The Oracles of Troy (The Adventures of Odysseus)

‘And do you think she would ever forgive you for killing him, Neoptolemus?’ asked Odysseus. ‘More likely she’ll put a knife into you when you’re sleeping. No, I’ll kill the boy.’

Eperitus watched incredulously as his king crossed the circle and picked up the small child, wrapping his faded purple cloak about him.

‘Odysseus, no!’ he said, rushing forward and seizing his forearm. ‘What are you doing?’

Suddenly Odysseus’s face transformed with rage and he shoved his captain hard in the chest, sending him staggering backwards to collapse between Little Ajax and Teucer. He tried to get up again, but the two men held him fast.

‘I’m a father,’ Odysseus said, tight-lipped as he faced the Council. ‘This is not something I do with pride; I do it with shame. But I’ll do it because it has to be done – not for you, Agamemnon, nor the Council, but for the future of Greece.’

He pushed his way out of the ring of commanders and walked slowly towards the Scaean Gate, turning once to stare back accusingly at the members of the Council. They looked away guiltily and Agamemnon picked up the tablet from where he had put it down in the grass.

‘We have unfinished business,’ he said, looking down at the markings on the tablet. ‘Yes, here we are. The weight of gold found in Troy was –’

His words faded into the background as Eperitus tried to see Odysseus through the ring of seated men, but Little Ajax and Teucer kept him pinned between them. They would not let him go, he realised, until Odysseus had reappeared on the walls and thrown Astyanax down to his death. Quickly his mind scanned back over what had happened, wondering if there was anything he had not understood, some statement that could justify Odysseus killing a child. But there was nothing, nothing at all. He felt numb, unable to comprehend what was happening. Once again, he was lying helpless while a child he had tried to protect was murdered.

A woman’s scream shook the Council from its half-hearted dissection of the plunder list. All heads turned to the walls, then higher still to the top of the tower that protected the Scaean Gate. There stood Odysseus, Astyanax held high above his head. The child’s white clothes blew in the westerly wind, and then with a howl of anger Odysseus hurled him down to perish on the stones below.

Chapter Forty-seven

THE DEAD CHILD

Shaking off Teucer and Little Ajax, Eperitus sprang to his feet and ran from the shocked assembly towards the gates. The child’s body lay among the wreckage of stone beneath the tower, his head dashed in but with surprisingly little blood spattered over the huge blocks on which he had fallen.

‘Wait!’

Eperitus turned to see Peisandros’s stocky physique sprinting towards him.

‘What are you going to do?’ the Myrmidon commander asked as he caught up with him. ‘I mean, if you’re going to confront Odysseus about this, then give me that sword first.’

‘We’re old friends, Peisandros,’ Eperitus replied. ‘You know me better than that by now.’

‘Angry men have been known to do rash things.’

Eperitus shook his head, but handed Peisandros his sword anyway. ‘I just want to know why. Why would he do that?’

Peisandros stared down at Astyanax’s body. ‘I don’t know, but I’m coming with you.’

They ran through the gate and entered the doorway that led into the dark interior of the tower. Eperitus’s eyes adjusted quickly and spotted the wooden ladder ascending to the next floor. The two men climbed it but found the room above empty except for a pile of spears in one corner and shields stacked against the foot of the wall. A dusty shaft of grey light fed into the gloom from a hatchway above and without hesitation Eperitus continued climbing. He reached the top of the tower and saw Odysseus standing against the parapet, looking out at the smoking ruins of Troy. As he clambered through the narrow square in the wooden floor, half-followed by Peisandros, Odysseus looked at them both and raised a finger to his lips. The angry words that Eperitus had been about to hurl at his king fell dead.

‘Are you alone?’ Odysseus asked them.

They nodded, mystified, and then Odysseus leaned across and tipped the stack of shields forward to reveal Astyanax, alive and smiling at them. Peisandros almost fell back through the hatch.

‘But –’ Eperitus said. ‘But –’

‘You saw me throw him from the walls?’

Peisandros rushed back to the opposite wall and looked down at the body still on the stones below.

‘Come back from there, you fool,’ Odysseus ordered. ‘Do you want the Council to see you?’

‘But how’s it possible?’