“I am sorry,” Clytemnestra says.
“Yet you have been sent here to convince Phoebe to leave, haven’t you, Sister?” Castor’s last word is nearly a sneer. Clytemnestra looks at him. Her brother has never stayed with the same woman for long before. People have always amused him, like a dancer would, or bored him.
“Lynceus and Idas are angry,” she says. “They will come for you both.”
“Of course they are angry,” Phoebe replies. “They are men. They are used to getting what they want.”
“It is too late,” Castor says. Clytemnestra can see fever in his eyes, wildness. “Phoebe and her sister can’t go back to Messenia.” He walks over to Phoebe and touches her belly with the gentleness of a warrior touching the petal of a flower. “They are pregnant. Both of them.”
21
Birds and She-Bears
IN THE DINING hall, Clytemnestra looks at the elaborate handles of the bronze swords on the walls—bone, ivory, gold, with inlaid decorations of lions hunting deer, geese flying, dogs running. As the servants prepare the room for dinner, her brothers, Phoebe, and another woman with long hair and a dark-blue dress walk in. Hilaeira has the same burning look of her sister, though her features are more delicate. They take their seats, and the servants carry in the wine jugs. Hermione runs into the hall, climbing onto Polydeuces’s lap.
“Where is your mother?” he asks her, caressing her hair.
“She is accompanying the Trojan prince here,” Hermione says.
Polydeuces stiffens, his eyes on the door. His fists are clenched, as if he were ready to spring up and fight. Clytemnestra follows his gaze and Helen appears, more luminous than ever. Her golden hair is loose, waves falling on her shoulders. A richly decorated tunic, heavy with golden drops, chimes pleasingly as she moves. Clytemnestra can see the mischief carefully hidden on her face. Even after all these years, she knows her sister as well as she knows herself.
Behind her is a man unlike anyone Clytemnestra has ever seen. His eyes sparkle like gems, and his hair is silky as a fox’s fur. As he walks into the hall, the light from one of the torches above him turns his skin the color of gold when it is poured into stone cavities to make jewels. It is a shocking, almost intimidating beauty, because it is careless. Is this how gods look? Clytemnestra wonders. Helen beckons him and he follows, never taking his eyes off her. An adoring servant girl jumps out of the shadows trying to pour wine for the prince, but he takes the jug and pours for Helen.
“Paris,” Helen says when they are seated, “this is the sister I have told you so much about.”
Paris’s eyes land on Clytemnestra as if he has just noticed she is there. “You are the queen of Mycenae.”
“And you are the Trojan prince who managed to make peace with the Greeks.”
“Ah, I don’t know about that,” Paris says, smiling. It is a cheeky smile. Helen claps her hands and young men enter, flutes and lyres in hand. They play, each note unfolding quietly like wings in the darkness.
“In Troy, they never eat without music,” Helen explains. Paris smiles at her and Helen smiles back. She doesn’t touch her food; the honey on her plate spreads, soaking the cheese.
“Has your stay in Sparta been pleasurable?” Clytemnestra asks Paris, because the way the prince stares at her sister makes her uncomfortable.
“The most pleasurable,” Paris says. “I have always heard Sparta was no more than a small palace on a rocky mount. It is far richer and its people far more welcoming than I could have imagined.”
“Surely it must seem nothing compared to your home,” Clytemnestra replies. From what she has heard, Troy is bigger than any Greek city, a huge, impregnable citadel built on a hill in front of the sea. “A palace with walls the color of wheat,” an envoy had told her once, “its buildings inside so high that the people there are closer to the gods.”
Paris shrugs. “Compared to Troy, yes. Our city has walls and towers higher than mountains. From the ramparts, you can see the land stretching around the city. It is like molten gold.”
He pauses, sipping his wine, and a strand of hair falls on his face. “But I didn’t grow up in Troy. When I was born, my mother dreamed she gave birth to a flaming torch. A warning, the seer at court said, a sign foretelling the downfall of Troy.” He smirks, as if mocking the seer. “He declared that the only way to spare the kingdom was to kill me, and my father believed him. Our people are deeply religious . . . They would cut off their own arms rather than disappoint the gods.”
The music is quieter now, and Paris’s voice rolls on it as if he were singing. “My mother couldn’t kill me. She couldn’t ignore the seer, but she couldn’t kill her son. So she left me on Mount Ida, sure that I would die there.” A shadow passes over his face, but he quickly covers it with his bright smile.
“But who knows what plans the gods have for us? A herdsman found me on the rocky outcrop where my mother left me. He could have killed me, thrown me into the river, but he took me in as his own.”
Clytemnestra gazes at his dazzling face. He doesn’t look like a man who lived among sheep and goats. Any other prince would be ashamed to speak so, but not him. Paris seems prouder of his upbringing than of his birthright. But perhaps that is his way into people’s hearts—not his beauty, not his wealth, but his story.
“If you didn’t grow up in Troy,” Clytemnestra asks, “why were you sent here?”
“I didn’t want to grow old as a shepherd,” he says as if stating the obvious. “The herdsman told me the truth when I came of age. I traveled to the city, leaving my life behind. I wanted the king to recognize me as his son.”
Clytemnestra can easily imagine him, in a dirty tunic, walking inside the mighty walls of Troy, kneeling in front of the old man. King Priam must have been quick to claim him this time—the gods gave him a chance to mend a past mistake.
“Your father is said to have fifty sons and fifty daughters,” Clytemnestra says. “Why did he choose to send you here?”
Helen touches her hand as if asking her to stop questioning the prince. But Paris seems neither annoyed nor affronted. Answers come to him with no hesitation. “I asked to come. I wanted to show my father that I am as worthy as his other sons.”
The music stops. On Clytemnestra’s right, Phoebe and Hilaeira are telling some story to little Hermione. She is giggling, and Polydeuces smooths Hilaeira’s hair, listening to them with a half smile. Castor seems lost in thought, gobbling food and staring at the gleaming weapons on the wall. But as soon as Paris stops speaking, he looks up.
“You, a noble prince, all those years on Mount Ida among herdsmen and shepherds . . . You must have been desired by every woman there.”
Helen clears her throat. As if unwilling to be a part of the conversation any longer, she calls Hermione. Her child leaves her place next to Polydeuces and trots happily to her mother.
“I was married,” Paris replies, smiling, “though when I went back to court, I couldn’t bring her. She was a mountain girl, unfit for life in the palace.”
Castor laughs and keeps asking the prince questions—Were the women of the palace fit for it? Are the warriors in Troy as strong as people say? Clytemnestra isn’t surprised. Even after all these years, her brother cannot resist pressing others with questions, pinching them with his tricks. She focuses on the food and lets Castor do the rest of the talking.
“So the priestess was right once more,” Helen tells her quietly. She is plaiting Hermione’s hair. The music grows louder again, and Paris laughs at Castor’s inquiries.
“It seems we underestimated her.”
“First you, then Timandra,” Helen says. “Soon it will be my turn.”
Clytemnestra laughs. “And then we’ll all be deserters of our lawful husbands. Though I am not sure my experience counts as deserting.”