Greek Warriors (3 page)

Tom read it aloud to Isis:

“The horse that roars a battle cry,

A wooden gift from the Greeks,

Will breach the walls that reach the sky,

Lead to the jewel she seeks.

The Trojan folk are under siege

Inside old Priam's city,

Seek the prize upon the liege!

Set in his ring so pretty.”

“I've got it!” Tom said. “Or at least part of it.”

Isis looked hopefully at him. “It sounds like a pile of nonsense. Go on. Explain it to me and Cleo.”

Tom could just about contain his excitement. “Well, it mentions Trojans and Greeks and a horse. Have you heard of the Siege of Troy?” he asked.

Isis cocked her head to one side and frowned. “I've heard of Greece, obviously. But I can't remember much about Troy.”

“Well, Troy was a really powerful nation too,” Tom said. “About one thousand six hundred years after you died, the Greeks went to war with the Trojans. I'm pretty sure that's what the riddle's talking about.”

Isis snorted. “Sounds like the Greeks were always waging war with someone. What were they fighting over?” She asked, stroking Cleo's silky fur.

Tom chuckled. “You'll love this! The different Greek armies sailed across the Aegean Sea with a massive fleet of ships… and all because Helen left her husband, King Menelaus of Sparta – a city in Greece – to be with Prince Paris. He was the son of Priam, the king of Troy.”

“They started a war over a girl?!” said Isis. She shook her head and laughed.

As Tom tightened his sandals' laces, he explained. “Helen was meant to be the most beautiful woman in the world. So when she left Menelaus, she broke his heart. Menelaus went bonkers and demanded that Paris give Helen back. But Paris wouldn't, so the Greeks declared war. Simple!”

“Egypt would never wage war over anything that silly,” Isis said. “Mind you,” she added thoughtfully, “
I
was the most gorgeous princess that Egypt had ever seen. If I'd been kidnapped, Father
definitely
would have sent his army after me!”

She started to stroke her plaits, and Tom noticed a dreamy look in her eyes. He clicked his fingers in front of her face.

“Wake up!” he said. “If you ever want to get into the Afterlife, we've got an amulet to find. And judging by the riddle, it's behind those city walls. We'd better start coming up with a plan to get inside, because the Trojans kept the Greeks out for
ten
years!”

Boink! Doink! Rattatatatat!

A strange banging noise interrupted Tom. He and Isis crept along the sand dunes until they came to a dense clump of fir trees. A band of workmen was hammering away at an enormous sculpture made from tree trunks. Some of them were arguing with a group of soldiers.

“Whatever is that thing?” Isis asked, pointing to the looming object.

Tom grinned with delight. “It's a horse. Can't you see? Legs, head, tail!” Tom had read about the legendary battle of Troy. Could this possibly be
the
wooden horse that had changed the course of the Trojan War?

Isis squinted at the pile of trunks. “
That's
a horse? The Greeks weren't very good with a hammer and chisel, were they? Not a patch on the Egyptians.”

Before Tom could plan their next move, Isis and Cleo were strutting towards the craftsmen.

“You lot!” Isis shouted, hands on hips. “You've done the horse's legs far too short. And what's with the wheels? Horses don't have wheels! Can't you see that the head makes it look like a giant cow?”

The workmen turned round to face Isis with confused faces. They looked as though they hadn't understood her. But Tom knew that, thanks to Anubis's magic, everyone could understand them wherever they went.

One of the men stooped down and stared at Isis.

“A cow?!” he said. “It looks nothing like a cow! There must be something wrong with your eyes if you can't see that it's a horse. You got a fever, son?” He slapped a rough hand on to Isis's forehead.

Isis batted the man away. “Ugh! Leave me alone! What
is
this… thing?”

The man looked proudly up at the wooden horse. “This is an offering to the gods, of course!” he said. “The siege is going so badly, we thought we'd make something to tip things in our favour.”

Suddenly, the squabbling soldiers rounded on Tom, Isis, Cleo and the workmen. Their daggers were drawn and pointing right at them.

The ringleader picked out Isis. “The boy with the stupid hair is right,” he growled. “If you lot had made the horse better, we might have broken down those walls by now!”

“I'm not a bo—” Isis began to protest.

Tom nudged her. “Shh! Don't let them know you're a girl,” he whispered in Isis's ear. “We might need to pass ourselves off as soldiers.”

Isis nodded and held her tongue.

Another angry soldier poked one of the workmen in the chest. He had a sweaty face and fierce, dark eyes. “It's your fault we're losing the war,” he snarled.

The band of soldiers waved their fists in the air at the carpenters.

“We blame you!” they yelled.

“Get them, boys!” shouted the ringleader.

There was a
swoosh
by Tom's ear as a sword cut through the air. Then a deafening
clang
as it clashed against a carpenter's saw.

“You have displeased the gods!” the sword-wielding soldier cried. “Your wooden cow is terrible.”

“It's not a cow. It's a horse, you idiot!” the workman shouted, waving his saw. “We're going to win the war with that!”

The group of soldiers and workmen were locked in a tussle that would have had Ares, the Greek god of war, in a spin.

No wonder they're losing the war
, thought Tom.
They're too busy fighting each other
.

Tom looked for Isis and Cleo in the fray. Cleo was darting through the men's legs and digging her claws into their shins. But where was Isis?

“Let me through, you big, sweaty brutes!” Tom heard her cry.

Finally he caught sight of her, kicking out at the men as they rained punches down on each other.

“Isis!” Tom shouted, elbowing a soldier in the belly. “We've got to get out of here.”

He held out his hand towards her. Isis was just about to take it when Tom spotted a tall, muscly carpenter holding a hammer above his head.

“Out of my way, Spartan child soldier!”

Tom squeezed his eyes shut and waited for the hammer to attack him. But the blow didn't come.

“Stop this fighting at once, you mules!” a commanding voice bellowed.

Tom opened his eyes to see his attacker being pushed to the ground by an older man. He wore a fine breastplate and a helmet topped with a red plume.

“Commanders! Come to my aid!” the man shouted.

As Tom and Isis finally managed to prise themselves free, three important-looking men ran out of a large red tent pitched nearby.

Tom could see the outside was decorated with the upside-down V symbol.

“Cool! These Spartan soldiers were really famous!” he whispered to Isis excitedly.

“What do you mean, ‘cool'?” Isis asked. “Getting roped into a fight the minute we arrive is hardly a great start.” She picked up Cleo and held her close to her chest. “We've got to get out of here.”

“No!” Tom said. “Let's just see what happens. We might get some clues that will help us find the amulet. The riddle mentioned the wooden horse…”

Tom, Isis and Cleo watched as the commanders dragged the soldiers away from the angry workmen.

The older commander took off his helmet and held it under his arm. His hair was short and grey. “You lot are making the Greek army look like fools,” he said.

“What does it matter?” one of the soldiers said, holding his hand over what Tom could see was already turning into a whopping black eye. “The Trojans have been laughing at us behind their unbreakable walls for years. We've tried everything we can think of to get inside that city. This siege is a joke!”

The commander pushed the soldier roughly towards the entrance of the tent. He turned to the rest of the bruised and sorry-looking rabble.

“You think that's an excuse to start fighting amongst yourselves?” he shouted. “Well! You idiots can explain yourselves to the Chief Commander Odysseus himself.”

The commander held a flap to one side. Tom stood on his tiptoes to get a look inside the tent.

“Can you believe it?” he asked Isis. “We're going to meet Odysseus! He was an amazing warrior. He commanded all the different Greek armies, including the Spartans.”

Isis sniffed and examined her fingernails. “If they haven't been able to break into Troy in ten years, he can't be that amazing.”

One by one, the soldiers entered the tent to speak to Odysseus. Soon it was Tom and Isis's turn.

“Get in there!” the grey-haired commander said.

He pushed them both inside the tent, which was now crowded with burly soldiers, who looked like they had just been given a telling-off.

With a pounding heart, Tom scanned the tent. In the middle a young, dark-haired man was sitting in a chair that was far too big for him. He was wearing a gold breastplate clearly meant for someone with rippling biceps and a broad chest.
That's the legendary Odysseus?
thought Tom.
He looks like a kid wearing his dad's armour!

Odysseus crossed his skinny legs and swished a tasselled fly swatter in Tom's and Isis's direction but accidentally swatted himself on the nose. He blushed.

“You two children! Come forward!” he said in a whiny voice that reminded Tom of his teacher, Mr Braintree, when he had a cold. “Which army are you from?” demanded Odysseus.

Tom and Isis shuffled towards the chair.

“Please, Mr Odysseus,” Tom said. “We've only just got here. We never meant to get roped into a fight.”

Odysseus looked them up and down. “You're too young to be Agamemnon's soldiers,” he said. “And I know all of Achilles's warriors.” He stood, stepped forward and grasped Tom's face in his hands. “You must be Spartans sent by Menelaus! Only Spartans force cubs to fight like bears.”

“Yes,” Isis said, smiling. “That's
exactly
what we are! Deadly bear cubs. Grrrr!”

Odysseus strode to the back of the tent. As he passed a small table stacked with drinks, he knocked the edge of the tabletop with his enormous breastplate. The table wobbled from side to side.

“Er, Odysseus, sir,” the grey-haired commander said, slapping his hand to his forehead. “Watch the—”

But it was too late. The table fell sideways and the cups rolled on to the floor with a clatter. Odysseus seemed not to have noticed. He simply snatched up two helmets from a pile and tossed them to Tom and Isis. His throw was so bad that Tom had to leap to the side to catch his. Isis's helmet landed in the sand a metre away from her.