Chapter 7 - The Greeks Came Ashore
War began with waiting.
That surprised me.
I had imagined armies arriving and immediately colliding in some enormous cloud of dust and bronze.
Instead, both sides spent much of the first day watching.
The Achaeans strengthened their camp near the shore.
Troy strengthened itself.
Men hauled stones.
Weapons moved from storage rooms.
Grain was counted.
Animals were brought within safer areas.
Messengers ran between the citadel and the gates.
The market remained open because people still needed food, but every conversation eventually turned toward the plain.
I went to the wall shortly after sunrise.
The Greek camp had grown overnight.
Tents spread across the land in rough clusters. Ships had been pulled onto shore in long rows, their dark hulls resting above the waterline. Fires smoked between them. Men moved everywhere.
From the height of Troy they looked small.
That illusion lasted until units began forming.
Lines of shields appeared.
Spears lifted.
The mass of men became something larger than the individuals who formed it.
Dymas stood beside me.
“There are too many,” I said.
“There are always too many when they belong to the enemy.”
“You remain remarkably comforting.”
“It is a gift.”
Someone below us shouted a name.
Men leaned forward.
A group of Achaean leaders had ridden or walked to a place visible from the walls.
People around me began identifying them.
“That is Agamemnon.”
“No, the one beside him.”
“Menelaus is there.”
“Ajax.”
“Which one?”
“The enormous one.”
That helped.
Then a whisper moved along the wall.
“Achilles.”
I looked.
At first I saw only another armored man among several.
He was younger than I expected.
That was my first thought.
My second was that he stood differently.
Most warriors looked toward Troy.
Achilles looked at it as though measuring the distance between himself and the gate.
He wore bronze armor that caught the light. Near him stood a smaller group of Myrmidons, men from his own contingent.
“Is that really him?” I asked.
Dymas frowned.
“Probably.”
“You sound disappointed.”
“I expected two heads.”
I laughed.
Then horns sounded below.
The first skirmishing began.
Men from Troy moved beyond the gate under Hector’s command.
Ione found me before I realized she had climbed the wall.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
“What are you doing here?”
“Watching.”
“So am I.”
We watched together.
The first clash was not beautiful.
It was confusing.
Dust rose quickly.
Men ran.
Shields struck.
Spears moved.
From the wall, it was difficult to understand individual actions.
All the songs I had heard about battle had made it sound clean.
One hero advances.
Another answers.
Spears fly.
Gods choose sides.
Real battle looked like fear organized into lines.
Trojan forces withdrew toward the gate after probing the Achaean front.
The Greeks did not pursue far.
Not yet.
Both sides were learning.
That evening, the city gates reopened briefly to admit men returning from the field.
Some walked.
Some were carried.
The first wounded entered Troy.
The city changed again.
A young soldier sat against a wall while Ione and her aunt bound his arm.
His face was pale.
“I did not even see him,” he whispered.
“Who?” I asked.
“The man who hit me.”
He laughed once.
Then began shaking.
That was the moment war became real to me.
Not when ships appeared.
Not when kings were named.
When a boy younger than my brother stared at his own blood and said he had not seen the man who made it flow.
Over the next several days, negotiations were attempted.
Messengers went out.
Messengers returned.
Menelaus wanted Helen.
The Achaeans demanded restitution and honor.
Troy refused terms it considered unacceptable.
Every side spoke of justice.
Every side prepared more weapons.
I began to understand that justice was a word kings carried into war because “pride” sounded too small.
One afternoon, I saw Paris and Hector arguing in the upper city.
I could not hear the words.
I did not need to.
Hector’s anger was restrained but unmistakable.
Paris turned away first.
That night, Ione asked whether I still planned to leave.
The inland road was becoming dangerous.
Achaean patrols and Trojan movements had made travel uncertain.
Merchants who tried to depart reported robbery, confiscation, or worse.
“I waited too long,” I said.
“You wanted to see Troy.”
“I have seen it.”
She looked toward the dark plain.
“No. You have seen the beginning.”
Below us, Greek fires covered the land.
Above us, Troy’s lamps burned along the streets.
Two cities facing one another.
In the following days, the first dead were returned to both sides. That changed the city more than any speech from the palace.
Trojan families waited near designated courtyards whenever soldiers came through the gates. Mothers searched faces. Wives counted men. Fathers tried not to look frightened. When a body arrived covered by a cloak, everyone nearby became silent even if the dead man belonged to another family.
I helped carry one stretcher because there were not enough hands. The man beneath the cloth was heavy in a way living bodies are not. His brother walked beside us repeating his name as though the dead might answer if called often enough.
Afterward, I washed my hands for a long time.
There was no blood on them. I washed anyway.
That evening, Ione found me sitting behind Myrine's house.
'First one?' she asked.
I nodded.
'You do not get used to it,' she said.
'I thought people did.'
'People get used to continuing afterward. That is different.'
She sat beside me until dark.
Across the plain, the Greek camp grew larger. Inside Troy, funeral smoke rose above rooftops. The two cities had begun learning one another's rhythm.
One of tents.
May you like
One of stone.
Between them lay fields that would soon belong to neither.
