The Hittite - Ben Bova [40]
“Hittite.”
I turned to see Hector approaching me. And berated myself for not being alert enough to hear his footsteps.
“Prince Hector,” I said.
“Come with me. We have an answer for Agamemnon.”
I followed him into another part of the palace. As before, Hector wore only a simple tunic, almost bare of adornment. No weapons, except for the ornamental dagger. No jewelry. No proclamation of his rank. He carried his nobility in his person, and anyone who saw him instinctively knew that here was a man of merit and honor.
Yet, as I matched him stride for stride through the palace’s maze of halls and chambers, I saw again that the war had taken its toll of him. His bearded face was deeply etched by lines around the mouth and eyes. His brow was creased and a permanent notch of worry had worn itself into the space between his eyebrows.
We walked in tight silence to the far side of the palace and up a steep narrow stairway that was deep in gloomy darkness lit only by occasional slits of windows. Higher and higher we climbed the steep, circling stone steps, breathing hard, around and around the stairwell’s narrow confines until at last we squeezed through a low square doorway onto the platform at the top of Troy’s tallest tower.
“Paris will join us shortly,” said Hector, walking over to the giant’s teeth of the battlements. It was almost noon, and hot in the glaring sun despite the stiff breeze from the sea that gusted at us and set Hector’s brown hair flowing.
From this vantage I could see the Achaian camp, scores of long black boats drawn up on the beach behind the sandy rampart and trench. The Trojan forces were camped on the plain, tents and chariots dotting the worn-bare soil, cook fires sending up thin tendrils of smoke that were quickly blown away by the wind.
Beyond the gentle waves rolling up onto the beach I saw an island near the horizon, a brown hump of a worn mountain, and beyond it another hovering ghostlike in the blue hazy distance.
“Well, Brother, have you told him?”
I turned and saw Paris striding briskly toward us. Unlike Hector, his tunic looked as soft as silk and he wore a handsome royal-blue cloak over it. A jeweled sword was at his hip and more jewels flashed on his fingers and at his throat. His hair and beard were carefully trimmed and gleamed with sweet-smelling oil. His face was unlined, though he seemed not that many years younger than his brother.
“I was waiting for you,” said Hector.
“Good! Then let me give him the news.”
“Wait,” Hector said, raising one hand to hold back his brother. “I have a question to ask this man.”
I thought I knew what he was going to ask me.
Sure enough, Hector fixed me with a stern gaze and said, “You say you are a Hittite.”
“Yes, my lord.”
“A soldier of the emperor?”
I nodded mutely.
“Is your emperor sending troops to aid us? We asked for help many moons ago. Are you the first contingent to arrive here?”
“And if you are,” Paris interrupted sharply, “what are you doing in the Achaian camp? Fighting against us? Claiming to be of Odysseos’ House of Ithaca?”
I kept my eyes focused on Hector. “My lord, the emperor of the Hatti is not sending troops to help you. He cannot even help himself. He is dead, murdered. The empire is racked by civil war. I brought my squad of men here seeking my wife and sons.”
Hector studied my face for long moments, as if trying to determine if I was telling the truth or not. I looked back into his steady brown eyes.
At last he murmured, “We’ll get no help from the Hittites, then.”
“So much for being the western bulwark of their empire,” Paris sneered. “When we need them, they have no strength