The Amazon and the Warrior

by Judith Hand

  Bias suddenly appeared beside him. “I told you to stay away from here,” Damon shouted. This was something no one should see, no one should hear. Bias would never be the same.

  Bias ignored him, and together they dragged away yet another table. Then each threw a chair off the pile. Two ale barrels, still half filled and heavy, they tipped on their sides and rolled away.

  The screams were subsiding. Fingers of fire licked around the door’s edges. The flames fully engulfed the roof. Damon felt and smelled heat singing hairs on his arms.

  “Faster!” he urged.

  Together they shoved away another table.

  The beating on the door stopped.

  They stood side-by-side and stared at the last table, which flames from the door had set afire and which was untouchable, burning from one end to the other.

  He took Bias by the shoulders and walked the boy backward, away from the rectangle of fire and death.

  He slumped onto the ground, Bias beside him.

  He sat silent, and felt the water of his grief and remorse running down his cheeks. When he was young, when he was ignorant, he had let others lead him on just such raids. And then he killed the boy’s mother, whose final gesture was to reach out to her dying son, a gesture that tore at Damon’s heart. And when he returned to his home at last, two months later, he was told that a raid by Thracians had taken the loves of his life. That day he grew old.

  Wolf crawled on his belly to Damon’s leg and placed his muzzle there, seeking comfort. Damon laid a hand on his head.

  To Bias he said, “Where is Dia?”

  “I left her on the hill.”

  “You were brave to come. I’m sorry for what you have seen. For what you will see. I need to check now, if anyone yet alive can be helped. You can help me, or not. As you chose.”

  Damon stood.

  Bias jumped up. “I can help.”

  Using his two thumbs, he wiped tears from Bias’ cheeks. “Then find anyone alive, and call me to come check them. I will be able to tell if anything can be done. Move quickly.”

  With Bias’s help, he made a survey. None of the men in the central courtyard were alive. They checked the first home next to the burning central building. No men or women there. Nor in any of the next four homes. It quickly became evident they would find no women or young children. The Acheans were utterly thorough, ruthlessly expert at what they did. That was, of course, why they were so successful. He found no one who could be saved. No one who could breed a grudge.

  He strode down to the beach and found a fishing boat with a sail of a size he could manage alone. To Bias he said, “I want you to take Dia and Wolf home. The Acheans have breached the Hellespont.”

  A chill of horror raised the hairs at the back of his neck as he thought of Pentha, and how she would take this news. How all of the People of Artemis might soon be affected.

  He had only seen five vessels. Could the Acheans be planning things even bigger? Pentha would be in the middle of anything that happened.

  “Going by boat is the fastest way for me to take word to the Hearth Queen. This boat will do.”

  He put both hands on Bias’s shoulders, looked into his eyes. “You have seen for yourself, now, the evil men do to each other. I can’t take the memory away.” He wanted to say something that would heal the boy’s spirit, but couldn’t think of anything that would touch this horror. “I can say, the pain will grow less with the years.”

  He gave the boy what he hoped was a reassuring squeeze, and said, “Go!”

  25

  AT THEMISKYRA’S HARBOR, DAMON FOUND A farmer with an empty mule-cart and asked for a ride. Fortunately, the man felt no urge to chat. At the Amazon compound entry, the farmer said, “You can’t go in.”

  “I know.”

  “Just tell the girl what will come scamperin’ up what your business is.”

  Damon nodded. The farmer flicked his mule’s flank with a long pole.

  A girl of perhaps thirteen galloped up on a mare with white socks. The girl had raven black hair, bound in the Amazon way at her nape. She wore the leather trousers of winter. This was probably her first year here. She pulled up in front of Damon and waited.

  “I’ve come to see Queen Penthesilea,” he said. “Tell her it’s Damon. And tell her I bring news of Achean ships in the Euxine Sea.”

  The girl displayed no visible reaction. Too young to know what this means.

  “You can meet her there,” she said, pointing to a long, single story building a short walk away to his right. The girl wheeled the horse, already expert at it, and trotted toward a stable.

  He walked to the building, and despite the disturbing news he carried, he found curiosity rising. Amazons spent nights here with the men of their choosing. Had he agreed to her arrangement, he might have been spending nights here with Pentha.

  One step up brought him onto a long, covered porch, finished with finely polished pine planks. A number of chairs, also of finely worked woods with animal designs carved into the backs, invited a person to sit and rest. The view down the coastline presented at least a hundred women engaged in either archery or practice with a slingshot. Beyond the warriors, mares and their young grazed in a fall pasture.

  Inside he found a spacious reception room. Nearly every speck of floor lay hidden under carpets with brilliantly colored designs—spirals, rosettes, diamonds, zigzags. His feet seemed to sink into the carpets like walking on fresh moss. He had seen rooms in some fine homes, but never more lush carpets. Red, green, and deep blue tones dominated. The one on which he stood probably originated somewhere far to the east of the Hittites. Perhaps the Mittani. Perhaps even as far as Assyria.

  He eased himself into a cushioned chair. This was late afternoon. He was alone. He imagined quite a different scene at night.

  Curiosity struck more forcefully. He stood again and looked down the hallway that led from the room’s center to the building’s other end. Door after door lined the corridor. He looked around to be certain he was alone. Then he walked to the first door, opened it, and peered inside.

  Clean and comfortable. Two large chairs cushioned in green sat against one wall with a low table holding a bronze basin and a lamp. The bed was larger than any he’d ever seen, something royalty might insist on. A black, mink-pelt cover invited one to come and touch. A washing basin occupied one corner, and a cabinet stood in the other. A man could curl up or stretch out in pleasure here.

  Curiosity satisfied, he backed out, returned to the reception room, and sat.

  Soon Pentha strode in, accompanied by two of her commanders—Bremusa and Clonie. And Hippolyta. Hippolyta rushed to and embraced Damon. Her spirit always impressed him with an uncommon gentleness.

  Pentha simply stood still before him—but he felt as if the lightening of Zeus jumped between them.

  The room and the other women blurred. His heart seemed to rise to his throat. He ached to hear her speak so that he could see the yellow light. He had dreamed for a year of hearing her speak again.

  “It pleases me to see you, Damon.”

  26

  AND THERE IT WAS, THE YELLOW LIGHT, IN Pentha’s voice exactly as Damon remembered it. No. Better. Like the brightest golden sunrise.

  And did he detect a hint of caring, a bit of wistfulness?

  He said, “I’m sorry. I carry bad news.”

  “Tell us.”

  “I was out with the boy I told you about, Bias. We saw smoke and I feared it was at a Kaskan village. When we arrived, the village had been sacked. Achean ships had put back to sea.”

  Her gaze seemed to bore into his skull. “Can you be sure they were Achean?”

  “I know them well, Pentha. There were five Achean warships.”

  “Who was leading them? Was it Achilles?”

  “Why do you ask specifically about Achilles?”

  She snapped back, “Was Achilles there?”

  “The pennants were those of Achilles, but it would be impossible to say if he was the
re. The ships were too far away to see individuals. I saw only five ships. They may have been an expeditionary force, without the king.”

  She let out a long breath. “The villagers?”

  “Killed the men, boys, old women, infants. Took women able to work and breed.”

  Hippolyta sank into a chair, bowed, and shook her head. Pentha turned to the broad-chested Bremusa. “Take this news to Harmonia. Tell her, I call a Grand Council, and it must be this night.” Bremusa struck the back of her clenched fist to her forehead in salute, turned, and strode out.

  Pentha paced. Clonie stood still, watching her commander.

  Abruptly, Pentha stopped. She looked at him. “You say there were five ships. What direction were they moving?”

  “West.”

  “I am calling for a Grand Council. Tonight. You and I have talked of this before. It’s my worst fear, but I’ve felt in my bones it was coming. It changes everything.” She went back to pacing.

  “Sadly, I agree.”

  “Good. Then you will stay the night, and describe for the council what you saw.”

  “No.”

  “Of course. You must.”

  “You don’t need me. I’ve told you everything I know.”

  She stopped and stared at him, as if not quite understanding, or not wanting to understand. The shocking vibration in the air sprang back to life between them.

  “Hippolyta. Clonie. Leave us. I’ll join you shortly in the barracks.”

  Hippolyta stood, and they left, Clonie following Hippolyta out the door.

  “Why won’t you stay? I want you to stay. I may need your help.”

  He touched the place where, beneath his tunic, her arrowhead lay and fought the urge to cross the chasm between them, take her in his arms, and take one more kiss from her mouth. “You will be talking of war, preparing for war. War is not my life.”

  “I ask only that you describe what you saw.”

  “I repeat, you don’t need me to do that. I need to return to my animals.”

  “This news is earthshaking, Damon. Why won’t you stay? Perhaps there will be some who question that the ships truly were Achean.”

  He didn’t want to argue with her. He said nothing.

  Her face, which had been so intense and angry, relaxed. The fire in her eyes softened. “Is it me? Are you for some reason angry at me?”

  He shook his head, could not suppress a rueful smile. She had no idea how much it was her, but certainly not in anger. “Of course not. I remember our days together with nothing but pleasure.”

  She said softly, “I have missed you.

  I have missed you. The words snatched the breath from his lungs. “And I missed you.”

  “Then stay.”

  “War is not my business. And nothing has changed my feeling that you also are not my business. I can’t be with a woman only now and then. At a whim. If I spent the night here in Themiskyra, I would want to spend it only with you. And certainly not in talk of war.”

  “Stay, Damon.”

  “I cannot.” He bowed his head to her. “I ask your leave.”

  “I’ll not order you to stay. I’ll not keep you if you don’t want to stay.”

  Fire burned where his heart should be. “I’m glad to see you again. Glad to hear, and see, your voice.”

  She smiled at that.

  He added, “I will have you and your people in my prayers.”

  With an effort so mighty he felt his heart might burst open, he turned and walked out the door.

  27

  A YOUNG, FEMALE VOICE SAID, “YOUR TAMBOURINE, mistress.”

  Derinoe let the curtain close and turned to face the hazel-eyed girl of perhaps fifteen holding the tambourine Derinoe had forgotten and left behind when changing clothes. Derinoe wore three silk garments, the outmost dark blue one essentially a veil covering most of her body but not her arms, face, or head. To the girl she said, “You need not call me mistress. I’m a servant too.”

  “Oh, mistress. That’s certainly not so. No dancer in Troy compares with you. I doubt there’s a better dancer in the world.”

  Derinoe smiled. “Kind words make a heart happy.”

  The girl nodded at the curtain, which Derinoe still held closed, and said, “May I look?”

  Derinoe once more pulled the heavy, gold silk curtain back so that she and the girl could peek into the Great Hall of Priam. This dinner for one hundred of Troy’s elite was a dinner of joy. Hektor had returned, and not only safe. In this last battle of the war season, he had fought the Achean royal Ajax—a huge man—and their duel had ended in a tie. In recognition of their respect for each other, the warriors even exchanged armor. Tonight, long after the evening’s celebrants snuffed out their last candle, Derinoe would be in Hektor’s arms. She hoped to catch a glimpse of him before she danced, to assure herself he was truly uninjured.

  Together she and the girl contemplated the lavish scene. Despite years of siege, Troy’s control of her landlines enabled these assembled elites to receive the goods necessary to feast in opulence. A head table occupied the end of the room to her left. Two side tables ran from the head table to the room’s other end. Wood blazed in the great central hearth as the season, now in early September, had turned cold.

  Gold plates, candleholders, goblets, and platters flickered in the light of candles on the tables and lighted bronze cressets on the walls. The mouth-watering smell of cooked beef and partridge, boar and hare permeated air and clothing. Heavy red wine flowed fast and in abundance, like the Scamander River in early spring. And in the room’s center, between the hearth and Priam’s table, six acrobats in body-tight costumes of red and yellow entertained, twisting themselves into the most remarkable positions, doing astonishing flips, then piling one onto the shoulders of another.

  The girl said, “Isn’t our Queen elegant? I know a woman who sews Hekuba’s gowns. That purple. Purest silk from Cos.” She put a hand to Derinoe’s outermost covering. “This is silk too, isn’t it?”

  Derinoe nodded, still gazing into the room. Would Hektor come? Surely he would. The banquet was for him. Would Andromache arrive with him?

  The thought of Andromache soon studying every tiny bit of Derinoe’s exposed body gave Derinoe a chill that tickled the back of her neck. The last time she had danced for the royals Andromache had pretended interest in Derinoe’s costume, but then had said, “I hear you have a little girl. And a boy. Where is your husband?”

  Afterward, Derinoe couldn’t even remember how she had replied, but her fears for the children had leapt once more into full flame.

  “I’m more fascinated by the monkey,” she said to the girl, something to divert her mind. “See! There. Behind the king’s throne. The ambassador from Nubia’s king Memnon just gave it as a gift.”

  The monkey sat on a perch behind Priam, a remarkable little thing with a black body, white nose, and long, white beard. With tiny, busy hands, it peeled skin from a yellow fruit and then took delicate bites from the white center.

  The monkey wasn’t the only animal present. A bronze cage—of a man’s height—displayed four almost entirely white Little Egrets with startling, bright yellow feet. Long, snowy plumes crested their heads. A hand-raised pair of cranes, as tall as a man’s chest and resplendent in white with gorgeous black necks, strutted freely between the tables.

  Behind another curtain, musicians created a festive mood with music of reed flutes, tambourines, and sistrum. Soon the musicians would play for her.

  The girl said, “Do you get to eat from the table after the banquet?”

  She shook her head. After the banquet, she would join Cassandra in the palace rooms reserved for the king’s daughter. Cassandra didn’t enjoy large public dinners. They would dine there together before Derinoe went to Hektor’s quarters. He rarely slept the whole night with Andromache. Derinoe put her hand to the curls piled onto her head, as if checking that everything about her was perfectly in place to meet him.

  The guests leapt to thei
r feet, thumping on the tabletops in applause. Hektor strode from the main door to the head table with Andromache the customary pace behind him. At least from here, Derinoe could see no wound on him.

  Aphrodite had surely kissed Hektor in his mother’s womb. He was so stunningly handsome. Not pretty like his younger brother, the fair-haired Paris, who sat next to Helen. No, Hektor had strong features and a character to match.

  His light skin contrasted sharply with black curly hair, very like her own light skin and dark hair. His close-cut beard emphasized the strong jaw, and under a high forehead, his dark blue eyes most often bespoke thoughtfulness.

  He went first to his father and kissed Priam on both cheeks, then embraced his mother and kissed her too. He sat to his father’s right with Andromache behind and to his left. Derinoe counted eight of Priam’s other legitimate sons also seated at the head table with their wives.

  “When do you dance?” the girl said.

  “The musicians will wait until Andromache serves Hektor food. Then they begin the music for me.”

  “Aren’t you nervous?”

  Irony seized her and she smiled, hugely amused. This young woman could have no idea how nervous. With her dancing, Derinoe had attracted Hektor. She did not think he would abandon her or their child if she ceased to please the court. On the other hand, what would happen when she grew old? Too old to dance and please. This worry never ceased to plague her. And now, what if Andromache did know the truth for certain? “Very,” she said.

  The music changed. Conversation diminished. A hush gathered around the guests. Derinoe straightened. The girl took hold of the curtain. “Now,” Derinoe said.

  The moment she stepped into sight, the hush became complete. Only the music filled the space. Making no movement except with her hand, she rattled the tambourine, then touched it to her thigh. Sudden silence.

  When she once again rattled it, the music commenced, drums and flutes. She moved her hips side to side, keeping her body still from the waist up except for moving the rattling tambourine in a wide circle.