The night that Troy fell was not heralded by thunder or omens of the sky, but by a silence so profound it felt like a weight upon the city. For ten years, the walls of Ilium had withstood the might of the Achaean host, yet victory for the Greeks was not won through the strength of the sword, but through the guile of the mind. The massive wooden horse, a deceptive gift left upon the shores, now stood within the very heart of the citadel. As the Trojans slept, exhausted by a decade of siege and a final day of premature celebration, the belly of the beast opened. Odysseus and his chosen warriors descended into the streets, while the traitorous Sinon signaled the Greek fleet anchored at Tenedos to return.
At the house of Anchises, Aeneas, the son of Venus and a prince of the blood of Dardanus, was locked in a deep and uneasy slumber. In the realm of dreams, he was visited by a specter that chilled his soul. It was Hector, the greatest of the Trojan heroes, but he did not appear as he had in life. He was caked in dust and gore, his feet swollen from the thongs that had dragged him behind the chariot of Achilles, his beard matted with the blood of his many wounds. With a voice that seemed to echo from the depths of the underworld, Hector spoke. He told Aeneas that the walls were being scaled, that Troy was falling from her high pinnacle, and that the city had paid its due to Priam. 'If Troy could have been saved by a right hand, mine would have saved it,' the ghost lamented. He commanded Aeneas to take the Penates, the sacred household gods of Troy, and seek out a new home across the sea.
Aeneas started awake to the sound of distant wailing and the unmistakable crackle of fire. He climbed to the rooftop of his father’s house and looked out upon the city he loved. The sight was a nightmare made manifest. The grand palace of Deiphobus was already a skeleton of timber and flame; the house of Ucalegon was a torch. The Sigean straits reflected the orange glow of the burning towers. Aeneas, driven by a desperate, frantic courage, did not immediately think of flight. Instead, he reached for his armor, his mind clouded by the singular, doomed thought that it is a beautiful thing to die in battle. He rushed into the streets, gathering a band of survivors as he went. Together, they moved through the smoke like ghosts, catching Greek patrols off guard and stripping the armor from the fallen to disguise themselves as the enemy. For a time, they fought with the strength of the damned, but the tide was insurmountable.
They reached the palace of King Priam, where the carnage was at its peak. Aeneas watched from a high gallery as Pyrrhus, the son of Achilles, broke through the doors with a double-edged axe. The scene was one of sacrilege and sorrow. Pyrrhus pursued the young Polites, one of Priam’s many sons, through the colonnades, finally striking him down at the very feet of his parents. The aged Priam, clad in armor that sat heavy and useless on his trembling shoulders, rebuked the youth for his cruelty, reminding him that even Achilles had shown respect to a father’s grief. But Pyrrhus, cold and relentless, dragged the old king through the blood of his own son to the altar and plunged his sword into Priam’s side. The head of Troy, the ruler of Asia, lay as a nameless trunk upon the shore.
In that moment, a cold horror seized Aeneas. He thought of his own father, Anchises, of equal age to the murdered king. He thought of his wife, Creusa, and his little son, Iulus, left unprotected at home. As he turned to leave the palace, he saw Helen, the cause of all this misery, hiding in the temple of Vesta. Rage boiled within him, and he moved to strike her down, but a celestial light intervened. His mother, the goddess Venus, appeared to him in her true divine form. She stayed his hand, telling him that it was not Helen or Paris who was destroying Troy, but the ruthless will of the gods. She brushed the mortal mist from his eyes, allowing him to see the terrible truth: Neptune was prying up the foundations with his trident, Juno was at the Scaean Gate urging on the Greek reinforcements, and Pallas Athena sat upon the citadel, wreathed in a storm cloud. 'Flee, my son,' she urged. 'Put an end to your labor.'
Aeneas hurried back through the chaos to his father’s house. He found Anchises, but the old man, broken by the sight of the burning city, refused to leave. He declared that if the gods had wished for him to live, they would have preserved his home. He begged Aeneas to leave him behind and save himself. Aeneas, however, could not conceive of abandoning his father. He prepared to return to the fight, preferring death to the shame of desertion. But then, a miracle occurred. A light, harmless flame appeared to lick at the hair of young Iulus, and as his parents watched in terror, the fire did not burn but shone with a holy radiance. Anchises, sensing a divine sign, prayed to Jupiter. A sudden clap of thunder rolled on the left, and a shooting star streaked across the sky, marking the path toward Mount Ida. Anchises was convinced. 'Now, now, there is no delay,' he cried. 'I follow, and where you are, there am I.'