The Amazon and the Warrior

by Judith Hand

  She took his hand. Looking into his eyes she said, “I do care for you, Damon. You surely know that. But—”

  “Then, so be it.”

  She squeezed his hand. “I need to see Mother.”

  During the walk from the Temple to Gryn’s home, Pentha seemed oblivious to the stares and murmurs of everyone they passed, all of whom looked at her ash-smeared face, crumpled trousers and tunic, and especially her jaggedly butchered hair, with open-mouthed astonishment.

  At Gryn’s door a page from Harmonia approached Pentha. She waved the page off and went inside. “What is the message?” Damon asked.

  PENTHA ENTERED AND WENT straight to the weaving and sewing area where Gryn spent most of her time. Her mother sat in a chair, a blue silk tunic and an embroidery needle in her hands, but staring into space.

  Pentha rushed to her and knelt beside the chair. She tried to speak, but tears blocked off words.

  Gryn patted her head.

  Pentha looked up. Her mother was crying. “Forgive me,” Pentha whispered. “I beg forgiveness.”

  Gryn, lips trembling, only shook her head.

  “I have done a great evil. And more than once.” Now words tumbled out of her mouth. “This is the gods’ punishment, and I have to accept it. But I can’t bear to live if you don’t forgive me.”

  “Pentha, my sweet. What foolishness is this?”

  Damon came in. Gryn wiped away Pentha’s tears, then said to Damon, “She thinks she has done so much evil that this accident is the gods’ way to punish her.”

  He moved across the room and to her surprise, dropped to the floor and sat cross-legged opposite her. He touched her cheek and with such tenderness she felt her heart break. “What could you ever have done for which the loss of Hippolyta at your own hands would be fair punishment?”

  “My heart knows.”

  “Well, I don’t believe that. This is the Furies. Or the Fates, blind and cruel. These senseless things don’t come to good people as punishment. They just happen.”

  She wanted to believe he was right, and that she was somehow not to blame. She wanted to believe. But something in the deep place where she hid her secret wouldn’t let her.

  The gentle lines of his faced shifted, and he clenched his jaw. “The page brought news you’ve wanted. Priam has answered at last. His words are, ‘Priam, besieged king of Troy, asks that the great Hearth Queen of Themiskyra send to us troops under the command of the Warrior Queen Penthesilea so we may destroy the Achean invaders encamped before my people.”

  At last!

  Damon continued. “Semele also sends word. Her spy in the Achean camp assures her that Acheans cannot have rowers ready in any great numbers to take on the Hellespont for another two or three moon cycles.”

  Mind racing. Pulse racing. She leapt to her feet. Damon rose, facing her. He did not want this, she knew. But he would be at her side. That she also knew.

  She looked to Gryn and said, “We can be, must be, at Troy before the next full moon.”

  45

  SLUMPED IN A CHAIR IN HIS TENT IN THE LATE afternoon, Achilles took a swig of wine from the jewel-encrusted golden cup he kept at hand. He’d been doing a lot of drinking, maybe too much drinking, since withdrawing from the alliance. He was probably half drunk already.

  But at least this afternoon he had good reason. Patroklos had insisted on returning to the battle.

  So here he sat, half drunk, worried for Patroklos.

  Demon’s piss, I hate Agamemnon!

  This whole mess was Agamemnon’s fault. And all over a woman awarded as a prize to Achilles. Agamemnon’s belated taking of Briseus back for himself, the most prized woman Achilles had lately been awarded, simply demanded strong action. Honor required that Achilles withdraw his forces from the siege. No man, no leader, could accept such humiliation.

  For weeks now, though, he’d decided he must find some way to reenter the struggle while keeping honor intact. Without him and his forces, the Acheans took loss after loss. And a spy inside Troy had informed him that the Amazons were marching on Troy. If only he could find a way to attack Themiskyra now. Curse the blasted Hellespont!

  A sudden hue of many voices and the sound of chariots flooded the tent. Automedon swiftly followed the noise. Tears streamed down Automedon’s cheeks. Stunned at the sight, Achilles dropped the cup.

  “Achilles, come,” Automedon sobbed. “Patroklos.”

  Achilles leapt from the chair. Outside, four litter bearers walked toward him, a body covered in a white linen cloth laid out between them, entirely covered in linen, including the face.

  He stopped, his feet suddenly sunken into the ground like two great stones. When the bearers reached him, they halted.

  Odysseus and Ajax came up, one on either side of the litter. “I am profoundly sorry,” Odysseus said. The sunlines on his weathered faced were deeply dug with sorrow.

  Pulling his feet from where they had taken root, Achilles forced himself to the litter, next to Ajax. He wanted to reach out to pull back the thick linen, but his hand was not only shaking, his arm seemed paralyzed because blood shown through the cloth in so many places.

  “This is the work of Hektor,” Odysseus added. “Patroklos fought well. Brilliantly. He killed many. But then he ventured so close to the Trojan wall that he caught Hektor’s attention. Hektor challenged him.”

  As if lifting the weight of the world itself, Achilles raised his arm and reached toward the linen. Ajax gripped his wrist. “You don’t want to look, Achilles. Hektor went mad. He dishonored himself.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Ajax looked to the ground.

  Odysseus said, “To do something like this.” He shook his head as if amazed. “For any man of honor to defile a warrior’s body. This is not like the Trojan prince, to behave so. Some great evil seized Hektor today.”

  Achilles shook off Ajax’s grip, grasped the linen sheet, and thrust it back. His dearest friend and companion lay nearly naked, his body soaked in blood, and there were wounds—the slashes of spear wounds everywhere. The top of Patroklos’ head was missing. The ground beneath Achilles’ feet tilted. So much blood covered his cousin’s beautiful face, Achilles could not, in truth, recognize him.

  Achilles legs failed, he went to his knees. Nausea brought up the wine and his last meal. This was not battle, this was defilement.

  When the vomiting ceased, Automedon helped Achilles to his feet. Achilles’ body shook and he could only draw in short, gasping breaths.

  “We had to fight to reclaim the body,” Odysseus added. “I think Hektor would actually have allowed the hoard to feed Patroklos to the dogs. As his chariot retreated, he shouted, ‘That’s for Glaukos!’”

  Ajax said, “We took many captives. Four are Priam’s sons.”

  “Good,” Achilles said. “Good.”

  Achilles looked to Odysseus. “I want the biggest funeral pyre this camp has ever seen. You see to that for me, won’t you?”

  Odysseus nodded.

  “And then afterward, we will have games. In Patroklos’ name, I shall give great prizes to the winners.”

  He bit the inside of his lip to stop tears welling at the back of his eyes that would shame him. They could come later. But not now. “And we will have sacrifices. Oh, yes. We will have sacrifices.”

  FULLY DRESSED FOR THE funeral, Achilles lay on his bed. Over an hour earlier a slave completed dressing him, and for that hour, he waited flat on his back. The past two days had passed with the unreal feeling of a horrific dream you can’t stop and can’t escape. Last night, with his troops and the other royals, he spent a nightlong vigil at Patroklos’ pyre. Now, at midday, he must preside over last rites for the only person he had ever really loved.

  No, that wasn’t exactly true. He had loved others. But only Patroklos had truly loved him.

  A slave entered, stopped inside the door and said, “It is time, Lord Achilles.”

  Time. Time to get up. Time to say farewell. Time to face an emp
ty future.

  The slave said, “You’ve not eaten for two days, sire. Are you certain you don’t want me to bring something before you go?”

  “I have no need to eat.”

  Achilles sat up. His muscles felt like stiff boards. He finally got his soles on the floor and, fighting weighted feet, he walked outside.

  Automedon waited with the chariot. Achilles stepped into the car, and they began the half-hour journey to the funeral pyre. At Achilles’ direction, the pyre sat on a rise in the plain where it could best be seen from Troy. He would have Hektor see this day. And Priam. Both of them would see the rage of Lord Achilles for the mutilation and dishonor of Patroklos.

  He had forced himself to watch slaves wash Patroklos’ body. Watched as they filled the brutal wounds with unguents. The body had then been dressed and laid on a bier and draped with a white shroud. All the chariots of Patroklos’ fellow warriors had been driven three times round the bier, and then Achilles had accompanied it, with his troops, to the site of the pyre. There every man cut off a lock of hair and cast it onto the body.

  Now, as they once more approached the site, his Myrmedon men lined the road, all with ashes on their forehead, all fully armored. They raised their swords in salute as he passed. Behind them, in eerie silence, stood the troops of the other kings.

  Achilles had never seen so huge a pyre. Great logs framed the bottom, topped by smaller ones that would burn hotly. On top of it all lay Patroklos, his mutilated body covered with white linen, in a corral stood a hundred sacrificial bulls, their gilded horns shining in the sun. Achilles would thank Odysseus. He could not have done a better job himself. Sometime during the morning the body had been wrapped in the fat of slaughtered cattle, to speed the reduction of the flesh to ashes.

  Achilles stepped from the chariot and, with Automedon beside him, took his place as the head of the assembled royals. He could not bring himself to acknowledge any of them. Status and courtesy. What point had these things to him now?

  Twelve men were bound to stakes around the pyre’s base. Twelve Trojan captives.

  Odysseus crossed from where he stood with his troops. Frowning, he stopped in front of Achilles. “The Trojan warriors, Achilles. This is not wise. It is unprecedented. You will not be remembered well for it.”

  “Don’t tell me what to do,” Achilles bellowed.

  Odysseus bowed his head, turned, and returned to his men.

  Lamentations rose from the crowd, a deep wailing accompanied by the beating of swords against shields. As the mourning cries continued, the sacrifices began, performed by the priests. They slit the throats of two of Patroklos’ hunting dogs. Their blood ran red on the ground. Their bodies were added to the pyre. Four of Achilles best horses were led up a ramp to the top of the pyre and similarly slaughtered.

  He asked Automedon, “Which of the twelve are Priam’s sons?”

  “The four at Patroklos’ feet, where they are closest to Troy.”

  One after the other, the priests slit the Trojan prisoners’ throats. The cries of the assembled warriors changed to a shouted, “Patroklos! Patroklos! Patroklos!” Achilles prayed that Priam and Hektor were watching.

  He signaled, and four priests set torches to the prepared wood. At first the fuel did not catch. Achilles ordered libations of wine thrown onto the fire. A blaze sprung up, encouraged by the northern wind.

  The sight of the flames drove home the ceremony’s finality. His throat tightened. This time tears could not be stopped. He offered his final salute. “A good and honorable man, Patroklos. A great warrior and loyal friend. There will be no other like him.”

  The heat from the blazing pyre was so great now that it put shame to the sun. “May the greatness of this warrior’s spirit never be forgotten. May some part of that great spirit live forever in our hearts.”

  He wanted to say more. He did not dare, lest he completely break down.

  He turned and strode to his chariot. When the fires burned themselves out, Patroklos’ ashes would be gathered by the priests, placed into a golden bowel, and into the shelter built for it. When the time came, the ashes of Patroklos would be retrieved, and they would be mingled with his own ashes, so that he and Patroklos might share eternity as they had shared life.

  To Automedon he said, “Tomorrow I make peace with Agamemnon. I will rally the Acheans to an attack on Troy like no other. And I will kill Hektor.”

  “All of the royals will welcome you back.”

  “My mother came to me in a dream last night. She told me that if I challenge Hektor and kill him, I will die here.”

  Automedon looked at him, eyebrows raised in surprise. “Then surely—”

  “I will have my revenge. If I am to die, so be it. I will die in battle. I can accept dying in combat, in a struggle to the death with a worthy opponent. That’s the way a warrior should be remembered.”

  46

  SEATED NEXT TO ALCMENE IN CASSANDRA’S CHILDREN’S garden, Derinoe finished retying the ribbon in Myrina’s hair and then gave her daughter a hug. The ribbon didn’t need tending. Derinoe just needed something to keep her mind off of raging fear gnawing her insides. “Now go play.” Myrina scampered to a group of girls dressing dolls.

  To Leonides Derinoe called out, “Leonides, don’t jump from there. It’s too high.”

  Alcmene, carding wool while watching the children, said, “He’s a daring one, that boy. I have to keep my eye on him every minute.”

  “You are wonderful with the children.”

  Cassandra rushed into the garden. She grabbed Derinoe’s hand and pulled her away from Alcmene. “I am going to watch the battle. It is by the northwest wall and close. Come with me!”

  Derinoe pulled free. “I have never watched one. I won’t watch this one. I am too sick with fear to watch.”

  Cassandra nodded. “You must pray for Hektor, then. Pray to Athena.”

  Cassandra draped her shawl over her head and swept past Derinoe and out of the garden.

  Derinoe returned to Alcmene. She picked up wool and a carder and set to work, her hands moving almost frantically.

  She let Alcmene chat on about a recipe for a yellow dye, only half listening. In what seemed little more than a heartbeat, a young girl rushed into the garden. “Derinoe,” the girl said, pausing to gasp for breath, “the Lady Cassandra says you must come to the wall. The Lord Hektor is fighting with Achilles.”

  Shivers prickled her sides. Derinoe stood, her hands clenched together, her will undecided, torn. Hektor and Achilles. A nightmare come to life.

  She followed the girl, needing to see but her heart thumping with dread.

  She found Cassandra alone, but not far from the royal ladies: Hekuba, Helen, Andromache and other wives of Priam’s sons, all of them wearing black robes of recent grief.

  Of a sudden, a great envy of Helen stabbed her heart. If Derinoe lost Hektor, she and her children could be in mortal danger. She would have only Cassandra to rely on for protection from Andromache. But there stood Helen, whom the Trojans loved in spite of pretty Paris’ being such a silly, trivial man. Even Hekuba and Andromache staunchly defended Helen.

  Scores of elites clustered together, rigid and watching in fascination. Cassandra grabbed Derinoe’s arm and pulled her to the wall’s edge and pointed to a confusing mass of men and chariots who struggled close enough to the wall that the nearer men could be recognized.

  Clashing of metal upon metal, shrieks, groans, and screams. The sound lifted the hair on her scalp. Her stomach knotted.

  Bronzed swords and shields and helmets gleamed like a myriad of setting suns on still water. Pennants of dazzling gold, red, blue, green, and purple flapped in the never-ending breeze or lay trampled in the dirt. And everywhere, bodies lay in pools of blood. The breeze shifted, and a whiff of a strange, feral stench of earth mixed with urine and blood and bowels sent bile up the back of her throat.

  She turned away, swallowing hard to keep her insides down.

  Cassandra yanked her arm and s
pun her around. “There,” she said, pointing.

  Derinoe saw Hektor. He and another man fought each other in a clearing in the middle of the massed bodies, their chariots standing off to the side, and all the men around them watching, their hostility temporarily suspended.

  Achilles!

  Derinoe’s heart turned to ice. He was exactly as she remembered him. Huge. Even taller and bulkier than Hektor. The deep chill gave way to a hot flush of rage.

  Hektor held only his sword. Achilles had spear and sword. Neither was helmeted. Hundreds of warriors, from both sides, had parted to make room to watch the battle between these two famed enemies.

  Her trembling arm clutching Derinoe, Cassandra rambled. “My parents tried and tried to make Hektor stay inside the walls, but he wouldn’t listen. He went out. He accepted Achilles’ challenge. Like a madman he raced around the wall in his chariot. He must have hoped to draw Achilles close enough to a place where archers on the wall could kill him. It didn’t work. Now this!”

  Achilles thrust his spear toward Hektor’s legs. Hektor rushed forward and took a mighty swing toward Achilles head. Up came Achilles’ sword. Hektor swung his sword again. Achilles countered with his spear.

  She wanted to turn away, but fear and fascination rooted her to the wall.

  Hektor rushed Achilles, forcing the Achean backward so many steps that the watching men cleared more space. She prayed, a whispered prayer: “Kill him, Hektor! Kill him quickly!”

  Achilles threw himself against Hektor. Hektor stumbled backward with Achilles pressing against his body. Twisting to his right, Hektor broke free

  Achilles raised his spear, snapped his powerful spear arm forward, and drove the tip into Hektor’s throat.