  An explosion of noise erupted from the woods, the sound of broken twigs, sprung brushes, and running feet. Men in Achean garb and brandishing weapons rushed toward them at the charge. Damon didn’t even have time to yell a warning before the Acheans, who easily outnumbered his party two to one, were on them. He pulled his sword. A soldier leapt onto him. He fell backward, hit the ground, slammed the back of his head, and the world spun. Damon rolled the both of them, his head clearing, then backed onto his knees and brought his sword blade down and across the Achean’s neck.

  A warm blood arc sprayed Damon’s legs as he bolted to his feet, only to be jumped again by two men from behind. They clung to him like lions on a stag’s back. Damon swung them around.

  At the edge of the struggle, he saw Bias drop Dia’s cage and start running. Bias was unarmed. Escape would be his only chance. But even as Damon wished Bias’ feet to sprout wings, a spear sailed through the air and slammed into the boy’s back. Bias staggered and then fell to the ground, out of view.

  Rage. Pure rage. Fired by it, Damon bellowed and thrust his elbow into the breastplate of one of the beasts hanging onto his back.

  Trusis, sword drawn, ran toward Damon, and from one side, Wolf bounded toward Trusis. Clearly Wolf thought Trusis intended to attack Damon. As Damon grappled with burly arms around his neck—the soldiers appeared intent on pulling him to the ground, not killing him—he yelled, “No, Wolf!”

  Trusis turned to Wolf, raised his sword, took one step toward the animal, and as Wolf was in a mid-air leap, shoved the sword’s blade deep into Wolf’s chest. The animal gave a great whine that pierced like a crude blade into Damon’s heart, and collapsed at Trusis feet.

  Around Damon, his Themiskyran men and the Acheans fought deadly struggles. At that very moment four more Acheans converged on Damon. He went down on his knees. In front of him he saw Wolf’s body. And standing in the middle of all this chaos, Trusis. Trusis, doing nothing but standing there.

  A blinding blow to the head, and he saw only blackness with a blaze of stars against it. Then nothing.

  Trusis moved to where Damon lay on the ground, savoring the moment.

  “Tie him well,” Trusis said to the Achean attackers. “He’s strong and he’s clever.”

  He surveyed the scene. The only men now standing were Achean. A soldier approached him and said, “What do you want us to do with the two who are still alive.”

  “No witnesses,” said Trusis.

  PART III

  DESTINY

  61

  STEAM HEAT DUG ITS WAY THROUGH DERINOE’S muscles down to her bones. She sighed. Not sure whether talking in a steam house was appropriate, or if so, what she should or could talk about, she waited for Pentha to break the silence.

  Finally, Pentha said, her tone somber and with a direct gaze that probed deeply, “You told me Myrina is Hektor’s child. You don’t have to say, if you don’t want to, but who is Leonides’ father? He is a beautiful boy. He will become an extraordinary man in size. And we can hope, in character.”

  This was sad talk, but necessary. Derinoe said, “You know what happened. In Tenedos.”

  “Yes. And I’ve—”

  “Let’s not talk about it. Only one good thing came from that nightmare. My Leonides. But his father—I would gladly kill him if I could.”

  Pentha nodded. Derinoe noted a small smile curving Pentha’s lips, as if it pleased Pentha to know that her sister had no love for Achilles.

  Pentha said. “I suspected. That’s all I need to know. If you don’t want to, we won’t ever speak of Tenedos again. Instead, let’s talk of good things.”

  “Then let’s talk about Themiskyra. Tell me what it’s like?

  “Ah, Themiskyra.” Pentha used a corner of her wrap to wipe sweat from her face. “It is beautiful, Deri. Rugged, but we have our comforts. At least there are comforts once one is no longer Amazon.”

  Deri licked her sweaty upper lip, tangy with salt. “Could I learn to ride? To hunt? Perhaps I’m too old.”

  Pentha chuckled “They say we are never too old to learn anything we want to learn badly enough.”

  Deri’s thoughts suddenly turned serious. “What I want most is to have Myrina grow up free. Women don’t have that here. You do. You’re free to make the decisions for your life. How can anyone be truly happy without freedom?”

  62

  DAMON SNAPPED INTO CONSCIOUSNESS—AND FOUND himself blindfolded, sitting in something moving.

  His hands were bound together at the wrists in front of him. A short length of rope tied him to a slat on what must be the side of a cart, it’s wheels creaking like a great bull toad as they turned. In front and to the rear, he recognized the higher sounds of chariot wheels.

  How long had he been unconscious? He didn’t have a headache.

  He felt no wounds.

  So the good news, at least for the moment, was that whatever the reason for this capture, he wasn’t wanted dead. At least not immediately.

  But why? And what of the men who had been with him? Were they dead?

  And Bias? Guilt struck. Behind the blindfold, his eyes burned. His throat tightened and he swallowed hard. He had promised Bias’ mother to send or bring her son home, alive. How could a man bear living with such a failure?

  And Trusis? What should he think about Trusis? Was he dead? Something about the way Trusis had been walking toward him—Damon had felt menace, and apparently so had Wolf. Wolf attacked. And Trusis had not been fighting. There were many things Damon didn’t like about Trusis, but the man was no coward. Indeed, he was powerful and proud with a sword.

  Trusis and his sword. The image of Trusis shoving his sword into Wolf flashed and fixed in Damon’s mind. Wolf’s cry. The pool of blood. Damon hung his head and bit his lip.

  63

  “I THINK WE NEED MORE STEAM,” PENTHA SAID. Derinoe felt already cooked.

  Pentha thumped the leather side of the sweathouse with the dipper and within moments a young Amazon brought freshly heated rocks. Using iron tongs, she laid them on top of the still warm oval pile of gray stones, then used the dipper to spill fresh water over the lot. With a great hiss, clouds of steam billowed up and spread over Derinoe’s skin. The girl left them alone again.

  Pentha said, “Sometimes, when I am with Damon, I think it might be good to go to a new place. A different place.”

  Surprised, Derinoe said, “Somewhere other than Themiskyra?”

  “I love our home, Deri. But sometimes Damon gets under my skin with his t
alk of a man and woman living together all the time. He makes it sound wonderful. It’s something he yearns for, I can tell. They live that way here in Troy. What is it like?”

  “I don’t know. I was a man’s mistress, not his wife. My best friend, my only real friend, was Cassandra, an unmarried woman.”

  “Damon talked more than once about a small place called Ephesus. A place away from battles. Good land, good hunting, favorable weather, good fishing. Just a village really. He says it sits on at a lovely location on the coast, many days south of here.”

  “Damon is a formidable man.” Derinoe remembered Damon’s touch on her hand, felt the pull of his nearness, and how she couldn’t look away from him. The potential for danger and great unhappiness lay in her feelings for her sister’s lover. If they were all to have a good future, she must find a way to avoid that precipice.

  “I think now about perhaps leaving Themiskyra with him, Deri, because I’m nearly certain I am carrying his child.”

  “Pentha!”

  “I have missed two bleeding cycles. Until we left Themiskyra a little over a month ago, I was usually with him twice a week.”

  “Does he know?”

  “Not yet. I can’t tell him until this battle is over. And until I am sure. He must have his mind focused only on fighting.”

  “I … I thought Amazons … well, how did it happen? Amazons are known not to have children.”

  “When we take lovers, we take a potion from the giant fennel, and another mixture is placed on a boiled sea sponge and put inside the body. They ordinarily prevent new life. But it doesn’t always work. I am thinking, maybe Artemis gives me this gift as a sign that she will not be displeased if I leave with Damon. After I have served Her here.”

  “If you don’t leave Themiskyra, what will happen?”

  “A wet nurse. And my mother, Gryn, would raise the child for me until I become two and thirty. But when I think of a baby that belongs to me and Damon, I want to nurse it and watch it grow.”

  They talked more of Themiskyra and of children, then Pentha said, “It’s time for me to return to the day’s tasks.” She took Derinoe’s hand. “I want to invoke the blessing of the Goddess.”

  They looked upward, beyond the top of their little hide hut, into the heavens, to Olympus and Ida where the divine dwell.

  Pentha said, her voice soft but firm, “We, your daughters, Penthesilea and Derinoe, pray you will care for us fierce Artemis. I feel a great darkness in the world. A hungry, consuming darkness against women who love you. I’m afraid the darkness will consume all women everywhere. Even your daughters in Themiskyra. Mighty Goddess, give me courage. I must not fail.” Pentha stopped, then with a choked voice whispered, “I will not fail You.”

  Derinoe listened with her heart’s beats pounding in her throat, tears spilling down her cheeks, and Damon’s words in her mind: “Savor every moment with her. When an Amazon goes into battle, there is no guarantee of a good outcome.”

  64

  AFTER A RIDE THAT MIGHT HAVE TAKEN DAMON either as far as Troy or perhaps even the Achean camp, rough hands dragged him from the wagon. Rough hands on both arms guided him. He estimated that the day must now be in early afternoon.

  The sounds were of talking men, clanging metal, and sawing. Much more nearly the sounds of a war camp than a town, and the men who had attacked had been Achean warriors.

  The rough hands shoved him through a door into a quiet building. They forced him down a hallway in which they turned twice, a door was opened, and they shoved him inside. He tripped over something and fell to his knees.

  AFTER SWEATING WITH DERINOE, Pentha’s morning had been busy. First she spent time with the women and horses practicing lying-in-quiet. Then she watched the practice of the women and horses assigned to pull the log bridges. Finding their timing too slow, she ordered that another horse be hitched to each pulling team.

  Now, having finished a midday meal, she must see to the fire. Pentha approached the tent of their fire carrier, Harmothoe. It was critical that the Amazon archers, both cavalry and infantry, have fire.

  She passed Gryn and said, “Bias tried to steal my arm bracelet the other day. He got it off my arm, but I caught him.”

  “He’s determined, that one,” Gryn said “Always at it.”

  When Pentha entered the tent, two low-ranking cavalry saluted. She nodded. They returned to work.

  She scanned the trestle tables and the hundreds of fire kits on them and the working men and women. Harmothoe approached and saluted She was, for an Amazon, remarkably short, built like a block, body square with broad shoulders and hips. Her gift was a brilliantly inventive mind.

  Harmothoe made fire kits by wrapping red-hot coals in dried peat, then enclosing the package in green bark and lashing it tight. The trick was to give the embers enough air to keep them burning, but not enough to burst into flames. When unwrapped and fed fine bits of dried dandelion fluff, a fire could be quickly started.

  Pentha said, “How many are ready? I estimate only two hundred. That’s not enough. Every two archers in the trenches must have one.”

  “You said you want five hundred. By the end of tomorrow, you shall have them.”

  “And the fire pits to make embers? I will put our warriors into the field tomorrow night.”

  “You have my word. The fire kits will be ready by tomorrow evening.”

  One of Gryn’s serving girls burst into the tent. She dashed to Pentha and forgetting all formality, blurted out, “You must come at once, Penthesilea. Something terrible has happened.”

  Pentha ran with the girl to Gryn’s tent. A large crowd already milled outside, perhaps a hundred men and women. She strode in to find Bias lying on his side on a table, facing her. Bremusa and Marpessa stood watching.

  Gryn bent over Bias’ back. The boy was filthy, his trousers torn in several places, and the pale look of his skin spoke of death.

  “What?” Pentha said, looking at Gryn.

  Bias opened his eyes. He tried to speak, a sound more like a groan.

  Gryn said, “Spear thrust near the shoulder blade.” She rinsed a cloth in a bowl of water.

  Bias struggled to sit up. Gryn started to force him down.

  “Let me sit,” he said.

  Pentha put an arm around him and helped him. She struggled to keep her mind focused, to keep her emotions calm, even as horrible dread threatened to shake her senseless. She looked at Gryn. “Can he have water?”

  Her mother nodded.

  “Fetch him water. Quick,” she said to the serving girl. To Bias she said, “What happened?”

  “Attacked. We were attacked, Lady Penthesilea.”

  The girl helped him drink a sip of water from a copper dipper.

  “Did he come back alone?” Pentha asked Gryn.

  Gryn nodded.

  Bias took Pentha’s hand and squeezed it, a weak gesture, almost a reflex, as if he were trying to muster energy. “Acheans attacked us. At the top of the hill. Maybe fifty or sixty.”

  “Where are the others?”

  “Dead.”

  Damonides dead. Surely this was a mistake. Stay calm! “They are all dead? Including Damonides?” Damon could not be dead. She could not live if Damon were dead. Then another thought. “Trusis? Is he dead as well?” How could she wage a battle in two days without her two top infantry commanders?

  “I’m not certain.”

  The boy gestured for more water, and in the moments it took him to sip it and lick his lips, she died a thousand times.

  “Lots of chariots came out of the woods. I got hit pretty quick. Crawled into bushes. After they left, I found everyone dead. Don’t really know about Trusis and Damon. Acheans must have taken them.”

  She laid his hand back on his thigh, took a step away, took a full breath. Perhaps Damon was not dead. Yes. That must be so. She had to believe that was so. He was only taken captive.

  Gyrn laid a poultice on the wound.

  “Lady Pentha,” Bias said, his e
yes brimming with tears and begging her for assurance and comfort. “Is it possible Damon is not dead?”

  Pentha nodded. “I believe he’s not. We’ll know for certain quite soon. But in my heart I am sure our Damon is alive.”

  There were only six of them in the tent. She asked him, “Have you told anyone else what you just told us?”

  “No.”

  “No one? Not the first people who brought you to this tent? No one?”

  “No one, on my oath.”

  “Good.” She looked to Bremusa and Marpessa and then to the serving girl and Gyrn. “No one outside this tent can know what Bias has said. Absolutely no one, unless I direct otherwise. Clear?”

  Bremusa, Marpessa, and the serving girl said, “Yes,” at the same time. Gyrn nodded.

  “It is critical that our people not learn of this until I find out exactly what happened and determine the consequences. I’d like to think this camp has no spies, but I don’t assume anything. Our enemies must also not know that we are aware of what happened.”

  She fell silent a moment, grappling with alternatives. Then she said to Bremusa, “Find Clonie. Tell her everything, and send her at once to Aeneas. She is to take her fastest mount and run him. She is to tell Aeneas this news—Aeneas alone—and ask him to find out from his spies whatever information he can that will be of use to me. I must have his response in no more than three hours. We must move tonight, Bremusa. While the Acheans still think we don’t know what happened.”

  Bremusa left. Pentha patted Bias on the leg. “I am so glad, brave young Bias, that you survived. And I admire the courage it took you to return to us despite your wound. You could have waited until someone came looking for you. But it is very important that you returned to us with this news quickly. I will not forget your courage.”

  “I need to ask a favor.” he said, looking down with a shyness so very unlike his usual cocky self.

  “Ask anything.”

  “I was supposed to take care of Dia. But when I was hit, I dropped her cage. I tried to carry it with me. But … well …” He looked into her eyes. “I left her on the hill. I couldn’t carry the cage and walk.”