Telys shook his head again, more vigorously. “She’s too old to leave on foot, and we’re too poor to get passage on a ship.”
Now I understood, and I felt even worse for Telys than before. I decided it was best to divert him from dwelling on his unlucky situation. “I still don’t see what I said that was so wrong,” I remarked. “Did Lady Aithra think I was insulting her by giving Theseus two fathers?”
“That wasn’t it,” Telys replied. “It was what you said about him neglecting his father. Do you know about his first bride, the lady Ariadne?”
“I heard he was sent to Crete to seal an alliance by marrying her, but that he came home alone. That’s all.”
“There’s more to it than that. Lord Theseus loved her dearly, chosen for him or not, but a plague struck Crete before they could sail.”
“She died?” I felt a pang of sympathy.
Telys nodded. “A ship from Crete carried rumors here of a royal death, but none aboard knew more than that. Lord Theseus was too grief-stricken to think of sending word that he was alive and well. Lord Aegeus—my father—was out of his mind with worry.” Telys sighed deeply. “Lord Theseus came home under a black sail to honor his lost bride. A lookout recognized the prince’s ship and brought word of the black sail to the palace. All Athens heard of how wildly my father wailed, ‘He’s dead! He’s dead!’ and ran to the edge of a cliff above the sea. No one could stop him. He jumped to his death.”
“Horrible,” I murmured. “May Hades be good to his spirit.”
“And to the spirit of the slave they forced to give the tragic news to Lord Theseus,” Telys said with a shudder. “That’s why he built that shrine to the lord of the Underworld, the one where we met. He wanted to atone for what he’d done, and what he’d neglected to do.”
Theseus was gone and I enjoyed a breath of freedom. The wedding no longer haunted me. The first night after he sailed north to help Pirithous, I stood before the oil lamp in my room and raised my hands in prayer to all the gods. They’d given me the precious gift of time to think, and I was grateful. Then I murmured a special prayer to Athena. “Goddess of wisdom, make me wise enough to escape from Athens before Theseus comes back, wise enough so my guard Telys won’t have to pay for my freedom with his blood. Even though my hands are clean, I feel accountable for how Hylas, Argus, and Milo died. How can I bear another death? So help me, great Athena. Once I’m free, I’ll make you any sacrifice you ask for, but not Telys’s life.”
I lowered my hands, extinguished my lamp, and lay down under my blanket. Just before I fell asleep, I thought I heard a voice whisper, “Thank you, Lady Helen,” but I was so drowsy that it might have been only the herald of my dreams.
13
LESSONS TAUGHT, LESSONS LEARNED
In the days that followed Theseus’s departure, life in the palace changed. Theseus had taken many of his soldiers with him, but he couldn’t take all of them, leaving his city undefended. The men he’d left behind resented the king’s choice. Every day, I had to spend some time in Lady Aithra’s company, and every day, I heard the guards grumbling. They soon found a defenseless target for their bile. Telys was still assigned to keep an eye on me through most of the day, so I heard every nasty jibe they tossed his way.
“You ought to teach them some manners,” I murmured to Telys one morning as we passed a trio of those ugly bullies.
“I can’t,” he replied unhappily. “They’ll use it as an excuse to mob me.” He gave a little sigh. “Even if they would fight me one to one, I’d still lose. You saw how useless I am with weapons.”
“I know what I saw,” I replied as we walked on. “I was wondering about it. I know your father made you a guard when Theseus first came to Athens. That must have been years ago.”
“Ten years, I think. I was fifteen.”
“Telys, it’s just not possible for someone to serve as a man-at-arms for so long and still be as—as—well, as bad as you are with weapons. It makes no sense.”
For the first time, I saw a flinty look of resentment on Telys’s face. “It wouldn’t be if I were given decent weapons and real training. I had both when I first started, but my father died too soon, and when Lord Theseus took the throne—”
“I can imagine. If you’d had the proper equipment, your story would be different.”
He smiled shyly. “I don’t think so. Having the right weapons isn’t all it takes to be a good warrior. You’ve actually had training, Lady Helen. I still would have lost to you.”
His words hit me in the same way that the Muses’ divine inspiration is supposed to strike their most beloved singers and poets. I stopped and poor Telys stumbled into me, but I didn’t care. In one beautiful instant, my eyes had opened to a way for me to flee Athens without having to worry that Telys or his mother would suffer for it afterward.
“Oh, Telys, this is wonderful!” I exclaimed, turning a beaming face to him.
I suspect that my unexplained joy must have looked like an attack of madness to him. “Lady Helen, is something the matter?” he asked, genuinely concerned.
“That…depends,” I said, growing thoughtful again. “Telys, how badly do you want to leave Athens?”
“Shh!” He darted nervous glances all around, then whispered, “With all my heart. But you know I can’t.”
“No, I think you can, you and your mother both, safely. All you lack to do it is the means to buy passage on a ship bound far from here.”