Penelope's Web

by Christopher Rush

  ‘Forward, you motherfuckers!’

  We fought under a cloudless sky. Olympus stood bare and empty, no gods to be seen. Or heard.

  ‘Murder the cunts, come on! Let’s do some fucking damage here!’

  We broke the front line first time. Agamemnon wiped out Bienor and Oileus, his driver, using up both spears. The driver got it first. The spear impacted so hard it pierced the helmet and sank deep into the bone of the forehead. Bienor got the same treatment, bone and brain giving way to bronze. Agamemnon stripped the pair of them and left them lying naked, their limbs ghostly white.

  Then he wasted Antiphus and Isus, legitimate and bastard sons of Priam, both in the same chariot. The two spears again. The first one hit Isus in the chest. Antiphus ducked the second and briefly saw it bounce off a chariot.

  ‘Bloody hell!’

  He gasped with relief and breathed again. The bastard couldn’t believe his luck. But just as he stood back up and glanced over his shoulder Agamemnon split open his head at the ear and stuff came out.

  ‘Fucking beauty!’

  He stripped that pair too and left them lying bare. Then he killed Peisander and Hippolochus – next of kin Antimachus, their father. He was the one who’d stood up in the Trojan Assembly when I went with Menelaus on the peace mission and he’d said we should be butchered on the spot. Agamemnon remembered that when he saw the pair of them in a spot of bother. They’d lost control of their horses and their chariot was all over the place. Agamemnon charged up.

  ‘Let me help you out!’

  He struck Peisander in the chest with his long spear and knocked him off the chariot.

  ‘There you go!’

  Hippolochus didn’t wait. He jumped out, scared shitless, and stood with both arms held up, begging for mercy.

  Agamemnon bent down and slashed each arm off at the shoulder. Hippolochus hardly had time to change expression before his head was slashed off too.

  Agamemnon didn’t let it go at that, though. He jumped down and gave each of them a pussy wound, a post-mortem cut in each head, a terrible one, even in the case of the disembodied head. It was a lesson to their father, he said, to treat ambassadors with some respect.

  ‘Now you’ll know, you old fuck, how to behave!’

  He stripped their corpses too. His arms were steeped to the elbows by this time, red as a butcher’s, and his face was spattered with brains. He’d done enough. But he wouldn’t stop – he carried on charging after Trojans in retreat, hacking madly from behind. He was high on something, that was for sure.

  And so many an empty chariot rattles along the battleline as the charioteers lie dead and dying in the dust, far more enticing now to the vultures than to their lovely young wives. In spite of their recent advantage and the amount of ground gained, Hector’s men are in full retreat, driven back to the tomb of old King Ilus in the middle of the plain, and even beyond that point to the old oak tree and the Scaean Gate. There, however, the Trojans make a stand.

  Agamemnon’s next meeting was with Iphidamas, Antenor’s son, from the meadow lands of Thrace, fleecy with sheep. His grandfather, father of the sweet-cheeked Theano, had tried to keep him at home with the offer of a delightful daughter of Aphrodite, lovely to look on, but he cut short his married bliss, enticed from the sweetly parted thighs of his new bride by the news of the Agamemnon expedition to Troy with all its promise of plunder and exciting action in the field. A night with Aphrodite, an eternity with Ares. Alas, the young man had little idea exactly what he was getting into.

  It became clearer to him when he met Agamemnon, though Agamemnon missed with his throw. Iphidamas seized his chance and ran in, thrusting with his own spear. He caught his opponent below the corslet and felt the contact.

  ‘Got you, man! It’s a strike!’

  He tried to drive the spear home, putting his whole weight behind it. But the point bent and Agamemnon wrenched at it. As Iphidamas fell against him, Agamemnon quickly whipped out his sword and drove it into his throat.

  ‘That’s a strike, boy, right in the fucking windpipe! Now let’s hear you gurgle!’

  Iphidamas falls to his knees, his strength ebbing from him, the sorrowful spirit flitting quickly from the bones. In no time at all he has entered the big bronze slumber, leaving his lovely young wife to the widow’s lonely sleep. He’ll never see her again, or the pleasant meadows of Thrace, where they first made love among shy violets blue and on beds of buttercups. Now he rests his weary limbs on beds of asphodel, while she . . . Ah, see her now, see how she lies, dreaming of his return. But he’ll never part those dreaming thighs again.

  And he paid a fortune for her too – a hundred head of cattle at the time, with the prospect of a thousand more to follow, sheep and goats from his flocks, filling her father’s fields. Others will tend them now. And, in time, another man will attend to that unmanned bride, desolate in Thrace, dreaming of the return that is not to be.

  Penelope knew a thing or two about celibate beds and lonely couches. She lingered on such scenes with a knowing hand.

  ‘I’ll fucking kill you, man!’

  Iphidamas had an older brother, Koön. He saw his little brother die, and his eyes blurred and burned. He made for Agamemnon and managed to hit him.

  The blade of the spear passed clean through the forearm and Agamemnon shuddered when he saw the blood. Koön saw the shudder and stooped to rescue his brother’s body – which was the last mistake he ever made. If he’d had his wits about him he’d have pressed home his advantage and finished his opponent off. But Agamemnon jumped on him, caught him under his shield and floored him. Then he hacked off his head. Koön hadn’t thought it through – he’d buggered up Agamemnon’s left arm, not his fighting arm.

  ‘Stupid cunt!’

  So the two sons of Antenor lay together in the dust, their destiny fulfilled. But almost at once the pain of the wound began to bite and Agamemnon ordered his driver to get him back to the ships.

  ‘At the fucking gallop! Before I bleed to death!’

  The horses flew before the whip, their breasts flecked white with foam, their bellies white with dust.

  The tide was turning yet again. As soon as Hector saw the horses’ heads turn for the ships, he scented victory and urged his men on. He himself cut down a whole run of men, felling them like tender saplings, though they were all experienced soldiers and commanders: Asaeus, Autonous, Opites, Dolops, Opheltius, Agelaus, Aesymnus, Orus and the stalwart Hipponous – nine Greek leaders going down in as many minutes, one after another, part of the web now, their names threaded into posterity.

  Then Hector swooped on the rabble.

  He hit them like the west wind when it blows a full gale at sea and scatters the south wind’s massed snow-clouds, and the big seas lunge and plunge as the whistling wind flicks the spindrift in the sailors’ faces and the foam flies high.

  A nice picture. And an apt one too. We were about to be overwhelmed.

  I yelled to Diomedes. He couldn’t hear me above the din, so I signalled to him for support. He came and stood with me and threw. The spear hit Thymbraeus in the chest and brought him down. I took out his squire Molion. Then we got the two sons of Merops, and Diomedes made an easy hit on Agastrophus, who was horseless and trapped after insisting on leaving his chariot behind and going into the front line on foot.

  Now Hector loomed up, and Diomedes hurled at him and struck the crest of the helmet. Hector staggered. Diomedes whooped.

  ‘Got the bastard!’

  The triple plates had stopped the bronze just short of the skull. But the impact knocked him nearly senseless. Hector fell, clutching at the ground. You could see from his glazed eyes that the world had gone black for him. And if Diomedes had got to him in time, he’d never have seen the light of day again. But he managed to stagger to his feet and lurch back into the lines.

  ‘I’ll fucking get you yet, you cunt!’ shouted Diomedes and started to strip the man he’d just killed.

  But Paris was watching, like t
he little snake he was, from the tomb of Ilus. He leaned against the gravestone, took aim, and coolly loosed an arrow. It looked like it was falling short, but it got there, just. Maybe some god cheered it on. Diomedes never even saw it coming. It pierced his right foot. The point went right through the sole and pinned him to the ground where he stood. He was so shocked he was speechless, just stood there staring in a daze at the stricken foot, literally riveted. Paris saw it and ran out from his ambush. The little prick knew he was safe. He taunted his target.

  ‘Fucking nailed you! O fucking joy! Where would you like the next one? Other foot suit you? Or would you like it in the belly? Or the eye?’

  ‘A scratch!’ yelled Diomedes. ‘You haven’t even hurt me! And how the fuck could you? You fucking bow-boy! A skulking fucking archer! Too scared to see the whites of the eyes, eh? Shoot from a distance instead, you gutless sniper! You sad little lady-killer! It’s all you’ll ever fucking kill!’

  Paris laughed.

  ‘I wouldn’t be too sure of that, cripple!’

  He selected another arrow and fitted it to his bow. But Diomedes saw it coming this time and, pinned down as he was, managed to deflect the missile with his shield.

  ‘You’ll have to do better than that, pretty boy – that’s poorer than piss!’

  Paris cursed and reached for the next arrow. Diomedes kept at it, intent on upsetting his enemy’s aim.

  ‘When I shoot back you’d better fucking watch out! One hit from me and your kids are fatherless and your bitch is a widow with lacerations to improve her looks! Except you don’t have any kids, do you? Haven’t even got it up yet by the looks of things! As for you, you’ll be rotting soon, and it won’t be the girls circling round you then, dancing boy, it’ll be the fucking vultures!’

  Paris’s next arrow went wide.

  All the same, Diomedes was feeling the pain. He sat down and wrenched the arrow out of the foot, unpinning himself from the ground. The effort and the agony were written all over his face. I helped him retreat before Paris could fire again. Then I came back to the line to look for the little cunt, but found myself hemmed in. I took out a few, but a spear from a fucker whose comrade I’d just killed ripped right through my shield and tore the flesh from my side – I felt it bite. Then the stupid cunt turned and ran. I gave it to him right between the shoulders, and he reached the earth, dead on arrival. I knew I had to call it a day and shouted for support. Big Ajax came up and covered me with his shield. Menelaus helped me to his chariot, and Ajax left us to it. When I looked over my shoulder, I could see him back on the attack.

  A mountain torrent sweeps down to the plains, tearing away the tall trees as it goes and scattering them in all directions as if they are straw – hundreds of tons of oaks and pines flung like driftwood into the sea. That’s how Ajax flings himself on the Trojans, inflicting unmendable wounds, demolishing many a horse and man as he storms the plain.

  Hector saw none of this. He was heavily engaged on the far left, on Scamander banks, where a furious battle was being fought out round Nestor and Idomeneus. We were taking heavy casualties. Even so, our lads would have stood their ground but for that cunt Paris, who fired another arrow, a three-barbed bastard that hit Machaon in the right shoulder. Machaon was by far our best physician, and a physician is pure gold, worth a hundred squaddies. Idomeneus yelled to Nestor to pick him up and head back for the ships on the double. Nestor went like the wind, with Machaon hanging on to the sides of the chariot for dear life and the arrow sticking out of his shoulder. It was going to be a bugger to get out.

  Meanwhile, Hector’s driver, Kebriones, saw the situation on their right and he brought the two of them up fast. Hector’s best men were right behind them, galloping over wounded men and corpses and shields. The axles and rails were bright with blood. Ajax fell back. He was reluctant to go but he’d no choice.

  Was he a lion or an ass? The lion retreats from the herdsmen and the ass from a band of boys. The lion is unwilling to leave the fold and the ass the cornfield. Even though the boys break heavy sticks across the donkey’s back, he keeps on eating until he has taken his stubborn fill, and only then does he consent to go. The lion shrinks from the hail of missiles and blazing torches but still tries a charge or two. Only at dawn does he finally slink off, growling and disgruntled and still hungry for blood.

  Peacetime, life back home. Ordinary life has its hardships too, and its difficulties, but eventually the cornfield and the sheepfold are left in peace. The corn grows high as the tides of the sea, the fleecy sheep cover the plain and are left in peace.

  Peace again – and the dream of home, the dream all soldiers dream.

  Back at the ships myself now, I could see Achilles and Patroclus standing high on the stern of Achilles’ ship, watching the conflict. Patroclus was pointing to Nestor’s chariot as it charged up and the wounded Machaon was helped into Nestor’s tent. Patroclus jumped down and started running. Achilles was sending him over to find out the situation – he was good friends with Machaon. I got there just before him. Machaon was hurt but would live. I wanted him to have a look at my own wound. A sick doctor can still heal, and the wound was fucking sore.

  There was a girl in Nestor’s tent, Hecamede of Tenedos. She’d been given to Nestor by Achilles after he’d sacked the place, and she was the kind of girl whose beautiful hair you longed to see spread out unbraided on your pillow. She went on her knees in front of me to offer me a drink, and the next thing I knew I was picturing her kneeling there, holding not a wine cup but my cock, stuck hard in her mouth, her head bobbing like a bird’s with real relish, then her lips pulling away, flecked with semen. A nice thought. One not to be found in the web, though. There’s only so much a man will tell his wife. Instead, Hecamede gave me an onion to flavour my drink, with yellow honey and barley mixed in. I made do with it. And I let my imagination see to the rest. Could you blame me? Fucking hell, even when he’s wounded, a soldier’s still a man. And his life but a span. All the more reason to indulge a pleasant dream, when death has flirted with you in the field. And you give way to the longings of the flesh, the only antidote to war. Why then, let a soldier drink. And dream.

  We were supping up when Patroclus came in. He looked a bit sheepish, as well he might. He’d never picked up anything more lethal than a fucking quoit while the rest of us had been getting shot to pieces in some of the worst fighting we’d encountered since we came to Troy.

  ‘Achilles asked me to find out . . .’

  He waved vaguely at Machaon.

  ‘That’s right,’ said Nestor. ‘But he’s not the only one.’

  He indicated me.

  ‘Stay, and we’ll let you have a full account for Achilles, if he’s so suddenly interested in our casualties.’

  ‘I was ordered to report on Machaon, that’s all, you’ll have to excuse me.’

  Nestor spread his arms.

  ‘The entire army is taking a hammering,’ I interrupted.

  Nestor nodded.

  ‘And as well as Odysseus here, Diomedes has been hit. And Eurypylus, I’ve just heard. And Agamemnon.’

  ‘Agamemnon?’

  ‘Yes. Do you want the full list? God, if only I were young and strong again like I was all those years ago when I killed the Epeans and took so many cattle and sheep and horses, I’d fight to the death. To the fucking death!’

  Nestor never swore. Everybody looked up.

  ‘Patroclus, I beg you, can’t you persuade Achilles to relent? Or won’t he at least let you put on his armour and lead the Myrmidons into the field? Maybe you could trick the Trojans into thinking he’s back in the war? You know, demoralise the enemy? It’s worth a try.’

  Patroclus left at once to report to Achilles. On the way, he ran into Eurypylus. He’d taken one of Paris’s arrows in the thigh and was losing blood faster than a horse can piss. Patroclus stopped. He knew what to do. He’d been taught by Chiron, the good centaur – if you care to believe in centaurs – and by Achilles.

  ‘Yarr
ow for the arrow,’ he said.

  Eurypylus knew what was coming and bit on the bronze.

  ‘Better clench your fists too,’ Patroclus said, putting a spear-shaft into his hands.

  Then he cut out the arrow from the flesh, bathed the wound and crumbled the bitter healing root over it, which both staunched the blood and acted as a sedative, taking away the pain.

  Meanwhile, Hector had reached the wall again. But the Trojan mounts refused the fosse with its sharpened stakes, fucking suicide, and even Hector could see that there was just no point at which a horse could risk the ditch, not trundling a chariot behind it. This was a job for the infantry.

  There’s always one heroic fucker, though. One of their leaders, a crazy cunt called Asius, spotted the narrow causeway we used for our own retreat, and he led his company across it, making straight for the open gate. They ran right into Polypoetes and Leonteus, our Lapith champions, and the next thing they knew it was raining fucking boulders. Damasus was the first casualty. He took a massive one on the top of the head, dropped from the full height of the wall. It splintered the bone and scattered the brains. He struck the ground, where he was quickly joined by other casualties of the rain of rocks. But it was the wind-drinking spear of Idomeneus that stopped Asius in his tracks and put paid to his bid to be a hero. The spear struck him in the chest with such force that it spun him round. He started to stagger back to the line but didn’t get far. The second spear pierced him right between his retreating buttocks, coming out at the navel, so that he was speared both ways now, front and back. Not much fun. He died screaming unheroically.

  That ought to have been omen enough. And it was. But Penelope added another to the web. High above the ditch, a soaring eagle, clutching in his talons a writhing snake. The reptile reared and struck the bird, which dropped its prey and flew screaming down the wind. Polydamas was a brave fighter but also a believer in augury. He urged Hector to heed the portent and not to dispute the ships further. His leader rounded on him angrily.