Well if I couldn’t kill Agamemnon, what could I do? Only one thing was possible. I have pulled out of the fighting. Along with my fellow Myrmidons I will sit in the Greek camp, consuming their resources and watching them being slaughtered without me and my battlefield prowess. That should kill Agamemnon as surely as my blade, or at least many of his men. To make sure my plan will work, I tried one more thing: I called Mother to me and begged that she may get almighty Zeus to make the Greeks suffer in my absence.
XI
Whatever the cause be it the return of Agamemnon’s slave girl to her father or just pure fluke, the plague has stopped. There is nothing much to do around here when you are not fighting or quarrelling with Agamemnon so I’ve been spending more time with my personal servant good friend cousin Patroclus. I find he is very good at cheering me up and I hardly feel the loss of the girl except for the injustice and humiliation any more: he takes my mind off things and has very interesting conversation, a superb companion.
XXII
Agamemnon called a meeting today. Of course I didn’t go, I’m sticking to my threats and I’ll make him sorry for what he did to me but I did watch it from my hilltop. It was a most amusing spectacle. Agamemnon decided to test the courage of his troops (probably to see what effect my leaving had on them Patroclus said) by telling them that they were giving up and going home. Guess what, without me there to raise moral, they ran and started preparing the ships. I could almost see the redness in Agamemnon’s cheek from here. It was fantastic. Anyway once the idiot had his force back in line they marched off to battle and haven’t come back yet.
XXIV
More supplies came into the camp today and being the only Commander here, I told Patroclus to take liberties when sharing the food out especially with the wine.
The Greeks seem to be losing their battle, no doubt as Agamemnon was leading them and as I wasn’t fighting so they built a wall round the camp. In usual style, it’s not what I would call a brilliant wall, only 6 feet high, so Hector (the Trojan and slightly inferior version of me so Patroclus says) could probably leap it. It looks like I might have to fight just to defend my ships but I don’t think even Agamemnon is that useless.
XXV
Another day of fighting and the Greek army is being lead so well in my absence that the Trojans have camped on the plain outside Troy for the first time in the whole war! It won’t be long before Agamemnon sends me envoys begging me to return to the fighting.
Well I was right.
No sooner had I finished writing than Odysseus (slimy, snake like and cunning), Ajax (with the brawn and brain of a bull) and Phoenix (a good man who helped raise me) came to persuade me to come back. Apparently Agamemnon is offering me a wealth of gifts to bribe me to fight for him again including the girl Briseis and I was sorely tempted to accept but that would be spineless and it will be much funnier to spite him by remaining here. After telling me this Odysseus asked me to fight out of pity for the Greeks but I remained strong: I don’t trust a word that man says; he’s a schemer and a liar much to clever for his own good. One day a god will take a disliking to him and bring him down a peg or two.
Next Phoenix told me of how he raised me as he had no children of his own and also of the Litae who chase away delusion and also of the story of Melager who refused gifts to persuade him to fight and when he finally had to fight for his own life, got nothing. These stories moved me little though I decided to offer Phoenix a bed with me as he is a good friend.
Ajax, with his usual tact and subtlety of a charging bull told me that I was being silly and that the gifts greatly outweighed the offence. I must say I agreed with him as Agamemnon had offered me one of his own daughters in marriage and if it had not been for Deidamia I may have accepted the gifts. Anyway I told them that I would only fight if my ships were threatened and then sent Odysseus and Ajax away.
XXVI
Even from the top of my hill, it was plain that the fighting didn’t go well for the Greeks this morning. Watching, it wasn’t long before I saw Nestor helping one of the Greeks from the field and, curious as to whom it was I sent Patroclus to find out. Shortly after he came back telling me it was Macheon, the Trojans successfully broke through the pitiful wall and fought their way right to the ships. I was on the verge of arming myself and charging into the fray to protect my boats when the battle turned and they were driven back. Oh that I had what grief and anguish it would have saved me.
It was not long before Hector had led the Trojans back to our ships in a massive counter attack, driving the Greek fighters before them until they were fighting from the decks of the ships themselves. They were held back for a long time by a huge Greek wielding a long pike with enough force to knock several Trojan heads of every sweep. The warrior, who could only have been Ajax, was only stopped when Hector thought to chop the head of the spear, not that it made much difference in the hands of Ajax; I don’t think he probably noticed the loss for a while, until he became tired of smashing the heads of his foes.
It seemed that Zeus was giving me one more chance to fight and save myself from this doom, but alas, at that time, even the thought of fighting for that most vile of men Agamemnon even to save my own ship brought bile to my throat: cursed pride, what it might have spared me. Patroclus at this point begged me to let him join the fight. He called me impossible, said I was spawned of the grey sea and sheer cliffs which were harsh words despite the fact that they are at least partially true: my grandfather is the Old man of the sea. Of course I agreed, what could I refuse that man but I warned him, begged him to be careful and gave him my armour, that the enemy might think it was me and gave him command over my Myrmidons. Then I prayed to Zeus that he might be kept safe in battle.
Zeus wasn’t listening. Either that or he has a twisted and evil sense of humor and is more like his father than we imagine. From my hill I saw the Trojans being driven back then the fight thickened at one point. First the Trojans and then the Greeks controlled it and then back again. My stomach was filled with a sickening dread and I felt a terrible sense of foreboding for what might have happened to my Patroclus; then I caught sight of the runner coming to my tent, and I knew.
I don’t remember who it was but I could have killed him on the spot for what he told me. Mother came to comfort me and the fury rose inside. She knew it and made me promise not to go to battle until she had asked Hephistus whether he wanted to make me another set of armour. You could always tell with mother, the more of an option she gave you the less of an option you had.
Regardless I set of to the slope above the battle where I yelled my fury at the Trojans. I’ll swear by the river Styx twelve of them dropped dead from the fear. What cowards these Trojans are, to die because a man with no armour or weapons shouts at them. They will know a new level of fear. I will avenge Patroclus. Troy will fall to me.