I outran the sentries in spite of my injured foot. I escaped them by dodging through the olive grove, then circling all around the royal citadel until I reached the path back to the great gate. The men on guard there didn’t think twice about letting me in. To their eyes I was just another one of the young slaves who worked in the palace kitchens or stables or any of a hundred other places inside our walls. Why should they care about a slave? They waved me inside impatiently, without a second glance. I scrambled past them and vanished into the cool shadows of the palace before their comrades could catch up to me.
I managed to avoid Ione or anyone else who might recognize me in my disguise. I tore off my clothing, hid the ragged tunic in the wooden box that held my dolls, and crawled into my bed, breathing hard. I stayed there the rest of the day, wrapped up in a blazing sheet of agony, until Ione found me at suppertime. She didn’t know what to think when she saw my wounded foot and heard me spin a story about treading on a piece of broken pottery in the palace.
“Why didn’t you find me when this happened?” she demanded, examining the wound tenderly. In spite of all that my brothers and Glaucus had done, it was a mess. I watched in dismay as Ione plucked a sticky olive leaf out of my foot and held it up between us.
“I—I was—” I began.
Ione raised one hand, silencing me. “Don’t bother lying to me. I can’t make you tell me the truth, but I don’t need to waste my time hearing lies.” She turned her head toward the little heap of bandages she’d unwound from my foot and picked up one of the longer strips. “I know who you’ve been with, at least. I know this cloth. I wove it myself to make a tunic for your brother Castor. My needle made this little pattern of sea creatures along the hem. I knew that my work would be wasted on him—he doesn’t care what his clothing looks like as long as it serves its purpose—but I wanted to do it for him anyway.” She let the tattered strip drop back onto the small, bloody heap.
“I’m sorry, Ione,” I said meekly. She was hurt, and it wasn’t because Castor had ruined her embroidery. It was because she’d always trusted me and now I’d tried to deceive her. She loved me, and I’d repaid her with lies. I didn’t know how to apologize for that, so instead I said, “I’m sorry Castor tore that. It was very pretty. All the work you—”
Again her hand went up, demanding my silence. “You don’t need to apologize to me. You’re growing up, all of you, shutting me out of your lives. The boys were taken away from me long ago, because they claim it’s bad for future warriors to be raised by women. Soon I’ll have no more authority over you and your sister either. I’ll be no more than a piece of furniture to you then, something you can ignore unless you need to use me. Keep your secrets. But next time you want to persuade someone that you were hurt inside the palace, get rid of this sort of thing”—she held up the telltale olive leaf—“and wash yourself. You look as if you’ve been wrestling with pigs. As for your hair…”
She went on like this for a while, fetching water and salve and fresh bandages for my foot as she chattered on. She sat beside me on my bed and cleaned my face roughly, like a mother cat with a wayward kitten. When she turned her attention to my hair, she yanked the tangles out so hard that I thought she meant to take my scalp off with them. When she was done with me, I looked like a presentable daughter of Sparta again.
“There,” she said, holding me at arm’s length and surveying her handiwork. “That will do. Look at you! It won’t be long before you’re a woman, and what a beautiful woman you’ll be.”
I felt the tips of my ears turn red. My nurse had never given me such a compliment before.
“Ione, I’m nowhere near being a woman,” I told her. “I’m only ten.”
“Not forever. One way or the other, you’ll fly away.” She shook her head and sighed. “That Glaucus is a wise man, even if he’s too tight-lipped. He told me to keep an eye on you, but he wouldn’t say why. I don’t know what you’re up to that should involve him, and I don’t want to know. All that matters to me is that he asked me to keep you close and I failed. Now look what’s happened to you.”
I thought I saw tears in her eyes. I tried to throw my arms around her neck, but she was on her feet and beyond my reach before I could do that.
“Go and eat, little bird,” she said from the doorway. Then she was gone.
I limped a little as I walked through the palace, following the smell of food. It wasn’t coming from the hall where my parents held feasts to honor Spartan nobles or foreign ambassadors. Instead, the aroma led me to the kitchen, where I found my brothers gobbling bread and sheep’s milk cheese, with the bony remains of a broiled fish between them.
“Where’s Clytemnestra?” I asked as a kitchen slave hurried to find me a stool. Another fetched my food and some triply-watered wine.
“Been and gone,” Castor said cheerfully, through a mouthful of bread crust. “Something’s up with her. Every bite she took, she was smiling. I know that sly look: She’s got a secret.”
Polydeuces agreed with his twin. “I’ll bet it’s about the guest, the one who came today while we were all on the training ground.”
“What guest?” I asked eagerly. It was always exciting when visitors came to our father’s court. Visitors meant gifts, thrilling tales of the perils they’d braved to reach Sparta, and news from other kingdoms.
“One of the maids said that her brother was the one summoned to bring bread and salt to the king’s hall.” All of Sparta’s important visitors were welcomed with the ritual that created the sacred bond between host and guest by the sharing of bread and salt. The gods punished any man who violated that holy trust.
“Any idea where he’s from?” I asked. My brothers shook their heads ruefully. “I’ll bet Clytemnestra knows. That’s got to be her secret.”
“Good luck making her tell us anything,” Castor said sarcastically.