Beauty's Daughter: The Story of Hermione and Helen of Troy (19 page)

I knew it was a mistake to argue with him, and yet I couldn’t stop myself. “And when husbands betray their wives with concubines, that’s a very different matter, I suppose? Men are free to sow their seed wherever they wish, and women must accept it!
I’m
supposed to accept it!”

I saw the alarmed expressions on the faces of Andromache and Hippodameia, Pyrrhus’s favored bedmates. They stared at me, mouths forming O’s, and they knew, as I did, that there were others as well. I wondered about their true feelings, but I no longer cared enough about either woman to want to ask them.

The anger rang in his voice like the clash of a bronze sword on a bronze shield. “My ill luck to have married a whore like her mother in every way but one—her looks. At least Helen is beautiful!”

For little more than a heartbeat I was rigid as stone. Then I inclined my head slightly in the direction of Pyrrhus’s glaring eyes and reddening face and swept out of the megaron.

“Bitch!” he shouted. A wine goblet flew past my head and smashed. Wine ran down the wall like blood.

I kept going.

“You’re not even a decent whore, Hermione!” he bellowed after me. “Andromache knows how to please a man. Hippodameia does too. You eat my food and drink my wine and give me nothing in return.”

His cruel words bounced off me like pebbles off a wall, but I knew that I would pay for
my
words, for speaking out. I sat in my bedroom, trembling, waiting for whatever punishment he chose to deal.

My husband had no love for me; I was merely part of the spoils of war, as Andromache was. But she had given him a son, even Hippodameia had produced a daughter, and he often threw it in my face that I was barren.
Of no value,
he had told me more than once;
worthless.

My punishment was longer coming than I’d expected. As the night wore on and he didn’t appear, I hoped that he had decided to stay with one of his concubines and I could go to sleep. But I was wrong. Pyrrhus strode shouting into my bedroom and seized me.

“I’ve been thinking about your visitor,” he snarled, forcing me down on the bed. “Zethus is your lover now, isn’t he?” he roared. I denied it. “Now that you’ve lost your pretty Orestes, you’ve turned to a common carpenter.” Pyrrhus shouted at me, called me vile names, had even viler names for poor Zethus, and vowed that he would castrate him and make him a slave.

There was no reasoning with him. Madness ruled him. His anger had inflamed his lust. I shut my eyes and bit my thumb to keep from screaming.

I HEARD THE SERVANTS
stirring outside my room when at last Pyrrhus finished with me and stumbled off to his own bed. My bones ached, my whole body hurt, and I was exhausted, but sleep was out of the question. I ordered a warm bath and sank into it gratefully. My maidservant, Ardeste, rubbed me with oil. I saw in her eyes that she had heard more than I wanted her to know.

She dressed me in an embroidered peplos and fastened a narrow belt of gold links around my waist. “Mistress,” she whispered, “I can help you, if you wish.”

I looked at her. “Help me? In what way, Ardeste?”
Is this a trap? Is she another of Pyrrhus’s spies?

“In the servants’ quarters last night we heard Pyrrhus raving, spewing hatred of you and your friend. Zethus should leave Pharsalos without delay. It’s dangerous for him. I can take a message to him.”

I studied my servant carefully. “How do I know I can trust
you,
Ardeste? This household is infested with spies.”

“We have a saying here in Pharsalos,” she replied. “‘There are more spies than fleas.’ But in the end you have to trust someone. You’ve known me since you first came here with Pyrrhus, and you are well liked by the people. Achilles is remembered as a brave and wonderful warrior, but many who had nothing to fear feared him anyway. Pyrrhus is much like his father in the wrong ways. Everyone is afraid of him except his Myrmidons, who claim to love him. Escape while you can, mistress. I’ll come with you, if you wish.”

I thought hard about what Ardeste was telling me. She was right—if I intended to escape and set out to find Orestes, no matter what terrible thing he had done and how terribly he was being punished—then I had to do it now. Ardeste, her back to me, knelt by my bathing tub and dipped out the water, waiting for my decision.

“What do we need to do to get ready, Ardeste?” I asked.

“I’ll find Zethus,” she said. “It won’t be difficult—everyone will know of the stranger in town. We’ll arrange to meet. I grew up here, and I know the place well. There’s a cave where he can wait for us. It’s well hidden. We won’t be found there.” She sponged out the last of the bath water and replaced the jar of scented oil on a shelf. “You will not be able to travel as a queen—there will be no carrying chair. Do you think you can manage?”

“I lived in a military camp on a beach for ten years,” I said. “I know how to get along very well without luxuries.”

She pinched back a smile. She probably didn’t believe me. “I’ll bring you plain tunics and sturdy sandals. And a shawl to cover your head. Everyone will recognize your red hair.”

“I once stole a scarf from a marketplace to cover my hair.” It was my turn to smile, remembering how old Marpessa helped me to travel on the women’s ship to Troy.

Ardeste said, “On the night we leave, you must give Pyrrhus a drug that will induce the most pleasant dreams and leave him unable to pursue you. I’ll bring you a powder made of ground poppy seeds to mix with his wine. Be sure to give some to Andromache and Hippodameia. I’ll make certain that the Myrmidons with him also drink some.”

I hoped I could do what she suggested without arousing suspicions. I closed my eyes for a moment, and when I opened them again, my mind was clear.

“Find Zethus,” I told her. “Tell him our plan. We’ll leave tonight. The longer we wait, the harder it will be.”

22

ARDESTE LEFT FOR THE
lower town carrying a market basket, but shopping was only an excuse to look for Zethus. My plan was to sleep, having had no chance the night before. But just as I lay down, Hippodameia drifted into my room. She was in a talkative mood.

“I was worried about you, Hermione,” she said sympathetically. “Pyrrhus seemed so angry last night.”

“Yes,” I agreed, hoping to keep the conversation short. “He was.”

“He’s that way sometimes. But I think it was hearing about the visit from your friend that set him off. Pyrrhus is like Achilles—very jealous. I wonder how Zethus found you here. We’re so far from everything.”

The direction this conversation was taking made me uneasy. No matter what I said, it would surely be repeated to Pyrrhus. My old friend Hippodameia was not only sleeping with my husband—she was more than welcome to him—but she also might be spying for him. I wondered why women couldn’t be kinder to one another. Maybe it was a matter of survival.

Now my survival was also at stake.

I yawned deeply and suggested that we talk later, after I’d rested, and Hippodameia reluctantly drifted out again. But still the gift of sleep did not come. Then I heard Ardeste’s soft footsteps.

“I found Zethus and told him everything that happened,” she whispered. “He was distressed to hear of your argument with Pyrrhus. I explained our plan and showed him the way to the cave. He’ll meet us there tonight.” She told me how to mix the poppy-seed powder into the wine so that it wouldn’t be detected. “We must be sure that everyone gets some. It won’t take much. And as soon as the drink begins to do its work, we’ll leave.”

“How long will the drug keep its effect?”

“Long enough, I hope.”

I TUCKED THE PACKET
of powder into a fold in my peplos and held it in place with the gold-link belt. I was uneasy, my hands trembling no matter how I tried to control them, and I wondered if Pyrrhus would sense my anxiety and question me. But he was more intent on carousing with his Myrmidon chieftains and as usual paid little attention to me. The weather had become cooler, and a fire blazed in the hearth at the center of the megaron. Pyrrhus had ordered a banquet, and the smell of baking bread and roasting meat hung in the air.

Ardeste moved among my husband’s friends, pouring wine into their goblets. She avoided looking at me directly. A blind minstrel plucked his lyre and sang the men’s favorite stories of victorious battles. They listened intently, cheering loudly at their favorite parts. Then, unexpectedly, Pyrrhus called out to me.

“Hermione, my beauty! Bring your lyre and honor us with a song, to welcome your husband home!”

“My beauty”?
I thought.
Is he serious?

He had never called me that, and he had never asked me to play for him. I wondered if he suspected something. I hadn’t touched my lyre, made from the shell of a tortoise, in many months, and I was not sure I could even do this. But, I reasoned, the men had been drinking and they wouldn’t know if I performed well or not. The blind minstrel smiled and nodded in my direction. I hurried to my room, made sure the packet of powder was still secure, and took down the lyre.

The men were waiting. I plucked the strings, badly out of tune—enough to make me wince—but Pyrrhus seemed not to notice, or to care. “A love song!” he cried, with that sneering smile I detested.

I stumbled through the beginning of the one song I could remember that might be considered a love song, and then—almost miraculously—the blind minstrel picked up the tune and led me through it, while I added a few notes, singing along with him. Pyrrhus seemed surprised by this unusual performance, but the men were well pleased and called for more.

The minstrel began another song, a favorite of the men. I took advantage of their distraction to empty most of the powder from the packet into a large ewer of wine mixed with water and flavored with a little pine resin. The Myrmidons were fond of the slight bitterness of the resinated wine, and it served to mask the taste of the poppy-seed powder.

“Drink well, my good men of Pharsalos!” I cried merrily, smiling and moving among them with the ewer, pouring the wine into their goblets. The blind minstrel, sensing my presence, shook his head, refusing the wine. “Perhaps you’ll want it later, poet!” I said, and poured more wine into his cup. “Drink up when your songs reward you with a thirst.”

Andromache and Hippodameia turned up their noses when I attempted to fill their goblets. “I don’t like the taste of resin,” Andromache complained. Hippodameia agreed. “It’s too bitter.”

“True women of Greece are quite fond of it,” I reminded them—reminding them at the same time that they were not Greeks. “It’s a taste you would do well to acquire.” Then, with a smile and an arched eyebrow, I whispered, “And it will surely enhance your pleasure, both given and received, in lovemaking.” I glanced meaningfully toward Pyrrhus, who had drained one full goblet of the drug-laced wine and was ready for another.

Glumly, the two women held out their goblets, and I filled them. “Come now, drink up, my friends!” They sipped tentatively, made faces, and decided that the best thing was to drink it down in one swallow. I nodded, smiled, and moved on.

The potion Ardeste and I had administered was taking effect, gradually at first, and then, with another round of wine, more quickly. I watched their eyelids grow heavy; their speech was slurred. A few of the Myrmidons who had imbibed more than the others were actually nodding off. Pyrrhus yawned hugely. Moments later I heard him snoring. Andromache and Hippodameia had put their heads down on the table. Only a few of the guards were still awake, but they, too, had become drowsy.

It was time to go.

Ardeste moved quietly toward the door. I paused for a few moments, circling the megaron where the fire had burned down to glowing embers, and then I followed her. She had a simple woolen peplos for me, a plain rope belt, and a fringed shawl. I changed into sturdy sandals and rolled my soft leather slippers into a bundle with the embroidered gown I’d just taken off. “Bring it with you,” Ardeste advised. “You may find an occasion to wear it later in our journey.”

I added my wedding veil with the silver and gold ornaments, as well as the lapis lazuli and amethyst jewelry, necklaces and bracelets, armlets and ankle rings, that my mother had given me for my wedding—not with the idea of wearing any of it, but to use in trade. I also took my mother’s silver spindle and, of course, my half of the wedding goblet.

We left the palace by a side door, heads modestly lowered and faces covered, and walked toward the servants’ quarters, to avoid the suspicious glances of any outside guards who might have been around, though I suspected they’d all come into the megaron to enjoy the feast, leaving the palace unguarded, and were now asleep with the others. We circled behind the servants’ quarters to the small postern gate. From there a steep, narrow path plunged almost straight down through the scrub growth. Loose soil and crumbling rock skittered out from under our feet, and we began to slide, grabbing at brush and young saplings to break our descent. We reached the bottom with cuts and scrapes to our hands, elbows, and knees. My peplos was torn.

A thin sliver of moon darted behind a cloud. We were somewhere outside the walls that encircled the town, and Ardeste admitted that she was lost. “I’ve been to this cave a few times,” she said as we groped and stumbled through the darkness. “But that was in broad daylight.”

I was frightened, but I was also exhilarated. I had not felt so free in all the months since I’d married Pyrrhus. But as the night wore on, I was more aware of how tired I was. I tripped over tree roots and once or twice I fell, sprawling in the dirt.

An owl hooted, then hooted again.

“It’s Zethus!” Ardeste exclaimed, and imitated the same low call.

We’d been circling the hidden mouth of the cave without realizing it, but now we followed the sound of the “owl” until we found Zethus. We crouched in the damp cave ripe with the scent of animal dung and discussed what to do next. Bats flittered in and out through a small hole in the roof, on their nightly search for a meal of insects. The triumph I felt at escaping from the gloomy palace was rapidly being replaced by anxiety. The drug would soon lose its effect, and Pyrrhus and his men—and the two women—would wake up and realize that I was gone.