The Song of Troy

by Colleen McCullough

  I came to stand at the foot of the steps. ‘Yes, sire?’

  Frowning, he leaned forwards, his displeasure overlying all the other pains stamped permanently into his features: the grief, the despair, the utter hopelessness.

  ‘Daughter, you have lost your husband and I have lost yet another son. I have begun to lose count,’ he quavered, voice a rustle in the gloom. ‘All the good ones have been snatched away. Now these two come to me snarling and snapping and bickering over their brother’s still warm body, each demanding the same thing, each determined to have his way.’

  ‘What is this about?’ I asked, exasperated beyond courtesy. ‘Why does a disagreement between this pair concern me?’

  ‘Oh, it definitely concerns you!’ the old man said harshly. ‘Deiphobos wants to marry you. Helenos wants to marry you. So tell me which one of them you prefer.’

  ‘Neither!’ I gasped, outraged.

  ‘One of them it has to be,’ said the King, suddenly looking as if he found the situation piquant, novel, invigorating. ‘Give me his name, madam! You’ll marry him at the end of six moons.’

  ‘Six moons!’ Deiphobos cried. ‘Why do I have to wait for six moons? I want her now, Father – now!’

  Priam drew himself up. ‘Your brother isn’t cold,’ he said.

  ‘There’s no need to get upset, sire,’ I said before Deiphobos could erupt into one of his famous tantrums. ‘I’ve been married twice. I don’t wish to marry a third time. I intend to give myself into the service of the Mother and attend her altar for the rest of my days. So there will be no wedding.’

  Helenos and Deiphobos broke into a babble of protestations, but Priam’s uplifted hand silenced them.

  ‘Be still and listen to me! Deiphobos, you’re my eldest imperial son and my designated Heir. At the end of six moons you may marry Helen, but not until then. As for you, Helenos, you belong to the Lord Apollo. You ought to hold him dearer than any woman, even this one.’

  Deiphobos whooped. Helenos looked stunned, but even as I watched, stunned myself, Helenos seemed to grow and change, to melt in some parts and harden in others. It was very strange.

  He looked at his father steadily then, and said, ‘All my life I’ve watched others satisfy themselves while I go hungry and thirsty, Father. No one asked me whether I wanted to serve the God – I was dedicated to him on the day of my birth. When Hektor died you would have made me Heir, except that Apollo got in the way. And after Troilos died you passed over me again! Now, when I ask you for such a little thing, I am denied once more.’ He drew himself up proudly. ‘Well, there comes a time when even the least of men will rebel. That time is now for me. I’m leaving Troy. I’m going into voluntary exile. Better to become a wandering nobody than have to stay here and watch Deiphobos ruin everything Troy has left. I hate to say it, Father, but you’re a fool.’

  While Priam assimilated this, I tried again.

  ‘Sire, I entreat you, don’t force me to remarry!’ I cried. ‘Let me consecrate myself to the Goddess!’

  But he shook his head. ‘You’ll marry Deiphobos.’

  I couldn’t bear to be in the same room with them; I fled like one pursued by the Daughters of Kore. What happened to Helenos I do not know. Nor do I care.

  I sent a note to Aineas, entreating him to come to my rooms. He was the only one left who might be moved to help me. Then doubt gnawed as I waited for him, pacing up and down, up and down. Though our affair was long over, I fancied he still had some affection for me. Or did he? Where was he? The time slipped away, each moment longer, more dreary, emptier. I listened vainly for his strong, decisive step in the corridor; since Hektor’s death the only footfalls which had the ability to inspire confidence in their owner.

  ‘What do you want, Helen?’ he asked, having entered the room so quietly I didn’t hear him. He drew the curtain carefully.

  Laughing and weeping, I flew to embrace him. ‘I thought you wouldn’t come!’ I said, lifting my face for his kiss.

  He moved away. ‘What do you want?’

  I stared at him; when I spoke, my voice faltered. ‘Aineas, help me! Paris is dead!’

  ‘I know that.’

  ‘Then you must understand what it means to me! Paris is dead! I’m at their mercy! I’m ordered to wed Deiphobos! That slavering hound! Oh, Gods! In Lakedaimon they wouldn’t have deemed him fit to touch the hem of my skirt, yet Priam orders me to marry him! If you have any regard for me at all, Aineas, I implore you to see Priam and tell him I meant what I said – I have no desire to remarry! None!’

  He looked like a man facing an unpalatable chore. ‘You ask the impossible, Helen.’

  ‘The impossible?’ I asked, stupefied. ‘Aineas, nothing is impossible for you! You’re the most powerful man in Troy!’

  ‘My advice is to marry Deiphobos and be done with it.’

  ‘But I thought – I thought – I thought that even if you didn’t want me for yourself, you’d feel enough for me to fight for me!’

  Hand on the curtain, he laughed. ‘Helen, I won’t help you. Understand that, please. Every day creates a new gap in the ranks of Priam’s sons – every day brings me closer to the Trojan throne. I’m on the rise, and I won’t jeopardise my position for you. Is that quite clear?’

  ‘Remember what comes to men of such ambition, Aineas.’

  He laughed again. ‘A throne, Helen! A throne!’

  ‘I’ll buy a curse just for you,’ I said dreamily. ‘I’ll spend everything I own on it. And I’ll ask that you never sit on any throne – that you never know peace – that you’re forced to wander the width of the world – that you end your days amid savages so poor they live in wicker huts.’

  I think that frightened him. The curtain swung; he vanished.

  After Aineas had gone I took stock of what I was looking forward to: marriage to a man I loathed, whose touch would set me to puking. Then I realised that for the first time in my life I had no resources beyond my own. That if I was to break free from this dreadful place, I would have to do so unaided.

  Menelaos wasn’t far away, and two of Troy’s three gates were always open. But palace women were not used to walking, nor did they have access to sturdy shoes. To succeed in getting from the Dardanian Gate past the Skaian Gate to the Greek beach wasn’t possible. Unless, that is, I rode upon an animal! Women rode donkeys; they simply perched on the beast’s back with their legs to one side. Yes, I’d do it! I’d steal a donkey and ride to the beach while night still lay upon the city and the plain.

  Stealing the donkey didn’t prove difficult. Nor did riding on its back. But when I reached the Dardanian Gate – much further from the Citadel than the Skaian – my transport refused to budge. A city beast, it smelled the open air of the countryside and misliked the perfumes floating on the wind – the tang of coming autumn, a whiff of the sea. When I whipped it with a switch it began to bray mournfully, and that was the end of me. The gate guards came to investigate. I was recognised and arrested.

  ‘I want to go to my husband!’ I wept. ‘Let me go to my husband, please!’

  But of course they didn’t let me go, though the wretched donkey had now decided that it liked what it smelled. While it kicked up its hind legs and bolted to freedom, I was returned to the palace. But they didn’t wake Priam. They woke Deiphobos.

  I waited passively while he came from his bed, gazed at him calmly when he appeared. He thanked the gate guards courteously enough and gave them a gift; when they had finished bowing themselves out he threw the curtain to his bedroom wide.

  ‘Do come in,’ he said.

  I didn’t move.

  ‘You wanted to go to your husband. Well, here I am.’

  ‘We’re not married, and you already have a wife.’

  ‘What does that have to do with it?’

  ‘No marriage for six moons, Priam said.’

  ‘But, my dear, that was before you tried to escape to the Greeks and Menelaos. When Father hears about that, he won’t stand in my way. Especiall
y after I inform him I’ve already consummated the union.’

  ‘You wouldn’t dare!’ I snarled.

  For answer, he grabbed my ear in one hand and my nose in the other, wrestling me into the bedroom. Dizzy with pain, unable to break his hold, I collapsed on the bed. The only violation worse was death. The last thing I thought before I put my mind in the care of the Mother was that one day I would violate Deiphobos in that worst way of all: I would kill him.

  31

  NARRATED BY

  Diomedes

  Shortly after the unsuccessful Trojan raid Agamemnon called a council, though Neoptolemos hadn’t yet arrived. A general air of optimism pervaded the beach; all that stopped us were the walls, and perhaps with Odysseus thinking on that subject, we would even conquer them. We laughed and joked among ourselves as Agamemnon dallied with Nestor, amused at something Nestor said to him low-voiced. Then he lifted his sceptre and rapped its staff on the floor.

  ‘Odysseus, I believe you have news for us.’

  ‘I do, sire. First of all, I believe I’ve worked out how to breach the Trojan walls, though I’m not ready to speak about it yet. But in other areas, interesting news.’

  He looked at Menelaos, then walked across to put his hand on Menelaos’s shoulder, rubbing it. ‘I’ve heard a snippet of Citadel gossip concerning a difference of opinion between Priam, Helenos and Deiphobos. Over a woman. Helen, to be precise. Poor thing! After Paris died she asked to be allowed to dedicate herself to the service of Mother Kubaba, but Deiphobos and Helenos both demanded to marry her. Priam decided in favour of Deiphobos, who then married her forcibly. It set the Court on its ears, but Priam refused to nullify the union. Apparently Helen was caught in the act of escaping to join you, Menelaos.’

  Menelaos said something beneath his breath and bowed his head into his hands. While I thought of beautiful, imperious Helen come down to the level of a common house woman.

  ‘The whole business so disgusted Helenos, the priest-son,’ Odysseus continued, ‘that he elected to go into voluntary exile. I intercepted him outside the city, hoping that his disillusionment was great enough to permit of his telling me about the Oracles of Troy. When I found him he was at the altar dedicated to Thymbraian Apollo, who, he informed me, had instructed him to tell me whatever I wanted to know. I asked for the Oracles of Troy in their entirety – a wearisome affair. Helenos recited thousands! However, I got what I needed.’

  ‘A great piece of luck,’ said Agamemnon.

  Odysseus lifted his lip. ‘Luck, sire,’ he said evenly, ‘is an overrated commodity. It’s not luck leads to success, it’s hard work. Luck is what happens in the moment when the dice land. Hard work is what happens when a prize falls into a man’s hands because he’s worked for it.’

  ‘Yes, yes, yes!’ said the High King, rueing his choice of a phrase. ‘I apologise, Odysseus! Hard work, always hard work! I know it, I admit it. Now what of the Oracles?’

  ‘As far as we’re concerned, only three of the thousands have any relevance. Luckily none of them presents an insurmountable obstacle. They go something like this: Troy will fall this year if the Greek leaders possess the shoulder blade of Pelops, if Neoptolemos takes the field, and if Troy should lose the Palladion of Pallas Athene.’

  I jumped up excitedly. ‘Odysseus, I have the shoulder blade of Pelops! King Pittheus gave it to me after Hippolytos died. The old man was fond of me, and it was his most treasured relic. He said he’d rather I had it than Theseus. I brought it to Troy with me for good – er – luck.’

  Odysseus grinned. ‘Isn’t that lucky?’ he asked Agamemnon. ‘Of Neoptolemos we have high hopes, so that’s taken care of. Which leaves the Palladion of Pallas Athene, who luckily is my protectress. My, my!’

  ‘I’m getting annoyed, Odysseus,’ said the High King.

  ‘Ah – where was I? The Palladion. Well, we have to have that ancient image. It’s revered above anything else in the city, and its loss would hit Priam hard. As far as I know, the image is located somewhere in the Citadel crypt. A closely guarded secret. But I’m sure I can penetrate the secret. The most difficult part of the exercise will be moving it – they say it’s very bulky and heavy. Diomedes, will you come with me to Troy?’

  ‘Gladly!’

  As there was nothing else of importance to discuss, the council broke up. Menelaos caught Odysseus at the door and took him by the arm.

  ‘Will you see her?’ he asked wistfully.

  ‘Yes, probably,’ said Odysseus gently.

  ‘Tell her I wish she’d succeeded in reaching me.’

  ‘I will.’ But, as we walked back to his house, he added to me: ‘I will not! Helen is for the Axe, not for her old spot in Menelaos’s bed.’

  I began to laugh. ‘Care to bet on it?’ I asked.

  ‘Will we go up through the conduit?’ was my first question when we settled to work out a plan.

  ‘You will, but I can’t. I have to be able to gain access to Helen without suspicion. Therefore I can’t look like Odysseus.’

  He went from the room but was back in a moment, carrying a short, cruel whip divided into four thongs, each tipped with a ragged bronze knob. I stared at him and it, bewildered, until he turned his back on me and began to strip off his blouse.

  ‘Flog me, Diomedes.’

  I leaped up, horrified. ‘Are you out of your mind? Flog you, of all men? I couldn’t!’

  His mouth thinned. ‘Close your eyes, then, and pretend I’m Deiphobos. I have to be flogged – properly.’

  I put my arm around his bare shoulders. ‘Ask whatever you like of me, but not that. Flog you – a king! – as if you were a rebellious slave?’

  Laughing softly, he laid his cheek on my arm. ‘Oh, what are a few scars more on my scraggy carcase? I must look like a rebellious slave, Diomedes. What better than to see a bloody back on an escaped Greek slave? Use the whip.’

  I shook my head. ‘No.’

  He grew grim. ‘Use it, Diomedes!’

  Unwillingly I picked it up; he bent over. I curled the four thongs about my hand, gathered in my courage and brought them down on his skin. Purple welts rose under them; I watched the things swell in fascinated revulsion.

  ‘Put a little bite into it!’ he said impatiently. ‘You drew no blood!’

  I closed my eyes and did as I was told. Ten strokes in all I gave him with that vile implement; each time it fell I drew blood and scarred him for life like any rebellious slave.

  Afterwards he kissed me. ‘Don’t grieve so, Diomedes. What use is a fair skin to me?’ He winced. ‘It feels good. Does it look good too?’

  I nodded wordlessly.

  He dropped his kilt and moved about the room, wrapping a piece of filthy linen around his loins, tousling his hair and darkening it with soot from the fire tripod. I swear his eyes flashed in sheer enjoyment. Then he held out a set of manacles. ‘Chain me, you Argive tyrant!’

  I did as I was told a second time, aware that I hurt from the flogging in ways he never would. To Odysseus, it was no more than a means to an end. As I knelt to snap the bronze cuffs about his ankles, he talked.

  ‘Once I’m within the city I have to get into the Citadel. We’ll travel together in Ajax’s car – it’s strong, stable and quiet – until we reach the grove of trees near the small watchtower at our end of the Western Curtain. From there we’ll go separately. I’ll bluff my way through the little door in the Skaian Gate, and do the same at the Citadel gates – my story will be that I have to see Polydamas urgently. I find his name works best.’

  ‘But,’ I said, straightening, ‘you’re not really going to see Polydamas.’

  ‘No, I intend to see Helen. I imagine after this forced marriage she’ll be glad to help me. She’ll certainly know all about the crypt. She may even know whereabouts the Palladion’s shrine is.’ He clanked around a little, practising.

  ‘While I?’

  ‘You’ll wait in the trees until half the night is gone. Then ascend through our conduit and kill the guards
in the vicinity of the small watchtower. I’ll get the image to the walls somehow. When you hear the nightlark’s song with this variation’ – he whistled it three times – ‘you’ll come down and help me get her through the conduit.’

  I dropped Odysseus in the trees without being detected, and settled down then to wait. Limping and staggering, he ran like someone demented towards the Skaian Gate, shouting, screeching, grovelling in the dust, the sorriest specimen of man I had ever seen. He always loved to be someone he wasn’t, but I think he enjoyed the escaped slave identity most.

  When the night was half over I found our conduit and crawled slowly up its twisting, stifling length, making no noise. At its top I rested and got used to the moonlight, ears tuned to pick up the few sounds which drifted along the pathway atop the walls. I was close to the minor watchtower Odysseus had made our rendezvous because it was well removed from other guarded points.

  Five guards were on duty, awake and alert, but they were all inside – who organised these people, to permit them to sit in comfort while the bastions were neglected? They’d not last long in a Greek camp!

  I wore a soft, dark leather kilt and blouse, had a dagger between my teeth and a short sword in my right hand. Edging up to the window of the guardroom, I coughed loudly.

  ‘See who’s outside, Maios,’ someone said.

  Out came Maios, strolling; a good, unconcealed cough isn’t at all alarming, even when heard on top of the most bitterly contested walls in the world. Seeing no one, he tensed – though, being a fool, he didn’t call for reinforcements. Obviously telling himself that he was imagining things, he came on with pike at the ready. I let him pass me before I rose up silently, one hand gagging him, the other using the sword. I lowered him gently onto the path and dragged him into a dark corner.

  A few moments later another one emerged, sent to look for Maios. I cut his throat without a sound: two down and three to go. Then before those left inside could grow uneasy, I edged up to the window again and hiccoughed drunkenly. Someone inside heaved an exasperated sigh; another lunged out impatiently. I wrapped my arms about him as if very drunk, and when the bronze slid under his left ribs and up to his heart he didn’t so much as grunt. Holding him upright, I reeled about in a tipsy dance, mimicking a Trojan voice. Which brought a fourth man out. I tossed the dead one at him with a low laugh, and while he fended the fellow off I stuck a cubit of sword blade through him from one side to the other. I got both of them to the ground with fading chinks, as if they had moved off into the darkness. Then I peered over the windowsill.