Authors: Colleen McCullough
While the Trojans mourned Hektor we rested, wondering if we would ever see them outside their walls again. Odysseus remained confident that they would come out, but the rest of us were not so sure.
On the thirteenth day I put on the suit of armour Odysseus had given me, to discover that it felt much lighter. We crossed the causeways in the dimness of dawn, endless threads of men trudging across the dew-wet plain, a few chariots in their lead. Agamemnon had decided to make his stand along a front about half a league from the Trojan wall adjacent to the Skaian Gate.
They were waiting for us, not as many as before, but still more numerous than we were. The Skaian Gate was closed already.
The Amazon horde was positioned in the centre of the Trojan van; as I waited for our wings to come into formation I sat on the side rail of my chariot and looked them over. They were mounted on big, shaggy beasts of some breed I didn’t know – ugly aquiline heads, shorn manes and tails, hairy hooves. In colour the horses were uniformly bay or brown, save for one white beauty in the middle. That would be Queen Penthesileia. What I could see was how they stayed aboard – clever! Each warrior fitted her hips and buttocks inside a kind of leather frame strapped beneath the horse’s belly so that it remained firmly in place.
They wore bronze helmets but otherwise were clad in hardened leather, and covered themselves from waists to feet in tubes of leather bound about from ankles to knees with thongs. On their feet were soft short boots. The weapon of choice was obviously the bow and arrow, though a few were girt with swords.
At which moment the horns and drums of battle sounded. I stood upright again, Old Pelion in my hand, the iron shield riding my left shoulder comfortably. Agamemnon had concentrated all his chariots in the van opposite the Amazons, pitifully few.
The women ploughed in among the war cars like harpies, shrieking and screaming. Arrows zipped from their short bows, flying over our heads as we stood in our chariots and coming to earth in the foot behind us. The constant rain of death shook even my Myrmidons, not used to fighting an adversary who engaged at a distance preventing instantaneous retaliation. I pushed my little segment of war cars closer together and forced the Amazons out, using Old Pelion like a lance, fending off arrows with my shield, shouting to others to do the same. How extraordinary! These strange women wouldn’t aim their barbs at our horses!
I glanced at Automedon, his face set dourly as he struggled with the team. His eyes met mine.
‘It will be up to the rest of the army to slaughter Trojans today,’ I said. ‘I’ll count the battle well fought if we can hold our own against these women.’
He nodded, swerving the car to avoid a warrior who launched her steed straight at us, thick and powerful forelegs flailing a pair of hooves big enough to dash out a man’s brains. I snatched up a spare javelin and flung it, hissing satisfaction as it took her straight off her mount’s back to fall under its trampling legs. Then I put Old Pelion down and picked up my axe.
‘Keep close to me, I’m getting down.’
‘Don’t, Achilles! They’ll smash you to pulp!’
I laughed at him.
It was much easier on the ground; I passed the word to my Myrmidons.
‘Forget the size of the horses. Come in under their feet – they won’t kill our horses, but we’ll kill theirs. A horse down is as good as a rider down.’
The Myrmidons followed my lead without hesitation. Some got maimed and battered beneath Amazon horses, but most stood their ground amid the deluge of arrows, slashing at hairy bellies, skirted legs, straining equine throats. Because they were neat and quick, because my father and I had never discouraged initiative or versatility in any one of them, they got away with it and forced the Amazons into worried retreat. A costly victory. The field was littered with Myrmidon dead. But they had won the moment. Uplifted, they were ready to kill more Amazons, more Amazon horses.
I heaved myself up beside Automedon again and searched for Penthesileia herself. There! In the midst of her women, trying to rally them. I nodded to Automedon.
‘Forward, at the Queen.’
I led the charge at her lines in my car, before they were prepared. Arrows met us all the same; Automedon shouldered a shield to protect himself. But I couldn’t get close enough to her to harm her. Three times she managed to drive us off, all the while battling to re-form her lines. Automedon was panting and weeping, unable to command my three white stallions the way Patrokles had.
‘Give me the reins.’
Their names were Xanthos, Balios and Podargos, and I called to each of them by his name, asking him for his heart. They heard me, though Patrokles was not there to answer for them. Oh, that was good! I could think of him without guilt.
Without need of the whip they went in again, big enough themselves to shoulder the Amazon beasts aside. Shouting my war cry, I gave Automedon the reins and took up Old Pelion. Queen Penthesileia was within range and moving closer, her warriors in worse disorder than they had been before. Poor woman, she didn’t have the gift of generalship. Closer, closer… She had to swing her white mare to one side to avoid crashing into my team. Her pale eyes blazed, her side was presented for Old Pelion. But I couldn’t throw. I saluted her and ordered a withdrawal.
A riderless Amazon horse – they seemed all mares – was tethered to its own feet, reins beneath one. As Automedon drove past I reached out, hauled the reins from under the mare’s hoof and compelled her to follow us.
Once out of the turmoil I jumped down from the car and surveyed the Amazon horse. Would she like a male smell? How could I get myself seated in that leathery frame?
Automedon went pale. ‘Achilles, what are you doing?’
‘She wasn’t afraid to die, she deserves a better death. I’ll fight her as an equal – her axe to mine, from the back of a horse.’
‘Are you mad? We can’t ride horses!’
‘Not now, but after seeing how the Amazons manage to, do you think we won’t learn?’
I scrambled onto the mare’s back by using my chariot wheel as a step; the corners of the frame were stoutly knobbed, which meant I had great trouble edging into it, for it was too small. But once there, I was amazed. Remaining upright and balanced was so easy! The only difficulty was my legs, which hung down unsupported. My mare was shivering, but by luck I seemed to have chosen a placid-natured beast; when I thumped her on the shoulder and yanked the reins to turn her round, she obeyed. I was horsed; the first man in the world to be so.
Automedon handed me my axe, but the man-sized shield was out of the question. One of my Myrmidons ran up, grinning, to hand me a little round Amazon shield.
Myrmidons following with yells of delight, I charged into the midst of the women warriors, aiming for the Queen. In the crush my mount couldn’t move much faster than a snail, and had grown used to me besides. Perhaps all that weight cowed her.
When I saw the Queen I sent my war cry winging to her.
Shrieking her own bizarre, ululating call, she wheeled to face me, pushing her white mare through the crowd with her knees – I learned a new trick – as she slung her bow across her back and transferred her right hand to a golden axe. Some sharp order she gave made her warriors fall back to form a half circle, my Myrmidons eagerly making up its other half. The battle must have been going all our way in other parts of the field, for among the Myrmidon observers I saw troops belonging to Diomedes, and the dark, unpleasant face of his cousin Thersites. What was Thersites doing here? He was co-commander of Odysseus’s spies.
‘You are Achilles?’ the Queen called in atrocious Greek.
‘I am!’
She trotted closer, her axe lying along her mare’s shoulder, her shield steady. Knowing myself green at this new form of the duel, I decided to make her use her tricks first, trusting to my luck to stay out of trouble until I felt more comfortable. She flung her steed sideways and swung like lightning, but I pulled away in time and took the blow on the bullhide shield, wishing I had one of iron and that size. Her blade bit deep, emerging free of the leather as cleanly as a knife paring cheese. She was no general, but she could fight. So could my brown mare, which seemed to know when to turn before I did. Learning, I swung my axe and missed by a fraction. Then I tried her own trick, crashing into her white mare. Her eyes opened wide; she laughed at me above the rim of her shield. Getting the feel of each other, we exchanged blows with ever increasing speed; the axes resonated and struck sparks. I could feel the power in her arm, and admitted her consummate skill. Her axe was much smaller than mine, designed for one-handed use, which made her a very dangerous foe; the best I could do with my own weapon was to grasp its handle much closer to its head than I normally did, using my right hand only. I kept to her right and forced her to crack her muscles, stopping each of her lunges with a power that jarred her to the marrow.
I could long have outlasted her in strength, but I hated to see her pride humbled. Better to end it swiftly and honourably. As she realised her course was run she lifted her eyes to mine and consented silently; then she tried one final, desperate trick. The white horse reared high, twisting as she came down, thudding against my mount with such impetus that she stumbled, hooves slipping. As I held her together with voice and left hand and heels, the axe descended. I raised my own axe to meet it and push it aside, then did not hesitate. Penthesileia’s side was bare and took my blade like unfired clay. Not trusting her while she remained upright, I wrenched it out again quickly, but the hand groping for her dagger wasn’t strong enough. Scarlet streams gushing over the white mare’s hide, she tottered. I slid off my own mare to catch her before she married the earth.
Her weight bore me to the ground, where I knelt with her head and shoulders in my arms, feeling for her pulse. She was not yet dead, but her shade was called. She looked at me out of eyes as blue and pale as sunstruck water.
‘I prayed that it would be you,’ she said.
‘The King should die at the hands of the worthiest foe,’ I said, ‘and you are King in Skythia.’
‘I thank you for ending it too quickly to betray my lack of your strength, and I absolve you of my death in the name of the Archer Maid.’
The death rattle came, but her lips still moved. I bent over to hear.
‘When the Queen dies under the Axe, she must breathe her last into the mouth of her slayer, who will rule after her.’ A cough; she struggled to continue. ‘Take my breath. Take my spirit until you too are a shade and I must ask it back.’
Her mouth was free of blood; with all of her remaining she breathed into me, and so died. The spell broken, I lowered her carefully to earth and stood up. Screaming their grief and despair, her warriors charged me, but the Myrmidons stepped in front of me and gave me the chance to lead my brown mare off the field, find Automedon. That wood and leather frame was a prize worth more than rubies.
Someone spoke.
‘What a spectacle you gave the crowd, Achilles. I’m sure few of the men – or the women either, for that matter – have ever seen someone making love to a corpse.’
Automedon and I spun round, hardly crediting our ears. There postured Thersites the spy, smirking. Was this the depth of the army’s contempt for me, that a man like Thersites could voice his foul thoughts to my face, deeming himself safe?
‘What a shame they charged and you couldn’t finish it,’ he sneered. ‘I was hoping to catch a glimpse of your mightiest weapon.’
Shaking with ice cold anger, I lifted my hand. ‘Get away, Thersites! Go and hide behind your cousin Diomedes or your string puller, Odysseus!’
He turned on his heel. ‘The truth hurts, doesn’t it?’
I struck him once, my arm sparking pain to the roots of my shoulder as my fist found the side of his neck just below his helmet. He dropped like a stone, twisted on the ground serpentlike. Automedon was weeping with rage.
‘The dog!’ he said, and knelt down. ‘You broke his neck, Achilles, he’s dead. Good riddance!’
We beat the Amazons to their knees, for their hearts had died with Penthesileia; they fought on only to be killed in this, their first foray into the world of men. When I had the time I searched for the Queen’s body, but it was nowhere to be found. As the day died one of my Myrmidons came to me.
‘Lord, I saw the Queen’s body taken from the field.’
‘Where to? By whom?’
‘King Diomedes. He arrived with some of his Argives, stripped her body, then tied it by the heels to his car and drove off with it and her armour.’
Diomedes?
I could scarcely believe it, but when men began to tidy the field I went to beard him.
‘Diomedes, did you take my prize, the Amazon queen?’
‘Yes!’ he snapped, glaring. ‘I threw her in Skamander.’
I spoke civilly. ‘Why?’
‘Why not? You murdered my cousin Thersites – one of my men saw you strike him down after he’d turned his back on you. You deserve to lose Queen and armour both!’
I clenched my fists. ‘You acted hastily, my friend. Find Automedon and ask him what Thersites said.’
I took some of my Myrmidons and went looking for the Queen, not expecting to find her. Skamander was running strong and full and foul again; during the twelve days of mourning for Hektor we had repaired the river’s banks to keep our camp dry, and then there had been more rain over Ida.
Darkness had fallen; we kindled torches and wandered up and down the bank looking under bushes and willows. Then someone shouted. I ran towards the sound, straining to see. She was in the stream, bobbing up and down, caught by one long, pale braid of hair upon a branch of that same elm to which I had clung for my life. I drew her out and wrapped her in a blanket, then laid her across her own white mare, which Automedon had found roving the deserted field, crying for her.
When I returned to my house Brise was waiting for me.
‘Dear love, Diomedes called and left a parcel for you. He said it came with his sincere apologies, and he would have done the same to Thersites.’
He had sent me Penthesileia’s things. So I buried her in the same tomb as Patrokles, lying in the position of the Warrior King, armoured and with a gold mask covering her face, her white mare at her feet so that she would not go riderless in the realms of the Dead.