Daughters of Sparta

by Claire Heywood

  “Yes, I suppose it does,” said Klytemnestra quietly, finally allowing the smile to fall from her cheeks now that Iphigenia could not see. “But the veil is a very important part of the wedding. You mustn’t take it off, or even lift it. Do you promise me?” Klytemnestra grasped her daughter’s narrow shoulders. “That is for your husband, after the sacrifice.” She almost choked on the last word.

  “Yes, I know, Mother.” Then she gave a small sigh. “I wish I could see how I looked.”

  “You look . . . like a princess of Mycenae,” said Klytemnestra, her eyes stinging with tears. “I am so very proud of you.”

  “Are you all right, Mother?” Iphigenia must have been able to hear the tears in her fragile voice.

  She clasped her daughter’s hand. “It is an emotional day when one’s daughter is given away in marriage.”

  “But I’ll be coming home afterward. Don’t be sad, Mother,” came the little voice from under the veil.

  Klytemnestra had to stop the sob that rose in her throat. Not able to reply, she nodded pointlessly.

  * * *

  It was still early when Talthybios led them from the tent. The sun was low and there was a remnant of pink hanging in the clouds. Klytemnestra clasped her daughter’s hand tightly, guiding her small, blind steps.

  “The wedding sacrifice is to be performed in the meadow outside the camp,” the herald informed them, as he marched ahead. Men and horses cleared a path in front of them, while grim faces watched from either side.

  As they made their slow way, Klytemnestra kept expecting her husband to appear, for him to tell them to turn back, that there would be no sacrifice after all. She scanned the camp for his dark head, but as the tents thinned and they began climbing the slope toward the meadow, he was nowhere to be seen.

  Klytemnestra’s legs shook beneath her as they approached the brow of the hill.

  “Nearly there,” she said to her daughter, hoping she would take the quaver in her voice for shortness of breath.

  Agamemnon will stop it. The goddess will save her. Agamemnon will stop it. The goddess will save her. She began chanting the words inside her head. Surely the Lady Hera had heard her prayer. She would do something. Her husband would see sense. He would stop all this. She knew it. As soon as he saw—

  And there he was. His broad shoulders emerged over the brow. And beside him a priest—not Kalchas, the coward—and nearby . . .

  An altar.

  Klytemnestra’s stomach dropped and she stumbled as if dragged with it.

  “Are you all right, Mother?” asked Iphigenia, touching her arm blindly. “What is it? Are we there?”

  “Yes, dear. Almost. Just a few more steps.” She fought to keep the terror from her voice, but when Iphigenia next spoke Klytemnestra could tell she sensed something was wrong.

  “Why is it so quiet, Mother? Where is the wedding song?”

  Klytemnestra didn’t have the strength to answer, but kept leading her on, all the while battling the urge to turn and run.

  Agamemnon will stop it. The goddess will save her. There is no sense in running. Agamemnon will stop it.

  Her husband stepped toward them. “You are here, my daughter,” he said, his voice thinner than usual. Dark shadows lurked beneath his eyes.

  A little sigh of relief came from beneath the veil. “Father.”

  “Come. It is time.”

  He took one of her pale hands in his and gave Klytemnestra a sharp look, indicating that she should let go of the one she clung to.

  She hesitated, tightening her grip, but he grabbed her wrist and squeezed so tightly that she winced. Her daughter’s hand fell from hers.

  He led Iphigenia toward the altar where the priest now stood and left her there, returning to stand beside Klytemnestra. He grasped her wrist in his huge hand once more.

  He will stop it. The goddess will save her. The voice in her head was more urgent now.

  “Father?” called Iphigenia. “Mother? What’s happening?”

  “I’m here,” Klytemnestra called back. “Don’t be afraid.” Her heart was pounding.

  Agamemnon will stop it. The goddess will save her.

  The priest had taken up a knife from beside the altar.

  Klytemnestra turned to her husband, a silent plea ready in her tear-filled eyes. But he had turned his face away.

  Coward. He could not even bear to watch. He would leave his daughter to suffer alone. But her mother would not abandon her.

  She turned back.

  The goddess will save her. Something will happen. She won’t die. She cannot die.

  Her daughter was crying.

  The priest raised the knife—Agamemnon will stop it, the goddess will save her—and lifted Iphigenia’s veil a little, enough to expose her throat.

  It was happening. Her father would not stop it. The goddess would not save her.

  Klytemnestra lurched forward, but Agamemnon held her wrist.

  “No!” she cried.

  The knife swept across Iphigenia’s neck.

  CHAPTER 41

  KLYTEMNESTRA

  Klytemnestra screamed.

  She wrenched herself free from Agamemnon’s grip and rushed forward, reaching her daughter as she fell.

  “No no no no no no no . . .” she breathed.

  It was as if a horse had kicked her in the chest. So much blood. White skin streaming red. She pulled the veil off but her daughter’s staring eyes were lightless.

  She put her shaking hand to the blood, not quite believing it was real. Pressed her hand to the wound as if she could bring her back. But she knew Iphigenia was already gone. She clutched her daughter to her chest, rocking her as she wailed.

  “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she whispered between sobs. “I failed you. I’m sorry.”

  She looked behind her for her husband, but he was still turned away.

  * * *

  “You will not take her!”

  Klytemnestra swiped wildly at the priest and his attendants with one arm, the other still clutching Iphigenia’s limp body.

  “The rites must be performed, my lady,” said the priest, taking a step backward.

  “I will not see my daughter burned like an ox!” she yelled, tears rolling unfelt down her numb cheeks. “You tell my husband that. She will be buried in Mycenae, where she belongs.”

  She glared up at the men surrounding her, daring them to defy her.

  “Very well, my lady,” said the priest after a moment. “We will tell him.” They shuffled off, heads bowed.

  She was still kneeling on the grass, in the spot where it had happened. She was covered in her daughter’s blood—her hands, her arms, her chest. The air was foul with it. From something so pure the stench of evil flowed, and now released, could not be contained.

  The horror of it swirled inside Klytemnestra, like a savage beast trapped in a cage. She screamed and sobbed and wailed and cursed but the beast remained, clawing at her heart. She clawed back, raking her cold cheeks with her nails till beads of her own dark blood dropped to mingle with her daughter’s. She barely felt it.

  * * *

  Agamemnon must have agreed to forgo the burning, for when the servants returned it was with a wagon and shroud.

  Even then she clung to her daughter, not yet ready to let her go. Patiently, cautiously, the servants pried the body from her, and finally she let them wash the blood from it and wrap it in the scented cloth. She knew she should be the one to do these things, but it was as if her feet were rooted to the earth, her arms too heavy to lift from her sides. So she watched in bewildered silence as the daughter whose sweet voice she had heard not an hour ago, whose warm hand she had held, was lifted onto the back of the wagon, a corpse.

  Klytemnestra followed the wagon back through the camp, her feet shuffling one after the other without her bi
dding. She barely saw the faces that turned to stare, barely heard the gasps and muttered prayers as they saw the blood. She almost walked into the wagon when it eventually stopped.

  “My lady,” came a voice beside her. She turned and, after a second or two, registered that it was Talthybios’s face she saw.

  “You should change your clothes, my lady,” he said in a low voice. His calmness of earlier was fractured now, his face pale. It wasn’t until he lifted the door flap that she realized they were outside her tent. “Quickly. Inside, now. There we are, my lady.”

  She stumbled through the gap in the canvas and the flap closed behind her. She looked ahead of her, and there it was. Iphigenia’s bed.

  It was like a veil had been pulled off, and the wind of reality whipped the numb haze from around her.

  Her daughter was dead. And she had let it happen.

  She should have saved her, instead of leading her to her death like a fool. She was wrong to rely on the goddess. She should have done something. And now . . . now it was too late. And it was all her fault.

  No. It wasn’t.

  It was Agamemnon. Agamemnon who had given the order. Agamemnon who had made it happen. Agamemnon whose ambition was so great he could sacrifice his own child—their child—to get what he wanted. And that was it, wasn’t it? Her whole life, since she had moved to Mycenae, had been directed by what he wanted. The wife he wanted her to be, the children he wanted her to have. All she had ever wanted was a family, and she had earned it, hadn’t she? With her dutifulness, her obedience, her suffocating meekness. All those hours of spinning wool and bowing her head, of shutting her mouth and opening her legs. And still he could not let her keep this one thing for herself. The injustice of it raged inside her, for herself, for her daughter, for those blank staring eyes that had once held the light of her world.

  And then she remembered her vow.

  I will kill him in return. That was what she had whispered in the dark night. Her stiff lips mouthed the words, remembering the shape of them. And didn’t he deserve it? Their daughter lay cold in a shroud. And for what? A good wind? A chance at glory?

  Her cheeks were hot now, her heart pumping. The longer she stared at that empty bed, the harder it pumped. And the more determined she became.

  She didn’t change her clothes. If she lingered she might lose her resolve. Instead she turned straight around and left the tent.

  Her husband’s tent was not far—she could see its top from where she stood. She set off with long strides, ignoring the stares and the whispers.

  As she neared the tent she realized she didn’t know what she was going to do when she got there.

  Kill him, said the beast still clawing inside her.

  How? came her own meeker voice. But there was no time. She was there.

  No guard. It was as if the Lady Hera were willing her on. Her hand trembled as she pulled the door aside.

  Agamemnon sat at the other end of the tent, his broad back to the door. He didn’t seem to hear her enter. She paused inside the door.

  Could she really do it? She raised her hands before her, still smeared with her daughter’s lifeblood. Were they the hands of a murderer?

  She could do it for Iphigenia.

  Stepping silently, she glanced about the tent.

  There. On the table between her and her husband—a dagger. Its golden handle glinted encouragingly, as if placed there by Lady Hera herself.

  She picked it up and carried on toward her husband’s broad, exposed back.

  Almost there. Her legs stiffened but she carried on. She raised the dagger. He was so close she could hear his breath, smell his sweat.

  She hesitated, dagger hanging in the air. It was as if something were holding it there.

  She had to do it. She had made a vow.

  She raised the dagger higher and—

  “My lord.”

  Klytemnestra snapped her arm down by her side and turned toward the doorway, where the voice had come from. She managed to push the small blade up into her sleeve just as Talthybios entered.

  “My lor— Lady Klytemnestra,” he said with surprise. “Your clothes— I thought you were going to change?”

  “Yes, I—”

  “What are you doing here?” came her husband’s voice from behind her.

  But as she turned to him his look of confusion turned to concern—or perhaps it was revulsion.

  “Your face . . .” he said. “Talthybios, I thought I told you to see to my wife? Why is she still covered in blood? Has she been walking through the camp like this? And those cuts . . .”

  “Y-yes, my lord. I mean, I tried—”

  “Have a servant come here to attend her. I won’t have her wandering the camp. And make sure they bring fresh clothes.”

  “Yes, my lord. Right away.”

  Talthybios hurried out, leaving the two of them alone once again. Klytemnestra was still stunned by what had happened—by what had almost happened. She looked up at her husband dumbly.

  “Iphigenia will be buried in Mycenae, as you asked,” said Agamemnon gruffly. He seemed unable to look her full in the face. “May it bring you comfort. I . . . It is a terrible thing that you have suffered today. I suggest you return home as soon as possible.”

  Even now he could not apologize, could not take responsibility for what he had done. She stood glaring up at him, her hand shaking as it still held the dagger’s hilt. Just a few more seconds. That was all she had needed. Those few seconds of hesitation. If she hadn’t been such a coward.

  “I will have your wagon prepared,” he said. “I will not see you again before you leave. The seer spoke true—the winds have begun to change already. I must make arrangements for our departure.” He headed toward the door.

  “Husband,” she murmured, and he paused, looking back. But no more words would come. She squeezed the dagger hilt.

  “Farewell, wife,” he said. “Until I return.”

  And then he was gone, and her opportunity with him.

  PART IV

  CHAPTER 42

  HELEN

  TWO YEARS LATER

  Back and forth. Back and forth. Helen sent the shuttle between the threads. After all these years there was a comforting familiarity in the loom. The rhythm of the shuttle, the smell of the wool, the rooted solidity of the wooden frame. If she closed her eyes, she could almost imagine she was back in Sparta.

  On the other side of the chamber Paris sat arranging his hair, combing sweetly scented oil through each ringlet and assessing his progress with a silver mirror. Every now and then the polished metal would catch the light from the window and flash at Helen through the threads of her loom.

  Troy was at war, but for the most part life went on as usual. Since its arrival two years ago, the Greek force had spent much of its time pillaging the surrounding settlements, growing fat and rich from Troy’s extensive hinterland. Paris had told her they had even raided some of the islands off the coast. He called them cowards.

  “Troy’s walls cannot be breached,” he had assured her. “Your Greeks know this, and they fear our men. Let them kill farmers. They will never take Troy.”

  The city certainly seemed well defended. The citadel, where the royal palaces were, sat atop a rocky acropolis, with walls so high and so wide that Helen thought they must have been built by giants. And down on the plain, like the flesh around an olive stone, lay the lower city, itself bounded by another wall, and beyond that a great ditch. What few skirmishes there had been—all within the first few months of the Greeks’ arrival—had taken place beyond the city, on the plain between Troy’s boundary walls and the beach where the Greek ships had landed. If it weren’t for the food restrictions, it would be difficult to tell there was a war going on at all.

  The Greeks claimed they were here to take her back, but for now they seemed more interested i
n plundering the Troad for all it held. Helen sometimes wondered which theft had grieved her husband more: hers, or that of Sparta’s royal treasure.

  But why should she care? She had a new life now, and a new husband. Paris was handsome and rich and . . . She had everything she needed here in Troy.

  Helen continued with her weaving. Back and forth, back and forth. As she worked she began to hum, a familiar tune that came without thinking, a tune from her childhood, one she used to sing while she and Nestra spun their wool in the women’s room . . .

  The notes stopped in her throat, as a horrible feeling spread through her chest. Oh, Nestra.

  Word had reached Troy of what Agamemnon had done to bring his army to their shore. Poor Nestra. Thinking of her sister always used to bring Helen comfort, but now it brought only guilt. She had never meant for anything like that to happen, not to Nestra, not to anyone. She hadn’t really meant for any of this to happen. It just had.

  “Why do you look so miserable?” Paris had turned to face her, his hair satisfactorily arranged. “You look much prettier when you smile.”

  Helen wiped the tear that had been about to fall and forced her cheeks upward.

  “That’s better,” Paris said, and rose from his stool. “I’m going down to the armory. My sword needs a new scabbard—this one is so dull.”

  “Can I come with you?” asked Helen, rising quickly from her seat. She didn’t like being in the chamber alone.

  Paris laughed. “Do you fear a harpy will come to snatch you while I am gone?” He threw his leopard skin around his shoulders. “The armory is no place for a woman. Go and sit in the hall with the others if you want some company.”

  Helen hesitated.

  “Come,” said Paris, stepping toward the door. “I have to go that way anyway. I will escort you.”