Glyn Iliffe - The Armour of Achilles

Astynome turned to face her new master. ‘You have my word I won’t try to kill you, my lord. You’re not like other Greeks. You remind me more of a Trojan than a Greek.’

He lifted his hand to cup her chin, feeling the distinct cleft with his thumb before raising his fingers to touch her bottom lip. She looked at him intently and for a moment he was tempted by her nearness. Then he let his hand fall to his side and turned away again.

‘That’s not a mistake you should make again, Astynome. I am a Greek, in heart and mind. But there’s one more thing I want to know if I’m to take you under my protection – can you cook? All my men bring me is grilled mackerel and tunny, or goat’s meat that’s too tough to chew.’

She smiled broadly, the first real smile he had seen on her pretty mouth. ‘Yes, I can cook. Even if you have no other use for me, you’ll value me for my food.’

They left the square and followed a line of crude dwellings to the city walls. The sound of voices increased and soon they were at the edge of a large space filled with Greek soldiers. At the far end was a low gateway. Unlike the gates that Achilles and his Myrmidons had stormed, there was no squat tower defending the northern entrance to Lyrnessus; instead, the eastern wall doubled back on itself and ran parallel with the western wall for a dozen paces, so that the gateway was positioned between the overlap in the battlements. Though not as well defended as the southern entrance, it did mean an assaulting force was exposed to attack on both sides. The gates were fully open now, and from where they stood in the shadows of a narrow alleyway Eperitus and Astynome could see the gentle plains and wooded hills beyond.

Unlike the bands of men roving the city, the soldiers by the northern gate were still disciplined and acting under orders, giving Eperitus the confidence to lead Astynome out from their hiding place. There had been a battle here but it had long since finished. Some of the victorious Greeks were on the walls, keeping watch, while others were standing fully armed and ready for the possibility of an unexpected counter-attack. The majority, though, had stripped off their armour and weapons and were busily removing the bodies of the dead and stacking them in long rows on either side of the open space before the gates. When Astynome saw the scores of Lycians and Dardanians who had died holding the gates – while their countrymen escaped the pursuing Greeks – she fell to her knees and covered her face as she sobbed quietly. Eperitus looked at the lines of young men who had fallen, many with missing limbs or mutilated faces. It was a sight he had become familiar with since the start of the war, so he was surprised to feel a sudden pang of guilt. Was that Astynome’s presence, or the realization these men were not so different from himself, and could even have been his own countrymen but for the exile of his grandfather?

Eperitus lifted Astynome to her feet and allowed her to rest her head against his shoulder, where her tears fell on to his breastplate and mingled with the spatters of dried blood. As her arms wound round him and he stroked her sea of dark hair – watched by the envious eyes of the men in the burial parties – he noticed a young woman leaning over the body of a man, laid out among his dead comrades beneath the shadow of the walls. Her shoulders shook with a slow, mournful sobbing, and despite her red eyes and tear-stained cheeks it was clear she had a powerful beauty. Other than Astynome, she was the only woman present.

‘Who’s she?’ he asked.

Astynome lifted her head and gazed across at the stricken woman. More tears came to her eyes and she shook her head pityingly.

‘It’s Briseis,’ she answered. ‘Daughter of Briseus the priest. And that’s her husband, Mynes, she’s weeping over, with his brother Epistrophus beside him. They were princes of Lyrnessus and proud men in life.’

‘And brave men in their deaths,’ added a soldier, stooping beside them and lifting a corpse on to his shoulders. The dead man’s arms hung limply down the soldier’s back as he turned to look at Eperitus and Astynome. ‘Those two were at the heart of the rearguard, refusing to surrender or admit defeat. But Achilles slew them both and now Briseis is his captive.’

‘Was it a hard fight?’ Eperitus asked.

The man nodded. ‘It was worse here than at the walls, a real bloodbath. That Sarpedon commanded the rearguard while Aeneas got the majority of the Dardanians and Lycians out through the gate. And they fought like Furies! If it hadn’t been for Achilles they might’ve held us to a stalemate. But we beat them in the end,’ he added, patting the corpse over his shoulder as he saw Astynome’s chin raise a little. ‘Sarpedon only escaped at the last moment, and Achilles, Patroclus and Diomedes have gone out in pursuit of him and the remainder of his men. He’ll be a rich prize if—’

‘What about Odysseus?’ Eperitus interrupted.

‘He was in the thick of it too, as usual, but Achilles asked him and Little Ajax to stay here and put down the last pockets of resistance. They were surrounding a group of militia not far from here, last I heard.’

The soldier pointed in the direction of a column of smoke billowing up from behind a line of ramshackle dwellings to the west, then, with a final glance at the Trojan girl, turned and carried his burden towards the lines of dead.

‘Come on,’ Eperitus said, taking Astynome’s hand and heading towards the smoke.

The battle must indeed have been a brutal one, Eperitus thought as they weaved a path between the bodies of the fallen. The sun-baked, dusty earth was dark with innumerable bloodstains and here and there he could see small fragments of human remains: several hands; arms severed at the elbow; a sandalled foot; even a cleanly lopped ear lying in a wheel rut. As they passed the gates a wagon laden with bundles of wood squealed its way through the gates.

‘For the funeral pyre,’ Eperitus explained, seeing Astynome’s look of confusion. ‘We stopped burying the dead years ago – it took too much time and effort, and by the time we’d dug the pits the carrion birds had already taken the eyes and the softer parts.’

Astynome squeezed his hand tightly and he shut up. Before long they heard the crackle of fire and turned a corner to see a large, two-storeyed house surrounded by at least three score of warriors. Long orange flames flickered up from the windows and sent spirals of dark, ember-filled smoke up into the air. More smoke wafted out into the street, but Eperitus recognized Odys-seus’s squat, triangular form through the fine haze, with the colossal figure of Polites beside him. As he watched, two men appeared on the flat roof of the building. They were unarmed, but their scaled breastplates and plumed helmets marked them out as warriors. Both were waving their hands before their faces and choking on the smoke. They stumbled to the edge of the low wall that surrounded the roof and looked down at the Ithacans below. Odysseus shouted a command and a moment later there was a loud twang. One of the men staggered against the wall, clutching at the black shaft protruding from his groin, before slowly curling forward and plunging to the floor below. He landed with a dull thud and lay still. His comrade shook his fist blindly at the surrounding Greeks, then retreated into the consuming smoke.

Suddenly there was a hoarse shout and several men ran out from the doorway of the house. They were half-blinded by the smoke, but the dull gleam of their weapons showed they had no intention of surrendering. Odysseus, who had been awaiting their appearance with calm patience, now sprang into action, dashing forward and knocking a man’s head from his shoulders with a swift slice of his sword. Polites followed, a captured two-headed battle-axe in his right hand, and within a moment the rest of the Ithacans were behind them. The battle was brief, bloody and uneven, and with Astynome at his side Eperitus felt almost ashamed as he watched the massacre. Then, when the ringing of weapons and the shouts of men were over, he saw Odysseus come striding out with his bloodied sword hanging at his side. He looked strangely savage in the sunlight: his face grimed with ash and spattered with gore; his normally bright and thoughtful eyes red-rimmed from the smoke and filled with a forbidding anger. In his left hand he held a cloak which he had torn from the shoulders of one of his victims, and with which he was slowly wiping the mess from his blade.