Fall of Kings (47 page)

Suddenly Skorpios felt very much alone. The last image of Justinos kept
flashing into his mind. He found he could not visualize his friend’s face
smiling or in repose, just in the agony of death. He closed his eyes in pain.

When he opened them again, he saw the small dot of a rider in the distance,
coming from the direction of Troy. The horseman stopped and got off his mount.
Skorpios thought he could heard the man shouting something, but he was too far
away to hear.

After a while the rider got back on his horse and continued along the bank of
the river. As he got closer, Skorpios could see that he was garbed in black
armor. The young Trojan gazed at him in bemusement. A single armored soldier all
the way out here. He must be one of ours, he thought. Surely he could not be an
enemy warrior, riding on his own in such hostile land.

The horseman stopped again. This time Skorpios could hear the words he
shouted, borne on the northerly breeze. “Hektor! Hektor! Come down and fight!
Come and fight me, you coward!”

Skorpios watched for a long time as the rider worked his way down the river,
stopping every few hundred paces. He wondered what to do: go back and report to
Hektor or keep his eye on the warrior. There were other scouts out, so he
settled down to watch, his back against a tree, assuming others would be telling
the strange news to Hektor.

He was observing the rider still when he heard a whisper of movement behind
him and turned to find a sword at his throat.

“You would be a dead man now,” Hektor said, sheathing the sword and emerging
from the undergrowth.

“I’m sorry, lord,” Skorpios replied, his face flushing. “I let you down.”

The Trojan prince squatted down beside him. “You look unwell, lad,” he
commented. “You lost a good friend yesterday.”

Skorpios nodded miserably. Hektor put a hand on his shoulder. “Justinos was a
fine warrior. I have seldom seen better. Make sure you get some food today; then
you will sleep better tonight.

“Now,” he said, turning his gaze on the rider in black. “What do you think of
this?”

“I think he is a madman. He must know there are hundreds of warriors in these
woods who could ride down and kill him in a heartbeat.”

“Yet he knows they will not, because he is a man of honor, and such men
believe against all the evidence that others are the same.” There was a long
silence. “That is Achilles, lad, and yesterday I killed his friend Patroklos.”

“Will you go down and fight him?” Skorpios blurted out the question without
thinking.

Hektor thought for a long moment, then said, “The time will probably come,
Skorpios, when I will. But I will not fight him today, when there is nothing
resting on it except the honor of two men.”

Is that not enough? Skorpios wanted to say, but he remained silent.

The next day the rider was a priest of Ares. Skorpios sat his horse in plain
sight high on the ridge with others of the Trojan Horse. They watched as the
priest, garbed in black robes with twin red sashes, traveled up the river,
stopping from time to time to shout out the challenge from Achilles to Hektor.
The Trojans watched him for much of the day until, as the sun fell into the
horizon, he returned to the city.

On the third day the rider was the king of Ithaka.

Mounted on a sturdy bay gelding and wearing a wide straw hat to guard his
head from the blazing sun, Odysseus was sorely conscious that he lacked the
grace of Achilles or even that of the priest. He recalled that Penelope once had
told him teasingly that he rode like a sack of carrots. He had confessed, “A
sack of carrots would be ashamed to ride this badly, my love.”

He walked the horse slowly to where the Scamander gushed under a wooden
bridge short of the foothills, dismounted gratefully, and settled down to wait.
He had brought enough food for two but was prepared to enjoy the peace and
silence of a day alone.

The sun was starting to fall down the sky when he finally saw a horseman
coming toward him out of the tree line. He could tell at a glance it was Hektor
by the rider’s size and riding style.

As he got closer, Odysseus could see that the Trojan prince had aged a good
deal since they last had met. Hektor reined in his mount and regarded him
silently for a moment, then got down.

“Well, king,” he said coolly, “we meet again in strange times. Are you
Achilles’ mouthpiece today?”

Odysseus chewed on a piece of bread and swallowed. Ignoring the question, he
gestured to the black horse Hektor was riding. “Where is Ares? He cannot be old
yet. I remember him as a foal not six years ago.”

“Great Ares is dead.” Hektor sighed, his stiff demeanor vanishing as he sat
down on the riverbank. “He fell at the battle of the Scamander, lanced through
the chest.”

“I saw that,” Odysseus replied, frowning, “but then I saw him rise up and
brave the river to save your troops.”

Hektor nodded, his face sorrowful. “He had a great heart. But it was gravely
wounded. He fell and died before we could reach the city.”

“This one has a wild eye,” the king commented, glaring at the black horse,
which looked back at him him balefully.

Hektor smiled. “His name is Hero. He has an angry nature. He is the horse
which leaped the chasm at Dardanos. You have heard the story?”

“I
invented
the story.” Odysseus chuckled. “I am surprised to see the
creature does not have wings and fire flaring from his nostrils.”

Hektor’s laughter rang out. “Truly it is good to see you, sea uncle. I have
missed your company and your tales.” Odysseus saw a little of the weight of war
and its burdens fall from the young man’s shoulders.

“Here, have some bread and cheese. I doubt if you’ve had either for many
days. It will seem like a feast in the Hall of Heroes.”

Hektor tucked into the food with gusto, and Odysseus pulled more salt bread
and cheese and some dried fruit from the leather bag at his side. There was a
jug of watered wine in there as well. They ate, then Odysseus lay back with his
head in his hands. The sky was of a blue so pale that it was almost white. He
sniffed the evening breeze.

“There is a scent of autumn in the air,” Hektor commented, swallowing the
last of the bread. “There could be rain soon. The city would likely hold out
until the winter then.”

“Without food?” Odysseus snorted.

Hektor looked at him. “Neither you nor I can guess how much food they have
still. You may have your spies in Troy, but a hundred spies are worth nothing if
they cannot get their information out.”

Odysseus countered, “And a lakeful of water is worth little if they have no
grain and no meat. We both know the situation in Troy must be perilous by now.”

They sat in companionable silence for a while longer, listening to the
plashing of the river blending with the liquid sounds of birdsong high above.
Then Hektor asked, “You have come to challenge me to fight Achilles?”

The king took a swig from the wine jug and wiped his mouth on the back of his
hand. “Agamemnon makes an interesting offer. I thought you should hear it.”

When Hektor said nothing in response, he went on. “If you will fight Achilles
in a death match, regardless of the outcome, Agamemnon will permit the women and
children of Troy to leave the city in safety.”

Hektor looked into his eyes. “Including my wife and son?”

Odysseus sighed and dropped his gaze. “No, he will not allow that. No members
of the royal family may leave Troy. Nor the Dardanian boy, Helikaon’s son. Nor
the two Thrakian princes.”

“Do you trust Agamemnon?”

Odysseus burst out laughing. “By the black balls of Hades, no!” He shook his
head in amusement.

“Then why should I?”

“Because I will see that the terms of the offer are made public to all the
kings and their armies. They are a wretched rabble, most of these kings, but
they will not allow the slaughter of innocents if their safety has been
guaranteed by all. It goes against their concept of honor. And my Ithakans will
give the women and children safe conduct to neutral ships at the Bay of
Herakles.”

“And why should I trust
you,
Odysseus, an enemy of Troy who paid an
assassin to murder our kinsman Anchises?”

Odysseus struggled to hold his tongue. His pride tempted him to tell the
prince the true story of Karpophorus and the plot to kill Helikaon, but he did
not. It is Helikaon’s story, he thought. He will tell Hektor himself one day if
he chooses.

He said, “It seems to me, lad, that you have no choice. I have delivered to
you a way by which you could save the lives of hundreds of Trojan women and
their children. If you turn your back and ride away now, you could never live
with yourself. You are a man of honor. You could not be otherwise.”

Hektor nodded but said nothing. They sat for a long while as the darkness
started to thicken and the air cooled.

Finally Hektor said, his voice strangely tight as if suppressing deep
emotion, “You say I am a man of honor. Yet to me it seems that every day of my
life is a lie and each word I speak a falsehood.”

“You are the most honest man I know,” Odysseus replied without hesitation.

Hektor gazed at him, and Odysseus could see the anguish in his eyes. “If you
tell the same lie often enough for long enough, then it eventually can become
the truth.”

Odysseus shook his head vehemently. “Truth and falsehood are two different
beasts, as different as the lion and the lizard. They are complex animals, and
they share many of the same features—they both have four legs, two eyes, and a
tail. Yet you cannot mistake the one for the other. I know the truth when I see
it, and I know the lie.”

He thought for a while. “Did you ever meet Helen, the wife of Paris?”

Hektor nodded. “Briefly. She was a shy woman and deeply in love with my
brother.”

Odysseus said, “I met her once. I thought her sweet-natured but mousy and
plain. You know how she died?” Hektor nodded, his brow darkening. Odysseus went
on. “The men who were there when she threw herself and her children from the
heights of King’s Joy are speaking of her as a great beauty. Throughout our
camps there is talk of the beauteous Helen and her gallant death.”

“What is your point, sea uncle?”

“Only that they do not speak falsely. Soldiers cannot speak of women in terms
they do not understand; they do not admire kindness, or modesty, or
unselfishness. But they admire Helen’s self-sacrifice, so they tell us she was
beautiful, like a goddess walking among us. And it is the truth.

“You are suffering under a great burden, Hektor. We have spoken of this
before, and you will not reveal it to me. But not revealing something about
yourself does not make you a liar. You show your true nature in each action you
take.”

Hektor was silent, and Odysseus wondered if the agony he was suffering was
because of the love between Helikaon and Andromache. Yet the young man seemed to
be suffering an inner torment, blaming himself for something rather than cursing
others.

He shrugged inwardly. If Hektor chose not to share his problems, there was
nothing he could do about it.

“You have soundly beaten Achilles once, at your wedding games in a fistfight
in front of thousands,” he said, returning to his mission. “This will be a
battle with swords, to the death. Achilles is seeking revenge. You killed his
shield bearer Patroklos two days ago.”

Hektor nodded. “I know. I recognized him. He was a skilled warrior.”

“He was indeed. And I liked him greatly.”

“Whose idea was the ambush?”

“It was Agamemnon’s. He calculated you would be short of supplies by now and
be tempted by the supply train. Patroklos volunteered to lead it. He was easily
bored, and the long summer without any action was harder on him than on most.”

“Achilles agreed to this?”

“No. He refused to allow Patroklos to go, but Patroklos went anyway, against
his king’s orders. Now he will go to the pyre at dawn, and Achilles is insane
with anger. He believes you targeted Patroklos deliberately, with the intent of
paying him back for your victory at the games.”

“That is madness! Why would he think that?”

Odysseus thought for a long while. Then he said, “I like Achilles greatly. I
have fought beside him on many occasions and lived cheek by jowl with him all
summer long. I like him,” he repeated, “but, like his sister Kalliope, he has
inner demons with which he fights every day. His honor is everything to him, yet
this honor means he must constantly be in competition with himself and with
others. Honor to him means always winning, and if he does not win, it eats him
up inside like a vileness of the heart. He assumes, of course, that you feel the
same way and that you are spoiling to fight him. He cannot understand why you
are reluctant. So he calls you a coward, although he does not believe it.”

He went on. “Agamemnon is more than happy for this fight to take place. If
you die, the Trojan cause will suffer a great blow. If Achilles dies, Agamemnon
will celebrate privately, too.”

“Why would he?”

“Achilles’ father, King Peleus of Thessaly, was a bully and a coward.
Agamemnon could manipulate him and found him an agreeable northern neighbor. But
Achilles will be a strong king and, if they each return to their lands, a
daunting new power on his border.”

“
If
they return to the west, Odysseus. These kings are foolish if they
think they can stay away from their lands for so long and not face problems back
home. Things will never be the same for them.”

“Indeed,” Odysseus agreed happily. “Agamemnon’s wife, Klytemnestra, loathes
him, it is said. I’m sure she already has a new husband in waiting.”

Hektor’s face darkened at that, and Odysseus cursed himself. Hektor fears
that Andromache is only waiting for him to die so that she can marry Helikaon,
he thought. What fools we humans are, he thought sadly.