Troy

by Kathryn Weber-Hottleman

  Prologue: Orpheus

  Based on the story of Orpheus and Eurydice

  Orpheus

  The day has come for me to take a wife. I suppose it is a day that must come to every young Argive; it has already fallen to most of my companions to take up the shroud of wedded bliss, and in due course it is at last my lot to join them beneath the veil.

  Her name is Eurydice, and I am told that she is quite beautiful, that the last years have transformed the child I knew. Certainly her hair is very black and her eyes very bright and her build tall and slender. As for beauty, I have never noticed it. Doubtless she will be disappointed when, at the altar, she looks to my face for that affirmation and it is missing. But I will be a faithful husband and in time, perhaps, she will forgive me and I will learn to observe her beauty.

  I can hear the music of the flutes and lyres and her maidens and know they are coming. My sober heart quickens in my breast, though I cannot say why. Perhaps it is fear, though I doubt it. I dare not probe too deeply into this stirring lest it betray itself as a warmer emotion. It is the work of several moments and deep breaths to bring my heart back to its slow, steady beat. Was it a glimmer of black hair that excited it so, the glimpse of a long-desired face?

  I am not accustomed to being on this side of the bard’s song. My cousin Linos will do his best to bless the marriage with his song, I am sure, but I am jealous of my usual place and would gladly resume it if it were not shirking my duty to do so.

  If it were any woman save Eurydice.

  Eurydice

  The day is finally here, and I have never been so excited in my whole life. I never dreamt that I would on this very day become the wife of Orpheus.

  His songs followed me through my childhood. My mother sang them to me, all the great romances and tragedies cut down to my size by the brilliant youth. I loved him then with the childish unreservedness lost by older hearts, and he made my days merry with song and fanciful stories. I loved him as we grew older and he became renowned for his magical voice, leaving us for a greater place in the city. I would like to think that he did not forget me even when he left for the Colchian coast with Jason, but perhaps that is too wistful even for a fanciful girl on her wedding day.

  He has at last returned, my Orpheus, and today is our wedding day. I wonder if he will tell me that he loves me. He is so reserved that such a demonstration has been beyond him, and it is only in rare unguarded moments that I have seen his feelings. Soon I will see his face again and know.

  My maidens enter, and it is at last time to begin our march to Orpheus.

  Adder

  The vibrations of myriad footfalls disturb my rest. I uncoil, arch my long back. Ah, there is no such joy as the sun! Apollo does not care for my kind, though his graces extend inadvertently to us. My silky diamonds soak up sunlight and warm my supple bones. Tranquility.

  Rude feet trample my delicate world. Cracked, callused heels crush verecund blades of grass as shrill melody rends the stillness of midmorning. A skipping toe brushes my nose, and I flinch, my pride and blunted snout stung. Woe to the next careless intruder!

  It is not long before opportunity kicks me, and I retaliate with an assertion of my affronted eminence. Jaw unhinged, I bury my fangs up to the gum in succulent white flesh, savoring the blood that trails thinly down. Justice. Soon I will enjoy some small portion of my revenge.

  A shadow collapses over me, long and heavy. I release my victim and wriggle back ineffectually, trying to dodge the toppling column. Folds of fragile white envelop me, and I realize I have misjudged my victim’s height and weight. I am a fool in my pride and cannot escape. Out of spite I sink my fangs into the ankle again, to die with it. There will be no doubt whose poison killed this beast.

  Eurydice

  There is a sharp pain in my ankle, not blinding, only what might be expected from a thorn or pin in the flesh. I must have run up against something in our dance towards Orpheus, but there is no need to stop. I can endure a little discomfort to more quickly join him.

  The sun stands still in the sky, and it seems to take hours to cross this field. My maidens dance lightly forward and back, hurrying my sluggish feet. Why am I suddenly so hesitant? Why are my arms heavy at my sides, my feet incapable of another step? The sun is unbearably hot, a white blur on dull eyes.

  It seems like a good idea to lie down, so I do, without any preamble of bent knees and spread skirts. The grass is like fire on my limbs, a gentle burn. Somewhere above me a voice calls. It must be my maiden but I cannot remember why. The sky has become the sun.

  My heart is slow and beautifully calm deep white sky above blazing grass below voices drift through thick air Orpheus my Orpheus I am coming not forsaken you rough hands spider webs drift over arms Eurydice Eurydice oh gods what is wrong with her blood ankle adder ’ware the adder dying oh gods Eurydice

  Maidens

  What’s happening to her? Eurydice, Eurydice, what’s wrong? Are you alright? Hurry up, we’re going to be late! Is she having doubts? Do you blame her, it’s the most terrifying thing in the world. But I wish I were as assured of my fate as her! What’s wrong with her? Orpheus is going to wonder what happened to us, hurry up, Eurydice!

  Now what’s happening? She looks pale! Don’t be nervous, dear, he loves you, we’re sure of it, and you’ll have a wonderful life. (We’re sure of it? Speak for yourself, the bard never told us anything of the sort. And you’d never know it to look at him.) Come on, darling, no backing out now.

  She’s swaying! Do you think she’s going to faint? Don’t faint, dear! It’s nothing to be afraid of. She’s falling, she’s falling. Catch her! Too late, she’s down. What’s this? Why is there blood on her ankle? It looks like a bite

  It’s an adder! She’s been bitten by an adder! Girls, look out, it might still be alive. Eurydice, can you hear me? Eurydice! It looks like she’s been bitten twice. Get your hands away, you’ll be next! Well you don’t expect us to just leave her, we’ve got to see if she’s alright what do you think she’s been bitten twice by an adder of course she’s not alright oh gods Eurydice

  She’s dying Hera why did you not bless this wedding do you not love your devotees

  Get Orpheus hurry up girl he has to get here before she

  Orpheus

  Korinna rushes up, her gown disheveled and grass-stained. Where is Orpheus? Here at the altar, who other than a bridegroom would embarrass himself with the pomp and circumstance of a wedding? You’ve got to come quickly, Eurydice Where is Eurydice?

  Her face is pale, upturned to the sky, and I notice that her black hair is braided in the manner of a bride. Wisps escape the tight braids, knocked free by her fall. She looks so peaceful, as though she has only left us for a moment and will return at the call of her name. Eurydice!

  Her eyes are open, pupils dilated as though she has just seen a friend over my shoulder. I turn in vain hope that I will find—myself—approaching her to win that look of love.

  Korinna takes me gently by the arm, meaning to draw me away from Eurydice. I do not move against her touch. There is a tight column of grief in my chest and if I move it will shatter. It is too late for the unseemly emotional display that accompanies a wedding, so it must be smoothed, refolded, and discarded with the waste of the day. There is no place for tears of any sort in my life, regardless of

  Too late to tell her I love

  Korinna

  He sets his face against me, determined to show that he is strong, that he is not taken in by his songs of love and loss and passion. He will never believe that the Trojan War was for love of a woman, or that Jason won the fleece through the tender emotion. He thinks that I do not know what he feels, I who have grown up at his elbow, listening to his songs. He thinks that his sister does not know of his love for Eury
dice because he does not show the world.

  He does not know me in his grief, his own sister, and resists my endeavors to lead him away. I can feel him growing stony and determined, for what I cannot say. I grieve for him, my Orpheus, my songbird. He opens his heart so rarely, is so grudgingly vulnerable, that after this bitter departure I fear he shall never do so again. Hestia, do not let my brother bar even me! Goddess of the home, preserve the bonds of family. Though I have lost a sister, save my brother from death born of silent despair.

  Orpheus

  I sing of death and a maiden.

  From the haven of her mother’s house in early morn,

  she came to the altar by love,

  to this bower of potential promise,

  a bride, this maiden, dancing

  lightly through sun and shadow alike

  in anticipation—around her,

  attendants and minstrels in bright array.

  But short bliss was her lot in marriage,

  unless it were possible to bend the rigid bonds of death

  and return her to Argus, land of the Argives,

  her forebears, and the arms of her beloved.

  Tell me the reason, O gods, how cruel

  in your fancies, and how inscrutable in your

  careless decisions, you compelled her—

  a exceptional maid, pledged to her marriage—

  to undergo a pitiable death

  by an unseen enemy. Can folly

  bitter as this afflict this minds of heaven?

  Korinna

  It shocks me that my brother can so easily shrug off his outward emotions and begin the dirge. I know that he is a bard, but I had thought he was first and foremost a man, and this man has suffered greater tragedy than I have ever known. A sister knows the depths of her brother’s heart, however well hidden, yet he does not mourn. I cannot help but desire to withdraw from him to protect my own grief; how can I expose the rawness of my wound to his chill response? But he is my brother, and I cannot release him into secret despair despite his cleverly sung words. He is trapped in his world of decorum in which men cannot feel, and he cannot give voice to grief but through song. My Orpheus, would that it were else!

  He does not seem to feel my hand on his arm, for I know he would put by what he considers an unseemly display of sympathy had he felt it. Leave him, say the other girls, for no one can share the grief of another heart, not even a sister. Leave him, and perhaps the heat of the setting sun will warm his heart and unbind his tears.

  He will not be moved. Perhaps he is waiting for us to leave so that he may loose his emotions without fear.

  I embrace him, poor substitute for Eurydice. When he does not respond, I leave him to his strange and terrible vigil.

  Orpheus

  My hands are cold, but I feel no grief. I have siphoned my grief into my hands and they, trembling, mourn.

  The night is cold but clear and filled with the cleanliness of moonlight. I am wrapped in white, thin sacred purity, a remnant of promise scudding across my body in indifferent wind. I have heard that distant peoples wear white in mourning, white decked in jewels of creamy pallor, richness of death. Dredge the body in milkfat, fine flour, powder away the grey shadows and feign ennobled life.

  Her hair was black, a gross affront to the paleness of mourning. I want to bathe my hands in ink, sink in the blackness of Hell and envelop the acrid ash of death.

  The river at my feet is black in the moonlight, a cold proxy for my tears. I plunge my hands into it to still their tremors. If I can bury their whiteness in the river, then grief will cease to exist.

  The water is chill and sulfurous, burning my hands with its noxious flow. A distant cry arises from it at my touch, the echo of a despairing soul. What river, this, that courses past the Spartan Gates? A dim sob assures me that it is no river of the living. It is the Acheron, the cruel tributary that seeks out the grieving and invites them to a damp reunion.

  My hands ache for the act that will join them with Eurydice, but it is unthinkable. How can one willingly yield a soul to Hades?

  But the Acheron beguiles me with cool promise to submerge one foot, then the other. A thousand sighs rush upon my living flesh, voices of the dead whom I am bound to join. One cry seems sharper than the rest, freshly bereaved. Is it Eurydice?

  I will seek her out in the land of the dead, I will follow this river to its father Styx. Hades allowing, I will find her and return her to the light. If not, I will succumb to the caress of the Acheron and join Eurydice in darkness.

  Eurydice

  My soul screams out of my body, tearing through bone and sinew with the rush of a thousand winds. I claw with vaporous fingers to cling to dead flesh, but they offer no purchase on their former vessel. With a moan I am dragged down, down through the black bitter depths of the River of Hate.

  On that desolate shore the ferryman demands his fare. I have nothing to give him—my soul was taken so suddenly there was not time to collect the coin necessary, and the grace of my burial has not laid it in my grave yet. There is but one substitute that Charon accepts, and I lack even that; he will give crossing if one yields to him all love grown in life. But I have no love left in me, for I gave it all to Orpheus.

  When we die, there rises in us a longing, a need, to cross the river Styx. Every moment spent stranded on the shore is torment. Some souls try to resist, to stay, insisting that some brave, still-living being will come to reclaim them from the maw of death, but as hours pass their eyes roll in their ghastly heads and fragile arms grow translucent. Their substance—what little of it they have—palls and thins in the harsh earth-air that filters in from above. When they crawl, gibbering death-addicts, to Charon’s skiff, he lifts their blind weightless shades and poles them to relief below.

  Charon was kind to me, making room for my slight soul though I lacked proper payment. The River Styx absolved me from my sins with its flow as Charon released me from my torture into Hell.

  Persephone

  Who is he, this man who comes through the darkness? He is a living man, ashamed in his fragile white clothing and proud in his grief. Tears have not etched his face, but divinity sees a crueler anguish, fire in his veins that causes his hands to tremble.

  Oh, Hades, my husband, look at the warmth of his beating heart! He has come, not to plead for himself with the Fates, but on behalf of another. He has come out of love.

  Take pity on him, my husband, and do not unleash your righteous wrath, for he has a noble brow and bears a harp on his back. Let us listen to his song, for we know not what tidings he may bring. Perhaps—dare I say it?—we have made a mistake, taken one too soon.

  How sweet is his voice! We will be blessed on the day when he joins us with a remnant of his music. But how sad his song, how eloquent his plea. My hand reaches for yours, husband, for though you were once despised you are now beloved, and though you have taught me to turn a hard heart against these pleas I cannot stop my ears against this man. Can we deny him the smallest measure of our joy? In a few years, she would come again and never leave, with him following hard on her heels in the usual fashion. Ah, husband, can we not bend the rules of death but once for this frail mortal man?

  Orpheus

  My lord and lady, I come before you bearing a dolorous tale. It concerns a maiden called Eurydice, who, on the morn of her wedding day was stung on the ankle by an adder and, stricken, fell prey to death. I know she is here below, for I have heard her voice echo in grief along the Acheron. For weary hours I have followed that faint cry, seeking your presence and hers.

  She was my bride-to-be, a maid with nobility of character and endowed with reason and beauty. I esteem no other maiden so highly and regret the loss of her as my wife.

  Did I—love—her, your Ladyship? My lady, it is hardly seemly for a bard to sing of his own doings. No, no please don’t send me away! I have come all this way on the slightest of hopes, braved the horror of the mouth of death that I might kneel before you and beg a boon!
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br />   My lady Persephone, in years long passed faithful Charon ferried your husband across the River Styx that he might snatch you from your fields of flowers and carry you below to his kingdom. You fought him and pleaded for release, but out of love he kept you, wooed and wedded you, and in time you gave your four months gladly and mourned the other eight.

  He is not a man of demonstration, my lord Hades, and it was difficult to persuade Charon to make an exception in his duties. But they say Charon sees the soul of a man before it crumbles in this abyss, and he knows the true intent of the heart.

  I am a man of others’ words, not given to sharing my own, and unpracticed in declaration. But, Lady Persephone, Charon gave me crossing, that I might beg to see Eurydice again, if only for a moment, to tell her what I never told in life, that I

  I love

  Hades

  Who is this man, who, bold yet broken, descends into my kingdom? Even here we have heard the name of Orpheus and been bewitched by his dulcet tones. Now he stands before us, his beautiful voice cracking under the weight of grief. And yet, I think it has never been more beautiful.

  My wife’s hand steals over to mine. Her touch brings back younger days, when she lingered between prisoner and bride, unsure of my intentions and yearning for her mother. Don’t cry, my sweet, don’t cry! He is only a mortal with a mortal bride, and they are both doomed to this place of eternal separation. What does it matter if they share a few short years before then?

  What would it have mattered if we

  It would have mattered! I would not drain one drop from this cup of joy. To think of months with Persephone lost—to grieve, unknowing, for more years—to strive again for her love

  I will set him an impossible task. Go, Orpheus, you may take her! But only—but only. But only if you will do that which is most difficult for lovers. You will walk out of the valley of Avernus, fixing your eyes on the daylight beyond and turning neither to the left nor the right. Eurydice will follow. But if you turn to look behind, if you steal a glimpse of her before you have gained the light, she will be lost to you forever. You may not watch her follow. This is the price of love.