Beauty's Daughter: The Story of Hermione and Helen of Troy (16 page)

“I’m her friend,” Astynome said.

“As am I,” said Hippodameia.

“They’ll be with me at the wedding,” I explained to my mother. “If you insist upon forcing me to marry Pyrrhus.”

Helen sighed. Her delicately arched eyebrows rose. “Hermione, do you understand nothing? Women do as men command—that’s the way of the world. We really have very little choice of whom we marry. Isn’t that true?” She looked from one to the other of my friends.

“It’s true,” admitted Hippodameia, and Astynome nodded.

“My father chose Menelaus from among all my suitors and married me to him. The choice wasn’t mine—I scarcely knew him!” Helen said.

“You chose to leave him and to run away with Paris,” I could not resist reminding her.

“It was the work of Aphrodite,” she said. “I’m not sure it
was
my choice. And it was certainly
not
my choice to marry Deiphobus after Paris was killed—Priam insisted, and Deiphobus forced himself upon me.”

“Now he is dead too—and by your own hand!”

“Did I kill him?” Helen frowned. “First he was there, threatening me, and then he lay dead on the floor and I was holding a bloody knife. But did I choose to kill him? I’m not certain I did,” she said, shaking her head. “I don’t remember. Perhaps the gods intervened.”

“But it was your choice to return to Father?”

“Oh, yes.” My mother smiled. “This time it is. I’m happy that he still wants me as his wife after all that has happened.”

I wondered if she was telling the truth.

“Then why are you forcing me to marry Pyrrhus? I was promised to Orestes by your father. I love him, Mother, and Orestes loves me! Surely you can understand that.”

“I understand it, but I can do nothing about it, and neither can you. It doesn’t matter what your grandfather promised—he’s long dead. Your father pledged you to the son of Achilles even before the ships sailed from Greece for Troy.”

Had he really done that? Was
this
true? And if it was, as my mother claimed, why had he not said anything to me in all this time?

“Menelaus owes it to the memory of the great warrior to honor that pledge,” Helen was saying, though I scarcely listened. “Breaking that promise would only lead to more violence, and there’s surely been enough of that. Now bring your friends, Hermione, and we’ll prepare for your wedding. Who knows—you may even come to care for Pyrrhus. Stranger things have happened.”

I gazed into her eyes of hyacinth blue and gave up. “I will obey, Mother, and do as you and Father command. But I will
never
care for that brute.”

Glumly, I went with my mother, my two friends trailing along silently behind us. It seemed odd to be with Helen. She had not expressed a single word of regret at leaving me behind, or one word of pleasure at seeing me after such a long separation. Was she happy to be with me? What did she think of me, of the woman I’d become?

I walked beside Helen, feeling tongue-tied. There was so much in my heart that I wanted to say to her but I could not. It had been ten years since we’d lived together. We were different people now. I didn’t know her. I wasn’t sure I ever had. I had no idea what she was thinking. She was so cool, so remote.

All the fleets except Agamemnon’s lay anchored near the teeming beach. The smell of roasting meat drifted through the air. Musicians were tuning their instruments. Only days earlier this had been a desolate place, the shelters of a temporary city built for war pulled down and burned, leaving only smoking ash. Now the ashes had been buried and tents erected again, fitted out with carpets and fine furnishings looted from the conquered Troy. It had all happened so swiftly, carried out by Trojans now enslaved by the Greeks.

My mother led me into her quarters, where she’d laid out several gowns and veils from the trunks she’d brought from Troy. “I wove them myself,” she said, holding up one elegantly decorated peplos after another. “There should be something suitable here for you. And for your friends, too,” she added, glancing at Hippodameia and Astynome.

My mother sent several of her serving women to dress me and to fix my hair. She also left necklaces and bracelets set with lapis lazuli, earrings of amethyst, and other jewelry. I chose a peplos of finely spun wool dyed a delicate yellow and treated with oil that gave it a rich luster, and a gossamer veil stitched with spangles of hammered silver and small discs of gold. There were also well-made sandals of soft and supple leather. The loom Zethus had made for me and the veil I’d been weaving for my dreamed-of wedding to Orestes were already on Pyrrhus’s ship. I prayed that my half of the wedding goblet was safely hidden there too.

Astynome dismissed Helen’s serving women, telling them that she would arrange my hair herself. It had grown long, and when Astynome finished combing it smooth and fixing little curls across my forehead, it shone like burnished copper.

“Hermione,” Hippodameia said, watching us, “you have no idea how beautiful you look. I think Helen is jealous of you.”

Hippodameia began then to recall her own wedding, interrupted so brutally by the arrival of Achilles. “I’d spent the day with my mother and aunts and sisters. They walked with me to the megaron where my father and the man I was to marry were making their sacrifices to the gods. I remember the scent of flowers. How nervous I felt when I saw the man who was to be my husband! His eyes were kind. But at that moment Achilles stormed in with his henchmen and the murders began.”

“And yet, in spite of what he had done, you came to love him,” I remarked, wondering how that could be possible.

“Yes,” Hippodameia admitted, “I did. There was goodness in Achilles as well, and when I discovered that goodness, my feelings toward him changed.” She took my hands in both of hers and looked earnestly into my eyes. “Pyrrhus is his son. If you can, try to find the goodness in him, too. You may not love him, but it will make your life bearable.”

Though I did think she was wrong—I saw no hints of goodness in Pyrrhus—I thanked her.

Astynome arranged my shimmering veil, and when the heralds had twice come for us and we could not delay any longer, the three of us went out together to the beach where the rites would take place and my father would hand me over to my husband. It was to be a hurried affair. Menelaus was eager to take Helen home to Sparta; Pyrrhus would tolerate no more delays before returning to Phthia.

Pyrrhus had never looked more handsome; I gave him that. He wore a beautiful white tunic banded in blue and belted over a kilt fringed with tassels, and a necklace of amber beads that were favored by warriors. His long, wheat-colored hair was freshly washed and oiled. He had grown a beard. But handsome as he was, he was not Orestes.

I must stop thinking about Orestes,
I told myself
. My lover is gone.

Animals were sacrificed, and libations of wine were poured on the ground. I scarcely heard the words being spoken. My father, smiling, joined my hands with Pyrrhus’s.

My lover is gone.

The feasting and drinking went on until after the stars appeared. I looked for Hippodameia and Astynome but couldn’t find them. Queen Helen, luminous in her beauty, was the center of attention, just as she had always been. She was playing a lyre and singing in a pure, silvery voice, her golden hair streaming, marble-white skin glowing in the torchlight. Every man listened as though no one else in the world had ever sung such songs.

Pyrrhus led me back to his tent. We walked in silence. We had nothing to say to each other. I was surprised to find Andromache there, though I should not have been. She huddled in a corner, watching us warily. Pyrrhus grasped her by the shoulders and steered her out of the tent. “Tonight I lie with my wife,” he said. She went away silently. I knew she was relieved.

My husband took me angrily, forcibly, with no regard for my feelings. I closed my eyes and submitted, weeping for Orestes.

My lover is gone. Gone. Gone.

19

THE REMAINING GREEK FLEETS
prepared to sail for home. Odysseus had already departed with his ships. Menelaus’s fleet was ready to set out for Sparta. Helen had agreed to take Astynome, along with her baby, as her servant. Astynome had confided to me that although she had accepted this offer, her goal when she reached Sparta was to find her way to Agamemnon in Mycenae. I considered that foolhardy. Not only was Clytemnestra not likely to welcome her as a replacement, but Agamemnon had declared his love for Cassandra. Hippodameia begged to be allowed to come with me, and when I asked permission from Pyrrhus, he did not deny me. I would have at least one friend—two, if Andromache could be counted.

Someone else had joined us: a Trojan named Helenus, twin brother of Cassandra, brother of Hector and Paris, though not nearly as handsome as Paris. Helenus had been the rival of Deiphobus to marry my mother after Paris was killed, but luckily for Helenus—or Helen might have stabbed him instead—Priam chose Deiphobus. Helenus was said to have the gift of prophecy, taught him by his sister, Cassandra, but people believed
his
prophecies, unlike hers.

“Helenus will make a useful servant,” Pyrrhus said. “I need someone to make accurate predictions.”

Maybe it would be good for Andromache to have her husband’s brother nearby. Or maybe not—that depended on many things. Helenus was unlikely to forget that Pyrrhus had also murdered Priam, Helenus’s father, and countless other noble Trojans. I marveled that my husband could sleep at night with so many in his household who no doubt wished him dead.

We were ready to set sail. I had looked in vain for Zethus. No one seemed to know what happened to him after he’d fulfilled his duty, signaling the Greek ships and then letting the men inside the wooden horse know when the troops had arrived. I had to assume he’d been killed in the turmoil and bloodshed that followed. I greatly feared that his body lay rotting within the walls of the ruined city.

THE GODS HAD DECIDED
to toy with the Greeks once more—or perhaps the men had misjudged the winds. Pyrrhus had told me he expected to reach Phthia in three days. Menelaus had given a similar estimate of the time it would take his ships to get to Sparta. But they hadn’t counted on the violent tempests that swept the Chief Sea, scattering the ships and drowning many men who, until the water finally closed over their heads, had clung to the belief that they’d soon be with their wives and children again.

Now, after a long and violent voyage, Pyrrhus’s ships—what was left of them—arrived at Iolkos, the main seaport in Phthia. I was very glad to be on dry land after days of relentlessly churning seas, towering waves, and winds that tore at the sail. The Myrmidons had reached their homeland at last, and when we stepped onto the shore, even the most hardened among them kissed the ground.

We camped at Iolkos while the ships were unloaded and Pyrrhus’s share of the Trojan treasure was piled onto donkey carts. That night the men celebrated, and after much wine had been drunk, Pyrrhus summoned a ship’s captain, a man named Leucus, and ordered him to burn all the ships bearing Pyrrhus’s emblem, the horns of a bull on a rayed star.

Leucus was not a Myrmidon but came from the island of Skyros, where Pyrrhus had spent his boyhood. “All of them?” Leucus asked, and hesitated, frowning.

“Yes, all of them!” Pyrrhus shouted angrily. “Are you questioning my command?” He struck Leucus squarely in the face. Blood spurted from the captain’s mouth. His front teeth were now gone.

Leucus didn’t flinch. He gave the order to the men, who ran drunkenly from ship to ship with flaming torches, setting fire to the entire fleet. I watched the leaping flames with a sinking heart and understood that Pyrrhus was destroying our connection to the rest of the world.

The blackened hulls of the ships were still smoldering when Pyrrhus led his war-weary troops on the long journey overland toward the heart of Phthia. The rough path, sometimes not much more than a goat track, wound through the mountains. There were no carrying chairs. Hippodameia, Andromache, and I struggled to keep up with the soldiers and the donkey carts. Helenus did what he could to help us, until Pyrrhus grew suspicious of the Trojan’s nearness to Andromache and ordered him to stay away. Runners dashed ahead to scattered villages to alert the inhabitants to our approach. Peasants emerged from their huts to greet the battle-scarred warriors, trying to recognize the men they hadn’t seen for ten years.

I saw no young children in these villages, only hollow-eyed women and a few stooped old men; the younger men and boys had left their homes long ago to follow Achilles into battle. There were tears of joy as women welcomed their husbands, and half-grown boys and girls shrank from fathers who were strangers to them. There were tears of grief, too; many women wailed and scratched their faces when they realized their husbands were not among those who had come back.

The villagers quickly organized themselves to prepare a feast, slaughtering their fattest animals and bringing out dust-covered wine jars saved for years for this occasion. After we’d eaten and drunk our fill and stories had been told and retold, we moved on to the next village, and the next, Pyrrhus’s army of Myrmidons shrinking as the men reached their homes.

I’d lost count of the days when at last we crossed a broad plain marked with stands of leafy green trees, sparkling springs, and a fast-moving river. Pyrrhus pointed out the citadel on the crest of a high hill. “Pharsalos!” he shouted. “Capital of Phthia, the kingdom of the Myrmidons!”

Walls constructed of huge, rough boulders—walls twice as thick as those at Sparta and Mycenae—encircled the citadel and extended down the hill to surround the town below. Outside the walls lay abandoned fields, once planted in grain but now overrun with thistle, and we entered the sleepy lower town through unguarded gates hanging on broken hinges. The narrow, crooked streets were unpaved and dusty, and the mud-brick houses, even the large ones of the wealthier citizens, were neglected and crumbling, the sagging roofs in need of thatching.

“It’s nothing like Troy,” murmured Andromache, walking beside me.