Glyn Iliffe - The Gates Of Troy (Adventures of Odysseus)

Protesilaus narrowed his eyes at the approaching army, several thousand strong with every man viciously armed and baying for blood. With a last, hurried prayer to Ares on his lips, he gripped the high prow of his ship and waited for the impact as it hit the beach. He glanced across at his brother, who was still behind him and away to his right, then behind at his men, still heaving at the oars. A moment later the broad belly of the galley thumped into a sandy shelf below the waterline. Everyone on board lurched forward, tumbling over each other as the vessel slid to a halt. With a great shout, Protesilaus leapt overboard and landed knee-deep in the water. Clutching his long spear fiercely in both hands, he waded through the surf towards the beach.

The Trojan army was now screened from his sight by a high bank, where the beach rose up to meet the firmer soil of the plain. The ridge was crowned by a curtain of tall, dry grass that quivered in the breeze from the sea. As Protesilaus cleared the water he took another fleeting look to his right, where Podarces’s galley was now juddering to a halt further along the beach, then over his shoulder to where the different-coloured bows of the Greek galleys were racing towards the shore. His own men were now crowding into the prow of his galley, but instead of leaping into the water their eyes were focused on the plain beyond the grassy ridge. Two or three archers released hurried shots, and then Protesilaus heard the drumming of hooves followed by the snort of a horse. He looked up and saw a man on a grey mare standing on the bank at the top of the beach, a long spear held at the ready in his right hand. He was tall and powerfully built. His stern, bearded face looked down at the Greek warrior with a ferocious hatred.

‘When your ghost reaches the halls of Hades,’ he began, speaking in Greek, ‘tell the dead you are the first of many today, and that you were slain by Hector, son of Priam.’

Protesilaus felt a momentary tremor of fear, then with a rush of energy his courage returned the strength to his limbs. In a quick movement he pulled back his spear and aimed it at the horseman. But before it could leave his hand, Hector’s own weapon caught him in the chest, piercing the breastplate and hurling him backwards with such force that Protesilaus was pinned against the hull of his own ship. A howl of anger erupted from the deck above him, followed by a rush of armoured bodies as the Thessalians leapt down into the surf and ran yelling past their dead leader towards the man who had killed him. In response, Hector drew his sword and spurred his horse down the slope to meet them. He was followed by a great pounding of hooves, and a moment later a wave of horsemen swept over the grassy ridge to plunge into the crowd of Greek spearmen.

From the prow of their ship, Odysseus and Eperitus looked on in silence as the Thessalians fell back before the onslaught. The Trojan horses were up to their hocks in the sea, their riders hacking and slashing at the invaders, lopping heads and limbs from bodies and filling the dark waters with corpses. More Thessalians leapt recklessly into the fray from the sides of their galley. The nearest horsemen were caught and dragged from their mounts, to be stabbed, throttled or drowned in the shallow waters. But the Trojans were winning an easy victory, enjoying the advantage of height, momentum and numbers. Hector was at the heart of the fight, a master of battle who led his men by the example of his own ferocity and courage.

The slaughter of the Thessalians was terrible to watch. The water churned all around them from the thrashing of the wounded and dying, and the breakers were scarlet with their blood. Further along the beach Podarces and his men were also hemmed in by cavalry, but a screen of archers firing from the prow of his ship forced the Trojans back and allowed him to form his spearmen into a line. Soon they were pushing along the beach towards his brother’s galley, driving the enemy horsemen before them.

‘Ready your shields and spears!’ Eperitus ordered, looking back at the rows of soldiers. Like the Thessalians, they were mostly inexperienced and poorly armed. Fear was written clearly on many of their faces, though some seemed eager for their first battle. Others were relaxed and calm, and Polites was one of these. Towering head and shoulders above Arceisius, he chatted happily to the young squire while adjusting the fit of his armour, as if he were preparing for nothing more dangerous than a training exercise. Though the Thessalian had once been an unwelcome bandit in their homeland, the Ithacans around him drew comfort from his massive presence and confident mien.

It pleased Eperitus to see his men and he knew his faith in them was warranted. The long days of training he and Odysseus had given them at Aulis would help them to survive, and in time their experience and fighting instinct would develop. More than that, they were drawn from doughty stock, peace-loving islanders who were slow to anger, but when roused were tough, courageous and fearsome. And though not one of them had experienced warfare on such a scale before, Eperitus was sure that under Odysseus’s leadership they would prove themselves more than a match for the Trojans.

Thessalian ships were thumping into the sand at every point now. Eperitus watched in tense excitement as hundreds of yelling warriors spewed onto the beach, enraged at the death of their leader and seeking vengeance in Trojan blood. But Hector was a skilled cavalry commander. Knowing his lightly armoured horsemen were wasted in a standing fight, he was already leading them back across the plain to safety. But there was another purpose to the practised disorder of their flight, and to Eperitus’s dismay many of the Greeks were taking the bait.

They were led by Podarces, who by then had found his older brother’s body still pinned to the hull of his ship. With tears of grief and rage in his eyes, he led his men through the screen of tall grass to the plain beyond, only to see the cavalry already streaming to safety behind a long wall of Trojan spearmen. Undeterred, the Thessalians now charged towards the disciplined line of tall, rectangular shields hedged with heavy spears. The immediate danger did not come from the infantry, though, but the densely packed archers who stood behind them. At an order from Hector, they let fly their arrows and the Thessalian ranks fell like stalks of wheat before a scythe. They wavered for a moment, then rushed forward again, only to be met by another hail of missiles. This time the survivors, Podarces among them, turned and fled back to the cover of the sloping beach. Not one man had reached the Trojan line.

By this time the first waves of Spartans, Myrmidons and Ithacans were hitting the shoreline, beaching their ships all along the great crescent of sand between the mouths of the Simo¨eis and the Scamander. Eperitus felt a heavy thud beneath the belly of the ship and an instant later the whole mass of wood, leather and canvas came to a halt. Within a moment he had leapt down into the surf, close behind Odysseus, and was splashing up the sloping beach. The rest of the crew followed, pouring over the sides of the galley and shouting like Furies, drunk on fear and courage. All around them masses of other Greeks were surging ashore to join the battered Thessalians, who were already reforming for a second attack.

Out in the bay, flames were blazing up from the Trojan galleys where reckless Greeks had tossed lighted torches over the sides as they passed. Now great plumes of black smoke were carried inland on the sea breeze, darkening the air over the beach and the plains beyond. Then there was a great hum of massed bowstrings released simultaneously, followed by the evil hiss of arrows as they filled the sky. Men looked up in fear, watching as the black shafts seemed to hang suspended for a long moment, before plunging down again towards the crowded shore and the galleys behind. Eperitus and Odysseus threw themselves on the sand with their shields above their heads as the deadly hail of bronze-tipped missiles fell. Many clattered on the wooden decks of the Greek ships or snagged in the sails; others hit the water or thumped into the raised leather shields of crouching soldiers. And many found their mark. Men cried out as arrows bit into flesh, toppling dead and wounded alike onto the sand or back into the waiting water. More men tumbled from the decks of the ships, clutching at the long, feathered shafts protruding from torsos and limbs.