Читать книгу The War at Troy - Lindsay Clarke - Страница 9

They had agreed to assemble the fleet at Aulis, a rock-sheltered harbour on the narrow strait between Boetia and the island of Euboea. The Boeotian levies were already there, and neither their northern neighbours, the Locrians, nor the warriors of Euboea had far to come. By the time Agamemnon’s own fleet of a hundred ships arrived in the port, Ajax and Teucer, the sons of Telamon, had also arrived from Salamis bringing the twelve vessels they had promised. Meanwhile, Menelaus had mustered sixty ships out of Laconia, and though there was no word from Crete as yet, the principal Argive allies rallied quickly to his cause. Diomedes brought eighty ships out of Tiryns while Nestor’s flagship led ninety more out of Pylos round the many capes of the Peloponnese, and Menestheus sailed fifty Athenian warships around Sounion Head. More impressively, Odysseus and his allies out of the Ionian islands managed to launch only eight vessels short of the sixty that Palamades had mockingly suggested.

Even the distant island of Rhodes contributed nine ships, but King Cinyras of Cyprus was less forthcoming. When Menelaus sailed on a recruiting mission there, half-hoping that he might waylay Helen and Paris somewhere at sea, Cinyras promised to send fifty ships to Aulis. In the event only one Cyprian vessel turned up – though its captain did launch forty-nine model ships made out of earthenware in fulfilment of his monarch’s pledge before he sailed away.

Menelaus was furious to have been duped in this manner, but perhaps he should have expected no more from a king who was also high priest to Aphrodite on the island of her birth. Worse still, the insult confirmed a suspicion that had haunted his jealous mind while he was on the island – that Cinyras had made a pact with Paris to conceal the runaways on Cyprus while he himself was there.

Agamemnon had set up his headquarters in the ancient fort on the rocky bluff overlooking the harbour where a vast fleet of around a thousand ships jostled each other as they made ready to cast off for Troy. The town below the fort had been overcrowded for some time now, and at night the watch-fires lit by the bivouacked troops stretched far along the strand. Standing beside Agamemnon one evening, the head of the college of Boeotian bards – a famous master of the art of memory – assured the High King that no one before him, not even Heracles or Theseus, had ever mounted an expedition on this scale. The Lion of Mycenae could scarcely manage his pride.

But various minor conflicts had already demonstrated the difficulty of holding together a diverse force that spoke many different dialects and harboured a number of old feuds and grudges. Agamemnon was under no illusion that so many men had been drawn to Aulis merely out of loyalty to himself and his brother. Yet whether it was greed for the rich spoils of Troy, or lust for land and trading advantage, or the mere love of violence and adventure that had brought them, this mighty host of warriors was now his to command, and the name of Agamemnon, King of Men, would live for ever in the songs of bards.

He was, however, engaged in the less glorious business of arguing with a hard-bargaining minister from Delos over terms for the provision of wine, oil and corn when word came that Achilles and his Myrmidons had arrived. ‘Send him up at once,’ he said. ‘Let’s see what this son of Peleus is made of.’ Then he dismissed the Delian with orders to think of better prices and summoned his chiefs of staff into council.

Many ferocious warriors were oiling their spear-shafts and sharpening their swords among the host outside the fort, and Agamemnon was glad enough to have their weapons under his command. But the touchy youth that Odysseus had brought back from Skyros was an altogether different proposition. Resolute to demonstrate that he was a man among men, Achilles walked into the council with an arrogance that fell not far short of disdain and then he sat throughout most of its deliberations taut as a bowstring, observing the others in the room with a taciturn frown that could be construed as vigilant in some lights and as surly in others.

From the first there was no doubting that this young warrior had something of a god about him. Whether or not Thetis, his mother, had seined him with fire or dipped him in the Styx, a radiance of immortality already flashed like a nimbus off his hair and glittered from the keen grey metal of his eyes. And it did so with such ardour that even old Nestor, more than forty years his senior, found it hard to stop a wondering gaze straying towards his lithe, graceful presence. For there was – Nestor saw with both admiration and trepidation – a killer’s glitter in that sheen.

Nor had he come alone. Though the invitation to join the council had been extended only to Achilles, a companion entered the room at his side, darker and slightly taller, but with much the same assured composure, as though the war had been arranged for their mutual satisfaction. When Agamemnon queried his presence, Achilles jutted his chin and said, ‘This is Patroclus, son of Menoetius, grandson of Actor, King of Phthia. Where I go, he goes also.’ And it was immediately clear that either both men stayed or both men left.

Seeing the blood flush in his brother’s face, Menelaus hastened to remind him that Patroclus had been among the men who took the oath at Sparta, and Odysseus further defused the tension by remarking that the last time he’d seen Achilles and Patroclus together they had been six years old and scrapping like dogs beside the stream at Cheiron’s school. ‘If the two of you fight as hard now as you did then,’ he said, ‘the Trojans are in for a bad time.’

Having already reminded himself that Apollo had promised victory only if Achilles came to the fight, Agamemnon joined in the laughter and ordered that room be made for another chair.

When Nestor asked for news about his old friend Peleus, Achilles answered with the stiffness of a young man reluctant to speak freely about his personal life. ‘My father regrets that he can no longer be of service to the cause himself, but the men I lead are his. Also he gave me the long spear which was Cheiron’s gift to him and bade me use it well. Divine Athena polished its shaft with her own hand. My father prays that the goddess will bestow her favour on us.’

Diomedes and Odysseus exchanged glances at the youth’s solemnity, but Ajax, who was cousin to Achilles, gave a good-natured laugh. ‘And no doubt your father warned you about keeping on the right side of the gods as mine did me. But as I said to the old man when I left his bedside, any fool can win glory if the gods are with him. I mean to do so whether they’re with us or not.’

‘Well I for one,’ said Odysseus wryly, ‘will be glad of any help we can get.’

At that moment Agamemnon’s herald Talthybius entered the room to announce the arrival of a Cretan legate, who was seeking audience with the High King.

‘Only a legate?’Agamemnon frowned. ‘Deucalion was supposed to send me ships. Where are they?’

Talthybius shrugged. ‘There’s no sign of them as yet.’

‘Damn these Cretans and their lies. Let’s have him in.’

Menelaus immediately recognized the legate from his visit to the island. One of Deucalion’s shrewder ministers of state in Knossos, Dromeus had caught the drift of the changing wind and aligned himself with the dissident faction of young men that had gathered around Idomeneus. That it was he, and not one of Deucalion’s minions that had come to Aulis, augured well. But where, Agamemnon demanded to know at once, were the ships they had hoped to see by now?

Dromeus chose to answer a different question. ‘There have been changes in Knossos since the sons of Atreus graced us with their presence,’ he said. ‘Deucalion has crossed the river to the Land of Shades. His son Idomeneus now sits on the Gryphon throne.’

There came a few formal acknowledgements of regret for Deucalion’s death before Agamemnon said, ‘But were we not given reason to think that your new king looks on our cause more favourably than his father did?’

‘That is indeed the case, Great King’

‘Then I ask again. Where are the ships?’

Dromeus opened his hands, brought them together at his lips and smiled. ‘The House of the Axe now stands ready to commit a hundred ships to this war.’

‘A hundred! Excellent!’Agamemnon made no effort to conceal his pleasure.

He turned smiling to Menelaus, who exclaimed that this was more than they had dared to hope. The mood around the table lifted.

Then Palamedes said, ‘So when can we expect to see them?’

Again Dromeus smiled. ‘This is, as you acknowledge, a generous commitment. You will not be surprised, therefore, that it comes attended by a condition.’

Lifted by a breeze gusting from a courtyard down the hill, the distant shout of an officer haranguing his men entered the room. With an irritable flick of his hand Agamemnon shooed a fly that was buzzing about his ear. ‘What condition?’

‘That as leader of so large a force King Idomeneus should share supreme command of all the allied forces.’

Telamon’s son, Ajax, an open-faced, broad-chested fellow with a frank manner, was the first to break the silence. He gave a derisive snort, slapped a hand across a sturdy thigh and said, ‘The crown has gone to your new king’s head! Go home and tell him that we already have the only leader we need.’

Still smiling, Dromeus fingered the curls of his beard and turned his gaze back to Agamemnon. ‘I might point out,’ he said, ‘that Crete’s hundred vessels are equalled in number only by the large squadron that the High King himself has brought out of Mycenae. Our ships are ready to sail. They await only your word.’

The stern young face of Achilles was also waiting for that word.

Agamemnon did not miss the quick sideways glance directed by Patroclus at his friend, but the cool, intimidating scrutiny of Achilles’ gaze remained fixed directly on the king’s frown, waiting to see how he would react.

Feeling the immediate need for decision, yet flustered by this unforeseen development, Agamemnon was, in those tense moments, listening for the advice of a god. When no voice entered the silence of his mind, he decided that though a hundred ships meant a great deal to him, his honour and authority meant a great deal more.

He was about to declare as much when Nestor straightened from where he had leaned to hear Odysseus whisper in his ear. ‘Perhaps’ – the old man cleared his throat – ‘perhaps it might be wise for the council to deliberate upon this matter?’

Taken aback, Agamemnon observed Nestor’s insistent nod.

‘My own thought precisely,’ he said. ‘If the Cretan legate will excuse us …’

Bowing courteously to each of the counsellors, Dromeus backed out of the room, leaving a musky trace of perfume on the air.

As soon as the door had closed behind him, Ajax said, ‘What is this whispering about? The High King is our commander. He has all the fighting force he needs.’

‘Bear with me, friend,’ Odysseus smiled, and would have said more but Palamedes intervened. ‘This matter requires careful thought. Crete promises more than eight times the number of ships that Salamis could muster.’

‘But at what price?’ demanded Ajax. ‘Any fool knows that a divided leadership can only spell trouble in the end.’

‘I stand with Ajax,’ declared Diomedes. ‘It seems to me there’s nothing to discuss. Like most of us here, Idomeneus was sworn to our cause at Sparta. A man doesn’t make conditions when he swears before a god.’

Fortified to find his own instincts strengthened by such unqualified support, Agamemnon said, ‘There’s already too much scope for division in our forces. A hundred ships more or less will make no great difference to our strength. I’d rather do without them than lose control of the rest. If Idomeneus won’t bow to our authority then let him stay at home.’

‘Good,’ said Odysseus. ‘The only hard part being that’s not what he will do.’

‘What do you mean?’ Ajax frowned.

‘You heard what Dromeus said. His ships are ready to sail. If Idomeneus has scoured his island to mount such a considerable fleet, he’s not about to let it rot in port at Knossos.’ Odysseus turned his ironical smile on Agamemnon. ‘A hundred more warships may not count for much in your reckoning, King of Men, but I’ve no doubt that Priam will welcome them with open arms.’

Ajax uttered an outraged gasp of dismay. Menelaus began to shake his head. ‘Idomeneus was among the first to swear. I don’t believe he would betray us.’

Odysseus shrugged. ‘Is it unknown for Cretans to break their word?’

‘But the man’s my friend,’ Menelaus protested. Then he saw that every man in the room was thinking the same bleak thought: that the open-hearted, younger son of Atreus had not proved to be the wisest judge of friends.

‘Nevertheless,’ Nestor dispelled the fraught silence, ‘it seems that Deucalion’s son has ambitions for his kingdom. Evidently he hasn’t forgotten that there was a time when Crete ruled the seas and took tribute from many of our cities. With Troy’s help it’s possible that she might do so again.’

Diomedes said, ‘Then what would he have to gain from joining us?’

‘A large share of the spoils of Troy,’ Odysseus answered. ‘Unrestricted access to her trade routes through the Hellespont and around the Asian coast – gold, silver, grain, cinnabar, timber, amber, jade. All of this, along with recognition of his independent authority by every kingdom in Argos.’

‘My friend Menestheus won’t care for that,’ said Palamedes.

Odysseus made a dismissive gesture. ‘Then the Lord of Athens should have kept as tight a rein on his vassal as his predecessor did.’

Agamemnon grunted and sat back in his chair. ‘Crete was on the rise again even before Theseus leapt from the cliff on Skyros. Idomeneus merely has more ambition than his father.’

‘And more courage,’ Menelaus put in.

Diomedes frowned. ‘The more shame that his courage is not matched by his honour. I took him for a true man at Sparta, and a worthy contender for Helen.’

‘But the question remains,’ Odysseus insisted. ‘Do we want his ten thousand Cretan spearmen inside our tents pissing out or outside them pissing in?’

A hint of a smile briefly crossed the face of Achilles.

Agamemnon caught it from the corner of his eye, and decided that the time had come to confront this arrogant young blood directly. ‘The son of Peleus seems amused. What are his thoughts on this question, I wonder?’

‘That it is a matter of indifference to me,’ Achilles said.

Agamemnon frowned. ‘How so?’

‘With all due reverence to the gods, my trust is in my own strength and that of my friend.’ Achilles smiled at Patroclus. ‘Whether the Cretans are for us or against us, we will fight.’

‘So will we all,’ said Ajax. ‘But who will lead? My obedience is to Agamemnon.’

‘And mine,’ Diomedes concurred.

Nestor rubbed a hand through the silvery-white curls of hair at the back of his head. ‘Yet Idomeneus awaits an answer. I for one am wondering whether it may not be prudent to have his forces at our side.’ He turned his grave eyes to Odysseus, who nodded and said, ‘This war will have to be won at sea before it can be won on land. A hundred ships either way could make all the difference.’

Agamemnon stared at Palamedes, who said quietly, ‘I agree with that judgement,’ and glanced away across the table, where Menelaus fidgeted with the heavy gold signet ring that Helen had given him on their wedding day. He was frowning gloomily down at the rampant pair of leopards on its bezel when Palamedes asked, ‘What does the King of Sparta say?’

The younger son of Atreus glanced uncertainly at the elder before answering. ‘As I said before,’ he murmured hoarsely, ‘I consider Idomeneus to be my friend. I believe he will prove a valuable ally.’ He fingered the ring which slipped loosely around his knuckle. Then he said, ‘This thing is for my brother to decide.’

Again Agamemnon shifted in his chair, trying to gauge the feeling in the room. His face had reddened and his eyes were on the move, avoiding the silent faces round him, yet finding nowhere sure to settle. This was the first occasion since he had committed himself to this war when he knew he was faced with a decision on which the whole dangerous enterprise might turn. Yet which way to lean? Every muscle of his body insisted that he retain absolute control. Control over the forces he had gathered, control over this council, control over himself. And the two men in the room with whom he felt most at ease fully expected him to do so. But Ajax and Diomedes were men of action, not of thought. And the same was true of Achilles and Patroclus, young men both, driven by an invincible confidence in their own strength and prowess. Neither of them, he suspected, would hesitate for a moment. They would go down fighting sooner than yield an inch in pride. That was the warrior’s way, the way of men, and he was Agamemnon, King of Men. But there was more to waging war than blood and fear and mindless valour amid the clash of chariots, and if shrewd old Nestor and that cunning thinker out of Euboea agreed with Odysseus on this, then more might be at stake than pride.

Agamemnon sat with his hand across his mouth, regretting that he had exposed his own position too soon. Were he to change his mind now, he might appear weak before those who most respected him. Yet if they were wrong … A hundred more ships … ten thousand more men … on one side or the other. He saw his whole proud fleet in flames around him and a Cretan pentakonter bearing down on his flagship with a gryphon at its prow and the double axe painted on its sail. An error made now might prove costly indeed when his ships were at sea.

But he could not vacillate for long under the impatient gaze of Achilles.

He was summoning the will to speak when Odysseus leaned back with a mildly incredulous air and said, ‘Do I speak only for myself when I say that if there was disagreement between Idomeneus and Agamemnon, I would know where my own loyalty belonged?’

And before either of them had fully taken in the implications of the question, both Ajax and Diomedes, at whom his challenge was directed, had declared that he was certainly not speaking for himself alone.

Odysseus arched his brows at Agamemnon and opened his hands. ‘It seems that we’re in agreement then.’

Agamemnon narrowed his eyes and saw that a door had opened on his dilemma. ‘Very well. On that clear understanding, let the Cretans come.’

But the Lion of Mycenae was feeling the full weight of the burden of command, even in the very moment when he was about to relinquish half of it.

Nor was he to know that Odysseus had no particular reason to mistrust the intentions of Idomeneus. But as the Ithacan said to his cousin Sinon afterwards when telling him how the meeting had gone, ‘We need those Cretan ships and how else was I to persuade Agamemnon to give up half his command?’

As to whether or not divine assistance might be required, Agamemnon was more inclined to agree with Odysseus than Ajax, so he had set aside the day before the fleet was due to sail for prayer and acts of sacrifice to the gods.

All the principal commanders and their men assembled outside the town in a hollow where a thick-girthed plane tree, sacred to Hera, had stood for centuries. An altar had been raised in the shade of the tree beside a nearby spring. The priests invoked the almighty power of Sky-Father Zeus, and Calchas prayed for the wisdom and guidance of Apollo. Then Agamemnon offered the sacrifice.

He had just raised the knife from the kill when all the men standing in the hollow were amazed to see a huge snake slither out from under the altar. Agamemnon stepped back in shock, gazing down at the scarlet markings streaked along the mottled black scales of the creature’s back. With astonishing speed, the snake writhed its long body towards the trunk of the plane tree and began to climb.

Calchas moved quickly from where he had been standing a little behind Agamemnon to observe the behaviour of the snake. He watched it make its way along a high bough to where a sparrow had made its nest. Though the mother-bird rose, fluttering her wings in alarm, she was quite powerless against the muscular strike of the great snake. Eight times it dipped its jaws into the nest, snatching out a fledgling sparrow at each strike. Then it raised its head upright, swayed for a time, watching the flight of the panic-stricken mother-bird. A last swift strike caught the sparrow by the wing and swallowed it whole. A moment later the snake stretched itself out along the bough and lay there so stiff and rigid that men later swore that it had been turned to stone.

A murmur of wonder and alarm ran through the assembled men.

Agamemnon stood with the sacrificial knife still dripping in his hand, looking to Calchas who threw the flat of his right hand to his forehead, cried out, ‘We accept the oracle,’ and stood with his eyes closed.

Silence settled across the glade. Not a man moved. Only the plane tree stirred a little in the breeze off the sea. Then Calchas lowered his hand, opened his eyes and smiled at the hundreds of men gazing at him with rapt attention. ‘Argives,’ he cried, ‘the mighty intelligence of Zeus himself sends you this portent. We have waited long for it, and will have to wait long for its fulfilment, but the glory promised here will never die.’

Still dismayed by the shock, Agamemnon took encouragement from his words. ‘Tell us, Calchas,’ he said, ‘how do you read the omen?’

‘Does a serpent not renew its skin each year?’ said Calchas. ‘And are the leaves of the plane tree not reborn with every year that passes? Eight was the number of the fledglings in the nest. Their mother sparrow made the ninth, and the death of each bird speaks of the passing of a year. The sparrow is one of Aphrodite’s creatures and Aphrodite fights for Troy. So for nine years you must fight to take Troy, but in the tenth year her broad streets will be yours.’

The priest’s voice was exultant. He threw open his arms, gazed skywards, and then stood with his eyes closed as though in silent prayer. Around him the assembled men waited in silence, each locked in his own thoughts.

Agamemnon saw at once that more was needed. ‘It is the will of Zeus,’ he shouted. ‘The god has spoken. Victory will be ours.’ Then Menelaus and Ajax were quickly at his side taking up the shout, urging others on. Soon the hollow was loud with the cry of ‘Victory will be ours’. It rose from the throng again and again, but as he joined the shouting, Palamedes, the prince of Euboea, became uncomfortably aware that only a few yards away across the glade, Odysseus of Ithaca was studying him with a cold, ironical regard.

The next day, to the accompaniment of a peal of thunder which was generally interpreted as a sign of encouragement from Zeus, the fleet set sail for Troy.

Two generations have passed since that day and many men have told the stories of the war many times. But memories grow confused with the passing of the years, so not all of the stories are reliable, and some chroniclers, for reasons that serve their own doubtful ends, have been known to tell downright lies. My own authority is the word of Odysseus, which I have found to be trustworthy in almost all respects, and he was quick to dismiss as nonsense the story put about by some that the fleet got lost almost immediately and made landfall in Mysia, where they launched a major assault, thinking that they had reached the coast of Troy.

Those who believe this fable offer divine intervention in explanation of the error. They claim that Aphrodite confused the navigators in order to stave off the attack on the city. But as Odysseus pointed out, Agamemnon was well-furnished with charts, Menelaus himself had already made a voyage to Troy without difficulty, and some of the most experienced rovers of the Ionian, Cretan and Aegean seas were among the captains of the Argive fleet. Odysseus was not the only prince who supplemented his wealth by piracy, and among his many other pursuits, Palamedes took a particular interest in the problems of navigation. So the story is most charitably understood as a muddled memory of a war that lasted for many years and involved many different campaigns not all of which took place beneath the walls of Troy.

It is true that when Agamemnon first conceived of attacking Troy, he had hoped to emulate the swift, devastating raid by which Telamon and Heracles had once breached the weakest stretch of the city’s walls. But King Priam had strengthened his defences since then. He had also commissioned a new fleet of warships and had been engaged in serious, and successful, diplomatic activity to ready his many allies for the coming conflict around the western coast of Asia. The High King of Troy might have fewer ships at his command than the High King of Argos but he was not faced with the problem of transporting a hundred thousand men across the Aegean, and his fleet was quite large enough to guard the mouth of the Hellespont and offer support to his allies.

And his allies were many. As intelligence reports came into Mycenae from Agamemnon’s spies, they proved ever more daunting. Of all Troy’s friends, only the Dardanians had decided to stay out of the war. Having tried and failed to persuade Priam that Helen should be returned immediately to Sparta, King Anchises had declared that he would not embroil his people in a military conflict that had begun with Paris’ perfidy and might end with the ravaging of all the lands around the Idaean Mountains. But neither would he lend support to the invaders, and all the other coastal kingdoms, from Paeonia and the Thracian Chersonese in the north to the Lycians in the south had swiftly rallied to King Priam’s aid. The Phrygians, the Mysians, the Carians and the Pelasgians out of Larissa were raising armies, and Priam was also given promises of support from countries further east should the need arise. The Amazons, the Paphlagonians and even the distant Halizonians all stood ready to send forces to the defence of Troy.

In the face of such concerted opposition, Odysseus advised that a cautious war of attrition would be the wisest course of action. Troy might be more easily taken if they first wore down her allies through a campaign of naval blockades and raids on the weaker fronts. Until that ominous day at Aulis, no one except Odysseus had reckoned that the campaign might drag on for as long as ten years. But if such was the will of Zeus, he argued, then the princes of Argos must resign themselves to it, fortified by the knowledge that they would win in the end.

Agamemnon listened to this argument but his was not a patient temperament. He still nursed a hope that the sheer size of the force he had mustered would shock the Trojans into surrender and prove the reading of the omen wrong. When he expressed this view the council divided round him along the usual lines, with the thinkers among them – Nestor and Palamedes – supporting Odysseus. The rest argued for an immediate attack on Troy.

When he saw that he was outnumbered, Odysseus came up with an alternative plan. Very well, he suggested, rather than risk everything on a single throw while Troy was at her strongest, it would be wise to establish a secure bridgehead as close as possible to the city. The small island of Tenedos, rising from the sea off the Trojan coast, was perfect for their needs. From there they could either mount a direct assault on Priam’s capital if it seemed likely to succeed, or they could blockade the mouth of the Hellespont and launch raids against Thrace to the north and southwards against the coastal strongholds of his other allies.

Everyone saw the sense of this and the plan was agreed.

By the time the fleet arrived near Tenedos, Agamemnon had decided to position most of his ships where they could hold an advance of the Trojan warships while the island was taken by a smaller force. He called a council aboard his flagship and was about to announce his decision to put Diomedes in command of the invasion, when Achilles demanded the honour of leading this first strike himself.

The day was sultry and close. There had been a delay in starting the council while the others had waited impatiently for Achilles to appear. The mood was now fraught with nervous anticipation.

Agamemnon hesitated. He had no wish to enter into open conflict with this volatile young man, but neither was he willing to trust the success of his first, crucial assault to a warrior who had yet to fight a full-scale battle. Before he could pick his words, Achilles narrowed his eyes. ‘Calchas has warned you that this war can not be won without my help. If the gods are looking to me to seal the victory, they will favour me as I lead the first attack.’ He spoke as though the full force of oracular authority lay behind his declaration, leaving no room for debate or contradiction.

News of the omen about the seventh son of Peleus had spread quickly throughout the ranks, and Achilles already commanded the affection of the troops as well as their respect. His Myrmidons had always been prepared to lay down their lives for him, but so were many others now, and he was known among the common soldiers as the luck of the force. Well aware of it, Agamemnon had already bitten back his tongue on a number of occasions when the youth had spoken with arrogant presumption, but this time he was not prepared to yield.

‘We commend your ardour, son of Peleus, and are grateful for your offer,’ – he glanced down at the chart of Tenedos on the table before him – ‘but our trust is in the experience of Diomedes, the veteran of Thebes. When you have proved yourself in battle as thoroughly as he, we will be glad to give you a command.’

Agamemnon cleared his throat and was about to progress the attention of the council to a discussion of tactics for the assault when Achilles said, ‘The High King must think again.’

Agamemnon visibly swallowed his rage. ‘Did I not make myself clear?’

Achilles rose from his seat. ‘Quite clear enough. The insult you have just given me was quite as clear as the first I had to suffer at your hands.’

Agamemnon looked up in impatient bewilderment.

Anxiously old Nestor sought to intervene. ‘Calm yourself, Achilles,’ he said quietly. ‘I feel sure that no insult was intended.’

‘No,’ Agamemnon growled, holding up a clenched hand so that the gold shone on the lion-seal of his ring, ‘let’s have this thing out once and for all. I shall be most interested to hear how the son of Peleus thinks I have insulted him.’

Achilles brought his fist down on the table. ‘It’s been clear to me from the first that you recruited me to this campaign only as a mere afterthought. Had Calchas not made it plain that Troy would never fall without my aid, you would have been content to leave me on Skyros and keep all the glory for yourself. Is that not so?’

Irritably Agamemnon said, ‘If your fame had been greater we might have thought of you sooner.’

Achilles’ nostrils flared. He was deciding whether to release his pent-up fury or to turn on his heel and walk away for ever, when Odysseus spoke. ‘Achilles my friend, you’re wrong to believe that the High King slighted you. Had I been quicker to come from Ithaca, you would have been called sooner to the cause. Such things are ruled by the gods, but if there is a fault here, it is mine.’

‘And today?’ Achilles demanded, barely mollified by the generous apology. ‘Have I not seen my courage thrown back in my teeth?’

‘No one doubts your courage,’ Odysseus answered, ‘but you ask a great deal.’

Menelaus shifted uneasily in his chair, sweating a little in the heat. ‘My brother seeks only to secure the success of the landing.’ ‘Then am I to understand that the sons of Atreus question my prowess?’

Nestor smiled at him. ‘No more than I do, and that is not at all. But there will be many opportunities for you to demonstrate your skill at arms, young man.’

‘You are old, sir,’Achilles answered, ‘and I respect your wisdom. But were you not once as young as I am and as impatient for fame?’

‘It’s your impatience that worries me,’ Agamemnon scowled. ‘I will not court disaster merely to feed your ambitions.’

Again Achilles bristled. Again Odysseus was about to intervene, but it was Idomeneus who spoke first. It had been one thing for the King of Crete to gain formal acknowledgement as joint-commander of the enterprise, but it had been quite another to make his authority felt in a council that had assembled around Agamemnon and evidently owed him its allegiance. His position was weakened also by the fact that he had brought twenty less ships from Crete than the hundred he had promised. But having observed this dispute with cool detachment, the suave Cretan now saw his first clear opportunity to assert himself. ‘There is a way we might resolve this matter to everyone’s satisfaction while at the same time advancing our business here today’. Gratified to sense that he had secured the full attention of everyone present, he kept them waiting a few moments longer than necessary. ‘I agree with my royal cousin of Mycenae that Diomedes is the right man to lead this force. The conqueror of Thebes will surely make short work of Tenedos.’ Achilles stiffened but Idomeneus smiled and raised a restraining hand. ‘Be patient with me, friend.’ When Achilles settled in his chair again, Idomeneus looked round at the others. ‘Priam has, of course, anticipated our plans to seize the island, and has taken steps to fortify it. He knows that the only harbour large enough for the number of ships we will need is here.’ He pointed to the place on the chart. ‘One of my spies reliably reports that a number of large rocks have been placed on the cliffs above the harbour. In the event of attack, they will be rolled down, causing massive damage both to ships and men as they come ashore.’ Agamemnon was about to demand why he had not been told this before, but Idomeneus spoke over him. ‘This is my suggestion. Let Diomedes command the main assault on the harbour, but give Achilles command of a smaller force that will swim ashore under the cover of darkness, making for this cove here. From there he can storm the cliff positions from the rear. If he times his assault correctly, and conducts it with sufficient ardour, he will prevent the release of the rocks and allow the main force to come ashore unmolested.’ His black eyes smiled across at Achilles. ‘There is great honour to be won from such a perilous task. And this way the two commanders will act together – as Agamemnon and I act together, to mutual advantage and for the good of all.’

Odysseus and Nestor immediately commended the merits of the plan. When Diomedes declared that he had no objection to sharing that part of his command, Agamemnon gave the scheme his general approval so long as the details could be worked out to his satisfaction. But though the conflict between Agamemnon and Achilles had been contained, it had not been resolved, and Odysseus came away from the council privately convinced that, whatever the oracles promised, the hostility between the High King and the dangerous young man he had brought out of Skyros might one day prove disastrous for the whole campaign.

Whenever Odysseus spoke about Achilles in later years he would always claim that there was a mystery about the youth that baffled understanding, for though his pride was impossible, his murderous efficiency as a warrior was matched by a degree of tenderness such as Odysseus had observed in no other man. In some respects, he suggested once, Achilles had more in common with Helen than with anyone else he knew. They had both grown up loving wild things in wild places – Achilles at Cheiron’s school in the mountains, Helen in the wilderness groves of Artemis – and both had a certain feral quality about them, by which I think he meant an almost amoral air of innocence that was capable of ruthless action. It’s true also that both of them had been injured by the human world at a crucial moment of their development and their destinies were shaped for ever by those wounds. Above all, however, they seemed kindred in the knowledge that though their bodies were mortal, their spirits were not, and everything about them seemed touched by immortal fire.

‘Mother,’ Achilles had said at last as he and Thetis parted, ‘I was born to die soon, but Olympian Zeus owes me some honour for it.’ And so he had come to the war, convinced that he would never return, and driven by so urgent an appetite for his destiny that he would let nothing stand in the way of his honour. Out of forces that once threatened to tear him apart – the bitter strife between his mother and his father, between the old religion and the new, between the claims of his peaceful life on Skyros and his need for glory – Achilles had forged himself into a weapon of war, and his whole being gleamed with warlike purpose.

This then was the young man entrusted with the leadership of the surprise assault on Tenedos, and his bristling new resolve to prove himself something more than a man among men generated such a degree of impetus that his small band of Myrmidons crashed into the rear of the Trojan defenders with terrifying ferocity. The cliff heights were taken with few losses, a signal was sent to Diomedes telling him to bring his ships ashore, and the raiding party advanced so far ahead of the main force that it was Achilles himself who thrust his spear through the breast of King Tenes, the commander of the island force, and then killed the man’s father with a savage blow to the head.

Thereafter resistance quickly collapsed. Splashed with blood that was none of his own, his bright hair gleaming in the dawn light, Achilles stood among his cheering men, waiting for Diomedes to join him in the citadel. However soon his death might come, he felt certain now that his name at least would never die.

Once the bridgehead on Tenedos was established, Agamemnon decided to send ambassadors to Troy offering terms for the withdrawal of his forces. Menelaus, Odysseus and Palamedes were chosen to present demands which – it was clear to all of them before they set out – Priam must find unacceptable. The true purpose of the mission was to discover just how united the Trojans were behind their outward show of defiance, and with that intention in mind, Agamemnon’s herald Talthybius had arranged for the envoys to be lodged in the house of Antenor while in the city.

They found the king’s chief counsellor cagey and reserved at first, and far from at ease with the knowledge that he was responsible for their safety in a city filled with their enemies. Over a few goblets of wine, however, and at the subtle prompting of Palamedes, it was natural enough for Menelaus and Antenor to share some hard feelings about Paris, the man whom each saw as the destroyer of his happiness. Meanwhile, Odysseus worked his wry charm on Antenor’s wife Theano, who needed little encouragement to express her undying hatred for the man who had killed her child and now threatened ruin on Troy.

For the first time the Argives began to gather a picture of the way events had unfolded in the city since Paris had left Sparta with his prize. They learned that Aeneas had lent his support to Paris during the flight from Sparta only because they were sworn friends committed to each other’s aid, and not because he approved in any way of Paris’s treacherous behaviour. He and his father Anchises had soon made it plain that the High King must not look to Dardania for help when the hosts of Argos came battering at his gates. According to Antenor, Priam had tried to make light of this rift with his cousin, saying that until his son returned, and he had heard the whole story directly from his lips, he would reserve judgement on the matter. Privately, however, the king’s mind was already bent on war. He had known that it must come sooner or later, and was as ready for it as he would ever be. Antenor even remarked on a certain gleefulness in Priam’s usually grave features when he considered the scale of the insult that his son had given to Argive pride.

But Priam had been forced to wait for several months before the Aphrodite returned to Troy, for Paris and Helen had sailed as far east as Cyprus in the hope of eluding all pursuit. Menelaus winced to learn that his wife and her lover had indeed been concealed on the island while he was there, and had sailed southwards into Egypt shortly after his departure. The weather was good at that time and the seas calm, so after making his devotions at the birthplace of Aphrodite, Paris had turned their flight into a prolonged voyage of love. He had calculated that a delay in his return would allow time for his father and brothers to accept what had been done and come to terms with it. Perhaps it might also whet the appetite of the Trojans for the fabled beauty of his abducted lover.

In that last respect, his calculations had certainly hit the mark, for as soon as the Aphrodite was seen approaching the city, a large crowd began to gather along the road from the harbour to the Scaean Gate, while yet others lined the streets. To further heighten the excitement and the air of mystery, Paris arranged for Helen and Aethra to be carried in curtained litters, so that they could pass from the ship to the palace without being exposed to the mob’s coarse stare. They would have heard a few bawdy jeers from the back of the crowd, but they must also have sensed how the rich procession of retainers, slaves, animals and trophies was received for the most part with an exhilarated awe intensified by further expectation. Behind those gauzy curtains lay Helen of Sparta, who had now become, to the city’s undying glory, Helen of Troy. It was as though a goddess had descended among them, one whose mystery must not be profaned. And Paris, the people’s own prince – the bull-boy from the pastures of Mount Ida – could be seen riding proudly beside her litter. Who could argue when a beggar shouted that the age of wonders was come again upon the earth?

Antenor told how Helen’s face had still been veiled when Paris finally brought his lady before the full assembly of Priam’s family and counsellors in the great hall of the palace. ‘It was a little like watching a sculptor presenting his master work,’ he commented drily, aware of the pain on the face of Menelaus, whose sensitive imagination made him feel all the more a cuckold with each new fact he learned. ‘We had waited for so long to see her that the entire hall was agog. And yes, I have to admit that Helen is a woman of astonishing beauty – though whether any woman is worth putting an army at risk is, in my opinion, quite another matter.’

‘Or a city,’ Palamedes said.

‘Indeed.’

‘Yet we are all reasonable men. Our enmity is with Paris not with Troy. It would be a great tragedy if thousands were to die for one man’s selfish folly. Don’t you agree?’

Aware that he was answering other questions than the one that had been put to him, Antenor said, ‘Believe me, if my wife and I could see a way of avoiding war by delivering him over to you, Paris would return with you in chains this very night. But the High King is as smitten with Helen’s beauty as he is indulgent of his son. And the war party on his council is stronger than those of us who would prefer a peaceful solution. So do not expect Priam to look with favour on any demands for Helen’s return.’

When the Argive envoys presented themselves before Priam the following day, they found the atmosphere in the great hall even more openly hostile than they had expected. Paris himself was absent from the council, and Antenor did what he could to ensure a fair hearing for Agamemnon’s ambassadors, but he could not prevent the gasps and jeers of outrage with which Deiphobus and Antiphus greeted their catalogue of demands. These included the immediate return of Helen, the surrender of Paris to answer charges of murder and abduction, the compensation of Menelaus for the injury he had received, the compensation of Agamemnon and Idomeneus and all the princes under their command for the massive expense to which they had been driven by Paris’s actions, the establishing of well-defended Argive settlements in strategic locations on the Asian mainland, and free, unrestricted access to the Hellespont, the Black Sea and all the major trade routes with the east and north.

The monetary demands alone would have been sufficient to ruin Priam many times over, but the King of Troy heard Odysseus out, stony-faced, before silencing his noisier sons with a raised hand, and giving his response.

‘As to the first point, we are hardly to blame if our royal cousin of Sparta failed to satisfy his wife. Unlike my sister Hesione, who has languished in captivity on Salamis for many years, the Lady Helen is here in Troy of her own free will. If it was her wish to leave, I would regard it as beneath my dignity to keep her here. Let the princes of Argos learn a simple lesson of courtesy in that respect.’ Aware of the angry flush across the scarred face of Menelaus, he drew in his breath. ‘As to your other demands, we have long been aware that the High King at Mycenae covets our wealth and power. And why should he not when his own domain is a mere hovel by comparison? Our message to him is also simple. Nothing awaits him in Troy but ruin and humiliation. Let him clear our waters of the infestation of his ships and take his pack of Argives home before all their wives find husbands better suited to their taste.’

Remembering the last time he had stood before Priam in this hall and the amicable manner in which they had parted, Menelaus found it hard to contain his fury. ‘I see that your son lacks the courage to look me in the eye,’ he said. ‘If all your followers are as brave, King Priam, look to have your women raped, your city burned and pillaged, and your line extinguished. I will have my wife again. And you – you will rue the day that Paris shuddered from your loins.’

Odysseus put a restraining hand to his friend’s arm, and then he turned to face Priam with a cool, disdainful stare. ‘We will deliver your message to our king,’ he said. ‘Look to have his answer soon.’

The Argive ambassadors withdrew stiffly from the hall and returned to the house of Antenor. Not till long after they had left the city did they come to learn that, if Deiphobus and Antiphus had been given their way, the three of them might have been murdered in their beds that night. Only Antenor’s outraged protests, fortified by Hector’s sense of honour, had kept them from the crime.

The first assault on Troy turned into a brutal and inconclusive clash which left both sides damaged and thoughtful.

Things began well enough for the Argives when a night raid with blazing torches caused havoc among Priam’s fleet, seriously weakening his ability to guard against invasion. But the same raid had warned the Trojans of the imminence of attack and by the time Agamemnon’s ships approached the shore, a well-positioned army stood waiting to repel them.

To make matters worse, the Argive troops were troubled by rumours of a prophecy that the first man ashore was doomed to die. Even Achilles hesitated at the prow of his ship, reluctant to throw away his life with so little glory gained. Meanwhile the Trojans hurled rocks and stones at the crowded ships, keeping up an unnerving ululation that carried on the harsh wind blowing across the plain.

At last, stung by the insults coming from the enemy before him and from Agamemnon at his back, an old warrior called Iolaus who had once been charioteer to Heracles, gave a mighty shout and jumped into the surf. He was immediately surrounded and cut down on the strand before he could strike a single blow, but the man’s rash courage was to win him undying fame. He was given the title Protesilaus – ‘first to the fight’ – and buried with great honour that night on the Thracian shore of the Hellespont.

But now that the first life had been lost, other warriors began to jump from the ships. Achilles and Patroclus were among the leaders, with Phoenix and the Myrmidons behind them. Odysseus, however, held back a while, watching how the battle developed. He had counselled against launching a land attack until more had been done to stretch Priam’s resources, but Agamemnon had been so infuriated by the king’s insolent reply to his terms that he was determined to force the words back down his throat. Now the price of his impatience swiftly came clear as more and more men fell under the volley of arrows that met them as they stumbled towards the shore.

By sheer force of numbers, the Argives forced a landing, only to find themselves embroiled in a fierce and bloody struggle all along the strand. The strongest resistance came from a sector of the front where a Trojan hero called Cycnus hacked his way through the invaders as if he was invulnerable. When Achilles saw what was happening, he shouted for Patroclus to follow and fought his way across the uneven ground until he confronted the Trojan giant. Cycnus laughed in his face, gesturing for the youth to come at him if he dared. A moment later he was astonished by the speed and ferocity of Achilles’ attack. Even so, the fight was long and desperate, and might have gone either way had not Cycnus stumbled over a stone as he sought to avoid a sword thrust. He fell to the ground on his back, pulling Achilles down with him. Both men lost their weapons in the fall, but Cycnus was winded by the weight of his opponent’s armoured body. In a frenzy of violence, Achilles grabbed at the Trojan’s throat and strangled the man with his own helmet straps.

When he stood up, gasping and exultant from the kill, it was to feel Patroclus pulling at his arm. All around him, as a trumpet sounded from Agamemnon’s flagship, he saw the Argive warriors retreating from the shore.

Many recriminations followed the failure of that first attack, but the heavy losses he had taken persuaded Agamemnon that Odysseus had been right to insist that Troy would fall only after a long campaign of attrition. So the war entered a new, sullen phase of sporadic violence that dragged on for a year, and then another, until it became clear that, if Troy ever fell, it would not be until all the long years of the snake had passed.

Battles were fought at sea, and many ships were sunk, and many men burned and drowned before the Argives established their naval superiority. From their stronghold on Tenedos, they were now free to mount raids all along the Asian coastline. The island of Lesbos was taken, and mainland cities smaller than Troy fell before them. Priam’s southern allies in Lydia suffered heavily from these attacks. Colophon, Clazomenae, Smyrna and Antandrus were all left looted and burning, but other important cities such as Sestos and Abydos on either side of the Hellespont held out under siege. So the years of warfare protracted themselves from season to bloody season, and all across Asia, from the Black Sea to Cyprus, even in places far from where the Argives had ever landed, the name of Achilles struck fear in men’s hearts and kept children from their sleep.

There were also long periods of inactivity while both sides licked their wounds, or when fever, dysentery and pestilence robbed men of the will to walk let alone fight. Sometimes the troops could not be stirred in the torrid summer heat, and the dark winter months were always wretched and bitter. A maddening wind blew across the Trojan plain throughout much of the year but in winter there was ice on its breath. It left the springs frozen, the tents heavy with snow, and battle-hardened warriors groaning over chilblains and frostbite. And even when the weather was clement not a day went by without men questioning why they had ever got into this insane fight and wondering whether they would ever sit by their homeland hearths again. But those who deserted faced a long trek home through hostile territory and most of the Argives grudgingly decided that having endured so much, it made no sense to turn for home with little to show for their pains but wounds and stories. So the war went on.

In the ninth year, with Troy’s western sea lanes cut, and many of her allies demoralized by constant raids, it began to look as though the war was finally moving Agamemnon’s way. Late in the summer he decided to attack Mysia.

The Mysians are a Thracian people who had crossed from Europe a century earlier. Their king, Telephus, was a bastard son of Heracles who had gained the Mysian throne with Priam’s help after marrying one of the High King’s many daughters. His fertile lands were now keeping Troy supplied with wheat, olives, figs and wine that were carried along inland routes beyond the reach of raiders. Agamemnon had been convinced by Odysseus that if Mysia fell, then Troy might be starved into submission. So leaving behind him a force strong enough to hold Tenedos, he brought the bulk of his fleet to the island of Lesbos and used the harbour at Mytilene as a base for his assault on that part of Mysia around the mouth of the river Caicus which is called Teuthrania. But once again he miscalculated the strength of the resistance and the battle took much the same shape as his failed advance on Troy many years earlier. The landing was made more quickly this time but the Mysians had the advantage of the ground and by the time Agamemnon had seen half of his advance guard cut down, he was struggling to avoid a rout among his troops.