Stella Gemmell - Fall of Kings

The Bloodhawk crewmen ran back to their ship, and Helikaon went with them. It was impossible to run through the carpet of rats without treading on them, and the men slipped and slid on squashed bodies and rodent blood. They leaned into its planks and within heartbeats pushed the smaller ship into the water. Helikaon climbed on board. Men were killing the rats frantically, stabbing them with swords and daggers and throwing them overboard. Fewer were getting onto the ship as she drifted out into clear water. Helikaon glanced at the Xanthos. She also was floating clear, and the oars were being run out.

He skewered a dozen more rodents and threw their carcasses in the water. Then he walked over to Odysseus, who still was energetically stabbing any rat he could see.

“This will make a fine tale for you, my friend,” Helikaon told him, laughter bubbling up as he watched the fat king dancing about, impaling rats on his sword.

Odysseus stopped, panting, and grinned. “I need no more tales, even rats’ tales,” he countered. “Stories are always buzzing in my head like a hive full of bees!”

Then his expression sobered. “Get back to your ship, Helikaon. We must both make haste. We cannot take on an entire Mykene fleet.”

Helikaon stepped forward and embraced his old mentor for the last time. “Good sailing, my friend.”

Odysseus nodded. “Look for me in the spring,” he promised.

With a parting salute to Kalliades and Skorpios, Helikaon ran to the foredeck and dived into the sea. As he swam toward the Xanthos, he tried to ignore the floating carpet of dead and dying rats and the scratching of claws as drowning animals tried to scramble onto his back. He grabbed the rope his crew had lowered for him and climbed onto the deck. Only then did he allow himself to shudder and brush phantom rats from his shoulders.

He looked around. Andromache stood at the mast, gazing up at the Great Horse. Oniacus was ready at the steering oar. The oar smen watched Helikaon, waiting for his words.

“By the mark of one!” he shouted, and the oar blades sliced into the water. Following the Bloodhawk, the Xanthos left the island as the sun rose toward noon.

Agamemnon liked to think of himself as a pragmatist. Standing on the deck of his flagship as it raced toward Thera, he was still angry, but looking back on the last day in Troy, he knew he would have made his vital decisions no differently.

That blowhard Idomeneos had berated him for opening the Scaean Gate to the Hittite horde, but had he had any choice? If they had barred the gates to keep the Hittites out, Agamemnon’s troops would have been trapped in the city as surely as the Trojans had been before them, with little water or food. They would have starved within days, then been forced to sally out weakened and vulnerable to face superior Hittite numbers.

And although it had been humiliating to be ordered from Troy by the upstart emperor, it actually had worked in his favor. Agamemnon had no intention of rebuilding the ruined city. His aim had been accomplished. Everyone throughout the Great Green knew he had destroyed Troy, defeated Priam, and killed all his sons. He was Agamemnon the Conqueror, and all men quailed before him. His name would echo forever in hearts and minds, as the priest in the Cave of Wings had predicted.

He smiled to himself. Once he had found Priam’s stolen treasure, he would return to the Lion’s Hall in triumph. The boy-king Astyanax need not concern him. Mykene soldiers, spies, and agents would hunt him down relentlessly, and Helikaon the Burner, too, and the bitch Andromache. He still held hopes of finding them on Thera. He would take great pleasure in their deaths, which would be lingering and agonizing.

As the fleet approached its harbor, the Mykene king could see a heavy gray pall lying over Thera. The black isle at its center was much bigger than he remembered, and a column of smoke was rising from the top. He heard the rumble of a small earthquake like a portent of doom. He shivered.

“My king,” said his aide Kleitos, “the beach is empty. The Xanthos is not here.”

“Then the vile Helikaon must have been to the island already and left. He can be no more than half a day ahead. He will not expect to be followed, so he will be taking his time.”

“What do we do, my king?”

Agamemnon thought swiftly. “Send six of our ships around the black isle to ensure that the Xanthos is not hiding on the other side. We will go ashore and find Priam’s insane daughter. I will make her tell us where Helikaon is. She claims to be prescient, and now she can prove that claim. If she is no longer here and we find no treasure, we sail on to Ithaka.”

My visit to Ithaka is long overdue, he thought. I will revel in the deaths of the fat fool Odysseus and his family.

Agamemnon’s flagship and the Kretan war galley beached on the black sand, and the three kings stepped ashore with their bodyguards. There were hundreds of dead rats on the strand, and it was difficult to cross the beach without treading on their carcasses. A pungent smell of blood and burning lay over the island.

“Why are all these rats here?” Menelaus questioned nervously. “And that black isle is growing. There is the stench of witchcraft here. I do not like this place.”

Idomeneos, who as usual was garbed in full armor, growled, “An island of women is an abomination. We have all heard tales of the unnatural practices they revel in. It will be pleasant to see the witches sold into slavery.”

Menelaus was astonished. “But they are all princesses, some of them daughters of our allies!”

Idomeneos turned on him. “And will you go running to tell them, you fat lapdog?” he spit.

Irritably, Agamemnon told them, “We are near the end of our journey. We will not have to suffer each other’s company much longer. Now, follow me!”

He set a fast pace up the cliff path, with bodyguards in front and behind. They were near the top when there was the low grumble of another quake. They all froze for a heartbeat, then threw themselves to the ground as the earth shook under them. Two guards ahead of them were dislodged from the path and fell, plummeting to the rocky shore below. Agamemnon closed his eyes and waited grimly for the ground to stop moving. Something deep inside screamed at him to run to his ship and race away from this witches’ isle. He ruthlessly suppressed it.

It was a while before the kings cautiously picked themselves up. A thick layer of gray ash lay over them, and they brushed it off their clothes. Agamemnon stalked off angrily. “This island is cursed,” he agreed with his brother. “We will take what we need and leave quickly!”

Menelaus looked around. “It is very quiet,” he muttered.

As Agamemnon breasted the top of the cliff, he saw the Great Horse temple looming above him. A faint, elusive memory touched the edge of his mind, but he forgot it as he saw one of the priestesses stumbling toward him. She was an old crone and had difficulty walking, but she struggled forward, holding her arms out in front of her as if to touch him. Agamemnon drew his sword. He lanced it into the old woman’s skinny breast and walked on, leaving her in a pool of blood.

Agamemnon handed the etched and decorated sword to a soldier to clean, then returned it to its scabbard, feeling more elated than he had for days. He strode between the horse’s front hooves and into the temple.

It was cold and very dark in there. All he could see at first were bright shafts of daylight streaming vertically from the roof. He paused to give his bodyguards time to fan out in front of him. There were only women there, but he felt unnerved by the strangeness of the isle.