"Cousin?" Patroclus said, his voice hesitant.
Achilles didn't look around. He patted the rock beside him and Patroclus sank down.
"Is everything all right?" he asked tentatively.
"Fine," Achilles said brusquely. "I'm just thinking about tonight."

It was a lie.
He was looking out over the horizon, thinking about the woman in his tent, his stomach sour. They had lain together; she had seemed abject, downcast, and he thought he had finally brought her to her senses. She had made a special effort to please him, even though she still refused to moan in pleasure – but the sight of her biting her fist to prevent any sound always made him laugh and she grinned at him, stroking his face with her soft hand. Their lovemaking had been, as usual, satisfying, and afterwards they stretched out on his bed, nose to nose and fingers entwined.

"Tell me about your husband," he'd whispered and she'd frozen momentarily, as though turned to stone, her eyes watchful.
"What do you want to know?" she asked.
"How did you end up married to the King of Kalios?"
She'd smiled a kind of half-smile, a grin of resignation, and started to tell him about how she'd come to court and her strange first encounters with the cranky Kalions, who'd mocked her odd accent and her freakish skin. Her impersonations were so funny, so accurate, that they laughed till tears rolled down their cheeks, hushing each other to stay quiet. She asked him about Agamemnon, then about the other kings ... till at some point he realised that he'd been doing all the talking and the subject of her marriage to the vain Kalion king had been touched upon... but never really answered.

Just as he realised this, she'd yawned and closed her eyes, murmuring that she needed to rest.
So Achilles got up to wash, to call Ahma for food, and as he did, his eye caught sight of that pouch she had carried with her all the way from Kalios and a strange feeling came over him, an inkling of disquiet. A corner was sticking out from under the bed, so he bent down and pulled it out, throwing it open on the covers. Her eyes shot open when she heard the jangle of the metal buckle and she snatched at the strap to pull it away.

"No," he said, pushing her hand back.
"That's mine," she snapped.
"I know," he answered simply and upended its contents on the bed.
There was a pouch of gold, a chiton rolled up tightly and a bright yellow piece of cloth which, when he shook it open, turned out to be a little dress. He pulled at the material in his hands, stretching it.
She gasped.
"Leave that alone!" she cried and tried to snatch it back.
He held it over his head with one hand and with the other, pushed her back on to the bed. Then he pushed back the flap of the pouch and discovered that a map had been inked on the pale leather inside, a map of the coast of Greece, its main cities and islands, Crete, Syracuse, Cathage and the tribes around the Great Sea, up to Tartessus, up the ragged coastline of Hispania, north, ever northwards to the little islands scratched into the top lefthand corner. One of them bore a cross, a mark that seemed to radiate a determination from its dark ink.

He held it up wordlessly.
Relta stared at him and, for the first time, he thought he saw real fear in her eyes, an unmitigated fear, not masked by one of her cheeky smiles or batting eyelashes.
"You said you would leave me eventually," he said. "I see you already have your escape route planned."
She said nothing.
"So this is why you tried to run away today?"
"I wasn't trying to run away."
"Don't lie," he hissed. "I am not in the mood, woman."
She licked her lips nervously.
"I have a daughter," she said finally. "A small daughter. She's been sent on ahead. We're going back, back home to my people. I have to get out of here. My lord," she added, placatingly.

Achilles felt the material in his hands and looked down at the gaudy yellow, felt a compulsion to rend it in two.
He pulled the material and heard her gasp again.
"Please," she said. "It's all I have of her."
Her eyes reddened and she blinked fiercely, trying not to cry. When he flung it at her, he noticed her discreetly raise the heel of her hand to her face to wipe a tear away, ducking her head so he would not see it as she folded the little dress, carefully and tenderly.

"And I thought you were ... happy with me," he said, unable to keep an ice out of his voice. "I told you that we could be together in a couple of days – Agamemnon wouldn't be able to harm you, and you would officially be my concubine. By the Gods, you would probably have far more status and far more jewels than you ever had as the Queen of Kalios."
She said nothing.
"You were not happy?" he insisted.
It was an absurd question.
Why did he care? He felt foolish as he asked it but he had to know. He thought they'd been happy, the hours spent laughing till his stomach hurt, her legs wrapped around his, one of her braids between his fingers. He'd simply taken for granted that she would take her place at his side to alleviate the dullness of the Trojan campaign, tend his hearth and provide him with some children.
He might have even married her if she'd given him healthy sons.

Relta shook her head, dumbstruck.
"I'd never be happy with you," she said at last. "I want to go."
Achilles slowly stuffed the chiton back in the pouch, threw in the little bag of gold and closed it.
"Fine," he said. "Leave."
"My lord?"
"Leave. If you want to leave, be gone before I come back. If you are still here, I'll take it that you've come to your senses and realised how futile that attempt would be."
"You're not joking?"
"About it being futile? No, I'm not. You're surrounded, my queen, surrounded by Achaeans, who will march you back to Agamemnon, and Trojans, who will deliver you to Priam. If they don't rape and kill you first."
"I meant: joking about letting me leave," she said, as though she hadn't heard what he'd just said.

Achilles laughed coldly.
"Think on it, my queen," he said. "You ought to think carefully before you make a decision. And if you are sensible, you will stay here. Staying with me, though, means an end to any of your attempts to run away. Is that clear?"
"Yes, my lord," she replied. "I will consider it. Carefully."
He threw the pouch roughly at her and she caught it, its weight almost knocking her backwards. Without another word or a backwards glance, he pulled on his robe and left the tent.

xXx

In broad strokes, he told Patroclus about the exchange. His cousin hesitated and then confessed that he'd caught her wandering about when the Achaeans had been on the battlefield.
Achilles cursed under his breath. That little witch had been up and down the beach since the moment she'd clambered out of that chest.
"She will not leave," Patroclus said reassuringly. "She's not stupid."

Achilles rolled his eyes.
"And so what if he does?" he said, standing up. He stretched out a hand to Patroclus and pulled him up. "Let the little fool go. If she does not realise what I'm offering her, she doesn't deserve to have it. Plenty of women to take her place."
He heaved his young cousin up into a standing position.
"Enough about that accursed woman," said Achilles gruffly. "I have no need to waste another word on her."
"She won't leave," Patroclus said again. "I am certain of it."
"Enough!" his cousin cried, clapping him on the back. "We must find Eudorus and Monkey and discuss exactly what must do tonight."

They walked across the sand, Patroclus talking about the latest camp gossip. Achilles would not allow himself to look in the direction of his tent but finally, almost past it, he did. Ahma was standing outside, like a guard. When he caught her eye, she shook her head, a tiny movement.
The White Queen was gone.
Achilles felt a surge of anger.
To Hades with her, he thought. The damned fool.
He had more important things to think about that some white-skinned witch. He would banish her from his mind. The fool, the damned fool.
He set his sights on Agamemnon's tent, where Eudorus and the Monkey man were waiting patiently for him to arrive.