A Thousand Ships(3)
She stood in the doorway, unsure what to do. She should stay in the house, of course, or her husband might not be able to find her when he returned. Many years ago, he had promised that if the city ever fell, he would take her and their son and his father, and any other Trojan survivors, and sail away to found a new city. She had put her fingers on his lips, to stop the words from coming out. Even saying such things could invite a mischievous god to make them come to pass. His beard tickled her hands, but she did not laugh. And nor did he: it’s my duty, he had said. Priam commands me. Someone must take on the mantle of founding a new Troy, if the worst should happen. She again tried to crush the flurry of thoughts that he would not return, that he was already dead, that the city would be razed before dawn, and that her home – like so many others – would not be here for anyone to return to.
But how could this have happened? She pressed her head against the wooden door, its black metal studs warm against her skin. She looked down at herself and saw oily black dust had already settled in the creases of her shift. What she could see happening across the city was not possible, because Troy had won the war. The Greeks had finally fled, after a decade of attrition on the plains outside the city. They had arrived with their tall ships all those years ago and had achieved what, exactly? The battles had been waged nearer the city, then further away; advancing right up to the beached vessels, then closing back towards Troy. There had been single combat and all-out war. There had been sickness and famine on both sides. Great champions had fallen and cowards had sneaked away with their lives. But Troy, her city, had stood victorious in the end.
Was it three days ago, four? She could no longer be completely sure of time. But she had no doubt of the facts. She had watched the fleet sail away herself, climbing to the acropolis to see it with her own eyes. Like everyone else in the city she had heard the rumours several days earlier that the Greek army was packing up. Certainly they had withdrawn to their camp. Aeneas and his fellow men – she would never think of them as warriors, for that was their role outside the city, not within it – had debated the merits of a raiding party, hoping to discover what was going on as much as to cause mayhem. But they had held themselves back within the city walls, watching patiently to see what might happen next. And after another day or two with no spears thrown nor arrows fired, people began to hope. Perhaps another plague was ravaging the Greek camp. It had happened before, a few moons ago, and the Trojans had cheered, making thankful offerings to every god. The Greeks were being punished for their impiety, for their senseless refusal to accept that Troy would not fall, could not fall to mortal men. Not to men like these, these arrogant Greeks with their tall ships and their bronze armour, glinting in the sun because not one of them could tolerate the notion that he should labour in obscurity, unseen and unadmired.
Like everyone else, Creusa had prayed for plague. She had not thought there was anything better to pray for. But then another day passed and the ships began to move, the masts quivering as the men rowed themselves out of the bay and into the deep waters of the ocean. And still the Trojans stayed quiet, unable to believe their eyes. The camp had been an eyesore to the west of their city, behind the mouth of the River Scamander, for so long that it was peculiar to see the shore without it, like a gangrenous limb finally amputated. Less horrifying than what had been, but still unsettling. And a day later, even the last and slowest of the ships was gone, groaning under the weight of the men and their ill-earned treasure, ravaged from every small town in Phrygia, from everywhere with fewer men and lower walls than Troy itself. They rowed themselves into the wind, then unfurled their sails and floated away.
Creusa and Aeneas stood on the city walls, watching the white froth churning up on the shore, long after the ships had disappeared. They held one another as she whispered the questions he could not answer: why have they left? Will they return? Are we safe now?
*
A loud, distant thud jerked Creusa back to the present. She could not now go up to the acropolis to look for Aeneas. Even from her house, she could see that the citadel roof had collapsed in a rush of smoke. Any man who had been underneath it would be dead. She tried not to think of Euryleon darting past his father’s legs, trying to help quench an insatiable fire. But Aeneas would not have taken their only son into danger. He must have gone to collect Anchises, to lead the old man to safety. But would he return for Creusa or expect her to find him in the streets?
She knew Aeneas’ heart better than she knew her own. He had set off to find his father before the fire had reached its fullest extent: Anchises lived closer to the acropolis, where the flames were burning most fiercely. Aeneas would have known the journey to his father’s house would be difficult. He would have anticipated returning, but now he would see that it was impossible. He would be making his way to the city gates and trusting her to do the same. She would find him on the plains outside; he would head towards what had recently been the Greek camp. She paused on the threshold for a moment, wondering what she should take with her. But the shouting of men was coming closer and she did not recognize the dialect. The Greeks were in her city and there was no time to search for valuables, or even a cloak. She looked across the smoke-filled streets, and began to run.
*
Creusa had been caught up in the festival atmosphere that spread through the city the previous day: for the first time in ten years, Troy’s gates were thrown open. The last time she had walked out onto the Scamandrian plains which surrounded the city, she had been little more than a child, twelve years old. Her parents had told her that the Greeks were pirates and mercenaries, sailing the glittering seas to find easy pickings. They would not stay long in Phrygia, everyone said. Why would they? No one believed their pretext: that they had come to claim back some woman who had run off with one of Priam’s boys. The idea was laughable. Countless ships, as many as a thousand, sailing across oceans to besiege one city for the sake of a woman? Even when Creusa saw her – saw Helen with her long golden hair arranged over her red dress, matched by the gold embroidery which decorated every hem and the ropes of gold she wore around her neck and her wrists – even then she did not believe an army would have sailed all this way to take her home. The Greeks took to the seas for the same reasons as anyone else: to fill their strongboxes with plunder and their households with slaves. And this time, when they sailed to Troy, they had over-reached. In their ignorance, they had not known that the city was not merely wealthy but properly defended. Typical Greeks, Creusa’s parents had said: to Hellenes, all non-Greeks were alike, all were barbarians. It had not occurred to them that Troy was a city surpassing Mycenae, Sparta, Ithaca and everywhere they themselves called home.