His matter-of-fact tone made me squirm with humiliation. The knowledge that these men felt free to speak of such a private thing—my wedding night, my body—flooded me with sickening rage. I swallowed hard, fighting back a swell of nausea.
Lycus went on, while my cheeks burned. “She is made after the usual pattern, fair as you please when she’s naked, and tight enough that I’d swear to her virginity. I took a great deal of pleasure in that night; I won’t lie to you. But the whole time, even as I was fucking her, all I could think about was her witch blood. The red-haired one—her mother was a sea nymph. That’s what they say, here in Colchis. Minos got the daughter of a sea nymph, but old Heliodoros passed his witch-daughter to me.”
I could listen no more. I scrambled from my bed and ran out of the house, into the deep forest, where the light was dappled and serene. I sank down among the roots of a laurel tree and hugged my knees to my chest. There I remained, weeping and broken-hearted, keening for my sister and my mother—whoever she had been—until the sun set and the chill of night set in.
Lycus may have taken pleasure in our wedding night, but the gods know I never did. His touch had revolted me from the first. After hearing the crude way he spoke of me to his friends, the mere thought of lying with him again made me sweat and shake. He came to me that night—witch blood or no—and claimed the right of a husband. I endured it, for I had little choice, but I had made up my mind as I’d huddled beneath the laurel that I would never bear Lycus a son or a daughter. If he truly believed I was born of Hekate’s blood, then I would not burden him with a witch-child. There was no telling what such a callous brute might do to a baby he thought tainted by sorcery.
That week, instead of going to the temple shrine, I went instead to the riverside. There, I found a trader in scrolls, and paid a handsome price—gold I had skimmed from my dowry—for a long list of useful herbs, complete with illustrations of their leaves and flowers. I was not a strong reader in those days—Heliodoros had seen little point in educating his daughters. But I could puzzle out enough words to learn the best application and basic utility of each plant described in that fascinating compendium.
As luck would have it, the forest around my husband’s half-formed farm was full of silphium. The sunny yellow flowers with their glossy leaves seemed to smile at me from every crossroad and clearing. While the silphium still bloomed, I crushed their leaves into an acrid-smelling juice, soaked up the juice with wool, and placed the wool high within my body. Lycus never knew it was there, and he came to my bed nearly every night. My monthly flow continued moon after moon, and every day I prayed in gratitude for the blessed emptiness of my womb. When autumn came and the golden petals withered and dropped, I gathered the seeds of my little friend, the silphium plant. By the end of the harvest season, I had two sacks full of silphium seed hidden in the bottom of my clothing chest—enough to brew a strong tea every day, until spring came again and the yellow flowers opened new in forest and field.
So began my knowledge of herb and tree, of grove and grassland. I started with silphium out of necessity, but soon I gathered other plants listed in my scroll—every herb I could find within a day’s walk of the slowly expanding farm. I made tinctures and teas, dried leaves on the sill of my window, and gathered seeds and roots, storing them in small pots and jars beneath my bed. When I had experimented with every plant listed in my scroll, I begged enough money from Lycus to visit the river traders again; I bought another list of herbs, more detailed and expansive, and passed the winter making plans for all the fascinating walks I would take in the spring, hunting up new varieties to add to my little bedside apothecary. Those lonesome walks to gather herbs were my only solace during the dark days of my marriage. The plants themselves were my only friends, yielding their hidden powers to me through my gentle attentions.
Spring came again, but Pasipha? did not visit me, despite her promise. The gynaeceum at Heliodoros’s house—our childhood home—was a dreary place without her. During my father’s feasts, I remained sequestered with the aging female servants and the young wives of my father’s friends, while Heliodoros and Lycus pretended camaraderie in the andron.
I hated those dinners at my father’s house. Every corner seemed to echo with the memory of Pasihpa?’s laughter. My sister was a ghost there, fading a little more each time I visited. I could not bear to feel her disappearing from my life. On one night, while the andron rang with glad shouts and laughter, I left the gynaeceum and walked alone in the twilight, circling Heliodoros’s house aimlessly, searching the rocky ground for any interesting leaves or flowers.
After a time, I became aware that someone walked with me. I looked up and found Perses, my eldest brother, strolling by my side.
“Good evening, little sister,” he said.
I nodded mutely, too harrowed up within my spirit to reply.
“You’ve left dinner early. Aren’t you hungry?”
I shrugged, then bent to pick a sprig of young marjoram. I twirled the stem between my fingers.
“I’m glad to have the chance to speak to you tonight,” Perses said. He cleared his throat; he seemed to be searching rather awkwardly for his next words. “That is to say…Father told me to look for an opportunity to—”
“Father,” I said. “What does he want with me?”
Privately, I asked myself—and the gods—whether I hadn’t done more than enough for Heliodoros already. Hadn’t I gone without complaint to my wedding, as any dutiful daughter should? Didn’t I suffer through the loneliness of a cold, unfeeling marriage—through the pain of intercourse with a man whose touch, whose very presence, set my skin crawling? What more could Heliodoros ask?
Perses seemed to sense my sudden outrage, though I tried to conceal it. He made a placating gesture, one hand uselessly patting the air between us. “Father is only worried about you, Circe. You have been married almost a year now, but you have no child. We have not heard that any child is expected, either.”
Nor should anyone expect a child from my womb, I thought wryly. I had seen to that. I said only, “Sometimes it takes younger women many months to conceive. Years, even. That’s what all the wise women say.”
My brother flushed in embarrassment. “Have you been…that is to say…”
I rounded on him. “I know how children are made, Perses. I’m not a fool.”
“I didn’t mean to imply—”
Words and feelings I could no longer control came tumbling out against my will. “The gods know Lycus tries often enough, no matter how he claims to be disgusted by me and my blood.”