King of Ithaca (Adventures of Odysseus)

The dagger in his hand shone blue in the darkness as he walked towards the stooping guard. The man turned his head in time to see the blade flash before him. A moment later he fell dead at the merchant’s feet, the blood swilling out from the gash in his throat.

Koronos dragged the body away from the gates and slipped the bolts aside. The doors were at once thrust inward by Polytherses, who walked in with confidence and looked quickly about himself. ‘Well done, Koronos. We shall not forget your loyalty.’

A seemingly endless stream of heavily armed men poured through the gates after him. Koronos, who had sold his king in exchange for a promise of money and power, stood aside to let the mercenaries pass.

At that moment one of the guards returned with Mentor at his side. They halted just beyond the threshold of the great hall, hardly able to believe that the gates had fallen and their enemies were already filing into the courtyard. Then they heard a shout and saw Polytherses leading a group of Taphians towards them at a run. Several more of the enemy were pulling bows from their shoulders and fitting arrows.

Shocked into action, Mentor and the guard ducked back inside the palace, slamming the doors shut behind them. Arrows thumped into the great wooden panels as they barred the door against the invaders.

For a short while the two men struggled to catch their breath as they stood in the small anteroom to the great hall. But there was no time to spare: there were other ways of getting into the palace from the courtyard now that the outer walls had been penetrated, and unless they acted at once the building would be overrun.

‘Go to where the militia are billeted and wake them,’ Mentor ordered. ‘Quickly!’

The guard ran across the hall and disappeared through a side-entrance. Moments later, Mentor sprinted across to the far wall of the great hall where a hunting horn had hung for as long as he could remember. Pressing it to his lips, he blew hard and a clear and piercing note thundered out into the still air of the hall, blasting beyond the walls and high ceiling to echo about the whole palace.

He blew again, then tugged the sword from his belt and fled through the side entrance into a corridor that skirted the great hall. He heard voices approaching from around the next corner, whilst behind him something heavy crashed against the palace doors, coughing splinters into the great hall. After two more blows the doors burst inwards and the flames of the hearth flickered with the fresh night air. Figures entered and gathered in the shadows, three or four of them, their foreign voices filled with threat. Taphians.

Mentor turned and ran. Arrows bounced off the walls about him as he cleared the corner, only to find himself faced by a hedge of spears. He stopped short and looked into the confused faces of half a dozen Ithacan guardsmen. They had thrown their armour on in a hurry, but they were armed and ready to fight.

‘Taphians,’ he warned, pointing back down the corridor. ‘They’re inside the palace.’

As he spoke, three of the mercenaries came rushing round the corner and almost impaled themselves on the wall of spears. The guardsmen reacted quickly, spitting the invaders upon their sharpened spear points. All three fell in a groaning mass, their stomachs gushing dark blood onto hands that tried desperately to stem the flow. The victors wasted no time in dispatching their souls to the Underworld.

‘They’ll be coming in through every door and window by now,’ Mentor told the bloodied guards. ‘Our only chance is to get to the upper level and defend Laertes. The stairs are narrow and we’ll be able to hold them until the townsfolk come to our aid.’

‘The king’s gone,’ one of the men announced. ‘He took the other guards and went to alert the militia; he ordered us to stay here and defend the way to the upper levels.’

Suddenly the whole palace erupted with noise. A loud shout from the great hall announced the arrival of more Taphians. From the corridors surrounding them they heard more shouts and the ringing of weapons, whilst on the upper levels there was screaming from the women’s quarters. And now the first party of Taphians from the great hall turned the corner and faced them, their swords at the ready.

Mentor struck quickly, swinging his sword to slice open the neck of their leader. A mist of blood sprayed over the knot of soldiers behind him, who fell back as the body drove a wedge into their tightly packed ranks. A moment later the Ithacan guardsmen rushed into the gap, sinking their spear points into two more of the tall warriors.

The remainder turned and tried to push the weight of men behind them back into the great hall. Mentor picked up a spear and thrust it into the back of one man, then trod his body down into the dirt of the corridor floor as he hacked down another. His companions managed to gouge the life out of a further three before the mercenaries escaped back into the open space of the great hall.