Rise of Princes (Homeric Chronicles Book 2)

by Janell Rhiannon

  “On this we agree, Priam. I had feared you would wish to send him abroad.”

  “We have lost much already … and perhaps more to come,” Priam said.

  Hecuba contemplated her work. “I would pray to the gods, but they are deaf to my pleas.”

  Priam waked across the chamber, taking up Hecuba’s place by the window. He looked out across the yard. Children played at wooden swords around the fountain. Several nursemaids chased after the most wayward. “Perhaps, they will give Hektor a son soon.”

  “Perhaps, they will stop our second son from marrying that whore from Sparta.”

  “You are a harsh woman.”

  “Helen has a rightful husband.” Hecuba put down her weaving strand. “Who raids our allies until he can strategize a way to raze us to the ground.”

  “I need no reminder of the enemy at the gate,” Priam snapped.

  “Dissuade Paris then.”

  “You ask the impossible.”

  Hecuba reached for the pale blue yarn. “Try.”

  Priam sighed, continuing to look out the window. “I will try, for your sake.”

  Paris had been at training when the messenger arrived from his father. “Did he say nothing else?” he asked.

  The old man shook his head. “Only that you accompany him atop the citadel’s rampart.” He bowed his head. “He asks that you come … unaccompanied.”

  “Unaccompanied? Who would …” His father’s meaning dawned on him. “Yes, of course.” Even he believes I am a slave to Helen’s thighs. How could he explain that Aphrodite had bewitched them both, and that neither wished for release from the goddess’ hold? Would he blame me? Throw me from the walls of Troy if he knew? Paris secretly blamed himself for his choice, and he’d come to understand his decision years ago had set the current war in motion. What if I had chosen Athena? I could have defended Troy if the united Greeks had moved against us. I chose the love of a great beauty instead of honor and glory. They will laugh at me in the Underworld. “I will go straightaway.”

  It was a short distance to meet King Priam atop the wall. Paris waited but a few moments and his father appeared, embracing him as beloved son. He had noticed over the years that his father always held him a moment longer than necessary, as if in a continual cycle of regret.

  “I see you have been at training again,” Priam said.

  “Apologies, I thought the matter urgent, so I did not pause to change.”

  The king waved the matter off. “I have just come from your mother’s chambers.”

  Paris also noted that when it came to Hecuba, his father always referred to her as your mother, never as the queen. It was as if Priam was yet trying to convince himself that Paris was truly a member of the household, even after all these years. Is my position so precarious? “How fares my mother?”

  “She is concerned about your future.”

  “My future?”

  “I have accepted Helen into my household, into Troy. It was only right to do so after Telemon refused to send Hesione back time and time again. I have regrets—”

  Paris clapped his father on the shoulder. “We all have regrets.”

  King Priam clasped his hands behind his back. “Your mother urges you not to marry Helen. She does not see Helen in the same light as I do. I fear she will always be the Spartan queen in your mother’s eyes.”

  “How can I choose between a mother’s wishes and the woman I love? How can I allow Helen to be treated as unfairly as Hesione?”

  “I am not the man to answer such questions. My choices … have not always led to the most harmonious of households. I do what I must for the sake of Troy. You … you are free of such burdens.”

  Yes, Paris thought, Hektor is the Prince of Troy. I am only the Forgotten Prince. “If I do not honor Helen with marriage, I am declaring her unworthy before the entire world. Even Menelaus took her as wife. If we should have children … they would be bastards.”

  “You can say it. Like Kebriones. I have only legitimized him because the war has taken a heavy toll on our allies and on our family. I could do nothing less than what was right for my kingdom and her allies. I have alienated your mother, yet again, by taking Melita as wife.”

  Paris caught his father’s insinuation. “Oenone will not live in a home of brick and stone.”

  “What of the son you left behind? Surely, he is a man by now? Old enough to join you in defense of the city.”

  For Paris, guilt shadowed everything about Oenone. What he’d told her, what he’d not told her, the way he’d abandoned her after promising to honor her forever. “I cannot take the boy from her.”

  “I figured as much.” Priam embraced his son. “Should your mother ask, tell her I tried in earnest to dissuade you.”

  “How do you know I will choose Helen?”

  “Oh, my son, I have lived long enough to know how to read a man’s eyes regarding women.”

  BAY OF EDREMIT

  Beach Camp between Lyrnessus and Pedasus

  Achilles rolled over in his bed, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. Briseis lay across the tent on a makeshift bed of furs and linens. He reached for the jug of water beside him and drained what little remained. His head ached slightly. He’d drunk too much wine, even for him. This fucking war has no end. Achilles sat up slowly. Why is she here? Why did she not return to her own tent? “Briseis,” Achilles said, his voice rough with wine and sleep.

  “Yes, my lord?” She rolled over to face him. “It is about time you awoke.”

  “Why are you in my tent? And why have I no woman beside me?”

  Briseis sat up, kicking aside the fur coverings. “In your haze of wine, you commanded me to stay.” She stood up. “Against my wishes.” And then she stormed from the tent, leaving the Myrmidon commander utterly confused.

  As he sat there, Patrokles, dark and glorious, burst through the flap, bringing the unwanted light of Apollo. “So, Achilles rises to greet Apollo!”

  “What is it to you, cousin?” Achilles grumbled, shielding his eyes from the light.

  Patrokles’ chair sank beneath him into the sand. “Has she gone already?”

  “Who?”

  “Briseis.”

  Throwing his coverings off, Achilles stepped naked from his bed to the center table. He lifted an amphora and finding it empty, slammed it down. “Where is all the fucking wine?”

  Patrokles laughed. “You swam in it. Have you no memory of last night?”

  Achilles narrowed his eyes at his cousin. “Do not jest with me. I am in no mood.”

  “That is quite obvious. But, why so―”

  “Nax!” Achilles bellowed. “Nax!”

  The young servant practically stumbled over himself as he entered the tent. “My lord?”

  “Get me some wine.”

  Nax nodded.

  “And water.”

  Nax nodded again. “Aye, my lord.”

  “Bread. I require bread.”

  Nax nodded, but did not leave.

  “Go! Why do you stand staring?”

  Nax slipped quickly from the tent.

  Patrokles’ gaze was keenly fixed on Achilles, resting his hands behind his head. “You truly do not remember dicing?”

  “No.”

  “Or beating Ajax at the game?”

  Achilles’ stern mouth broke into a lopsided grin. “Was he angry?”

  “Very.”

  “Then, it was worth this blinding pain behind my eyes.”

  Nax returned with two amphorae of Achilles’ favorite wine, followed by a reluctant Briseis carrying water and fresh bread. She set her burden down and left before Nax could pour the wine into their cups. Achilles walked to the far corner of his tent, picking up a round clay pot. He relieved himself of the previous nights’ libations, handing it to Nax. “Find me some roasted goat or beef. I am of an appetite.”

  “Yes, my lord,” Nax mumbled, hardly able to keep from grimacing, and immediately exited to empty the steaming piss.

  Achilles
grabbed his wine cup by its handle and gulped twice. The familiar warmness spreading down his throat caused his stomach to grumble. Grabbing a hot loaf, he bit off a chunk. “I am famished.”

  “So it would seem,” Patrokles mused, as he sipped from his cup.

  Achilles set his wine and food aside. “Out with it. What knowledge do you keep from me?”

  “Nothing you do not already know, only what you keep from yourself, dear cousin.”

  “By the balls or Zeus! The blood ties again!”

  Patrokles sucked air through his teeth. “I warn you, you may not care for my words.”

  “I do not care for your evasions.”

  “It frustrates you that Briseis has found a weakness in your armor.”

  Slowly, Achilles arose, the veins of his neck bulging beneath his sun-darkened skin. “If you were not my cousin, I would slit your throat.”

  “For speaking the truth? That is more Agamemnon’s way than yours.”

  Achilles swiped a hand across the table, sending gold coins and strings of pearls flying, and his cup and the bread onto the sandy floor. “Get. Out.”

  Patrokles, unfazed by the angry tirade, said, “You are a fool. She was not always a slave, cousin. You are the one who made her so.” Patrokles abruptly took his leave.

  The Myrmidon commander paced the length of his tent. Fucked by the gods. Love has no place in my tent. His choice of a short and glorious life loomed before him. I should not love her. He scowled. But now that Patrokles, whom he trusted with his life, had uttered the words aloud, he couldn’t shake them from his thoughts.

  Achilles found Briseus at the washing stream, pounding his chitons clean against the rocks. The hem of her dress was tucked into her girdle. The sun lit her unbound hair, framing her face in a halo of light. She is beautiful. She looked up when he approached.

  The Golden Warrior walked straight to her without a word or proper greeting. Briseis stood with the wet garment hanging in her clenched fist. Grabbing the chiton she was washing, Achilles tossed it to the pebbled shore. He lifted her in his arms, carrying a shocked Briseis up the embankment to softer ground. “Do you desire me, Briseis?” His voice was a low rumble. His blue eyes burned into hers, searching for the truth between them, as he set her down.

  The grass was cool beneath her feet, but her blood warmed as her heart pounded in her ears having been pressed so close to his chest. He smelled of the sea and cinnamon. Her breath caught in her chest. “What trickery is this?”

  “Do you?” he asked again, his lips brushing dangerously close to her mouth.

  Briseis whispered, “I … When … I―”

  Achilles’ impatient mouth descended on hers. He softly kissed the corner of her mouth before moving to the sweet center of her lips. Her body softened in his embrace. Achilles pulled her closer with one arm, running his other hand down her back, grabbing the roundness of her buttock.

  Without thinking, Briseis wrapped her arms around his neck and returned his kiss.

  Achilles growled, lifting her over his hips. His tongue invaded her mouth with abandon, tasting the tang of her tongue and inhaling the essence of sunshine and heat radiating from her hair and skin. He took them both to the ground, laying her gently back into the slope of the stream’s soft grassy bank.

  “We will be seen,” she whispered, suddenly afraid of their passion.

  “I do not care who sees us.” Achilles ravaged her mouth with an experienced tongue, and soft lips.

  “B-but … I-I …” Briseis stammered.

  “Do you wish me to stop?” he breathed into her mouth.

  She shook her head against the warm grass.

  Achilles’ mouth moved down her neck, nibbling and licking her until she squirmed beneath him, laughing and joyful. He had never heard the sound of her mirth before. He pinned her firmly, yet gently, with his hands while his lips continued their assault, savoring the salt from her skin. He unpinned the shoulders of her garment. He slid farther down her body, teasing her nipples with his tongue. The air and wetness chilled each one to a pebble. He swirled his tongue around each quivering mound, as Briseis wrapped a leg around his, maneuvering to straddle his hips.

  “You surprise me, Briseis,” he said, his voice low with unsated passion.

  The Golden Warrior grabbed her buttocks in both hands, pressing her center against his hard cock as she leaned down to kiss him. Her hair fell about them like a dark curtain, blocking out the war and the world. Reaching a hand around the top of her thigh, Achilles slid his hand beneath her chiton, pushing his fingers into her sacred cross.

  Briseis gasped at the intrusion. Her mouth pressed harder, her tongue now assaulting his. Quickly, a hard spasm of pleasure squeezed against his deft fingers. “It has been so long,” she whispered in apology.

  “Shah,” he said quietly against her ear. He pulled up the sides of her chiton and the front of his. His cock now throbbed against her wet center. And Achilles finally pushed into her, slowly.

  Briseis moaned as the heat of Achilles melted into her body. She rocked her hips against his, until sweet tension began once again to build within her. She moaned as he kissed her, her hips grinding faster.

  “Not yet,” he said softly, grabbing her by the waist and turning her onto her back. He gazed into her eyes. “Not yet.” The final onslaught began. He entered her with shallow thrusts, feeling the head of his cock engorging with the need to spill his seed. Briseis writhed beneath his heavy body, panting and raising her hips to his. Slowly, he allowed more of his shaft to penetrate her wetness.

  Briseis arched her back. “Please …”

  The Golden Warrior could wait no more. He plunged his entire length into her, thrusting steadily until her body shook with pleasure, and he groaned as he spilled his seed in her. Neither of them moved while he throbbed and danced inside of her.

  Briseis kissed his neck.

  Achilles rolled to the side, his cock softening and slick with their intimacy. “You will move into my tent.”

  Briseis wanted to protest, but her words stuck in her throat. She turned her head, noticing for the first time that a group of camp women had gathered downstream, and had witnessed their public act of love. Shame filled her. She yanked the bottom of her chiton down, pulling the shoulders up. Humiliated, now, that she had given into Achilles’ lust. Still trapped beneath him, she pushed him off her side. Grabbing her shoulder pins from the grass, she fastened her chiton and stood up. “I have to finish …” She looked around for the soggy chiton she’d been washing and picked it up. It was now covered in dirt and bits of grass.

  Achilles sensed a shift in her. “By dusk,” he commanded, as he, too, stood up. The front of his chiton caught on his still swollen cock.

  She wanted him to cover his nakedness up in front of the other women who were now unabashedly gawking. Instead, he yanked the garment off and tossed it at her feet.

  “This needs washing as well.” He walked away without a hint of modesty to garb him.

  Out of the corner of her eye, she spied the washer women pointing and giggling as Achilles’ backside shone in the sun.

  Tears sprang to Briseis’ eyes. Her body may have rejoiced in the sweetness of Achilles’ embrace, but her heart shattered anew as thoughts of Mynes broke through the haze of passion. She had failed to honor her own promise to remember her dead husband, cut down without honor by Ares striding at Achilles’ side. She closed her eyes to Apollo’s light, willing Mynes’ face to float behind the darkness. But there was only the darkness.

  I have forgotten. The joy of passion faded. She cursed herself that she wasn’t strong enough to live in loneliness and misery forever. You are weak, Briseis. Now, the entire camp will see what you are when he tosses you aside like all the others. A whore. A whore of war.

  FORTY ONE

  TROY

  1240 BCE

  Hecuba sat alone at the courtyard fountain, contemplating her next move. She refused to accept a marriage between Paris and Helen, so she’d take
n matters into her own hands. She’d sent a messenger to Agelaus, urging him to find Oenone and the boy, Corythus. She’d pleaded that the boy belonged in Troy and that he should fulfill his destiny as a son of Paris.

  But Agelaus’ reply was disheartening. All he had said was, “Not yet.” Not yet. Cryptic bastard. When, if not now? Surely the boy has the shadow of his first beard. She doubted he’d even spoken to the nymph. She recalled Agelaus’ utter horror when Priam had called upon him to speak the truth. I cannot blame him. “By all the gods, I cannot blame him.”

  “Blame who, Mother?”

  Hecuba turned to find Paris. “I did not hear the gate.”

  “No, you did not. I called you, but your thoughts were elsewhere.”

  The queen smiled wanly and sighed. “My thoughts seem to be anywhere but here of late.”

  Paris sat next to her, reaching for her hand. “May I speak truthfully?”

  Hecuba looked into her son’s dark eyes. She saw his determination and his sadness. “What troubles you, Paris?”

  “You deny your blessing on my marriage to Helen.”

  She stiffened, pulling her hand from his. “Men often ask for advice, refusing to listen once it is given. Marrying Helen will only inflame the hatred of the Greeks.”

  “Is it not a disrespect to keep her only as concubine? Does she not deserve better? Did Hesione deserve less? I have only taken what the Greeks once took from us.”

  “But your father did not send an army to retrieve her. He was satisfied in his youth and inexperience, to let his sister go. Menelaus is no such youth. He is a man … cuckolded before the world. And his brother, Agamemnon, is a king to rival Priam. Mycenae and Sparta are worthy adversaries. Do not believe the lies soldiers tell one another around campfires at night. No Trojan is safe, will ever be safe, as long as Helen remains behind these walls.”

  Paris scanned the inner courtyard wall, the high gate reinforced with iron, the penetrating blue of the sky. “I cannot give her back.”