The Amazon and the Warrior

by Judith Hand

  Damon felt a new flash of unease. He frowned and with the back of his knuckles, roughly stroked his beard. Why would Diomedes be absent? Could the Acheans be hiding forces, just as he and Pentha had hidden their own Amazon cavalry and archers?

  Squinting, he scanned the plain. Although for the most part flat, scattered hillocks humped skyward here and there.

  He scrutinized the five hillocks behind which lay five hundred Amazon horses and their riders, covered with cloth the dun color of the ground. Five hundred horses trained to lie silent for hours if necessary. As hard as he looked, he could see nothing, and he knew they were there.

  The Acheans would not know. At least, they should not know unless Trusis had betrayed them to Achilles, and Damon didn’t believe that was so.

  No. On this day, the pivotal weapons of the forces under Pentha’s command would be surprise along with terror and speed.

  Aware that his anxiety for Pentha caused most of the churning in his gut, Damon looked right and contemplated the waist-high, cobblestone altar. Only a short time ago, Semele sacrificed ten white goats there. A diviner had examined the liver of the first goat slain and said the omens were right for battle. Fire still burned, and black smoke curled upward carrying the scent of charred flesh.

  Damon strode to the altar, knelt, and took the arrowhead in hand. He struggled to force reverence to replace fear as he prayed. “Divine Artemis, beloved daughter of Leto, great patron. I ask again, I beg you, protect Pentha. Give her your strength. Give her victory over the men that besiege this land.”

  At the sound of hooves, he looked up. Pentha rode toward him along the line of solemn warriors who raised their spears and swords in salute as she passed. Admiration and love glowed on every face. She wore full Amazon battle gear, including the golden girdle and fur cap, the insignias of her rank. He bolted to his feet and slipped the arrowhead back under his tunic.

  When Valor reached him, he grasped the halter’s cheek strap. With his other hand, he rubbed the soft nose. “The horses are in place?”

  “In place, down and covered, well before dawn.”

  He stepped closer and let his hand rest on her thigh—firm, and warm, and alive beneath his touch. She dropped the reins. With her left hand she covered his. “Give me time to return to them. Then attack.”

  He nodded and smiled for her, but dread kept his lips stiff.

  She picked up the reins. Damon stroked Valor’s cheek. “Keep her safe,” he said softly. He let go of the halter.

  With a light touch of her knee against the Valor’s side, she wheeled the stallion, and he moved quickly into a trot that carried her away. Damon watched until he could no longer see the white fur of her hat.

  He felt the men stirring, restless to be unleashed.

  At last Phemios said, “She has had enough time now to reach them.”

  “No,” Damon said. “Not yet.”

  The sun now cut patches in the fog, and where light fell on the Acheans, brilliant flashes from the bronze of their helmets, cuirasses, and shields shot across the plain. To the southwest, in the far distance, the increasing light revealed the dim outlines of the massive Achean wall.

  Finally he felt certain she would be in place.

  He strode out before the waiting men and their commanders, drew his sword and raised it. He raised his voice to spread as far as it might. “Do not forget,” he shouted. “Pass the word. Approach slowly. Attack only at my command. We must lead them past our cavalry.”

  He turned. His aide handed him his helmet and then his shield. He secured both, feeling the hot rush of blood to his face, feeling the chest-tightening grip of battle fever. Beating his sword against the shield, he began a slow march forward. “Long live Artemis!” he bellowed.

  “Artemis!” came the responding boom of thousands of male voices. The sound of swords, spears, and javelins beaten upon thousands of shields rose around him like thunder from Zeus.

  The body moved forward, the first five ranks being expert spearmen and javeliners. “Slowly!” he shouted. He kept his pace steady, glanced left and right to be certain the Trojan charioteers were following orders and would not rush ahead.

  At first the enemy made no response. Then he heard the distant sound of a trumpet, followed by the yammering of a battle cry spreading across the plain under the dismal gray fog. The Acheans advanced. They came quickly. He grinned, pleased.

  “Slowly!” he yelled again, keeping to the same steady pace.

  His heart thudded against his armor. His neck grew warm under his tunic. Soon enough the leading edge of Agamemnon’s army moved into range of their archers.

  “Now!” he shouted to Phemios above the sound of the beaten shields.

  75

  DAMON INCREASED THE PACE, FELT AND HEARD the lines of men behind him move as one with him. Within a heartbeat, the blast of a trumpet from behind shattered what, by comparison, seemed like calm. The shouting and beating of shields transformed to a wall of sound.

  He watched with grim satisfaction when their archers, hidden in shallow trenches paralleling the enemy’s advancing line, rose and fired volleys of burning arrows. He heard the hissing of the arrows’ flight, watched the arrows arc and disappear into the low-lying fog only to reappear again as they fell and struck their targets in the front ranks of the Achean forces.

  Trojan slings hurled flaming balls of oil-soaked grasses into piles of dried fodder. The fodder caught quickly. A wall of roaring red flames leapt up and across the field like a bleeding gash on the land.

  Their arrows spent, the first squads of Themiskyran archers retreated at a run toward the Themiskyran line, seeking replacement arrows.

  Chariots emerged on the Achean front. Attempting to turn too quickly in an effort to avoid the blazing barrier, some tipped over. Other drivers looked for a way through the flaming barriers. Horses balked or reared or ignored their driver’s whips.

  But pass through the fiery line some did, followed by the infantry. The oncoming hoard swarmed like ants as they continued their forward rush. And the fires had distracted them. The Achean lines raced passed the hillocks behind which Amazons lay waiting.

  The two opposed forces closed fast. “Javelins!” Damon shouted.

  Immediately came the trumpet signal and waves of Themiskyran and Trojan javelins whistled into the air. At almost the same moment, Achean javelins began to rain around him. He dodged two. A third struck his shield. Its power jolted his arm, but the weapon streaked beyond and impaled itself into the ground.

  “Attack!” Damon shouted. Again the trumpeter signaled.

  He ran forward in a full charge. The front lines collided. The Acheans always sent poor fighters first. He knew this practice. Counted on it. He had seen to it that the best men of Artemis made up their front line, expert javeliners first, then expert spearmen and swordsmen.

  Almost with ease he avoided the awkward moves of the first two Achean spearmen he encountered, and with a single sword blow each, gutted first one and then the other. The Achean tide kept advancing.

  A giant of a man with a mace swung the huge ball at his head. Damon ducked, took the blow on his right shoulder, gasped, fell onto his left knee and lost his helmet. He brought his sword up in time to thrust it deep into the giant’s belly, just under the man’s cuirass. The man fell. Damon rose, put one foot on the body, and pulled his sword out.

  A warrior raced toward him in a chariot, as if to challenge him to a single combat duel to the death. Damon was, after all, the Themiskyra infantry commander. His status guaranteed that his death could swing the tide of battle. And to kill him would count heavily. He loathed this revolting practice of the royals of both sides. Loathed the whole notion that the path to fame and glory lay in killing another man. How many men have you killed? Who? But in a short time he would use this foul tradition to kill Achilles.

  So who was this challenger? The warrior in the chariot’s car didn’t have the enormous stature of Achilles.

  Maybe Agamemnon? No. The w
arrior was too young to be Agamemnon. Then Damon realized the chariot did not carry a royal pennant. This was not one of the Acheans’ royal heroes out for glory.

  The charioteer, his body straining with the effort, drew his team to a halt. The warrior jumped from the car and rushed Damon, sword in hand. They exchanged fierce, ringing blows. White light shot through Damon’s head.

  Then he heard the sounds for which he had been waiting. A trumpet blast from the Achean rear, then the ululating cry of Themiskyran Amazons shrilled over the battling men.

  The hair on his own neck stood, so uncanny was this sound from the throats of hundreds of women as they threw off their covers, urged their battle stallions to stand, leapt onto their backs, and attacked from the rear.

  Hearing this skin-crawling sound, the warrior across from Damon froze, his eyes bulging. Damon gave the man a horrible grin. “Terrifying, isn’t it,” he yelled, and with one huge swing, took off the man’s head.

  Bodies sprawled now, all around him. The air smelled of blood and piss. Sweat poured down his sides.

  He rushed the nearest man in his view. They exchanged two blows. He severed the man’s sword hand. Blood, life, spurted warmly onto legs. At the thumping, creaking sound of an approaching chariot, he spun around scarcely in time to dive headfirst out of the path of a team running with an empty chariot car. He rolled and regained his feet.

  He had lost track of Phemios. Lost track of time. He trusted that Aeneas’ chariot and driver were still near. The quality of the fighters was getting better as the rear ranks of the Acheans, the better ranks, took over.

  He, on the other hand, felt the burn of fatigue, age catching up to a forty-three-year-old man. But he sensed that they were pushing the Acheans back. His next blow he delivered with renewed zeal.

  Now was the time to find Achilles. He spun around, looking for Aeneas’ chariot. Not there. Bremusa caught his eye. She was on her knees and clutching Clonie’s ominously limp body, and even in the heat of struggle, Damon felt a stab of horror.

  Another warrior charged up in a chariot. Before he could dismount, Damon grabbed him by his sword arm, threw him down, and delivered a deep sword thrust into the throat As the charioteer started to drive off. Damon leapt into the car. He shoved the man into the swirling melee of struggling warriors, saw someone thrust a spear into the charioteer’s back. The man’s warbling scream blended into the din of clanging metal, shrieks, groans of the dying, and the thundering of chariot horses and wheels.

  Damon gathered the reins and aimed the pair toward the crest of a hillock. He needed height to find his quarry.

  At the crest, he at first saw only confusion. There were many dead, Themiskyran, Trojan, and Achean. So much waste. Only steps away lay the dead bodies of Marpessa and Evandre. At the rear, though, the Acheans were retreating. Some had actually turned and were running. Mounted Amazons were running them down and finishing them with arrows or axes as their horses galloped past the stunned warriors. Damon doubted that any of these Achean men had ever seen a horse ridden in battle, let alone a horse ridden by a shrieking woman. A thrill of exultation raced hotly under Damon’s skin. The Achean call for full retreat should come at any moment.

  Where was Pentha? He scanned the field for Valor’s distinctive gray color. Nothing. Damon’s heart squeezed tightly and his breath shortened. Where was Pentha! Don’t let her be dead!

  PENTHA HAD ALREADY LOST count or any sense of how many men she had brought down. Around her the struggle still had the crazed feeling of midbatttle, but she had decided before letting a single arrow fly that she would find and challenge Achilles as soon as possible and she had single-mindedly fought her way in the direction where she had first sighted his pennant. She saw a break in the Achean line at almost the same moment she caught her second glimpse of his pennant. She wheeled Valor, bent over him, and they raced toward the opening.

  A downed chariot loomed ahead, then two horses on their sides, their legs thrashing. Valor leaped over them.

  Pentha sensed that she was outpacing her second. It couldn’t be helped. She had to reach Achilles.

  Across the plain, she spotted the pennant and the chariot. She raised her sword arm and after sucking in a great breath, gave a ululation so loud it surprised her. Achilles’ chariot almost at once veered in her direction. He’d spotted her. Doubtless recognized her cap. Now, at last, the mighty Achilles would pay—or she would die with the effort.

  ANOTHER CHARIOT PULLED OUT in front of the Achean line. It sped toward Damon. And it carried Achilles’ pennant. Yes! Damon thought. He reached for the reins—and saw Pentha. She came at a gallop from somewhere behind him, passed on his left, and raced forward.

  Panic exploding in his chest. Scarcely able to breathe. Please, my heart. Don’t do this!

  Achilles’ chariot halted. The legendary warrior dismounted. His charioteer pulled away. Pentha signaled Valor to a halt. The two warriors faced each other, close enough now to clearly see the expression on their opponent’s face.

  Word spread. The battle slowed, then ceased, with both sides in the immediate area separating, retreating in the direction of their respective camps to watch what would happen as the greatest warrior they had ever known fought the Warrior Queen of the Amazons. Residents of Troy would be watching in grim fascination, praying she would give them revenge for Hector. From shouts of rage and screams of pain and death, the plain of Troy fell suddenly, eerily quiet.

  Pentha charged. Her first javelin glanced Achilles’ bronzed shield and flew past him. Achilles was so tall that even mounted, she did not sit much above him. Damon noted, his heart rampaging with fear, that she had at least exchanged her wicker and leather shield for one of the tougher Achean ones. But compared to Achilles, bronzed from head to greaves, she was perilously vulnerable.

  She wheeled Valor and charged again. This time Achilles’ spear went up and he slashed at her as she passed. She deflected it with her shield. Her second javelin dug deep into the center of his shield. As she wheeled again, Achilles ripped the javelin away and thrust it to the ground.

  Damon dropped the chariot’s reins and stumbled out of the car. Without thought he ran toward where they battled, leaping or trampling over bodies and shoving men and women aside.

  He burst onto the scene, his intent to attack Achilles. Two spears crossed in front of him at the same time that a pair of hands grabbed him from behind and yanked him to a halt.

  “Release me!” he bellowed.

  He looked behind. Phemios held him. “You cannot interfere, Damonides,” Phemios said. “She challenged him.”

  Pentha once more charged Achilles. In their struggle, her cap had come off revealing her red hair, a short, fiery mass of waves that framed her exquisite face. Achilles half raised his spear, and as Valor charged, Achilles rammed the spear into the stallion’s chest.

  With great force, Valor’s forward motion threw Achilles backward onto the ground, but the Achean quickly regained his feet. Valor staggered, squealing in agony against the spear. He went down on his front knees. Achilles ran to Pentha and, grabbing her by her hair, pulled her off her dying stallion’s back.

  Time slowed for Damon. He felt every beat of his heart. He saw every curve and line of her face.

  76

  VEILED, WITH BIAS BESIDE HER, DERINOE climbed the stairs to Troy’s northeastern tower. They stepped onto the wall and turned to walk south.

  “I’m glad you wanted to come,” she said. “I have to see what happens. I couldn’t see anything from the encampment.”

  “I would give anything to be fighting. Damon should have let me. I’m not too young. I’ve been practicing. I could at least have carried a pennant.”

  “If after you see this battle you are still so eager to fight, you will doubtless have many opportunities.”

  They reached the southwest section. The battle raged below. People milled about, edging themselves into the best vantage points. Bias looked around, soaking up the mood. “You’d think this was the g
ames at festival.”

  “For some, there is a kind of sick pleasure in watching death and maiming, But others are like me. They’re here because someone they love might not return.”

  “Pentha will be all right. And Damon, too. No one fights better.”

  He was so young, and so naive.

  The battle sounds, faint on the wall’s northern section, were loud now. Cries and shouts, the whinny of horses, and above it all, the clang of metal.

  Bias said, “I smell burning grass.”

  Derinoe looked up at the roof of the great south tower and could see that up there, there wouldn’t even be breathing space. She saw Priam, and beside him Hekuba and Helen. But not Andromache. Was Paris in the battle? Or was he once again withdrawn somewhere else. She thought of Hektor, of his disgust for Paris, and of his own great, courageous heart. A familiar lump swelled in her throat.

  “Here,” Bias said. He grabbed her hand and, tugging her along, squeezed them between two fat men paying attention to two attractive women, but not to their place at the wall.

  Now Deri could see. Her first impression was of churning chaos. Fires burned in the direction of the Achean camp. Horses and chariots moved about here and there on the plain with men, by the hundreds, either still fighting or lying on the ground. Her throat tightened and she pressed a hand to her stomach.

  “We’ve won!” Bias crowed, his voice quiet so as not to capture attention, but greatly excited. “See there. The Acheans are fleeing.”

  This appeared to be true. In the part of the battlefield that lay to the south, in fact, in most of the field, she saw that Acheans were indeed fleeing back toward their encampment, in chariots and on foot, and were being pursued by Amazon cavalry. But there were bodies of men, women, and horses everywhere. Pennants lay on the ground, still clutched in the hands of the seconds of several Amazons, and some pennants she recognized—those of Evandre, Andro, and Harmothoe. Horrified by what this signified, she clenched a fist of one shaking hand and pressed it to her lips.