The three stood, and as they walked slowly back to the riverbank, Helikaon told Hektor, “Menados has a new ship, a great bireme almost as big as the Xanthos.”
“I know of it,” Hektor said. “It is called the Alektruon. A cursed name. It has not the heart of the Xanthos. It is just a hollow copy.”
“And it was not built by the Madman from Miletos,” Helikaon replied grimly. “It will break apart when Poseidon swims.”
On the Xanthos, unloading was complete. Hektor turned to them both and said, “I fear we three will not meet again this side of the Dark Road. This is a story with no good endings.”
Andromache took his hand. “We will meet again, Hektor. I know it.”
He smiled. “Is this a prophecy, Andromache?”
“You know I am not given to prophecies, visions, or prescient dreams. I am not Kassandra. I just know in my bones that this is not the end.” She kissed his hand gently. “Until we meet again, my husband.”
She caught the expression on Helikaon’s face, and she felt as if her heart were being wrenched in two. She was standing with the two men she loved yet was to lose them both within moments. And she could not say a proper goodbye to either of them. Looking into Hektor’s shadowed eyes, she felt the familiar stab of guilt that she could never love him as he deserved. And under Helikaon’s intense blue gaze she hated herself for hurting him by choosing to stay with her son.
Her heart in pain, she turned her eyes toward the distant city hidden by the night. One thing was certain: There would be more grief for them all before the end.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
MEN OF COURAGE
When dawn arrived, the Xanthos still was making her way back along the narrow Simoeis. Heliakon stood at the steering oar and watched for signs from Oniacus at the prow. The growing light behind them put the river ahead of the ship in deep shadow, and Oniacus was using a long notched pole to test the depth of the water. Progress was slow, and Helikaon had long since given up on his first idea of attacking the Mykene fleet before sunrise.
He tried to keep his mind on plans for the battle ahead, but his thoughts kept straying back to Andromache. The moment he first had glimpsed her so long before on that ill-starred night at Bad Luck Bay, his heart had been ensnared. Until then he always had told friends that he would marry for love alone. Until then, though, he had had no idea what love was. And arrogantly, he had believed the choice of marriage always would be his. He never had dreamed he would fall helplessly in love with someone who was unavailable, already betrothed to his closest friend. The gods watch for such arrogance with glee, he thought.
In many ways these last hundred days had been the happiest of his life. The Xanthos was his true home, the one place where he could find total contentment. To share it with the woman he loved had been a pearl beyond price. There had been times that winter, as they sailed from island to island in fair weather or foul, as he watched Andromache sitting at the prow gazing at the sea, walking like a flame-haired goddess among the oarsmen handing out waterskins, or crouched by the mast holding on tightly as the ship plowed through rough seas, when he had thought he could never be happier. She was his north star, the fixed point around which his world turned. For as long as his heart beat, or hers, he believed they would share a destiny.
He had not expected to lose her so suddenly that night, to watch her walk away beside one of the donkey carts into the darkness on a perilous journey to the beleaguered city. She had made her choice and decided to stay with Hektor’s son. She had not looked back. He had not expected her to.
As the sun rose, a beam of light speared through the mist and lit up the ships of the Trojan fleet waiting where the river Simoeis opened out into the bay. They lay as if becalmed in the pale morning, sails furled, the rowers resting on their oars, waiting for action. We are fighting the greatest war the world has ever seen, Helikaon thought, and our likely future is death and ruin, and you are thinking about the woman you love instead of making battle plans. If this is what love can do to a man, perhaps you were better off without it.
He smiled to himself. I do not believe that, he thought.
He handed the steering oar to the helmsman and strode to join Oniacus on the central deck. “Gather the captains of the Trojan ships,” he told him. “We have much to discuss.”
“I will ask them to join us, Golden One,” Oniacus replied. He turned away, then came back hesitantly. “It is rumored,” he said, “that some of the the Mykene ships now have their own fire hurlers.”
Helikaon laughed. “Good news at last!” he said.
Oniacus looked mystified. “They will have no battle experience and little practice, Oniacus,” Helikaon explained. “We know how dangerous the nephthar balls are, and we treat them with great respect. In the heat of battle the Mykene will likely do more damage to themselves than to our vessels. This is welcome tidings. Just wait and see, my friend.”
It took a while for the captains of the eighteen Trojan ships to gather. The smaller ships eased in toward the Xanthos until their masters could climb on board, sometimes crossing over several adjacent ships to get there. As he looked at the mass of vessels lying together and bumping gently against one another, a new plan formed in Helikaon’s mind.
Finally, all the ships’ masters were mustered on the central deck of the Xanthos. Helikaon knew them all, and he felt a thrill of pride. They were all men of courage and skilled seamen. They had been frustrated by confinement in the bay for many days. Each was eager for action, but the most impatient was Chromis the Carian, master of the Artemisia, one of the fastest ships in the Trojan fleet, though the smallest. Chromis, a red-faced burly man, stood at the front of the group, hands on hips.
“We are nineteen,” Helikaon said, looking around. “Do we have an accurate report on the number of Menados’ ships?”
“More than fifty,” Chromis said. “Until today half of those were patrolling the coast down to the Bay of Herakles. The arrival of the Xanthos has caused Menados to order them all to the Hellespont. We are heavily outnumbered. But he will expect you to make a run for it soon, lord.”
“What Menados expects is a vital part of my plan,” Helikaon said thoughtfully. “Which of your ships have fire hurlers?” he asked.
“The Naiad and the Shield of Ilos,” replied a young dark-eyed man with a heavy limp.
“And what experience do you have of using them, Akamas?”
“None in battle, lord. But my men on the Shield and the crew of the Naiad have spent many long days throwing empty clay balls at targets. There was little else to do in the bay,” Akamas added ruefully. “Our crews became quite expert at hurling them at the other ships.” Most of the masters smiled, and there was some laughter.
“Have any of you seen a ship aflame with nephthar?” Helikaon asked, his face hardening, his voice cold.
They all shook their heads. Helikaon nodded. “I thought not. You must understand, and all your crews must understand, that once a nephthar ball hits a ship and breaks, that ship is doomed, as if it already sat at the bottom of the Great Green. Do not wait for the fire arrows. All the crew must abandon ship without hesitation. Is this clear?” He looked around at them all, his violet blue eyes studying them one by one, until they all had nodded.
“Very good. And although I respect what you say, Akamas, I will put some of my own crewmen with battle experience on board the Naiad and the Shield of Ilos to advise and help with the nephthar. Do not feel slighted. Be in no doubt we have a mighty confrontation ahead. We need to allocate our skills where they are most needed. And we have extra crewmen from the Boreas to fill the gaps in any of your vessels’ rowing benches.”