The Oracles of Troy (The Adventures of Odysseus)

Before long, the answer to his prayers arrived. A trail of dust appeared above the heat haze on the horizon, where the well-worn road to the Dardanian Gate issued out of the foothills. It moved slowly across the plain towards the city, eventually revealing the distant figures of a troop of cavalry, followed by a line of ox-drawn waggons laden with supplies. Shortly, the gates opened and the mounted escort – some fifty horses and riders – began filing through. The waggons followed, the sluggish beasts that drew them taking little notice of the shouts or sticks of their drivers. The final waggon was piled high with sacks of grain that made the heavy axle and solid wooden wheels squeal in protest. With an agility that belied his powerful bulk, Odysseus darted out from the shadows beneath the wall and hopped up onto the rear of the waggon. A moment later he could hear the sound of cloven feet on flagstones echoing back from the interior of the gate, and watched with a quiet smile of satisfaction – mixed with a pang of nervous anticipation – as the wooden portals were swung shut behind him.

He lay back in the sacks and tried to look as if he belonged there. Then a short guard with an angry, self-important face pointed at him and called out. Odysseus jumped down and immediately assumed a beggar’s pose: back bent, eyes wide with fearful humility, hands cupped and thrust out in a gesture of supplication. The guard shouted something in Trojan that was too fast for Odysseus to understand, then brought the shaft of his spear down on his bowed spine with a whack that gave the other soldiers great amusement. Odysseus hardly felt the blow on his hardened muscles. Moving quickly, he grabbed the hem of the soldier’s cloak.

‘Got any food, captain?’ he croaked, thickening his voice to disguise his accent.

The guard wrinkled his nose up and blinked as the mixed stench of manure, urine and stale sweat washed over him. Yanking his cloak from Odysseus’s clutching fingertips, he stumbled backwards and waved the beggar away.

‘Go on, you filthy swine. Get out of my sight.’

Odysseus turned and shuffled off into the narrow streets before the guard could change his mind and have him thrown back out of the gate. It was ten years since he had last entered Troy, when he had been part of an embassy sent to petition for the return of Helen. Then the population had been openly hostile to the foreign warriors who had dared to bring threats of violence to their peaceful city. Now they were less naïve, their lives changed forever by the war that had claimed so many of Troy’s sons and so much of its wealth. Half of the women seemed to be widows, dressed in the black of mourning, while almost as many were prostitutes, with painted faces and brightly coloured dresses. Their wretched, hungry children scurried through the streets like rats, following the slow-moving waggons and trying to steal whatever they could lay their hands on, indifferent to the frequent cuffs of the escorts. And everywhere Odysseus looked there were soldiers, drawn from all the towns and cities of Ilium. Some were beardless boys barely old enough to carry a shield and spear; others were grey-bearded old men, ordered to fill the numerous gaps left by the dead on the plains between the Scaean Gate and the Greek camp; but most were professional warriors or mercenaries, stalking the streets with their battle-hardened faces in search of wine or women with which to pass away their boredom.

Few paid any attention to Odysseus, unless it was to avoid the odour that emanated from his wretched form. Looking up, he saw the battlements of Pergamos rising a short distance beyond the houses to his right. The temple of Athena – and the Palladium – lay within the citadel walls, and guessing that was where the supplies would be taken for safe storage, he quickened his pace to catch up with the rearmost of the waggons. After a while, the convoy turned right onto a broader thoroughfare that sloped gradually up towards Pergamos. Despite the years since he had last been there, Odysseus recognised the tall tower that guarded the main entrance. Each of its smooth, well-fitted blocks was half the height of a man, and at its base were six statues depicting different gods from the Trojan pantheon. Though these were ostensibly the same gods that were worshipped by the Greeks, the identities of the crudely imagined figures had been a mystery to Odysseus ten years before and remained so now as he followed the trudging convoy to the foot of the tower. The gates opened and the cavalry escort trotted through first, ducking beneath the short, echoing tunnel that led to the highest part of Troy. Odysseus closed the gap between himself and the last waggon, praying silently to Athena that he would not be noticed by the guards.

‘Where d’you think you’re going?’