by Laura Gill
“It’s stowed safely away, Mother, where no one else can abuse it.” Eurymedon wore a troubled expression. “I do not handle it lightly. But if you want to know the full account of all my trials and adventures, that’ll have to wait until tomorrow. It’s been a long day for us all, and there’s still much to be done.”
“Yes,” I agreed, “but something else troubles me. How did I not recognize you yesterday, Eurymedon?”
He chuckled. “Oh, that’s simple, Mother. Lady Athena set a glamour over me, so Polydektes wouldn’t suspect the danger he was in until it was too late.” Then he embraced me, and I felt him trembling. “Right until the last minute I feared he would see through the disguise, and force you to stay. Bad enough that I killed so many.”
I kissed his cheek and reassured him that he was not entirely to blame for the carnage. “Polydektes bears the brunt of the blood guilt for those deaths.”
Diktys interjected, “We will have a difficult time convincing the kinsmen of that. I do not expect that our troubles are over.”
Eurymedon shot an exasperated look over his shoulder at him. “Must we discuss that now, with Mother present?”
“The sooner dealt with, the better.”
Diktys’s tone when we parted was softer, more conciliatory. “Please excuse my terrible manners, Dorea. I’m tired and still recovering. It makes me snappish.”
“Do you want me to stay?” His pallor continued to alarm me. “Who is looking after you? Eurymedon’s no nursemaid.”
Shaking his head, he held up a hand. “There’s no need to worry yourself.” His quavering fingers said otherwise. “I exerted myself before I should have, and it was a rough drive through the mountains. Leukothea can be trusted to look after me now, and my supporters and Eurymedon will keep order until I can manage.”
I stared at him. “Leukothea?” Was he trying to offend me by sending for the woman when his capable and loving sister was more than willing to help?
Diktys seemed to read my thoughts. “For one thing, we’re going to need a new high priestess of Hera. And another, having my brother’s widow tend me—even though she is my beloved sister—would reflect badly on both of us.” He managed a weak smile. “I want you to remain apart, closeted, above scrutiny for the time being.”
“I’m hardly even a bride, much less a widow!” I chafed my arms. Despite the warmth emanating from the central hearth, I suddenly felt cold. “Besides, I don’t care what anyone else thinks. It’s been too long since I last saw you, and then I heard you were dead, slain in the mountains. You have no idea how I mourned.” Not wanting to make a scene, I furiously blinked back tears. “Am I to leave my brother to suffer alone?”
“I have my reasons, Dorea.” He started to unpin his cloak to wrap around my shoulders, even though he clearly needed the warmth more than I. Only when I threw up my hands to refuse did he withdraw the offer. “Please do as I instruct for now. I’ll have Leukothea visit you with news of my improving health, and I suspect Andromeda will want to keep you company. Keep to your apartment. Exercise in the garden court. Let the furor die down.”
He kissed my hand and led me from the hearth onto the aithousa, where Paebel and Keret awaited me. “Rest, beloved sister, and stop worrying.” He spoke louder than necessary, for the benefit of any onlookers. What did it matter what they thought, when Polydektes and his supporters were all dead? “Everything will be all right.”
On the way back to the queen’s apartment, I noticed for the first time the Seriphians among the Canaanites, men wearing Diktys’s colors; armbands of blue replaced Polydektes’ scarlet and yellow. I encountered Captain Molugros leading a contingent of household guards; he stopped to honor me with a respectful bow. “Princess.”
I did not retire right away, but ventured into the nursery to ascertain how well Polydektes’ surviving children fared.
What I found was not at all to my liking. All were subdued and still frightened because no one brought them news. Neither did they have food or supervision; the nurse had abandoned them at the first opportunity. So, gathering the four daughters and three young sons around, I related to them that Zeus had sent a prince of Canaan, a hero, to punish their father for desecrating his sanctuary in Ganema. That the hero was my son, I omitted for the time being. “Many people died because of the Gorgon’s head. Even the flies dropped dead under her cold, withering gaze. Even the wedding garlands shriveled.”
“Where is our father now?” the eldest boy, a child of nine, asked. “Did he turn to stone like the stories say?”
“No. The bodies are cold and stiff, but not turned to stone.” How much to tell the younger children? “I do not quite know what happened, because your father told me to leave the megaron with the ladies when the prince arrived. There was only that terrible shrieking.” I allowed the children a moment before turning to more immediate matters. “Your Uncle Diktys is here. I’m sure he will give your father a proper burial.”
Enough of that. Dwelling on horror and death would only heighten the children’s fears. “I will bring you food if you are hungry,” I told them, “and you will have new servants. Your old nurse is not coming back.”
Agesias, the nine-year-old boy, reached for my hand. “Stepmother, don’t leave us. Uncle Diktys might harm us.” All the other children echoed his sentiment, even Aleta, who was certainly old enough to have realized that she as a woman and a bastard was not a threat to her uncle.
“No, he will not,” I said firmly. “Your uncle is a gracious man who does not make war with children.”
“But Adeimon and Demaratos died today, too,” Agesias argued, “and they were the sons of Polydektes.”
I could not fault the boy’s logic, and might have agreed with him had he not been so contrary in attitude to his older half-brothers, and too young to rule. “Your brothers died because they were in the megaron with your father when the prince of Canaan brought forth the Gorgon’s head. But you are illegitimate. All of you, remember that. You are no threat to your uncle unless you choose to be.” I gently tousled Agesias’s hair, and petted the youngest daughter. “Throw yourselves on his mercy and be obedient nieces and nephews. If you do this, I will intercede on your behalf.”
To emphasize my good intentions, and further soothe the children’s fear, I took them under my protection by bringing them all to the queen’s apartment where Zoe and I arranged beds for them. “This chamber is the safest place in all the kingdom because Zeus watches over us.” I introduced them to the deities on my altar, and helped the youngest with their prayers and offerings. “There will be no Gorgon’s head here.”
Andromeda came first thing the next morning. When she saw the children, she brightened and fussed over them, indicating to me through signs that she had a baby. Was she with child so soon after the wedding? I congratulated her.
The men were not far behind. Eurymedon appeared as finely dressed as yesterday, and Diktys, making concessions to his new rank, wore a dark blue tunic with a gold pectoral. My earlier concern increased when I saw him leaning on an ivory-tipped walking stick. He managed a weary smile and a courteous greeting, but the children nevertheless rushed to hide behind me.
“What is this?” he asked me.
“Your brother’s children are afraid you have come to kill them.” I draped an arm over Agesias’s shoulders, as he had the most to fear from his uncle. “Their nurse and servants abandoned them yesterday, so I have taken them under my protection.”
Diktys’s bewilderment clearly indicated that he had not given much consideration to his brother’s bastards. “Have I ever said I would eliminate the children?” He made eye contact with Agesias. “Young man, you must be the eldest boy. What is your name? Agelaus? Agathon?” The boy answered in a low voice. “Ah, yes, Agesias. I am sure that your father told you and your siblings all sorts of nonsense about me, that I reek of fish, that I disobeyed him, that I am lowborn. None of these things are true. I rose up against Polydektes because he attacked me and the village where I
lived. He attacked my foster son, Eurymedon, and his mother, the noble lady who is protecting you now. As for my ‘low’ birth, I am the legitimate son of King Magnes, your grandfather.”
He took time to speak to each child with reassurances that he meant no harm, and that children generally liked him. When that was done, he said to me, “Find them servants, Dorea. And tutors, if they have none. Something will have to be done about their mothers, too. I have no intention of taking my brother’s women.”
I spent the day scouring the palace for suitable servants. All the citadel was in chaos, for many officials had been present in the megaron and vestibule, and had perished along with the nobility. The steward Eunomos numbered among the dead, a loss I sincerely regretted. Timandra had survived, but, mourning the loss of her sister the priestess, would not return to the palace from whence she had fled. Leukothea, in the meantime, had arrived to take charge of the ritual equipment and the servants nursing Diktys.
“He’s actually doing much better than he looks,” she reported. “Most of his wounds are healing well.”
I did not entirely take her at her word. “He looks twenty years older.”
“It’s been a hard winter in the mountains,” she argued, “and a man his age takes longer to heal, but heal he will.” She had lost her disheveled appearance in favor of a respectable matron’s neat and colorful garments. A rope of carnelians hung around her neck, and a pair of bronze pins with golden flower heads secured her graying bun; one would not know from looking at her now that she was a priestess. “Your daughter-in-law is certainly pretty, isn’t she?”
Andromeda and her three ladies, sewing across from us, did not glance up from their handiwork. Had I been the girl’s mother, I would at least have sent with her a servant who spoke Hellene. “Apparently I’m to be a grandmother soon.”
Later, I interviewed the concubines, a group of eight women who dwelled in an isolated suite of apartments on the third floor. The eldest two, a pair of heavy-set, middle-aged women, wept as they screeched and hurled themselves at me. “Curse you, daughter of Acrisius!” My guards and the steward restrained them. “Murderer!”
Only after they had been hustled into a back storeroom and securely locked in did the other concubines venture to speak. “Forgive them, Lady,” said one. “They’re the mothers of Adeimon and Demaratos.”
The steward, a florid, nervous man, cleared his throat and added, “They will not trouble you again, Lady.”
“Let them grieve in peace,” I answered, “as long as they understand that I will tolerate no curse-making.”
Even as I said this, my attention rested on the women, whose curiosity mirrored my own. They wanted to touch the hem of my robe, to examine my hair and skin. “You’re the consort of Zeus?” they murmured.
“The princess in the chest?”
“She couldn’t be. Polydektes said Princess Danaë was as beautiful as the dawn, with shining gold hair.”
“I thought she would be younger.”
Then the women collectively realized that they were no longer in private, that I, the disappointing princess in question, stood among them. Still in unison, their faces fell and they groaned aloud. “Lady,” croaked one, “we meant no harm.”
I stared at them a moment, then burst out laughing. “Polydektes really told you I had beautiful golden hair?”
Their simultaneous nods gave them the appearance of flower heads bobbing with the wind. They moved together, spoke together, perhaps even thought the exact same thoughts; whatever individual spirit each had once possessed had been suppressed. So when they looked at each other in amazement and responded with the same laughter, it did not surprise me. “Yes, yes!” they exclaimed. “Golden hair and bright blue eyes.”
“Skin whiter than cream!”
“Cheeks like pomegranates!”
I laughed louder than the rest, while the steward remained in the corner wearing a perplexed expression. “Polydektes was always a lousy storyteller.” Looking around, I found a vacant footstool. “Come, sit. Tell me what you do all day.” Spinning and sewing things lay scattered around, and an unfinished length of blue wool stretched across the chamber’s single loom. Everything was neat and tidy. Polydektes’ women were apparently far from the indolent, insolent creatures I had been led to believe they were.
When they could be persuaded to speak of themselves as individuals, they confessed both their profound boredom, as they were not permitted to go out or mingle with people, and an understandable longing to see their children.
Mention of children reminded me of the two women locked in the storeroom. I summoned the steward and indicated that, if the matrons had calmed down enough and were agreeable, they should be allowed to join us.
I almost hoped the women would refuse the invitation, but my other, more maternal, forgiving instincts brightened when they shuffled out into the common room. “Welcome, ladies!” Footstools were brought, and food and drink, and I invited the pair to accept the places of honor alongside me. Where I could, where the younger women and steward supplied them, I used their names as a means of comfort and—just perhaps—potent reminders that a woman with a priestess-knowledge and the names of those who did her wrong was a formidable enemy.
After a time, the bravest among them confided that she missed her family. A chorus of pleas followed, in which other women asked for news. The two eldest simply sobbed and complained, “Who in our villages will remember us after so many years?”
By now, I saw them as they were: embittered women whose perpetual grousing was their only pleasure. Whatever hopes they had cherished for their old age had rested with their sons. I lent a sympathetic ear because I understood their pain, but I was not about to let their doldrums drag me down. “You need not return to your village, or even send word. Your lives are your own. You may do as you wish.”
*~*~*~*
The evening I reserved for my son and his wife, and Diktys, who requested that we dine in my apartment.
What time Andromeda had not spent with me, she had spent with Zoe and the children, playing games and practicing Hellene words; she was only sixteen, and despite her high status as a princess and royal bride was not very far removed from the children she babysat. Before we sat down to dine, I congratulated Eurymedon on becoming a father.
“She did not say when she conceived, but if the child has not yet quickened she might deliver at harvest.”
His puzzlement confounded me. “Andromeda is with child again?” Eurymedon addressed her in Canaanite; her gestures required little translation. Had I been mistaken, and I was not to become a grandmother, after all?
At length, my son explained, “There’s a misunderstanding. Andromeda was trying to tell you that she is already a mother. We have a son, Perses. Sadly, we had to leave him behind with his other grandparents.”
His confession floored me. Eurymedon had not only found time to marry the Canaanite princess and enjoy the luxuries of an eastern court, but had stayed long enough to sire a son. “What else have you found time to do?” I asked hotly.
“It is not what you think, Dorea.” Diktys took this opportunity to interject himself into the conversation. “Eurymedon told you last night that he had no choice in the matter. Hear him out before passing judgment.”
Supper was served in the sitting room, on the fine ceramic and gold plate that Polydektes had commissioned for his everyday use. Zoe and the manservant brought in the dishes, starting with the first course of bread, cheese, and pickled olives, tasting from each. My healthy appetite now made up for the countless days when I had been too agitated for food.
“What would you like to hear first, Mother?” my son courteously asked. “Diktys and I both have stories to tell.”
“You have made me wait long enough, young man.” I tucked into the bread with olive paste. “Where did you go from the sanctuary of Ganema? That was the last anyone saw of you.”
“I had a visitor in the temple, a young man who took me aside to give me adv
ice and presents, except...” Eurymedon wore a mischievous grin. “No one could see him!” He laughed. “It was Hermes, Mother. He whisked me away from Seriphos faster than a mortal man can blink, and the next thing I knew we were standing on the shore of a desert island somewhere between here and Libya, and he was demonstrating how to use his presents. Imagine, Mother, a helmet that makes a man invisible, and sandals equipped with eagle wings that can bear a man across the ocean. It was a wondrous thing. I flew like Daedalus!”
“You skipped like a water bird across the ocean?” I tore a second piece of flatbread into smaller pieces. “I believe you.”
Eurymedon did a double take. “You truly believe me? Even Diktys here thought I was exaggerating.”
In sharp contrast, Diktys picked at his food. “Much of what you said is hard to fathom.”
“But I believe you.” I reached across to clasp my son’s wrist. “I have had some strange dreams of late. Once, I dreamt you were underground, in a cave where the rock seemed to have swallowed human victims whole. You had a shield with you, so bright that you could see anything reflected in it, and you focused on that to avoid looking at the Gorgon.”
His eyes widened. “The mirror shield, yes. That was a gift from Athena, but that’s getting too far ahead. Hermes sent me to three witches, sisters, who dwelt on the rocky coast of Libya. Only they could reveal the location of the Gorgon’s lair.”
Diktys showed his skepticism with a snort. “The messenger of the gods could not take you there directly?”
“He had his orders from Zeus, which I wasn’t about to question.” Eurymedon paused when Andromeda, who had been munching olives and trying to maintain a facade of polite interest, stirred. He spoke to her in her native tongue, explaining the conversation, for she nodded. His attitude toward her reminded me of an elder placating a child, although there could not have been more than two years’ difference in age between them. Did he love her? I wondered.
