She scrutinized her knife, then wiped it on her tunic and thrust it into its sheath. ‘No, you shouldn’t,’ she said.
He sat down beside her and rested his forearms on his knees. ‘Where’s Havoc?’
‘In the hills. I don’t think she likes all the people and the dogs.’ She paused. ‘Do you want me to go and look for her, too?’
‘Pirra, I said I’m sorry. It’s just …’ He broke off with a scowl. How could he tell her what it had been like? Hoping against hope that finally, after all this time, the guilt and the anxiety would be over, and he would see Issi again? And then to walk into camp and have it all come crashing down.
He glanced at Pirra’s crinkly black hair and her pale, severe face. She’d never had a sister. How could he expect her to understand?
Everything feels different now, thought Pirra, watching the embers collapse and send a flurry of sparks into the night sky.
After days in the mountains, the rebel camp had come as a shock. The smells, the dirt, the noise. Donkeys and sheep; dogs foraging for scraps; children running messages; women cooking, tending the wounded, mending armour, making arrows; men and boys getting ready for battle. Everyone was either Messenian or Lykonian, all of them rough and war-like. And Akastos – Akastos – was High Chieftain of Mycenae. It was too much to take in. Pirra felt very Keftian: very foreign and out of place.
Hylas, too, looked tough and war-like, and so Lykonian, with that nose that made a straight line with his brow. With a pang, she remembered the hope in his tawny eyes when he’d found her, and how the light had died when she’d told him she hadn’t found Issi.
‘Have you eaten?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ she lied. ‘You?’
‘Mm.’
Their eyes met, and they glanced quickly away. Then of one accord they rose and stood looking at the campfires on the ridge, and all the tired and dirty people. Behind them, Mount Lykas blotted out the stars. On its roots to the north, Pirra made out a clutch of glimmering red pinpricks: Hekabi had told her that that was the Crows’ stronghold of Lapithos. East across the plains, the darkness was seamed with a swathe of more red sparks.
‘That’s Pharax’s camp,’ Hylas said quietly.
Pirra swallowed. ‘There are so many of them.’
‘There’ll be more soon. According to the scouts, Telamon’s forces have made it through the main pass, and they’re massing to the south.’
‘Which means we’ll be attacked from the south and the east.’
In the dark, she saw him nod. ‘Akastos says we’ll take up position just below this ridge, not far from camp.’ He paused. ‘If the battle goes against us, the women and children must flee to the hills. He says the Crows will reach us late tomorrow. That’s when the battle will begin.’
‘“We will take up position”?’ she said sharply. ‘You’re not thinking of taking part in the battle?’
He looked down at her. ‘Of course I am.’
‘But – Hylas … The Crows have the dagger. That means they can’t be beaten!’
‘Well – but if what we hear is true, and Pharax has it, I might be able to find some way of getting it off him –’
‘How?’ she burst out. ‘Hylas – Pharax is a grown man and a seasoned fighter! He’s the best warrior the Crows have got!’
There was a dangerous silence. ‘Are you saying I should run away?’ he said in a hard voice. ‘Be a coward, like my father?’
‘Of course not! I’m saying that if – if we’re to have a hope of beating them, it won’t be in battle!’
‘Then how?’
‘I don’t know! But –’
‘If the Outsider wields the blade, the House of Koronos burns. How will I get to “wield the blade”, Pirra, if I’m not in the battle?’
‘But there must be another way! The Oracle can’t mean for you to go into battle, you’re not a warrior, you’ve never even worn armour!’
She’d gone too far. ‘Nor have quite a lot of these peasants with their sickles,’ he retorted, ‘or these fishermen with their spears! Pirra, none of us knows how to fight, not really – apart from Akastos and Periphas and a handful of others – but what else can we do!’
‘And what about me?’ she flung back. ‘What am I supposed to do? Wait meekly here in camp, and pray they don’t bring you back in pieces on a shield? Well I won’t do it, Hylas! There has to be another way of fighting the Crows, and I’m going to find it!’
‘He says a battlefield’s no place for a girl,’ snarled Pirra, pacing up and down in front of Hekabi. ‘As if we’ll be any safer here if the Crows win!’
‘But it’s Hylas you’re worried about,’ Hekabi said calmly.
‘Because he’s going to get himself killed! And the stupid thing is, even if he did manage to get the dagger off Pharax, there’d be no point! He’s not a god, he can’t destroy it on his own in the middle of a battle – and I doubt very much that the Lady of the Wild Things is going to come down and do it for him just because he asks Her to!’
Hekabi bent over a steaming pot hanging over the fire. Pirra went on pacing. At one stroke, Hylas had made her feel utterly powerless and sick with dread. ‘We’re missing something,’ she said. ‘We’re doing this all wrong, why can’t he see that?’
Hekabi ladled sludge into two wooden bowls and set them on the ground.
‘What’s that?’ said Pirra. ‘Some sort of spell?’
‘Barley gruel. Eat.’ Taking two horn spoons from her goatskin bag, she stuck one in each bowl.
Irritably, Pirra waved hers away. Then she discovered she was ravenous, and snatched it up. As she wolfed her gruel, she glanced at Hekabi, calmly eating. ‘You always said there was no hope for him,’ she said with her mouth full.
‘Not quite,’ mumbled Hekabi. ‘I said he has a destiny, so his life is not his own.’
‘You mean the Oracle.’
‘And the visions. They’re part of it, too.’
Pirra stopped eating and waited for her to go on.
‘Hylas told you once,’ said the wisewoman, ‘that on Thalakrea, he saw the Lady of Fire. He asked Her to save everyone else and take him instead – and She touched his temple with Her burning finger and said, I already have.’
Pirra set down her bowl. ‘I thought of that too. You think the Lady means to take him, just like She said. You think – you think he’s going to die.’
‘Maybe.’
Black spots swam before Pirra’s eyes. ‘You really think there’s no hope?’
‘For him? Who knows? For the rest of us?’ Placing her bowl on the ground, Hekabi spread her hands. ‘Although we’ve more of a chance now that Akastos is leader.’
Pirra saw the High Chieftain in the distance, at the centre of a ring of men. He listened gravely to one, nodded to a second, spoke briefly to a third, then strode off for another part of camp. The men he left behind appeared calmer and more purposeful: he’d given them strength.
‘I wasn’t all that surprised when I found out who he really is,’ said Hekabi, watching him. ‘A great leader has the power to make people believe in themselves. Akastos can do that. Who knows where it’ll lead?’
‘But what about Hylas?’ Pirra burst out. ‘How can you think it’s his destiny to go charging into battle and throw away his life?’
‘I don’t know what his destiny is. Only the gods know that.’
‘But you’re a wisewoman, you’re supposed to know!’
Hekabi scraped up the last of her gruel and licked her spoon. ‘While you were arguing with your lion-haired Akean, I did a fire reading, to see how the battle would go.’
‘And?’
‘I heated the blade of a bronze axe till it was red-hot, then I dropped on a handful of pebbles – rock crystal, jasper – and saw how they moved.’
‘So who will win?’ Pirra said impatiently.
‘The stones didn’t say. But one of them – a crystal – leapt clean off the blade and into the fire.’
Pirra gasped. This was
almost worse than she’d feared. ‘You think that’s Hylas? You think he’ll run away?’
‘I don’t know. What I do know is that you can do nothing for him now. You must leave him to do what he thinks is right.’
Pirra clenched her teeth. ‘Well I refuse simply to wait here till it’s over! There must be other ways of fighting the Crows!’
Hekabi did not reply. She sat facing Mount Lykas with her hands clasped about her knees. Her expression was thoughtful, but Pirra sensed her fierce intent.
Following the wisewoman’s gaze to the mountain’s lower slopes, Pirra made out the distant red glimmer of torchlight. That’s Lapithos, she thought. The Crows’ ancestral stronghold, where they first began all those years ago, before they sought richer lands to the north, and attacked Mycenae itself …
An idea came to her, and she caught her breath. It was so outrageous, so impossible … ‘I’ve just thought of something,’ she said. ‘I wonder … I wonder if you’ve had the same idea?’
Hekabi turned her head. Firelight played on the streak of white hair at her temple, and her eyes gleamed. ‘You tell me.’
Pirra licked her lips. ‘The rebels say the Crows have taken half of everything the peasants produce – and it’s all up there in the storerooms at Lapithos. Linen, wool … Jar upon jar of olive oil.’
Hekabi’s lip curled, the closest she ever got to a smile. ‘They’d better be careful,’ she said softly. ‘Someone might start a fire. And you know what the Oracle says: The House of Koronos burns …’
With a stick, Pirra jabbed the embers. She watched the flurry of sparks shooting skywards. If the rebels lost tomorrow, then in all likelihood, Hylas would be killed. That was too awful to contemplate. She concentrated on revenge.
‘What if the Crows did win the battle,’ she murmured, ‘and they made it back to Lapithos, only –’
Hekabi barked a mirthless laugh. ‘– only to find nothing there but a pile of smoking ruins!’
The eve of battle, and everyone busy: painting shields, mending armour, sharpening weapons. Keeping their minds off tomorrow.
Archers trimmed their beards and tied back their hair so that it wouldn’t get in the way. Slingers filled their pouches with the smoothest, roundest pebbles. Every man washed himself, oiled his skin, combed and braided his hair – so that if he was killed the next day, he would be fit to meet his gods.
Akastos had ordered Hylas to get himself kitted out, and the women had given him a quilted linen tunic and a kilt of sturdy pigskin, a hauberk, a ridiculously heavy oxhide shield, and – to his astonishment – a full set of bronze armour.
The tunic was unwieldy and hot, the armour made him feel like a beetle, and the helmet had earflaps that muffled his hearing; he found a quiet place and sat down to cut them off. He was ashamed to find that his hands were shaking uncontrollably, he could hardly hold his knife.
‘Here,’ said Akastos, making him jump. The High Chieftain dropped two leather wrist cuffs into his lap. ‘They stop the sweat running on to your hands and spoiling your grip.’
‘Thanks,’ muttered Hylas, praying that Akastos hadn’t noticed him trembling.
To change the subject, he asked where Akastos had got his own bronze armour, and his splendid sword with the gold hilt. Akastos replied that it had been his own at Mycenae, and Periphas had hidden it years ago along with his sealstone, when the Crows had taken over. ‘He was about your age at the time. He never accepted the story that I was dead.’
Hylas jammed the helmet on his head and stood up. It was a hot night, and the air felt heavy. He drew a deep breath, but still felt breathless. ‘What’s on your sealstone?’ he asked.
Akastos showed him. It was green jasper, carved with a warrior standing beside a lion, with one hand on its mane.
‘The Lion of Mycenae,’ said Hylas. Havoc still hadn’t made an appearance, and he missed her savagely.
He asked Akastos if Hekabi had done the charm against the Angry Ones. The High Chieftain nodded slowly. ‘She gave me this.’ He touched a small black pouch on a thong around his neck. ‘But she said we can’t be sure it’ll work – or for how long.’
‘Well, it’s dark and there’s no sign of Them,’ Hylas said hopefully. ‘Maybe that’s down to the charm.’
Akastos’ mouth twisted. ‘Maybe. But whether it works or not, I’ll lead the rebels tomorrow. I have to. Tomorrow either we crush the Crows, or they crush us.’ He spoke calmly, and he looked immensely strong and capable: an experienced warrior who’d fought many battles.
What am I doing here? Hylas thought suddenly. Pirra’s right, I’m a boy among men, I’m not up to this.
The High Chieftain gave him a searching glance, then jerked his head. ‘Come with me.’
They walked to the edge of camp, where the sounds of voices and pack animals gave way to the throbbing ring of night crickets.
Akastos pointed south, to a stretch of rocky ground. ‘You can’t see it from here, but there’s a gully that’ll stop Telamon’s forces attacking from that side, so he’ll have to move round and join forces with Pharax. Which means that they’ll all be facing west – and by the time the battle begins –’
Hylas caught his breath. ‘The Sun will be in their eyes!’
Akastos nodded.
‘That’s clever. But – we’ll still be massively outnumbered. And yet you sound as if you think we might win.’
‘There’s always hope.’ Akastos fell silent. Then he said in an altered voice: ‘Hylas, I need to know something. When we were in the pass, you said you’d seen ghosts. Were they – did you see one who looked like me, only younger?’
Hylas shook his head. ‘I’m sorry. If your brother’s ghost was there, I didn’t see him.’
Akastos nodded sadly, and his gaze turned inwards, into the past. Hylas couldn’t tell if he feared to see his brother’s ghost, or longed to.
Mustering his courage, Hylas asked the question he’d wanted to ask since last winter. ‘How – why did you kill him?’
Akastos blew out a long breath. ‘A woman. He was in love with her, and the Crows told him that I wanted her too. They said she refused me, and I forced her. So my brother, he picked a fight with me …’ He glanced down at his hand resting on the hilt of his sword. ‘Tomorrow’s my last chance, Flea. Fifteen years ago, I swore to crush the Crows and appease my brother’s ghost. If I can kill Pharax, or Telamon – if I can shed the lifeblood of a highborn Crow – my brother’s ghost will be at peace. And I will be rid of the Angry Ones for ever.’
He spoke as if he truly believed he could do it, and Hylas felt a surge of love for this man who’d endured years of unimaginable hardship and terror, and yet had never given up.
But Akastos was also a warrior who knew what to do in battle, and as Hylas stared across the plains at the distant campfires of the Crows, he thought of all the swords and daggers and arrows which tomorrow would be aimed at him. He wished passionately that he was a woman or a child, and could stay behind in camp.
‘You’re scared,’ Akastos said softly.
He nodded. ‘Does that make me a coward, like my father? Will I do what he did, and run away from battle?’
‘There’s something you should know about your father, Flea. When Ekion captured you, you told him that that tattoo on your arm was Mountain Clan: your father’s clan. And once, on Keftiu, you said that your mother left you and your sister on the mountain, wrapped in a bearskin.’ He paused. ‘That told me something. It told me that your father wasn’t just some member of the Mountain Clan. He was their Leader.’
Hylas blinked.
‘He refused to fight because he thought his people would have a better chance if they took to the mountains.’
‘Because he was a coward!’ Hylas said hotly.
‘He did what he thought was right for his people.’ Again he paused. ‘And when the Crows finally hunted him down, he fought to the end, and he made a good death.’
‘But he didn’t fight when you needed him,’ Hylas sa
id stubbornly.
‘No. No, he didn’t.’
‘Well, I will.’
‘I know you will, Flea.’ He put his hand on Hylas’ shoulder. ‘Every man is frightened before a battle.’
‘Even you?’
‘Oh, yes. The more battles you fight, the harder it gets.’
Hylas opened his mouth to reply, but at that moment, Nomios ran up with a question for Akastos and they went off together, leaving Hylas on his own.
He found a lonely tamarisk tree and made an offering of half his rations to the Lady of the Wild Things, asking Her to keep Pirra, Havoc and Echo safe, and Issi, wherever she was – and to let Akastos and Periphas survive the battle – ‘and me too, if possible, but above all, the others.’ Then he went in search of Pirra.
He found the tent she shared with Hekabi empty, and all their belongings gone.
‘They left,’ said a woman mending a tunic nearby.
‘Where’d they go?’
The woman bit off a thread and waved an arm vaguely at the mountain. ‘Dunno why.’
Hylas stood staring into the darkness, with the hot wind stinging his eyes.
There has to be another way of fighting the Crows, Pirra had cried. And I’m going to find it!
And now she was gone, and he had no idea where, or why. All he knew was that he might never see her again.
Ten paces away among the thorn bushes, he made out a large grey shape. ‘Havoc!’ he whispered.
Havoc’s eyes threw back the starlight as she raised her muzzle and snuffed his scent; but instead of bounding towards him, she turned and melted silently into the shadows.
First Pirra, and now Havoc.
Hylas glanced back at camp, where people were rolling themselves in cloaks and settling to sleep. So many people …
And yet he’d never felt so alone.
Once again, the boy called to the she-lion. He needed her, she could hear it in his voice. She longed to burst from her hiding place and bound down to him, to fling her forepaws around his neck and give him a good muzzle-rub.
And yet – the little half-grown human needed her, too. The little human was miserable up there on the mountain, and she was far too young to be by herself.