“Andromache, I—”
“Don’t speak, husband. She’s your brother’s wife. For his sake you have to put aside your disapproval. At least pretend to like her. We must make her welcome.”
“Disapproval?”
“You would not look at her, and when you did, you scowled. It must have been very frightening for her. Promise me you will apologize for your bad manners.”
“But Andromache—”
“For me, if you won’t do it for Paris. Welcome this woman into the palace.”
“Why are you so concerned about Helen?” I asked. “She has a reputation for scandal.”
“You don’t know what it is like to leave your family and dwell with strangers. She will be lonely. I want to be her friend. She will need one if everybody thinks as you do.”
I stared at Andromache. My thoughts kept returning to the red lips and the sapphire eyes that had stripped me bare. I could sense the meddling of the gods in this. I ignored their gifts at my peril.
“All right. I give my word.” I swear that my oath was tinged with regret. I knew I had no defenses against Helen. Didn’t Andromache understand the viper she was inviting into her chambers?
“I knew I could depend upon you, husband. I will pray to the gods that Hector and Helen find the happiness that we have found.” She reached up and gave me her kiss.
I returned it dutifully and pushed a false smile to my face. Red lips and the bluest eyes.
That evening we dined at my father’s table. I mixed and poured Helen’s wine and placed the cup in front of her. I watched her bring the kylix to her lips and sip from its broad, shallow bowl. A tiny drop of wine glistened at the corner of her mouth, brighter than the necklace of gold she wore at her slender throat. My wife patted my leg to show her approval. Paris entertained us with stone of the Achaeans and their strange manners. Helen laughed at everything he said. He kissed her frequently, with great passion, to remind us that she was his, and none of ours. For me the food and drink had no taste.
Later I lay in bed with Andromache. She curled against me, a leg draped over mine. We could both hear a loud thumping coming through the wall. On the other side was Helen’s bed chamber. Andromache giggled. “She is enthusiastic, I will give her that.”
Now a loud, long, drawn-out, shuddering moan. “And noisy.”
I made a sound indicating my disgust. “They rut like common farm animals,” I whispered. “Have they no shame?”
“The marriage bed is still new. His passion will cool soon enough.”
Another moan. Paris muttered something unintelligible and the bed knocked against the wall and the thumping began again.
“Gods, will they never stop?” I was in agony.
“Would you like it if I was loud like that?” Andromache ran her fingers down across my stomach.
“What is this?” she cooed, finding my erection. “You still desire me, don’t you?” She rolled on her back and drew me to her. I had no choice now. I made love to Andromache, but all the time I imagined the woman on the other side of the wall.
The first Achaean ship arrived a month later. Soon there were dozens, then two hundred. They came with at least ten thousand men. I welcomed them. It gave me something to occupy my thoughts during the day. Every night, though, I had to listen to Helen pretend to find pleasure with my brother. He acted the fool, fawning over her during the meals Andromache insisted we take together. I could see the misery in Helen’s eyes when she looked at me. I found ways to brush against her, and soon I was engaged in a series of chaste kisses and brotherly embraces, while Andromache urged me on and Paris began to drink the way our father did. It was more than I could stand. My thwarted passion haunted me, a reproving ghost.
We skirmished with the Achaeans daily, but avoided a pitched battle. Every morning I watched them from the roof of the palace. One day Paris joined me.
“It will be hard to drive them out,” he said, pointing to Agamemnon’s camp on the promontory on the far side of the wide bay.
“Too hard. The approach to their camp is narrow, and that ditch and rampart look sturdy enough.”
“What do we do, just let them sit there? Look at the damage they are doing.”
The Achaeans were burning farms and fields. It looked like Troy was surrounded by a landscape of funeral pyres, the columns of smoke climbing tall and straight into the autumn sky.
“That is exactly what we do,” I said. “Father has decided to leave the fighting to me, and that is our strategy. We wait. Eventually they will do something foolish, like attacking our walls. We will make many Achaean widows when they do.” I patted my sceptical brother on his back. “We can always plant new fields and build new farms. I will need your help. I have to be able to depend on you.”
“Expecting me to do something foolish, brother?” he said. “Promise me they will not carry off Helen.”
His weakness disgusted me. It was his responsibility to safeguard his wife, not mine.
“I promise, Paris. No Achaean will lay hands on her while I draw breath.” I made no such promise for my own hands.
In the following months, the Achaeans tried the walls twice. Then it was their turn to weep at the smoke-darkened skies, coming as they did from the pyres of their slain. We took each other’s measure, like wrestlers seeking the hold that would lead to victory.
The long days slowly passed. The fighting flared and diminished like an improperly banked fire. Achilles made his presence felt. He was terrible to behold. He was dangerously fast and fought with great rage. But unlike most men, Achilles focused it, and so it was a source of strength. I did not relish crossing spears with him. Our tactic was to withdraw before him and pin his warriors in place with the threat of cavalry, while archers harried his men. Paris led this force, and soon began to accumulate reputation and not a little fame. He reveled in his success, and it translated into an insatiable appetite in the bedroom. I could hardly take myself to my own bed, knowing what I would have to hear.
Andromache watched me with mounting concern.
“Husband, you are distracted. You are always tense, and snap at me for no reason. Tell me what I can do to put you at ease.”
I shrugged. “My father hides in a wine cup. I have to rule the city as well as lead in battle. What do you expect?”
“The only time you smile is when we take our meal with your brother and Helen. I’m glad that his jests and boasts entertain you.”
“My troubles will pass once the Achaeans leave.”
I knew Andromache found no pleasure in Paris’s bragging and crude humor. How the war had changed him! Her failure to make friends with Helen had left her guilty and confused.
It was clear, however, that she had something more important on her mind than Paris’s table conversation.
“I have bad news, husband. It is my mother. She is dying. My father has asked me to return to help. Will you permit me to go?”
“I am sorry to hear this,” I said, putting my arm around her shoulder. “Of course, you must go.”
“Helen has noticed your unease as well. She watches out for you, as a sister should. I wish I could be a better friend to her. She said she’d look after you if I went. That is a great burden lifted from my shoulders.”
She hesitated. “I can trust you when I am gone, can’t I?” She was blushing and her eyes glinted with distress.
“Trust me? If you mean the Achaeans, I will keep them at bay.”
“Yes, husband. That is what I mean. The Achaeans. Every one of them.”
I sat without moving, my thoughts churning in my head and my breath suddenly trapped inside my chest. “When do you leave?”