Chapter 22

THE day dawned gray and dreary. The Achaians, aching and sick from their revelries of the night, were quiet and solemn as the sun climbed slowly behind banks of scudding clouds. The wind from the sea hinted rain, and the chill of approaching autumn.

Neither I nor my Hatti band took part in the sacrifices. Poletes was puzzled at that.

"But you serve the goddess," he said.

"She is dead. Regardless of what they offer, she won't be able to receive it."

Muttering "sacrilege," Poletes wandered off toward the tall pyres of driftwood and timber that the slaves and thetes were piling up in the center of the camp. I remained near our own fire, close by Odysseus's boats, and watched.

Nestor led the priests in a procession around the camp, followed by Agamemnon and the other chiefs—all in their most splendid armor and carrying long glittering spears that seemed to me more ornamental than battle weapons.

While they paraded through the camp, singing hymns of praise to Zeus and all the other immortals, the sacrificial victims were being assembled by the pyres. There was a regular herd of goats and bulls and sheep, hundreds of them, kicking up enough dust to obscure the blackened remains of Troy up on the bluff. Their bleatings and bellowings made a strange counterpoint to the chanting and singing of the Achaians.

Standing off to one side of them were the human sacrifices, every man over the age of twelve who had been captured alive, their hands tightly bound behind their backs, their ankles hobbled. Even from the distance where I stood, I could recognize the old courtier who had escorted me in the palace. They stood silently, grimly, knowing full well what awaited them but neither begging for mercy nor bewailing their fate. I suppose they each knew that nothing was going to alter their destiny.

The whole long day was spent in ritual slaughter. First the animals, from a few doves to raging, bellowing bulls that thrashed madly even though their hooves were firmly lashed together, arching their backs and tossing their heads until the priest's stone ax cut through their throats with a shower of hot blood. Even horses were sacrificed, dozens of them.

Then came the men. One by one they were led to the blood-soaked altar, made to kneel and bow their heads. The lucky ones died in a single stroke. Many were not so fortunate.

By the time it was ended and the pyres were lit, the priests were covered with blood and the camp stank of entrails and excrement. As the sun went down the pyres blazed across the darkening landscape, sending up smoke that was thought to be pleasing to the gods.

Then the whole camp swarmed toward Agamemnon's boats, in the center of the beach, where the spoils of Troy had been heaped high. Hundreds of women and children stood near the pile of loot, guarded by a grinning handful of warriors.

Agamemnon climbed up onto a beautifully carved chair pillaged from the city. It had been set up on a makeshift platform, to turn it into a rough sort of throne. Then he began to divide the spoils, so much to each chieftain, starting with white-bearded old Nestor.

The Achaians crowded around, greed and envy shining in their eyes. I stayed by Odysseus's boat and watched from afar. I noticed that Lukka and his men stayed with me.

"Your own goods are safe?" I asked him.

He grunted affirmatively. "They wanted to take our women for the High King to divide out, but we convinced them to leave us alone."

I almost smiled, picturing Lukka and his disciplined soldiers forming a phalanx against a gaggle of hung-over Achaian warriors.

Far into the night the ceremony went. Agamemnon parceled out bronze armor and weapons, gold ornaments, beautiful urns and vases, porphyry and onyx, glittering jewels, kitchen implements of copper, iron tripods and cooking pots, robes, silks, blankets, tapestries—and women, young boys and girls.

Half of everything he kept for himself: the High King's prerogative. But as some of the chieftains and men passed me, carrying their loot back to their boats, I heard them complain of the High King's meanness.

"He's got the generosity of a dung beetle."

"He knew we had done the hardest fighting, up on the wall. And what do we get for it? Less than his brother."

"Those women should have been ours, I tell you. The fat king is too greedy."

"What can you do? He takes what he wants and we get his leavings."

I thought that even Odysseus looked less than pleased when he approached me. The pyres smoldered in the distance, but our campfires lit his darkly bearded face with flickers of red.

"Orion," he called to me. I went to him.

"Your servant Poletes is digging a grave for himself," Odysseus said. "He is mocking the High King's generosity."

I looked into Odysseus's dark eyes. "Isn't everyone?" I asked mildly.

His answering smile told me how he felt. "But not everyone is speaking so loosely within earshot of Nestor and Menalaos and others who will report his words to Agamemnon. You'd better see to it. The old storyteller is swimming in dangerous waters."

"Thank you, my lord. I will see to it."

I hurried over toward Agamemnon's part of the camp, passing a stream of disgruntled Achaians toting their loot.

Poletes was sitting on the sand by a small campfire, practically under the nose of one of the High King's boats, surrounded by a mob of squatting, standing, grinning, laughing Achaian men. None of them were of the nobility. Off in the shadows, though, I noticed Nestor standing with his skinny arms folded across his chest, frowning in Poletes's direction.

"...and do you remember when Hector drove them all back inside our own gates, here, and he came in with an arrow barely puncturing his skin, crying like a woman, 'We're doomed! We're doomed!' "

The crowd around the fire roared with laughter. I had to admit that the old storyteller could mimic Agamemnon's high voice almost perfectly.

"I wonder what Clytemnestra will do when her brave and noble husband comes home?" Poletes grinned. "I wonder if her bed is high enough off the ground to hide her lover?"

Men rolled on the ground with laughter. Tears flowed. I started to push my way through the crowd to get to him.

But I was too late. A dozen armed men tramped in, and Poletes's audience scrambled out of their way. I recognized Menalaos at their head.

"Storyteller!" he snapped. "The High King wants to hear what you have to say. Let's see if your scurrilous tales can make him laugh."

Poletes's eyes went wide with sudden fear. "But I only..."

Two of the armed guards grabbed him under his armpits and hauled him to his feet.

"Come along," said Menalaos.

I stepped in front of him. "This man is my servant. I will take care of him."

Before Menalaos could reply, Nestor bustled up. "The High King has demanded to see this teller of tales. No one can interfere!" It was the shortest speech I had ever heard the old man make.

With a small shrug, Menalaos headed off toward Agamemnon's quarters, his guards dragging Poletes after him, followed by Nestor, me, and all of the men who had been rollicking at the storyteller's gibes.

Agamemnon still sat on his makeshift throne, fat, flushed with wine, flanked by the treasures of Troy. His chubby fingers gripped the chair arms as he eyed Poletes being hauled before him. Rings glittered on each finger and both his thumbs.

The old storyteller knelt trembling before the High King, who glared down at his skinny, shabby presence.

"You have been telling lies about me," Agamemnon snarled.

Poletes drew himself together and lifted his chin to face the High King. "Not so, your royal highness. I am a professional storyteller. I do not tell lies, I speak only of what I see with my own eyes and hear with my own ears."

"You speak filthy lies!" Agamemnon screamed, his voice rising shrilly. "About my wife!"

"If your wife were an honest woman, sire, I would not be here at all. I'd be in the marketplace at Argos, telling stories to the people, as I should be."

"I'll listen to no calumnies about my wife," Agamemnon warned.

But Poletes insisted, "The High King is supposed to be the highest judge in the land, the fairest and most impartial. Everyone knows what is going on in Mycenae—ask anyone. Your own captive Cassandra, a princess of Troy, has prophesied..."

"Silence!" roared the High King.

"How can you silence the truth, son of Atreus? How can you turn back the destiny that fate has chosen for you?"

Now Agamemnon trembled, with anger. He hauled himself up from his chair and stepped down to the ground before Poletes.

"Hold him!" he commanded, drawing out the jeweled dagger at his belt.

The guards gripped Poletes's frail arms.

"I can silence you, magpie, by separating you from your lying tongue."

"Wait!" I shouted, and pushed my way toward them.

Agamemnon looked up as I approached, his piggish little eyes suddenly worried, almost fearful.

"This man is my servant," I said. "I will punish him."

"Very well then," said Agamemnon, pointing his dagger toward the iron sword at my side. "You take out his tongue."

I shook my head. "That is too cruel a punishment for a few joking words."

"You refuse me?"

"The man's a storyteller," I pleaded. "If you take out his tongue you condemn him to starvation or slavery."

Slowly, Agamemnon's flushed, heavy features arranged themselves in a smile. It was not a joyful one.

"A storyteller, eh?" He turned to Poletes, who knelt like a sagging sack of rags in the grip of the two burly guards. "You only speak what you see and what you hear, you claim. Very well. You will see and hear—nothing! Ever again!"

My guts churned as I realized what he intended to do. I reached for my sword, only to find ten spears surrounding me, almost touching my skin.

A hand clasped my shoulder. I turned. It was Menalaos, his face grave. "Be still, Orion. The storyteller must be punished. No sense getting yourself killed over a servant."

Poletes was staring at me, his eyes begging me to do something. I moved toward him, only to be stopped by the points of the spears against my flesh.

"My wife has told me how you protected her during the sack of the temple," Menalaos said, low in my ear. "I owe you a debt of gratitude. Don't force me to repay it with your blood."

"Then run to Odysseus," I begged him. "Please. Perhaps he can soothe the High King's anger."

Menalaos merely shook his head. "It will all be over before I could reach the Ithacans' first boat. Look."

Nestor himself carried a glowing brand from one of the pyres, a wicked, perverse smile on his aged face. Agamemnon took it from him as the guards yanked on Poletes's arms while one of them put a knee in his back. Agamemnon grabbed the old storyteller by the hair and pulled his head back. Again I felt the spear points piercing my clothes.

"Wander through the world in darkness, cowardly teller of lies."

Poletes screamed in agony as Agamemnon burned out first his left eye and then his right. The old man fainted. The smile of a madman still twisting his thick lips, Agamemnon tossed the brand away, took out his dagger again, and slit the ears off the unconscious old man's head.

The guards dropped Poletes's limp body to the sand.

Agamemnon looked up and said in his loudest voice, "So comes justice to anyone who maligns the truth!" Then he turned, grinning, to me. "You can take your servant back now."

The guards around me stepped back, but still held their spears leveled, ready to kill me if I moved on their king.

I looked down at Poletes's bleeding form, then up to the High King.

"I heard Cassandra's prophecy," I said. "She is never believed, but she is never wrong."

Agamemnon's half-demented smile vanished. He glared at me. For a long wavering moment I thought he would command the guards to kill me on the spot.

But then I heard Lukka's voice calling from a little way behind me. "My lord Orion, are you all right? Do you need help?"

The guards turned their gaze toward his voice. I saw that Lukka had brought his entire contingent, fully armed and ready for battle: thirty-five Hatti soldiers armed with shields and iron swords.

"He needs no help," Agamemnon answered, "except to carry away the slave I have punished."

With that he turned and hurried back toward his hut. The guards seemed to breathe one great sigh of relief and let their spears drop away from me.

I went to Poletes, picked up his bleeding, whimpering body, and carried him back to our own tents.