Read Online Hippolyta and the Curse of the Amazons by Jane Yolen - Free Book Online Page B

before thinking better of it. “My mother needs your help,” she pressed. “The mother of your son, Podarces, needs your help.”
    He paused, a grape halfway to his lips. “ My help? Amazons never ask for help from men. They just use them to beget children and leave.” There was an undertone of anger in his voice, as if some anger with Otrere’s refusal to stay with him lingered.
    “Because Mother wouldn’t sacrifice the boy on Artemis’ altar but sent him here instead, she’s been cast in prison,” Hippolyta told him.
    This time the king looked at her with great interest. “But when she sent me Tithonus, there was no such trouble,” he said.
    Tithonus! That little … brat? The other brother? Hippolyta could not believe it. But she had to answer quickly and not show her surprise.
    “It’s against our laws for a queen to bear more than one live son,” Hippolyta said, her voice barely a whisper. She would not tell him why.
    A mocking smile lit Laomedon’s handsome face and changed it horribly. “Now we come to it! You Amazons thrive on superstitions, like crows feeding on dead flesh. Ha!”
    Why, he’s just as brutish and selfish as any man, only w ith a prettier face. Oh, Mother, how could you have let that face seduce you? Hippolyta thought. But then she realized she was being unfair. Her mother had sought out a king to her queen, power to her power, beauty to her beauty. Her only interest had been to bring forth a strong, handsome child. She had not expected a boy.
    But Laomedon was still Hippolyta’s only hope. She would have to put aside her disgust for him and beg for her mother’s life. “Queen Otrere has been stripped of her throne and will be tried for sacrilege.”
    He popped a grape in his mouth. For a moment he savored the grape. “It is of no interest to me.” He glanced down, savoring the look of astonishment on her face. “And what would you have me do, little princess? Lead an army into Amazon country and set Otrere back on her throne? Leave my own city unguarded, my people unprotected, to march my troops through our enemies and into a barbaric country to settle a quarrel between savage women? Do you think I’m mad?”
    “My mother has given you a child,” Hippolyta cried. “No, she has given you two children.”
    “So have many women. I will not go to war for them.”
    “So she means nothing to you?”
    Raising an eyebrow, he said with slow deliberateness, “My horse means something to me. When he dies, I will get another. I value my sword, my shield, my guard.”
    Hippolyta couldn’t contain her anger any longer. The man had mocked her, her mother, her people. She lashed out an arm and knocked the bowl of fruit from the table. Grapes flew in all directions.
    “You’re no king!” Hippolyta raged. “The lowest beggar in the streets has more honor than you.”
    “Guards!” he thundered. But even before the doors could be flung open, he grabbed her by the hair and threw her to the floor. “ I am the king, and I will decide what is honorable here in Troy.”
    She looked up, more surprised than hurt. “May the gods curse you, King Laomedon.”
    His face darkened. “They already have.”
    Just then the guards burst in.
    Laomedon ran a hand down his tunic, smoothing it. “Take her to the cells.”
    The guards seized Hippolyta by the arms and yanked her to her feet. She struggled against them, but they were too strong.
    “You needn’t be gentle,” the king said as the men bundled her out of the door. “She’s an Amazon, which means she has no tender female sensibilities to injure.”
    They hauled her out of a back entrance and across a bare yard where soldiers were practicing with their spears. She tried to kick at the men who held her, but they were used to such tactics.
    One of the spear handlers yelled out, “Leave her with us for an hour, Caracus, we’ll show her how to behave.”
    But the guards didn’t reply, merely dragged her to a large stone building standing