“It’s in the hands of the gods,” she said, staring at the ground. “And one can’t defy the gods. I was captured on my wedding day, still a virgin. I expected the worst when Achilles brought me here, the spoils of war who meant no more to him than anything else he had seized. But he has treated me with great kindness. I know that he cares for me, even if he doesn’t love me yet.”
“But you believe that someday he will?”
“It’s my greatest hope! The person he loves more than anyone, more even than his son, Pyrrhus, is his cousin, Patroclus,” Hippodameia said. “Achilles eats with Patroclus, drinks with him, fights beside him, stays up talking with him throughout the night. Patroclus, too, is kindhearted—he visited me daily and consoled me when I found myself alone and a prisoner of the man who murdered everyone in my family. He says that Achilles is sure to fall in love with me and will someday want to make me his wife. Patroclus promised to provide our wedding feast with days of singing and dancing and roasted meats and fine wine and honey cakes, after the war ends.”
Hippodameia smiled, thinking of the glorious future that would one day be hers. She described such a lovely scene that for her sake I wanted it to be true. “I’m sure Agamemnon won’t harm you in any way.” Even as I spoke the words, I hoped I was right. I was never quite sure how my uncle would behave.
Before we reached the king’s tents, Achilles, swift runner that he was, raced past us, shouting for Agamemnon. A crowd gathered quickly; I spotted Pyrrhus on the edge of it, sneering as usual. Orestes and I with Hippodameia between us made our way through the crowd toward the king’s tent, the largest and most luxurious in the Greek encampment. Agamemnon emerged with brow furrowed, fists on hips, hard jaw jutting. “You called for me, Achilles?”
The argument quickly reached white heat. Agamemnon demanded his prize now, and Achilles shouted that Agamemnon—“the greediest man alive, armored in shamelessness”—must wait, because all the plunder seized from the conquered had already been divided among the warriors and could not be reclaimed.
Agamemnon’s eyes blazed with anger. “Do not dare to cheat me, Achilles! You, the most violent man alive!”
Achilles shot back, “I have no reason to be here on this miserable beach! The Trojans never did me any harm! No, I followed you, to please you, to fight for you and win your honor back.” Achilles turned abruptly to my father, who stood helplessly to one side. “And you, Menelaus, you dog face! What do you care? You look neither right nor left but seize everything you want, and now you’re threatening to take away my lovely girl, the prize I deserve!”
Achilles wheeled again on Agamemnon. “Whenever my men sack some rich Trojan city, they are the ones who take the brunt of the savage fighting. But when it’s time to divide the plunder, you step forward and seize the lion’s share, and I return to my ships clutching some pitiable scrap, some pittance you’ve allowed me. Well, I’ve had enough! I’m taking my men and my ships and returning to Phthia.”
“Go, then!” Agamemnon bellowed. “I won’t beg you to stay! You are less than nothing to me.”
Achilles reached for his sword and whipped it from its sheath. Orestes leaped forward to stop the flashing blade. Pyrrhus smiled, a nasty look in his eyes. I gasped and cried out, “No!”
In that instant Zeus’s daughter Athena in her helmet and breastplate swept down from the heavens. The goddess of wisdom and war seized Achilles by his hair and ordered him to put up his sword. “Stop fighting, both of you,” I heard her say. In the same instant she was gone, soaring back to Mount Olympus. Everyone looked puzzled. It all happened in less than a heartbeat. Had I really seen her?
Achilles sheathed his sword, but his anger still boiled. He roared insults, calling Agamemnon “a coward with dog’s eyes” and “a fawn’s heart who spends his time in his tents instead of on the field of battle.” Nestor emerged from the crowd and tried to talk sense to the two wrathful men, but neither wanted to listen to the old sage’s words.
Achilles stalked off. Agamemnon ordered a fast ship to be hauled down to the sea with gifts for Chryses and ten sacred bulls for a sacrifice to the gods. Odysseus took the helm, and beautiful Astynome, face streaked with tears, stepped aboard. Twenty of the strongest oarsmen sped the priest’s daughter on her way.
Agamemnon turned to Hippodameia, who waited nervously nearby, and greeted his new mistress. “Welcome, my lovely girl,” he said in a tone as sweet as honey. Hippodameia smiled up at him with a quivering lip, her head held high, and followed a servant to her new quarters.
And Achilles, the mightiest of warriors, striding back to his tents in the thickening darkness, vowed to fight no more. Pyrrhus turned and looked back, his burning eyes fixed on me.
12
The Battle for Queen Helen
AGAMEMNON AND MENELAUS sacrificed a fat ox, praying to the gods and tossing out handfuls of barley as an offering. Up and down the beach in every part of the Greek encampment animals were slain and butchered, the meat stripped from the bones, wrapped in fat and pierced with spits, and roasted over blazing fires. A feast was laid out.
“Take food and wine now,” their commanders ordered, “then take your rest. When Dawn first spreads her golden cloak over the fields, ready your chariots and your battalions. Agamemnon will lead the fight.”
I watched them pour a few drops of wine on the ground as an offering to Zeus before they drank, and I saw them eat and drink and then go off to sleep. I hoped that Orestes would come to me, that we could share a few moments, have a few words together before the first great battle of the new season. We had not seen much of each other since the preparations began. But he didn’t come, and though I longed to see him, I understood why. He would be with the other men.
The next day the earth thundered beneath the pounding feet of thousands of men armored in bronze, ready to fight and die on the great open plain outside the walls of Troy. I watched them go. Our duty as women was to prepare for the return of the victorious, care for the wounded, and mourn the dead. I was proud of our courageous warriors but nearly sick with worry. I worried for the safety of my father and Agamemnon. I worried even more for Orestes, an expert archer, still young but in command of men much older than himself. And I thought of the Trojan women, my mother surely among them, who must also be watching anxiously as their men got ready for battle. How did Helen feel, I wondered, knowing that she was the cause of so much misery and death? Did she take some responsibility? Or was it all just a game to her?
I didn’t want to be alone, and I was pleased when Hippodameia came to find me, bringing a basket of clean wool. I took out my mother’s silver spindle, and we spun, our spindle stones whirling, twisting the fibers into strong thread. Spinning calmed us, a distraction from the brutal sounds of battle.
“I didn’t know who you were at first,” Hippodameia said, “until Agamemnon explained that you’re the daughter of Queen Helen and King Menelaus.”
“It’s because of my mother that all these men are fighting.” It grieved me to speak of it. “I haven’t seen her in ten years, since Paris came to Sparta and took her away.”
Hippodameia reached into the basket for more wool. “I met Queen Helen several times, when I was still a child.”
“You did? You’ve spoken to my mother?” My spindle dangled uselessly. I’d had little news of Helen, let alone heard from someone who had actually met her.
“I have,” Hippodameia said, fingers flying. “I was present at their wedding feast in Troy. Later, Helen and Paris and their children visited my father in Lyrnessus—”
“Children?” I interrupted. I laid down my spindle and stared at her. “They have children?” Of course they do, I realized now. I should not have been surprised.
“They had three, but none survived. A roof collapsed and crushed them when they were still very young.”
Perhaps I should have felt sympathy for my mother’s loss, but I confess that I felt nothing. “And my brother, Pleisthenes?” I asked, picking up the spindle again. “
Do you have any news of him?”
“I’m sorry to say that he was taken by an illness,” Hippodameia said tenderly. “Such a beautiful boy. He resembled Helen—the same golden curls, the same hyacinth blue eyes.”
A wave of grief for my dear little brother swept over me. “And my mother?” I pressed, unable to resist asking. “Is she still beautiful?”
“Everyone says that Helen is the most beautiful woman in the world. And it’s true!” Hippodameia confirmed. “She’s not like other women, whose beauty fades. Helen seems to become even more beautiful as the years pass. Everyone adores her. But there’s something about her, something undefinable, that is just as powerful as her beauty. King Priam swears there is no one like her. And Prince Paris is bewitched by her. He’s as enamored as he was when he first set eyes on her. Every man in Troy is at least a little in love with Helen. Even when she was great with child, her beauty was incomparable. The Trojan men may be devoted to their wives, but it’s Helen they think of when they’re making love.”
“And the wives don’t hate her for that?” I asked incredulously.
“You’d think they would.” Hippodameia smiled. “But they don’t. They truly worship her. Her dearest friend is Andromache, the wife of Hector, Paris’s oldest brother. Such a lovely woman, with her lustrous dark hair and her exquisite green eyes—any man would feel fortunate to have Andromache for his wife. But it’s Helen whom everyone desires. The Trojans won’t give her up. They’ll fight until the last man falls dead before they surrender their beautiful queen.”
How could it be, I wondered, that my mother was so universally adored? Surely her great beauty must have inspired jealousy among at least a few of the women and resentment among some of the men that they were being asked to fight and die for her. I couldn’t explain it. Maybe no one could.
I gathered my courage and asked, “In the times you were with her, did my mother ever speak of me? Did she ever mention that she had a daughter?”
Hippodameia hesitated and dropped her spindle. “Oh, yes!” she assured me as she pretended to search for it. “She spoke often of you. It was ‘My Hermione said this’ and ‘My Hermione did that.’ You were always on her mind.”
But that hesitation before she answered told me all that I needed to know.
RESTLESS, I STRAPPED ON sturdy sandals and set out alone through the Greek encampment. It had become like a huge city, the men’s crude tents clustered on the beach near the ships, the officers’ well-furnished tents and huts placed among the scrub growth, each group identified by the shield of its commander. The encampment was mostly deserted now, except for slaves and their overseers.
I passed a slave fixing the broken wheel of a chariot. His shoulders glistened with sweat. We glanced at each other, he looked as though he was about to speak to me, and then he quickly went back to his task.
I frowned and walked on, but I’d gone only a few steps when it struck me: I know him! I turned and hurried back.
The slave laid aside his tools and greeted me with a low bow. “Princess Hermione,” he said, grinning.
“Zethus!” I cried. “What are you doing here?”
“Unfortunately for me, Princess, I’m here as a slave. After I left you with your father at Gythion, I joined a ship bound for Thebes. From there I planned to go on to Troy, but your great Achilles came marauding with his Myrmidons. I was captured and brought here. The overseer discovered my talent for working with wood.”
“I still have the little wooden boat you carved for me.”
He wiped sweat from his brow and glanced warily over his shoulder. The overseer, who’d been watching suspiciously, was advancing toward us. “I must stop talking to you, mistress, or I’ll shortly feel the sting of his whip as well as the lash of his tongue.” Zethus hefted his tools and the length of wood he was shaping for the wheel. “The next time we meet, perhaps you’ll tell me what you’re doing here.”
“Yes, the next time,” I promised. There was so much more I wanted to ask Zethus, but I knew it would not go well for him if I did, so I moved on.
I passed the mounds of earth where the ashes of hundreds of our dead lay buried, and followed a well-worn path toward the battlefield. The sounds of men shouting were louder now. When I paused to fill my leather water bag from the communal tank, I saw a white-bearded man, thin as bone, hobbling slowly along the same path. It was old Calchas, the seer.
“Where are you going, Hermione?”
“To watch the battle.”
He shook a warning finger. “Come with me. We’ll watch together.”
“But you’re going away from the fighting.”
“That doesn’t mean I can’t see it. It’s far too dangerous for us to be there among them, but if you’ll allow me, I can describe to you exactly what’s happening.”
His advice seemed wise. I followed Calchas into a small grove of fig trees. The seer lowered himself to the ground, leaned against a gray-barked trunk, drew up his sharp knees, and closed his eyes. I sat down nearby and waited.
The seer, his eyes now opened wide and staring, began to describe what he saw. “The savage battle has been launched. Those hoarse cries you hear are the Trojans,” he said. “Our Greeks marched to meet them in silence. Clouds of dust swirl around them. Out of the blinding dust comes Paris, magnificent as a god, a leopard skin slung across his shoulders. He carries a bow on his back, a sword on his hip, two bronze-tipped spears in his hand. He strides forward, shouting out a challenge to any Greek who dares to face him in mortal combat, a fight to the death. And there, leaping from his chariot to meet the challenge, is mighty King Menelaus—”
“Menelaus?” I broke in. “My father intends to fight Paris?” I was shocked. Somehow I hadn’t expected the rivals to fight—I’d thought the armies would do it for them. Blood pounded in my ears.
“He’s eager for revenge. But what’s this?” Calchas leaned forward intently. “Paris cringes at the sight of Menelaus advancing fearlessly straight for him! The prince’s knees are trembling, his face is pale with dread, and he retreats back into the Trojan lines, hiding among his men. He will not fight Menelaus! Can you hear our own Greeks howling with laughter?” Calchas, too, was laughing shrilly.
A wave of relief swept over me. “I hadn’t known Paris was so cowardly,” I said. “Tell me, what’s happening now?”
“His older brother, Hector, is calling him a curse to his father, King Priam, a disgrace to Troy and to himself. Paris is covered in shame! And he agrees now to meet Menelaus and to fight it out. Hector strides between the two great armies and makes the proposal: Paris and Menelaus will meet one on one in mortal combat, the winner to take Helen home. The two sides will then declare peace.”
“Surely Father will win!” I cried. My earlier relief vanished. “He’s a much better fighter, don’t you think?”
“That’s not for me to say.” Calchas raised his bushy eyebrows. “Now old Priam is talking with Helen, who has been watching from a tower on the great wall of the citadel. Ah, Hermione, if only you could hear what I hear! Your mother speaks of how she regrets leaving her husband and her favorite child now full grown. You, Hermione! She’s speaking of you!”
I was too caught up in thinking of Helen, my mother, and the tears she shed for me to listen to the seer’s description of the men’s preparations for their fight. The old seer grunted and struggled stiffly to his feet, his staring eyes focused on the faraway scene. I jumped up, too fearful for my father’s safety to remain still.
“The duel has begun,” he announced. “Menelaus hurls his spear—it strikes Paris’s shield and goes straight through it, but Paris leaps aside and avoids death’s black cloud. Now Menelaus draws his sword and smashes it on his rival’s helmet, but the sword shatters in his hand! Menelaus lunges, seizes the horsehair crest of the Trojan’s helmet, swings Paris around, and starts to drag him off. But Aphrodite, daughter of Zeus, sweeps in and breaks the helmet strap, setting Paris free!”
I cried out, begging Zeus to inte
rvene and help my father, but the great god ignored me. Calchas rubbed his eyes and sank down again beneath the fig tree. “The goddess has wrapped Paris in mist, snatched her favorite away from murderous Menelaus, and spirited him back to his bedroom in the palace.”
“Aphrodite saved Paris?” I asked in disbelief.
“It seems so. But Helen is waiting for him. She’s been watching from the tower, a witness to his cowardice. Aphrodite is there with her. The goddess of love, known for her ethereal beauty, appears now as an aged crone, commanding Helen to go to Paris’s bed. Helen resists, and Aphrodite berates her, calling her a wretched, headstrong woman, and threatens to turn her over to the warriors to be stoned to death. Helen relents, and there she is, radiant, dressed in silvery white robes. Oh, Hermione, if only you could hear! She tells Paris that she wishes he had died in battle, brought down by Menelaus, ‘that great warrior, my husband of long ago,’ as she calls him.”
“How does he answer her?”
The seer hesitated. “It’s hard to believe what he tells her! Paris promises her that even though Menelaus won today, he’s sure that he will win tomorrow—he will prove to her that he is the better fighter. In the meantime, Paris wants to make love!”
“But my mother turns him away—doesn’t she?”
No answer from Calchas. I repeated, “Doesn’t she?”
“No,” he replied. “No, she does not refuse him. They lie in the great carved bed, lost in love.” Calchas shook his head sadly. “Menelaus has fairly won the fight, but Helen will not come back, nor will Paris send her. It is Zeus’s doing.”
Would the gods never listen to me? I put my head down on my knees and wept.
THE GODS WERE ARGUING, Calchas said. “Zeus claims that your father won, but his wife, Hera, wants the fight to go on. To placate her, Zeus has sent Athena to provoke it.” The fighting resumed when one of the Trojan archers, urged on by Athena, wounded Menelaus. “It’s not serious,” Calchas assured me. “Athena just wanted to break the truce between the two sides.”
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