Menelaus was not a tall man—not a noble giant like his absent brother, Agamemnon, nor an ignoble giant like that ant-pizzle Achilles—so he knew he’d never be able to leap to the reviewing ledge, but would have to take the stairs up through the crowd of Trojans there, hacking and shoving and killing as he went. That was fine with Menelaus.

But Helen could not escape. The reviewing balcony on the wall of the Temple of Zeus had only the one staircase down to this city courtyard. She could retreat into the Temple of Zeus, but he could follow her there, corner her there. Menelaus knew that he would kill her before he went down under the attacks of scores of outraged Trojans—including Hector leading the funeral procession now coming into sight—and then the Achaeans and Trojans would be at war with one another again, forsaking their mad war against the gods. Of course, Menelaus’ life would almost certainly be forfeit if the Trojan War resumed here, today—as would Odysseus’, Diomedes’, and perhaps even the life of invulnerable Achilles himself, since there were only thirty Achaeans here at the pig Paris’s funeral, and thousands of Trojans present all around in the courtyard and on the walls and massed between the Achaeans and the Scaean Gate behind them.

It will be worth it.

This thought crashed through Menelaus’ skull like the point of a lance. It will be worth it—any price would be worth it—to kill that faithless bitch. Despite the weather—it was a cool, gray winter’s day—sweat poured down under his helmet, trickled through his short, red beard, and dripped from his chin, spattering on his bronze breastplate. He’d heard that dripping, spattering-on-metal sound many times before, of course, but it had always been his enemies’ blood dripping on armor. Menelaus’ right hand, set lightly on his silver-studded sword, gripped the hilt of that sword with a numbing ferocity.

Now?

Not now.