Helikaon laughed, and the feeling of urgency in his chest eased.
Then he saw Kalliades and Skorpios walking toward them, and his heart sank. He had tried to persuade the two warriors to stay on the ship to the Seven Hills, but he could guess what they had come to ask.
“Kalliades!” Odysseus cried. “It is good to see you! Where is our friend Banokles?”
“He fell at Troy,” Kalliades told him.
“Then I wager he took a good few of the enemy with him.”
“Banokles never did things by halves. He was a brave man and a fine comrade. He often spoke of the Hall of Heroes. I’m sure he is supping there now with Hektor and Achilles and telling them what a fine warrior he is.”
The other men smiled. Then Kalliades told Odysseus, “This is Skorpios of the Trojan Horse. We both wish to go to Ithaka. Will you grant me passage one last time, Odysseus?”
“Aye, lad, with pleasure. And you can tell me tales of the fall of Troy to pay your way.”
The tall warrior unstrapped his sword belt and held it out to Helikaon.
“I owe you my life, lord, and I owe it to Argurios, too. Take the sword of Argurios with you. It belongs to the people of Troy, not one wandering Mykene.”
Helikaon received it silently. He slid the sword out of the scabbard and gazed at it with awe. “It is a wondrous gift. But will you not need it, my friend?”
“I do not yet know the shape of my future, Golden One, but I know I will not be carving it out with a sword.”
They sat on the black sand then. Kalliades spoke of the last days of Troy, and Helikaon told Odysseus of the escape from the city. The sun was rising fast toward noon when Helikaon spotted the flame of Andromache’s dress on the cliff path. She appeared to be hurrying, though she was treading with care on the treacherous slope. There was no sign of Kassandra.
He stood and strode over to meet her. As he did so, he saw dozens of rats running from their holes in the base of the cliff and scurrying toward the sea.
“Where is Kassandra?” he asked, taking Andromache’s hand.
“She will not come. She is dying.”
As Helikaon frowned and moved toward the path, Andromache stopped him. “She wants to die here. She says it is her fate. She will not come, and it would not be right to make her.”
“Then I will go and say goodbye to her.”
She grabbed his arm. “She says Agamemnon is coming with a fleet. He will be here by noon. I know you do not believe her predictions. It is her destiny never to be believed. But the First Priestess confirms her brother is coming for her. We must leave, my love, as fast as we can.” There was an edge of panic in her voice.
He looked up the cliff path but turned back to her, the woman he loved above all others. “As always, I will take your advice. Come.”
As they walked back to the ship, Helikaon shouted to his crew to get ready. He quickly told Odysseus the news, and without a parting word the Ithakan king hurried to the Bloodhawk. Helikaon felt something brush against his foot and looked down. There were more rats heading for the ships, dozens of them, running over his feet and climbing the ship’s trailing ropes.
He heard cries as the crew spotted them, and he looked back up the beach. The black sand now was swarming with thousands of the creatures. And they all were heading for the two ships.
There were shouts and curses from the crew of the Xanthos as the rodents started scrambling on board. Men were leaping about, skewering rats on their swords, but more and more were climbing onto the ship all the time.
“Don’t try to kill them all!” Helikaon bellowed. “Get the ship off the beach!”
He handed Andromache quickly up the ladder. He saw that her face was pale with anxiety for her boys as she stepped onto the rat-infested ship. Then, trying to ignore the creatures running over his feet and biting his legs, Helikaon put his shoulder to the hull with others from his crew. He saw crewmen running from the Bloodhawk to help move the Xanthos. Slowly the great bireme began to shift. Then, with a rasp of wood on sand, she moved into the sea and floated free, surrounded by swimming rats.
The Bloodhawk crewmen ran back to their ship, and Helikaon went with them. It was impossible to run through the carpet of rats without treading on them, and the men slipped and slid on squashed bodies and rodent blood. They leaned into its planks and within heartbeats pushed the smaller ship into the water. Helikaon climbed on board. Men were killing the rats frantically, stabbing them with swords and daggers and throwing them overboard. Fewer were getting onto the ship as she drifted out into clear water. Helikaon glanced at the Xanthos. She also was floating clear, and the oars were being run out.
He skewered a dozen more rodents and threw their carcasses in the water. Then he walked over to Odysseus, who still was energetically stabbing any rat he could see.
“This will make a fine tale for you, my friend,” Helikaon told him, laughter bubbling up as he watched the fat king dancing about, impaling rats on his sword.
Odysseus stopped, panting, and grinned. “I need no more tales, even rats’ tales,” he countered. “Stories are always buzzing in my head like a hive full of bees!”
Then his expression sobered. “Get back to your ship, Helikaon. We must both make haste. We cannot take on an entire Mykene fleet.”
Helikaon stepped forward and embraced his old mentor for the last time. “Good sailing, my friend.”
Odysseus nodded. “Look for me in the spring,” he promised.
With a parting salute to Kalliades and Skorpios, Helikaon ran to the foredeck and dived into the sea. As he swam toward the Xanthos, he tried to ignore the floating carpet of dead and dying rats and the scratching of claws as drowning animals tried to scramble onto his back. He grabbed the rope his crew had lowered for him and climbed onto the deck. Only then did he allow himself to shudder and brush phantom rats from his shoulders.
He looked around. Andromache stood at the mast, gazing up at the Great Horse. Oniacus was ready at the steering oar. The oar smen watched Helikaon, waiting for his words.
“By the mark of one!” he shouted, and the oar blades sliced into the water. Following the Bloodhawk, the Xanthos left the island as the sun rose toward noon.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
FIRE IN THE SKY
Agamemnon liked to think of himself as a pragmatist. Standing on the deck of his flagship as it raced toward Thera, he was still angry, but looking back on the last day in Troy, he knew he would have made his vital decisions no differently.
That blowhard Idomeneos had berated him for opening the Scaean Gate to the Hittite horde, but had he had any choice? If they had barred the gates to keep the Hittites out, Agamemnon’s troops would have been trapped in the city as surely as the Trojans had been before them, with little water or food. They would have starved within days, then been forced to sally out weakened and vulnerable to face superior Hittite numbers.
And although it had been humiliating to be ordered from Troy by the upstart emperor, it actually had worked in his favor. Agamemnon had no intention of rebuilding the ruined city. His aim had been accomplished. Everyone throughout the Great Green knew he had destroyed Troy, defeated Priam, and killed all his sons. He was Agamemnon the Conqueror, and all men quailed before him. His name would echo forever in hearts and minds, as the priest in the Cave of Wings had predicted.
He smiled to himself. Once he had found Priam’s stolen treasure, he would return to the Lion’s Hall in triumph. The boy-king Astyanax need not concern him. Mykene soldiers, spies, and agents would hunt him down relentlessly, and Helikaon the Burner, too, and the bitch Andromache. He still held hopes of finding them on Thera. He would take great pleasure in their deaths, which would be lingering and agonizing.