they had been worn to dullness. The small votive statues in the niches were decked with rings of withered flowers. The room smelled of incense and old candles.
Standing by the door, her back to me, was Helen.
14
Apet, standing in a shadowy corner, saw me and hissed, “The Hittite.”
Helen whirled to face me, her fists pressed against her mouth, her body tense with terror.
“Lukka,” she whispered.
She stood there for an uncertain moment, dressed in her finest robe, decked with gold and jewels, more beautiful than any woman has a right to be. She ran to me and pressed her golden head against my grimy, bloodstained chest. Her hair was scented like fragrant flowers.
“Don’t let them kill me, Lukka! Please, please! They’ll be crazy with bloodlust. Even Menalaos. He’ll take my head off and then blame it on Ares or Athene! Please, please protect me!”
“That’s why I came to you,” I said. As I spoke the words I realized that they were true. It was the one decent thing I could do in the midst of this mad, murderous day. I had broken past Troy’s lofty walls. I had killed the man who had abducted Helen. Now I would see that she herself would not be slain, not even by her rightful husband.
“Priam is dead,” she said, her voice muffled and sobbing. “His heart broke when he saw the invaders coming over the wall.”
“The queen?” I asked.
“She and the other royal women are in the main temple, just on the other side of that door. The guards outside have sworn to go down to the last man before allowing Agamemnon and his brutes to enter here.”
I held her and listened for the clamor of the fight out in the corridor. It didn’t last long. A final scream of agony, a final roar of triumph, then a thudding as the Achaians pounded against the locked doors. A splintering of wood, then silence.
“It would be better if you went in there,” I suggested, “rather than forcing them to break in and find you.”
Helen pushed herself away from me and glanced at Apet, still hovering in the shadows. Visibly struggling for self-control, Helen lifted her chin like the queen she had hoped to be. At last she said, “Yes. I am ready to face them.”
I went to the connecting door, unlatched it, and opened it a crack. Agamemnon, his brother Menalaos, and dozens of other Achaian nobles were crowding into the temple, goggling at the gold-covered statues taller than life that lined its walls. The floor was gleaming marble. At the head of the temple, behind the alabaster altar, loomed a towering statue of Aphrodite, gilded and painted, decked with flowers and offerings of jewels. Hundreds of candles burned at its base, casting dancing highlights off the gold and gems. The victorious Achaians focused their attention on the richly draped altar and the old woman lying upon it.
I had never seen Hecuba before. The aged, wrinkled woman lay on the altar, arms crossed over her breast, eyes closed. Her robes were threaded with gold; her wrists and fingers bore turquoise and amber, rubies and carnelian. Heavy ropes of gold necklaces and a jewel-encrusted crown had been lovingly placed upon her. Seven women, dressed in the ash-gray robes of mourning, stood trembling around the altar, facing the sweaty, bloodstained Achaians, who gaped at the splendor of the dead Queen of Troy.
One of the older woman was speaking to Agamemnon. “My mother took poison once the king died. She knew that Troy would not outlive this evil day, that my prophecy had finally come true.”
“Cassandra,” whispered Helen to me. “The queen’s eldest daughter.”
Agamemnon turned slowly from the corpse on the altar to the grayhaired princess. His narrow little eyes glared anger and frustration.
Cassandra said, “You will not bring the Queen of Troy back to Myce me in your black boat, mighty Agamemnon. She will never be a slave of yours.”
A leering smile twisted Agamemnon’s lips. “Then I’ll have to settle for you, Princess. You will be my slave in her place.”
“Yes,” Cassandra said. “And we will die together at the hands of your faithless wife.”
“Trojan bitch!” He cuffed her with a heavy backhand swat that knocked her to the marble floor.
Before any more violence erupted, I swung wide the door of the sanctuary. The Achaians turned, hands gripping the swords at their sides. Helen stepped through with regal grace and an absolutely blank expression on her beautiful face. It was as if the most splendid statue imaginable had taken on the glow of life.
She went wordlessly to Cassandra and helped the princess to her feet. Blood trickled from her cut lip.
I stood by the side of the altar, my hand resting on the pommel of my sword. Agamemnon and the others recognized me. Their faces were grimy, their hands stained with blood. I could smell their sweat.
Menalaos seemed to be stunned with shock. Then he suddenly stepped forward and gripped his wife by her shoulders.
“Helen!” His mouth twitched, as if he was trying to say words that would not leave his soul.
She did not smile, but her eyes searched his. The other Achaians watched them dumbly.
Every emotion a human being can show flashed across Menalaos’ face. Helen simply stood there, in his grip, waiting for him to speak, to act, to make his decision on whether she lived or died.
Agamemnon broke the silence. “Well, Brother, I promised you we’d get her back! She’s yours once again, to deal with as you see fit.”
Menalaos swallowed hard and finally found his voice. “You are my wife, Helen,” he said, more for the ears of Agamemnon and the others than for hers, I thought. “What’s happened since Paris abducted you was not of your doing. A woman captive is not responsible for what happens to her during her captivity.”
I thought grimly that Menalaos wanted her back so badly that he was willing to forget everything that had happened. For now.
Agamemnon clapped his brother on the back gleefully. “I’m only sorry that Paris didn’t have the courage to face me, man to man. I would have gladly spitted him on my spear.”
“Where is Paris?” Menalaos growled.
“Dead,” I answered. “His body is in the square by the Scaean Gate.”
The women started to cry, all except Helen. They sobbed quietly as they stood by their mother’s bier. But Cassandra’s eyes blazed with unconcealed fury.
“Odysseos is going through the city to find all the princes and noblemen,” said Agamemnon. “Those who still live will make a noble sacrifice for the gods.” He laughed at his own pun.
I left Troy for the final time, marching with the Achaian victors through the burning city as Agamemnon led the seven Trojan princesses back to his camp and slavery. Menalaos walked side by side with Helen, which somehow stirred a simmering anger in me. His wife once more. Thanks to me. I brought them this victory and she goes back to him.
I shook my head, trying to clear such thoughts away. To night I claim my sons and my wife. Tomorrow we leave Troy forever.
And go where?
A guard of honor escorted our little pro cession, spears held stiffly up to the blackened sky. Wailing and sobs rose all around us; the air was filled with the stench of blood and smoke.
I trailed behind and noted that Helen never touched Menalaos, not even to take his hand. I remembered what Apet had told me, that being a wife among the Achaians, even a queen, was little better than being a slave.
She never touched Menalaos, and he hardly glanced at her after that first emotion-charged meeting in the temple of Aphrodite at dead Hecuba’s bier.
But she looked back at me over her shoulder more than once, looked at me, as if to make certain that I was not far from her.
