Short Stories: Glaring at the Sun

What happens next, is what has always happened. A girl will die, the winds will rise. A god is appeased, a man is pleased. The war can proceed.

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She was her father’s daughter, it seemed only right to call herself Chryseis. Or, at least, it seemed right for them to call her Chryseis. No one was allowed to forget who she belonged to when she lived under her father’s roof. The name her mother gave her was forgotten, like a pebble settled at the bottom of a lake.

There goes his one and only girl, lovely isn’t she?

Smart man, he knows when to keep one so fair wrapped up so tightly in priestess garb.

Ain’t it such a pity for the boys?

‘Chryseis! Chryseis!’, they’d call her and beckon her forward as she dashed to the temple. She would never stop, and neither did their calls. Eager parents would plead with her with shiny eyes to train their young daughters on how to perform the rites and rituals. Imagine the outrage when her father had wed her off just before her final initiation into priestesshood. Chryseis did not have to try hard to imagine, she had often seen the betrayed faces of the boys that had tried foolishly to woo her, she also unfortunately remembered each fumbling line of poorly composed poetry noisily sung aloud. (Were they really surprised that their efforts failed?) But alas, she was her father’s daughter, a whirlwind romance was a luxury a girl could only pray for and never afford. Especially since Apollo hardly answers the prayers of an almost-priestess, Chryseis knew just as much, the gods can only do so much for a girl.

O Apollo, God of the Sun, whose golden chariot gleams and glistens. O Apollo, God of Prophecy, tell us whatever shall we do with good daughters if not for marrying them off to be good wives?

The king of Lyrnessus should have just asked nicely if all he wanted was the pleasure of sleeping with an almost-priestess. What use was the nasty business of marriage if one was still Chryseis after being wed? Oh, how her husband had loved to call her that, as if her hymen would magically repair and she would be a virgin once more upon the mere exclamation of ‘Chryseis!’. Or was it that he enjoyed tearing into the property of another man, each echo of Chryseis fueling his ecstasy because it evoked her father’s name?

Here lies Chryseis, precious daughter now made wife beneath me.

Well, no matter, now her husband was dead. She had known it was only a matter of time before swift-footed Achilles would race through the city, leaving only dust in his wake. The girls who were stolen alongside her gripped tightly to her shredded trailing dress. They were like wet clothes clinging desperately to skin. As they first padded meekly into the camp, she heard constant whisperings of prayers, quiet pleading for her to ask Apollo to intervene. She supposed an almost-priestess was good enough for these girls, but Chryseis knew better. She was also just a girl again, here in this camp, they still knew her as just Chryseis—Daughter of Chryses. Even being the war prize of Agamemnon was not powerful erase the stain of the name Chryseis.

Good Chryses! Humble and loyal servant of Apollo! His daughter must have some favour with the gods. She must.

People at war were just bodies dragged beneath the current of warcraft, men for fighting, women for fucking. By nightfall each girl would find themselves staring into the eyes of men who impaled their husbands and sons, the very same men who impale them still. Years and years, bodies swept through the camp. Bodies swollen with blood and bloodless bodies just laying beside. Bodies oozing with infection, bodies swollen with life of unborn children. Bodies that betrayed the lines between the Greeks and the Trojans. Pleasure and pain, gore and glory; Chryseis saw that the men were all drunk off it. By any other name, it would have been called addiction, a disease without cure. Maybe Apollo was watching after all… So after sinking deep in the war camp, the mournful cries were muffled and resignation settled like heavy rocks at the bottom of a lake. The girls soon learned that there were neither gods nor goddesses. No one to save them, no one here worth saving.

Oh, so imagine the surprise when her father arrived. Air trembling in the terrifying heat of midday sun. An unnatural hush blanketed the square. Heads turned as her father trudged up with resolution carved into the wrinkles of his weathered face. With each step he took, men in armour ceased their clanking swords, lowering the tip of their weapons to graze the sandy earth. Chryseis was peeping from Agamemnon’s tent flaps. She turned to gaze at his heavy-set body still heaving in the soft bed, sweat welling up in large beads on his forehead. His bones seemed to be straining beneath the sheer weight of himself.

Sir, please wake up, Chryseis’s father is here. It seems that he has come to bring her home.

Agamemnon hauled her out by the arm, squeezing so tight that everything else felt numb. She stood beside Agamemnon, opposite the lone figure of her father draped in his priestly garb. She quickly scanned his stony face, she was sure her expression mirrored his, but he was not looking back at her. He was looking at Agamemnon. Of course.

Chryseis could not take her eyes off the golden glow of the gifts that he arranged for her exchange. The mountain of gold, rare gems and precious stones glinted cheekily, almost mocking her. She could barely hear her father pleading with Agamemnon. Her ears were ringing. What was he saying? She wondered if the pile weighed more than her entire self. She squinted at it. It was a curious moment, for she saw herself mirrored in the reflection of the heaping pile of wealth. So many tiny selves, some features stretched out, too oblong, too narrow, too wide. Did they all make up the girl named Chryseis or the daughter named Chryseis? Facing her uncanny visage, all at once, this was her father’s glittering price. She felt a strange kinship to the faces she saw staring blankly back at her.

Turn back now Chryses, for I do not care for your god, his arrows nor his plague.

I refuse to return the girl, I rank her higher than Clytemnestra, my wedded wife--she’s nothing less in build or breeding, in mind or works of hand.

It wasn’t as if she was the first girl to have caused a squabble amongst men. If anyone had been making a list, Aphrodite herself would be right at the top of the list, followed by the lovely Helen, of course. Chryseis thought herself as too small to offend anyone, but now—ranked higher than a wife, no less!

She turned her eyes skywards, knowing that there were no lofty gods looking down at her. Her eyes watered from the glare of Apollo’s sun. She smirked. No, not Apollo’s sun, she reminded herself, such unfilial glee from a human woman must go unwitnessed. Anyway, what punishment could they inflict that has not already been?

Turn back old man, I will listen to you no further. You have my word no man here shall harm you, if you would only turn and not look back.

For one shining moment—for it burned so bright that she hardly thought it was real—in the sputtering of hot air when Agamemnon spat at her father, Chryseis was not herself. She swayed on her feet.

Higher than a wife, but still a girl? A prize too prized to trade? Chryseis was not herself, for the first time in a long time. The name that once lay buried and drowned in the stillwaters came bubbling to the surface. What had not been voiced now echoed from within, it was undeniable.

She was Astynome.

-

What happens next, is what has always happened. A girl will die, another girl will rise to replace her. Men will exchange pain for pleasure, gore for glory, one girl for another, one prize for another. The gods do not care, war can proceed.