She knows where to find Helen now. She walks to the temple of Artemis, and there is her sister, standing close to the spring at the foot of the mountains, her eyes closed. Is she praying? As soon as she hears Clytemnestra’s steps, she looks up. Around her neck shines the golden necklace that was in her room, each rosette perfectly outlined against her pearly-white skin.
“Who gave you that necklace?” Clytemnestra asks. For a moment, with her newly short hair and swollen body beside her luminous sister, she feels ugly. She remembers she had felt like this when she was a child. A warrior visiting from Argos had told Tyndareus that Helen was the fairest girl in all their lands. “Her hair is like honey,” the warrior said, “and her neck like a swan’s. She will marry a king favored by the gods.” He had said nothing about Clytemnestra.
Helen ignores her question. She fixes her eyes on Clytemnestra’s with a challenging stare.
“It was Menelaus, wasn’t it?” Clytemnestra asks.
“And what if it was?”
“He is not a good man, Helen.”
“You know nothing about him.”
“And you do?”
Helen shrugs. The air is cold and the wind blows drops of the spring water in their direction, sprinkling them.
“Father will send word that you are ready for marriage,” Clytemnestra says, trying to keep her voice even. “Many men will soon come to claim your hand, and you will be free to choose.”
“He is not my father,” Helen says.
“He has been such to you. You have grown up here, in this palace, with your brothers and sisters.”
With a jerk of her head, Helen seems to flick off an annoying fly. “You don’t understand,” she says. “I can make decisions for myself. I do not wish to live in your shadow any longer.”
Clytemnestra’s face stings. “How can you say that when you have always been the most beautiful, ever since you were a child?” She is speaking with resentment now, and she doesn’t hide it. “The Spartan people sing of your beauty during feasts, and everyone thinks you are a daughter of Zeus, just because of your looks.”
“I do not care about looks!” Helen cries. “What good are they? You know what my beauty got me. You remember Theseus, don’t you?”
“What do you care about, then?” Clytemnestra asks, but Helen continues, her voice lower and lower, yet each word sharper, more painful.
“You have always been the center of attention. ‘Helen is beautiful, but Clytemnestra is clever and charming, strong and wise,’ and so many other things . . . You’ve always had Tyndareus’s love and, more than anyone else, you have the respect of the Spartan people. Whatever you do, you excel. Whatever you put your mind to, you accomplish.” Jealousy, which Clytemnestra always thought would be strange to her sister, easily finds its way onto her perfect features. “And there I am, next to you, your beautiful, weak, dull sister, who has nothing interesting to say. I am only interesting to look at.”
Clytemnestra stands fixed in her painful understanding. She forces her voice to be as low as her sister’s, as colorless as the gray sky above them. “You only see what you want to see. You don’t understand how it is for me.”
Helen rolls her eyes. “And how is it for you?”
She wonders what would hurt Helen most. Something tells her that shouting and pleading would do nothing. “It doesn’t matter,” she says. “You only care about your own suffering.” She wipes away a water droplet from her cheek. “Do what you wish with Menelaus. Marry him, if you desire jewelry and rich clothes.” She sees the shock on Helen’s face but doesn’t stop. “But do not fool yourself. He doesn’t see you or love you for what you are. He is among those who only find you interesting to look at.”
She clenches her fists as she walks away, frost crunching under her feet, the sky merciless above her.
*
The next day, Agamemnon and Menelaus leave. Lysimachos is chosen for their mission, and Cynisca’s father. Cynisca stands at the gate to say goodbye. She hugs her father and kisses Agamemnon’s hand, but he is not looking at her. He stares at Clytemnestra, his face dark, his eyes drinking her in. Helen stands next to her mother, her hair plaited around her head like a golden wreath. She is still wearing the necklace, the rosettes cold against her collarbones.
The priestess is waiting outside the stone gate, a goat limp at her feet. When the warriors are ready, Tyndareus gives her a large golden bowl. She takes the bronze knife tied to her cloak and cuts the animal’s throat. The body kicks as blood spurts and pours into the basin. Clytemnestra watches the red spot spreading on the priestess’s cloak.
The priestess turns to the soldiers. She looks taller and dangerous in her gravity. “You may go,” she says. “Mycenae will be yours in five days, before the night falls.”
Menelaus mounts his horse. Around him, the other men do the same, swords and axes glinting and clanking at their sides.
Agamemnon turns to Tyndareus, his face sharp and cold. “Thank you for your hospitality, king of Sparta. We will send gold from Mycenae soon.”
Without another word, he gallops away, his brother and soldiers following. Darkness swallows them, and all that remains is the sound of hoofs beating on the frosty ground.
*
They gather in the dining hall, their hands chapped from the wind outside. There are no nobles and warriors tonight, only Clytemnestra’s family, and the servants set out bowls of pears and apples, cheese and nuts. The hall feels cold, and a helot lights a small fire; the flames cast shadows on the weapons hanging on the walls.
“This morning, I sent envoys to the most powerful cities across Greece,” Tyndareus says. “Kings and princes who wish to court Helen have been summoned here to Sparta.” He says Helen’s name as though she weren’t in the room. Phoebe looks at her sister, saddened by her father’s behavior.
“Thank you, Father,” Helen says without looking at him. Her tone is slightly mocking, but not enough for Tyndareus to notice it.
“Warriors will come from as far as Crete,” Leda says. She stops for a second when Phoebe whispers excitedly, “Crete!” then continues, “It will be an honor to have them here.” For a moment, Clytemnestra can’t help but think of how the priestess had deemed lying with Theseus “honorable.”
“Do you know who will come?” Timandra asks.
“Ajax, cousin of the great Achilles, will be here,” Tyndareus says. “He is no older than thirty and in search of a wife.”
“Isn’t he a brute?” Clytemnestra says. “You once said so.”
Helen looks at her and their eyes lock. Clytemnestra remembers how they laughed when their mother described Ajax in the past and how they spent an entire night doing impressions of him. The memory makes her stomach burn.
“Chiron trained him, and the hero Telamon is his father,” Leda says. Helen looks away, focusing on the cheese on her plate. “Though he was a brute when your father met him, I am sure that he is grown now and would be a good catch.”
“If he was trained by Chiron,” Helen says, “then he is good in the art of healing, I suppose.”
“He is,” Leda says. Turning back to Timandra, she continues, “Then the king of Argos might come, Diomedes, and even the archer Philoctetes.”
Phoebe giggles, delighted. Each day, she is growing more beautiful. Though she isn’t as skilled in wrestling and training as Timandra and Philonoe, she is a gifted archer. “Since so many men will come,” she says, “maybe one of them will marry me.”
Tyndareus raises his thick eyebrows skeptically. “You have plenty of time to be courted and to decide, Phoebe,” he says. “But Timandra may begin to think about it.”
“Marriage disgusts me,” Timandra says, bored. “Sometimes I wish I were a boy.”
Tyndareus laughs. Phoebe glares at her sister. She thinks Timandra wanted to offend her. “Is that why you were with that girl the other day?” she asks.
Timandra blushes, her fists suddenly clenched. Clytemnestra remembers Timandra’s words: It was cold and I was in a hurry. I had to meet someone else.
“What is this?” Leda asks, frowning. “Which girl?”
Timandra kicks Phoebe so hard under the table that everyone hears the loud thump.
Phoebe lifts her chin, defiant. “I saw her with a girl from the gymnasium, one that always fights with her. They were near the orchard.”