by Laura Gill
The postern gate was smaller than the Lion Gate; it was used mostly for foot traffic: women going back and forth to the Perseia spring, soldiers on patrol, messengers arriving from the north, and noblemen visiting the family tombs on Mount Charvati. On normal occasions, Philaretos posted a minimum of four guards on the postern gate: two to the portal, and two to the bastion; he might have doubled or even trebled the watch tonight.
A single sentry was warming hands over a glowing brazier. He wore a bronze helmet, casting his face in deep shadow, and a cloak against the night’s chill. I knew all the citadel guards, and this one had a distinctive set to his shoulders. “I think it might be Doryklos,” I whispered to Timon. “I’m not sure, though.”
Timon set down the bedroll, then patted my shoulder. “Stay here.”
What he did next was the bravest thing I had ever seen him do. He approached the gate alone, head held high and hands extended to show he was unarmed. I held my breath. Perhaps it was not Doryklos, but someone less amiable who would challenge Timon, shove him about, and detain him.
Grounding his spear, the guard drew Timon aside to talk to him. I scanned the circuit walls, searching for other sentries who might notice something amiss and call out a challenge. Several heartbeats passed without incident.
Timon then vanished into the shadows under the portal’s great lintel, hustled there by the guard as a second man appeared. I saw the two men exchange words, but could not hear what they were saying; their gestures, however, conveyed profound boredom.
Bidding the first man a good-natured farewell, the second sentry left, presumably to return to his post. The first sentry rubbed his hands over the brazier one last time, while furtively glancing in both directions. My nerves strained as he left the gate and approached my hiding place.
He did not crouch down to address me, which would have called attention from above, but stood there with his spear and looked around as though attending his usual duties. “Come with me, Orestes,” he rumbled. Doryklos. “Stay on my left, in my shadow.”
I rejoined Timon under the lintel. Doryklos resumed his post; he turned his head as though scanning the walkway to the right and started giving us instructions in a very low voice. “Aegisthus has men on the south road, waiting for an attack from Tiryns or Argos. Go north. Avoid the roads. Hide during the day. Travel only at dawn and dusk. Don’t build a fire.”
“What about the men on the walls?” I whispered.
“Xanthos knows you’re here. Saw Timon creeping up here before. He and Dymas have the bastion tonight, but he’s sending the man away to fetch some wine.” Dymas was loyal to Aegisthus. I wondered about the other men, who had stood idly by while Philaretos and Aegisthus’s followers murdered my father. Was I fool to trust them now? “You haven’t got much time. Stay in the shadows and move quickly, but don’t run. Once you get around the bend, you should be safe enough.”
Then he ducked under the lintel alongside us; he propped his spear against the wall, and maneuvered the bolt and opened the heavy oak door just enough to let us squeeze through. Doryklos pushed the door shut behind us; we heard the bolt slide back into place.
Just because we were outside the citadel did not mean we were free, though. Not yet. Xanthos, who watched the bastion, knew we were there, and had agreed to cover our flight—or did he intend to shoot us? And there were other sentries stationed along the walls; at least one would notice two shadowy figures creeping along the road and down the hillside. There would be a shout, then the split-second whistle of an arrow before it hit me in the back. Xanthos would do it to save his own skin, or Dymas would return early. I forced myself to remain optimistic, to pray to whichever gods might be watching over me, and to keep moving.
At last, we rounded the bend and found ourselves in the deepest shadows at the base of the citadel mount, where not even the sharpest eyes would be able to see us. I let myself breathe. We had done it, we had escaped the citadel, and were free for the moment. Off to the right, the path turned toward the Perseia spring, while to the left it stretched away to meet the northwest road to Nemea.
We had to keep moving. Sooner or later, someone would realize what the sentries had done and come after us; I did not dwell on what Mother and Philaretos would do to those men. Keeping to the road, we walked until dawn lightened the sky. I gazed back toward Charvati, saw her northwestern face shadowed with blue and violet; we had not traveled far enough. I would have kept going, even broken into a run and sprinted to the Nemea road, had Timon not needed to rest.
“Remember what the sentry told us,” he said.
Avoid the roads. Hide by day. Travel at dawn and dusk. “I remember.” I found a suitable hiding place in a depression behind a stand of wild oaks, where we could spread out the fleeces and lie down. “I’m glad you came, Timon.”
“I fear I may not be much use to you.”
“Don’t say that.” I noticed how he kept shifting around to try to find a more comfortable position. It was hard going from soft living straight to the outdoors. Maybe I should not have dragged him along. But it was too late to regret it now. “Do you want my fleece to ease your back?”
He shook his head. “I expect to drop dead by tomorrow. Will you remember to bury me and pour the correct libation?”
His halfhearted lament coaxed a smile from me. “Yes, Timon,” I answered, “but you’re not going to die.”
Timon slept far better than I did. I lay in the grass, sensitive to every noise, and not daring to close my eyes for fear someone would discover us. A cart lumbered past, then someone rode by on horseback, and then later on, a group of chattering farmwives appeared carrying their goods to market. I sent a swift prayer to Hermes to speed those travelers along.
Traveling by dusk was well enough for men traveling in a group, but not an old man and boy alone. Brigands might haunt the highways again, as they had a generation ago during Thyestes’ short reign. Or there might be lions and wolves.
I forced myself to be rational. Father had been dead less than a day. It might be some time before the news spread to the outlaws in their remote dens. As for the wild animals, nowadays lions and wolves avoided the populated areas around Mycenae; vigilant local herdsmen and generations of hunting had driven them deep into the mountainous wilderness. Timon and I should be safe from predators as long as we did not venture too far from the main thoroughfares.
We drank a little water, and divided the food into rations. I chewed my morsel of bread and cheese slowly, to make it last. “Timon, do you think Father is watching over me?”
Timon regarded the question thoughtfully. “Only you would know that.”
“I know shades haunt the living when they’ve been wronged,” I said, “but do you think they also come back to watch over their loved ones?”
“I think it is unhealthy for you to dwell on such questions.”
I sighed. “It’s just that I feel so alone.”
“When you are alone, the best thing to do is find a friend.” Timon brushed dirt and bits of leaves from his blanket. “I am your friend. Only a friend would ever agree to bump his shins in the dark, sleep in the dirt, and run his old bones into the ground for you.”
“Yes,” I agreed, feeling bad that I had said I was alone when he was right there. “You are my friend.”
Late afternoon arrived in shades of mellow gold, bronze, and bruised violet. A breeze stirred the oak leaves overhead. It was time to go. I helped Timon bundle the blankets and fleeces, then guided him from the ditch and back onto the path. An hour or two of daylight remained before twilight fell. We had three hours at most before we had to move, find another hiding place in which to hunker down, and wait for dawn. We would not cover much ground that way. It might take months to reach Phocis.
Timon’s arthritis and bad back forced us to maintain a slower pace than I would have preferred. Although he never once complained, he was in obvious discomfort. I should never have dragged him along.
While we rested during the second
day, I found a fallen branch that would make an excellent walking stick. As he slept, I trimmed it to the right length with my dagger, then whittled away the foliage, and smoothed the rough grain as best I could; the result was crude yet passable for someone unaccustomed to working with wood.
Timon woke in the late afternoon. I helped him sit upright, then presented the stick to him with a flourish. “It’s for you,” I said. “You’ll look more like a herdsman, and less like a scribe.”
Timon studied the walking stick a long time before trying it out. I had never seen him use a staff before, and suspected he avoided it because it made him feel old; he might hate my handiwork.
It suited him, though; its length and shape made him look more distinguished. “A herdsman and his grandson.” A twinkle appeared in his eyes. “Indeed.”
*~*~*~*
We strayed from the main highway as it descended into the Nemean valley, and turned east onto a tributary road winding through the hill country of Corinthia. As the weather continued fair, we slept outside. We avoided people wherever we could, but pretended to be grandfather and grandson whenever we encountered anyone. Timon always did the talking on those occasions. He even scolded and knocked me about like an exasperated grandfather, relishing his part a bit too much.
Through that occasional contact, we learned that no one in the region knew about the High King’s murder, and we certainly did not enlighten them. People were only just starting to learn that the war was over.
The herdsmen we met shared with us their bread and goat cheese, which eased the persistent gnawing in my belly. I sharpened a stick into a makeshift spear, although I never caught anything with it. Using the technique Kleitos had taught me, I once snared an old hare that was mostly gristle and bone. I also found some edible herbs and berries, but it was never enough to sate my hunger. The herdsmen informed us where we could find fresh water and a safe place to sleep, and cautioned us to avoid certain places where mountain lions had been sighted.
Every animal call, every movement through the undergrowth, pricked my anxiety. Thieves and murderers could also be out there, among the beasts and Aegisthus's hired men. I tried to select high, defensible campsites, then dreaded lighting the fire that might betray us to human enemies. I started to forget what it was to sleep, to eat a full meal, or to move about without fear. This new existence, this exile, seemed to me like an unending nightmare.
*~*~*~*
When the premonition took hold, it would not let go. My every nerve stood on end. I stopped on the path, and took several moments to look around. We were at least half a mile from the main road, meaning the danger, whatever it was, could just as easily be a wild boar in the underbrush or a mountain lion crouching behind a boulder as a man.
“What is it, Orestes?” Timon asked.
I lifted my hand for silence. Something was not right. I did not think it was a wild animal. This danger was human, I felt certain of it. Was it a group of brigands, or one of Aegisthus’s trackers? Surely he would have sent men in pursuit. “We have to get off the path,” I said. “Someone is coming.”
“How do you know?”
There was no time to answer his questions or to debate the matter. “I know.”
As I had had martial training and he had not, he accepted my wisdom. Every advantage we could seize counted. We needed to find higher ground. It was not difficult to find there in the hill country. Movements of the local herdsmen and their flocks had created narrow goat tracks between grazing grounds.
The first such track we came across was the one we must use; the threat was growing closer, like a thundercloud rolling in. Timon eyed the steep incline with trepidation. “Are you sure?”
“Yes,” I insisted.
I scrambled up first, to gauge the grade and survey the terrain above, then returned to help him negotiate the path. After checking the ground for snakes and burrows, we spread our fleeces behind some sheltering rocks. Behind us loomed a sheer rock wall, rising forty feet high or more; whoever was tracking us would have to approach from below, unless there was a second goat path which converged on this spot. I scanned the area around the rock wall, searching for just such a track, and found none.
My instincts warned me that the danger lay below, in the direction from which we had just come. I remembered the training wall back home, and how the defenders used to lob sandbags at the attackers. I started to pile fist-sized stones to use as missiles, before realizing that the sheltering rocks themselves, which were not held together by any mortar, could be shifted and loosed like an avalanche.
Hearing my plan, Timon examined the rocks and my pile of missiles. “Orestes, I sincerely hope that whoever is coming does not turn out to be some innocent traveler or herdsman.”
An honest traveler would have caught up to us, as all travelers knew there was safety going in numbers. And herdsmen announced their presence through the brass bells their goats wore, by the pipes they played to alleviate their boredom, or by the barking of the dogs which often accompanied them into the hills. Whoever was trailing us, whether he was a brigand or a Mycenaean tracker, he moved by stealth, and meant to harm us. “I will absolutely make sure before doing anything,” I assured him, though I had utterly no idea how I would or even could accomplish that.
Clearly Timon was not convinced that we were in danger, otherwise he would not have lain down to doze. I stretched out on the ground beside the sheltering rocks, pillowing my head on my arm in such a way as to let me observe the trail below. Truthfully, I was not at all certain that I could take a man this way; it just seemed like the best option out of a half-dozen poorer ones.
Athena, watch over me. I had nothing to offer the goddess in exchange for her favors, and thus, no reasonable expectation that she would smile upon me. Grant me my father’s strength and courage, and I will give you the best I have the very moment I am able. On my father’s grave, I, Orestes Agamemnonides, so swear.
I had Father’s seal stone, of course, but could not offer it up to her. And surely the goddess, having been with me in the bathroom, knew that. It was the symbol of his authority, and the only way by which my Phocian relatives would know me.
The sun beat down hard. I was dirty and sweaty, and itched all over from the coarse grass and lack of a bath. Insects buzzed in the dusty, drowsy afternoon, and the hills seemed desolate. A hawk shrilled high above. I smothered a yawn. Falling asleep now would be the very worst thing I could do. I snored, or so others had told me. Giving into my drowsiness meant that I might as well have gotten up, shouted and waved my arms, and invited the intruder to join me.
And then, as I was thinking that very thought, without preamble, we were no longer alone.
He entered my view from the left, a nondescript man dressed like a traveler, but armed with a sword, bow and arrow, and wearing molded linen greaves. Traveling was admittedly a dangerous occupation, and all sensible wayfarers carried weapons, but there was something about this particular man... I held my breath as he ambled along the trail, heading in the direction we would have taken. Maybe there was nothing more to him than a man walking through the hill country, after all. I would be immensely relieved to find that Timon had been right all along.
Suddenly the man paused, twitching his head to one side to test the air and listen, and then bent down to peer more closely at the ground. My heart lurched with disappointment and fear as I realized what he was doing. Philaretos had taught us to track animals by the subtle disturbances they made in the landscape. This man was doing the exact same thing, only with people.
He backtracked, scanned the ground some more, then lifted his head to study the rock face above and behind me. I dared not move to duck down, instead observing with hitched breath as he stooped to examine the scant traces of our passing.
I had to make my move, and quickly. Taking a deep breath, I sent a lightning-swift prayer to Athena, leaned my shoulder against the sheltering rock wall where it was the weakest, and shoved with all my might.
Onl
y then did the doubts rush in. It would never work. My projected avalanche would stop short, or my timing was simply all wrong. And he knew what he was doing. Almost certainly he would see the danger and avoid it.
Such were the thoughts that raced through my head in the fraction of a second it took for the wall to collapse, sending stones, pebbles, and dirt cascading down the slope. As I scrabbled backward to regain my balance, I heard the man’s alarmed cry from below, then a solid thud, and a silence broken only by loose showers of pebbles and settling earth.
Timon, startled by the noise, sat up among the fleeces. “What is it?”
I shushed him, then grabbed a fist-sized rock and crawled back to the edge.
A cloud of dust blanketed the road below. As it started to settle, I saw the man lying prone. His body was powdered with dirt. Stones tangled among his limbs and littered the ground around him. He can’t be dead. It can’t be that easy.
Perhaps he was not dead at all, merely stunned. I hurled the rock, just missing his head. Trying again, I struck his torso. He did not stir. “Timon,” I said, without turning my gaze. “Give me your walking stick.”
I navigated the descent, dividing my focus between the steep path and the man’s body; his motionlessness might be a ruse to lure me closer. Philaretos had taught us what to do when an enemy played dead. An arrow or spear would have served the purpose; bludgeoning a man meant getting close. That could be fatal. I scooped up another stone, aimed more carefully, this time hitting his head. He did not stir. Either he was very good at shamming dead, or he was unconscious. Or—but, gods, it could not be that simple—he truly was dead.
Very well, then. I rammed the butt of the walking stick into his skull—once, twice, thrice—to make certain he never moved again.
Afterward, I stood there, watching the blood from his crushed skull slowly seep into the dirt. Flies were starting to settle on the wound. I had just killed a man, because, in the end, it truly was that easy.