White Lotus

by Libbie Hawker

  “Do you need any assistance, my lady?”

  Rhodopis turned. It was the steward—the one who had run the auction. He carried a clay lamp in one hand. Its flame illuminated an earnest, intelligent face, and Rhodopis longed for Aesop with a terrible, cold pang.

  “I’m looking for Archidike—the girl dressed up as fire. Have you seen her?”

  “Ah,” the steward said, “she went back to Xanthes’ place some half an hour ago, perhaps more. Are you Rhodopis?”

  “Yes, that’s me.” She pulled the mask from her face.

  The steward offered a small bow. “Your friend said you would be returning to your master’s house in Good Man Charaxus’ litter. Is that no longer the case? Shall I make other arrangements for you?”

  “N—no; no, thank you,” Rhodopis said quickly. “Charaxus will see me home.”

  The steward bowed again and headed off across the courtyard, to deliver the extra light to the dicing litter-bearers. Rhodopis ducked back into the shadows of the side garden, watching. When the steward had vanished again inside Iason’s house, she marched stiffly across the courtyard, past the litters and the dicing men, and walked right out the front gate.

  The trek back to Xanthes’ house was longer than Rhodopis had expected. If the two estates hadn’t lain along a straight path, at opposite ends of the long market street, she could certainly have lost herself somewhere in Memphis. But she followed the market road faithfully, ignoring the men who called out to her. She could only pray that no one would assault her. Her thoughts were dark—very near despair—and her bleak mood distracted her. She didn’t notice the turmoil brewing in the street until she was well into the thick of it.

  “If you don’t like the king, then why don’t you get out of the country?”

  Rhodopis looked up quickly. She was in the center of a wide square—the site of the great market, during daylight hours. There were no peddlers’ booths or farmers’ wagons in the square now. Instead, groups of men lounged about the corners, leaning against buildings, drinking from skins of beer, and tossing dice in the wan moonlight. Five or six fellows came out of a nearby wine shop, singing loudly and laughing. A pair of garishly dressed pornae approached them, but the men waved them off.

  The fellow who had shouted was one of the dicing men. He pointed across the square, to the men with the beer skins. They all wore the short white kilts of Egyptians.

  “Get out of the country?” a kilted man shouted back. “This is still Egypt, for all the Pharaoh tries to turn it into Greece. You get out, and take all the rest of the boy-buggering Greeks with you!” His friends hooted in appreciation.

  “Fucking Egyptian dogs don’t know what’s good for you!”

  The group of Egyptians barked at the dicers, then howled to the moon.

  The dicers were on their feet now. Rhodopis could see how they stumbled as they rose. They were perilously drunk, and spoiling for a fight. She sped up, hoping to cross the square and slip back into the shadows of the market street before any violence could erupt.

  The men in the white kilts stopped barking—stopped speaking in Greek, too. They flung insults at the dicers in their own tongue. Rhodopis knew just enough Egyptian to know they offered dire offense. The dicers were coming on faster now; she saw the glint of honed metal as they slid daggers from their belts.

  “Gods have mercy!” Rhodopis gasped. She ran from the square. Behind her, the bristling men clashed; shouts filled the night, from the fighters and from those looking on. She clenched her fist around the ties of her mask, wishing it was a knife instead. A man’s agonized scream cut through the darkness; Rhodopis ran as fast as her legs would carry her, deeper into the cold dark of Memphis.

  By the time she returned to Xanthes’ house, Rhodopis was footsore and hopelessly out of breath. The guards on Xanthes’ gate stared at her, startled.

  “Let me in, for pity’s sake,” she cried. “Can’t you see it’s me?”

  The gate squealed open; Rhodopis flung herself into the house and along the corridor until she reached the door of the Stable. She leaned against it, covering her face with her hands, heaving until her breath had finally slowed, until it no longer burned in her throat. Then she pushed the Stable door open and crept inside.

  All the girls save Archidike were still at Iason’s party; they weren’t expected home for hours yet. None of the lamps had been lit. Rhodopis found her way down the long chamber by feel, counting each alcove as her outstretched hand found it, until she reached Archidike’s bed.

  Rhodopis pulled back the curtain. She could tell by the rhythm of Archidike’s breathing that she wasn’t asleep.

  “Archi, it’s me—Rho. I didn’t know that fool Charaxus would do what he did. I didn’t want it to happen.”

  The silence stretched on.

  “Archidike, please. Won’t you talk to me? Haven’t we always been good to one another?”

  The only response from Archidike was a sniffle in the darkness. Then her bed creaked and the mattress crackled as Archidike shifted to her other side, turning her back to Rhodopis.

  4

  A Patron, At Last

  Rhodopis soon learned that she was on her own in the Stable. Archidike hardy spoke to her, unless occasion—or Vélona—required it. Vélona was quick enough to note that the girls’ alliance had crumbled; she tactfully turned away requests for Rhodopis and Archidike to entertain together, and within a few months, all such requests ceased.

  Rhodopis didn’t know how she ought to feel about losing her partnership with Archidike. On the one hand, she was grateful she didn’t have to pretend. It would have been agonizing to go to parties arm in arm with Archidike, making believe their friendship had never ended. But on the other hand, Rhodopis missed her friend terribly. She longed for a chance to make everything right between them, to mend and rebuild what they’d once had… though she hadn’t the first idea how she might go about it.

  A certain pall of fear hung over Rhodopis in the months after Iason’s party, too. Archidike could be a dangerous enemy; she knew that instinctively. The gods had never made a harder girl. Archidike had learned long ago that success only came to those hetaerae who cared for themselves—first, last, and always. A girl who succumbed to the pleasantries of friendship was a girl who ended with her heart broken—or worse, a knife in her back. Rhodopis knew full well that Archidike had the strength of will—and the raw cunning—to achieve whatever she wanted. She could only hope that whatever Archidike wanted now, it wasn’t to revenge herself upon the friend who had inadvertently betrayed her.

  As Rhodopis had grimly foreseen, the story of the four-hundred-hedj bid spread rapidly through Memphis society. She was isolated in the Stable—a complete outcast now, despised by all the girls, who envied the high bid and took Archidike’s outrage as a convenient excuse to shun Rhodopis. But beyond the walls of the Stable, her star was at last beginning to rise. The men of Memphis clamored for their chance to make the acquaintance of the shy new hetaera. It seemed every wealthy man sought to uncover her secret, to learn what subtle magic had inspired the astonishing bid. Rhodopis was busy almost every night—and was grateful for it. The more parties she attended, and the more beds she visited, the less time she spent in the Stable, where Archidike’s simmering hatred and the other girls’ envy made life a misery.

  Nearly eight weeks after the auction, Charaxus finally lived up to his promise. He wrote to Xanthes, proposing an official patronage for the hetaera Rhodopis, along with the gift of an emerald necklace. The necklace was exquisite—three stones the size of hedj coins, set in discs of gold. When Vélona presented it to Rhodopis, even Archidike had to admire its beauty.

  The emerald necklace was only the first of Charaxus’ gifts. As the offerings came from a true patron, Rhodopis was allowed to keep them, rather than surrendering the goods to Amenia and the dressing closet. But Charaxus’ taste in presents was as confusing and ever-changing as his moods. Some of the things he sent—silver bracelets, ivory hair combs, ankl
e cuffs of lapis lazuli—had real value, and added to Rhodopis’ growing store of personal wealth. Others were only the silly sentiments of a hopelessly besotted man. He sent her honey cakes and bouquets of flowers, valueless bracelets made from colored thread. Rhodopis was dreadfully afraid that he’d send her a kitten or a puppy, and what would she do with a pet? But whether the gifts he sent were valuable or had no real worth at all, Charaxus sent something to Rhodopis nearly every day. Soon Rhodopis thought it best to seek discretion. She asked Vélona to pass Charaxus’ gifts to her only when the other girls weren’t anywhere nearby, for she was frightened of what might happen to her if their jealousy boiled over.

  Her new patron’s largesse presented another problem, too. Rhodopis was running out of places to hide the wealth she was accumulating. Long ago, when she’d first arrived at the Stable, Archidike had told Rhodopis that all the girls had a secret place—a hidden nook where they stashed away their money, protecting it from theft until they’d accumulated enough silver to buy their freedom. The only hiding place Rhodopis had yet devised was a slice in the bottom of her mattress cover. She knew it was too obvious a spot, and vulnerable to raiding. Besides, she could no longer sleep soundly at night, for Charaxus’ many affections filled her mattress with lumps and hard, awkward edges.

  The solution came to her one day when Vélona held her back while the other girls went off to the gynaeceum for their breakfast.

  “Another gift from your patron,” Vélona said. She opened the dressing closet door, stooped inside, and presented Rhodopis with a clay amphora.

  Rhodopis accepted it with some confusion. It was the size of a large melon, with two looped handles beside its narrow neck and a stopper in its wide mouth. It was heavy, too—full of something that sloshed as Rhodopis shrugged.

  “Bath oil,” Vélona said. “As if we don’t keep you oiled enough here. As if I don’t know the business of running a house full of hetaerae.”

  Rhodopis sighed. “Charaxus doesn’t mean any insult, Mistress. He’s just… a bit silly, that’s all.”

  “Silly or not, you certainly have charmed him. You’ve done well, Rhodopis. Now take that stuff off to the baths—there’s enough for a whole year’s worth of bathing in that jar—and hurry along to the gynaeceum. You’re working this afternoon, so be sure to eat well.”

  “Yes, Mistress.”

  In the bath house, Rhodopis pulled the tight stopper from the amphora. She sniffed the oil within. The smell was lovely, redolent with spices and myrrh—but even the finest bath oil wasn’t worth much. She sighed again; another sentimental but ultimately useless gift from her patron. Charaxus keeps up this foolishness, and Vélona will cut him off entirely. Bath oil was the kind of present an honest woman would receive from her lover, or her husband. It was not the type of offering a serious patron would give a hetaera.

  Annoyed, Rhodopis left the jar sitting beside the bathing pool. But she paused on the threshold of the bath house, and turned back, tapping her chin thoughtfully.

  The oil wasn’t worth much, but the amphora itself could be of real value…

  Rhodopis rummaged on the supply shelves until she found a few empty jars. She poured the bath oil into these, draining all she could from the heavy amphora. Then, pausing at the door of the Stable to be sure Vélona was not still within, she hurried back to her alcove with the amphora tucked beneath one arm.

  Quickly, Rhodopis raided her own mattress, scooping out every bracelet and bangle, every necklace and collar and hair comb. She found the little linen bundle that held the smallest items—the earrings and finger rings Charaxus had sent—and then the larger bundle that contained the silver she had earned from other men, including the prize money Iason had sent for garnering the highest bid at his auction.

  Everything went into the amphora. She estimated the value of her treasures as each piece plinked down into the jar. It made a merry music, and when she tamped the stopper down and hefted the jar to her hip, she was pleasantly surprised at its weight.

  Won’t be long before I’m out. One more year, maybe, and then I’m free.

  Rhodopis carried the amphora well out into the garden. She must find someplace to hide it—where no one would ever think to look. And she must do it soon, before the girls finished their breakfast and came out into the garden to start their lessons.

  She passed the big circular pond, raised partway above the ground in the old Egyptian fashion, walled with white-washed mudbrick. Lotus lilies covered the water in bright profusion, the spiky blooms sweet and fragrant among their flat, floating leaves. There was a bit of brick missing from the wall, just there—a perfect way to mark the place.

  Rhodopis leaned over the edge of the pond. It was difficult to judge the depth, for the water between the lily leaves reflected bright sunlight, obscuring the pond’s bottom. Glancing around to be sure no one saw her, she lowered the amphora carefully into the pond. She kept a fierce grip on one handle, afraid the jar would sink beyond her reach. But it came to rest on the silty bottom, and Rhodopis slowly withdrew her arm from the water. The lilies hid the amphora perfectly.

  A job well done, Rhodopis thought, and hurried back to the Stable.

  The morning after she’d sunk the amphora, Vélona made her usual rounds of the Stable, stalking down the room with her arms held stiffly behind her back, shouting commands to each girl. The girls had presented themselves, as always, in their plain white tunics. Vélona eyed them sharply, inspecting their beds for neatness and order.

  “Callisto,” Vélona barked, “stand up straight or I swear to blessed Isis, I will pay a metalsmith to melt an iron bar to your back. You are off to Good Man Sophos tonight for a private entertainment. If I her that you slouched in his presence, it’s the strap for you. Archidike, Tarasios the boat-wright is entertaining his friends, up from Thebes. You and Bastet will attend. The party will go late, I understand, so look alive. But first, this afternoon, you’re to visit Xanthes.

  “Rhodopis—” Vélona pulled a small, lidded basket from behind her back. She held it out to Rhodopis. “Your patron wants you to dance at his party tonight. You’re to wear these—a gift.”

  Rhodopis blushed. She didn’t like to receive the gift in front of all the other girls, but as it played a part in her assignment, she supposed Vélona couldn’t be blamed for having done it. She lifted the lid of the basket—and gasped.

  “What is it?” Callisto called.

  Wordlessly, Rhodopis tilted the basket so the other girls could see. A pair of slippers lay inside, snuggled into a nest of pink silk. The slippers flashed as she tipped the basket, catching the lamp light, for they were made of rose gold.

  “Gods be merciful,” Persephone muttered.

  Rhodopis lifted one slipper out of the basket, examining it more closely. It was made in the Egyptian fashion—a flat, sturdy sole that narrowed and curved at the toe, to arch up and over the foot. Open at the top, it would be held in place by a thong that ran between the first and second toe, looped around the ankle, and tied to the heel. The edges of the sole were etched all over with Greek keys, graven firmly into the precious metal. A cluster of engraved grapes decorated the upcurved toe, and in the center of the sole, just where her foot would rest, was the image of a goose feather.

  A tiny curl of papyrus lay in the basket. Rhodopis spread it between her fingers and read Charaxus’ note: Rose gold, to match your hair, my love.

  After so many strange and disappointing gifts from her patron, the remarkable quality of the slippers—their obvious craftsmanship, their unique appearance—struck Rhodopis speechless with awe.

  “They are beautiful,” Bastet said, grudgingly. “Lucky you.”

  “All right,” Vélona said, “enough gawking. You have your assignments for the day. Get to work, all of you—and Rhodopis, I’d keep those shoes somewhere safe, if I were you.”

  Evening was approaching. Rhodopis stood alone in the bath house, combing some of Charaxus’ myrrh oil through her long, wet hair. The heat of h
er bath was dissipating from her skin, leaving behind a pleasant, subtle chill. Two hours hence, she would be at Charaxus’ party, dancing for his guests—And oh, won’t I just about enjoy his company now! The gift of the exquisite slippers seemed to prove that he’d learned the role of a patron at last. Rhodopis glanced at the slippers, waiting for her on a stone bench beside her tunic and belt. She smiled.

  First those pretty shoes, and next…? Perhaps another necklace like the first he’d sent her—the emeralds set in golden discs. She didn’t know what the value of the slippers might be, but surely they had added significantly to her private cache of wealth. Charaxus, you good soul—you dear, silly thing! How glad I am to have met you!

  “Rhodopis? Rhodopis!” It was Vélona, calling for her with increasing annoyance.

  Rhodopis dropped the comb on the stone bench and pulled the tunic over her head. “Here I am, Mistress, in the bath.”

  Vélona leaned, head and shoulders, into the steam-filled bath house. “Xanthes wishes to speak with you immediately.”

  “Xanthes?” Nervously, Rhodopis tied the belt of her tunic in a sloppy knot. She hadn’t gone before Xanthes since the first time, on her entrance into womanhood. The master had left her alone since then, only trotting her out to perform now and again at his supper parties. “Isn’t Archidike with him now? I thought—”

  “He wants to speak with you, not bed you. I don’t know what you’ve done, but he doesn’t seem best pleased.”

  Stumbling with sudden fear, Rhodopis stepped into her rose-gold slippers. She hadn’t let them out of her sight since she’d received them that morning. She would have to find someplace else to hide them, for they certainly wouldn’t fit in the amphora, and in any case, Rhodopis didn’t know whether pond water would damage rose gold.