EXCERPTS

“Achilles? You’ve seen Achilles?” the new man asked.

“But aren’t you…?”

“No, I’m Patroclus—Achilles’ cousin.” Dimitri cocked his head. The man continued: “Cousins. Family resemblance? We were brought up together.” Dimitri saw that Patroclus, indeed, lacked the blaze of radiance that illuminated Achilles. Patroclus’ glow reflected a lunar gleam rather than of the sun itself. And then Briseis strode into the space among the broken pillars and the shattered walls. Perhaps it was Dimitri’s imagination, and his brain was currently dazed, but this new figure brought the light of the stars with her, which collected about her and shone on her face and hair, caught the gleam of her eyes and the soft, tactile shade of the planes about her cheeks and throat. She was small and compact but large, somehow. There was a kind of poise and stillness in her movements, and there was music in her voice like the deeper notes of the lyre when the bards sang in the night, and you heard their voices at the campfires while you hunched in the dark beyond the glow, and the sound seemed to invite you to stand and walk toward it, but you were afraid you could not understand its beauty.

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“...Achilles laid her upon the stone. He placed the knife in my hand. I looked around. Faces with beards and gleaming tiger-teeth. Wolf’s eyes. Snouts lifted to the wind. Hairy hackles raised. A rhythm beaten out on their shields with naked blades as they gazed upon the whiteness of her body, stripped now by Achilles and the priests... for this union with the god. Through it all, a staccato rhythm, a steady, beaten pulse rose into a storm of sound. My ears burned with the blare of it; my skull ached as if split by the very din as this torrent of blows, rolling on and on, transformed into a tumult and flood of emotion. They were urging me, shouting, howling it out now. I raised the knife, eyes blurred and blinded with tears of anger and despair. And then I was aware, in the midst that clamor, of an emotion rising in me. It was I who was caught now, drugged, swept up in its current on this windless island by the whirl of a passion so vehement, an agony of such fervid rapture that its vividness was then and forever impressed into the very bone and sinew and soul of my being. What care had I for the girl lying there on the hot stone? She was blood of my blood—but this heat, this fury and frenzy, this rage—this was my blood.”

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Unbidden, Briseis stood and removed her only garment, a short chiton, pulling it up over her head. Her hair tangled a moment in the rough fabric, but she freed it and stood before him naked. His breath, all the motion of his being seemed to stop. He saw that she was lovely and delicate, but beyond his breathing he did not react to her nudity, which was less an uncovering and more a manner of turning in and away to a place that was invulnerable. Her very meagerness of flesh behind the nipples, below the flat stomach; the scarcity of hair above the sex, at the arms, was something filched, not something offered up. He did not try to touch her.

“Give me one of your stories,” he demanded quietly.

Silent a moment, she drew a careful breath before speaking. Stirred by her breath, the lamps’ flames swayed in toward her. The light, in sympathy with her thought, fell softly upon her face, and her momentary silence commanded a concord in all elements, including the man, that reached into the dim corners of the lodge and even beyond into the settling camp and to the cold, transcendent height of motionless Mount Ida. She began:

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“Talthybius!” Dimitri tapped his own head to indicate his stupidity. “Yes, now I know your face. You are a Greek. The messenger, Thanno.” Thanno looked on dumbly. “The Greek herald. He’s famous.”

“Famous?” Talthybius echoed. “No, not me. My father. My grandfather. My uncles. All famous. Remember Oedipus? Patricide, incest, blinding: unimaginable shame. My father brought the news about him to Thebes—and in the event, transformed a bloody-eyed, howling, plaything of the gods into a hero of tragic proportions. And that wasn’t even the pinnacle of his career—no, only months later the Creon debacle: familial devastation--once again transgression transfigured. My uncle: he announced the news to Theseus that his wife had killed his boys, dangled them from a window, life spilling from slender throats gashed to purple spouts. Beautiful work—my uncle’s: Clear, keenly observed, powerful, triumphant--everyone said so. He recited the revised version for us at holiday dinners: horror tempered with mercy and imagination.”

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Thanno watched Diuss’ writhing disinterestedly, while Dimitri winced in sympathy. Finally, Diuss hissed: “You bitch!”

As if turned to stone—Thanno stiffened. Her head dropped. She grunted dryly. Dimitri too froze--in dread. Thanno knelt in front of Diuss. He grinned.

“What did you say?” Thanno’s voice was quiet. Dimitri tried to interrupt, but Thanno said it again, a little more loudly. “What did you say?”

Diuss’ seemed completely unaffected. “You can’t hide what you are. A little slip in the walk; a beardless face, a certain shape beneath the rags. Even now, I’m sure, the numbness is setting in. Very entertaining.”

Thanno gazed at him with deadened eyes. But she shared some of his humor. “Amuse you, do I?”

Diuss shrugged. “Late at night a bachelor fantasizes certain whimsical possibilities…”

“Come again?”

“Exactly.”

“Too bad you ended the pact.”

“You can’t teach an old dog new tricks…” He sighed wistfully, “but a young bitch now…ah!”

“Careful, this one bites.” Thanno nodded. Dimitri snapped another finger. This time Diuss’ reaction wavered between merriment and agony. Eventually, Thanno said: “I’m waiting.”

*******************

It was not difficult to read the meaning of this mosaic garnishing the muted uniformity of the plain with color and light and drifting sound. As he watched, his mind working to take it all in, Dimitri saw a squad of chariots, chased by a volley of arrows, pelting in swift retreat from a distant postern of the city’s walls. Several of the chariots, pinked with a mass of arrows, swung wide of Agamemnon, their drivers slumped bloodily over the rails of their chariots. One charioteer, ensnared in a tangle of reins, tumbled and dragged behind the vehicle helter-skelter as the other occupant, a warrior in muted, leather armor strove with the horses and reins until the entire machine lurched rightward, twisted irrevocably on an unintended axis, and toppled sideways as other chariots swerved frantically to avoid the same disaster, ending by carving cragged gaps into the panicked lines of Argive ranks. But this roiling and confusion was soon ended as comrades tended wounded and dead men, and a bevy of peltasts killed and hauled away the bodies of tangled, thrashing beasts, and lochogoi, stepping from the ranks, bawled for order and silence.

“The gate’s not open!” Dimitri shouted to them from the height where he stood, but not one of the Greeks turned to heed him. “NOT OPEN!” he yelled again, pointing frantically.