by Glyn Iliffe
There was something else, though. Something forgotten. Something he had to do.
The falling stopped and he felt the pressure of the water buoy him upward. Below him was a black abyss, above him a lesser darkness punctuated by twisting shadows. Suddenly, as he felt the air in his lungs expiring, he knew he had to live. He kicked hard and pushed his hands before him, propelling himself upward. His lungs began to burn and he kicked again and again, all the time resisting the instinct to open his mouth and drink in the air that was not there. He could hear his heart pumping furiously and his already dark vision darkening further. Then he broke the surface, took a gulp of air and was swallowed up by a wave. He pushed through again, glimpsing grey clouds and the countless heavy drops of silver rain falling from them, before being submerged by another swell. The third time he wrestled free of the sea’s clutches he saw the high waves and the flotsam being tossed about on them. Near at hand was a piece of the deck with a man clinging to its broken edge. He snatched a mouthful of air before the next wave engulfed him. Opening his eyes, he saw the dark shape of the wreckage above him and the legs of the man hanging on to it. He reached out, grabbed the wood and used what little strength remained to him to pull himself on top.
Immediately a wave broke over the wreckage and would have thrown him back into the sea had he not grasped the edge of the platform and hung on to it. He wiped the water from his eyes and saw that the man had been swept away. Looking around, Eperitus saw the galley had completely disappeared, though its broken remains were spread across the undulating surface of the sea. There were a few bodies, too, mostly of the Trojan slaves and their children who had not been pulled down by the weight of armour or muscle. All were dead, kept afloat for a while by pockets of air in their clothing, but this soon escaped and one by one the corpses sank from sight, leaving Eperitus alone on the water. Its work done, the storm rolled away almost as quickly as it had arrived. The waves grew calm again and the sun reappeared, its warmth making steam rise from Eperitus’s sodden clothing.
The revenge of the gods had been absolute. Hyperion’s cattle had been paid for in Ithacan blood, while Poseidon had avenged Polyphemus’s eye by taking Odysseus down to the seabed. Eperitus lowered his head and wept, his misery complete. Why had they fought ten long years at Troy and overcome such fantastic obstacles since, only to perish at the last? He understood the gods were the gods and the lives of men were insignificant. But even the gods had their favourites, men and women whose strengths and weaknesses gleamed like gold amid the earthly mire. They populated the songs that Eperitus had heard since he was a boy, and he had been privileged to fight alongside or against many of them in the Trojan War. Of these, Odysseus was the greatest of all. The humble ruler of an insignificant nation, he had walked with gods and counselled kings, conquered the greatest of cities and sailed beyond the known world, even to the realms of the dead. Now his great friend had returned to Hades forever – if indeed Eperitus could call him friend any more. As Ajax had spurned Odysseus in the Underworld, would Odysseus turn his back on him should their souls meet again? It was as much as he deserved. And yet death was not what Odysseus had deserved. The gods had cheated him, just as they had cheated Astynome. Just as Eperitus felt they had cheated him, too. Why had Ithaca always been just beyond the next horizon? Why had the gods robbed him and Astynome of home and family, and Odysseus of the loved ones he had fought so hard to return to? He wanted to shout his anger at the skies, but he knew the gods would not listen. They never listened.
He lay down on the raft and closed his eyes. The water moved gently beneath him, lapping at the edges of the broken wood as it bobbed up and down. He wondered whether he would be taken back to Thrinacie, or onward to Phaeacia, or whether he would just die of thirst on the raft. He could not last more than a day or two. The sooner the better, he thought. Then, as he drifted into sleep, something took hold of his raft and almost tipped it over. Startled, he sat up and looked at the man trying to pull himself onto the unsteady platform.
‘Odysseus!’ Eperitus exclaimed, taking hold of the man’s forearms and pulling him aboard.
But it was not Odysseus. Instead, Eperitus found himself staring into the pig-like eyes of Eurylochus.
Chapter Forty-Two
AFTER THE STORM
The room was dark and smelled fusty. Heavy curtains hung across the window that had once allowed daylight to fill the room. Now only a few fingers of sunshine penetrated the gaps, capturing countless particles of dust in their narrow beams. Argus sneezed and then looked up at Penelope, as if to ask why she had come to the deserted bedroom. She patted his grey head and ordered him to lie down.
White sheets covered the furniture, though Penelope remembered every piece. Beneath the window was a couch that she and Odysseus used to share in the evenings as they looked out at the stars. Over against one wall was her dressing table and here and there were a few chairs, anonymous beneath their pale covers. The bed in the centre of the room was also covered, but for its four posts. These were made of olive wood and inlaid with intricate patterns that twisted up to the ceiling. They were grey with dust now, but Penelope knew their designs intimately.
She walked over and put a hand on one of the posts. The dust came away beneath her thumb to reveal a gleam of gold and silver. But the rich ornamentation her husband had put there was not its only secret. He had built their bedroom over a small courtyard beside the palace, where an olive tree had stood; this particular post had been carved from the bole of that tree, the roots of which still ran beneath the floor of the bedroom. It was a secret only she and Odysseus knew. Or perhaps it was now hers alone.
Every king who had survived the war had either returned home by now or had perished. Only Odysseus’s fate remained unknown. In his absence Eupeithes and his allies had regained the confidence they had lost after the news of Troy’s fall. The old serpent had reasserted his authority over his son, but Penelope did not know how long that would last for. And though Antinous had not threatened Penelope with rape again, she felt his eyes on her constantly. As if he felt it was just a matter of time before she was his.
She sat on the mattress, raising a thin cloud of dust. Argus sensed her sadness and came to lie at her feet. His brown eyes looked up at her as he lay with his head on his paws, wondering what was on her mind. She smiled and rubbed his head.
‘Time, Argus, that’s what I need. To buy time for your master’s return.’ The dog’s ears pricked up slightly. ‘There was an old oracle that said if he went to Troy he wouldn’t come back for twenty years. I hated that oracle, but now it’s all I’ve got left. The promise that he’ll return one day. That his bones aren’t at the bottom of the ocean, or that he hasn’t given his love to another woman. I couldn’t bear either, but it’s more unbearable not knowing anything.’
She looked around at the room. It was just a place of memories now. The couch where they had looked up at the stars was just a couch; the bed where they had made love so many times was just a bed. Without Odysseus they were meaningless and held nothing but pain for her, which was why she had abandoned the room to dust and darkness. If she knew that he had perished it could become a place of grieving and slowly fading memories, where she would go through the process of letting go. Until then it was a place of sadness, somewhere to be avoided. She should not have returned here.
‘Come Argus,’ she said, rising to her feet. ‘Let’s return to the world of the living.’
Odysseus lashed the broken mast to a part of the keel and tied himself to the makeshift raft before collapsing with exhaustion. When he awoke it was to darkness. He pushed himself up onto his knees and looked around. The sky was filled with stars from horizon to horizon, but the ocean was black and empty. He scoured the surface for a long time, hoping to spot wreckage from the galley with men clinging to it. But there was nothing. The gods had obliterated his ship and taken his crew with it.
And yet he still lived. Had they overlooked him? Not Zeus, who never missed an opportuni
ty to punish. Then had Athena pleaded that he be spared? Or perhaps it was the others who had been spared, while his punishment continued. Like Sisyphus continuously pushing a boulder up the same slope in Hades, or Tantalus taunted by food and drink he could never reach, was he doomed to drift from one place to another for eternity with Ithaca and his family always just beyond the next horizon? The thought was terrifying, and for a moment he contemplated the cold comfort of the surrounding waters. He only had to jump in to end his torture. But the ever-present voice of his sanity argued that his fate might be to survive and reach Ithaca after all; that this might be just another test of his worthiness, or a final step towards redemption. And if not – if the gods had decided that he must indeed spend eternity lost – then would they not contrive a way to pull him out of the water and throw him up on the next strange shore?
He sighed and lay on his back with his arms stretched out, looking up at the distorted constellations. The skin of water he had grabbed as the galley had disintegrated around him was strapped over his shoulder and there were some dried strips of beef from the sun god’s cattle in the pouch on his belt. Remembering them, he felt the sudden dryness in his mouth and the gnawing hunger in his stomach. But he knew that if he was to survive he would have to eke out his rations until he found land again. And surviving, he thought dryly, was something he excelled at.
‘Somehow I never thought I would make it without you, Eperitus,’ he said. ‘I just assumed we would go on together, even if everyone else perished. But you’ve gone too. Abandoned me when I needed you most.’
His face pulled into a sudden snarl and he felt the tears burning their way out of the corners of his eyes. It felt like anger but he knew it was grief. His friend was gone and they had parted as enemies, with clashing swords and murder in their faces. Damn the gods, he thought. Damn their mockery. Damn their unassailable detachment. Damn their grand games and petty schemes, pitting men against the impossible. Damn them for making him the instrument of their revenge. Damn them for making him betray everyone he had ever cared about, one by one, until there was no-one left any more. He rolled onto his side and pulled his knees up to his chest, sobbing like a child.
He woke drowsily to bright sunshine and shadow. He could smell wet rock and hear the roar of breakers, as if they were part of the dream he was still half rapt in. Then he realised their meaning and sat up.
He was passing between two great bulwarks of rock, the skirts of which were lost in a fine mist from the waves crashing against them. Through this narrow gateway he could see a large circle of water surrounded by cliffs. He recognised the place at once by the cave high up on one side, the same den from which Scylla had snatched up six of his crewmates. Any moment she might appear over the threshold of her cave and seize him too. But the current pulled him away from the cave and to the right, where the waves splashed and lapped against the smooth base of the cliff. Then he realised what was drawing him that way. Ahead of him the water was bubbling and frothing like the contents of a great cauldron. The perverse luck that had led him away from Scylla was now sending him into the mouth of Charybdis.
He looked at the cliff wall, but there were no jutting rocks that he might swim for or cling on to. Charybdis’s mouth opened with a roar of sucking water and the raft spun rapidly towards it. Odysseus saw the overhanging boughs of the olive tree that clung tenaciously to the cliff face and leapt up. He seized hold of a branch just as the raft was pulled out from beneath his feet and down into the throat of the vortex. The branch sagged under his weight and as he hung there the sound of rushing water was deafening. The mist from it drenched his hair and clothes and he felt his fingers slipping as they gripped the wood. The white rocks of the monster’s teeth gleamed below him and he could see the blackened ribs of wrecked ships’ protruding from the blue-grey sand. With terrifying suddenness his interlaced fingers slid apart and he fell. In the same instant, with a crash of water and a jet of spume, Charybdis’s jaws snapped shut. He hit the surface with a smack that momentarily concussed him. As he came to, his limp body was being drawn down by the last of the swirling current. Kicking out with new strength, he forced himself to the surface and gulped in a lungful of air.
As he looked around at the smooth, uninviting cliffs, he called on the name of Athena. A moment later his raft bobbed up just a short way ahead of him. He pulled his weary body towards it and climbed on board.
Eurylochus had fallen into a deep sleep from the moment he had crawled exhausted and naked onto the raft. Taking pity on the wretch, Eperitus had thrown his cloak over him as he lay face down on the piece of wreckage they shared. After all, they were all that remained of the six-hundred-strong army that had sailed from Ithaca so many years before. Several times Eperitus had checked to see that he was still alive, fearing his soul might have slipped away in the night. But when the chariot of the sun climbed out of the far reaches of the ocean the next morning he was still breathing.
‘Where are we?’ Eurylochus mumbled, raising himself groggily on one elbow.
‘I don’t know,’ Eperitus answered.
‘Are we the only ones left?’
‘Yes.’
‘There must be other survivors.’
‘I’ve been scanning the horizon since dawn. There’s no-one else.’
Eurylochus groaned and slumped back down on the raft.
‘But why me? Why not one of the others? They’re stronger and fitter than me –’
‘Some were wearing armour. Some went down with the galley. Some couldn’t swim, I suppose.’
‘I can barely swim.’
‘But you can float. Fat is lighter than water, or so Odysseus once told me. It kept you from drowning and it kept you warm during the night.’
‘And what good will it do me if we don’t find land soon,’ Eurylochus grumbled, sitting up and wrapping Eperitus’s cloak around his shoulders. ‘I’ll just starve, which is the worst death imaginable.’
‘I’d starve before you: you’ve more fat than me.’
‘So being a fat good-for-nothing finally trumps being a mighty warrior,’ Eurylochus said sardonically.
‘Not if the warrior decides to kill the good-for-nothing and eat him instead. But it doesn’t matter either way; we’ll both die of thirst long before we starve.’
Eurylochus shook his head. ‘What I wouldn’t do for a cup of sweet wine now. My throat’s as parched as… Wait, what’s that?’
He pointed over Eperitus’s shoulder. Eperitus gave him a cynical look, but Eurylochus jumped to his feet and pointed, the cloak slipping away to reveal his nakedness.
‘By all the gods, it’s a sail!’
He began to wave his hands, his movements unsettling the raft. But Eperitus did not care if he tipped them into the water or whether he had seen a sail or not.
‘What are those?’
‘They’re coming towards us. We’re saved!’
‘What are those marks on your chest?’ Eperitus repeated.
‘What? Oh –’
Eurylochus snatched up the cloak and threw it quickly about his shoulders.
‘Look, Eperitus. Look, why don’t you!’
Eperitus snatched the cloak from Eurylochus’s shoulders. Four parallel scars ran across his chest, from his right shoulder to beneath his left nipple. Eurylochus threw his hand across them and shook his head.
‘They’re nothing. Old scars from –’
‘A few days old at the most,’ Eperitus said, pulling Eurylochus’s arm aside with one hand and tracing the fingers of his other hand down the deep gashes. ‘Who gave them to you?’
‘One of the slaves.’
‘It was Astynome, wasn’t it,’ Eperitus said, his voice quiet and firm. ‘You attacked her.’
‘Of course I didn’t –’
Eperitus slapped him hard across the face.
‘You attacked her, didn’t you?’
Eurylochus shook his head and Eperitus slapped him again, harder.
‘Didn’t you?’
Suddenly Eperitus’s fingers were on Eurylochus’s throat, crushing the windpipe until his fat face began to turn a deep purple. He took hold of Eperitus’s wrist with both hands, trying desperately to prise himself free of the grip that was squeezing the life from him. Eperitus pulled one of the hands away and closed both his hands around his neck. Eurylochus’s jaw moved quickly and a few sounds escaped his slobbering lips, but no words came out. He began to struggle violently, but Eperitus’s hold was unrelenting. Even after Eurylochus’s body had gone limp and his weight pulled him down to the surface of the ramp Eperitus refused to let go, squeezing harder until he was certain the man who had raped his wife was dead. He understood everything now, and knowing gave terrible strength to his anger, which Eurylochus’s death did nothing to soften. The man had murdered his son and killed his wife and Eperitus had not been there to stop it. Even when the blood began to flow over his thumbs he could not stop himself. Eurylochus had taken all he had and the only thing he could do about it was to keep squeezing.
By the time the shadow of the galley’s sail fell across him and the rope dropped onto the raft, Eurylochus’s body had rolled off into the water and disappeared. Eperitus remained on his knees, aware only of the monotonous repetition of his own breathing.
‘Take the rope, man,’ a voice shouted.
After a moment, he fumbled for the leather rope and wound it twice around his wrist. Steadying himself, he let the crew haul him in until the small raft butted up against the side of the galley.
‘Here, give me your hand,’ said the same voice. ‘I think we’ve got another of your crewmates on board.’
Eperitus looked up into a leathery face with a ragged seafarer’s beard and long, braided hair. The man looked at him with kind eyes as he offered him his hand. Other men stood around him, and as Eperitus took the outstretched hand, several others joined together to pull him onto the deck. He fell onto his back and someone placed a skin of water against his lips, squeezing a few drops into his mouth before splashing his face with it.
