CLIMBING THE WALL proved easier than anticipated. The stonework was crude on this side, and the exposed joints provided ample space for hand- and footholds. Where the climbing was more difficult, we could rely on the giant for a boost, or we could send him ahead with the rope and have him pull us up. But once we arrived at the top of the wall, we discovered that the other side was perfectly smooth, and our guide had to lower us to the ground, then jump down after. All in all, sneaking into Hell wasn’t much of a challenge. Whoever had designed its fortifications had been more interested in keeping people in than out.
Thus we found ourselves on a dank stone shelf with the pit of Hades dropping into oblivion before us. Off to the right, the ledge narrowed against the wall; on our left, it widened somewhat, and just this side of the gateway, Minos, the half bull, sat on a stool behind a small wooden table, his horned brow furrowed in thought. He twitched and curled his tail as he greeted each new client. One by one, the souls approached him, wringing their hands with grief. His manner was so officious and so calm, one might have mistaken him for some minor bureaucrat. He might have been hearing petitions, or taking legal appeals, except that after a question or two, a nod or shake of the head, and a brief jot on a scroll spread out before him, he would grab the soul by its hair and toss it over his shoulder into the pit, shouting, “You who come to this sanctuary of pain, beware! Watch how you enter and in whom you trust!”
“Think you’ve seen enough?” said Diomedes.
I nodded.
We were over the ledge and down to the next level before Minos or anyone else noticed we were there.
“This is a change,” mused Diomedes, once we reached the ground. Here the black earth was littered not with ash and filth but with the ruins of what must have been a beautiful city: turrets and minarets, buttresses, columns, and fragments of stone were scattered everywhere. Indeed, the ground was so thickly strewn with debris that traversing it was as much a climb as it was a march. Before long, none of us had the energy or inclination to wonder at its artistry.
We must have spent hours picking our way across that landscape of devastation, though without stars or sun, it was hard to tell how far we’d come; and so preoccupied were we with negotiating this rough terrain, that we failed to notice the gathering darkness until the storm was upon us.
Don’t ask me how in the stagnant confines of Hell, meteorological phenomena are possible. Perhaps the vacuity of sin itself stirs the air, or the flames of the lower rings heat the clouds into currents. Whatever the case, the gloom that now enveloped us was cast by a dark storm gathering on our right, and before long, a cold breeze stirred the air, trailing the sharp, metallic smell of rain. From across the battered plain, a sound like a thousand sighs blew to us on the wind.
“Better find some shelter,” said Diomedes.
“Where?” I answered. “Everything here has been turned to rubble.” But our guide was as keen of sight as he was short on words. Just as the first drops began to scatter and pop, the giant found a bit of collapsed roof leaning against a wall. He pushed his way to the back of the tiny space, sat down, and wedged his spear into the corner. Diomedes and I piled in after him. There was just enough room to sit upright with legs outstretched.
“None too comfortable,” grumbled Diomedes, “but it should keep the rain off us. Well done, giant.”
Our guide wagged his head and scratched the back of his neck. Diomedes could charm anyone.
I looked into the triangle of darkness beyond our shelter and studied the advancing front. The air had turned a shade of green, and tiny pellets of ice began to clatter against the stone. Diomedes shifted his shield to his outer arm, and I followed his lead, which changed the hissing patter of the hail into booming strokes on bronze timpani. It was then that I noticed the cyclones.
Once, sitting on the beach in Ithaca, I watched a spring storm roll in from the sea. The water at that time of year was cool, but the air over our island was swelteringly hot, so the front came to a sudden halt just at the water’s edge. Above me, the sky was clear and sunny, but directly ahead, the clouds boiled against the column of heat. I watched as the storm pushed against this invisible wall. Little puffs of cool gave me goose bumps. I watched as the storm eased around the island on either side, and then, as the warmth began to give way, a long, black finger reached down from the clouds to the sea. The tornado was so close, I could see the seawater fly into spray around it, and I stood there awestruck with my feet buried in the hot sand, watching great quantities of ocean scatter into the sky.
Now, as I contemplated the approaching tempest, memories of that spring day returned to me, for even as I looked on, a dozen dark columns of cloud stretched earthward. And as they ran their fingertips along the ground, another dozen formed in the clouds above. Then another. And soon, the air was as full of cyclones as the sky was full of cloud. Peeking out of our tiny shelter, it seemed as though the firmament itself was supported by a forest of winding pillars. Hundreds and hundreds of tornados danced across the devastated landscape, licking the rough earth and flinging its contents skyward. Great piles of stone were flung into the air like leaves, and the sky above swirled in an angry chorus of thunder.
But if this had not been terrifying in its own right, the hurricane had yet another, more alarming attribute: a deep howling wind. And I don’t mean this in a metaphorical sense; the wind, I am certain, actually howled. It screamed, shrieked, yelped, and sobbed like a crowd of prisoners on the rack—or a herd of swine at slaughter—and by the time the storm had overtaken our tiny shelter, it felt as though the walls were quaking in terror.
“I don’t think this roof will hold,” shouted Diomedes. We were close enough for our foreheads to touch, but I could hardly hear him over the screeching wind. “Should we really be staying here?”
“Do we have a choice?” I yelled back.
Diomedes was opening his mouth to speak again when our shelter was flooded with a piercing scream, and his shield, struck by some mass of airborne debris, slammed against him, knocking him over sideways. In the dark, it was hard to tell what had hit him, and as quickly as it blew into our shelter it was sucked back out again.
Diomedes righted himself, wiping his face on his sleeve. “Funny,” he shouted, propping his shield back up and refastening his chin strap. “The rain is salty.”
“No, you’re wrong,” I shouted back, scooping up a handful of hail. “You can’t make ice from saltwater. You must have bitten the giant when you fell over.”
“Not funny,” answered Diomedes. “I’m telling you, I’m covered in saltwater.” He held out one arm in the dim light. I could see that he was dripping wet. But it was not rainwater that covered him, for his hand was drenched with some darker, thicker substance like honey or . . . well . . . looking into Diomedes’ eyes, I could see the realization dawn. “I’m hurt, aren’t I?” he said. Although I could not hear the words, I watched him mouth it through the darkness. A moment of grim desperation passed between us before he closed his eyes. We knew from experience that the most serious battle wounds could not be felt. On the journey home from Troy, one of my crew had drunk himself stupid and fallen from a rooftop. He lay on his back, bleeding into the moonlight, his spine twisted cruelly, and even as he gasped his life away, he swore that he was feeling just fine. “I’ll be up in a moment, boys,” were his last words.
“Hold still,” I shouted. I looked him over, but there didn’t seem to be any wound.
“Go ahead. Tell me,” he said, and his eyes held the grim resolve of a man condemned.
“I hate to disappoint you,” I called back through a fresh spray of rain, “but you’re in excellent health. I don’t know where the blood came from, but it isn’t yours.”
I had no sooner spoken than another cracking thud sounded at the wall of our hut, then another outside the opening—and this time it was I who was covered in gore. We hardly had time to react when another shrieking figure slammed into an overturned pillar, caught on its capital, then whipped back into the air with a shrill cry. It paused long enough for us to recognize the creature as human, and our eyes were opened to the carnage around us. Caught up in the whirling chaos of the storm, the citizens of this ruined realm dwelt in a desperate tangle of humanity, hurled indiscriminately by every contrary wind.
Diomedes and I looked on in horror as another body tumbled into the fallen pillar outside our shelter. A woman. But as the wind seized hold, her robes caught on an outcrop of stone and held her. To our astonishment, it turned out to be someone we knew. She was soaked and spattered with mud, her hair in tousled knots, but even in that condition, she was lovely. I, Odysseus, man of the world and master of the art of love, had never in my life seen a woman so beautiful. The nymph Circe with her lustrous braids was never so magnificent as this woman, and the Sirens never so tempting. Here was the great prize and pride of Achaea, Helen herself. As much as I despised her for the pain her infidelity cost me at Troy, even now, in the midst of the howling storm, I had to admire her beauty.
Well, she was beyond beauty, really. To look at her was to come face-to-face with a force of nature. Her beauty had the strength of a cyclone or tidal wave. To be in her presence was to desire her in the most fundamental sense. Not to love her, exactly. No, love, I have come to believe, is something more complex, subtler—a tapestry woven on the warp of time from threads of patience and sacrifice. No, this was more immediate, more primal—like panic or rage. In the presence of Helen of Argos, men became beasts.
As I watched her writhe in the spattering rain, I flushed with desire. O Zeo! To see her now after three thousand years of solitude—well, you understand why both Diomedes and I might have acted a little irrationally. And you’ll understand why, initially, we simply stared while she was battered by the storm. Her sudden presence was like a drug, ripping fantasy and memory from our hearts by force.
There was a time, you see, when both Diomedes and I had competed for Helen’s hand. Now, shivering in that damp hovel, I relived those fevered days of my youth when a woman’s affection was worth dying for—when a woman’s face could launch a thousand ships.
Ah! And was she ever a woman to die for! Many, many did, though it would be unfair, or at least inaccurate, to blame the war on her alone. The suitors’ oath was my idea. I dreamt it up the summer that Helen came of age—that summer when the youth of Achaea descended on King Tyndareos’ house like wolves, slinking, stalking, circling one another, sniffing the close summer air. I wanted Helen for myself, of course, but I was tired of waiting, crowded into the king’s banquet hall with all those sweating, belching bullies; it made me sick to watch them drink and scheme, one hand on their swords, the other wrapped around a bowl of unmixed wine. I knew I would take her by guile long before any of them took her by force. Besides, I had never been one to fight over women. For that matter, I had never been one to fight at all if I could help it, and I felt pretty certain that if I used my wits, I could have Helen of Argos without lifting a finger.
Diomedes, by contrast, was willing to slaughter every suitor in the hall if he had to, and I didn’t doubt for a moment that he would give it a try. The funny thing is, I think he may have been the only man there who didn’t much care for Helen. He never seemed to have anything positive to say about her, and when she would make one of her infrequent appearances to the gathered suitors, he would usually find something else to do. As far as I could tell, he was in it for the competition. And what’s more, he may well have won. So I made the novel suggestion that we allow the lady to choose for herself. It was such an astonishing proposal that no one could come up with a reason to oppose it. Thus, with great pomp and ceremony, Helen was led into the hall, where she herself picked out her mate. I knew I would win, you see, because I had met her once already.
Seen her, actually. From a distance. It was at the festival of the wine god at Thebes. “Every man should see the Bacchanalia once,” said my father, winking to make a point I did not catch, “and never see it again.” I’d hiked for three days to make it there in time for the opening rites and arrived just as the sun was setting. As I looked about the clearing, I began to understand what he meant. The Thebans had built a great fire in a clearing on the slopes of Mount Cithaeron, and the whole countryside smelled of pine.
I’d never seen anything like it in my life—the wild dancing, the shrieks and howls, and loud, drunken laughter . . . But what moved me most were the drums—the deep, thumping cadence of the Phrygian drums. Thoom! Thoom! Thoom! The air shivered with their thunder, and I felt my own heart fall in with the rhythm. Every face I looked into was hot with wine. Thoom! Thoom! You would have had to be a stone not to dance—and once I’d had my fill of that Theban wine, dance I did, spinning in circles, twisting, leaping like a Cretan before a bull—I was a leopard, a lamb, a wild mountain goat. Thoom! The hot Theban air wrapped us all in a warm embrace till the sweat ran rivers down our necks. Thoom! Thoom! Thoom! Arms, legs, swinging hair, and hands held open to the starry sky. I felt young and perfect. No gray hairs, no broken bones, no scars but one. I’d never felt so full of strength and life—never would again, I suppose. Then, through that mist of wine and sweat, I saw her, the lithe beauty. Through a forest of flailing arms, my eyes touched hers.
I already knew her name. Every man in Greece knew it. And she’d been watching me dance. I grinned when our eyes met. I howled, and she gave a little leap like a startled doe. Then she turned away, threw her arms over her head—and danced. By all the gods of Olympus, I could see only her back, but I felt as though the soles of my feet had been pulled up through my throat. I also remember—and only because later it would take on a particular significance for me—that her sister had been there too, and had also been watching me. She was standing just behind Helen, and when I turned my eyes to hers, she blushed deeply, pulled her veil up over her face, and turned away. Years later, I would learn her name too. It was Penelope.
So this was another reason to assume that I had an edge over the other suitors. But like many of my most brilliant schemes, it did not fall out as planned. The way I figured, if my considerable charm had not already won her over, the mere fact that it was I who gave her the choice was sure to win her affection. But instead, she pointed to—of all people—Menelaos, that sniveling, weak-minded, redheaded stealer of sheep. Not even the oldest son of his family. I tell you, the demon Discord had her nimble fingers in that decision, though I ought to have seen it coming. Beautiful women always have had the most inexplicable attractions. But even so, Helen’s choice caught me off guard. She might have picked swift-footed Achilles or the giant Ajax or even little Teucros, skilled with arrow and bow. But she chose Menelaos.
She might as well have spanked me and stuck an onion in my mouth for all my astonishment, and I could see that every other man in the room was equally appalled. By then, however, we had taken an oath to defend her decision to the death (an idea, mind you, that was supposed to save my life if any of the losers left with hard feelings). We were all so dumbfounded, there was nothing we could think to do, so we abandoned Helen to her grinning groom. And all of us might have finished out our lives in peaceful tedium if Paris hadn’t turned up and stolen her away to Troy.
“That’s her,” gasped Diomedes. His words, strangely audible through the howling wind, pulled me back from my memories. “That’s her,” he said again, and I nodded dumbly.
She didn’t seem to notice us at first. Then a lull in the storm gave her a moment to look about. When she spotted us in our little shelter of stone, she cried, “Odysseus! Diomedes! Save me!” Loud as the storm was, the music of her voice carried across to us on the wind. Her damp dress fluttered, and everything in me longed to be out there with her. Back in my homeland, we refer to our women as “deep breasted and lithe”. The phrase came to me now as I watched her straining against her clothes. The longing felt like a clenched fist in my gut—like a rope pulled taut. She was so lovely, I could have wept.
“Save me!” she cried again, and—Aiki!—her voice was like honey and cream.
Of course, I should have wondered how she could say anything at all, given her condition—or how her voice was so strangely audible. I should have wondered how she had made it through this tempest without sustaining a single bruise, without even tearing her cloak. But my attention had shifted to Diomedes, whose posture gave every indication that he was going after her. He was going to rescue the girl and take her for himself. Looking back at her, I understood the risk. Hades might not be so terrible if it were spent with that woman. But even as I watched the damp and diaphanous clothing tremble over her curves—even as I plotted to outrace Diomedes into the storm and take her for myself—something held me back. It was an unfamiliar feeling, that moment of restraint. I’d never turned down a beautiful woman in my life. But something about the attraction struck me wrong. I had felt this way off the coast of Capri when, tied to the mast of my ship, I listened to the deadly music of the Sirens. And perhaps that is what saved me from throwing myself into that storm of lust—that, and the memory of my wife, whose sober countenance still lingered in my brain.
Diomedes, however, grew increasingly agitated as he looked on, and though I tried to warn him that we did not have the strength to save her, I could see by his demeanor that he was about to lose control. For safe measure, I wrapped one end of his armor belt around my wrist.
I had only just done so when he lunged out into the raging storm. The wind caught his shield and ripped the two of us from the safety of our shelter into the chaos of the squall.