they were using as an altar. Even with his hands tied behind his back and his ankles hobbled the boy put up enough of a fight for one of the guards to club him with the hilt of his sword. Then they hefted him up, moaning and half- conscious, and draped him across the altar. Three priests stood there, their robes and beards so soaked in blood that they looked black and evil in the flaming light of the pyre.
The boy’s eyes opened wide as the oldest priest raised his stone knife. He started to screech but the priest sliced the boy’s throat open in a shower of blood that silenced him forever.
There were several other priests, younger men, standing by the altar watching. Their robes were also stiff and black with victims’ blood. They looked tired from the work they had been doing. I clutched at the first one I could reach.
“What?” He seemed startled.
Showing him Odysseos’ bejeweled wristband, I said, “The King of Ithaca commands the release of one of the women. She was put in among the victims by mistake.”
He stared down at the jeweled copper band, then looked up into my face. “You’re no Ithacan.”
“I serve Odysseos,” I said, gesturing to the armband I wore.
The priest was young enough so that his beard was still dark. But his eyes were shrewd, suspicious.
“How do I know that you didn’t steal these trinkets?”
I slid my sword from its sheath. “I am a Hittite. My sword is iron. I serve the King of Ithaca.”
“I’m only a junior priest, fit only to slaughter animals. I can’t—”
“You’ll do what I ask or I’ll make a sacrifice of you.”
Strangely, he smiled at me. “So this sacrificial victim you want to save is a woman, eh?”
“My wife.”
That made his dark brows go up. “Your wife?”
“Come with me,” I said, clutching his shoulder once again. “I’ll explain on the way.”
Dragging the priest by his arm, I hurried across the sand to the crowd of victims that were now being herded slowly by their guards toward the sacrificial altars. I quickly told the priest my story, not caring if he believed me or not. The victims shuffled reluctantly toward their doom, some of the women wailing and moaning, but most of them silent and hollow-eyed, beyond hope. The guards prodded them along with their spears.
I couldn’t find Patros. The whole mass of victims was moving like a reluctant herd of cattle toward the blazing pyres and the blood-soaked altars. I could smell the iron tang of blood in the air, and the stink of fear: sweat and piss.
“You can’t pass through!” said one of the guards as we approached them. He waved his spear angrily.
“The Hittite woman,” I shouted at him. “She’s to be released.”
“What Hittite woman?” the guard shouted back, frowning. Three of his companions came edging toward us.
“My wife, dammit!” I snapped. “I’ve got to find her before she’s killed!”
The guard glanced uneasily at his cohorts, then turned back to me. “Our orders are to feed these people to the altars.”
The priest spoke up. “If one of the prisoners is among the victims by mistake …” He shrugged his shoulders, unwilling to say more.
“We can’t let prisoners go,” the guard said. “It’s hard enough keeping them moving. I’ve had to clout some of ’em.”
“I serve Odysseos, the King of Ithaca,” I said, thrusting the wristband under his nose. “He sent me to save my wife.”
He goggled at the band. “King Odysseos? Really?”
“Really. Now let me through. I’ve got to find her!”
He glanced at the other spearmen again, then looked questioningly at the priest.
“The gods don’t need a victim who’s offered by mistake,” the priest said.
“I guess not,” said the guard. He seemed more confused than unwilling. Finally he told me, “All right, go ahead and get her. If you can find her in this crowd.”
“I’ll find her,” I said, pushing past him and plunging into the throng of wailing victims.
I was growing frantic myself. Tugging the young priest along with me, I bulled through the throng of women and children, searching for Aniti.
The soldiers kept urging the crowd forward, toward the altars and blazing pyres. They prodded the victims with the butts of their spears, angry at any who was too slow to suit them. A few of them jabbed at the women with their spear points, laughing cruelly even when they drew blood.
One youngster—no more than twelve or thirteen, I thought—stumbled and fell to her knees. A guard kicked her, then pulled her by her hair, screeching, to her feet.
“Keep moving!” he demanded. “Keep moving.”
Up at the altars the priests were working in shifts, one man slitting throats until his arms grew tired, then another stepping into his place.
Aniti! I kept telling myself. She’s got to be in here someplace!
Where are you? I called silently as I elbowed my way through the sobbing, terrified women and children.
And another fear clutched at my heart. I dreaded the thought that I might find my own sons among the victims. The vision of their being tossed into the flames made me shake with anger.
Finally I made it to the head of the crowd, to the blood-crusted flat stone they were using as an altar. The women screamed and struggled as guards seized them, twisting their arms behind their backs and forcing them to bend over the reeking altar stone. Four priests stood wearily by, while a fifth slashed throats again and again with his ritual stone knife. The victims’ screams turned into gurgling death rattles, then the guards dragged the bodies off to the blazing pyres.
The priests looked tired, their faces set in weary resignation. The one who was doing the slaughtering straightened up and handed the knife to another, then stepped back, rubbing his aching arms. The killing went on, one after another, as mechanical as a blacksmith hammering out a sword blade.
The gods know I’ve killed men and never thought twice about it. But that was in battle, facing men who were armed and doing their best to kill me. What I saw now was nothing more than slaughter, butchery, gods or no gods.
I stepped up to the nearest priest, a shaggy-bearded old man, still dragging the young priest in my grip. The old man went wide-eyed.
“How dare you … ?”
“I seek my wife,” I said, and I shook the young priest’s arm.
“He serves Odysseos,” the young priest said, his voice high and shaking. “He says his wife was put in with the victims by mistake.”
The older priest scowled at me. “The gods—”
“She’s a Hittite!” I interrupted him. “She doesn’t belong here. She’s tall, with light brown hair. Her name —”
“A Hittite woman?” The priest searched my eyes.
“My wife!”
He shook his head, then turned toward the blazing pyre and the oily black smoke rising thickly from it. “She is one with the gods, Hittite.”
3
I stared at the black smoke rising into the darkening sky.
“Had we known …” the old priest began. But he saw the look on my face and lapsed into silence.
My young priest looked horrified. But he swallowed hard and managed to say, “The gods have taken her.”
The gods. Fat Agamemnon and these brutish warriors. Despoilers of Troy, killers and rapists. And I had
