Nobody's Princess (4 page)

I ran to the olive grove but took care to say a prayer to Athena before entering the trees. The goddess of wisdom created the olive tree so that we mortals would enjoy its gifts—especially the oil we used for everything from cooking, to protecting skin and hair, to filling the lamps that brightened our homes. The trees that grew near the citadel were kept sacred to her, their fruits never harvested except by her priests when they wanted oil to light her temple. I was sure that Athena would bless my plan to spy on Glaucus and my brothers, because she was a warrior herself, her images always wearing a helmet, carrying shield and spear.

I overestimated the goddess’s kindness and I underestimated Glaucus. I thought I was well hidden, crouched behind one of the sacred olive trees, watching him coach my brothers as they fought one another with wooden swords. How was I to know that the old soldier still had eyesight that a hawk would envy? I didn’t suspect a thing when he casually announced that he had to go pee and for them to keep up the good work. I was still spying on Castor and Polydeuces when he circled around the far side of the olive grove and swept down on me before I knew what was going on.

“What are you doing here?” he demanded, holding me by the back of the neck as if I were a puppy and dragging me out onto the training ground. When I squirmed, he shook me until my teeth rattled. “Answer!”

“Put me down!” I shouted at him. “I’m Helen! I’m your princess! I’m going to be your queen!” My brothers had dropped their swords and stood by, snickering.

Glaucus never cracked a smile. “Are you,” he said. He set me down, but he didn’t let go of my neck. “Queens work with spindles and needles. They card wool and weave cloth. They make medicines and perfumes. Do you see any wool to be carded and spun out here? Do I smell like I use perfume?”

“You smell like you ought to!” I snapped back. He still didn’t laugh, but I saw that grim mouth creep up just a bit at the corners.

“Why don’t you go back to the citadel and make me some, then,” he said. “Or would you rather tell me what’s brought you here?”

“I want to learn how to fight!” I declared, staring him right in the eyes to show him I wasn’t afraid.

“Even if I never have to use a sword, I want to know
how.
When I’m queen, I’ve got to be strong enough to protect myself. If I can’t do that, how can I protect anyone else? And if someone thinks he can control my life and my decisions just because he’s got a sword and I don’t—I want him to get a
surprise.
”

This time, Glaucus laughed. Laughed? He roared! I was positive he was mocking me, and that was so infuriating that, like a fool, I lost my temper. My arms were too short for my fists to reach him, but I flailed at him with my feet. I had to do
something
to show him that I wasn’t going to take an insult meekly, not even from a man who could throw me halfway to the citadel walls.

At my first kick, he dropped his hold on my neck, grabbed my foot in mid-arc, and had me dangling upside down in the blink of an eye. I was so startled I couldn’t even scream.

“That,” said Glaucus, “was your first lesson—keep your temper under control or it’s going to control you. Here’s your second—pick your battles.” Still holding me upside down, he turned toward my brothers. Castor and Polydeuces were now laughing so hard that they’d fallen over and were rolling on the ground. Quietly and gently, Glaucus set me on my feet and gave me one of the boys’ discarded swords. His eyes flicked meaningfully from me to them.

I didn’t need a second invitation. I thwacked my brothers’ backsides so fast and so hard with one of their own practice swords that the bruises left them looking like a pair of leopards. By the time they scrambled to their feet and out of reach, I was breathing hard, but I’d never felt happier. My brothers filled the air with their protests until Glaucus silenced them both with a look.

Then they had no other choice but to stand by, pulling long faces, while their teacher gave his attention to evaluating my improvised performance: “Good energy, even if it’s not focused. Bad technique, but that’s understandable and it can be corrected. Too much enthusiasm. There’s no shame in honorable combat, but there shouldn’t be so much unnatural pleasure. The man with the greatest thirst for blood ends up drinking at Hades’s table.
Men!
” At the word, my brothers tensed like hunting hounds. I giggled to hear him use that word to address a pair of boys still shy of their fifteenth birthday, but I bit off my laughter the instant Glaucus glared at me. “Men, we welcome your new comrade.”

The startled looks on their faces were beyond description.

“Is this a joke?” Polydeuces demanded. “Are you saying it just to punish us because we didn’t fight well today? We’ll do better tomorrow, I swear it by Zeus!”

“She can’t join us,” Castor said, shaking his head. “It’s—it’s—it’s just
wrong.
”

Glaucus soon put a stop to their protests. “Your sister has explained why she wants to share your lessons, and she makes good points. She’s younger than you, but already she knows the wisdom of being able to take care of herself
and
her people, once she’s our queen. Good: A weak ruler means a weak land; a weak land means war. Now if
you
can give me any reason why I should not teach her along with you, say it. If it makes sense, I’ll heed it, but remember this: It must be a reason that would apply if she’d been born a boy. If all you can say is
She’s a girl!
then save your breath. You’ll need it to outrun me, and the gods help you when I catch you.”

“But—but she’s a—She’s too
young
!” It was lucky Castor caught himself before he could utter the words that would earn him a beating.

“She doesn’t need to worry about protecting herself once she’s queen,” Polydeuces put in. “We’ll do that. We’d do it even if it
weren’t
our duty! Helen, don’t you trust us to take care of you?”

Before I could reply, Castor plowed on, “And she’s weak. Look at her arms! All scrawny. She’ll get hurt, and she’ll never be able to keep up with us.”

Glaucus folded his arms across his chest. “If she can’t keep up, she’ll get no special treatment. She can give up and go back to the palace anytime she likes. Once she does that, I won’t allow her to rejoin us. Understood?
All
of you?” He gave me a hard look. I said nothing, but I clenched my fists and made a private vow to Zeus himself that the only way I’d leave the training ground would be as a small, cold corpse.

I was still enjoying thoughts of
And I’ll be dead and then they’ll all be sorry!
when Glaucus added, “As for her age, she’s older than you were when your father first turned you over to me.”

“Father!” Castor cried, like a starving man discovering a loaf of bread. “He’d never risk anything happening to Helen. She
is
going to be queen one day.”

“Castor’s right,” Polydeuces said eagerly, his head bobbing up and down. “He’ll
never
hear of her training with us.”

“Exactly,” said Glaucus, and he smiled.

So we entered into a pact of the deepest secrecy, my brothers and Glaucus and I. It was agreed that I would train in the use of sword and shield and spear whenever I could slip away from the women’s world of distaff and spindle and loom inside the palace walls. Glaucus made Castor and Polydeuces promise that they would not speak of my lessons to anyone, not a word, not a hint. They clung to their initial reluctance. Castor kept repeating, “But what if Father finds out
anyway
? What will he do to us
then
?” until Polydeuces pointed out that I’d soon get tired of doing a
man’s
work; it would be only a matter of time before I quit on my own. Castor didn’t look convinced, but he went where Polydeuces led. Glaucus had them take the gods’ own oath, swearing by the dreadful powers of the river Styx, the black water that flows between the lands of the living and the realm of Hades, lord of the dead.

Of course, Glaucus laid down some exceptions to our pact for me. “If you’re clumsy enough to make anyone suspicious—anyone to whom you owe honor and obedience, I mean—and you’re asked a direct question about where you’re going or what you’re doing, tell the truth.”

I nodded. I knew that lying was wrong, but I drew a broken line around the whole matter of concealing my sword-training from my parents. If I didn’t tell them I
was
doing it, it wasn’t the same thing as telling them I
wasn’t.

“If you’re discovered, it won’t be anyone’s fault but your own,” he went on. “I know how to keep secrets, and your brothers have sworn.”

“I’ll be careful,” I promised. “I’ll make sure no one follows me, and I’ll always come in disguise. And if Clytemnestra asks me where I’m going, I’ll beat her until she stays quiet.”

“Do
that,
and we’re through,” Glaucus told me. “I’m not teaching you how to fight if it means you’ll turn into a tyrant. The world’s got enough of those. If you want to learn from me, you’ll work for the privilege, and you’ll know that not all of my lessons will take place on the training ground.”

         
3
         

LESSONS

My next lesson came between the time Glaucus first agreed to show me how to fight and the time I was at last able to steal away from the palace and join my brothers on the training ground. Seven days! Gods, how could seven days seem like eternity?

On the first day, I leaped out of bed, eager to throw on my “borrowed” tunic and run to the training ground, only to find Ione standing in my doorway with a stack of newly woven fabric.

“You need new dresses,” she said, and proceeded to fumble and fuss over how tall I was growing and whether or not to add an extra layer of flounces to my skirt, just in case I grew taller still. I didn’t know you could waste a whole day over dressmaking.

The next morning I learned that you can waste
another
day over the same stupid dresses. Ione decided it was time for me to learn how to sew my own clothes. I objected, saying, “I’m never going to have to do this for myself when I’m grown up!” Ione countered with, “Well, you’re not grown up yet.”

I did a terrible job. Ione sat me down with a group of the palace women, and they all took turns undoing my mistakes and trying to say something nice about my clumsy efforts. Ione couldn’t deny that I had no talent for needlework, but that didn’t stop her from putting me to work embroidering dress sleeves on the third day.

Once again I was working in the company of other palace women—servants and specially trained slaves and the daughters of high-ranking nobles who had the honor of attending the queen. As soon as she gave me my work, Ione went off on her own errand, which gave me an idea: If I could find a pretext for leaving the courtyard, I’d be able to escape the palace!

I jabbed myself with the needle deliberately; it was the first inspiration that hit me. “Ow! My finger!” I held up my hand so that everyone could see the blood. I dropped my embroidery and stood up, pretending to be desperate with pain. “I have to find my mother!” I wailed. It was the queen’s duty to treat sickness and heal injuries. “Oh, it hurts
so
much!” I started out of the courtyard.

Three of the older servants, all friends of Ione, flocked around me before I’d taken five steps. “You poor lamb, what a dreadful, dreadful wound,” one of them said, shaking her head. “We can’t allow you to go to your mother unescorted, not with such a terrible hurt.”

“I can find her myself, really,” I said, but they wouldn’t hear of it.

“And what if you bleed so much that you collapse before you reach her, dear Lady Helen? No, no, we must bring you to the queen. It’s our duty.”

“But it’s not that serious! It’s only a small—” I began. Then I stopped, realizing I’d tripped over my own hasty tongue. The women smiled and escorted me back to my place in the courtyard.

The fourth, fifth, and sixth days nearly drove me barking mad. I kept getting up earlier and earlier, hoping to escape before Ione could catch me. That was how I learned that you
can’t
get up earlier than a farmer’s wife. She was always there, always with a new set of tasks for me. At least she’d given up on the needlework, but that didn’t stop her from dumping a herd’s worth of fleeces in my lap for carding, or dragging me off to spin thread with my sister, or, worst of all, turning me over to Clytemnestra with the words: “I give up.
You
teach her.”

The only advantage to having Clytemnestra for a teacher was that she wasn’t an early riser. I suffered through my lesson with her on the sixth day—and if I had one olive for every time she sneered at my uneven, snapped, snarled thread, I could press a whole jug full of oil! Earlier that year, we’d each been given our own rooms, so on the seventh day I slipped out of my room and past hers while she was still snuffling in her bed.

I hurried down the hall, Castor’s tunic wadded up tightly against my chest, wondering where I could find the safest place to change. I was just about to sneak into one of the palace storerooms when a hand fell on my shoulder and Ione’s voice sounded in my ear. “Oh good, there you are. I need you for some
very important
work.”

“But Clytemnestra has to teach me how to spin better,” I said, hoping Ione would accept my excuse. No need to tell her that once she let me go, I had no intention of going anywhere near my spindle or my sister.

“That can wait. Your mother will soon be making our winter medicines. She needs us to gather ingredients.” So that was how I lost yet another day, picking herbs and flowers instead of learning how to use a sword.

Glaucus laughed when I finally came limping out of the olive grove to where he had Castor and Polydeuces doing target practice with the throwing spear. “There you are, princess!” he cried. “I thought you’d changed your mind and given up on our pact before it began.”

“Do I look like I’ve changed my mind?” I grumbled. I rubbed my arms, sore and aching, and spat dust from my mouth. My legs were covered with bloody scrapes, and it would take me hours to work the tangles out of my hair.

“Then why so long coming out here?” I liked Glaucus better when he was being stern; he had the most aggravating grin of any man alive. “Forget the path? Lose your way?”

“I’m watched,” I said. “Ever since the day you promised to teach me how to fight, it’s been next to impossible to get away. Whenever I knew you were taking the boys down here, I’d try to follow, but Ione always seemed to come along with a task for me to do. I wouldn’t be here now if I hadn’t gotten up
long
before dawn, dressed, and hidden myself in one of the storerooms all morning. Even then, I had to drop from a window and climb down the eastern side of the palace hill to be sure that no one would see me.”

“The eastern side…” Glaucus rubbed his chin. “That’s where the briars grow thickest, isn’t it?” And his grin got wider and wider, until suddenly I understood exactly what had been going on.

“You did this!” I shouted. “I don’t know what you said to Ione, but you’re the reason why she hasn’t left me alone for a moment all these days!”

“You look mad enough to throw a rock at my head,” Glaucus said calmly. “Did you think I was going to make this easy for you, princess? You say you want to learn a fighter’s skills. Well, patience is one of them, cunning’s another, and no one can give those to you but yourself. If you’d rather have gifts fall into your lap, go back to the palace and put on a skirt, but if you still want to learn from me, let’s see you throw something besides a rock.” Instead of giving me the sharpened wooden practice spears he gave my brothers, he handed me his own weapon, a beautiful, bronze-headed spear made to fly to the target with a hawk’s clean grace.

It wasn’t as massive as the great hunting spears the men used to kill wild boar, but it was heavy enough. I envied my brothers, armed with sharpened sticks. They had no trouble hitting the bales of barley straw at the far end of the training ground. Meanwhile, I spent more time struggling to lift the genuine spear than I did throwing it.
Hit
the target? I was happy when I finally managed to fling that cumbersome weapon more than five paces away from me.

I’d come to the training ground with sore arms. As that day wore on, they felt ready to drop off like dead vine leaves. Still I kept at it, hoisting the spear, throwing the spear, fetching the spear, until I wanted to howl from the pain. Part of my staying power came from fear that if I quit or even complained, Glaucus would decide that I wasn’t worth teaching after all. Then what? My brothers loved me, but they’d never agree to teach me the ways of weapons. They’d just point to my failure as proof that there really were some things boys could do that girls shouldn’t even try.

I needed Glaucus. I needed to show him that Castor was wrong, that I
could
keep up with my brothers after all.

“Well,” Glaucus said when at last he took the spear from my shaking hands. “That was awful. Next time you’ll practice with the same equipment as your brothers do.”

I was aching so badly that I could have kissed his hands for those words, but I didn’t want to let him know that. I had to make him see that I was strong enough to hold my own on the training ground, so I put on a brave show. “This was only my first day. I want to go on using the real thing. I don’t want to learn how to throw some stupid
stick.
”

Glaucus’s scowl was downright terrifying. “What you will learn, princess,” he said grimly, “is
obedience.
Or you’ll learn nothing more from me.”

I was tired and sore and frustrated. My mouth was dry, and my head was beginning to ache along with my arms. Glaucus was a famous warrior, the one man Father thought worthy to teach princes, but he was also the man who’d agreed to teach me, then made it almost impossible for me to come to my lessons, and now,
now
he was scolding me about obedience! I was so exasperated that I forgot his very first lesson.
Keep your temper under control or it’s going to control you.

“I know all about obedience.” I spat out the words as if they were sour pomegranate seeds. “Obey my nurse, obey my parents, obey the gods. If the gods love obedience so much, why didn’t they fill the world with sheep?”

I stamped my foot for emphasis. The sharp-edged bit of stone on the training ground wouldn’t have hurt my foot if I’d only trod on it, but stamping drove it into my flesh like a dagger. The sudden pain took me by surprise so that I gasped instead of yowling. When I picked up my foot to see what I’d done, there was a lot of blood.

I felt the tears rising, but I also felt Glaucus’s eyes on me, and my brothers’ as well. I clenched my hands and screwed my eyes tight shut, biting down hard on my lower lip, all in a mighty battle to hold back my tears.
Soldiers never cry,
I thought.
Soldiers never cry.

I lost that battle. The pain was too great, and my breath tore out of my body in a bone-shaking sob. I expected to see Glaucus turn to my brothers and say, “There, now you see the real difference between men and women. No man would ever act like this over a little blood.”

Instead, I was startled out of my tears by the sight of the broad-shouldered warrior kneeling beside me and taking my wounded foot in his hand as gently as if he were my mother.

“Let’s see that,” he said. “Mmm, this isn’t going to be easy to hide from your nurse. That was a stupid thing to do, princess, but I’ve seen worse. We’ll find a way around it. Men! Are you going to stand there like deadwood or have you got any brains to bring to this problem?”

I stopped sobbing as I watched my brothers scramble all over one another like a pair of big-pawed puppies in their haste to help me.

“It’s not such a bad wound, Helen,” Castor whispered, trying to give me comfort. “It’ll heal quickly.”

“You actually managed to lift that spear,” Polydeuces murmured. “Amazing. Wasn’t that something, Castor?”

Castor agreed, echoing Polydeuces’s pleasure in my accomplishment. I would have hugged them for their kindness then and there, but I didn’t know if that would have embarrassed them in front of their teacher. They did love me, even if they’d have to be convinced that a girl’s place was beside them on the training ground.

In the time it took for my tears to dry, Castor and Polydeuces managed to wash my wound, ruin their clothing by tearing strips from the hems for bandages, and wrap my foot as thickly and tightly as if they were swaddling an infant in wintertime. Polydeuces had even been able to scrounge up some spiderwebs to help stop the bleeding. When they were done, they stood back and gazed at Glaucus with happy, expectant faces.

The old warrior examined their bulky handiwork, shook his head, and undid it all. He retied the bandages, discarding most of the tattered cloth, muttering that Sparta was doomed if we were its hope for the future.

If I couldn’t thank Castor and Polydeuces for their care any other way, at least I could stand up to Glaucus in their defense. “Don’t say that!” I exclaimed, my face hot. “They did a
good
job, better than you’re doing now.”

Glaucus sat back on his haunches. “Loyalty, princess? That’s commendable, but they should earn your praise.”