by Emily Hauser
‘This is not godly,’ I said, my voice shaking. ‘We have done what you came for. We must go.’
‘Go?’
‘We must leave!’ I shouted at her. ‘You came for me, did you not? We have dealt vengeance on the Greeks. You have me and now – it is my order – we must leave!’
The light from the flames of the torched palace washed the battleground in streaks of orange as I turned my horse around. A fanfare rent the air, trumpets, coming from the west – and painted red in fire I saw more Greeks charging from around the flank of the palace rock, eyes glinting darkly through their helmets, spear-blades shimmering scarlet.
‘Melanippe,’ I shouted, ‘gather the troops,’ and I galloped off, calling to my Amazons and shouting the retreat, through duelling warriors fighting hand to hand, ducking spears and arrows and parrying the swords raised against me, blood and iron scenting the air.
I swore then, my heart singing with pain – my vision blurring as I forced myself to gaze on the flames of the blaze that consumed the palace where he had done me wrong – that I would never, in all my life, trust another Greek.
Ἀδμήτη
Admete
Sarmatia
The Eighth Day of the Month of Ploughing, 1265 BC
I started awake. The door to the wagon in which I slept had flown open, rebounding against the wall with a crack. My vision was blurred, and for a moment I could not recall where I was. Tiryns, with the fire lit by my father’s slaves? Or is it the hides of the Amazon tents flapping in the wind?
I blinked to see the outline of Alcides, framed against the sparkling light of dawn. I pushed myself to sit, rubbing my eyes, taking a breath to greet him.
But he was holding out a golden apple, and the words faltered in my throat.
Even in the half-darkness, lit only by the smouldering embers of the brazier, it made me gasp. I had never, in all my life, seen anything so perfect. Was it the shimmering skin that shattered the light into a thousand golden stars, or its fullness that drew my eyes so? As I gazed at it, it seemed to tease together all my desires, then bring them to life: visions spun in gold-thread filaments flashing before my eyes until I could barely see, and sparks spun bronze around my head, like the constellations turning in the heavens. And the letters inscribed across the skin in a fine, slanting hand: ΤΩΙ ΑΘΑΝΑΤΩΙ – For the Immortal – seemed to dance before me.
I swallowed, blinked. The scene around me resolved itself into reality. Alcides held out the apple. Cracks of light filtered through the wooden shutters at the windows, barely illuminating the patchwork covers on my bed, and the brazier hissed as a gust of wind blew over it.
I gathered the blankets up around my chest. ‘How did you come by it?’
He stepped forwards, tossing the apple into his other hand, and as he did so I heard Timiades, Perses and some of the others out in the clearing, talking and laughing, their horses whinnying. ‘We landed on the island of the Hesperides in the midst of a storm, a terrible storm,’ he said, spreading his hands wide, as a poet would tell the lay of a great hero. ‘I found it beneath a tree. The apples of the Hesperides were not so well guarded after all! But …’ he took my hands and pulled me to stand, his face taking on an expression of beatific joy ‘… that is not what matters. I have finished, Admete! I have completed my labours! All mortals will know of my greatness, and I will be accepted by Zeus among the gods!’
I shuddered at the darting whiteness of his eyes. ‘Alcides,’ I began, but he went on, rambling, half raving. ‘Alcides!’
He ceased muttering his own praises, and I saw his eyes focus on me, as if he had quite forgotten I was there.
‘Do you not find it strange,’ I said, keeping my voice low and wrapping a blanket tight around my shoulders, ‘that the apple was so easily found? And that there was only one? What if you did not find the Garden of the Hesperides at all?’
He frowned in the half-light. ‘Why would you say such a thing?’
I let out a breath. ‘Because all reason suggests it! A garden, Alcides – Timiades said it was a garden, and guarded by the daughters of Atlas! Why would the king and queen of the gods leave an apple there unprotected—’
He gave an incredulous laugh, and dropped my hand. ‘You are envious!’ he said, stepping back from me. ‘Envious of my glory!’
Now it was my turn to laugh. ‘Envious?’ I exclaimed. ‘When have I ever been a peacock-headed fool prancing around before others to earn their praise? But you, Alcides—’
‘You are calling me a fool?’ His voice was rising, and the Greeks in the yard beyond quietened.
‘I am merely saying that you would do well to be cautious!’ I snapped back. ‘Why would the gods allow you to find the apple with so little difficulty? Surely even you must see that it is worthy of suspicion.’
‘It was hardly simple!’ he roared, spit flying from his lips. ‘The truth is, Admete, you never wished me to succeed. You wished to have me always to yourself, as it was when we were in Tiryns, and now that I have proven myself an equal of the gods and will be famed among mortals I have piqued your vanity!’
I tightened the blanket around my shoulders and returned to my bed, shifting so that my back was turned to him. When I spoke it was to the wall. ‘The trouble with you, Alcides, is that you think always of your glory, and when you are distracted by fame and immortality you fail, always, to use your head.’
I heard nothing more from him, until a slam of the door and a shuddering of the wagon told me he was gone.
The next morning, as we were breaking our fast with the Sarmatians seated on the grass by the open fire at the centre of the enclosure, eating bread and cheese and drinking mare’s milk, Alcides came to me. Many of the Greeks had already finished, and my mother was occupied with the Sarmatians, so we were alone. I did not look up from my dish, and focused my gaze instead on the fire before me, feeling the breeze fresh on my face.
‘What?’ I asked.
He said nothing, but settled on the stool beside me. He took a breath to say something; then, unable to speak and for want of anything better to do, he pushed a morsel of bread into his mouth.
He has come to apologize, then, I thought, as the birds chattered in the trees nearby and the sheep bleated in their pen. My anger with him softened.
I opened my mouth to say something, but it was he who spoke first.
‘You know what this means?’
I wiped my bread around my bowl, catching the crumbs and frowning. ‘What?’
‘Finishing the labours,’ he said. ‘Completing my tasks.’
‘Immortality?’ I asked. ‘Eternal glory?’
‘Yes,’ he said. He was pushing the clay plate back and forth over his lap. ‘But – I do not know if you ever knew …’ He cleared his throat, evidently at a loss for words.
I turned to stare at him. ‘I have not seen you so incapable of speech since we sat in the apple orchard all those years ago and I first told you of my mother.’
Instead of laughing, as he would usually have done, his face reddened. ‘Yes – well—’ He swallowed, his jaw working. ‘I asked your father Eurystheus for your hand, but he said he could not allow it until my labours were complete – if you agreed. Well – now they are. I will be remembered across the ages. I will become a god.’ He turned his face to me at last, his eyes challenging. ‘What do you think, Admete?’
My mouth was dry. ‘What do I think – of what?’
‘Becoming my wife, of course. Is it not obvious?’
I let out a laugh. I could not help it. After the quarrel we had had the night before, he was asking me, here, in the land where I had found my mother … ‘Alcides, surely you cannot be serious!’
The flash of anger and hurt in his eyes was enough to tell me that he was. Oh, gods. Hera, defend me. I leant forwards to catch his hand as he made to push back his stool. ‘No – no, don’t go,’ I said. He was frowning at me, brows lowering, and his cheeks were flushed, but he allowed me to pull him back to hi
s seat.
I took a breath to steady myself, my mind working quickly as I gathered the words. ‘I am honoured by your request,’ I said. ‘Truly I am. Had you asked me before we left Tiryns, I believe I would have accepted. But,’ I pressed his hand between my own, leaning down to catch his gaze, ‘surely you must have noticed that things are broken between us?’
He did not reply.
‘We have done nothing but quarrel these past months,’ I went on. ‘We are too different, you and I. We long for different things. Your heart is set on immortality, and I …’ I smiled a little and squeezed his fingers ‘… I would wish for someone whose heart was mine alone. I would want a man with whom I could spend my life in Tiryns, in my father’s home, and, when life is done, pass quietly together to the Underworld. Eternity would be lonely, I think, without someone to share it with. I do not long for Olympus. But you do, Hercules.’
He looked up at the name, and though his face was creased with hurt, I saw the old longing, bright in his eyes.
‘You do. And I would not wish it otherwise. This is your calling, as I have mine.’
A long silence passed between us.
‘This is your choice?’ he said at last, and his voice was bitter, and he avoided my gaze.
I bowed my head, my heart pounding. ‘It is.’
He withdrew his hand from mine and stood, his broad frame casting me in shade.
‘Hercules,’ I called as he moved away, and he turned back. ‘I wish you to know. I will always be proud to have been your friend.’
A faint smile flickered over his face as his eyes rested on me, and beside him the fire spat and wood-pigeons called from the branches.
‘And I yours, daughter of Eurystheus.’
The Voyage Home
Hippolyta
Attica, Greece
The Thirty-ninth Day after the Day of Fire in the Season of Tabiti, 1265 BC
I rode a day from Athens to reach the Saka allies who had accompanied Melanippe, a tribe I later learnt she had come across as they traversed the Danastris, who claimed a distant kinship to our clan. After a disagreement between Melanippe and their leader, Panasagoras, they had chosen to pitch camp and to raid and burn the homesteads of the Attic fields rather than aid the Amazons in their attack on Athens. Neither Melanippe nor any of the others attempted to speak with me as we rode. It was as if they were giving me time to come to terms with what had happened; as if they knew that, when I was ready, I would come to them. For that I was grateful, and for long stretches of time I would lose myself in the sway of the horse beneath me, the cries of the kestrels and chattering swifts skittering overhead and the grey-green line of the horizon. I let my mind catch on inconsequential details, like a fisherman’s net snagging rocks: the play of the evening light on the silted sands of the Cephissus river; the rutting of a track where it had been passed over by chariot wheels; the bracken that lined the path, darkened by our allies who had burnt the crops of this fertile land. I felt that if I allowed myself to think at all – of the shame I had brought on my people, how I had failed as a queen, failed my sisters, my mother and all my tribe – I would be unable to go any further for the prickling goad of my humiliation. All I could do was to ignore it, to pretend I did not feel the creeping sense of failure in the pit of my stomach, to act as if I did not know that all the Amazons’ eyes were on my back as I rode before them, whispering between each other at my foolishness, pointing to their wounds and muttering of all I had cost them.
And so I rode on, trying, as I had always done, to keep my back straight and my chin lifted, as though I were a queen still in more than name.
Melanippe cantered ahead, her plait swinging behind her, to approach the allies with whom we would return north. I hung back, picking at the stitching on my reins, trying not to think how much better a leader my sister would have been than I. The Saka had taken over a Greek farmhouse and its outbuildings, a whitewashed stone dwelling surrounded by a low wall, a couple of barns for the hay, a pigsty and stables. Their horses were scattered over the hill behind, cropping the feathery grass, and most of the Saka ducked in and out of tents they had erected over the farmland, trampling the stalks of wheat and sending the dry scent of chaff onto the evening air. Melanippe guided one of the Saka towards me, a man with deep-socketed eyes and long hair tied back. I slid from my mount to greet him.
‘This is Panasagoras,’ Melanippe said. ‘He is the son of Sagylus, and pledged his support to us.’
Panasagoras gave a forced bow, his nostrils flared. ‘What your sister means,’ he said, ‘is that we were not informed when we joined her cause that you went with the Greeks in exchange for the freedom of your people. It is hardly an unlawful capture if the captive gives herself up willingly so that her people may be spared, is it – my queen?’ This last he added with a sneer.
The insult cut me like a dagger against the skin. I turned aside to recover myself, running my fingers over the war-belt Melanippe had given me: less fine than my own had been, but fitted with hooks enough for a couple of sagaris and a quiver. You have nothing to be ashamed of, I told myself, trying to force myself into belief. It was not your offence but Theseus’s that led to this.
‘The prince of Athens did not keep his oath,’ I said at last, looking up at him, keeping my gaze steady. ‘Though by all the laws of fair conduct in war he should have respected me as a captive queen, he treated me in every manner as a slave. Though he swore to take me as his wife, he broke my trust and abused his rights as a husband. I do not claim that Melanippe foresaw this, only that she had right on her side to come after me. And,’ I forestalled him, holding up my hand, ‘do you truly think I had a choice in the matter, when the Greeks threatened to raze the camp of the Amazons if I did not accompany them – having already caused much slaughter and destruction to our people? Having already,’ I swallowed, ‘slain my beloved sister?’ I held his gaze as his horse shifted beside him, sensing his discomfort. ‘Would you have acted any differently, son of Sagylus?’
He snorted, a line appearing between his brows.
‘And if the Greek lord comes after us to take you back? Why should I risk my people for that?’
I shook my head. ‘I assure you he will not. I know him: his pride will be hurt by his defeat in open battle. He will not try again for fear of failure in the eyes of the Greeks. And,’ I thought of the other women of whom Theia had spoken, and the vengeful look in his eyes as he had gazed at me that last night at the feast, ‘he is not so attached to me. Come,’ I said, extending my hand to him. He hesitated, then, at last, he took it, his grip firm. ‘Let us ride together, as kinsmen.’
He gave a half-nod and turned aside. ‘We ride tomorrow, then,’ he said. ‘We have raided all the horses we can, in any case, for they are scarce to be found, and kept guarded in stables.’
He strode off, and I turned to Melanippe, who was watching me, her eyes shining with tears. ‘Oh, sister,’ she said. She caught me and pressed me to her. Together we sobbed and wept and laughed, the blue sky whirling above us. ‘Sister,’ she said, over and over again, ‘sister.’
At last our tears subsided, and we broke apart. I lifted my cloak and dried her cheeks, then my own. She tried to smile but her mouth wavered. ‘I thought I had lost you.’
I grasped her hand in mine, feeling the flesh that was mine, too, tracing the blue veins beneath her skin that carried the same blood. ‘You will never lose me again,’ I said fiercely, interlacing our fingers so that we were woven together, her knuckles turning pale as we gripped each other. ‘Never, do you hear me? I will never leave you, or Cayster, or any of you again.’
Ἀδμήτη
Admete
Sarmatia
The Fourteenth Day of the Month of Ploughing, 1265 BC
Five days after Alcides’ return, as the morning broke and the tips of the trees nearby were fringed with gold, I came to my mother’s wagon. She opened the door, and her mouth tightened as she took in my expression.
‘So,’ sh
e said. ‘You are going to leave.’ It was not a question.
‘Do you have your belongings?’ I asked, in a soft voice, as she beckoned me in, latched the door and turned, the lamp flaring in my face. ‘From Greece,’ I added.
She sighed, her breath warm on my face, and nodded. ‘I knew it would come to this.’ She reached a hand to my shoulder and curled the end of my plait around her fingers, her eyes over-bright. ‘I am proud of you, my daughter.’
Kneeling on the rug beside her bed, she reached beneath and, with a scraping sound, brought out a wooden box. She handed it to me, and I slid back the lid. They were all there, laid carefully on coloured squares of felt: the bone comb I remembered her using to dress her hair, a flask of scented oil that had hung on a cord from her girdle, the delicate gold chain she wore around her neck. I looked up at her. ‘Will you – will you help me?’ I asked her, and I knew from the flicker in her eyes that she understood what I meant.
It is time.
It is time I chose to which of my two worlds I belong.
It is time I became a Greek, at last.
I sat on the edge of her bed, the blankets sinking beneath me and sending a waft of her scent over me, and started to unplait my hair. She hesitated, and I wondered for a moment whether she would refuse to do it. She set the lamp down, and I saw the shadows shift and change. And then, in utter silence, with nothing but the wind about us, the rise and fall of the breathing of the Sarmatians in the wagon as they slept, she started to comb my hair. I closed my eyes, feeling the comb scrape against my scalp, the brush of her hand. There was an intimacy to it, sadness, too – an echo of the days we had missed together. I felt her breath upon my neck as she bent to tuck a strand of hair into the ribbon, felt her deft fingers knotting and twisting till my scalp prickled. I winced as she pulled at my lobes to fasten the earrings.