Page 38 of Odette's Vow

Pride had cost the Greeks the war.

13

Οdysseus

The air went out of the soldiers after the death of Achilles. They knew what it was like to fight a war without him. Still, they continued at our insistence. Most of the men didn’t understand why we insisted; they hadn’t been privy to the conversation we’d had with the seer after Achilles’ death.

Calchas had reappeared in his priestly garbs, to the remainder of us lords still in the medical tent, the hem of his robe dusted with sand and blood. Nestor, Ajax, Meleamus, Agamemnon, and myself joined him while the other wounded soldiers were moved out of the tent to give us privacy.

“Calchas,” Diomedes started, ever the brash one. Brasher still, it turned out, when he was bedridden. “You promised us victory and yet it has been nine long years, and now victory appears further away than ever before.”

“Certain items must be collected if you are to see the end of this war,” Calchas replied.

“Didn’t fancy telling us that before?” Diomedes muttered. I, along with a few others, grunted in agreement, but Calchas did not rise to the bait.

Instead, his milky eyes clouded over and he continued. “Achilles has an unknown son. He must be found and broughthere. Philoctetes possesses a bow of immense power, and it is vital to our success. Lastly, Athena’s Palladium, the sacred statue, lies hidden behind the city walls of Troy. With it, the city cannot fall.”

A murmur ran through the gathered lords. I exchanged a glance with Diomedes, seeing my own exhaustion reflected in his eyes. The weight of nine years of warfare pressed down on us all.

Agamemnon was first to break the silence. “And how are we to accomplish these tasks?” he demanded.

“These are not ordinary tasks, but they are the keys to your victory. You must divide your forces wisely. Seek out Achilles’ son, persuade Philoctetes to join your cause, and retrieve the Palladium with the cunning that only Odysseus can muster.”

All eyes turned to me then, and I felt the familiar weight of expectation settle on my shoulders. The details were discussed, the remaining tasks divided out between the men, and a timeline put in place for when we would be able to act, subject to the medics’ discharge.

Nine long weeks I had lain in this infernal medical tent, confined to the pallet as my body slowly knitted itself back together. It would be another three before I would be discharged, I was told. That was not necessarily a bad thing, considering the wound in my side still throbbed relentlessly, a constant reminder of how close I had been, in truth, to travelling down to the Underworld.

That nightmare still haunted me.

Odette came every day, her touch as gentle as the breeze, applying salve to my wound and following the medics’ instructions with meticulous care. Yet she remained distant, her interactions with me minimal and perfunctory, as if she didn’t trust herself around me after our last encounter. It drove me wild, until all I could do was dream of her.

She came to dress my wound with salve as she always did. But this time, when I captured her wrist, she let me. And when my arms tightened around her chest and pulled her to me, she finally relaxed into me, allowing my hands to stroke her hair.

“Why?”

She knew what I was asking.

“You’ll be going home to your precious Penelope soon. Perhaps you should focus on that.”

I continued stroking her hair. “You sound jealous.”

“No, I am realistic.”

“I thought we agreed not to lie to one another.”

“We agreed to no more games. Besides, it is not a lie. You will leave this war, and I will remain a slave. This is my homeland. This,” – she pushed away from me and gestured to the space between us – “will cease to be anything more. And that will be that. The war will end soon. Nine years by your own declaration. It is almost over.”

I crushed her back into me. “You sound disappointed at the thought of my going home.”

“I am disappointed in myself.”

“For?”

She sucked in a breath and I could feel the raggedness of her heart beating against my stomach, throbbing at the same pace as my wound – two wounded creatures, making one another whole.

Eventually, she answered. “For believing that I mean more to you than I do. For all your precious words about not treating me like a spear-wife, your actions do not match, Odysseus. You use me, just in a different way than the others.”

She spun a colourful string of curses then, spitting each one out at me, calling me every heinous name she could think of, until suddenly I was barrelling towards her in our tent until herback hit the centre mast pole and I could crowd her with my body.

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