Clytemnestra by Costanza Casati

In the evening, when darkness seems to envelop the valley like a dark ocean wave, Tyndareus sends for her. Rain is falling thickly, the wind thrashing and screeching. Soon the Eurotas will overflow and the riverbanks will be muddy for weeks.

“I will come with you,” Helen says, closing the purple tunic on Clytemnestra’s back with a golden pin. She has been pacing the bedroom all day, restless, cleaning every stain from Timandra’s dress. There was crusted blood under her sister’s fingernails, and Helen scrubbed them so hard she might have been trying to flay them.

“I will go alone,” Clytemnestra says.

“Father must know it was me,” Timandra says, frowning. “Why is he calling you?”

“Maybe he wants to ask for forgiveness,” Helen says quietly.

Clytemnestra shakes her head. Her people don’t know forgiveness. They know respect, greatness, beauty, the forces that shine like flames, brightening the earth. And next to them, like threatening shadows, shame, dishonor, vengeance, and moira, the unbreakable thread between guilt and punishment.

She takes her sisters’ hands and feels their warmth. “Wait for me here.”

*

She meets her father in the high-roofed hall, her steps echoing on the paving, her fists clenched. It is painful to see his face after all this time spent in her room. She feels as if she is facing a life that has been lost. The man seated on the throne in front of her now might be a stranger to her, not the father who taught her to walk, to fight, to rule. Next to him is Leda, her black tunic too large for her lean figure. Two-handled jars, wheat bread, and pork on skewers are spread on a large table in front of them. Clytemnestra can smell wine, olives, and fear.

Leda is the first to speak. “The dead helots in the kitchen.” She stops to take a deep breath, as if at a loss for words. “Your sister killed them.”

Clytemnestra ignores her, staring at Tyndareus. His face is cold, inscrutable. She searches for some hint of affection, some warmth, but his features are barren, like the earth in winter.

“You have made Timandra a murderess,” Leda says. Her eyes are red—she must have been crying. “She is only fourteen.”

She is a Spartan. If I have made her a murderess, then what of Father, who ordered her to break Chrysanthe’s face? What of the priestess, who cut her back with a whip?

As if reading her mind, Tyndareus shifts on his throne. “Timandra is strong enough to bear the burden. But those slaves were following orders, Clytemnestra. Those lives weren’t yours to take.”

A scream in her head is clawing to get out. She spits each word as if it were poison. “You sit there, telling me about lives that were wrongly taken, after you helped a monster murder your grandchild.”

“Agamemnon and Menelaus are our guests.” Tyndareus’s voice is flat. “They must be treated with respect.”

“They showed no respect to us,” replies Leda. She raises her eyes and meets her daughter’s. Clytemnestra tries to understand whose side Leda has taken.

“Agamemnon has shown disrespect to a foreign man, not to us,” Tyndareus says. “He is Greek, and this makes him an ally.”

“He slaughtered your grandson!” Clytemnestra shouts.

Tyndareus looks down at his hands. When he speaks, his voice shakes slightly. “I wanted to keep the baby alive.”

This, for Clytemnestra, is even worse than his coldness. Does he expect her to forgive him now? Did he expect the Atreidai to keep their word?

“You are a king,” she says sharply. “If you want something, you demand it.”

“You are young still,” Tyndareus says, “and do not understand that sometimes you have to compromise. It is my fault; I have failed to teach you this. I have always given you too much freedom.”

“I do not need you to give me my freedom,” Clytemnestra says. “I am free. But you are not. You are Agamemnon’s puppet now, because you are weak.”

“Your husband was weak,” Tyndareus replies coolly.

“Tantalus was a good man, a kind man. But you can’t see that, because in your world, only the brutes can live, and they do so by tearing down everything else.”

“That is how life is. The weak have to die so that the rest may survive.”

“You disgust me,” she says.

Tyndareus stands and slaps her face before she can back away. She feels her father’s scar on the back of his hand scratch her cheek.

She looks up into Tyndareus’s eyes and sneers. “What kind of father are you?” She turns to her mother, seated in her chair with her head lowered. “And you do not fight him. You forgive him. You are no better.”

“There are laws to be respected,” Leda says quietly.

“You don’t seek vengeance because you have become a coward,” Clytemnestra says. Her hands are trembling, and she clutches them tightly. “But know this. I will have my justice. I swear it here and now. I swear it by the Furies and every other goddess who has known vengeance. I will stalk the Atreidai and crush everything they hold dear until only ashes remain.”

“You will avenge nothing,” Tyndareus says.

“What would you have me do?” she mocks him. “Forget? Wish Agamemnon a happy life with that whore Cynisca?”

Her mother shifts uncomfortably in her seat. She opens her mouth, but all that comes out is a choking sound. Tyndareus turns to her, annoyed.

“That will not happen,” he says slowly. “That will not happen,” he repeats, “because you will marry the man.”

Her father’s voice feels distant. Clytemnestra tries to catch her mother’s eyes, but Leda is staring fixedly at the floor. Without meaning to, she thinks about all the times when she would be seated in the hall and, as her father was speaking, she would catch Helen’s or Castor’s eyes and bite her tongue trying not to laugh. They would always think the same thing at the same time—how funny this messenger’s voice is! How serious Father is! How scared this stranger is! How boring the priestess is!—and later, during dinner, they would tell Tyndareus, giggling, and he would say, “You are not to come to the megaron anymore.” But then he would let them come.

Helen was right. Agamemnon would never marry someone like Cynisca. Clytemnestra isn’t surprised. She isn’t angry. She feels like a fool. Agamemnon has always wanted her for himself.

“I won’t,” she says, her voice so quiet she can barely hear herself.

“You live to honor Sparta and your king.” He recites the words he taught her as a child, when he wanted her to grow into a strong warrior, a free woman. “Or have you forgotten? Your loyalty is to me, not to a foreigner. If you think about yourself and not the good of the city . . . that is treason.”

The words hit her like lashes. Other words come too, words she has heard all her life, peeling her skin away one layer at the time. No man or woman is allowed to live as he or she pleases, not even in Sparta. Nothing ever belongs to them entirely.

She fixes her eyes on him, lifts her chin. “What are you going to do about it? Drag me to the Ceadas? Cut my head off?”

There is a long silence. At last, Tyndareus says, “You are my daughter. I won’t kill you.”

Anger and grief ripple beneath her skin, and she is afraid they might tear it. “I will not marry him,” she repeats.

“Yes, you will,” her father says. “I will come to your room in two days’ time, and you will be ready for the wedding. And if you are not, I will have you dragged out and into the hall.”

She grabs her tunic around her waist and squeezes it. When she lets go, the wrinkled cloth stretches like a pressed flower.

“I thought you loved me, Father,” she says, then walks away, back to her nightmares.

*

Agamemnon comes for her when the sun is rising, a gutting blade at his waist and a crooked smile on his face. She wishes she could carve it out. She stares at him, making no attempt to hide her contempt, though it seems not to trouble him. It is hard to face a man who is not touched by anything.

Helen stands quickly and walks in front of her sister, her long dress fluttering around her ankles. Agamemnon looks at her as an eagle regards a mouse. “Leave us,” he says.

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