‘Very nice,’ answered Laodike.
‘No, I mean, what does she look like?’
‘Oh, she’s tall and her hair is dark. Father says she was the most beautiful woman in the world. She is still very attractive. Her eyes are grey-blue.’
‘She is revered on Thera,’ said Andromache. ‘Part of her dowry built the Temple of the Horse.’
‘Yes. Mother spoke of it. Very big.’
Andromache laughed. ‘Very big? It is colossal, Laodike. You can see it from the sea, miles from Thera. The head is so large that inside it there is a great hall, in which fifty of the senior priestesses meet and offer prayers and sacrifices to Poseidon. The eyes are massive windows. If you lean out you can pretend to be a bird, so high are you in the sky.’
‘It sounds… wonderful,’ said Laodike dully.
‘Are you ill?’ asked Andromache, leaning in to her, and placing an arm round her shoulder.
‘No, I am well. Truly,’ answered Laodike. She looked into Andromache’s green eyes, seeing the concern there. ‘It is just…’
‘Hera’s curse?’
‘Yes,’ she said, happy that it was not a complete lie. ‘Don’t you find it strange that it was a goddess who cursed women with periods of bleeding? Ought to have been a capricious god, really.’
Andromache laughed. ‘If all the tales are to be believed the male gods would surely prefer women to rut all the time. Perhaps Hera was just allowing us a little respite.’
Laodike saw the shoulders of the carriage driver hunch forward, as if he was trying to move himself further from the conversation. Suddenly her mood lifted, and she began to giggle. ‘Oh, Andromache, you really do have a wonderful way of seeing things.’ Settling back in her seat she glanced ahead at the walls of King’s Joy, her fears melting away.
Laodike had not seen her mother for several months, and, when Paris led them into the garden, she did not recognize her. Sitting in a wicker chair was a white-haired ancient, frail and bony, her face a mask of yellowed parchment, drawn so tightly across her skull it seemed that at any moment the skin would tear. Laodike stood very still, not knowing how to react. At first she thought the crone was also visiting mother, but then the ancient spoke. ‘Are you just going to stand there, stupid girl, or are you going to kiss your mother?’
Laodike felt giddy. Her mouth was dry, her mind reeling, just as it had during those awful lessons. ‘This is Andromache,’ she managed to say.
The dying queen’s gaze moved on. Laodike felt a surge of relief. Then Andromache stepped forward and kissed Hekabe’s cheek. ‘I am sorry to find you in such poor health,’ she said.
‘My son tells me I will like you,’ said the queen coldly. ‘I have always loathed that phrase. It instantly makes me feel I am destined to dislike the person. So you tell me why I should like you.’
Andromache shook her head. ‘I think not, Queen Hekabe. It seems to me that in Troy everyone plays games. I do not play games. Like me if you will, dislike me if you must. Either way the sun will still shine.’
‘A good answer,’ said the queen. Then her bright eyes fixed Andromache with a piercing look. ‘I hear you stood on the high parapet with Priam, and that you refused to kneel.’
‘Did you kneel for Priam?’
‘Not for Priam, or any man!’ snapped the queen.
Andromache laughed. ‘There you are then, Queen Hekabe. We have something in common already. We don’t know how to kneel.’
The queen’s smile faded. ‘Yes, we have something in common. Has my husband tried to bed you yet?’
‘No. Nor will he succeed if he tries.’
‘Oh, he will try, my dear. Not just because you are tall and comely, but because you are very like me. Or rather as I once was. I too was once a priestess of Thera. I too was strong once. I ran through the hills, and bent the bow, and danced in the revels. I too had a sweet lover, full-lipped and heavy-breasted.
How did Kalliope take your parting?’
Laodike was shocked at this news, and glanced at Andromache. She thought her friend would be crestfallen and shamed. Instead Andromache smiled broadly. ‘What a city this is,’ she said. ‘Everywhere there are spies and whispers, and no secrets are safe. I had not thought the royal court would know so much of the happenings on Thera.’
‘The royal court does not,’ said the queen. ‘I do. So, did Kalliope weep? Did she beg you to run away with her?’
‘Was that how you parted from your lover?’
‘Yes. It tore my heart to leave her. She killed herself.’
‘She must have loved you greatly.’
‘I am sure that she did. But she killed herself twenty years later, after a vileness grew in her throat, draining the flesh from her bones, and robbing her of speech and breath. She threw herself from the Eye of the Horse, her life dashed out on the rocks far below. Now I have a vileness in my belly. Do you think the gods punished us both for our lustful ways?’
‘Do you?’
Hekabe shrugged. ‘Sometimes I wonder.’
‘I do not,’ said Andromache. ‘Angry men stalk the lands with sword and fire, burning, killing, and raping. Yet the gods are said to admire them. If this is true, then I cannot see how they would punish women for loving one another.
However, if I am wrong, and the gods do hate us for our pleasures, then they do not deserve my worship.’
Hekabe suddenly laughed. ‘Oh, you are so like me! And you are far more suited to my Hektor than your insipid sister. However, we were talking about Priam. He will not rape you. He will seek to seduce you, or he will find some other means to force your acquiescence. He is a subtle man. I think he will wait until I am dead, though. So you have a little time of freedom yet.’
‘How could anyone love such a man?’ said Andromache.
Hekabe sighed. ‘He is wilful, and sometimes cruel. But there is greatness in him too.’ She smiled. ‘When you have known him a little longer you will see it.’ Her eyes turned back to Laodike. ‘Well, girl, are you going to kiss mother?’
‘Yes,’ replied Laodike meekly, stepping forward and stooping down. She closed her eyes and planted a swift peck on her mother’s cheek, then moved back hurriedly. The queen smelt of cloves, the scent sickly and cloying.
Servants brought chairs and cool drinks and they sat together. Paris had wandered off, and was reading a scroll. Laodike did not know what to say. She knew now that mother was dying, and her heart ached with the knowledge of it.
She felt like a child again, miserable, alone and unloved. Even on the verge of death mother did not have a kind word for her. Her stomach was knotted, and the conversation between Andromache and Hekabe seemed like the intermittent buzzing of bees. Mother summoned more servants to raise a set of painted sun screens around them, and, though the shade was welcome, it did nothing to raise Laodike’s spirits.
And then Helikaon came, and once more Laodike’s spirits lifted. She rose from her chair and waved as the young prince came striding across the pale grass of the cliff top, young Kassandra beside him. He smiled when he saw Laodike.
‘You are more lovely than ever, cousin,’ he said, taking her into his arms and hugging her close. Laodike wanted the hug never to end, and she clung to him, and kissed his cheek.
‘By the gods, Laodike, must you act the harlot?’ demanded mother.
The harshness of the tone cut through her. She had committed the most awful breach of protocol. A guest must first greet the queen. Helikaon leaned in and kissed her brow. Then he winked and mouthed the words: ‘Don’t worry!’ Stepping forward he knelt beside the queen’s chair. ‘I brought Kassandra as you requested.’
‘No-one brought me,’ said Kassandra. ‘I came to make you happy, mother.’
‘You always make me happy, my dear,’ said Hekabe. ‘Now sit with us, Helikaon. I am told you have been battling pirates, and setting them ablaze, no less.’
‘It is too beautiful a day,’ he said, ‘to be spoiled by tales of bloodshed and savagery. And the lady
