People of the Inner Sea (The Age of Bronze)

by Diana Gainer

  aaa

  Twenty-eight long and narrow ships rode the waves of the Inner Sea, their beaked prows pointing southwest, toward Argo. Beneath a leaden sky, naked, sun-browned men pulled at their oars. Until they were out of sight of the land, they labored without speaking. The only voices to be heard were those of the navigators, on the platforms at each ship's stern, as they called the cadence for the rowers. Each helmsman, on his stern platform, craned his neck from time to time, straining to see the first of the twenty-eight ships.

  When only the column of smoke was visible from the land behind them, a square of sun-bleached linen rose above the heads of the rowers in that first longboat. "Raise the sail!" the helmsmen cried to the men in their own vessels. Several rowers released their oars, allowing the paddles to lie flat against the sides of the longboat, held in position against oak tholepins by straps of leather. The men prepared to raise the mast from where it lay, in the center of the ship. Its thicker end they shoved down into the stand made for it, in the middle of the vessel. A block of wood held it tight in its mooring. Four ropes of twisted flax secured it upright, tied to the port and starboard sides of the narrow bow and stern. From beneath the rowing benches, the men brought the sail, unwrapped its sheepskin covering, and attached it to the yard. On either side of the lead vessel, a great square of linen rose above each black hull, ropes securing the bottom corners of the sails.

  "The wind is strong," a thin oarsman observed hopefully, as the wind caught and billowed out the sail above him. "At least we will have a little rest." He sank down on his wet bench, rubbing his cold and aching arms.

  aaa

  On the shore behind the Lakedaimóniyan ships, Diwoméde washed his injured foot in the sea, grinding his teeth at the sting of the salt. Beside him, T'érsite rinsed the linen bandage, casting sidelong glances at the younger man. "You should have a woman do this," the gap-toothed soldier told him. "A nice, submissive captive should be washing your laundry and binding your wounds."

  "You know I did not receive a woman in the allotment," Diwoméde grunted, wincing as T'érsite wrapped the damp bandage around his foot once more.

  "You could buy one," T'érsite suggested, helping the younger man stand.

  Diwoméde was not hopeful. "My best prize was the pair of white horses from T'ráki that wánaks Agamémnon awarded me. They are dead. All I received yesterday was bronze." T'érsite said no more on the subject as he helped Diwoméde hobble back to his tent.

  In the shelter, the young man sank down gratefully on his sheepskin pallet. "Owái, T'érsite, my foot is killing me," he groaned. "Are there any more poppy jugs?"

  "I will see."

  As Diwoméde lay flat and closed his bleary eyes, T'érsite once more left the tent and walked through the seaside encampment. The men were up and about, the fires built up and crackling beneath caldrons of barley gruel and lentils. Sitting around the rough hearths, the men drank mixed water and wine, dipping it from large, ceramic bowls. "I killed four last night," one boasted, waving his two-handled cup.

  "Idé," spat another, nursing a dislocated shoulder. "You speared four little boys. I may have killed only two. But they were grown men."

  The first angrily shouted in the other's face, "Boys? They had full beards and wore bronze helmets!"

  T'érsite passed them without comment, kicking tent flaps open as he passed them, to glance inside. "Dáuniya," he called at each entrance. "Are you in there?" More than once he surprised a man and woman in a close embrace on their sheepskins. Driven quickly away by an empty clay pot or a dusty sandal hurled at his head, T'érsite pressed on, unperturbed.

  Near the center of the camp, the largest of all the tents stood. Muffled sounds came from inside, a man's grunts and a woman's wails, in a rising rhythm. "No, Agamémnon, no!" shrieked the higher voice, to no avail.

  T'érsite ducked behind the big tent, and hurried past with furtive glances to each side, hoping that he would not be seen by its owner. Once past the great shelter, he slowed his pace again, ambling easily to a wide area empty of tents, but filled with prone men. Here, stretched out on the bare earth, lay the seriously wounded, growing pale and cold, one by one, as the sun rose, unable to warm them with its feeble rays.

  T'érsite passed a man with crushed legs who seemed to be breathing no longer, his face pale and damp. Beside this man lay another who breathed still, but in quick and shallow gasps. His half-open eyes were glazed and unseeing, his hands weakly clutching at a massive wound in his side. Blood still oozed from his cracked ribs into a pool beneath him. Beyond him lay two others with deep gashes in their arms and legs, moaning, writhing in the clutches of burning fever.

  In the midst of this dying, one man stood unwounded, the front of his kilt washed in deepest crimson. Before him knelt a man whose face was obscured with blood, his nose recently broken. "Get me a goose quill," ordered the man on his feet. He spoke to a young woman in a long skirt, whose black hair fell to her waist in a thick braid.

  "Yes, Mak'áwon," answered the woman obediently, hurrying to a mass of clay jars and woven baskets stacked beyond the line of wounded men. From a basket she brought a large feather and presented it to the man in the bloody kilt.

  He took the quill and examined it cursorily. "Very well, Dáuniya. I will set his nose, then you wash his face." She nodded silently, clasping her work-worn hands behind her back.

  Mak'áwon grasped the hair of the injured man, who knelt nervously at his feet, and pulled his head back. The wounded man raised his hands instinctively. "Get your hands down!" Mak'áwon bellowed. At the same time, he deftly ran the goose quill up the other man's nostril. While the man with the bloody face roared and cursed with pain, his eyes pinched shut and streaming reflexive tears, Mak'áwon moved the broken nasal bones and cartilage back into place, pushing from the inside with the stem of the feather, pressing with a beefy hand on the outside. Withdrawing the quill, Mak'áwon stood back to eye his handiwork. After a brief consideration of the remaining damage, he said, "Now let me do the other side."

  "Get away from me!" the wounded man protested, choking and gasping. Before his physician could object, he scrambled away on his hands and knees, blood pouring from his face.

  Mak'áwon would have followed his patient, but T'érsite quickly stood in his way and asked, "Are there any more poppy flasks?"

  Mak'áwon looked him up and down with some surprise.

  "Ai gar, it is not for me," T'érsite laughed. "It is for Diwoméde, for his foot, remember?"

  The medical man shook his head. "No more poppy essence is to be distributed, by command of the high wánaks."

  Behind him, Dáuniya padded back to the stack of jugs and baskets. Silently she held up a small clay jar, shaped like the head of a dried poppy. Where Mak'áwon could not see, she caught T'érsite's eye. With a jerk of her head, she indicated a walk in the direction of the big tent.

  T'érsite pretended not to notice the woman. He shrugged his shoulders good-naturedly. "If that is Agamémnon's command, Diwoméde cannot argue," he told Mak'áwon unconcernedly. And he turned away, back toward the center of the camp. Before the large tent he waited, trying to look inconspicuous, poking at the fire with a bit of kindling. He did not have to wait long for the surgeon's assistant to appear, the small flask hidden in the folds of her ragged skirt.

  Dáuniya surreptitiously delivered her juglet, standing close to T'érsite and moving the little vessel from her side to his without looking at it. "Say my name to Diwoméde, now," she whispered to the broad-shouldered man, as he drew a fold of his kilt over the juglet. "Do not forget," the woman urged him. "I do not want to spend the rest of my days as the slave of a physician." Her young face contorted with distaste, she hurried back to Mak'áwon and his miserable charges.

  A large man's head suddenly peeked out the flaps of the great tent, a head with a full mustache and beard, both tinged with gray. "T'érsite!" he shouted, startling the man at the fireside. "Tell Diwoméde I have work for him. He is to gather an escort for the capt
ives. I have decided to allow the slaves to visit the funeral pyre by the city gate. Each can sing one song and cut a lock of hair for her kinsmen. Then Diwoméde must bring them all back to camp. There will be no lengthy rites this time. I want the lamentations finished before today's evening meal. Go, you lazy goat! What are you waiting for? Tell him!"

  T'érsite had straightened at the first appearance of the bushy head. As his superior spoke, T'érsite shifted his weight nervously from one foot to the other. "Yes, wánaks," he responded at last. "I will tell him. If that is what you want. But his wound…"

  "By 'Aidé," cursed the king. "I had forgotten about that. Ai, then, send for my brother."

  T'érsite lifted his shoulders in a shrug that was almost a cringe. "Meneláwo sailed at dawn. Idé, there is wánaks Idómeneyu now!" he hastened to add, pointing to a distant, bearded figure. "I will tell him, king Agamémnon."

  The wánaks nodded and his head disappeared inside the tent. In his place came a young woman. Her long, dark robe was rumpled, her eyes red from weeping. T'érsite gestured for her to follow him.

  aaa

  Across the Sqámandro River, by the blazing funeral pyre, soon there trailed a line of captives. Haggard warriors accompanied them from the seaside camp to the fire, their spears and swords at the ready. Each woman was allowed a brief song of lamentation and a blade to cut a lock of hair to toss to the flames. On the opposite side of the pyre, men and women from the smaller camp by the city gathered to watch the procession of misery. They cried out at the sight of those they knew among the captives, their hands reaching hopelessly toward each other.

  "Kashánda!" wailed a woman of middle age, with graying hair and wide hips, in the small group by the citadel’s blackened walls. "Owái, my poor little sister," she wept, spying the younger woman who had come from Agamémnon's tent.

  Kashánda looked across the flames at the woman who called her name, staring woodenly out of bruised and swollen eyes. She made no response to her sister. In silence, she knelt by the fire and bent her head for T'érsite to cut a lock of her hair with a bronze razor. She took the severed lock without glancing at the man, tossing it into the fire to burn. Raising her hands toward the sky, she began to sing.

  "Ai, Wilúsiya, my native land, I am leaving you.

  Under your soil, no grain has been planted.

  Ai, wealthy Tróya, I will mourn your lost children.

  On your steep hills, no sheep have been pastured.

  Six bright stars have fallen from Assúwa's sky.

  Six white doves have fallen from Tróya's nest:

  Parents, brothers, city, land.

  Ai, father and mother, I am an orphan now.

  Four brothers have followed you.

  Qántili and Paqúr, I have seen your pyres.

  Lupákki and Dapashánda both have left this earth."

  At each name, Kashánda's older sister, across the pyre, cried out and tore her face, wailing especially at the sound of the last. "Owái no, no, not Dapashánda, not him too!"

  With the butt end of his spear, the captives' guard urged Kashánda on. She rose, still singing, her voice now strong and angry.

  Winds, cruel winds, fan the flames and consume our halls.

  Lady Dáwan, mother of the gods; hear me, Apúluno,

  Ai, the Horse has betrayed your children.

  Poseidáon has failed us.

  Lady Kórwa is weeping, Lady Préswa is mourning,

  For the crop sprouting here is grief, for the hillsides are barren.

  Ai, Dáwan, send no rain, flood the earth with bitter tears,

  Till Tróya has sweet revenge."

  Kashánda began to turn away from the fire. When her sister called out her name once more, she looked back over her shoulder. "Good-bye, Laqíqepa," she called, tears welling in her eyes.

  Behind Kashánda came a younger woman, a fat baby in her arms crying wearily. Laqíqepa cried out again from the city side of the pyre, seeing the mother and child. "Owái, Andrómak'e, my poor brother's wife, what will become of you?"

  Without answering, Andrómak'e knelt by the fire in her turn. She pressed the little boy's face to her bruised shoulder before setting him on the ground. Choking, tears stinging her scratched cheeks, she sang her lament.

  "Owái, husband!

  Qántili, you were too brave.

  Beloved, you were far too bold.

  May lady Préswa treat you well,

  Though hers is such a cold embrace.

  For my love I cut my hair,

  But hair grows back – it is not enough.

  For you alone I scratch my face,

  But scratches heal – the heart does not.

  Ai, my soul laments your loss.

  Lamentations are too brief, far too brief.

  I will give my love my eyesight,

  Tear these eyes from my face.

  Eyes torn out will never heal,

  As my heart will never mend, Qántili."

  Close behind Andrómak'e knelt a young man with bony limbs. One of very few male captives, he had been stripped naked, and his back bore the marks of a recent whipping. He had been clean-shaven until recently, but a short stubble now covered his cheeks and chin, and all his hair was cut short.

  "Érinu!" wailed Laqíqepa, "owái, my poor little brother!"

  But Érinu did not answer her any more than the others had. Alarmed at the words of Andrómak'e's song, he threw his arms around her and clasped her hands in his. "No, sister-in-law, do not touch your eyes," he whispered in her ear, as she struggled weakly, crying with the abandon of a small child. "The souls of the dead take the form of birds, to fly to queen Préswa, to Dáwan's daughter. There in 'Aidé, my brother Qántili will find good things again. First, there will be a wondrous banquet where he will see all his kinsmen again. He will find my father and mother there to greet him, as well as his brothers. They will seat him at Préswa's golden table, and serve him the wine of the gods, mixed with cool water. They will feed him the seeds of the holy pomegranate." They had no more time to mourn, as the spears of the soldiers drove them on.

  Dáuniya came at the end of the line of prisoners. When it was her turn, she would not kneel. Unlike the others, she pushed T'érsite's hand from her black hair. Though tears moistened her cheeks, her face was unscratched and she had cut none of her locks in the recent months of war. By the pyre she spat. "It is just," she announced, staring into T'érsite's astonished eyes, "that those who took me captive in the ítalo land should now taste the bitterness of slavery themselves."

  Back across the low river that bisected the plain, back among the tents by the shore, the Tróyan captives huddled together in misery, while the victorious warriors drank watered wine and ate their fill, in celebration. But, even as they rejoiced, the soldiers turned their eyes to the sky from time to time, pondering the weather. In the flight of Tróya's domestic geese, in the vitals of slaughtered water birds, they sought signs of their uncertain future.

  CHAPTER TWO

  MENELAWO

  Twenty-eight longboats sailed from the blighted kingdom in Assúwa toward the west. On a platform at the stern of the lead ship, stood Meneláwo, the rowers' overlord, wánaks of Lakedaimón. In his patched kilt, one arm pressed to his side above the draining wound, he inspired little confidence in his men. With hollow, despairing eyes, the oarsmen watched their king as he stood behind his helmsman, scanning the horizon for signs of land.

  "We should reach the island of Ténedo before the sun is much past its summit," Meneláwo told the man at the steering oar. "If the gods are with us and the sky clears, we can make the island of Lámno before dark. By the goddess, I wish I had Odushéyu's knowledge of the weather!"

  The steersman grunted his agreement, straining against his extra-long oar. "I wish we had a few more men. Some of the soldiers are not fit to row."

  Meneláwo sighed deeply. "Owái, that is true enough." He turned and wearily surveyed the assembled ships behind him. To himself, he whispered, "Less than half my ar
my remains. What a price I have paid for Ariyádna!"

  At his feet crouched the woman for whom he had paid that price of souls. Her black hair was longer than the men's but just as ill-kept. Her lower lip was swollen, her face dark with bruises. Wrapped in a filthy cloak, she stared absently at nothing, twisting a lock of hair around and around her finger. "Feathered warriors do battle for the queen of the fertile land," she murmured, her head hanging to one side.

  Images flitted through her mind, of burning houses, unclothed men slaughtered in their beds at night, sobbing women collapsing on the still bodies of their husbands, children screaming at the sight of bloody spears and shields. Victorious warriors from Tróya once more killed her kinsmen, behind her vacant eyes, and forced the women of Lakedaimón from their homes. Mixed with those memories were similar ones of the previous day, as the city of her captors had fallen about her.

  Again and again, she turned to see the rising smoke above Tróya, now far behind them. "Owái, 'Ermiyóna," she whispered. "It is the end of the world, my child. Will I ever see you again?"