Glyn Iliffe - King of Ithaca (Adventures of Odysseus)

Suddenly, Eperitus felt a sharp blow to his shoulder and staggered backwards, pursued by a wave of pain that crashed over his senses and plunged him into the blackest night. For a moment he seemed to float, his head swirling like skeins of mist before the hard ground rose up to meet him, jarring him back to consciousness. He lay there amidst the sandalled, dancing feet of friend and foe alike, a curious peacefulness pressing him to the ground like a heavy weight. The sounds of battle receded, though he still sensed the sluggish thumping of feet all around him. Or was it the beating of his own heart?

Trying to draw breath, he felt something buried inside the flesh of his left shoulder. From somewhere deep within came the pounding approach of a fresh surge of pain, and instinctively he closed his eyes against it. Then it bit, hot and sharp, jerking him back to his senses.

He reached up and seized the shaft of the arrow. He tugged at it, feeling the barbs tear new furrows into the flesh that had closed about them. Fortunately it had missed the bone, but his muscles screamed with agony as the arrow slid free and dropped into the dust at his side.

He collapsed again, exhausted from the effort. Moments later he felt hands under his arms, causing yet more pain as he was hauled up and dragged away from the fighting. He looked up to see the faces of Mentes and Antiphus staring down at him. The archer looked into his eyes for a moment before lifting Odysseus’s bow over his head and pulling aside his cloak to look at the wound. Mentes joined him, probing the skin with his fingers until he was satisfied there was no danger. Then he tore strips of cloth from his cloak and bound them about Eperitus’s shoulder.

‘The gods are with you,’ the Taphian said in his thickly accented voice. ‘A flesh wound only. It will heal, but you can take no further part in this battle.’

He turned and rejoined the fight that still raged about the portals of the great hall. Antiphus looked at Eperitus, the relief visible in his eyes, and told him he would take command. Then he drew his sword and followed the Taphian into the thick of the fighting, leaving Eperitus amongst the dead and dying at the edge of the battle.

Eperitus looked down at Odysseus’s horn bow beside him and suddenly recalled that the prince was somewhere inside the palace. A sense of urgency gripped him and, picking the weapon up out of the dust, he struggled to his feet. His countrymen, as he now thought of them, were still at close quarters with the Taphians, and though his left arm could not support the weight of a shield he knew that he could still use a sword to help them. But despite their need his mind was now bent upon his friend. He looked about the large courtyard and saw the door that led to the pantry and kitchens. Retrieving his sword, he stumbled towards the door and found it unlocked.

He stepped into a narrow passageway. No torches burned there and the only light came from the doorway behind him, but his keen eyes penetrated the shadows with ease, picking out doorways on both sides of the corridor and a flight of stairs to the right. Suddenly he heard the sound of voices from somewhere within the palace and paused to pick up their direction. Straining his heightened hearing against the din of battle – filled with the screams of the wounded and dying – he listened for a particular voice, the voice of Odysseus. Moving slowly, he passed the stairs to the upper level of the palace and followed the passage around to the right. As he moved cautiously through the shadows, his sword gripped tightly in his hand, the voices became clearer. Then he recognized the unmistakable tones of Odysseus.

Within moments the short corridor had led him to the great hall, where he found the prince faced by four Taphian archers and Polytherses. The latter held Penelope to his side, with a gleaming dagger poised at her throat. Eperitus saw her and his heart sank, knowing he had arrived too late. Without any force of men behind him, there was little help he could offer Odysseus now other than to die at his side.

‘So, your army has arrived,’ Polytherses mocked.

Odysseus turned and for a moment the look of concern left his face, to be replaced by relief and even joy.

‘I knew I could rely on you, Eperitus,’ he said. Then his looks grew dark again, though determined, and he turned to Polytherses. ‘Release my wife and I’ll spare your worthless life. But if you harm her I will make your death so terrible you’ll beg me to kill you.’

‘You oaf,’ Polytherses retorted. ‘Don’t you see that your life is in my hands? One word from me and you’d be dead in an instant.’

‘Then why do you wait?’ Odysseus demanded. ‘Kill me now. Unless you fear to kill me.’

‘I fear nothing and no man, least of all you. No – I want you to kneel before your king, and then I will kill you. And if you want Penelope to live, you’ll do as I command.’

‘No, Odysseus,’ Penelope shouted fiercely, struggling against the strong grip that held her. ‘I’d rather die than be this man’s whore.’

Polytherses placed his hand over her mouth and pressed the tip of the dagger into her neck, pricking the soft skin so that a bead of blood rolled down over her chest. Odysseus took a step forward and the archers drew back their bows; the slightest twitch of their fingers would release the arrows.

Eperitus put a hand on his shoulder and pulled him back. The ungainly prince, with whom he had shared so many hardships, looked at him and there was anger in his eyes. But in that same moment Eperitus handed him Iphitus’s bow and a single arrow he had taken from the quiver. Odysseus snatched them from him and in an instant had fitted the arrow and was aiming it at Polytherses.

Silence fell in the hall. Polytherses’s eyes were wide with terror as he dragged Penelope in front of him to act as a shield against Odysseus’s arrow. The four Taphians strained their bowstrings even further and waited only for a word from their leader. Meanwhile, Odysseus focused his concentration on Penelope and Polytherses. Penelope met his eyes and nodded imperceptibly. Odysseus whispered a prayer to Apollo for the sureness of his aim, then released the arrow from his fingertips.

The darkness in the hall and the shimmering heat from the flames obscured the usurper of his father’s throne and made his aim almost impossible. Indeed, very few could have hit such a mark: Teucer, possibly; Philoctetes also, but only with the magical arrows that Heracles had given him; Apollo, certainly. But with Iphitus’s great horn bow Odysseus was as deadly as any archer in Greece, and the arrow flew from his fingers straight into Poly-therses’s left eye. It passed through his brain and killed him before he could even think to cut his captive’s throat. The Spartan princess stepped free of the dead man’s hold and the corpse collapsed in the dirt behind her.

In the same instant, the Taphian bowstrings shivered the air in the great hall. One of their arrows nicked Odysseus’s forehead, and another his upper arm. The third missed completely, but the fourth thumped into his thigh, making him shout in pain. Eperitus drew his sword and charged towards the enemy archers, but at that moment Mentes burst in through the twin doors, followed by Antiphus and a group of Ithacans. The Taphian held up his hand and ran to the centre of the hall.

‘You are victorious, Odysseus,’ he announced, and then to his countrymen: ‘Lower your weapons, my friends. The battle is over.’

With their leader slain, the archers realized they had nothing more to fight for and threw down their bows. Polytherses’s brief reign as king of Ithaca was over, and fittingly he was the last to die on that fateful day.

Odysseus plucked the arrow from his leg and tossed it into the shadows, then limped across the hall to embrace his wife.