The Gates Of Troy (12 page)

‘It was some time ago, when I was a shepherd on Mount Ida. I had been sleeping in the shade of an old tree when I sensed a great light pressing against my eyelids, far more brilliant than the sun. I opened my eyes and there before me were three women, each one naked and possessing terrible beauty. They told me they were Athena, Hera and Aphrodite and that I was to award a golden apple to the one I considered the fairest. Then, though their mouths did not open, I heard their voices inside my head, each offering me great gifts if I would but choose them over the others. But their promises meant nothing to me, for though they were all wondrous to look on, Aphrodite’s beauty could not be matched. I gave the apple to her, heedless of the scowls of Hera and Athena, and the last thing I remember before waking was the smile on her lips, as if all the love in the world were given to me.’

Helen watched Paris’s face intently as he spoke, then nodded her head knowingly.

‘It was the goddess who brought you here to me. For years I’ve prayed for someone to take me away from Sparta, but when I saw you in the great hall I knew my deliverance was at hand. Have you come to take me back with you to Troy?’

Paris felt a nervous churning in the pit of his stomach. Strangely, it was the same sensation he felt before a battle, when he would sit on his horse trying to convince all around him that he was calm and unafraid, when his whole body was wracked with nerves. He looked at Helen and saw a similar helpless uncertainty, as if she too were standing at the threshold of a new world, wanting to step out but afraid of what she might find. She was no longer a great and beautiful queen, but a young woman, trapped and desperate for freedom and yet knowing that the price of her liberty was an end to everything she knew.

‘I will take you if you’re willing to leave,’ he replied, his tone neutral, probing.

‘But I’m a queen and the wife of another man,’ she said, her voice shaking slightly. ‘I . . . I can’t just leave.’

Paris felt as if a blade of ice had been pushed into his stomach. ‘But you
hate
Menelaus.’

‘No. I’ve never hated Menelaus,’ she protested. ‘I couldn’t have wished for a kinder husband or a better father to my children.’

‘But you don’t
love
him.’

‘No,’ she replied with a shake of her head.

‘But you think you could love me?’ he asked, unable now to keep the neediness from his voice.

‘What does it matter? Did you not take an oath of friendship to Menelaus? Aren’t you honour-bound never to harm him or his household? In fact, why did you even come here tonight? To tease me?’ She looked at him and there was anger in her eyes. ‘When I heard of the oath I cursed you for a fool, knowing he must have tricked you somehow. And yet I had to come, to see if it was true. Is it?’

‘The oath was not carried out in the proper manner, according to the customs of my people.’

‘Menelaus believed it was, and that’s all that matters. If you break it you will lose your honour.’

Paris looked into her eyes, knowing the moment had come to choose between love and honour. He could concede that she was right, walk out of the temple and never see her again. There would be no loss of reputation; he would step back into his old life with no more damage than a broken heart and the thought of what might have been. Or he could step forward into a new world, a world of shame, danger and pursuit, but a world with her.

‘Compared to you, the oath means nothing to me.’

She curled her fingers around his hand.

‘Then I will come with you, and love you like no other woman ever could!’

He briefly caught the passion in her blue eyes, before she moved her face to his and kissed him. The press of her lips was warm and surprisingly tender, the scent of her perfume equally soft; the feel of her arms as they wrapped around his hard back was light and yet filled with urgency. He responded greedily, against his initial instinct, pulling her slender body against his and slipping his hand through the parting of her chiton, down to the flesh of her buttocks. Their embrace grew fiercer for a moment, and then she pulled herself free of his arms and moved back. She was breathing hard and there was a fire in her eyes as she stared at him.

‘No more, Paris. I won’t give myself to you – not yet, not even in Aphrodite’s temple.’

‘Then when?’

‘I’m no prostitute, damn you! I’m a queen and the daughter of Zeus himself!’ Her eyes were momentarily consumed by a terrible and beautiful fury, which subsided as quickly as it had appeared. ‘My mother was an adulteress and I vowed never to be like her. I’ve only ever given myself to Menelaus, and all my children are from his seed. But I
can’t
lead a life without love. I was made to love, Paris, and if you are prepared to break your oath then I will break mine. I promise I will love you with every beat of my heart, but if you want me you must take me away from Sparta first.’

‘I will!’ he said, reaching for her hand. ‘I can have my men ready to go tonight.’

Again she stepped back from him, her eyes still alive with the passion that had been kindled by their kiss.

‘Not tonight – not while Menelaus is in the palace.’

‘Then when?’

‘He leaves for Crete in a week,’ Helen said. ‘He won’t want to go while you’re here, but he can’t change his plans now. Besides, he trusts in the oath you took.’

Paris sensed the challenge in Helen’s words: she knew he was deceiving Menelaus, and that he could do the same to her.

‘My words to you aren’t hollow, Helen,’ he assured her. ‘I
will
take you back to Sparta with me. I’d have to be insane to refuse you, wouldn’t I?’

‘I have one condition, my prince.’

‘Name it.’

‘My children – they’re to come with us.’

The sight of her irresistible face and the tantalizing glimpse of bare flesh where her chiton lay open filled Paris with the desire to do anything she commanded, but he knew what she was asking was almost impossible.

‘I can get out of Sparta with you, Helen, but with four confused children our chances will be narrow.’

Helen stooped and picked up her robe, which she threw about her shoulders.

‘Think of a way, Paris. If you want me to be yours, you must bring my children too.’

She turned and walked to the doors, pulling them open to reveal the twilight of evening in the narrow street beyond.

‘I’ll find a way,’ he said. ‘I promise – but stay with me a little longer. Helen!’

‘Keep your word,’ she said, and was gone.

Paris yanked at the leather straps that held the two halves of the cuirass about his torso, pulling them taut before feeding them through the golden buckles. After nine days of feasting his armour was a tight fit, and heavy with the bronze plates that overlapped each other like fish scales from his neck and shoulders down to his groin. He looked around at his men, who were suffering similar agonies as they fitted their own armour and familiarized themselves with the feel and weight of their equipment. Greaves were tied about shins and leather or bronze caps – according to the wealth and rank of each man – were pressed onto heads.

‘Hurry up!’ Paris urged. He could feel the familiar sickness in his stomach that always preceded a fight, and just like the preludes to battle on the northern frontiers it made him irritable and quicktempered. ‘And pull your cloaks about yourselves – if the Spartans see our armour they’ll get suspicious.’

‘Much good it’ll do us without weapons,’ Aeneas grumbled.

‘This’ll do to start us off,’ Paris said, holding up the dagger Menelaus had given him. Though the weapons the Trojans had brought with them lay stored in the palace armoury, Paris planned to dispatch enough of the guardsmen dotted about the corridors to provide some of his men with swords, spears and shields. It was a foolhardy plan, but his gut instinct told him it would work. ‘Now, where in Hades is Apheidas?’

‘Here, my lord.’

The tall warrior stepped into the room that had been the Trojans’ quarters for over a week and strolled over to where his armour was laid out on a straw mattress. He sat down and began tying on his greaves.

‘So, what did you find out?’ Paris demanded.

‘Menelaus left at sunset,’ Apheidas announced. ‘No fuss or fanfare, just him with his escort and a covered wagon.’

‘A wagon?’ Paris said, his heart rattling nervously in his chest.

‘Don’t fear – she’s not with him. The slave I spoke to said she didn’t know who or what was in the wagon, but she reassured me Helen is still in her quarters. Menelaus went up to see her before he left, but was told she was asleep so he had to do without his goodbye kiss.’

‘Poor Menelaus,’ one of the soldiers mocked, causing a ripple of laughter from his comrades.

‘What about the rest of the palace?’ Paris asked as Apheidas was helped into his cuirass. ‘Are the guards at their usual posts?’

‘The corridors and halls are quiet – there’s no feast tonight and there’s hardly a slave to be seen. But the guards are there, just like every evening. There’s only one outside the great hall tonight, and he’s virtually asleep already. I would have snapped his neck with my bare hands, if I didn’t know you wanted all the glory for yourself.’

Paris frowned. His nerves were strained at the prospect of escaping from Sparta and he was feeling particularly surly.

‘I’ll kill him because I have to,’ Paris said, turning to his men. ‘But I want no unnecessary deaths. They may only be Greeks, but we are Trojans, not savages! Kill only guards or armed men; no slaves, no women, no one who does not stand in our way. Apheidas, Exadios – come with me. Aeneas, wait here with the rest of the men until we return; if you hear the alarm, make your escape as best you can.’

The three men made their way to the antechamber that led to the great hall, which was dark but for the restless glow cast by a handful of torches on the high walls. They waited in the shadows of a side corridor that ended only a short distance from where the solitary guard stood. They could hear his heavy breathing in the semi-darkness, and the occasional movement as he shifted his weight from one foot to the other and back again.

‘He’s still awake, then,’ Apheidas whispered.

‘Not for long,’ Paris said grimly.

Wrapping his black cloak tightly about his armour to prevent it catching the light, he edged along the wall and caught his first sight of the guard. He was a young soldier with a wiry beard, wearing a bronze cap with cheekguards and a tall shield slung over his back. One hand rested on the pommel of a sword, while the other gripped the shaft of an ash spear. His head was tipped back against one of the ornate doors to the great hall and his eyes were fixed on the high ceiling, tracing the barely-visible murals that he already knew so well from long spells of guard duty. A moment later Paris slipped from the shadows, clapped his hand over the man’s mouth and drew Menelaus’s dagger across his exposed throat. The blade was so sharp it sliced through the flesh as if it were cutting into a leg of mutton. The guard gave a single, bloody choke before the life left his limbs and he collapsed against the door. Paris held him there until Apheidas and Exadios arrived to strip him of his spear, sword and helmet, then lowered him to the floor, when they also took the shield from his back.

‘Put the body in there, Exadios,’ Paris said, indicating the great hall. ‘There’ll be no feasting tonight. Apheidas – where’s the next nearest guard?’

‘By the wine store, but the only approach is in full view down a corridor. It’s too risky: we should forget him and make for the rear entrance to the palace.’

‘No – we need as many weapons as we can get, and as quickly as we can get them. How do I find this wine store?’

‘Follow me,’ Apheidas replied, smiling grimly as he clutched the unfamiliar Greek sword in his hand.

He ran through the gloomy corridors of the palace with Paris and Exadios close behind, until moments later they reached the mouth of a side passage where he signalled for them to stop. A low murmur of voices was coming from the corridor, and after pressing his finger to his lips Apheidas peered around the corner. A moment later, he gave a curse and drew back again.

‘How many are there?’ Paris asked.

‘Two – the guard and a servant girl.’

‘Are they . . .?’

‘Not yet,’ Apheidas grinned. ‘But he’s already got his hand inside her chiton. Give him a bit longer and he’ll be too distracted to notice you creeping up on him.’

‘No time for that – I’ll have to bluff it.’

‘But what about the girl?’ Exadios protested. ‘One scream from her and this place’ll be teeming with guards.’

‘Don’t worry about her,’ Apheidas whispered, giving Exadios a wink as he hid the sword beneath his cloak.

‘Keep a lookout for us here, Exadios,’ Paris ordered, before entering the side passage, closely followed by Apheidas.

There was just enough room for the two men to walk side by side. Though their weapons were concealed, neither man bothered to hide his armour with his cloak; by the light of the single torch at the end of the passageway they could see that the servant girl was now half-naked and the guard – who had already removed his armaments – was preoccupied with her. By the time he noticed the approach of the Trojans, Paris’s hand was over his mouth and the point of his dagger was forcing its way between his ribs. Beside him, his lover opened her mouth to scream, but Apheidas’s sword swept her head from her shoulders before the air could be forced up from her lungs. Without pausing, he opened the door to the wine storeroom, threw the body inside and kicked the head in after it.