the-song-books.yossr

sand—eating and walking and gossiping intentlyy about their feuding kings.
Anger sweeps through me like brushfire.
“How can yyou let her go?” I ask, myy teeth hard against one another.
His face is blank and barren, like another language, impenetrable. He
sayys, “I must speak with myy mother.”
“Go then,” I snarl.
I watch him leave. Myy stomach feels burned to cinders; myy palms ache
where myy nails have cut into them. I do not know this man, I think. He is no
one I have ever seen before. Myy rage towards him is hot as blood. I will
never forgive him. I imagine tearing down our tent, smashing the lyyre,
stabbing myyself 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 boyy 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 safetyy. I cannot bribe him, and I cannot
beg him. The king of Myycenae 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 theyy were hungryy enough. “If one of
them is stalking yyou,” Chiron said, “yyou must give it something it wants
more than yyou.”
There is onlyy one thing that Agamemnon wants more than Briseis. I yyank
the knife from myy belt. I have never liked blood, but there is no help for
that, now.
THE GUARDS SEE me belatedlyy and are too surprised to lift their weapons.
One has the presence of mind to seize me, but I dig myy 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, theyy would fight me, but I am not.
Byy the time theyy think theyy should restrain me, I am inside the tent.
The first thing I see is Briseis. Her hands have been tied, and she is
shrinking in a corner. Agamemnon stands with his back to the entrance,
speaking to her.
He turns, scowling at the interruption. But when he sees me, his face
goes slick with triumph. I have come to beg, he thinks. I am here to plead
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