The Armour of Achilles

by Glyn Iliffe

  He stood up as if he intended to claim the object there and then, but Odysseus seized his wrist and pulled him back down again.

  ‘Don’t be a fool, Ajax,’ he hissed, staring at the giant warrior with a strange look in his eye. ‘Eperitus and I saw Thetis bring the armour to Achilles. Besides, the shield could just as well be showing Achilles’s marriage to Deidameia, whom he wedded back on Scyros. Why should it be you and Tecmessa when it could easily be Menelaus and Helen, or even myself and Penelope? And which of us hasn’t laid siege to one city or another?’

  Ajax shook Odysseus’s hand off and stared at him.

  ‘You’re wrong, Odysseus. This armour was meant for me, I can feel it in here.’

  He tapped his fist against his chest.

  ‘Ajax, listen to me. The armour has some sort of enchantment about it – I felt its pull myself, only a short while ago. But it was made for Achilles, at the command of his immortal mother. Since when have the gods lavished gifts like this on ordinary warriors like you or me?’

  ‘I’m no ordinary warrior, Odysseus. I’m the equal of any god in battle – even Zeus himself !’

  The others drew back, Little Ajax frowning and hissing through his teeth at his namesake’s blasphemy. But Great Ajax just glared at them contemptuously.

  ‘Fools! Superstitious old women have less fear of the gods than you do. But I tell you the truth, I’ve never needed an Olympian’s help in any battle I’ve ever fought. Even the great Achilles calls on their help before each fight, but not me! And if any of them dared face me in mortal form then I would master them by my own strength alone.’

  Eperitus shook his head. ‘I remember a short while ago you thought you’d met your match in Hector. Now you’re saying you could beat the father of the gods himself ?’

  ‘A comment made in a moment of exhaustion and weakness,’ Ajax replied, scowling. ‘I have the skill to beat anyone, Hector included, and the fact the gods have sent this armour to me proves it.’

  ‘But the armour belongs to Achilles,’ Odysseus reminded him. ‘Unless you think you can take it from him.’

  Ajax looked at him thoughtfully, then shook his head.

  ‘There’s no treachery in my heart, if that’s what you’re implying, Odysseus. But one way or another, I tell you the armour is meant for me.’

  At that moment Agamemnon stepped forward and raised his arms for silence.

  ‘Achilles,’ he called out in a stern voice, ‘you have called us to assembly. State your reasons and be quick about it; the rest of us have a war to fight.’

  Achilles did not answer immediately. He took a deep breath, enjoying the smell of the sea and the feel of the breeze against his face. Then he turned to look at Agamemnon and for the first time the King of Men saw the shield in all its glory. His eyes widened and his sceptre – which had also been made by Hephaistos – almost fell from his fingers.

  ‘Agamemnon, son of Atreus, king of Mycenae,’ Achilles began, the red plume of his helmet flickering lightly in the breeze. ‘It was your decision to take Briseis from me that caused this feud between us. And yet I would rather the girl had died first and my anger had never been provoked, for it has brought calamity on the Greeks and death to Patroclus, my beloved friend. But these things have happened and I have taken a solemn oath that I will not bury Patroclus until I have avenged his death with Hector’s blood, so for my part I declare this feud over. If you will accept it, my spear is at your service once more, King of Men.’

  His words were greeted by a ringing cheer from the watching soldiers. Those who were fully armed clashed the shafts of their spears against their shields, while even their leaders – Ajax, Odysseus and Eperitus among them – rose from the benches and shouted their joy at Achilles’s announcement. Only one man remained seemingly unmoved, though there was a glimmer of a smile on his thin lips.

  ‘You aren’t the only one, Achilles, to place the blame for our feud squarely on my shoulders,’ Agamemnon declared, staring round at the gathered men, many of whom looked down at the sand as his eyes passed over them. ‘Every man here was angry at me for driving you into your hut and away from the fighting, though none dared voice it. And yet I tell you the fault for our rift was not mine. It belongs with the gods, who blinded me with folly in order to heap more misery and suffering upon mankind. But as there can be little doubt that the immortals have betrayed me, or that they have shown you their favour’ – he pointed at the shield and his eyes lingered a moment on the constantly moving designs – ‘I will honour the gifts Odysseus promised you on my behalf. Let them be brought to you now – Briseis first – so that the whole army can witness my offer of reparation and the end of our feud.’

  The assembly raised their voices in agreement, but Achilles stepped forward and drew his sword, holding it up like a sceptre.

  ‘Let the gifts wait until after we have driven the Trojans back to their city and Hector’s blood is soaking the soil of Ilium.’

  The voices were louder in response, Ajax’s chief among them, but when Odysseus stepped forward and took the staff from Agamemnon, they soon fell away again.

  ‘Stem your anger, Achilles. We don’t all have your strength and our limbs aren’t as fresh as yours. The men must eat before they go out to battle and the gods have to be honoured with sacrifice for ending your quarrel. Agamemnon has acknowledged that the immortals overruled his own judgement and has offered reparation; you should have the grace to accept it. The Trojans will still be there once the right customs have been observed, and then we can all make them pay for the suffering they’ve inflicted on us.’

  Reluctantly, Achilles conceded and the army set about preparing their breakfast, though the prince stubbornly refused to eat until the day’s fighting was over. Even when Briseis was brought before him, along with the slaves and the other wealth that had been promised him, Achilles hardly seemed to notice the woman over whose ownership his costly feud with Agamemnon had taken place. Instead, he sat on one of the benches as his Myrmidons took Briseis to his hut, watching impatiently as Talthybius brought a boar to Agamemnon and the King of Men invoked Zeus’s blessing on their restored friendship. Then, as soon as Agamemnon had slit the creature’s throat and Talthybius had hurled its carcass into the sea, Achilles stood and returned to the Myrmidon camp to prepare his chariot for war.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  HECTOR’S DILEMMA

  Hector stood looking at his shadow as it lay across the crushed grass, pointing like a long, black finger towards the shining sea. He wore the armour he had stripped from Patroclus’s body, the magnificent breastplate, shield and helmet that for many years he had longed to pull from the corpse of Achilles himself. About his waist was the purple belt Ajax had given to him after their inconclusive duel. They were symbols of honour, won in combat against men whose spears had brought many a good warrior down into the dust, and yet they gave him no pleasure as he awaited the slaughter of another day’s fighting.

  Aeneas and Apheidas stood to his left, Paris and Deiphobus to his right, their own shadows thin and black before the bright sunshine. On the plain between them and the walls of the Greek camp were strewn the bodies of the men who had been slain in the previous days’ battles. They lay singly or heaped one upon another, hardly recognizable as the living, breathing, articulate beings they had been only a little while before. Now, scattered groups of vultures picked at their dead eyes or probed open wounds with their hooked beaks, occasionally flapping their large wings to give themselves leverage as they tore off strips of flesh. Elsewhere, packs of wild dogs buried their sharp teeth into exposed limbs and torsos, ripping open stomachs and pulling out long, purple entrails that the other dogs would then pounce on in a frenzy. Hector watched them impassively. He could send groups of soldiers to chase the vile creatures away, but what good would it do? The animals would soon come back and he would only be tiring his already exhausted men further.

  He sighed audibly and Aeneas, who had been fidgeting impatiently, took thi
s as a sign that the debate could begin.

  ‘Any moment now, those gates are going to open and the entire Greek army will come pouring out again,’ he said. ‘And if they find us still here, they’re going to massacre us. It’s a long way back, Hector; we need to return to Troy with the army intact, while we still can.’

  ‘Aeneas is right,’ Paris added, tracing his finger along the scar that crossed his face from forehead to beard. ‘The men are exhausted, but worse than that, they’re afraid. With Patroclus dead, Achilles is going to want revenge. He’ll be leading the Greeks this time, not Agamemnon, and if he was difficult enough to fight before he’ll be like a lion among lambs now. Face it, Brother, for all our efforts we’ve fallen short of victory. I say let’s return to the safety of the city and save our forces for another day.’

  Hector folded his hands behind his back and watched one of the broken forms on the battlefield wave a weak arm at a vulture, which hopped out of reach and waited for the arm to flop back down before closing in again. Aeneas and Paris were right, of course. Morale was low with the certainty that Achilles was going to return to battle, so one fiercely pressed attack could break the army’s will to fight and force them into open retreat across the plain. Better perhaps to turn back now and find shelter behind the city walls, where they would be safe and could rebuild their strength. With new allies getting nearer by the day – the Amazons led by Queen Penthesilea from the east and the Aethiopes under their king, Memnon, from the sun-parched south – it would not be long before they could sally out again and trap the Greeks in the middle, there to be annihilated.

  But allies would demand a high price for bringing victory. And Hector still had his pride: marriage to Andromache may have softened his youthful ambitions, but it had not taken away his warrior’s lust for glory. He wanted to defeat the Greeks himself, and, most of all, he wanted to face Achilles and take vengeance for the murder of Andromache’s father and brothers.

  ‘The walls will keep us safe, no doubt about that,’ said Apheidas, staring out at the carnage on the plain. ‘But they won’t send the Greeks from our shores or give us victory. Our only chance of that is to stand our ground here and defeat them, or to die in the attempt. If we go back now, Troy may hold out for another couple of years – but the Greeks will triumph in the end. Hector knows that.’

  Like the other commanders, Apheidas was ignorant of the new allies Priam had won over, so Hector was able to ignore the provocation in his tone. But the young and impetuous Deiphobus could not.

  ‘Apheidas is right. The only way we can save Helen is to destroy the Greeks now, while we have a chance. We’ve fought hard and lost many men, but so have they. All it needs is for one of us to kill Achilles and the rest of them will fold.’

  ‘I couldn’t agree more,’ Hector answered, turning to his comrades. ‘Get rid of Achilles and the rest is a matter of time. But who is going to kill him? Will you, little brother?’

  Deiphobus blinked in surprise. He had fully expected Hector, the bulwark of Troy and its greatest hope, to see the sense of his argument and announce he was going to face Achilles at last. The notion that he would accept the advice of Paris and Aeneas and retreat had never occurred to him. It was almost as bad as the thought of his beautiful sister-in-law, whom he had loved since the first moment he had seen her, being trapped inside the city walls for more long years or being taken back to Sparta by Menelaus.

  ‘I will kill him!’

  The five men turned to see a short, stocky warrior strolling towards them. His shield was slung across his back and he clutched two spears in his right hand, while his helmet dangled by its chin strap from the fingers of his left.

  ‘Podes!’ Hector exclaimed, rushing to embrace his friend. But the next moment he pulled away and stared hard into the man’s dark eyes. ‘What’s wrong? Why have you left Troy when I gave strict orders for you to stay there with the militia? And who’s protecting my wife and son?’

  ‘Andromache’s my sister, don’t forget, and Astyanax is my nephew – do you think I’d leave them if they weren’t safe? The fact is they never needed my protection in the first place and that’s why I’m here. I’m sick of waiting on the walls with frail old men and boys too young to fight, listening to rumours and watching the wounded and captured streaming back through the Scaean Gate. I’ve come to avenge the evil the Greeks have done to our beloved homeland – and to fight at your side, Hector, as I have done in every battle up until now.’

  ‘That all changed when Achilles killed King Eëtion and your brothers,’ Hector declared, his gravelly voice strained. ‘You’re the last of Andromache’s family. If you die, it’ll destroy her, so think of your sister rather than yourself and return to the city at once.’

  ‘No! You’re the one who should go back to Troy and let the rest of us do the fighting for a change. You never give yourself any respite in this war, my friend, no doubt because you don’t trust us to hold off the Greeks without you. But if you fall, then Troy will fall with you, and Andromache and Astyanax’s fate will be sealed! Go back to them now and let me face Achilles – it’s my duty and my heart-felt desire to avenge the deaths of my father and brothers, whom he slew in his vile and ungodly anger at Thebe.’

  As the last word left Podes’s lips, the different gates along the Greek wall flew open with a crash and streams of men began pouring across the causeways. First came the cavalry, the horsemen quickly assembling on each flank and the chariots forming a long line opposite the waiting Trojans. Hordes of archers and slingers followed, running on to the plain to create a thick, disorderly screen of skirmishers. Then came the dense ranks of heavily armoured spearmen, their bronze and leather equipment clanking as they drew themselves up into well-disciplined oblongs before the ditch. The sun sparkled on the breastplates and helmets of the assembled army, but from the armour of one man in particular it blazed like a great beacon, too fierce to look at. The red plume of his helmet fluttered in the ever-present wind like a jet of fresh blood, while on his arm was a shield as brilliant as the face of the sun.

  The Trojans looked on their foes with dismay. Their numbers seemed hardly diminished by the days of hard and terrible fighting that had taken such a toll among their own ranks, and though none could see his face, every man knew that the warrior with the bright armour in the leading chariot really was Achilles this time, fresh to the battle and seething with the desire for revenge. Hector looked from the resurgent Greeks to the faces of his own men, standing in their companies behind the small group of their commanders, and he knew what he had to do.

  ‘We cannot fight them,’ he announced, though his heart was heavy and he had to force the words from his lips. ‘The army’s exhausted and doesn’t share your enthusiasm for this fight, Podes, despite its skill and courage. I will speak to Agamemnon and call a day’s truce to gather the dead again, and then we’ll withdraw to the city during the night.’

  Podes spat in the dust and glowered his disapproval at his brother-in-law.

  ‘Back down now and all is lost,’ he warned. ‘You’re a greater man than that, Hector, and Troy is tired of surviving to fight another day. You must lead us to victory – or say farewell to everything you love.’

  ‘He’s right,’ Apheidas agreed, clutching at the hilt of his sword and looking at the prince sternly. ‘You’ll not get another chance like this.’

  Hector thought of the Amazons and the Aethiopes who were drawing closer to the city with each passing day and shook his head as he turned to face his men.

  ‘I’ve made my decision. I’m going to parley with Agamemnon and—’

  ‘Podes!’ Aeneas shouted.

  They turned to see Podes leap on to Hector’s chariot and shove the surprised driver back into the dirt. He seized the reins and with a shout sent the horses leaping across the plain.

  ‘Stop him!’ Hector ordered.

  At once Aeneas took up his spears and dashed forward, calling to the driver of his own chariot. The man was quick to react and a m
oment later Aeneas had jumped on to the car and was pursuing Andromache’s brother towards the Greek lines. As he watched the chariots speed across the battlefield, Hector knew there was no chance now of a truce and little hope of an unmolested return to the safety of Troy.

  ‘Apheidas,’ he said through gritted teeth, ‘prepare your cavalry to cover the army’s retreat, if need be. Paris, Deiphobus – pray to the gods and call on all your courage. We’re going to attack.’

  Raising his spear above his head, he turned to the ranks of skirmishers and spearmen whose tired faces looked at him with grim expectation. Then he thrust the weapon towards the Greek lines and, with a great shout that sent the vultures flying slowly and awkwardly up from the bodies of the dead, the army advanced.

  Out on the plain, Aeneas quickly overhauled Podes – whose horses were struggling to obey his unfamiliar voice – and shouted for to him to turn back. Podes ignored him, but as Aeneas prepared to cut across and force him away from the Greeks, Achilles spurred his own chariot forward and came rushing towards the two men at a fearful pace. Knowing there was no escape, Aeneas hurled his spear at the approaching warrior, only to watch Achilles raise his shield and swat it aside as if it were nothing more than a toy arrow fired by a child. The Greek’s reply was rapid and accurate, the point of his heavy spear punching through the oxhide layers of Aeneas’s shield and tearing it from his arm. A storm of arrows from the Locrian archers followed and as Aeneas ducked behind the low screen of his chariot his driver steered the horses away and drove them back towards the Trojan lines.

  ‘Achilles!’ Podes shouted, bringing Hector’s chariot to a halt and jumping down to the ground. ‘Achilles, you murderous dog! I am Podes, son of King Eëtion and brother to his seven sons, all of whom you murdered when you sacked my home city of Thebe. I have come to face you and take revenge for their deaths.’