Against the Tide of Years

by S. M. Stirling

  Rumors clicked together in the Achaean’s mind. Here was a chance to see all that his curiosity had desired.

  “Gods condemn you, bastards!” he roared, running forward. “See how you like an even fight!”

  The retainer beside him also called on the gods, although in a rather different tone. Odikweos met the attack of one dim figure head-on, ducking under a spearthrust, levering the other man’s shield aside with the edge of his own. That took a grunting twist of effort, but it left the man staggering and open. He ran the long steel sword through his opponent’s body, careful to strike below the ribs. There was a soft, clinging resistance, a bubbling scream as he wrenched the blade back and brought the shield up with desperate quickness.

  His alertness was unnecessary for once. His retainer had taken the wounded attacker, a short underarm thrust through the gut. Now he braced one sandal on the sprattling form and stabbed downward with a force that crunched his spearpoint through the dying man’s neck and into the cobbles beneath. The strangers had moved forward promptly, blades flickering. The attacker with the bronze sword took to his heels while they were dealing with the last of his followers. The curved sword bit low and hamstrung that lone and luckless one, and the odd short sword rammed forward into his gut in an economical underarm stroke.

  Odikweos lowered his own sword and waited, panting slightly. The dead added their bit to the sewer stink of the town. Pity, he thought, as the stomach-wounded attacker jerked and went still. We might have made him talk.

  “Odikweos son of Laertes, wannax of Ithaka among the Western Isles,” he said.

  “Walker son of Edward, hekwetos to Agamemnon King of Men,” the other man said. He looked as if he recognized the underking’s name, somehow, even panting with effort and the pain of his wound. Odikweos swelled slightly with pride at that.

  “My thanks,” he went on; not an Achaean phrasing, but the western lord caught the meaning.

  Walkeearh, he thought, shaping the word silently with his lips. This close, Odikweos could see more of the man, the one of whom he’d heard so much. His missing left eye was covered by a black leather patch and his brown hair held back with a strap of gold-chased doeskin; a very tall man, six feet or more, well built and strong-looking, and quick as well, from the way he stood . . . except that he kept a hand to his side, where a spreading stain darkened the fabric of his tunic.

  “Since we’ve fought shield-locked, shall I bind your wound?” Odikweos asked.

  Walkeearh shook his head. “We’re not far from my home, and it isn’t serious. Come and take hospitality of me, if you may.” He looked around. “We’ll have to get my man here back as well, he’s got a spearthrust through the leg.” Walkeearh’s hale retainer was binding it with a strip torn from a cloak.

  “Indeed,” Odikweos nodded in approval. A lord must look to the needs of his men. “That’s not a matter of difficulty.”

  He turned to the nearest door and slammed the pommel of his sword against the beechwood panels. “Open!” he roared. “Open, commoner—a kingly man commands you!” It was a large house; there would be a door or bedstead within, and men enough to carry it. “Open!”

  There were. The Achaean walked beside Walkeearh up the hillside road and through the massive gate with its twin lions rearing above the lintel stone. Their bronze fangs shone above him, for there were many torches and numerous guards there. They exclaimed at Walkeearh’s wound, but passed him through at his bitten-off command. The house he led them to was a fine one, a hall and outbuildings; Odikweos’s own palace in the west was no better. He accepted that with only a slight pang of envy. Mycenae was rich in gold and power, Ithaka wealthy only in honor and the strength of her men.

  He looked about keenly as they walked into the antechamber. It was brighter than he’d thought an inside room could be. Lamps were fixed to the walls, with mirrors of unbelievable brightness behind them—far brighter than burnished bronze, or even silver. The lamps were strange as well, with tops of some clear crystallike substance above them and wicks that burned with an odd bluish color and a fruity smell. The light made it easy to see the gear of the men who crowded around; their armor was tunics of small metal rings joined together. Odikweos smiled at the cleverness of it.

  Although—hmmm—those rings look good to ward a stab or cut, but they wouldn’t be much protection from a crushing blow.

  They were hustled into the main megaron-hall, which made his eyes widen. A great hood of sheet copper stood over the central hearth, with a pipe of copper running up the full two stories to the terra-cotta smoke-pipe in the ceiling . . . and he’d thought smoke-pipes were the last word in elegance. There was a cheery blaze on the big round hearth, but despite that, little or no smoke drifted up to haze under the painted rafters. More of the wonderful lamps were being turned on by the servants, giving fine light throughout the great room, shining on weapons racked around the pillars and doorways. There were chairs in plenty, more than you’d expect even in a great noble’s home, and fine hangings over them. Skilled slaves took his weapons and cloak and brought him heated wine with honey and a footstool. Another undid his sandal straps and wiped his feet clean.

  Walkeearh swore as they lifted the tunic over his head, leaving him dressed only in his kilt. Odikweos looked at the wound with an experienced eye. Not too bad. A clean-edged gouge where the spearhead had plowed his side, perhaps touching a rib a little. It bled more freely without the wool of the tunic packing it, but it should heal if it didn’t mortify, which was always a risk even if you washed the cut with wine as he did—an old Shore Folk woman had taught him that trick. His earlier impression was confirmed as he watched muscles moving beneath Walkeearh’s skin; this was a fighting-man you’d be cautious of offending. From the scars, he’d lived through many a battle.

  Two women with a flutter of attendants came down the staircase from the upper story of the house, straightening their indoor gowns. One was tall and blond with braids down her sides to her waist, well shaped but only passable of face. The other was . . .

  Odikweos fought not to gasp in astonishment at the exotic loveliness. The other was short, with skin the color of fine amber and hair raven-dark. Above a tiny nose and impossibly high cheekbones her eyes slanted, with a fold at their outer tips. Who had ever seen the like?

  And a wisewoman as well. She washed her hands in water and some sharp-smelling liquid that her attendants brought, examined the wound, then spoke in a sharp, nasal-sounding foreign language.

  “Speak Achaean, Alice,” Walkeearh said. “We have a guest.”

  “That needs some stitches,” she said, then bent to examine the warrior with the wounded leg. “I’ll have to debride this—that’ll take a while. Kylefra, Missora”—that to two young woman who looked alike enough to be sisters—“get him to the infirmary, and prep him, stat.”

  Walkeearh stifled a gasp when she swabbed out his wound, then set his teeth and ignored it as she brought out a curved needle and thread and began sewing the wound together, as if it were cloth.

  “Sit, be at ease,” he said tightly. “This is my captain of guards, Ohotolarix son of Telenthaur.” A big yellow-haired man, young but tough-looking. “And my wives Ekhnonpa”—the fair woman—“and Alice Hong. Ladies, here’s Odikweos son of Laertes, who probably saved my life tonight.”

  Odikweos bowed his head politely. Ekhnonpa spoke to Ohotolarix in a strange, almost-familiar language, then thanked him in slow, accented Achaean.

  Hong kept at her work. Strange name, he thought. Is she human? Perhaps she was a dryad, something of that sort—certainly this Walkeearh was otherwordly enough to wed an Otherworlder. When the wound was closed, she painted more of the clear liquid on it and then bandaged it, securing the pad with a roll of linen around her man’s chest and over a shoulder.

  “Don’t strain it,” she said. “I’ll go look at Velararax now, after I touch up that ear of your friend’s.”

  Odikweos made himself sit still as she came up beside him. “This is going t
o hurt a little,” she said. No, human enough, he thought; she smelled like a well-washed woman roused from her bed. The fingers touched his ear, and then something stung like liquid fire.

  “Here, Lord Odikweos,” she said. “That will heal cleanly.”

  When the women had left, a grave housekeeper brought basins of water to wash their hands and trays of food, bread and sliced meats, olives and dried figs. While she mixed the wine half-and-half with water and poured it into fine gold cups, Walkeearh shrugged into another tunic, moving cautiously.

  “My thanks again,” he said. “The gods witness”—

  He poured a libation, but—curiously—not on the floor. Instead he used a pottery bowl with a rush mat inside it. Courteous, Odikweos did the same; it was always best to honor a man’s household customs.

  —“that I and mine are in your debt.”

  “May we fight again side by side someday,” Odikweos said. That wasn’t unlikely, given the coming war. “Who were your foes? Men sent by some rival?”

  Walker smiled. “I have enough of those,” he said.

  “True, you’ve risen far among us in only one winter,” he replied. “Far and fast, for an outland man.” He looked around the curiously altered hall.

  “And where one man rises, other men envy and hate,” Walkeearh said. Odikweos nodded; that went without saying. “You’re in Mycenae for the muster against Sicily?”

  He tossed his head in affirmation. “My men and horses are camped outside the city,” he said. “We came by sea to Tiryns. I’ve a guest-friend here and sought his dwelling, but he has blood-kin sleeping like the ribs of a sheep on the floor of his hall, and I was leaving again to seek my tent.”

  “Stay here,” Walkeearh said. “There’s room in plenty, despite the war.”

  Odikweos nodded, smiling. That was just what he’d hoped. “I will take the hospitality you offer gratefully,” he said. Curious to see how this Walkeearh would react, he went on, “Although I’d be even gladder to be sleeping beside my own wife, at home. If this was a war against other Achaeans, I would have found some way to refuse the summons.”

  Walkeearh smiled, an odd lopsided expression. “Pretending to be mad, perhaps?”

  Odikweos laughed. “You have a godlike wit. Perhaps so, perhaps so. Well, there may be plunder in this war, at least.”

  You had to be more careful when the hegemon called his vassals for aid against a foe or rebel, of course; dodging that call looked too much like rebellion itself. He had no desire to see the black hulls of a hundred hollow ships drawn up on the beach before his home.

  The foreigner didn’t bluster about glory. Instead he nodded thoughtfully. “Spoken like a man of cunning mind,” he said. “When men who should be vassals of the same high king war with each other, the realm is weakened.”

  Odikweos blinked; that hadn’t been exactly what he meant . . . although when you thought about it, the idea made some sense in an odd, twisty way. “Certainly the king of men won’t get much tribute from the dead,” he agreed. “And besieging a strong city—well, the arrow of far-shooting Paiwon Apollo rain down on such a camp.” There was always sickness when too men stayed in one spot for long.

  “Leaving the realm weaker if outsiders attack, as I said.”

  Ah. A real thought. “I know of none such who threaten the Achaean lands,” Odikweos said. “Although the Narrow Sea north of my holdings swarms with pirates these days. Many more than in my grand-sire’s time; of course, we do more trade there, too.”

  “And the savages hear of the wealth of the Achaeans,” Walker pointed out. He yawned, then winced. “It’s time for sleep.”

  “It is good to yield to drowsy night,” Odikweos agreed.

  The housekeeper showed Odikweos to a room, offering to have a bath drawn first if he wished.

  “Tomorrow,” he said, looking instead at the lamp she carried.

  It lit the dark corridor off the megaron well; a tall wax candle in a bronze holder with a handle, with another bulb of the beautiful crystallike substance around it. The bulb keeps a draught from making the flame flicker or blowing it out, he thought. Clever, very clever.

  “What is that called, that crystal?” he asked.

  “It is called glass, lord,” she said, looking surprised at his curiosity. “I know little of these things, but I heard the master say it was made from sand, in fire.”

  This man must be beloved of Hephaistos, the Achaean thought. He’d seen beads of glass, from the eastern lands, but nothing like this. Nor is he shunned by Ares Enuwarios, either. An odd combination, the gods of craftsmen and of war.

  They came to a bedchamber; unusually, it had a door of wood rather than an embroidered curtain. Another candle on a table beside the bed gave light. The girl waiting within turned down the blankets . . . another new thing, Odikweos thought. Over the mattress was a sheath of linen fine enough for a lady’s undergown, and another atop it, beneath the blankets and sheepskins.

  The mixer and wine cup beside the bed were usual enough. He filled the cup as he stripped and sat on the bedside. The girl unbuttoned the shoulders of her gown, stepped out of it, and waited with her hands clasped and eyes cast down; young and comely, with good breasts and hips. He patted the bedside, and instead of mounting her at once gave her unwatered wine.

  “Tell me your name, little dove,” he said.

  She gave him a grateful smile and sipped. He smiled back at her. Odikweos son of Laertes was a man of medium height, his hair black with reddish glints and his eyes hazel, his face still unlined despite a weathered bronze tan.

  “I am called Alexandra, master,” she said shyly. With an accent, so that was probably not the name she’d been born with.

  “I don’t think you are a repeller of men, though,” he said, punning on her name, for that was its strict meaning. The male form, Alexandros, made more sense.

  She laughed, and he spent some time soothing her before he put his hands to her waist and urged her back, which made her ready to welcome him. Afterward they talked more, and it was easy to lead her mind.

  Many men forgot that women and servants had ears, and tongues to talk with. Such men were fools. You could learn invaluable things from underlings, and he intended to learn all he could of this strange house. The gods had given him rocky islands on the edge of the world for his demesne. That wasn’t to say that they meant him to spend all his life as a poor underking.

  He didn’t think this foreigner chief was a fool of the more obvious kind, either. Something could come of that.

  “It seems Moon Woman has sent stars to guide my feet on the path of war,” Swindapa said, with a sigh.

  After most of a decade, Marian’s mind translated automatically; the words were English, but the thought was Fiernan. An American would have said: No getting around it. Swindapa’s birth-folk were a fatalistic lot.

  “We’ve spent more time exploring and building ships than fighting,” she pointed out gently.

  “Truth,” the blonde said with another sigh and reached over to squeeze the other woman’s hand. “Moon Woman turned the years themselves in their tracks to give us that.”

  Alston laughed. “You know, that’s about as good an explanation as I’ve ever heard,” she said.

  Swindapa stroked a hand down the neck of her mount. “The ships are wonderful,” she said. “And horses are almost as much fun as babies.”

  They rode side by side, in the shade of the trees left uncut on either side of what was becoming known as the Great West Road down Long Island’s north fork. Leaves fluttered down to meet those already in swales by the ditches and thick on the gravel, drifts of old gold and dark crimson. To their right were patches of wood, of salt marsh noisy with wildfowl, and glimpses of the sound. She reined in for a second to watch a schooner beating eastward, its sails white curves of a purity that made her throat ache for a second.

  The other side of the road was a mixture of forest and plowland set out in big square fields—the Meeting had handed out square-mi
le farms to homesteaders, leaving half the land in forest preserve. Corn-stalks rustled sere and dry in stooked pyramids amid thick-scattered orange pumpkins, next to the almost shocking green of alfalfa; where it had been mown for hay the scent was as sweet as candy. Wheat and barley stubble was dun-yellow and thick with the clover that grazed herds of crossbred sheep. Where teams of oxen or horses pulled disc plows the turned earth was a rich, moist reddish brown, swarming with raucous gulls squabbling over the grubs exposed by the turning steel.

  The riders waved to the workers digging potatoes, to shepherds and their barking dogs, to passersby—farm wagons drawn by calm-eyed oxen, the odd rider, and now and then a lone pedestrian.

  Alston smiled at the miles of post-and-board edging the fields, remembering the experiment with splitting black walnut for Virginia-style rail fences. Theoretically that should have been cheaper, but it turned out that the use of wedge and maul was something Abe Lincoln must have learned at his father’s knee.

  Sure as shit nobody on Nantucket could do it! she chuckled to herself. Anybody could nail boards, though, and one of Leaton’s people had come up with a simple pile driver to set the posts.

  The road dipped into a belt of trees along a creek; planks boomed beneath the hooves of their mounts. Alston felt her horse take a sudden sideways skitter as something squealed angrily. A sounder of pigs erupted from the mud beneath the pilings, scattering into the trees in a twinkle of hooves and brass nose rings. The air was full of a cool, damp, musty smell, leaf mold and turned earth.,