Warrior Rising (Goddess Summoning #6)(52)

Ah, to hell with it, Kat thought. If I wake up with a monster it won’t be the first time.

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CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Agamemnon paced back and forth across the bedchamber of his voluminous tent while Briseis lounged on his bed, pouting.

“You said we were going to have a party tonight. One with those Greek dancing slaves.” She raised up on her knees, naked except for several strands of exquisite pearls, lifted her arms over her head and swayed her curvy hips back and forth. “You said they would teach me that lovely dance they do.”

Agamemnon glanced at her, his eyes lingering on her young breasts and their pink, succulent nipples. He wanted her again, of course. And he would have her. But right now she was a distraction he did not need.

“I told you, I cannot have a party tonight. Not after today’s losses in battle.”

“It’s him isn’t it? It’s his fault,” Briseis said, her sweet voice turning sharp and her soft, round face twisting into an ugly sneer.

“Are you still upset because of how easily he replaced you, pet? Ah, now, don’t fret. He simply didn’t appreciate your appetites.” Agamemnon moved over to the bed and stroked her long hair with one hand. With the other he tweaked her nipple painfully. Instead of crying out or pulling away, Briseis moaned and arched her back.

“I hate him! He ruins everything,” she said, and then gasped in pleasure as his hand left her hair and slapped her once, hard, across her bare buttocks.

“But it’s not really our dear Achilles who’s to blame for his absence from the battlefield. It’s that distraction he replaced you with.” Agamemnon enjoyed Briseis most when she was like this—when she discarded the mantle of gentle maid and showed the truth of her black little heart and her limitless craving for sensation of all types. What a fool Achilles had been not to have sampled from her sweet banquet.

Briseis’s hand roamed down the king’s body and began rubbing his semiflaccid penis to life. “It’s unnatural that she touches him. No woman touches him.”

Agamemnon pinched her other breast and her hand stroked faster. “Ah, what a shame he didn’t know what he was missing in you, pet.”

Her tongue flicked out to lave his nipple and she spoke against his chest. “The other war brides say she has put a spell on him. And that maid of hers, Melia, has also turned into a sorceress.”

“What do you mean?” Suddenly completely serious, Agamemnon took her chin roughly in his hand. “Tell me what you know.”

“Only that the women from her father’s palace say Polyxena and Melia are not as they used to be. They speak and act more like Sirens or witches than tools of a goddess. Achilles and Patroklos have both been utterly tamed by them.”

Agamemnon let loose her chin and she went back to tonguing his nipples. Neatly forgetting the fact that his actions in taking Briseis had been what had caused Polyxena to be given to Achilles, he continued, “The Trojan witch is the reason he is so willing to stay out of the battle and let his Greek brothers be slaughtered for his pleasure.”

“Get rid of her, and Achilles will have nothing to occupy his time. Believe me, he lives for battle. If the princess hadn’t bespelled him, he couldn’t bear not fighting.”

“My pet, I do believe you make an excellent point.” Agamemnon pushed her back on the bed, but instead of mounting her, as her splayed legs said she obviously expected, he began pulling on his clothes. “Stay here—in that very position. I won’t be long.” Then he paused, changing his mind. “Actually don’t stay in that position. I want you to go spread poison among the war prizes.”

Briseis bounced up, clapping her hands gleefully and looking like an evil kitten. “What shall I say?”

“Encourage the talk of witchery, but focus on the maidservant. When you speak of Polyxena, let it be known that you’ve heard rumors that Achilles’ mother, the sea goddess Thetis, would like to get a look at her son’s lover.”

Briseis sneered. “They can’t be lovers. Achilles is chaste.”

“Perhaps, but if they are lovers, they won’t be for much longer.”

“What are you going to do to Achilles?” Briseis asked happily.

“Now, pet, you know I would never harm that great warrior and hero of my people…” Agamemnon chuckled cruelly as he strode from his bedchamber, calling for Kalchas.

The old man rushed up to him, bowing subserviently.

“Remind me, Kalchas, is it a fat black bull that Poseidon prefers as a sacrifice when summoning his presence?”

“It is, indeed, great King.”

“And remind me, again, was it not Poseidon who Laomedon, Priam’s ancestor, refused to pay after the god aided him in building the impenetrable walls of Troy?”

“Yes, great King. And in doing so Laomedon, as well as all of his children’s children, gained the eternal enmity of the sea god.”

“So, in theory only, mind you, if it were possible for Poseidon to gain access to, say for instance, a daughter of the royal family of Troy, do you believe the sea god would be pleased at the opportunity to exact vengeance on Troy’s king?”

Kalchas’s thin lips twisted into the caricature of a smile. “Yes, I believe he would, great King.”

“In theory, only,” Agamemnon said.