Steep Wilusiya (Age of Bronze) (22 page)

When Paqúr and Ainyáh reached the damaged walls, they had equally dismal news for their lord Alakshándu and his despairing people.  Lupákki was dead, another prince felled by Ak'illéyu's pitiless bronze.  Renewed wails and laments broke out among the high-born folk and the low.  As other warriors failed to appear, the din only increased.

Eqépa was on the point of throwing herself from the walls.  But with her royal son-in-law came another, very different message.  "The ships in the harbor have anchored and the visitors have come ashore, my lord Alakshándu.  They are warriors from Mízriya and they say they are here at the request of our own emperor!"

The king shuddered from head to toe, laughing and weeping at the same time.  He clapped his hands to his head, gripping his thinning hair.  Eqépa embraced her husband and touched a respectful hand to her heart, her brow, and the sky, saluting the gods.  "Bring them to the mégaron, Ainyáh," the queen ordered.  The king, pale and sweating, silently, breathlessly nodded, behind her.  "We will have a feast in their honor,” the diminutive woman went on officiously.  “Tell my son, Paqúr, that he must open the last of the storage jars, personally.  See that none of our stores have been stolen.  Have all our guests taken to the throne room and have the serving women ply them with the finest wine that Paqúr can locate.  We will have bread and chick-pea soup, dried figs, and do find a bit of meat, either water bird or fish, and see that it is cooked well in olive oil.  Let there be rejoicing in Tróya tonight!  Qáttushli, our wise and merciful overlord, has sent us help at last!"

aaa

Kréyusa met Ainyáh with tears of joy when he returned to the palace.  The royal buildings, being high on the hill, had suffered considerably less damage than the lower town.  The fires that had so devastated the homes of the common folk did not pass the courtyard to endanger the roofs of the palace.  The prevailing winds blew from the sea that day, too, affording the western quarter of the city protection, even as they doomed the greater part of the eastern section.  Tróya's mercenary prince was greatly relieved to see that his own family was safe, having suffered nothing worse than bruises and minor burns.

The warrior's royal wife covered his dirty face and blood-stained hands with kisses, for she had thought him dead.  Sending the servants away, she bathed him herself in what water she could get, washing away the thick dust that was pasted to his flesh with dried blood.  With a bit of unspun wool, she gently oiled his wounds, a long scrape on one thigh, a series of smaller cuts on his sword arm, a wide patch of skin torn from one cheek where a spear shaft had struck him, and countless lesser bruises and scratches.  She kissed each injury, thanking Dáwan and Poseidáon for his life.

Her fervor and the warmth of her hands upon his body aroused him.  He would not allow her to finish drying him, but, still dripping, took his wife in his arms and carried her to their bed.  She was as filled with desire as he was.  She could not wait to remove all her garments before she wrapped her legs around him.  The weight of his body had never been more welcome to her, having thought she would never feel it again.  The scent of her hair had never seemed sweeter to him, wondering how many more times he might breathe it in.

At last they rested, lying on their sides, Kréyusa's back against Ainyáh's chest, his right arm under her head, his left over her warm body.  The king would be holding an assembly in the throne room, he knew.  Aching with fatigue, comfortable in Kréyusa's warm shadow, he thought to himself, 'Let them make their decisions without me this time.'  The king's daughter clasped his hand in both of hers, pressing it to her full breasts.

"Like a sword in its scabbard we fit together, Kréyusa," Ainyáh whispered.

She smiled, content with his warmth and his hairy chest against her back.  "That we do," she agreed.  The smile on her lips faded and she sighed.  "Owái, beloved, when I heard that you had gone out with Sharpaduwánna today, I thought I had lost you.  I went to see Andrómak'e this morning, you see, and I found her crying over her loom.  I tried to comfort her, reminding her that while she still had life she had hope.  But she only wept that much harder.  She said that when Qántili died, she lost her very life.  Now her son is an orphan and she is alone in the world.  Ai, I could see myself in her place and I was so afraid."

Ainyáh turned his wife's face toward his and pressed his lips to hers.  "You will never be in her place, my wife, not so long as the gods are with us."

Tears welled beneath Kréyusa's long eyelashes.  The crows' feet at the corners of her eyes deepened.  Her chin trembled as she went on, "Then, when the god that shakes the islands began to kick down our walls, I thought of that 'Elléniyan woman.  And my heart was even more afraid.  Have you seen how she sits and spins, day after day?  Her head is always leaning to one side and her eyes are as empty as those of a corpse.  She hardly knows where she is, talking to a child she will never see again."  Kréyusa rolled over and pressed her damp face to her husband's neck.  "If I lost you and our little Askán, I would rather die than live like that woman," she wept.

Ainyáh's eyes closed at the thought and he embraced his wife, holding her tightly.  His heart beat hard against the walls of his chest.  He knew she could feel it.  She must know he was as afraid as she was, as filled with anxiety for the future.  He, too, had seen his brothers' wives and pictured his own Kréyusa in their places.  "Do not talk about such things.  It brings bad luck," he whispered hoarsely.

She dried her tears and managed a wan smile.  "Of course, my dear husband.  I am sorry.  I am a foolish woman.  Surely, Mother Dáwan has had her fill of the blood of men.  She will not take my husband from me."

He noticed then how lined her cheeks had become in the past year, how the gray had spread through her hair and how the flesh had fallen from her bones.  A feeling of dread crept over him, chilling him to the marrow.  "So long as the gods are with us, I am afraid of nothing," he told her, meaning to comfort her.  To himself, another thought followed, deeply disturbing.  'But only so long as the gods are with us….'

"Yes," the woman said quietly.  "The gods must have been angry or we would not have suffered all that we have.  But Tróya still holds the Qalladiyón and so long as that emblem of the great goddess remains within these walls, no mortal can storm them."

"Kréyusa!" Ainyáh said sharply, suddenly raising himself on his elbow.  "Go to sleep without me tonight.  I must speak with your father.  Alakshándu will have to listen to reason now."

aaa

For the first time since Qántili's death, Alakshándu dressed in clean robes and bathed.  He ignored Eqépa's plaintive wails for Lupákki, insisting that it was all a mistake, that the young prince was only delayed and would be back in Tróya before morning.  The king left his queen to mourn the loss of their younger son with their smallest daughter and welcomed the commander of Mízriya's mercenaries with his regal dignity restored.  The aging king of Wilúsiya sat again on his throne, inviting his guest to take a finely carved chair close to the great central hearth of the mégaron.

"I am called Amusís," the slender leader of the visitors announced.  He was not a tall man and his chin was clean shaven, making him look very young to Wilúsiyan eyes.  But his voice was strong and he bore himself with a confidence that bordered on arrogance.  His tightly curled hair, black as coal and oiled to a bright sheen, caught the flickering firelight and made him seem almost divine.  Dressed in a diaphanous garment of bleached linen over a white kilt, he stood on clean, sandaled feet to announce himself.  "I come from Mízriya by command of our Great House, the golden Harú and divine Bull of Upper and Lower Mízriya, king Ramusís.  He is bound by treaty to your emperor, Qáttushli.  It is as if they were brothers by blood.  Each has pledged to support the other.  My lord says, 'The enemy of my younger brother is my enemy, too.'  Qáttushli's request for grain and archers has been most graciously fulfilled by Ramusís, son of Ra, shining in the sky, may he have everlasting life, prosperity, and health."

As Amusís rolled the flowery phrases from his tongue, the Tróyans looked him over with amazement as well as curiosity.  They had known their Náshiyan masters to shave their beards.  It was said to make it harder to catch hold of them and behead them in battle.  But the Mízriyan's skin was darker than that of the most sun-bronzed Assúwan.  Also, though clearly not royal or even an officer of the highest rank, he wore a ribbon of gold as a headband, over what was clearly a short, heavy wig.  So curly was the hair, it might have been sheep's wool.

"Have you ever seen such finely woven cloth?" Dapashánda whispered in Paqúr's ear.  "You can see the darkness of his skin clear through the material."

The older prince was also impressed.  "And look at that gold collar he is wearing.  It must weigh as much as a stirrup jar full of wine."

Only Ainyáh found fault with the new ally.  When the Kanaqániyan joined the counselors and officers in the mégaron, he asked. "Why have you come so late, stranger?  Did you not know that summer is the season for war?"

Alakshándu glared at his overly bold son-in-law.

But Amusís answered easily enough.  "My father is the governor of the southernmost province of Mízriya's empire.  My men are Káushans, children of the sun.  We had a very long journey to make, to reach you.  There was all of Mízriya to traverse, the upper kingdom and the lower.  We sailed from there to Kanaqán, in order to buy the best ships to take us around the Great Green Sea.  There was all of the southern coast of the Náshiyan empire to pass, and the northward journey after that."

"It seems to me that Ramusís could have sent someone from his northern provinces," Ainyáh complained.  "And they could have sailed directly north to Kep'túr.  After all, the eastern shore of the island once owed allegiance to Qáttushli.  To this day, no Ak'áyan dares set foot there."

The king's older son-in-law, Antánor, agreed.  "From Kep'túr an expedition might have reached Lúkiya in less than a single phase of the moon.  Then you would have been here at the beginning of summer, not at the end.  It was a waste of time to go so far east to begin with.  After all, Kanaqán is hardly the only land where ships are built."

The Mízriyan's dark eyes narrowed.  "If we are not welcome here," Amusís said icily, "we would be just as happy to leave you to the barbarians beyond the river."

"Do not listen to these yowling dogs," Alakshándu hastened to say, silencing the counselors with a thunderous glare.  "With open arms, Wilúsiya invites you and your men to stay, Amusís.  But of course you are our most honored guests.  We owe you and your great king a debt of gratitude greater than we can ever repay.  When our own emperor arrives with the rest of his armies, we will extol your virtues to him with many songs, so that you may be rewarded as you deserve."

Amusís wrinkled his brow, looking the king up and down.  "Perhaps I did not make myself clear," the Mízriyan said.  "Qáttushli is unable to come to your aid.  That is precisely why he sent for us.  We have come in place of his armies, not in addition."

Tróya's king smiled indulgently.  "No, no, the emperor would not be so miserly with his warriors as that.  He may have sounded a bit desperate in his messages to his brother emperor.  But Náshiya is the greatest power in the world.  And Wilúsiya is his wealthiest dependency.  No, no, Qáttushli's armies will be here, all right.  There can be no doubt about that.  The only question is when."