“Tonight, my queen, we need not hide.” He smiled in the darkness and sat down on the edge of the bed. “We’ll sleep together till dawn.”
“Till dawn,” I murmured, and already Sparta was a thousand miles away. His hand grasped my ankle, then moved higher. I relaxed contentedly among the pillows. Moonlight dripped slowly on us through a grille in the ceiling.
25
As he had promised, dawn found Paris in my arms, with his head on my breast and his mouth open; through the grille I could now see a gray sky. It was the hybrid moment when light meets darkness, the gray hour of ghosts as my wet nurse used to call it. I carefully rearranged the bedclothes over Paris on the bunk, and he started slightly in his sleep. I slipped on a tunic and pulled a shawl from my bag on the floor. The deck in the corridor rocked slowly from side to side under my feet. I shuddered at the thought of storms still far away. It was not the thought of sinking that frightened me, but of being seasick in front of Paris’s horrified eyes. Trying not to think about it, I got lost twice before I found the little stairway and climbed up to a bridge teeming with activity. The sailors, preparing to set sail, were shouting orders in a dialect I couldn’t understand, and they pushed me roughly out of the way. In the midst of this ordered chaos I saw Cebriones in the bows talking to a tall thin man who was frowning, perhaps the steersman. The Trojan prince smiled and raised his hand to me, as if I were legitimately betrothed to his brother. His boyish smile warmed my heart.
I felt familiar fingers link themselves with mine. “Callira! Where have you sprung from?”
“Prince Cebriones insisted on giving up his cabin to Etra and me. A mere hole, but anyway …”
“I doubt it was an entirely disinterested gesture.”
Callira turned to Cebriones, who was watching her as if transfixed. She gave him a smile such as no slave should ever give a prince, and the Trojan blushed.
“He’s only fifteen years old, and I don’t think he’s ever had a woman.”
“You could be the first,” I teased her, but Callira shook her head.
“If he wants me, he’ll arrange it.” A shadow passed over her eyes, turning their icy blue into a black sea. So I grasped her wrist on which a little bronze chain identified her as a slave. I squeezed the links and pulled: the bracelet fell to the deck with a tinkle.
“Starting today, you sleep with anyone you like,” I said severely, but my eyes were laughing.
Callira looked down, then a smile formed on her slender lips and she threw her arms around my neck. “I want to be with you always, Helen,” she murmured in my ear.
“Even if you go on fancying last night’s handsome soldier?” I answered, laughing.
“You know me too well, my queen. But will you let me stay in your service?”
“As long as you like, dear friend. As long as you like.” I took her hand, and together we watched the dawn dispersing a slight haze.
The anchor came loose from the sea bottom with a screeching of its chain, making terrified fish flee from the hull, streaking diagonally through the green water while the sailors hoisted a square sail. A wind was blowing behind us from the land, on our mixture of red hair and fair hair, as friendly Aeolus filled his cheeks and edged us gently away from the Peloponnese. I turned to look back at the jetties of Amyclae and, at the top of the slope, the town gates which were at that moment being opened for the day. I could see the long road to Sparta bordering the course of the Eurotas, and far off, beyond the bare hills, the mountains of what had been my country. But not now, not anymore. A dolphin leaped in front of our bows, followed by another and the sailors shouted with joy. Cebriones came up behind us and, his eyes on Callira, told us sailors called dolphins the nymphs of the sea, and saw it as a good omen when they appeared. Now these mermaids were leaping and spinning wide circles all around the ship, as we entered the metallic, wine-dark sea of Greece.
PART TWO
TROY
1
Asia Minor was hidden under a thick pall of fog, the woolen blanket of a sunless day. Paris wrapped me in his cloak and pressed his lips to my collarbone. “I wish this could have been a sunlit morning. Troy is so beautiful when its roofs are shining.”
At our last stop, at Tenedos, he had sung the praises of his city, telling me how beautiful I would find it when I finally had the chance to see it, with the blue-tiled roof of Priam’s palace sparkling in honor of the gods. But just now none of this was visible; only the outline of the fortified citadel rose above the fog; I looked at its severe contour and the narrow walls marking the bare path up to the temple of Apollo and Athene at the very top. Below the citadel’s double walls the whole lower town was drowned in the fog that had swallowed up the homes of rich and poor alike. The open Scaean Gates gaped like a black mouth on the lightless afternoon.
“Make no mistake,” Paris said in my ear, “this is a gentle land.”
But I had my doubts. Behind Troy a dark mantle of pine forests surrounded Mount Ida, and on either side deep rivers cut like wounds through the sandy plain on their way to the sea. Scamander and Simoeis; the stormy black waters of the one dark and bottomless, while the clear, solid stream of the other moved sluggishly over a bed of red clay. This was my new country: a few wooden houses and a stone pier stretching out to sea. Ten men with lanterns showed us the road. A rowing boat had come to meet us, stopping under the ship’s side. Messengers had left Tenedos two days before and reached Troy on horseback to say that Paris was not coming home from Sparta alone. I stayed on deck at the tiller with Cebriones. The sailors looked happy, their leathery old faces wreathed in smiles.
The voyage had taken us a month and a half; moving by furtive stages between caves and improbable landing places which could only be approached at evening, we had finally reached Egypt. From there we moved to Phoenicia, whose inhabitants were interested in nothing but their own business, then Asia Minor, where every landing was greeted triumphantly. Only now did Paris lose the fear and sense of insecurity that had followed him ever since we lost sight of the Peloponnese. We had been only just in time. By now Menelaus knew, but Menippus had been too proud to send news to Mycenae; an old guard dog waiting for his master at the door of an empty palace. Distant Sparta, lost beyond the confines of the world in this sea of milk and vapor. My memory of it blotted out by the numbing weight of the fog. I stood wrapped in my shawl, my eyes closed as I let the day seep through my skin and into my memory. A new life. A new home. I tried to recapture my smile and the sense of security I had felt when I crossed the ford. That crystalline world lost in this land without contours.
Familiar arms encircled my waist and I smelt the forest scent of Callira.
“My queen, we’re here; it’s no longer a dream or a mirage. This is Troy!”
I sighed. “I’m no longer a queen, Callira. Hecuba is Queen of Troy and Paris isn’t even heir to the throne.”
“Are you sorry you’ve lost your crown?”
I thought about it for a long moment. A white diadem. No. “No. Menelaus polluted the throne of Sparta, and that disgusted me.”
Callira nodded, looking toward Troy. “A beautiful city. But gloomy.”
“Do you think …?”
“Our happiness doesn’t depend on where we are. Don’t worry, Helen.”
She smiled and I smiled back at her as she moved toward the ship’s stern. Off to find her Glaucus. Yes, this was a new life and only the fog was hiding it. I must not behave like a child. I touched the amulet of Egyptian turquoise around my throat, a present from Paris. A new start. We reached the pier. Lines were flung to us, and an unstable gangway was stretched to make a fragile bridge from ship to shore.
My head was spinning after so long at sea, and dry land made me giddy; I needed to get used to it again, learn a second time how to walk. Paris smiled and pressed my hand, then turned back to the ship to direct the unloading while I waited on the wharf for Callira to join me. It was cold in the fog, so I pulled the shawl over my head. I heard a light shuffle, bare
ly more than a sigh on the Trojan wind. I turned. A horseman rode silently out of the fog and looked at me. Even on horseback you could see he was tall. A strong face. Great dark eyes that seemed to absorb the meager light. Long brown hair drawn together in a tail down his back. Strong arms and broad shoulders. He was riding bareback, and when he saw me looking at him he stared back at me for a long time but I could not interpret the expression in his eyes. Finally he tossed his head like a skittish horse, and silently shook the reins to turn his black charger. Digging in his spurs, he vanished into the fog just as he had come.
“Hector.” said Paris contemptuously behind me.
“What?”
“Hector.” He grimaced as if he had a nasty taste in his mouth.
“He was watching me … But why has he gone away?”
“Take no notice, he’s mad. Spends more time than he should with our sister Cassandra … You’ll meet her, but I warn you, don’t let her frighten you. She’s …” He shook his head without finishing what he was saying.
I nodded. No more time for talk. The horses had been disembarked. Callira smiled as she brought my reins. Now Troy.
2
We were swimming in nothingness. We could just hear, indistinctly, the cobbles under our horses’ hooves. The houses lining the road were as evanescent as shadows at sunset. There was a black shadow at the gates of Ilium. Hector, but he was not waiting for us. When he saw us he turned his horse and went ahead up the road. The light drumming of galloping hooves in the fog was like ghost music. Paris, riding in front of me, turned in his saddle and shook his head: mad, what did I tell you? I smiled weakly, but he had already turned back. I relaxed. There was no point trying to smile in the dirty milk of this air. We dismounted in a courtyard with invisible walls, gates and soldiers. Paris offered me his hand to help me up a flight of steps. Then more steps and another courtyard. It was like Sparta, too much like Sparta.
Callira went off with the rest of the retinue, giving me a last smile before she disappeared, a glimmer of green eyes fading into that blinding lightlessness, leaving me to climb the steps and cross a corridor alone. I could feel Paris’s hand in mine stiffen with anxiety. A son who knows he has done wrong coming home to his father. A child who must be punished. But there was no one about and the sentries guarding the throne room seemed carved from stone. Paris gave me an uncertain smile and we went in.
Facing us across the shining marble floor was Priam.
It was a bigger throne room than the one in Sparta, and higher than I thought it possible for anyone to build. Each window was like an immense wound in the walls, or the throat of a fish in an eternal bluish light. The court was assembled on one side, richly dressed in gold reduced to dull yellow by the absence of sunlight. Like a dune of sand and dust the king had forgotten, but his eyes never left me for a moment as I moved forward. The white splendor of the marble under my feet terrified me. But I did move forward, my smile fixed like a mask, a slave’s shawl around my shoulders. My eyes were said to burn with a green flame in weak light.
On the steps to the throne stood Priam’s huge family. Women to the left, men to the right, and the queen, her beauty overpowered by heavy ornaments of bronze and violet amethyst, showed her character in her haughty, disdainful mouth, just like the daughters lined up at her side. On the steps to the right of the throne were men in armor with richly decorated leather cuirasses and daggers hanging from their belts. The only man not in armor was Hector, who towered over the hall from the top step, in his eyes the relentless hostility of one who either did not know, or knew and was not interested in hiding his knowledge. His tunic was of simple coarse dark linen, but his face was naturally powerful, a triumph of blood with no need of help from gold. I was twenty paces from the steps when Paris signed me to stop, and I became aware that a young man previously hidden from me by Hector’s bulk was actually a woman. Extremely beautiful, with Hector’s eyes ringed by violet shadows. Her tunic was dark red and her only ornament was the bright gold band around her loose, untamed hair. A virgin of Apollo: Cassandra.
“Father.” Paris spoke, seeming to have almost recovered his arrogance. “This is my wife Helen.”
The king wasn’t old, not yet; and he ran his eyes over my body. Caressing my flanks and my breasts half-hidden among the folds of my dress, my thighs just visible below my skirt. I did not blush. After Theseus, I was used to male lust.
“Well, so this is the famous Helen …” Priam was staring shamelessly at me while the curve of Hecuba’s lips became increasingly bitter. There was silence in the hall, and I realized the king was making up his mind. If my body passed the test, his impassive smile would grant me the right to live in Troy. Finally his royal mouth spread in a happy grin: “Welcome, daughter.”
Paris relaxed beside me with a sigh of relief, while the court made obedient noises, taking the king’s approval for granted. Then a cry from Cassandra cut through the hall. I froze with amazement and turned to look at her: her open mouth was emitting a single note, like an animal whose suffering is beyond cure. The long note turned into speech, indistinct but savage.
“Burning … like a torch, like fire … ruin! Burning!”
“Cassandra, be quiet,” the king finally snapped in irritation.
But she was not listening. She slowly came down the stairs, her troubled eyes staring at me. “Come from the sea …” hardly more than a whisper. Then again that tormented scream. “Come to bring ruin to Troy!”
I drew back. Paris was in front of me. His features contracted, unrecognizable, his voice almost a snarl. “Go away, get out, how dare you …”
But Cassandra was beyond reason and the threats of men. She looked at him as if she did not know who he was. “You’ve brought us the herald of death … you, too cowardly to fight and born to destroy your race … you milksop!”
“That’s enough!” Paris raised his hand, but Cassandra stood her ground, nostrils quivering as if expecting a blow.
“Don’t touch her.” Hector came quickly down the steps of the throne to stand beside his motionless sister, who had turned into a Fury in the middle of the hall.
“Cassandra, come on, let’s go away …”
It was as if he had cut a thread. She collapsed in his arms like a broken doll. Her head on his chest, her body still lightly shuddering, her voice almost inaudible: “The herald of death …”
Paris turned away in disgust. Priam spoke: “My daughter Cassandra has been touched by the gods. Never mind her, Helen.” He smiled as though the woman collapsed into herself was not even there. “And I hope you will soon give Paris healthy sons. My first grandchildren.”
“No!” screamed Cassandra. Who knows what those eyes glaring at me could see. “No!” she screamed again.
Her brother took her by the wrists, speaking tenderly as he tried to calm her. In the midst of her screams, the calm voice of Hector was like a rock impervious to the waves. But Cassandra struggled against him, her words falling on me like torches of flame.
“This woman will bring fire. And you will die in the ruin her fire causes. Every one of you …!”
“Aeneas,” called Hector, and one of the young men to the right of the throne hurried forward. Together they led Cassandra to the door.
“Hector, wait.” Priam spoke with authority. “You must keep your sister under control. Or I really shall have to forbid her from appearing in public again.”
I could see a flash of desperate tenderness in Hector’s eyes before he gripped Cassandra firmly to take her away. The hatred in the look she gave me as they left the hall was like the quick, accurate slash of a knife cutting my heart in two.
The door closing behind Hector and Aeneas smothered Cassandra’s cries. The king tossed his head, ignoring the situation. None of the other princes and princesses, or the queen and the rest of the court, had moved. Their faces remained fixed and expressionless. Priam smiled and said with no trace of irony, “Welcome to Troy.”
3
Wind curling,
wind turning, wind sweeping rocks and singing, singing songs of a time with no thinking or desiring, a time of celebrations and banquets, of music softly sounding from instruments; wind singing to warm nights disappearing sleepless at dawn, and sleepless days in bed in the soft, gentle love of Paris. Wind blowing, wind bringing to the coast of Troy waves of cold, freezing spume, winter passing consumed by the same wind. Wind wrapping itself around the hours and stealing them, wind running away with stolen days under its arm and a lost smile in its eyes. Wind, wind spreading music, obliterating Cassandra’s cries and closing Hector’s eyes. Perhaps deceiving Helen into believing this is a new life. But only for a short time. Only until spring returns hand in hand with the wind.
4
We were halfway through a banquet when they came to tell us the ship had come. It was an important day, the anniversary of the king’s coronation and the first day of a quiet, tranquil spring. The wind was still blowing but perfumed now with soft pollen and the amber-scented sap of the forests of Ida. The sun was shining through the great windows and rested playfully on the gold weave of my veil.
I looked questioningly at Paris. It was the first ship since the Hellespont had opened again a few days before. The long winter was over and we had emerged into the sun like dazed lizards. Paris tossed his head carelessly as he sipped his wine. That’s what the winter had been like, a succession of parties in halls warmed by braziers; and if I could see no softening in the curve on the queen’s mouth, at least now I could sit at her right hand without her saying anything at all. The Trojan court was a colorful oriental magma of secret rivalries, a tissue of minute intrigues of a kind we had never had in Sparta, of precious cloth and gold flowing from the ever-full coffers of the king. A long way from the Peloponnese with its serious soldiers and hard men. There was never any hunger in the countryside around Troy; whenever Paris and I passed in our carriage the peasants would hurry to the road, offering the last fruit they had preserved before the coming of winter and the first fruits of the new season. I myself was lost, dazed and happy with the thousand presents Paris gave me, letting him adorn me and deck me out in any way he liked; every day new clothes and a new hair-do to rumple and crush during those nights that began at dawn and lasted till long after midday. A life of satisfied desire and stunning happiness. Like a cup of spiced wine. Like the long-forgotten smoke of my laurel-burning braziers.
Memoirs of a Bitch Page 9