The Hawk Eternal

by David Gemmell

And now a sneak preview from the launch of David Gemmell’s ambitious new trilogy, set in the time of Troy. This is a tale of kings and queens, of legendary heroes and epic combat. The action begins with Book One,

  LORD OF THE SILVER BOW

  Coming in October 2005 from Del Rey Books

  The Golden Ship

  The storms of the past two days had faded into the west, and the sky was clear and blue, the sea calm, as Spyros rowed his passenger toward the great ship. After a morning of ferrying crewmen out to the Xanthos, Spyros was tired. He liked to tell people that at eighty years of age he was as strong as ever, but it wasn’t true. His arms and shoulders were aching, his heart thumping as he leaned back into the oars.

  A man was not old until he could no longer work. This simple philosophy kept Spyros active, and every morning, as he woke, he would greet the new day with a smile. He would walk out and draw up water from the well, gaze at his reflection in the surface, and say: “Good to see you, Spyros.”

  He looked at the young man sitting quietly at the stern. His hair was long and dark, held back from his face by a strip of leather. Bare chested, he was wearing a simple kilt and sandals. His body was lean and hard muscled, his eyes the brilliant blue of a summer sky. Spyros had not seen the man before and guessed him to be a foreigner, probably a rogue islander or a Kretans.

  “New oarsman, are you?” Spyros asked him. The passenger did not answer, but he smiled. “Been ferrying men like you in all week. Locals won’t sail on the Death Ship. That’s what we call the Xanthos,” he added. “Only idiots and foreigners. No offense meant.”

  The passenger’s voice was deep, his accent proving Spyros’s theory. “She is beautiful,” he said amiably. “And the shipwright says she is sound.”

  “Aye, I’ll grant she’s good to look upon,” said Spyros. “Mighty pleasing to the eye.” Then he chuckled. “However I wouldn’t trust the word of the Madman from Miletos. My nephew worked on the ship, you know. He said Khalkeus wandered about talking to himself. Sometimes he’d even slap himself in the head.”

  “I have seen him do that,” agreed the man.

  Spyros fell silent, a feeling of mild irritation flowering. The man was young and obviously did not appreciate that the gods of the sea hated large ships. Twenty years ago he had watched just such a ship sail from the bay. It had made two voyages without incident, then had vanished in a storm. One man had survived. He had been washed ashore on the eastern mainland. His story was told by mariners for some years. The keel had snapped, the ship breaking up in a matter of a few heartbeats. Spyros considered telling this story to the young oarsman. He decided against it. What would be the point? The man had to earn his twenty copper rings, and he wasn’t going to turn back now.

  Spyros rowed on, the burning in his lower back increasing. This was his twentieth trip out to the Xanthos since dawn.

  There were small boats all around the galley, stacked with cargo. Men were shouting and vying for position. Boats thumped into one another, causing curses and threats to be bellowed out. Ropes were lowered and items slowly hauled aboard. Tempers were short both among the crew on the deck and the men waiting to unload their cargo boats. It was a scene of milling chaos.

  “Been like this all morning,” said Spyros, easing back on the oars. “Don’t think they’ll sail today. It’s one of the problems with a ship that size, getting cargo up on that high deck. Didn’t think of that, did he—the Madman, I mean?”

  “The owner is to blame,” said the passenger. “He wanted the largest ship ever built. He concentrated on its seaworthiness and the quality of its construction. He didn’t give enough thought to loading or unloading it.”

  Spyros shipped his oars. “Listen, lad, you obviously don’t know who you are sailing with. Best not say anything like that close to the Golden One. Helikaon may be young, but he is a killer, you know. He cut off Alektruon’s head and ripped out his eyes. It’s said he ate them. Not someone you want to offend, if you take my meaning?”

  “Ate his eyes? I have not heard that story.”

  “Oh, there’re plenty of stories about him.” Spyros stared at the bustle around the galley. “No point trying to push my way through to the stern. We’ll need to wait awhile until some of those cargo boats have moved off.”

  A huge, bald man, his black beard greased and twisted into two braids, appeared on the port deck, his voice booming out, ordering some of the cargo boats to stand clear and allow those closest to clear their cargo.

  “The bald man there is Zidantas,” said Spyros. “They call him Ox. I had another nephew sail with him once. Ox is a Hittite. Good man, though. My nephew broke his arm on the Ithaka a few years back and couldn’t work the whole voyage. Still got his twenty copper rings, though. Zidantas saw to that.” He turned his face toward the south. “Breeze is starting to shift. Going to be a southerly. Unusual for this time of the year. That’ll help you make the crossing, I suppose. If it does get under way today.”

  “She’ll sail,” said the man.

  “You are probably right, young fellow. The Golden One is blessed by luck. Not one of his ships has sunk, did you know that? Pirates avoid him—well, they would, wouldn’t they? You don’t cross a man who eats your eyes.” Reaching down he lifted a waterskin from below his seat. He drank deeply, then offered it to his passenger, who accepted gratefully.

  A glint of bronze showed from the deck, and two warriors came into sight, both wearing breastplates and carrying helms crested with white horsehair plumes. “I offered to ferry them out earlier,” muttered Spyros. “They didn’t like my boat. Too small for them, I don’t doubt. Ah well, a pox on all Mykene anyway. Heard them talking, though. They’re not friends of the Golden One, that’s for sure.”

  “What did they say?”

  “Well, it was more the older one. He said it turned his stomach to be sailing on the same ship as Helikaon. Can’t blame him, I suppose. That Alektruon—the one who lost his eyes—was a Mykene, too. Helikaon has killed a lot of Mykene.”

  “As you say, not a man to offend.”

  “I wonder why he does it.”

  “What? Kill Mykene?”

  “No, sail his ships all over the Great Green. They say he has a palace in Troy and land in Dardania and somewhere else way north. Don’t remember where. Anyhow, he is already rich and powerful. So why risk himself on the sea, fighting pirates and the like?”

  The young man shrugged. “All is never as it seems. Who knows? Maybe he is a man with a dream. I heard that he wants to sail one day beyond the Great Green, to the distant seas.”

  “That’s what I mean,” said Spyros. “The edge of the world is there, with a waterfall that goes down forever into darkness. What kind of an idiot would want to sail off into the black abyss of the world?”

  “That is a good question, boatman. A man who is not content, perhaps. A man looking for something he cannot find on the Great Green.”

  “There you go! There’s nothing of worth that a man cannot find in his own village, let alone on the great sea. That’s the problem with these rich princes and kings. They don’t understand what real treasure is. They see it in gold and copper and tin. They see it in herds of horses and cattle. They gather treasures to themselves, building great storehouses, which they guard ferociously. Then they die. What good is it then?”

  “And you know what real treasure is?” asked the young man.

  “Of course. Most ordinary men do. I’ve been up in the hills these last few days. A young woman almost died. Babe breeched in the womb. I got there in time, though. Poor girl. Ripped bad, she was. She’ll be fine, and the boy is healthy and strong. I watched that woman hold the babe in her arms and gaze down on it. The mother was so weak she might have died at any moment. But in her eyes you could see she knew what she was holding. It was something worth more than gold. And the father was more proud and happy than any conquering king with a vault of treasure.”

  “The child is lucky to have such loving parents. Not all children do.
”

  “And those that don’t get heart scarred. You don’t see the wounds, but they never heal.”

  “What is your name, boatman?”

  “Spyros.”

  “How is it you are a rower and a midwife, Spyros? It is an unusual pairing of talents.”

  The old man chuckled. “Brought a few children into the world during my eighty years. Developed a knack for delivering healthy babies. It began more than fifty years ago. A young shepherd’s wife had a difficult birth, and the babe was born dead. I was there and picked up the poor little mite, to carry it away. As I lifted him he suddenly spewed blood, then started to cry. That began it, you know, the story of my skill with babies. My wife . . . sweet girl . . . had six children. So I knew more than a little about the difficulties of childbirth. Over the years I was asked to attend other births. You know how it is. Word gets around. Any girl within fifty miles gets pregnant, and they’ll send for old Spyros come the time. It is strange, you know. The older I grow the more pleasure I get bringing new life into the world.”

  “You are a good man,” said the passenger, “and I am glad to have met you. Now take up your oars and force your way through. It is time for me to board.”

  The old man dipped his oars and rowed in between two long boats. Two sailors above saw the boat and lowered a rope between the bank of oars. Then the passenger stood and, from a pouch at his side, pulled out a thick ring and handed it to Spyros.

  It glinted in his palm. “Wait!” shouted Spyros. “This ring is gold!”

  “I liked your stories,” said the man with a smile, “so I will not eat your eyes.”

  Also By David Gemmell

  (published by Ballantine Books)

  LION OF MACEDON

  DARK PRINCE

  ECHOES OF THE GREAT SONG

  KNIGHTS OF DARK RENOWN

  MORNINGSTAR

  DARK MOON

  IRONHAND’S DAUGHTER

  THE HAWK ETERNAL

  THE DRENAI SAGA

  LEGEND

  THE KING BEYOND THE GATE

  QUEST FOR LOST HEROES

  WAYLANDER

  IN THE REALM OF THE WOLF

  THE FIRST CHRONICLES OF DRUSS THE LEGEND

  THE LEGEND OF DEATHWALKER

  HERO IN THE SHADOWS

  WINTER WARRIORS

  WHITE WOLF

  THE SWORDS OF NIGHT AND DAY

  THE STONES OF POWER CYCLE

  GHOST KING

  LAST SWORD OF POWER

  WOLF IN SHADOW

  THE LAST GUARDIAN

  BLOODSTONE

  THE RIGANTE

  SWORD IN THE STORM

  MIDNIGHT FALCON

  RAVENHEART

  STORMRIDER

  TROY

  LORD OF THE SILVER BOW (October 2005)

  The Hawk Eternal is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  2005 Del Rey Mass Market Edition

  Copyright © 1995 by David A. Gemmell

  Excerpt from Lord of the Silver Bow by David Gemmell copyright © 2005 by David A. Gemmell

  All rights reserved.

  Published in the United States by Del Rey Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

  DEL REY is a registered trademark and the Del Rey colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.

  Originally published in Great Britain by Legend Books, a division of Random House UK Limited, London, in 1995.

  www.delreybooks.com

  eISBN: 978-0-345-48613-4

  v3.0