by P. K. Lentz
She vanished, and in silence Demosthenes shed his own cloak and chiton and set to removing the gore from his own limbs and the warpaint of kohl from his cheek and forehead. Then, wrapping himself in his cloak and rolling his bloodstained chiton for a pillow, he laid down his head.
At first he tossed and turned, finding it difficult to sleep in spite of the exhaustion of travel and combat. If only, he thought absently—then balked at finishing the thought.
If only she were at his side.
Had he become so dependent on her presence? For protection. For distraction. Whatever else. The notion kept him awake longer still, fingers tensing on the sword handle at any sound sharper than that of a night bird's call.
“Dee!” he heard what seemed like seconds later, but surely was longer. He shot upright with sword in hand.
Of course, there was only one being in the cosmos who called him by that name, and so he quickly knew there was no danger.
Thalassia threw a heap of white fabric into his lap. The fresh garment which she wore glowed softly in the moonlight.
“Get dressed. We're going to meet Omega.”
Demosthenes shook off the sleep which yet dragged at his eyes. “What? How did you...? But...”
“Save your poetry for later,” Thalassia chided, jerking his arm.
“You did something foolish.”
“It worked, which means it's... never mind. I had a conversation with your cousin.”
“Phormion? You should not have—”
“It was pleasant and civil. By the time we finished, he was even able to look me in the eye and not stutter much.”
“And he knew? Of Omega? Why did he not tell us?”
“Simple. He swore secrecy. Even if he hadn't, someone like you, whom the Spartans can't wait to capture, is the last person they want knowing a secret like that. Now dress, will you?”
* * *
13. Huntress
One's wedding was hardly enough to excuse a Spartiate from the routine of morning mess, calisthenics, and drilling, and so Styphon awoke early the day following his abduction of Hippolyta.
When husband and wife had dressed, Hippolyta pushed back the plain curtain separating new construction from old. In the small megaron the hearth still burned, tended all night by Eurydike, who upon seeing them did as was expected of her, walking over promptly (if without enthusiasm) and putting knee to floor with head bowed before her new mistress.
Looking gratified by the gesture, Hippolyta set fingertips on Eurydike's matted, coppery curls. The hand then slipped under the slave's chin and tilted the downcast, freckled face upward.
“Eurydike,” Hippolyta said. “Styphon says you are undisciplined. Are you?”
The former slave of Demosthenes answered hesitantly, “I do not know, mistress.”
“You do not know? It seems you ought to.” After a pause which went unfilled, Hippolyta resumed, “Have you had a mistress before?”
As Hippolyta's fingers fell from her chin, Eurydike slowly nodded. Her former mistress was, of course, the one she had witnessed executed by Brasidas. Before the deed, Eurydike had even done her best to see their places exchanged. But Styphon had not told his wife of those events.
Hippolyta went on, “It will be a new experience for me having a maid dwelling in the house. We Spartans are used to our slaves living outside the city with their families. Hence I cannot tell you precisely what sort of mistress I shall be. However, I suspect I will be a strict one.” She put a hand over Styphon's lips and asked the slave, “Does my husband fuck you?”
Eurydike answered dully, “No, mistress.”
“Strange,” Hippolyta said. “You are quite pretty, for a... what are you, a Thracian? Yes.” She ran fingers over one of the dark bands of ink which ringed her slave's upper arms. “We don't get many of your kind here. In fact I've never seen another. So I suppose I could truthfully say you are the best-looking Thracian I have ever seen.”
She chuckled; Eurydike did not. Unsure what to make of the unfolding encounter, Styphon only stood by and let it proceed.
“If you are undisciplined,” Hippolyta observed, “then my husband must punish you. Does he?”
Dismay was evident in Eurydike's eyes, probably at learning (as Styphon himself was realizing along with her) that the new mistress of the house seemed inclined toward harshness.
“I try to give him no reason.”
Hippolyta smiled. “Such a cute accent.” The smile vanished. “But that was not an answer. What does he beat you with? There must be something. Bring it to me.”
No such implement existed, and Styphon had not beaten or otherwise harmed her since her entrance into his household. Like his new wife, he was new to cohabitating with a slave, but evidently it had led him down a different path than she. It seemed to him that a slave who remained present while the master slept, so long as he or she was adequately obedient, was not one who should be needlessly embittered.
Eurydike's eyes went to her master for salvation which he declined to offer. She threw her gaze instead at her mistress' feet, letting silence be her reply.
Understanding, Hippolyta mused, “We'll go and fetch a switch today, then. I think walnut will do nicely.” She stuck up her pinky finger. “About this thick. Yes, that should yield a satisfying stroke. But let's inspect the target. Stand up.”
Eyes downcast and hidden by her hair, Eurydike became a statue.
“You like my feet?” Hippolyta asked. “If you would care to kiss them, go ahead. Otherwise, stand up, turn around, bend over and show me my target. I am curious if you have freckles there, too.”
Keeping her face hidden, Eurydike dragged herself upright, her body a stiff, shadeless shell, and did as ordered. Hippolyta gripped the high hem of the slave's short chiton and flipped it up to expose rounded buttocks, one of which she passed a hand over before swatting just hard enough to make its flesh shiver. With her other hand, she tugged Styphon's belt.
“You tell me you never availed yourself of that?” she asked incredulously. “Why ever not?”
Styphon had no answer to give. It had not occurred to him to do anything of the sort. If he thought of Eurydike as a person and not just another object in his home, like a cooking pot or a table, then it was as his daughter's friend, or else a hostage entrusted to his care by Brasidas in case she proved of use someday against the former master who presumably gave a shit about her.
Eyeing the 'target,' which was indeed freckled, Hippolyta sighed petulantly. “That will do for now, slave,” she said. “If I need you, I—”
What stopped her speaking was the faint sound of a stifled sob. After flashing Styphon a strange look which he failed to interpret, Hippolyta walked around bent Eurydike's still exposed rear to kneel by the slave's face and part its curtain of dirty red hair. Eurydike's next sob was louder, wetter, and still more poorly contained. Styphon saw a tear plunge from her cheekbone to form a dark circle on the floor mat.
Almost maternally, Hippolyta took the slave's head in hand and used an arm on her back to guide her to the floor, where Eurydike curled up.
“I am sorry,” Hippolyta said to her softly, holding her. The apology must have surprised the recipient even more than it did Styphon. “I was only playing. It was in poor taste. I am not like that at all, I promise.”
The soft, sweetly spoken words of comfort failed to silence Eurydike's sobs or stop her tears, but rather seemed to have the opposite effect: now she cried loudly and openly. Hippolyta buried the younger woman's face against her breast, rocked her and whispered soothingly into her ear, “Shhh. It's all right. I think we'll be friends. I really do think you are pretty, you know. That part was truth.”
Eurydike continued to weep with undiminished intensity, surely not just over the cruel jest at her expense but other built-up sorrows besides. Over her red hair, Hippolyta delivered her husband a fresh, strange look.
He understood it, or thought he did.
Yes, she had been toying with Eurydike, but th
e tearful result was no mistake. The scene before him now, with slave curled up receiving comfort in her lady's arms, was exactly the ending she had desired from the start.
It was not for Styphon to imagine why that was, any more than it was for any man to imagine why women did almost anything they did. But if he had to guess, that guess would be that he had just witnessed the start of a seduction.
* * *
14. Blight
“You mustn't be late to mess,” Hippolyta advised her husband while still comforting Eurydike.
Nodding agreement, Styphon started out the door of his house only to behold Andrea returning up the long, dusty trail that connected house to unpaved street. She had been running, but slowed to a fast walk on seeing her father. Caught, she surely saw no sense now in racing up to him for a scolding.
She met him with gaze averted.
“Where have you been?” Styphon asked.
“Where you sent me,” she answered. Styphon lacked a witch's truth-sense, but native instinct told him this was a lie.
“Are you sure you were not with Eris?”
“I ran into her,” Andrea confessed, or certainly only half-confessed. “I lost track of the hour. I apologize.”
Since taking Eris as her tutor some ten days prior, Andrea had been acting strangely and telling what Styphon suspected but could not prove were small lies. Now, for example, the bedraggled look of her, short breath, and smell of fresh sweat suggested she had come from rather further away than the nearby house where she was to have lodged the night.
He was considering whether to bother confronting her or be on his way when Hippolyta came up behind him to stand in the doorway, forcing the moment of formal meeting between step-mother and step-daughter.
“Andrea,” the new wife greeted. “You are as beautiful a girl as your father has said.” Styphon could not recall having told her such a thing. “No to mention keen of mind and fleet of foot.” These things he had told her. “I pray I prove worthy of membership in such a remarkable family.”
Andrea only looked at her.
“Do you have nothing to say to your step-mother?” Styphon prompted.
“Thank you, ma'am.”
“Pft,” Hippolyta said. “I would hardly expect you to call me mother, but not that. Hippolyta, or Lyta, if you like.”
“Thank her,” Styphon said, nudging his daughter's arm. “And then apologize for your lateness. And your appearance, while you're at it. Is that blood on your dress?”
Looking down, at the spots in question, she thought a moment and said without looking up. “A girl I was wrestling with had her period.”
“I did not ask you that, did I?” Styphon pointed out. “Apologize.”
“I am sorry, Hippolyta,” she said. Andrea's normally sharp wits must have mounted a recovery, for she looked straight up at Hippolyta and offered with some sincerity, “You will prove more than worthy. I can tell my father has done well for us both.” Stepping forward, she lowered herself, took Hippolyta's hand and kissed the back of it.
“Add kindness to your growing list of blessings,” Hippolyta observed. She touched Andrea's hair, then drew her into an embrace which was returned, if somewhat stiffly. “I have a wonderful idea,” she said when they broke. “My wedding night has left me... salty. Eurydike's hair needs washing, and you've been menstruated upon, poor thing. Let us all three go to the river and bathe.”
“A fine idea. In fact, Andrea,” Styphon went on to decree, “you will become Hippolyta's very shadow for the next three days, helping her to adjust.”
Andrea's face fell slack and for several seconds she appeared to ponder confrontation, but in the end she opted reluctantly to yield: “Yes, father.”
To the degree which he could know his strange daughter's mind, Styphon understood her hesitation: she feared displeasing Eris. If only there were some way to break the she-daimon's hold on her. What interest did the witch even have in an eleven-year-old girl?
Leaving the females to embark on their outing to the river Eurotas at their leisure, Styphon hastened to morning mess.
* * *
Before and during the meal, word circulated that decisions were to be handed down this morning which units were to accompany King Agis on the expedition to subjugate and punish renegade Pylos, the city given its independence two summers prior by Demosthenes. Every Equal, naturally, was eager to find out he would get a chance at glory, but inevitably a large number were to be disappointed.
When dining was done, crowds clogged the open area near the foot of the acropolis, in sight of its golden temple, which was not by any means truly the center of the amalgam of five villages that constituted the city of Sparta, but was called a center and treated as such. (Neither was it a square, yet some called it that, too.) Styphon went to the place himself, and arrived at the back just as one of the king's men mounted the stout wooden platform which saw frequent use for announcements, speeches, floggings, executions, and the like—anything meant to be public, which was a great many things.
The king's man had no need to call for silence, for it was swiftly given. He unfolded a parchment and began to read from it, calling out a list of beasts and fearsome adjectives which were the adopted names of the 128-man pentykostyes to be called up for the campaign: Warthog, Python, Falcon, Fearless, Blood-slaked, Ironclad... the list went on. Styphon listened carefully for the name of his own unit, Scorpion, but the speaker fell silent without uttering it.
The men of the crowd finally broke their silence with words of muted celebration or congratulation, never disappointment, lest that be interpreted as objection to the will of a superior, in this case a king. Styphon, likewise, kept his disappointment private.
The king's man raised a hand, plunging the crowd back into silence for a final announcement, the time of departure for those named to bring doom to Pylos: tomorrow's dawn.
Styphon's men were sullen as he led them through drills and then accompanied them to a subdued midday mess, at the end of which a Helot messenger summoned Styphon to the king's presence at a corner of the red and gold painted temple to Apollo. Going there, he found Agis consulting with a cadre of advisers and the pentekosters of the units chosen to assault Pylos. Over the heads of those men, the king waved Styphon closer, interrupting his council of war.
“As most of you must know, Styphon last night became my kinsman,” he said to all present. The small crowd raised a congratulatory murmur. “He now has the misfortune of staying home fucking my cousin instead of helping us bring Pylos to heel. Now, if you would excuse me a few moments while I have words with him.”
Agis said to Styphon, “Walk with me,” and together they set off into one of the many wooded areas which filled the spaces between Sparta's five villages. When no man was left in sight, Agis said, “Apologies for making light of your being left behind. I would like to say it's mainly on account of your unit being only freshly returned from Attica, and there is that, but I am only a man and cannot always put my own desires aside. The desire in this case is to see the gods plant a son in my cousin's womb before they make her a widow. A mere king cannot control Fate, perhaps, but he might give it a nudge.” He rapped Styphon's upper arm with a friendly punch. “Offspring sired on her would have a valid claim on the Eurypontid throne, you know. Not a strong one, but a claim. Stranger successions have happened.”
“It had not crossed my mind,” Styphon said. Perhaps in truth it had, but only in the form of hope that it was not the case, since boys with tenuous claims to kingship often enough were the target of plots to ensure they never lived to see adulthood.
“Gods willing, there will yet be plenty of war to go around,” Agis said. “Pylos is being offered no alternative to destruction, but surely at least one of those other towns who were sympathetic toward Athens will yet refuse to capitulate. With luck, maybe some few of them will even try to form a League against us and require some harsh lessons.”
After traveling a few more paces in silence, Agis leaned close a
nd lowered his voice. “I am told by those who were supposed to care for her that Andrea vanished in the night, not to be seen again. Did she return to you?”
“She did,” Styphon said, declining to offer further detail.
“Good, good,” Agis said, although strangely he sounded as though he did not quite mean it. “She is a fine girl,” he went on, curiously, before arriving at what was surely his real point. “It is a shame to see her fall under such a malign influence as that so-called tutor of hers, the bitch whose name I prefer not to speak. Would that I could have provided her a tutor.” He paused, then added, certainly not extemporaneously, “I still could, were the current one somehow removed. That would be a good thing for every man, woman and child of us, never mind your girl.” He chuckled darkly. “Better for all excepting one man, perhaps, Brasidas, who then would have to stand or fall like the rest of us, on his own merits.”
Without giving reply, Styphon listened to the king speak with a false casualness, as if these thoughts were just now entering his mind, of killing unkillable Eris. What reply could there be except to counsel him against such madness, and that was hardly an enomotarch's place.
As if echoing those thoughts, Agis mused aloud, “Alas, I suppose it could not be done, except by some ruse or ambush, and even then not without substantial loss of life and the promise of terrible vengeance upon all in the event of failure. Right?”
At least the question was an easy one. “Most certainly,” Styphon answered.
“Unless...” Agis continued, as though the words were not prepared in advance. “Pah! No, never mind.”
Styphon knew the next line scripted for him. His lips struggled against the sense of duty which would have him speak it. When Agis threw him a darkly disappointed look, Styphon's inner conflict was settled, and he surrendered the expected words.
“Unless what?”
The young king subtly smirked and wrapped a brotherly arm around Styphon's neck as they walked. “I am told it is not possible to deceive the witch,” Agis said. “But if some close associate of hers were to pass along false information, believing it to be true, then there would be no lie for the witch to detect. A proper trap might thus be laid, yes?”
