The Lost Sisterhood (39 page)

Pointing at the bed, Creusa let Myrina understand this would be where she slept for the night—away from the others, away from Lilli. And as soon as Myrina stepped into the animal skins, the woman went back into the kitchen to return moments later with a small bowl of hot tea.

After seeing Myrina tasting and nodding with appreciation, Creusa bent forward impulsively to kiss her wet hair, after which she fled the room with downcast eyes.

Shortly thereafter, Myrina heard Creusa leave the cabin, and the door gently closing. Torn between her concerns for the others and her
obligation to Creusa, who so obviously wanted her to stay right there, Myrina decided to be patient and drink the rest of her tea before sneaking out to check on Lilli.

But by the time she finished the cup—which contained a curious blend of mint and something else—she was so relaxed that the prospect of getting back into her clothes, bundled somewhere on the kitchen floor, was downright torturous. Sighing deeply, she lay down on the bed to rest for a moment….

And was woken by the sound of water.

Sitting up, Myrina had no idea how long she had been asleep. Her hair was almost dry, and the fire had long since settled into a heap of smoldering coals.

Stepping out on the floor, she tiptoed to the curtain to peek into the kitchen, expecting to see Creusa—indefatigable Creusa—emptying the bathtub. But what she saw made her draw back with a gasp. For it was Paris, completely naked, standing up in the water after a bath of his own, his wet skin reflecting the glow of the embers in the kitchen hearth as he dried his hair.

Unsure what to do, Myrina stayed rooted to the spot, wrapped in her blankets. And when Paris finally pushed aside the curtain and entered the bedroom, barely dressed, she was so struck by bashfulness she turned away. But then … her desire to see him was greater than her shyness, and she looked up to meet his eyes.

How long they stood like that, unspoken words passing between them, she was not sure. Then, as though he had been waiting for permission, Paris crossed the floor and took her head between his hands, kissing her with all the pent-up passion she had seen in his eyes—kisses of tender promises and unbending demands that galloped away with her across fields, endless, blooming fields….

But when he tried to pull the blanket from her shoulder, her hand shot out by reflex to close tightly around his wrist. At which Paris smiled and whispered, “Don’t fight me. Not tonight.”

Myrina slowly released his arm. “It is only what you’ve taught me so well.”

He kissed her neck, right below the ear. “Yes, but there is more.”

She closed her eyes, barely able to think. “And what would you have me learn tonight?”

“The most important lesson of all.” He drew her tightly against him. “To surrender with grace.”

She gasped with surprise. “Once again you are armed and I am not!”

He chuckled but did not let her go. “That is usually why one surrenders.”

“If I were a man, you would never tell me to surrender.”

“No.” He took her by the neck and kissed her again, indulging in her softness. “But you are not a man. You are too lovely, too mysterious—”

Myrina gasped at his skillful touch. “I am not sure I know how to be a woman. I have never tried.”

Paris smiled. “If you could see yourself, you would think otherwise.”

“Will you help me?”

His eyes darkened. “Does Earth need to ask the Sun to rise?”

Myrina shook her head, willing him to understand. “Earth is new to me. For so long, the Moon has ruled my world.”

“I know.” Paris took her hand and kissed her wrist—a shade brighter where the jackal bracelet used to be. “The Moon has no power to give life. That is why she is so jealous of our pleasure.” He clutched her hand with his, then caught himself and let go. “But first …”

Puzzled, Myrina watched him disappear behind the curtain and return a moment later, carrying something wrapped in cloth. After tossing a few fresh logs on the fire he knelt down by the hearthstone to open the cloth and reveal two objects hidden inside. One was a humble clay bottle sealed with wax, the other a golden chalice beset with precious stones. Seeing the hesitant reverence with which he touched the latter, Myrina guessed it was no ordinary royal drinking vessel, but one invested with a certain magic.

“Here.” Paris handed her the chalice and peeled the wax seal from the bottle before pouring out the darkest, most viscous liquid Myrina had ever seen. Then he said, with solemnity, “You are the cup, and I am
the wine.” And when Myrina opened her mouth to ask why it could not be the other way around, he pressed his fingers against her lips with a warning glare. “Drink.”

And she did, but just a sip, leaving the rest for Paris, who emptied the chalice with a grimace.

“I am sorry,” she said. “I did not realize we were to finish it.”

“No.” He knelt down to wrap everything back up in the cloth. “Because I did not tell you. The taste of this, I am sure, has haunted many a bride on her wedding night—as if she did not already have her fill of frights.”

Myrina started. “Does this mean I am your wife?”

Paris rose slowly, to kiss her with reverence. Then he took the blanket she still had draped around her and very gently removed it. “Almost,” he whispered, taking in the sight of her. Picking her up in his arms and stepping directly into the bed, he said, “Before the night is over, you will be.”

M
YRINA WOKE IN A ROOM BATHED IN SUNSHINE
.
B
LINKING AGAINST
the bright light, she looked around to find its source and saw a pair of shutters that had been opened while she slept. Next to her lay Paris, smiling at her confusion. The sight of him sent a bolt of delight through her body, leaving a trail of smoldering embarrassment as all her memories from the night were released at once, flapping away on quivery wings.

Diving back under the bearskin they were sharing, Myrina hid her face against Paris’s neck and felt him chuckle. “I thought,” he said, kissing her temple, “we did away with this shyness of yours.” He ran his hands down her back, drawing her closer. “Perhaps we should try to hunt it down again? Clearly, it is still hiding somewhere.”

Myrina giggled when she felt his searching touch. “Unquestionably,” she murmured against his ear, “you did away with a lot of things—and thoroughly so—but let me keep my modesty a little longer that I may not be a complete stranger to myself.”

“Very well,” growled Paris, rolling on top of her. “Keep your shyness if you must, as long as you let this rapacious husband of yours have the rest.”

Later, when they were once again calm, Myrina put a hand over his heart and said, “To think I should travel so far away from everything I know … and find that my home has been here all along, waiting for me.”

Paris turned his head to look into her eyes. “Tell me about the people you used to know. Your parents, your family …”

Myrina reached out to cover them both with a blanket. “They are all gone. My sister Lilli”—she paused to stem a sudden sadness—”is the only blood relation I have left.”

Paris kissed her on the forehead, then lay back to stare at the ceiling. “You are fortunate,” he said, his voice heavy with a burden only he could see. “No one is waiting for you, making demands on you, judging you. You are free.”

Anxious to dispel his sudden gloom, Myrina ran a hand underneath the covers. “Not anymore.”

“But you are.” He checked her hand, not yet ready to play. “This house … you and me … that is freedom. We have both cast off our bonds to be together, and I wish”—he brought her hand to his lips, kissing it tenderly—”I wish we could lie here, just like this, until the end of time.”

T
HEY STAYED IN THE
hillside cabin for three nights. During the daytime, Myrina did what she could to entertain her sisters, but despite their goodwill and humorous comments, it was clear they were all—even Lilli—growing impatient with their mountainous isolation.

When Aeneas returned on the fourth day with orders to bring Prince Paris back to court, even Myrina was secretly relieved to see their rustic sojourn come to an end. She suspected the magnificence of a royal reception would have a soothing effect on her sisters’ disgruntlement and free her to once again spend long, delightful hours alone with her husband.

But as they rode back along the Scamander River, with the walls of Troy rising ahead, Paris was so silent she began to wonder whether there was something he had not told her—some terrible reality that would soon undermine her happy expectations. Myrina could not imagine what it might be, other than the obvious risk that the king and queen might be displeased in their son’s choice of wife. Whenever she had raised the issue, however, Paris had laughed it away and assured her
no one would find fault with
her
… implying that, whatever it was, the problem lay with him alone.

In the end, Myrina purged all those futile speculations from her mind and took in the beauty of the landscape around her. The Scamandrian Plain had already struck her as rich and plentiful on the day they first arrived; since then, her appreciation had only grown. For this was her home now; these golden ears of wheat, swaying in the breeze, carried the grains she would eat, and those colossal walls, engineered for eternity, would be the cradle holding her future. And Lilli’s future, too, should she decide to stay in Troy.

Riding up to the city gate, Myrina had to put back her head in wonder. Never had she seen walls this tall, or doors made from such giant boards of wood. Nowhere in the city of the Moon Goddess had there been architecture to rival this; even the massive fortifications at Mycenae seemed puny in comparison.

The gate stood wide open, allowing for the constant coming and going of farmers and merchants, the latter of whom were either on their way to the harbor—glittering in the distance—or returning to town with cartloads of foreign goods. There was a great sense of purpose to the place. Myrina could happily have gotten off her horse and sat all day next to the grandfathers on their benches, bobbing in the flow of life.

“When we arrive,” said Paris, as he steered them through the mayhem, “there may be some … commotion. But please trust me and do not worry.” He gave Myrina a reassuring smile. “No one will prevent us from being together, and before you know it”—he leaned toward her and lowered his voice—”I will be chasing you around a bed so big you’ll finally have a chance of escaping my satyric lust.”

Myrina was not fooled by his levity. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the muscles at war in his jaw and the trenches drawn across his forehead. It pained her to see him suffer, and even more that he did not share his concerns with her, or hint at their nature. But then … she also knew him well enough to understand that his silence was, more than anything, an expression of his love for her. Whatever had to be
endured, he intended to endure alone. To challenge his decision and argue he was hurting her would be a blow directly to his heart.

U
NLIKE THE CITY GATE,
the entrance to the Trojan citadel was closed and blocked by armed guards. A steep and narrow ramp led up to it, with tall walls on either side; it reminded Myrina of nothing she had ever seen before.

“We are private people,” explained Paris. “So many foreign ships stop here in the summer months—” He broke off to address the guards in the Trojan language, and they immediately snapped to, opening a small window in the door to order the whole thing unlocked from the inside.

As the gate swung out, Myrina saw that the entrance went through a tunnel built with enormous fitted boulders that looked as if they could have been moved by no one but the gods. On the other side of the tunnel, Paris led their party into a vast, sloping yard ringed with magnificent houses. The Trojan citadel, home to King Priam and his court, was a small city unto itself, dominated—at the top—by one particularly large building fronted with a colonnade.

“That is the Temple of the Earth Shaker,” explained Paris, following Myrina’s eyes. “The all-powerful uncle of the Sun God. This is where he lives”—Paris made a gesture out over the great blue sea visible beyond the walls of the citadel—”when he is not roaming the ocean. But come, I see my father is out. We have a chance of speaking to him without a great echo and a whining choir of doomsday priests—”

Only then did Myrina notice the cluster of men across the courtyard and the handsome red stallion in their midst. As she and Paris rode toward the group with Aeneas and her sisters trailing behind, she saw an old man with a walking stick checking the stallion’s teeth and guessed a purchase was afoot.

Dismounting, Paris walked up to another man who stood off to the side and began addressing him with a nod of deference. Because the man was clad in an entirely unremarkable garment, it did not even
occur to Myrina that he was the illustrious King Priam until he held out his hand to Paris. After dutifully kissing his father’s ring, Paris went on—Myrina guessed—to explain something about the women he had brought to court. He did not get far before the king’s serene gaze turned into a squint.

She had done much to prepare herself for this moment, and yet Myrina found herself shrinking under King Priam’s scrutiny when he looked at her, then her sisters. Although father and son were alike in stature, and the king’s hair had only just started graying, his eyes could have been those of the oldest man in the world.

“Come, my love.” Paris helped her from the horse and walked her over to stand before the unsmiling king. Then he took a deep breath and squared his shoulders. “Father, this is my wife. Her name is Myrina.”

King Priam’s face might as well have been carved in stone, for it was absolutely unmoving, expressing neither anger nor joy. For the briefest of moments, Myrina wondered whether Paris had been wrong in assuming his father would be comfortable switching into the language of Ephesus—perhaps he had not actually understood what his son said to him. But even before she had completed the thought, the king responded in that same language, without even a hint of an accent, “Is it a fact?”

Myrina felt Paris’s hand closing firmly around hers. “Yes.”

“What say you?” King Priam turned to Myrina. “Are you his wife?”

She nodded, too breathless to respond in words.

“Speak up!” The king was in no mood for meekness. “Are you his wife?”

Myrina swallowed her nerves. “Yes.”

Then at last, King Priam nodded at Paris. “So be it. May the Earth Shaker—and your mother!—look kindly upon this union. I will go and forewarn her now.” With that the king turned and marched away, leaving not only Myrina, but also her sisters and Aeneas in a state of silent mortification.

“Right,” said Paris, addressing all the women at once, his smile defying their shuffling embarrassment. “Welcome to my father’s house.
Aeneas will make sure you are comfortably installed, while Myrina and I will do what has to be done—a task you need not envy us.”

The queen was not in her courtyard, surrounded by ladies and musicians, nor had she withdrawn to her quarters to bathe and be private. When Myrina and Paris finally found her, she was kneeling in a windowless house shrine in front of a small altar crowded with wax candles and tiny figurines.

After waiting for a moment so as not to interrupt her, Paris leaned down and touched a hand to her covered shoulder.
“Mama—”

Myrina heard a gasp, then a sob … before the queen rose from the small praying stool to throw her arms around her son with a stream of tearful lamentations. Stroking his hair with frantic, trembling hands, she kissed him again and again, unwilling to let him go, and whatever he whispered to her—calm and patient as he was—only seemed to aggravate her more.

Stepping backward, Myrina wanted to run away and hide. She had anticipated fury and accusations, but not tears. It did not seem right that she should witness these intimate emotions; how could she ever look the queen in the eyes after this? She felt anger toward Paris for having involved her in such a critical moment, and yet she could see that he, too, was shocked by the force of his mother’s grief.

“Please, Mother,” he said, in the language of Ephesus. “When you know Myrina better, you will understand—”

“Myrina? That is how I must address your murderer?” The queen turned reluctantly to face her new daughter-in-law. “Do you know what you have done?” she whispered, as if she were pleading with a merciless hangman. “Do you know what you have done to my son, the only healthy boy that ever lay in my arms?” As she spoke, her voice gathered strength, and when she saw Myrina’s terror she fairly slung the last words in her face. “You think you have secured a life in riches, but you have not! Greedy sow! When he dies, I will see to it you burn on the same day, but on quite a different pyre!”

“Mother!” exclaimed Paris, taking her firmly by the shoulders. “Control yourself! Myrina knows nothing of this nonsense.” He drew
his mother into a tight embrace, trying to still her trembling. “Look at you! What must she think of you? Myrina loves me, I assure you, and would rather die than cause me pain. Just like you.”

There was a brief silence. Then the queen mumbled, her voice muffled by his shoulder, “She can never love you the way I do.”

“I know, Mother.” He kissed her again. “But she is doing her best. She is one of Otrera’s daughters and thus your niece. Just like you, she undid her vows to become a wife. Only
you
can know what she has gone through.”

This, at last, seemed to have an effect. Wiping her eyes with the corner of her praying shawl, the queen stood back and looked at Myrina once again, her hatred momentarily curbed. “Yet another woman with broken vows under this roof? Then we are doubly damned. But I must take my blame, I see it now. The Goddess has never allowed me to forget … and now my judgment is near.” She pressed a fist to her chest, fighting back another onslaught of misery. “I should not hate you, child. I was wrong to condemn you. For you are but an instrument of the Goddess. It was not you who killed my son. It was me. In my ignorance and wickedness, I gave him death even before the gods gave him life.”

P
ARIS HAD HIS DOMAIN
on the top floor of the royal palace—a vast room with a balcony overlooking the city and harbor. Beyond the harbor, which lay in a protected bay, the sea heaved quietly in the midday heat, specked with the occasional ship coming out of the narrow strait of the Dardanelles to round the Trojan headland.

It was a magnificent, truly luxurious sight, and yet Myrina could not enjoy it. The meeting with the queen had disturbed her greatly, and she was unable to pry her thoughts from the unspoken curse that had cast such a formidable shadow over mother and son.