The Hittite

“What does Odysseos want to tell me?” Helen fairly shouted. “Can he prevent tomorrow’s fight?”

Her golden hair was disheveled, she wore a plain shift belted at the waist. It was obvious she had been crying. Yet still she was so beautiful that it took a conscious effort of will not to reach out to her and try to comfort her.

“Nothing can prevent tomorrow’s fight, my lady,” I said. “Or, rather, no one will take a step to prevent it.”

She sank onto the sofa against the little chamber’s far wall. “No. It’s ordained by the Fates. Hector will die tomorrow. It’s foretold. Troy is doomed. I’m doomed.” She bowed her head and began to sob softly.

Still wondering where Paris was, I knelt on one knee before her. “My lady, Odysseos wants me to tell you how to survive.”

Helen looked at me, her soft cheeks runneled by tears. “How can I survive if he dies?” she demanded. “Why should I survive? I’m the cause of his death!”

Apet hurried to her side. “Not so, my dear one. Hector is doomed, truly, but it’s not your fault. It’s his destiny and there’s nothing anyone can do to avoid it.”

Helen shook her golden-tressed head and broke into more sobs.

Kneeling at her feet, I told her, “My lord Odysseos instructed me to tell you that if the worst happens, if the Achaians break into Troy, you are to flee to the temple of Aphrodite and take sanctuary there. He will seek you there, in the temple of Aphrodite.”

Helen’s sobbing eased. “Odysseos will seek me?”

“So he told me. He will protect you while the city is being sacked.”

Her face went cold. “And then return me to Menalaos.”

“Yes, my lady.”

“I’d rather die.”

“No!” I urged. “You must live.”

“Not as Menaloas’ wife. He’d probably kill me, after he’s had his fill of beating me, raping me, humiliating me in front of his kinsmen.”

Apet said, “Fly to Egypt, my pet! You’ll be safe in the Land of the Two Kingdoms.”

Egypt? I was stunned. The old woman must be insane. Egypt was a thousand leagues distant. Farther.

Helen echoed my thoughts. “How can we get to Egypt? How can we get away from Troy when the city falls? What good is anything if he’s killed?”

She had lost all hope. And suddenly I felt pity for beautiful Helen. She had nothing to look forward to if Troy fell; nothing but pain and humiliation and ultimately death. Hector had been her real hope, her one chance for survival. If he died …

But it was more than that, I realized. She loved Hector. More than her girlish infatuation with Paris. She truly loved Hector. She was terrified that he would be killed by Achilles. That frightened her more than her own fate at the hands of Menalaos.

I found myself wondering what love truly is. How can one person be willing to die so that another could live? With a shock of surprise, I found myself envying Hector.

But such thoughts were not for me. I was a soldier; she was a queen, and a princess of Troy. Slowly I got to my feet. “My lady, that is Odysseos’ message. If the Achaians enter the city, fly to the temple of Aphrodite. Not even the barbarians would despoil the temple of so powerful a goddess. He will find you there and protect you.”

Helen nodded bleakly. “And then turn me over to Menalaos.”

I spread my hands. “I have nothing to say about that, my lady.” Yet I wished that I did.

Helen breathed a long, shuddering sigh. Then she stood up and said to me, “Thank you, Lukka, for bringing me Odysseos’ message. Now you must return to your master and give him my thanks for offering me his protection.”

“It’s better than nothing,” Apet said, in a half-whisper.

“Is it?” Helen asked. Then she dismissed me.

The same two young men escorted me to the Scaean Gate. I left Troy, my mind in a turmoil over Helen. She was too beautiful to die, to be killed by Menalaos. Even though he was her rightful husband and had the power of life and death over her … I shook my head and tried to clear away such thoughts. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to picture my Aniti in my mind. Would she cry for me if I were killed? Would I cry for her?

It wasn’t until I was halfway back to the Achaian camp strung out along the beach, trudging alone beneath the moon as it glided among clouds of silver, that the full import of Odysseos’ message to Helen suddenly struck me.

He expected the Achaians to break through Troy’s walls. He knew that if Achilles killed Hector the Trojans would shut themselves inside those walls and defy the invaders. He knew that the only way to get past those walls was to build the siege towers that I had described to him.

Haughty Agamemnon might not believe that the towers could work, but Odysseos did. He believed in them! He believed in me!

I wished that Helen did, too.

7

I slept fitfully that night, my dreams filled with visions of Helen and Aniti, Hector and Achilles, all in a confusing, troubling whirlwind. I awoke with the sun. The morning dawned bright and windy.

Although the single combat between Hector and Achilles was what everyone looked forward to, still the whole army prepared to march out onto the plain. Partly they went because a single combat between champions can degenerate into a general melee easily enough. Mostly they went to get a closer look at the fight.

Odysseos came to me as my men were tugging on their leather jerkins and strapping their helmets under their chins.

“I want you and your Hittites to stand close behind my chariot,” said the King of Ithaca to me. “If a battle arises you must follow my chariot.”

“I understand, my lord,” I said. Then I added, “But we could be starting to fell trees for the siege towers. There’s plenty of timber on the other side of the river.”

“Not today,” Odysseos said. “If all goes well, we may not need your towers.”

I had no choice but to accept his decision.

Virtually the entire Achaian force marched out through the gate and drew itself up, rank upon rank, on the windswept plain before the camp’s sandy rampart. By the beetling walls of the city the Trojans were drawing themselves up likewise, chariots in front, foot soldiers behind them. Swirls of dust blew into the cloudless sky and quickly dissipated. I could see pennants fluttering along the battlement of the city’s walls. I even imagined I saw Helen’s golden bright hair at the top of the tallest tower, by the Scaean Gate.

Odysseos ordered us to stand at the left side of his chariot. “Protect my driver if we enter the fray,” he said. So I stood with my men, each of us clasping our heavy shields that extended from chin to ankle. Five plies of hides stretched across a thin wooden frame and bossed with iron studs, our shields would stop almost anything except a spear driven with the power of a galloping chariot behind it.

Poletes was up on the rampart with the slaves and thetes, straining his old eyes for a view of the fight. He would interrogate me for hours this night, I knew, dragging every detail of what I had seen out of my memory. If either of us still lives after this day’s fighting, I told myself.

As I stood on the windy plain, squinting into the morning sun, a roar went up among the Trojans. I saw Hector’s chariot, pulled by four magnificent white stallions, kicking up a cloud of dust as it sped from the Scaean Gate and drove toward the front of the arrayed ranks of Trojan soldiery. Hector stood tall and proud, his great shield at his side, wearing the gleaming bronze armor I had seen him with the previous night in the armory. A clutch of spears stood in their holder on the chariot, their points aimed heavenward.

For many minutes nothing more happened. Muttering started among the Achaian footmen. I glanced up at Odysseos standing in his chariot. The King of Ithaca merely smiled tolerantly. Achilles was behaving like a self-