@msktfired: another starter i promised a while ago
The palatial home where she was lodged had been strategically selected for its location - surrounded by mountains, like Sparta had been, about four days’ ride from Paris on a good horse. Around it there were no villages, no markets, no city. The closest sign of human activity was a small settlement, formed by roughly a dozen people and located about halfway from the french capital, which allowed Helen the greatest luxury she’d never had, even as a queen, thousands of years before: privacy. A rare thing to experience, not to be taken for granted. The castle had previously belonged to a fallen count, or an earl of some sort - one of those senseless titles invented by the people of these times in order to rank their aristocracy - then left abandoned for centuries.
It was within the main hall where she received an elite, rather selective group of guests who’d come to worship the Olympian Gods - where she kept their name and glory alive. Some of them were french nobles who’d found their true faith in them. Others were fellow countrymen of the present century, sparse though they were in this nation, who found in this place a memory of home - though home, as she knew it, had vanished through the millenia. That night, however, Helen performed no cults. Her guests were welcome to stay or leave as they pleased - most remained to partake in the communal activities of her days: to share meals together, to hunt together or to strengthen their virtues through hard exercise, conducted by her guards - Spartan soldiers of her times, risen from the House of Hades to fulfill this mission with their queen. As they did before, men and women gathered around, seminaked, to run races against one another and perform trials of strength. A restoration of society as she’d known.
Thus, given the secrecy of her mission and location, when one of her soldiers entered her chambers to announce the presence of a stranger requesting an audience, Helen received the news with curiosity and suspicion. “Send him to the shrine”, she commanded, and covered her face with her veil to meet this man.
It was mostly dark inside this shrine, though the light from dozens of oil lamps danced with the shadows as the breeze conducted them around the ivory sculptures depicting the gods and goddesses of her motherland. The architecture was typical of the present days in its structure, though the interior decoration was different from anything the french considered fashionable. There were no gilded arabesques or pastel figures of angels and naked virgins: the frescoes on the walls had been made in Greek style, portraying scenes from the life as it was then: nude children wearing belts and boxing against each other, an acrobatic spectacle with an athlete leaping backwards on top of a bull, chariot races and bare-breasted priestesses with kohl-painted eyes - like hers.
Clad in the fashion of her times in diaphanous, shining linen, her peplos was tied at the waist by a golden girdle; the skirt, albeit long, had two slits at the sides which went all the way up to the tops of her thighs - scandalously revealing for the period, as it would have been back then outside of Sparta. Her jewelry too was older than anything still alive, heavier and less ornate than those worn by the french ladies. Helen entered the room with imperious steps, imposing as ever, and climbed upon the altar where a high chair was placed, resembling a throne. There, she could assess him from above. Without saying a word, her eyes invasively inspected the man as if both his body and soul were laid bare before her, without ever lifting her veil to reveal her face. “State your name”, she demanded.
