Ben Bova - The Hittite

Soon the streets widened into broad avenues paved with marble, which opened onto grand plazas flanked by gracious houses and shops bearing wares from Crete, Egypt, Babylon, even fabled India.

I saw only a few beggars on those avenues, although there were mimes and acrobats and other performers in each of the plazas, entertaining the people who, from their dress, seemed to come from the four corners of the world.

Ephesus was truly a city of culture and comfort, rich with marble temples and centers for healers to ply their craft and even a library that stored scrolls of knowledge. We walked slowly through the plazas and the growing throngs of people crowding into them. Then we came to the city’s central marketplace, and passed a knot of people gathered around an old man who was squatting on the marble paving blocks, weaving a spell of words, while his listeners tossed an occasional coin his way.

“A storyteller!” Poletes yelped.

“Not here,” I whispered to him.

“Let me stay and listen, Master Lukka,” he begged. “Please! I swear that I won’t speak a word.”

Reluctantly I allowed it. I thought I could trust Poletes’ word; it was his heart that I worried about. He was a storyteller, it was in his blood. How long could he remain silent when he had the grandest story of all time to tell to the crowd?

I decided to give him an hour to himself while Helen and I browsed through the shops and stalls of the marketplace. Even with Sukku watching after them, I kept an eye on little Uhri and Lukkawi; they kept disappearing into the crowds and then popping into sight again. Helen seemed delightedly happy to be fingering fine cloth and examining decorated pottery, bargaining with the shopkeepers and then walking on, buying nothing. I shrugged and followed her at a distance, my eyes always searching out my two boys.

The ground rumbled. A great gasping cry went up from the crowd in the marketplace. A few pots tottered off their shelves and smashed to the ground. The world seemed to sway giddily, sickeningly. In a few heartbeats the rumbling ceased and all returned to normal. For a moment the people were absolutely silent. Then a bird chirped and everyone began talking at once, with the kind of light fast banter that comes with a surge of relief from sudden terror.

My sons came running up to me, with Sukku trotting behind them, but by the time they were close enough to grasp my legs the tremor had ended. I assured them everything was all right.

Helen stared at me, her face white with apprehension.

“An earth tremor,” I said, trying to make my voice light, unafraid. “Natural enough in these parts.”

“Poseidon makes the earth shake,” she said in a near-whisper. But the color returned to her cheeks.

The marketplace quickly returned to normal. The crowd resumed its chatter. People bargained with merchants. My boys ran off to watch a puppet show. I could see Poletes across the great square of the market, standing at the edge of the crowd gathered around the squatting storyteller. His gnarled legs were almost as skinny as the stick he leaned upon.

“Lukka.”

I turned toward Helen. She was half-frowning at me the way a mother shows displeasure with a naughty son. “You haven’t heard a word I’ve said,” she scolded.

“I’m sorry. My mind was elsewhere.”

“Watching over your boys.”

Nodding, I added, “And Poletes.”

Very patiently, Helen repeated, “I said that we could live here in Ephesus very nicely. This is a civilized city, Lukka. With the wealth we’ve brought we could buy a comfortable villa and live splendidly.”

“What about Egypt?”

She sighed. “It’s so far away. And traveling has been much more difficult than I thought it would be.”

“Perhaps we could get a boat and sail to Egypt,” I suggested. “That would be much swifter than travel overland.”

Her eyes brightened. “Of course! There are hundreds of boats in the harbor.”

I pulled Poletes away from the storyteller and we made our way to the harbor. Heavily laden boats lined the piers while bare-chested gangs of slaves unloaded their cargoes. The breeze off the sea carried the tang of salt air, although Poletes complained of the smell of fish. The boys ran up and down the piers, goggling at the boats, with their high masts and furled sails.

I saw that these merchant ships were different from the black-hulled boats the Achaians had used to cross the Aegean and reach Troy. They were broader in the beam and deeper of draft, built to carry cargo, not warriors; designed for commerce, not for war.

I began to ask about boats that carried passengers and talked with two different captains. Neither of them wanted to travel to Egypt.

“Too far,” said one of the grizzled seamasters. “And those Egyptian dogs make you pay a prince’s ransom just for the privilege of tying up at one of their stone docks.”

Disappointed, I was walking with Helen along one of the piers, searching for a willing captain, when suddenly Helen clutched at my arm.

“Look!” she cried, her eyes staring fearfully out to the water.

Gliding into the harbor were six war galleys, their paddles stroking the water in perfect rhythm. Each of them bore a red eagle’s silhouette on their sails.

“Menalaos!” Helen gasped.

“Or his men,” I said. “Either way, we can’t stay here. They’re searching for you.”

We fled Ephesus that night, sneaking away like thieves, leaving a very disappointed innkeeper who had looked forward to having us stay much longer.

As we rode into the hills and took the southward trail, I wondered if we could have appealed to the city’s council for protection. But fear of the armed might of the Achaians who had just destroyed Troy would have paralyzed the Ephesians, I realized. Their city had no protective walls and no real army, merely a city guard for keeping order in the bawdier districts. Ephesus depended on the goodwill of all for its safety. They would not allow Helen to stay in their city when Menalaos threatened to bring down the wrath of the Achaian host upon them.

So we pushed on, through the growing heat of summer, bearing our booty from Troy. A strange group we were: the fugitive Queen of Sparta, a blind storyteller, a half-dozen professional soldiers from an empire that no longer existed, and two buzzing, chattering, endlessly energetic little boys.

We came to the city of Miletus. Here there were walls, strong ones, and a lively commercial city. I remembered my father telling me that he’d been to Miletus once, when the great emperor Hattusilis was angry with the city and brought his army to its gates. The Miletians were so frightened that they opened their gates and offered no resistance. They threw themselves upon the emperor’s mercy. And he was magnificent! He slew only the city’s leaders, the men who had displeased him, and forbade his soldiers to touch so much as an egg.

We bought fresh provisions and mounts in the city’s marketplace. From my own hazy knowledge of the area, and from the answers I received from local merchants, Miletus was the last big city on our route for some time. We planned to move inland, through the Mountains of the Bull and across the plain of Cilicia, then along the edge of the Mittani lands and down the coastline of Philistia and Canaan.

But the sounds and smells of another Aegean city were too much for Poletes. He came to me as we started to break our camp, just outside the city walls, and announced firmly that he would go no farther with us. He preferred to remain in Miletus.

“This is a city where I can tell my tales and earn my own bread,” he said to me. “I won’t burden you further, Master Lukka. Please, let me spend my final days singing of Troy and the mighty deeds that were done there.”