Vengeance at Aulis (The Trojan Murders Book 2)

by Peter Tonkin

  ***

  I was allowed the privilege of riding in King Diomedes’ chariot which, like Odysseus’, was stabled in Aulis. It was spacious, but much less so than the High Priestess’ vehicle which had plenty of room for a charioteer, the High Priestess and her two attendants to fit comfortably aboard. It was pulled by two strong horses but at a speed which allowed Ikaros and a couple of guards to lope alongside as we left Aulis on the road to Thebes. Diomedes’ charioteer kept his horses on a tight rein so that we could travel alongside the High Priestess’ slower vehicle, allowing the conversations to continue. As we made our leisurely way out of the city towards the turning that led up through the trees to the temple, I explained in detail what I had found out and how the contents of my bulky leather bag supported what I believed. A bumpy ride in a jolting carriage was no time or place to show the High Priestess bits of broken bone and gilded skull, so Karpathia said she would be content to take my word for it until we reached the temple and she could see for herself.

  We arrived at the temple soon after noon. The day, like all the others recently, was windless and blazingly hot, however the road we were following through the trees towards the temple proved shady enough to rob the fearsome sun of some of its crushing power. And, although down amongst the foothills and on the plains beside the coast there was a dead calm, a gentle pine-fragrant breeze moved through the forest up here, helping the shadows to keep us cool to such good effect that Diomedes remarked upon it. ‘The breath of the Goddess,’ explained Karpathia. ‘She looks after her own.’

  Nevertheless, a bowl of fresh spring water was very welcome as we assembled in the temple’s reception area after we had left the chariots outside. Welcome also were the bread and honey that the temple’s bakery and hives produced – though I preferred the fragrant olive oil that was also on offer together with the sharp sheep’s cheese the servants made from their flock’s excess milk. I was particularly glad of the food because I had eaten nothing since the bone-spiked venison at Agamemnon’s feast last night. However, no sooner had we refreshed ourselves than Diomedes, Ikaros and I were off again, leaving my bag and its contents for Karpathia to examine at her leisure.

  We took Diomedes’ chariot. The king and I rode in it along with the charioteer, while the temple guards who had accompanied Karpathia back from Aulis ran alongside, led by Ikaros who guided us with terse instructions. We were soon back on the road to Thebes, heading up-hill away from Aulis. Ikaros and the guards ran on the inside of the chariot along the edge of the road. The highway cut through the forested slopes, the trees standing tall on either hand, the ground between their trunks covered with undergrowth – mostly of bushes hardy enough to withstand the constant gentle rain of pine-needles. Under the heat of the early afternoon, the thoroughfare was by no means busy. Only the occasional cart or pack-animal led by a weary trader disturbed the whining hum of the summer-hot copses. There was a subtle difference between the woodland on our left and that on our right. To our right, the thickets were quiet. They were as full of wild-life as those on our left no doubt, but the heat of early afternoon seemed to have struck everything dumb and stunned it into restfulness. On our left, however, the Groves of Artemis were gently a-bustle. Insects buzzed and whined; cicadas sang drowsily. Birds fluttered and called. Creatures scurried, snuffled and whispered. The cool, fragrant breath of the Goddess no doubt helped, but it seemed to blow more constantly in the sacred stands than elsewhere.

  Just as we crested the first low rise and caught a glimpse of the all-but empty roadway reaching down into the first shady valley between here and Thebes, Ikaros said, ‘Here.’ Diomedes’ charioteer pulled right to the side of the road and reined to a stop. Diomedes and I dismounted and fell in with Ikaros and the guards, leaving the charioteer to tend his horses. The retired huntsman led us a little distance away from the road into the first of the shadily stirring thickets. We didn’t need to go far and we didn’t need to strain our woodsmanship to follow the tracks through the undergrowth that showed where something had been dragged deeper. The footprints suggested two men.

  ‘One man holding each arm,’ said Ikaros. ‘Dragging him in here to hide him.’

  ‘He must have been dead then,’ said Diomedes. ‘There’s no sign of him struggling.’

  ‘The arrow might have killed him,’ nodded Ikaros. ‘Or they might have cut his throat by the roadside I haven’t looked there in any detail as yet.’

  ‘We’ll do that later, then,’ said Diomedes.

  ‘But we have to look here most closely first,’ said Ikaros, pulling aside a bush to reveal the corpse of a man lying flat on his back with an arrow sticking out of his armpit and a gaping slit in his throat that stretched from one ear to the other.

  v

  The corpse was that of a middle-aged man. His hair was grey and thinning, his eyebrows shaggy and his beard trimmed short – which went some way to explaining why his cut throat was so striking. His wide eyes were filmed. They struck me as being those of a blind man, but when I mentioned this with some surprise given the circumstances, Ikaros said that the eyes of the dead clouded over if they were not shut; it was true of animals and of men alike. It was also worth noting, he suggested, that the covering of bushes had protected the eyes – blind or not – from the beaks of the local birds. The clothing beneath the cut throat was covered in blood and that was providing a feast for the local ant and insect population, some of which had climbed into the wound itself and seemed reluctant to move, even when Ikaros waved them away. The stained clothing was a travelling outfit of himation, cloak and thick leggings suggesting he had been travelling on horseback. There seemed little doubt of that, and marks on the inner curves of the leggings also suggested that the dead man had been riding; something that a blind man was not likely to be doing. The condition of his left arm, shoulder and side seemed consistent with damage sustained falling sideways off a horse as the result of receiving an arrow just behind his right arm, so close to the limb and at such an angle as to suggest that it had almost pierced the arm-pit itself. It must have hit with considerable force to knock the rider off his seat I thought. ‘I see what you meant when you said to the High Priestess that this must have been a messenger,’ I said.

  ‘But from whom, to whom, and bearing what message?’ wondered Diomedes.

  Something in the young king’s tone alerted me. ‘Do you recognise him, Majesty?’

  Diomedes pulled a face and shook his head, more in frustration than in answer to my question. After a moment more, Ikaros, Diomedes and I all knelt around the corpse. As it was clear that the king had never undertaken a task like this, Ikaros and I took the lead. The gentle breeze was strong enough to move the branches so that shafts of sunlight swept regularly across the dead man’s face and body, making every element easy to see, though of course those details remained much less easy to understand.

  Trying to recall as many details as I could of how Odysseus went about such tasks, I leaned forward, examining the dead face. There was nothing there that called out to me except, perhaps, the manner in which blood had collected and thickened on the bearded jowls beneath the chin, making a black-floored, white speckled hillock joining the lower jaw to the sundered neck and suggesting that the man had been lying on his back when his throat was cut – the blood spurting upwards and downwards with equal force. After the arrow knocked him off the horse, therefore, but before it actually killed him.

  I next examined the throat, remembering Odysseus’ dictum ‘Eyes first and most, hands last and least.’ I did not touch the wound therefore, but examined it as closely as I was able, disregarding the ants and flies. Seeing instead the manner in which the skin had been cut – almost torn. How the wound stretched wide from one ear to the other; proof again that two men must have been involved – one to hold the head still while the other did this to the throat – as he lay helpless and dying on his back. A vigorous man cutting the gullet; a strong man therefore holding the head still as the deed was done. The manner in which th
e various tubes and vessels had been torn loose was striking but I could not immediately fathom any reason why it should be so unless it was simply a result of the vigorous chopping, slicing and sawing. There was no doubt in my mind, however; they had been pulled loose as well as being chopped apart. The blade that had done this had cut right through to the muscles of the neck before it had stopped, revealing glimpses of white bone from the spine.

  ‘Were they trying to behead him?’ wondered Ikaros, his voice making me jump, quiet though it was.

  ‘Why would anyone do such a thing?’ wondered Diomedes.

  ‘Proof that they’d done their job,’ said Ikaros. ‘It’s not uncommon.’

  ‘But they gave up.’ I observed. ‘I wonder why.’

  ‘Probably too difficult – whatever they used had just hit solid muscle and bone after all. Or maybe they ran out of time – even getting this far must have taken a good while. Or on the other hand, someone was maybe coming along the road – perhaps the murder was done at a busier time.’ Ikaros ticked off the possibilities.

  ‘I wonder where they did it, though,’ I said. ‘It can’t have been here. No blood on the ground…’

  ‘Unlike the grass by the rubbish tip this morning’ nodded Ikaros. ‘Yes, you’re right.’

  ‘Surely it would have to be at the beginning of the track you followed here,’ suggested Diomedes. ‘Have you examined the undergrowth by the roadside there?’

  ‘No. maybe we’ll do that later,’ said Ikaros. ‘But we need to press on here for the moment.’

  ‘Well,’ I said, ‘unless we’re planning to strip him, there’s not a lot more to examine. The arrow’s just about in his right arm-pit, though there’s not much blood there I notice. Judging by what’s sticking out, the point is in very deep indeed. Fired at close range – maybe just across the width of the road. His arm was raised, elbow forward – as it would be holding reins. And, unless the killers are being particularly devious, everything suggests that he was riding west, towards Thebes.’

  ‘It certainly looks that way,’ agreed Ikaros.

  ‘But who was he?’ said Diomedes, almost talking to himself, still obviously frustrated not to be able to remember where he knew the face from.

  And as chance would have it, I was able to answer that question a few moments later when I held his dead right hand up beside my living one so that the king and the huntsman could compare the identical calluses on our fingertips and thumb. ‘He was a rhapsode,’ I said.

  ‘Of course!’ said Diomedes. ‘How could I not see it immediately? How could I not have known at once? This is the man you replaced at the feast last night, lad. This is Sophos, High King Agamemnon’s rhapsode!’

  ***

  King Diomedes’ revelation altered everything. The three of us sat back on our heels silently regarding each-other as our minds whirled. The first thing that occurred to me was that Agamemnon must have been lying to the High Priestess. But then I realised… ‘The High King hasn’t actually seen the body. All he knows is what the High Priestess told him,’ I said.

  ‘True,’ agreed Ikaros. ‘And I described to her a man of middle years in travelling clothes who had been shot with an arrow and who had then had his throat cut…’

  ‘That could have been almost anybody,’ I observed, and Ikaros nodded ruefully.

  ‘But when did you estimate that the murder took place?’ wondered the king.

  ‘Quite recently…’

  ‘Within a day or two?’ I queried. ‘His clothes are bone dry. This was done after the weather changed. Soon after, perhaps, but not too soon – he must have fallen onto ground that was also bone-dry.’

  ‘So that Agamemnon might well have assumed his rhapsode could not be the man, especially if he was sent some days earlier – soon after the moment the weather changed perhaps.’

  ‘That’s right. I seem to remember that Sophos left just before Odysseus, in fact. But where was he sent? With what purpose?’ wondered Diomedes.

  ‘Sent to Mycenae,’ I answered. ‘With a message. Odysseus said that messengers have been going back and forth between the High King and Queen Clytemnestra. This must have been a longer, more intricate message than usual, though. I’ve come across this before. Anyone wishing to send a lengthy, complicated message – especially if he expects a long, complicated reply - can do no better than to get his rhapsode to memorise it.’

  ‘Just as he memorises lengthy epic songs, word for word. Yes, I see,’ breathed Diomedes.

  ‘It has to be a message for Queen Clytemnestra then,’ said Ikaros. ‘But who would want to stop the High King communicating with his queen?’

  ‘I think we’re going to have to show him the corpse and then ask him ourselves,’ said Diomedes.

  ‘That’s one way forward, I suppose,’ said Ikaros uneasily.

  But in the end it was the way we chose.

  As the two guards loaded the corpse into Diomedes’ chariot, Ikaros studied the roadside at the end of the tracks left when Sophos was dragged deeper into the woods. Sure enough, there were bloodstains here, but unlike those by the rubbish pile this morning, these were completely dry. ‘When did the weather change?’ he asked, talking to himself. ‘Six days ago? Could it be seven?’

  ‘Just before Odysseus went west,’ I said, ‘and he’s due back soon, I think.’

  The conversation stopped there, except that Ikaros ran across the road and searched for the place from which the ambush had been launched. ‘Here!’ he called after a few moments. ‘Two men judging by the footprints – but that doesn’t get us any further. We already knew two men were involved.’

  And that was all, except that as I climbed aboard Diomedes chariot again I realised that Karpathia still had my bag full of the evidence I wanted to show King Odysseus as soon as he did get back. ‘Don’t worry,’ said Ikaros. ‘The High Priestess and the Oracle will take good care of it and when they’ve finished with it, I’ll bring it back to you myself. If Odysseus is back before then I’ll look to find you at his tent. If not, you’ll likely be aboard Thalassa. Don’t worry. I’ll find you, and I won’t need to have you holding some brightly jewelled dagger to do it!’

  ‘As you wish,’ I said, realising I had little choice in the matter. Diomedes would be hesitant to go back to the Temple as it was a good deal out of his way; and, as Ikaros had already observed, there was no guarantee that the High Priestess would be ready to return it if he did.

  ‘It just shows you though,’ said Ikaros as a kind of parting shot while the charioteer stirred the horses into motion and the wheels rolled forward, leaving the hunter and the temple guards standing by the roadside, ‘if the High Priestess was able to describe the High King’s rhapsode to him and the High King didn’t recognise who she was talking about, how important was that unique and unmistakable dagger the High King gave to you.’

  As Diomedes and I rode eastwards again, back down towards Aulis and the huge camp that stood beside it with the corpse of Sophos lying at our feet, I said, ‘Do you think Ikaros was right, Highness? Did King Agamemnon give me the dagger simply so that I would be easy to recognise?’ My voice shook a little, for I was finding it very hard to come to terms with the potentially fatal notoriety that had been so suddenly thrust upon me.

  ‘About that,’ said Diomedes. ‘You know, I’m not certain that it was actually the High King who gave the dagger to Oikonomos the steward. There were several people gathered around there at the time. Menelaus, for instance, as well as Palamedes, Aias, King Menestheus and King Leonteus. It would have been easy for any one of them to give Oikonomos the dagger and say it came from Agamemnon himself.’

  This silenced me for the rest of the journey as I pondered a widened pool of suspects who might want me dead and wondered whether or not I should be relieved that the short-tempered, ruthless and all-powerful Agamemnon was no longer the only one on the list.

  5 - The Rat and the Rhapsode

  i

  As we approached Aulis’ western gate, King Diomedes s
poke quietly to his charioteer and we turned off the main highway onto the hard-beaten earth track that was effectively the inland road to the Achaean army’s vast camp. ‘Where are we going, Majesty?’ I asked.

  ‘We’re taking the corpse to the most logical destination,’ said Diomedes. ‘The quarters of Prince Machaon and Prince Podialirius the camp physicians. They will be able to examine it further. They are both accomplished surgeons and will be able to remove the arrow with any luck so that we can compare that with the one which killed the priestess when Karpathia returns it to you. Then they can have the body stripped, washed and prepared to be handed to Kalkhas for proper funeral rights, unless Karpathia decides to claim him on behalf of the Goddess because he was killed and hidden in the Groves of Artemis. And somewhere in all this preparation, we will bring the High King over to give formal identification to the corpse which he swore could have nothing to do with him.’

  ‘I would like to witness that moment,’ I said.

  ‘A dangerous wish,’ warned the young king. ‘It seems you are in sufficient danger as things stand. To witness the High King taken in a lie might well have fatal consequences – even more immediate and certain than those apparently hanging over you now.’

  I fell silent, still finding it difficult to believe that someone as insignificant as a partially crippled and half-blind rhapsode could possibly be of sufficient importance to merit murder on the command of a High King. But then, I considered, the situation was merely a lesser reflection of what seemed to be going on here and now: that the doings of such insignificant creatures as men could possibly merit the personal outrage of a Goddess who lived in far, high Olympus.

  I was still pondering these unsettling questions when the chariot drew up beside the brother physicians’ accommodation. At first glance, it seemed strange that the physicians should have needed not one great tent, but several. It was only when Diomedes and I entered the main one that I realised the truth. Even now, when the army was effectively at rest, there were still soldiers who were unwell, hurt and wounded. The range of aliments could be identified with a glance. Sickness arising from all the usual sources as well as from unwisely-foraged, spoiled and ill-prepared food. Accidents suffered during training; cuts and bruises, stabs and gashes arising from fights of all kinds from mock battles and competitive wrestling matches to knock-down drag-out brawls. Thousands of short-tempered, bored and frustrated fighting men cooped up together with dwindling supplies and no immediate prospect of getting into action: it was a wonder to me that there weren’t many more in here awaiting the physicians’ attention. But the tent did not appear to be packed and I assumed that the neighbouring ones were likewise less than full, though the physicians and their helpers clearly had quite a lot to do, passing out medicines, tending broken bones and binding wounds.