Alcestis (6 page)

PELIAS CAME THROUGH the gates at twilight with a roar like a wounded beast’s. I jumped, startled, and Admetus bolted off the couch. The slaves had their eyes lowered, as always, but I saw one of them fighting back a smile. Pelias stood in the doorway to the great hall, eyes gleaming ferociously. He had a bloodstain on his tunic and a smear of something visceral along one calf.

“Welcome, honored guest,” Pelias said, voice booming through the hall, smile knife sharp. “Admetus, son of Pheres, Nephew. I thank you for your visit. What is your purpose here?”

I felt my face go hot. “Father!” I ducked away from the head maid’s pinching fingers. “Please.”

“I did not ask you to speak, Daughter,” Pelias said. He hadn’t taken his eyes off my suitor.

Admetus lifted his chin. “To earn your goodwill and request your approval to marry your daughter Alcestis, Uncle.”

“Then your mission has already failed,” Pelias said. “I have been hunting with my men all day. I want a wash and a meal and my wife. When I return to my home, I do not expect to find suitors lying in wait for me or for my daughter. This behavior is an insult to her virtue and a waste of my time. I will not brook it.”

A cold prickle swept over my skin. An insult to my virtue? Admetus could have been a god, could have been a rival lord, and I had greeted him without fear. I’d shown him hospitality and care. I’d been a good host without being a bad woman, but Pelias didn’t see. The head maid tugged at my wrist, nodding toward the kitchens, her eyes darting back toward my father. I began to edge away, but Pelias held out a hand and I froze, mural still. “You stay, girl. You’ve done nothing wrong. You have greeted our guests and made them welcome?”

“Yes, Father,” I murmured. Admetus was watching me. I felt his eyes on my face, warmer than the touch of the sun.

“You,” Pelias said, turning to Admetus, “king of Pherae, you should not have come here. Alone with my daughter while I was not at home. Unheard of! I grant you a night in my home, but you will leave in the morning at first light.”

“My lord,” Admetus said, and even I could see how difficult those words were for him. “I was never alone with your daughter. The servants of your house observed us at every moment, both men and women, and your daughter acted with perfect propriety.”

“You do not suggest that a child of mine would act in any other way.” Pelias folded his arms over his chest. He was at least half a head taller than the king of Pherae, half again as broad through the shoulders.

“No,” Admetus said, stumbling over his words. “No, of course not. She is an honor to your house and behaves exactly as a woman should. That is why I wish to marry her, my lord. I will not leave until I have your answer.”

“Have it? You’ve already had it. The answer is no, and you shall leave when I say.”

“King Pelias—”

“Quiet,” Pelias thundered. “Before I take your impudence as an insult rather than an annoyance. You are a king, Admetus, and I honor you. You are also my guest. You will eat well, you will drink, you will have blankets and couches, and you will cease your talk of marrying my daughter.”

Admetus took an involuntary step back, looked from Pelias to me and back again. I watched him from beneath my lowered eyelashes and held my breath. Go, I thought. Go in the morning and do not come back. Then I thought: Come back, and take me away. The idea ran down my spine, crackling like a spark, flaring to life in my belly. I wished he had taken me before my father had returned, taken me when he had the chance, for now I would never be alone with him again.

I began to see what Pisidice had meant, why my father watched me so carefully now. Pelias was right. I was not to be trusted.

“Sir,” Admetus said, “I will not cease. I seek her for my wife, and my desire shall not change. But I shall talk of it no more now, not until you agree to hear my case.”

Pelias heaved a sigh and settled into his throne. “I will never agree to hear your case, Admetus. It displeases me. See to your men; my servants will assist you.”

The young king closed his mouth with a snap. “I shall,” he said, sketching a bow with sudden vicious energy. “I thank you for your hospitality, lord, lady.” He turned before Pelias could respond and went out of the hall.

I waited for the shouting to begin, but Pelias gave me a tired look and waved a hand toward the stairs. “Up with you,” he said, glancing back toward the entry hall. “Take food to the queen. Don’t come down until Admetus and his men have gone.”

“You’re not angry?” I whispered.

“Have you done anything that should anger me?” He turned toward me slowly, and my stomach crawled. I backed away, hands out behind me to feel for the wall before I ran into it.

“No. No, I have not.”

“Go upstairs then,” Pelias said. I turned and went. The head maid walked ahead of me, uncharacteristically silent. When we came to the kitchen door, she grabbed my elbow and pulled me to a halt, then disappeared inside. She came back with an oatcake and a handful of dried apple slices and pressed them into my hands, anxious, glancing around for my father. I looked past her into the kitchens, where piles of chopped onions lay on a table and slaves bent over to stoke the fire beneath a roasting spit of meat.

“Go on,” the head maid said. “Call for me if you need more to eat later. I’ll bring something for the queen.”

I went, but stopped on the first step of the stairs—if I craned my neck and peered through the pillars, I could just see Admetus’s men entering the palace, subdued now that Pelias had returned. The chariot driver was not among them. The head maid hissed at me again, her head sticking out of the kitchen doorway, and I ran up the steps, clutching my sticky dinner in sweaty hands. In the bedchamber, I put the food on the table and went to the window, wiping my hands on my skirt. I braced my palms against the stones that framed the window as I leaned out. The courtyard was bright with torchlight. The chariot driver stood with the horses, holding their reins and murmuring to them, and I held my breath as I watched him, waiting for him to look up. He did not.

“Alcestis?” Phylomache said sleepily. I smiled at her. She pushed herself up, back against the wall behind the bed, and reached out to touch Asteropia’s head, a brief glance of her fingers to reassure herself of the girl’s presence, the same way the head maid had touched me. “What are you looking at?” she asked me. “Come away from there, you make me nervous hanging out the window like that.”

“Admetus of Pherae has come to speak to Pelias,” I said. “I’m looking at his horses.”

Phylomache took a sharp breath. “When did he come? Just now?”

I pushed away from the window and went to perch on the edge of the mattress. “He came this afternoon while Pelias was hunting. I thought—” I stopped, but Phylomache nodded once, quickly. She knew. “But he was perfectly polite. We just sat, for hours and hours, and then Pelias came home and shouted at him.” I rubbed my hands together, the skin of my palms sticking and gliding. “Admetus says he’ll have my hand. Pelias refused him. And he didn’t do it politely.”

“It’s not your hand the man wants, love,” Phylomache said, and put her own hands on her belly. “You had chaperones, didn’t you? The maid at least, surely. You can’t have stayed down there with him alone. You would’ve wakened me.”

“I had chaperones and guards. And I prayed to Artemis. He did not dishonor me.” I reached over and picked up the cake, breaking off a piece and considering it. My stomach still felt trembly and knotted. “The head maid would’ve eaten him if he tried anything.”

Phylomache’s mouth twisted up on one side. “That is not funny, Alcestis.”

“I know,” I said, and put the piece of cake in my mouth.

“He made a bad mistake, staying while you were alone in the palace.”

“So I shouldn’t have invited him to stay?”

Phylomache waved a hand. “No, you had to invite him, of course. Your father knows that. He is letting Admetus stay the night, is he not?”

“He is.”

“And then?”

“I told you, Pelias refused his suit. He ordered Admetus to leave in the morning and never speak of courting me again.”

Phylomache gaped slightly. “He must not like this one.”

“It seems that way, does it not?” I looked down at Asteropia, who was still sleeping, sprawled on her side with one fist against her face and her mouth wide open, too exhausted to be awakened by our voices. “She tired herself out today.”

“You’re so good to watch her,” Phylomache said, her voice dropping into the same coo she used on her daughter. “You’ll make a good wife, Alcestis.”

I picked up the apple slices, slightly damp and flexible now from my touch, and ate one to keep myself quiet. Phylomache didn’t notice. She rarely did.

“Tell me,” Phylomache said, pulling off another chunk of cake. “Did you like him, this Admetus? Was he handsome or ugly? Did he bring many men?”

“It doesn’t matter,” I said. “Father won’t hear him whether I liked him or not.”

“Oh, Alcestis. Have pity on a huge married woman and tell me tales. I’m stuck here all day with nothing to amuse me.”

I looked down at the bedsheets tangled around Phylomache’s legs. I couldn’t tell her what I thought of him. Phylomache wanted me happy in marriage. If she knew I admired my cousin, she’d bother Pelias to accept him, and we’d both suffer for it. “I don’t know if I liked him. He’s small, much thinner than Pelias or Acastus, and very brown. Looks nothing like them. I suppose he takes after the mortal side. He smiles often. I did like that.”

“Not too often, I hope,” Phylomache said, leaning in.

“No, not too often. And I suppose he’s more handsome when he smiles, though he looks young.”

“You shouldn’t meet the man first, I think,” Phylomache said. “If you meet him before you marry him, then you have time to dislike him. No sense in that. If Pelias chooses him, you’ll wed him, and you’ll be all right, if the gods bless the match.”

“Phylomache, Pelias is not going to choose him.”

“Hmm,” Phylomache said with the expression that meant she was having a thought she considered very clever. “Does he have a lot of land?”

“He’s a king,” I said, frustrated. I knew none of the details of Admetus’s rule, but that didn’t matter—Pelias disliked him because he had come to pursue me, not because of the size of his kingdom. “He must. I don’t know. Ask Pelias.”

“I will.” She smiled. “The boy hasn’t lost you yet.”

“He’s not a boy,” I snapped, flushing, and dropped a half-eaten apple chip into my skirt. “And he doesn’t have me, Phylomache. You mustn’t let Pelias hear you say that. It’s not you he’ll be angry at.”

“Oh, he is a boy,” Phylomache said, looking down at her lap where crumbs had landed after bouncing down her belly. She brushed at them ineffectually and spoke again without looking up. “They’re all boys, really, even the gods. Hunting and fighting and making babies.” She stroked Asteropia’s head again, flicking a bit of hair out of the child’s eyes. “It’s not so bad, though.”

I had not seen her look this sad since the wedding. I reached over Asteropia and touched Phylomache’s wrist, the skin papery and warm beneath my fingertips. “Are you—are you all right?”

Phylomache heaved a great sigh and looked up, her eyes a little watery. “Yes. Just tired of this. I want the baby out and healthy and grown enough that I can sleep in my bed again.”

I want that too, I thought, then bit my lip. “Do you need anything?” I asked. “I can’t go downstairs till morning, but I could call one of the servants.”

Phylomache shook her head. “No, just help me up. I want to walk around the women’s quarters.” I slid off the bed and held out my hands, trying not to wince when her fingers clamped around mine. Phylomache hissed when her feet hit the floor and stood slowly, as if she were being lifted by a rope and pulley. She shook off my steadying hands and took a few steps on her own.

“All right?”

A nod. Phylomache lumbered away like an ox. I watched her until she’d gone through the doorway then went to the window again, leaning out to count the torches in the courtyard. Some of them had been doused; Pelias must have decided that the Pheraean men were no threat. The yard was quiet, no talk or laughter carrying on the air. All the men except for the guards must have gone inside to eat and drink wine. Admetus would be sitting in the great hall with my father, suffering Pelias’s rude talk or rude silence. I wondered if Admetus was thinking of me—I wondered what Admetus was thinking of me. Did he blush at the thoughts, wipe his sweaty palms against his clothes, look up to see my father staring at him with godlike eyes, furious as a speared boar?

Some light flickered in the courtyard: a lamp, an oil lamp, bright in the body of the Pheraean king’s chariot, shining on golden hair. The chariot driver had chosen to stay in the rig rather than enter Pelias’s house with his master? I stood at the window staring down at him, lonely in the cool air, and a shiver skimmed my body. I remembered the effortless way he’d managed the horses, the grace of his hands on the reins. He had turned them like a god turns the wind.

The golden head lifted, slow as a sunrise. I drew back so fast I scraped my palms on the stone and stood panting in the dimness of the bedroom. In the courtyard, the light winked out.