The Song of Achilles(76)

“I—” I try to speak, stop. She sees my face, and her smile vanishes. Swiftly, she is on her feet and by my side.

“What is it?” She presses the cool skin of her wrist to my forehead. “Are you ill? Is Achilles all right?” I am sick with shame. But there is no space for my self-pity. They are coming.

“Something has happened,” I say. My tongue thickens in my mouth; my words do not come out straight. “Achilles went today to speak to the men. The plague is Apollo’s.”

“We thought so.” She nods, her hand resting gently on mine, in comfort. I almost cannot go on.

“Agamemnon did not—he was angry. He and Achilles quarreled. Agamemnon wants to punish him.”

“Punish him? How?”

Now she sees something in my eyes. Her face goes quiet, pulling into itself. Bracing. “What is it?”

“He is sending men. For you.”

I see the flare of panic, though she tries to hide it. Her fingers tighten on mine. “What will happen?”

My shame is caustic, searing every nerve. It is like a nightmare; I expect, each moment, to wake to relief. But there is no waking. It is true. He will not help.

“He—” I cannot say more.

It is enough. She knows. Her right hand clutches at her dress, chapped and raw from the rough work of the past nine days. I force out stuttering words meant to be a comfort, of how we will get her back, and how it will be all right. Lies, all of it. We both know what will happen to her in Agamemnon’s tent. Achilles knows, too, and sends her anyway.

My mind is filled with cataclysm and apocalypse: I wish for earthquakes, eruptions, flood. Only that seems large enough to hold all of my rage and grief. I want the world overturned like a bowl of eggs, smashed at my feet.

A trumpet blows outside. Her hand goes to her cheek, swipes away tears. “Go,” she whispers. “Please.”





Chapter Twenty-Six

IN THE DISTANCE TWO MEN ARE WALKING TOWARDS US UP the long stretch of beach, wearing the bright purple of Agamemnon’s camp, stamped with the symbol of heralds. I know them—Talthybius and Eurybates, Agamemnon’s chief messengers, honored as men of discretion close to the high king’s ear. Hate knots my throat. I want them dead.

They are close now, passing the glaring Myrmidon guards, who rattle their armor threateningly. They stop ten paces from us—enough, perhaps they think, to be able to escape Achilles if he were to lose his temper. I indulge myself in vicious images: Achilles leaping up to snap their necks, leaving them limp as dead rabbits in a hunter’s hand.

They stutter out a greeting, feet shifting, eyes down. Then: “We have come to take custody of the girl.”

Achilles answers them—cold and bitter, but wryly so, his anger banked and shielded. He is giving a show, I know, of grace, of tolerance, and my teeth clench at the calmness in his tone. He likes this image of himself, the wronged young man, stoically accepting the theft of his prize, a martyrdom for the whole camp to see. I hear my name and see them looking at me. I am to get Briseis.

She is waiting for me. Her hands are empty; she is taking nothing with her. “I’m sorry,” I whisper. She does not say it is all right; it is not. She leans forward, and I can smell the warm sweetness of her breath. Her lips graze mine. Then she steps past me and is gone.

Talthybius takes one side of her, Eurybates the other. Their fingers press, not gently, into the skin of her arm. They tow her forward, eager to be away from us. She is forced to move, or fall. Her head turns back to look at us, and I want to break at the desperate hope in her eyes. I stare at him, will him to look up, to change his mind. He does not.

They are out of our camp now, moving quickly. After a moment I can barely distinguish them from the other dark figures that move against the sand—eating and walking and gossiping intently about their feuding kings. Anger sweeps through me like brushfire.

“How can you let her go?” I ask, my teeth hard against one another.

His face is blank and barren, like another language, impenetrable. He says, “I must speak with my mother.”

“Go then,” I snarl.

I watch him leave. My stomach feels burned to cinders; my palms ache where my nails have cut into them. I do not know this man, I think. He is no one I have ever seen before. My rage towards him is hot as blood. I will never forgive him. I imagine tearing down our tent, smashing the lyre, stabbing myself in the stomach and bleeding to death. I want to see his face broken with grief and regret. I want to shatter the cold mask of stone that has slipped down over the boy I knew. He has given her to Agamemnon knowing what will happen.

Now he expects that I will wait here, impotent and obedient. I have nothing to offer Agamemnon for her safety. I cannot bribe him, and I cannot beg him. The king of Mycenae has waited too long for this triumph. He will not let her go. I think of a wolf, guarding its bone. There were such wolves on Pelion, who would hunt men if they were hungry enough. “If one of them is stalking you,” Chiron said, “you must give it something it wants more than you.”

There is only one thing that Agamemnon wants more than Briseis. I yank the knife from my belt. I have never liked blood, but there is no help for that, now.

THE GUARDS SEE me belatedly and are too surprised to lift their weapons. One has the presence of mind to seize me, but I dig my nails into his arm, and he lets go. Their faces are slow and stupid with shock. Am I not just Achilles’ pet rabbit? If I were a warrior, they would fight me, but I am not. By the time they think they should restrain me, I am inside the tent.