A Song of War: a novel of Troy Read online

  There would soon be a time when I would no longer be quiet and demure. Until then, I would be my father’s most perfect daughter.

  In the meantime, I asked Hellenus to procure a few items for me to replace those taken from my room. I’d been at work with the chisel and thin sheet of lead for ages, but it was finally complete. I wound the strand of Helen’s golden hair around the rolled metal.

  The delicate tablet was inscribed with daemon words unintelligible to the eyes of mere mortals, taught to me by an Achaean slave girl who knew darker ways to commune with the gods.

  “I curse Helen of Sparta,” I chanted over the tablet. “I curse her mind and her memory and her face. May her liver be rotten and spotted, her tongue gnarled and twisted. May this curse hasten her to her grave or back from whence she came.”

  With that, I stabbed the flimsy metal and its strand of golden hair through with iron nails.

  And I braced myself to do what I swore I wouldn’t do.

  I lied.

  I sent word to my attendant that I’d dreamed of Troy, our glorious city still standing while the Achaeans withdrew their ships from our beaches. I had glimpsed this in a dream, but it was only a fragment of some larger, bleaker story. But as my cell doors swung open and I stepped into the sunshine for the first time in months, I told myself the lie didn’t matter.

  I’d made it over the first obstacle. I could do this.

  In the first moment of forgotten freedom, I felt like a drowning woman brought to the ocean’s surface for air. I ignored the guards at my side with their spears and daggers and instead closed my eyes, briefly letting my fingers touch the vial tucked into my bodice. In my own head, I could make everything fade away and focus on the play of the sea air on my cheeks and the feel of the warm stones beneath my bare feet. Perhaps people stared at me, but I was accustomed to their glares. My dark face would always garner attention, as did my twin’s, and I received twice the number of gapes he did as I was not just dark but mad. But today I didn’t care about the stares. I was free.

  My attendant had dressed me in a fresh skirt today, my customary black but emblazoned with golden suns at the hem. I’d embroidered the skirt myself after my girlhood incident in Apollo’s temple, enjoying the fact that I could kick the symbol of that treacherous god each time I took a step. But today it was a different deity that I sought.

  Guards escorted me to Athena’s grand temple at Troy’s highest point, stone lions guarding her outer entrance, the inner shrine flooded with light from high windows. The goddess’ altar lay heaped with flowers, and a meager fire burned in the brazier, its smoke rising in a sullen crown. A great statue of Athena towered, yet it was the small figure of the Palladion that was the most sacred object in Troy. It stared at me from its small niche with wooden eyes, the goddess holding tight to her lance in one hand and distaff in the other. The wooden Palladion was a gift from Athena, fallen to earth at the founding of Troy, and so long as it remained within our walls, Troy was impervious. It was because of this that I offered Helen’s curse tablet to Athena alongside a vial of my own blood, collected drop by drop since I’d been confined to my room.

  “A maiden’s blood,” I whispered, overturning the blood into Athena’s sacred fire, where it hissed and fizzled. “I have no drink offerings to pour for you, or firstling lambs to lay upon your altar, but I beg you to hear my plea. Help me find a way to return Helen to the foul backwater from whence she came.”

  If the great goddess heard me, she didn’t answer. But from the way a sudden shaft of sunlight fell upon the Palladion and made the stars painted on her cloak suddenly glimmer, I believed she accepted my offering.

  “I don’t think I’ve seen you so at peace since we played morra here as children.”

  I startled and knocked the vial and tablet into the fire so my brother couldn’t see them. I hated to hide anything from Hellenus, but my brother was far too upstanding to understand something as sordid as a curse, especially one paired with a blood offering. “A game I always won.”

  Hellenus bumped his shoulder against mine. “Because you cheated.” He walked around as if inspecting my clean hair and finely woven skirt. “I see you’ve left that skull in your chambers.”

  “Or so you think.” I pulled back the hem of my fringed kilt to reveal the cat skull at my hip.

  My brother blew out an exasperated puff of air but didn’t comment. We left the temple side by side, and I watched a sleek black vulture soar lazily overhead, scanning the plains and beaches for an easy meal. Finding none, it flapped its wings and flew away.

  Death, death, go away…

  “Never to return another day,” I murmured, transfixed by its movement. Was it a sign? My hopes rose further.

  “What’s that?” Hellenus asked.

  “Nothing.” I smiled.

  He studied me, then gestured over the expanse of rooftops toward the horizon, where two ships approached. “I came to find you,” he said. “The Achaeans are here.”

  Gooseflesh rippled down my arms as I peered at the foreign ships with their striped black sails, half fearing to see the waters swarmed with Achaean vessels as I did in my visions. The vibrant sun dog overhead might have been a good omen, but I’d learned not to trust Apollo. “There are only two ships, so they bring an offer of reconciliation. This may be the final opportunity to preserve peace,” I said.

  “Father said you’d had a positive vision—”

  “I lied,” I said, unable to meet Hellenus’ eyes. “It was the only way he’d release me. If we fail…”

  Yet I knew we could not fail.

  “It’s not our decision,” Hellenus said. “It’s Father’s responsibility to set our course.”

  “Then we must make him set the right one.”

  “Tell me again of all you’ve seen. I’ll try to convince Father.”

  I recounted the various sordid scenes commonplace in any war. Save the newest, one that had left me clawing at an unknown attacker and crying out for Hellenus as I’d woken. Gods, but I hoped that was a false vision. I didn’t say more, for we had an unexpected visitor. “Greetings, Andromache.”

  I saw Hellenus’ pulse thrum a quick beat in his throat before he turned around to greet our brother’s small, bird-boned wife. “Good day, Andromache,” he echoed.

  “A happy morning to both of you,” she replied. “King Priam requests your presence in the megaron,” she said to my brother. Her gaze went to the foreign ships, growing taller on the horizon, and a line appeared between her straight brows. If there was anyone else in this city not utterly delighted by Helen’s presence, it was Andromache—since her return from Sparta, my sister-in-law had been more solemn-eyed than the laughing lighthearted girl who departed our shores. I wondered if she shared my disquiet about the future—she was the future queen of Troy, after all, and watching those ships approach our shores, she looked it. “It’s the Achaeans, isn’t it?” she asked, unsmiling. “Have they finally come for Helen?”

  “Without a doubt,” Hellenus answered.

  Andromache bit her lower lip. “Is there a chance King Priam will relent and send her back?”

  “Not if he’s found a way for Troy to profit from a war against the Achaeans,” I answered.

  “War?” Andromache blinked. “You still believe it will come to that?”

  “I will stop it from happening.” But her attention had already shifted.

  “Hector will lead our forces in any fight that comes,” she said. “So we will win.” Conviction brought a flush to her cheeks. It was easy to see why Hellenus loved her. “I must summon the rest of your brothers for the king,” she said, and we watched her go.

  “I’ll bring the goat cream with honey you like tonight,” Hellenus said to me, but I could tell his mind was elsewhere, lingering on freckled cheeks and a pair of solemn eyes. I put a hand on his arm but didn’t mention his heartache again. There were more important matters at hand than my brother pining for a married woman, feelings I knew him too honorable to
act upon.

  “Help me stop Father’s mad plan,” I said instead. “Together we can do this. Together we can do anything.”

  “Looking at you now, I believe it,” my brother said. He touched my oiled curls with a smile. “You seem happier than I’ve seen you in a long time.”

  Not happier, perhaps, but filled with purpose. I would avert this war and heal myself in the process, and then Hellenus and I could leave Troy, start a new life filled with sunshine and laughter.

  We discussed the bones of my plan as the sun climbed high and the Achaean ships approached, their oars working in perfect unison like giant dragonfly wings. The ships were black, their keels tarred and their prows stained a vibrant hue to match the sky. The oars raced to build momentum, then held themselves aloft as the hulls rammed onto the beach. Hellenus departed then, but I stared down at the ships, fascinated.

  They seemed like children’s discarded playthings in the shadows of our walls, their palsied sails flapping weakly in the breeze. I squinted to see a short man with a beard and thick shock of black hair standing at the bow of the first ship. Even from this distance, I could see him lift his eyes toward the citadel ramparts to where I stood. I knew then how a warrior must feel before a battle, facing off across a broad field from his enemy.

  For we were enemies; there was no denying that. So, too, were Paris and Helen, and perhaps even my father. Troy was beset upon by all sides and from within.

  Although the surveying Achaean couldn’t see me, I dropped my chin in respect of his mission. He was a peacekeeper, and so was I.

  May the gods aid us both today.

  A flurry of movement down on the beach caught my attention. Rather than jump into the shallow surf, the black-haired Achaean threw a round shield onto the sands. He leaped with the grace of a wild cat onto the metal disc, as if he dared not sully his feet with Troy’s sands.

  I watched in confusion as, from the ship, a man in a striped tunic raised his arm, then jumped feet first onto our shores. Only then did the black-bearded man retrieve his shield and lead the way to our city’s colossal main gate, more man-locusts leaping from the ships to follow him.

  The riddle tickled at the edges of my mind, but I dared tarry no longer. It would take time for the Achaeans to make their way through the lower city to the citadel, but I could linger no longer to witness their approach, not while the men of my family plotted below. Yet I couldn’t very well saunter into my father’s megaron when my two guards had explicit orders to keep that from happening.

  Why must everything in life be so difficult?

  I walked in silence along the ramparts, my guards trailing like cursed shadows. I didn’t stop until I’d reached the gardens. I lingered near the kitchen herbs in their giant terra-cotta pots, plucking new leaves and tasting fragrant rosemary and basil, thyme and marjoram. Near the gardener’s shed was the customary pot of sand taken from the same beach the Achaeans had just landed upon, used to mix with soil for the coriander and other plants.

  “Curses!” I exclaimed, suddenly kneeling down near the pot. “This wretched sandal strap has finally gone and broken.”

  The guards were imbeciles, for I was always barefooted as the day I was born. I wiggled my exposed toes at them and gave a nervous giggle, relishing the looks of consternation.

  Ah yes, I was a mad one, wasn’t I?

  I bent as if to fix my imaginary sandal, waiting for the most opportune time as my guards drew closer.

  One, two…

  I exhaled, making as if to brush off my black skirt.

  Three.

  I grabbed two fistfuls of sand as I straightened, then whirled and threw them in perfect unison.

  Straight into the eyes of my guard dogs.

  They howled, their orders suddenly forgotten. I didn’t waste time, my feet flying over the cobbles as if they were glowing embers. I raced down all manner of back corridors to ensure that the guards didn’t find me.

  Sometimes the gods favor us. Today was one of those rare moments, a sign that they wanted me to succeed.

  I skidded to a halt outside my father’s grand hall, for the contingent of Achaeans had already arrived. A fire burned in the great hearth where entire goats would turn on spits tonight and the room would fill with the tang of meaty offerings to the gods, but for now the only scent was that of cloying wood smoke.

  Smoke and fire.

  I fought away a heavy crash of panic as I slipped along the back walls, refusing to allow the now-familiar vision to gain hold over me. My mouth filled with the taste of copper coins from biting the inside of my cheeks until I could breathe again. A quick survey proved that no one had noticed me, although my sand-blinded guards were now pushing their way through the crowd in search of a barefoot princess. I ducked my head and pushed farther into the hall.

  A quick glance revealed that this was no normal assembly, for the panoply of Troy’s showy women were absent. Including Helen.

  This was a council of men. A council of war.

  “We must succeed,” I whispered, stroking the top of my cat’s skull for reassurance. He only stared at me with dead and hollow eyes.

  I stumbled a step, for suddenly everyone seemed to stare at me with the same eyes, as if I were surrounded in a room of rotting corpses and sun-bleached skeletons. A scream built in my throat, but I swallowed it raw and willed myself to keep walking.

  Gradually, the bodies around me returned to living, breathing men.

  But not for long. They’ll make lovely carrion for the crows.

  The black-bearded Achaean stood on the bottom step of my father’s dais, one hand holding the round shield he’d leaped onto earlier and the other clasped behind his back in the relaxed posture of a man before his equal. A cluster of other men stood with him, including the soldier in the striped tunic who had followed him onto the beach, a hulking Achaean larger than an ox, and a flame-haired one that could only be Menelaus. Had this been a normal greeting among kings, my father might have been alone on the dais. Instead, his armada of able-bodied sons flanked him.

  Yet all was not as it seemed, for both my father and Hellenus were narrow-eyed. So Hellenus had done his best. Perhaps he had been successful, and if not, there was still my part to play.

  “Greetings to Menelaus of Mycenae, Odysseus of Ithaca, and Ajax of Locris,” Priam said, nodding in turn for Red Hair, Black Beard, and the Ox, and making a great show of leaning back on his throne as if bored.

  Helen’s husband and Odysseus of Ithaca. The ox Ajax I discarded; he was only here to intimidate, but my eyes lingered on the black-haired bridegroom who had tricked Penelope’s father into parting with her. That one bore watching.

  Father accepted a rock crystal rhyton from a slave and took a long draft of watered wine, as if the Achaeans had interrupted his leisure. “My sons tell me you wish to see me as a matter of urgency.”

  Menelaus moved to speak, but Odysseus stopped him with a hand on his forearm. “King Priam, you rule over many rich vassal cities,” he said with a gallant sweep of his hand. His voice was a slow drawl. “My King Agamemnon is also a great king, one with a most fervent desire for peace between our peoples.”

  “Is that so?” My father laughed. “Did he tell that to the Trojan villages he raided last summer? I think not.”

  “And did you tell your sons of your wish for war before they availed themselves of my wife?” Menelaus demanded.

  “Your wife chose to leave you,” my father said. “She has found a new home here in Troy.”

  I wanted to howl and scream at my father, for he had heard me in my cell and felt my same doubts, yet he persisted in this folly.

  “Your sons violated their guest-rights at my wedding,” Odysseus said calmly to my father. “That’s no small crime in the eyes of the gods.” The king of Ithaca frowned at my eldest brother. “Condoning the kidnapping of Helen of Sparta was beneath you, Hector.”

  Divide and conquer. That was Odysseus’ strategy with my father and his sons, but it would fail. N
othing could turn Hector into a betrayer.

  “Helen was not kidnapped,” Paris said from his place on the dais. Still, the coward stood half-hidden behind the shield of Hector’s shoulder. “She came of her own free will, escaping a husband too much a worm to hold her.”

  “That worm could kill you with his bare hands,” Menelaus snarled, opening and closing his fists for emphasis.

  Once again Odysseus stepped in as peacekeeper. “Menelaus has his brother’s full support. Agamemnon is not a man to trifle with.”

  “Neither am I,” my father said. He rose from his throne in a leonine movement.

  Odysseus bowed his head, switching to a fresh tactic. “Troy has held hostage the precious tin we need for our bronze forges and demanded outrageous taxes from us for years now, but we never guessed that your taxes included other men’s wives. We are sent here to negotiate for the return of Menelaus’ queen. What are your terms?”

  “We have no terms.”

  My father’s pronouncement was like the heavy roll of a war drum. I wanted to rail at him, but all was not lost…

  The megaron erupted into a cacophony of shouts and jeers. It didn’t take an oracle to know that they would bluster and boast, and Odysseus would leave without having accomplished his mission.

  Thus, I covered my ears and skirted my way along the room, but not before I’d caught Hellenus’ attention. He nodded his acknowledgment. Then I slipped unnoticed from the megaron and took up a post in the corridor where the thwarted Achaeans would have to pass on their retreat. I didn’t have long to wait. Menelaus stormed from the megaron first, his face mottled purple with anger. I let him go, for there would be no reasoning with that one. Odysseus soon followed, although I silently cursed as two men fell into step behind him, the ox-like Ajax and the striped tunic I’d seen jump from his ship earlier.

  “Odysseus,” I called out. He startled, and his hand went to the dagger hilt tucked into his belt while the oblivious Menelaus disappeared around a corner. Odysseus’ confusion only deepened when he saw no assassin lurking in the shadows, but a mere woman.