One wing of the palace was afire. I could see flames crackling in the windows. I closed my eyes momentarily, picturing in my mind the chamber where Helen had spoken to me. It was there where the fire blazed.
From a balcony overhead I heard shouts, then curses. The clash of metal on metal. A fight was still going on up there.
“The royal women have locked themselves into the temple of Aphrodite,” I heard a man behind me yell. “Come on!” He sounded like someone rushing to a party, or hurrying to get back to his seat before the curtain rose on the final act of the drama.
I snatched my sword from its scabbard and rushed up the nearest stairs. A handful of Trojans were making a last-ditch defense of the corridor that led to the royal temples, fighting desperately against a shouting, bellowing mob of Achaian warriors. Behind the doors locked at the Trojans’ backs waited aged Priam and his wife, Hecuba, together with their daughters and grandchildren, I realized.
Helen must be there too, I thought. I saw Menalaos, Diomedes, and Agamemnon himself thrusting their spears at the few desperate Trojan defenders, laughing at them, taunting them.
“You sell your lives for nothing,” shouted Diomedes. “Put down your spears and we will allow you to live.”
“As slaves!” roared Agamemnon.
The Trojans fought bravely, but they were outnumbered and doomed, their backs pressed against the doors they tried so valiantly to defend, as more and more Achaians rushed up to join the sport.
I sprinted down the next corridor and pushed my way through rooms where soldiers were tearing through chests of gorgeous robes, grabbing jewels from gold-inlaid boxes, and pulling silken tapestries from the walls. This wing of the palace would also be in flames soon, I knew. Too soon.
I found a balcony, swung over its balustrade, and, leaning as far forward as I dared, clamped one hand on the edge of a window in the otherwise blank rear wall of the temple wing. I swung out over thirty feet of air and pulled myself up onto my elbows, then hoisted a leg onto the windowsill. Pushing aside the beaded curtain, I peered into a small, dim inner sanctuary. The walls were bare, the tiles of the floor old and worn to dullness. Small votive statues stood lined on both sides of the room, some of them still decked with rings of withered flowers. The palace smelled of incense and old candles. Standing by the door, her back to me, her hands clasped in fear, stood Helen.
I could hear the sounds of the fighting from outside the temple. I dropped lightly to my feet and walked quietly toward her.
“Helen,” I said.
She whirled to face me, her fists pressed against her mouth, her body tense with terror. I saw her eyes recognize me, and she relaxed a little.
“The emissary,” she whispered.
“Orion,” I reminded her.
She stood there for an uncertain moment, wearing her finest robes, decked with gold and jewels, more beautiful than any woman had a right to be. Then she ran to me, three tiny steps, and pressed her golden head against my grimy, bloodstained chest. Her hair was scented like fragrant flowers.
“Don’t let them kill me, Orion! Please, please! They’ll be crazy with bloodlust. Even Menalaos. He’d take my head off and then blame it on Ares. Please protect me!”
“That’s why I came to you,” I said. As I spoke the words, I knew they were true. It was the one civilized thing I could do in this entire mad, murderous day. Having slain the man who had abducted her, I would now see to it that her rightful husband took her back.
“Priam is dead,” she said, her voice muffled and sobbing. “His heart broke when he saw the Achaians coming over the western 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 to the clamor of the fight. It did not last long. A final scream of agony, a final roar of triumph, then a thudding as they pounded against the locked doors. A splintering of wood, then silence.
“It would be better if we went in there, rather than letting them break in and find you,” I suggested.
She pulled herself away from me and visibly fought for self-control. Lifting her little chin like the queen she had hoped to be, Helen 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. Gold-covered statues taller than life lined its walls, and the floor was of gleaming marble. At the head of the temple, behind the marble altar, loomed a towering marble 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. But the Achaians ignored all the temple’s treasures. Instead they stared at the richly draped altar, and the old woman on 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, ranging in age from gray-haired to teenaged, stood trembling around the altar, facing the sweating, bloodstained Achaians, who gaped at the splendor of the dead Queen of Troy.
One of the older women was saying quietly to Agamemnon, “She took poison once the king died. She knew that Troy could not outlive this day, that my prophecy had finally come true.”
“Cassandra,” whispered Helen to me. “The queen’s eldest daughter.”
Agamemnon turned slowly from the corpse to the gray-haired princess. His narrow little eyes glared anger and frustration.
Cassandra said, “You will not bring the Queen of Troy back to Mycenae 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 incredibly beautiful face. It was as if the most splendid statue imaginable had taken on the power 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 left hand resting on the pommel of my sword. Agamemnon and the others recognized me. Their faces were grimy, hands stained with blood. I could smell their sweat even from this distance.
Menalaos, who seemed to be stunned with shock for a moment, suddenly stepped forward and gripped his wife by her shoulders.
“Helen!” His mouth seemed to twitch, as if he were 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’s 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.