Heroes (formerly Talisman of Troy) (24 page)

The man studied him carefully and only then did Anchialus realize what he must look like: his hair was long and unkempt, his hands rough and calloused, his fingernails black. ‘I know, I seem a beggar, but you must believe me. I was enslaved and forced to put sheep and swine to pasture for years. I finally succeeded in liberating myself and I resumed my journey so I could keep my promise. I want nothing, although I am tormented by hunger. Just allow me to speak with the king.’

‘The king has departed,’ said the guardian.

‘Departed? Where has he gone?’

‘King Menelaus has asked for his help.’

‘King Menelaus? He is alive then?’

‘Yes. He is asking for help from all his allies to put together a large army and attack Mycenae, which is in the hands of his sister-in-law, Queen Clytemnestra. The queen has killed King Agamemnon, with the aid of her lover.’

Anchialus lowered his head. The Great Atreid had fallen! After having endured such suffering in the war, he had fallen in his own home, between the very walls he had so dearly desired.

‘How long ago did he depart?’ he asked.

‘Two days ago. He is marching south, along the coast.’

‘Can you tell me where he is headed?’

‘I do not know. But I could not tell you if I did. The king’s destination is a secret. No one must know where he is coming from. He will descend like a hawk into a flock of crows.’

Anchialus fell silent for a moment, trying to work out what he should do. If only he had been able to meet the young king, he would have given him Diomedes’s message and his mission would have been over. He would have looked for some ship in a port and sailed westward. He wanted to return to Diomedes. As he was contemplating his course of action, his gaze alighted upon the figure of a woman who was just exiting a side door and heading towards a path that led to the mountainside. For a moment, their eyes met and he was thunderstruck: Priam’s daughter-in-law, Hector’s bride: Andromache!

He followed her without making himself seen and saw her stop in front of an earthen mound topped by a stone. Weeds had completely covered the mound and at its base a few wild thistles had opened their purple flowers. She knelt next to it and bowed her head until it touched the ground; she was weeping, her back shaken by sobs.

Anchialus turned away because he understood that those solitary tears should bear no witness. He knew who that mound had been raised to. Andromache had wanted a place where she could grieve for her lost husband, buried far away in the fields of Asia after Achilles had slit his throat, pierced his heels and dragged him behind his chariot. She was the sad bride that the man who had directed him to Buthrotum was speaking of. Queen of a miserable kingdom of shepherds and fishermen, prey to a violent and irascible boy who had demanded her as his trophy; she, the rightful spoil of his father had the gods not sent the arrows of Paris to fell him at the Scaean Gates.

After some time, Andromache rose to her feet, drying her eyes with the edge of her veil, then walked back down the path that led to the city. Anchialus approached her, bowing like a suppliant.

‘Queen,’ he said, ‘stop and heed my request. I am a man who has nothing left to me, neither home, nor homeland, nor friends, but I think I can offer you something if you will help me.’

Andromache appeared startled, as if she could never have expected to meet anyone in so solitary a place. She looked him over calmly; her skin was pale as marble and her eyes were black as the gates to Hades, but the glitter of tears gave her gaze a mournful intensity.

She did not answer and hurried her step, head bowed.

‘I beseech you, queen,’ said Anchialus, nearly barring her way. ‘Do not deny a moment of your time to a poor suppliant.’

‘I am not who you think I am,’ she said in a soft voice. Anchialus could hear her light eastern accent, the same as the women prisoners whom he would take to Diomedes’s tent when they were dividing the spoils after a victory in Asia. Tears swelled within him as well, as the violence and futility of her pain pierced into his very bones.

‘I beg of you, I must reach your husband Pyrrhus, valiant son of Achilles. I have been told that he has departed.’

‘He is not my husband,’ replied Andromache. ‘He is my master. They have given me to a boy who could be my son . . .’

‘They say he marches to join forces with Menelaus. Tell me the road he is following, if you can, because I absolutely must find him. If you tell me, I will help you to escape. I will take you with me; I promise you, you will not lack sustenance nor a resting place for the night. I will respect you as befits your rank and your sorrow, and I will never raise my eyes to you unless you wish to speak with me. I will find a peaceful, secret place for you. My own nurse will care for you, if she is still alive; she is a good, old woman who lives alone on a little island. If she is dead, I will find another house for you, and another woman to serve you for as long as you desire. More than this I cannot do, but I swear before the gods that I am sincere and will keep faith to what I have promised.’

‘Sincere . . .’ said Andromache. ‘Like the vow Ulysses made to Poseidon on the beach of Ilium: an enormous horse, of wood . . .’

Anchialus dropped his head, unable to bear the look in Andromache’s eyes.

He drew a knife from his belt and he held it out to her, kneeling before her. ‘I was inside that horse,’ he said. ‘With lord Diomedes, my king. Kill me if you want, because if I cannot fulfil my mission, I prefer to die by your hand, so that at least a little justice may be done in this world, and so that you may be convinced that I am sincere.’

Andromache hesitated a moment, looking at the glittering blade, eyeing the edge slowly all the way up to the hilt. She stretched out her hand until she was nearly touching it with her long white fingers. Anchialus raised his head and saw in her gaze the ferocious tranquillity that he had so often seen in the eyes of warriors in the heat of battle. All their strength gathered in a still gaze and even stiller hand. The quiet that comes the instant before dealing the blow that will take a life.

Anchialus realized that he was ready to accept death without regret, on that dusty trail at the edge of the land of the Achaeans, from that gentle hand that had once caressed the head of a boy and the body of a hero. But all at once, the hand drew back.

‘Pyrrhus has taken the road for Phocis; his aim is to reach King Strophius and Queen Anaxibia, Menelaus’s sister. From there, he will continue with the Phocians towards the Isthmus to close off Mycenae from the north.’

Anchialus sheathed the blade and rose to his feet: ‘Accept my offer, queen. You will live in peace, sheltered from all violence.’

‘In peace?’ said Andromache. ‘Do you know why I haven’t killed myself yet? After having endured the hands that hurled my son from the wall of Troy on my skin, do you know why I haven’t killed myself?’

She turned her head towards the stone stuck into the pitiful, weed-covered mound, and the tears suddenly began to pour from her eyes again, trembling first on the rim of her eyelids, then trickling to meet the corners of her wan lips. Anchialus felt his heart unsteady in his chest.

‘Because the sweetness of my memories is still greater than the horror of that massacre. And my memories are so dear to me that they give me the strength to live. Death would take even them from me. My Hector, my one and only love, and my beloved child: they would die entirely, and for ever. My life, as miserable and shameful as it is, prolongs theirs. Without me, their memory would be lost for ever.’

They began to walk again towards the little city and Anchialus realized that she would not separate herself from that place for any reason. Might that mound actually cover the bones of Hector, the greatest warrior of all Asia? If that were true, what terms did she have to accept in exchange for keeping those relics there? Was her shame the price she’d paid to live with her memories?

An icy shudder gripped him, although the sun shone high; it seemed to him that the sky had lost its light and the sea its splendour.

When he set off for the mountain, he was burdened by an obscure weariness that he had never felt before.

*

He reached Pyrrhus’s column five days later, in a valley at the heart of the steep mountains of Acarnania. The only people of Achaean stock who had not taken part in the war of Troy lived in that land. They were so isolated and primitive that they cared nothing about anything. Ten years earlier, Agamemnon had sent Ulysses in vain to convince them to fight at his side; not even the persuasive words of the king of Ithaca had moved them. But what could be expected of a people who had no king nor cities, only wretched villages? Ulysses had spoken to a few old heads of family, who had no authority. They listened impassively as if he were speaking nonsense, and did not even deign to answer him. They neither agreed, nor disagreed; they said nothing. As Ulysses was still speaking, one of them stood and left, then another followed, and yet another, until they were all gone.

Anchialus had heard this directly from Ulysses when King Diomedes had once invited him to share the evening meal in his tent. And so he had avoided any contact with those people as he journeyed, for fear of not knowing how to deal with them.

He announced himself to the camp sentinels. One of them ran to advise the king that Anchialus, son of Iasus, a comrade of King Diomedes, had come to speak with him. Pyrrhus had him brought to his tent at once.

A wispy beard barely covered his cheeks, his hair was cut above his ears, and he had an incredibly powerful build for a boy his age. Anchialus had seen him on rare occasions, always at a distance and always flanked by two huge Myrmidons, Periphantes and Automedon. When his eyes had adjusted to the gloom in the tent, with a mere lantern to light it, Anchialus saw that Pyrrhus wore the armour of his father. His first suit of armour, the one that Patroclus had worn to trick the Trojans into believing he was Achilles and drive them from the Achaean camp; the armour that Hector had stripped from Patroclus’s body, and that Achilles had won back by slaying Hector. The other suit of armour, the one that Hephaestus had forged for Achilles’s last battle, had gone to Ulysses.

‘You wear the armour of your father,’ said Anchialus, gazing at the shield adorned with silver stars. ‘How often I saw it shine on the chariot drawn by Balius and Xanthus! We Argives were usually lined up alongside the Myrmidons.’ The youth seemed not to hear his words.

‘Why did you ask to speak with me?’ asked Pyrrhus, eyeing the guest with diffidence.

‘Oh
wanax
,’ began Anchialus, ‘my lord Diomedes, king of Argos . . .’

‘King of nothing!’ snapped the son of Achilles. Anchialus stiffened, wounded by his insult. ‘King of nothing,’ repeated Pyrrhus, his voice dropping, ‘like me . . .’

Anchialus understood. ‘Do not say this,
wanax
. You reign over the Epirotes and Diomedes will soon have a great kingdom in the land of Hesperia, and I will join him there.’

‘Diomedes was forced to flee, as was I. Thessaly is my kingdom, the Myrmidons are my people, my palace stands in Phthia, and yet I must live in these mountains in the midst of savages in a pathetic dwelling that I conquered without glory.’

‘But I have heard that your grandfather, old Peleus, is still alive. How is it possible that you no longer live in your palace, enjoying your privileges? Has an enemy killed Peleus, perhaps, and driven you out?’

‘No enemy,’ said Pyrrhus. ‘There is no enemy capable of driving me out. Only my own grandfather could do so. Peleus would not have me. One cannot fight such an enemy, but only flee. I fled my grandfather.’

Anchialus fell into silence, but his desire to know what had happened prompted him to speak. He said, ‘
Wanax
, pardon my boldness. Why did Peleus not keep you with him?’

‘He doesn’t like me. He’s an old man and he thinks like an old man. “Why did you kill the old defenceless king,” he said, “who your father Achilles had spared thinking of my white hair? Why did you kill the little prince, smashing him on to the rocks below? Why did you force his mother to lie with you after obliging her to witness such horror?” They’d told him everything, understand? He already knew everything. I swear that if I knew who it was I’d strangle him with my bare hands. I would rip out his eyes and his tongue and feed them to my dog.’

Anchialus was quiet, not knowing what to say.

‘But there was something you wanted to tell me,’ said the youth then. ‘Where do you come from? How did you arrive here among these mountains?’

‘I was following my king, Diomedes, sailing north on the western sea, when we fought a people marching towards the land of the Achaeans. They were as numerous as locusts and they possessed weapons made of an invincible metal. The sword of Tydides, a formidable arm, was snapped in two as if it were made of wood. The king barely saved himself, and we with him. He ordered me to take my leave of the other ships and to sail back, to warn the Achaean kings of the danger. “They must assemble an army,” Diomedes said to me, “they must send the black ships out to sea!” I have travelled at length, I have endured every sort of suffering, I have been imprisoned and enslaved, but I have kept faith to my promise. You are the first of the Achaean kings I have met. Tell the others to prepare their defences and allow me to depart, for I must join my king in the land of Hesperia.’

Pyrrhus looked at him without batting an eye.

‘Who told you where you could find me?’ he asked, looking intently at Anchialus in the darkness as if to see inside of him. He rose to his feet and approached him, towering over him by a full head. ‘My route was a secret. How did you find me?’

‘I suffered and fought at Ilium like your father, like all the other Achaean chiefs and warriors, like you did. What does it matter how I found you? The gods guided my steps so I could bring you this alarm.’

Pyrrhus burst out laughing. ‘The gods! If there are any gods, they amuse themselves by setting us down the wrong paths, by bringing us to remote, desolate destinations. They set us off one against another and they enjoy watching as we add wound to wound, as we slaughter each other. Like when we goad our dogs into a fight, and bet on which will be the first to rip out the throat of another. Don’t talk to me about the gods. I’m young but I’m not stupid, don’t make game of me. Tell me who told you where I was or you will die. I could care less if you fought at Ilium.’