Life goes on

My duties at the bathhouse contune-and I listen. The women are very open during their treatments and bathing. I hear gossip about the latest love affairs, the "shocking" prices in the market place. I also hear snatches of political news. There seems to be some trouble or other with Troy. One of the good things about not being thought of as intelligent-or even human-is the way they talk so freely in front of you. The girl, Astera, comes regularly. She has a dreamy look about her lately. I sincerly hope she does not form any emotional attachments to her costomers. I fight that tendency myself. So many of the women speak to me of their inner most feelings about their husbands and children. There are a few that are expecting. They are praying hard for male children. Poor things are so fearful. Will their husbands accept or reject their infants? Will the children even survive the birth process? I am now beginning to wonder if motherhood is such an honor after all. If the child can be exposed on the whim of the father because he might be having a bad headache from a party the night before, what hope is there?
I am much better off here. I am manageing to put aside a few coins in secert. The women sometimes give me a few extra for listening, I guess. I have been feeling attracted to my master lately. I had thought that I would not long for the touch of another man after Methos. Master Kale has commended me on the way I carry out my duties in such a timely and efficent manner. I have had little praise from males. Perhaps this is why I feel these longings for him. I would hate to say it, but I miss intimate touching--and the act of love. I will not show it outwardly. It would not do.

daily duties 

What Am I?

It has been a few months since I started here at the bath house. I see and hear many things. I have made some good friends amoung the women here. I like it better than when I was home. I do my work and Kale praises me for doing it well. I feel proud of what I do. I have learned the arts of massage and am gaining more knowledge of oils and balms to treat the skin and hold back the aging process that most of the women who come here are so conserned about. Women of the Hereta are especially consened with this. It is to their advantage to stay disrieable-in fact it is their entire livelihood. They depend on their disirability to win them rich suitors whose gifts will provide for the years when their looks are lost. The wives are not so conserned with it. The ones who have produced children already know that their futures are sure, if they suvrive the next childbirth. I met a young woman today who is just starting out in this "profession". Her name is Astera--no more than a child to my way of thinking, though I am but a few years older than her. She is a lovely young woman. She will bring much wealth to Kale and the other man who owns her, a prince, I belive. She is graceful and soft spoken, bright. She talks easily of current events and court gossip. Kale called me to tend on her the other day. He insturcted me to take special care of her, to make sure she had the finest linen towels, the best of the sweeting and softening oils. He said he trusted me with her for he knew I would do well and be careful of his "investment". I met her in the courtyard of the bathhouse. I made sure she was shown the proper respect for a preistess. I led the way to a garden pool, away from the main house which is reserved for the best ladies of rank. I helped her disrobe. Astera is indeed exquisite. I know that some women have disires for other women in the way that some have for men. I am not of that sort, but looking at Astera's well formed breasts and firm body, I could not help thinking that if I were a man, I should pay a great sum for her favors. I bathed her back and shoulders with cool water. She did not treat me as the other wealthy ladies did. They barely noticed my presence. They treated me like I was just part of the furinture, no more than a chair or table. A convenice. Astera engaged me in conversation. She actually asked if I enjoyed my work. She did this afterwards, when I was massaging the jasmine oil that Kale instructed me to put on her during the after bath massage. Astera, as many of the women did, opened her heart to me while I was applying the treatments to her skin and hair. She told me of how she missed her father, how he had left her with in the Temple. Kale had sent her to a special place of insturction for what she was to become. When she spoke of her first time, the nervousness, the pain and then the plesure, I could not help think of my wedding night with Methos. So long ago it seems now.
As I always do, I just listened. It helps these ladies to unburden their hearts to a stranger it seems. If I told all the secrets that I have heard from some of these great ladies, many a marriage would be dissolved, some perhaps by death. Suddenly she stopped me short.
"Ilanthe, are you happy?"
"Happy, my lady? Why should I consern myself with happiness? I am here to fulfull my duties. My happiness does not matter."
"Ilanthe, " she persisted, "please answer my question. I want to know."
"Happy enough, my lady Astrea. I am more content here than I ever was as a wife or being at home."
"You were married?"
"Yes, my lady, but it did not come to anything. My husband returned me to my father's house."
"And you have a better life here?"
"Yes, truth to tell, I do. I do my work and do it with pride. Master Kale is a good man. He feeds us well and is generous with his complements for a job well done. That was never the case with my father's house or my husband. I have friends here amoung the women. All in all, my life is better, even if I am only a little above a slave."
Astera gave a sigh and I saw a few tears fall down her cheeks.
"I am lonely and do no know sometimes--what will become of me. I think I have been doing well so far. But the other man, Kyros-he seems not to like me. I do not truely understand what I have come to here."
"My lady, I know not much of what you have entered, but I would say this. If you find true happiness, clutch it with both hands and hold it as tightly as you can, but not so tight that it will wound you to let it go. Be careful with your heart, but do not be so careful that you grow hard and jaded. You are young, you are lovely. Men will look on you as a thing to be used and disgarded. Do not take your worth from men. Take your worth from who you are. I will pray the gods, though I am not a preistess and my prayers are not worthy of notice as yours are, that you will find your worth and be all the gods have fashioned you to be."
Astera smiled then, as I wrapped her in a clean towel and led her to the tireing room. I had hopes that she was cheered a bit by what little comfort I could offer.

I start my duties

I woke before dawn this morning. My duties started today. I took sand and water and proceeded to the bathhouse to make it ready for the customers. The place was filthy! Kale is just starting out I know, but he could have gotten some lower slaves to do the worst of it. I scrubbed and rinsed the floors with the rest of the women. The walls have some fine art work on them, the dirt just needed to be cleaned away. Kale had mentioned that there would be men coming later to refirbish the paintings. When I was finished there, I was called to wash and fold clean towels. The water in the bathhouse is heated by a series of pipes under the floor, that are heated by slaves tending fires. I do not fully understand how the hot and cold water runs into the differnt pools. I want to learn. Women and men come every day, not just to bathe here but also to discuss things--reglion, politics, and gossip about the comings and goings of the noble familes. I am not intrested in the gossip. I want to know why the gods are the way they are. I want to know about wars and other things. I will keep my ears open, but I must be careful to stay quiet and look passive, disintrested. It would not do for me to openly take intrest in these things. The other women would think I was trying to get above my "Place". Kale demands a high standard of work, but he is not a cruel man. I think I will like it here. The work is hard, it roughens my hands, but the other women are friendly and plesant and do not berate me for being a disgrace. I do not want to go home ever again. I don't care what becomes of my wages as long as I can work and sleep in peace, with out being in fear of being insulted and mistreated every waking hour.

Hope for a better life

My father came in this evening and announced that he had found a place for me in a more "respectible" profession. It was a dishoner, he said, for a citizen's daughter, even if she was useless as a wife, to be sold to a brothel. There is a man named Kale who is serching for women to cook and wait tables at an upperclass eating house. I have some knowloge of food preperation. I supervised my slave women in my former household. I taught them to serve tables properly. I have a better feeling about this than I did about becoming a harlot. I love no man but my former husband. I do not think I will love again, ever. My father will be taking me there tomorrow. I can only hope that he will be a good man, not cruel or stern. I do not mind the work. Being away from my family will be hardest.

This morning, Father took me to meet this man, Kale. He has an ambitious look about him. Money seems to be the main consern with him. Father pushed me forward and Kale inspected me as I used to teach my slave women to inspect produce at market. He felt my arms, looked at my teeth, lifted my chin and looked into my face.
"She is strong, ' my father assured him, "And knows how to set a good table. She had taught others to wait and prepare. She is a hard and fast worker. "
I felt for the first time what my former slave women must have felt in the marketplace. Kale waved me to a seat while he and my father discussed terms. I listened when they thought I was not. Why do men assume that women do not have any senses or feelings? They agreed on my wages and duties. My wages are to go to my father. My duties are yet to be given me by Kale, but I imagine I will be putting in a longer day than I ever did as a wife.

Goods to be sold

My father was impatient with me as I packed what little I was allowed to take. I found no comfort anywhere. My brother's wives have all produced or are producing children. They look at me like I was some cursed thing. I was sitting with them and my mother the other day when, Alathe, the wife of my eldest brother commented that she had heard Methos was already bargining for another wife to replace me. I had to turn my face away. I know it is not conventional for one to feel affection for one's husband deeply. Even my mother did not offer any comfort. She rebuked me in front of all of them for being a 'barren, usless, fool."
"You can at least be of some use to this family by becomeing a paid compaion to some rich man. Your face is fair enough--when you have not been weeping-and when you take that hang dog look off it."
Father says he is going to take me to someone named Kale to be looked over. The man is a preveyer in goods such as I am to become. I have not lost my figure in child bearing-this is supposed to be an advantage. I attempted to take some posion herbs the other night, but was stopped by my sister-in-law, and beaten by my brother. My father railed at him, not for beating me, but for possiably damageing me so I would not sell well. Such is the love of parents.

What I have feared has come

Today Methos announced that I am to go back to my father. He says that he has given me long enough to produce a child. It must be my fault he says. It must be that I do not want his children. I wept, I begged, I assured him that I was making all the proper offerings and seeing the physicians. He also told me that he had impregnated Mycia, my handmaid. He will be returning my dowry to my father and taking me back home.

Two days later.....

My father is highly displeased. My brothers are angry. Even my mother rejects me. "How could you disgrace us in such a way?" she screamed at me. "How can you refuse to bear children?"
"Refuse? I have done all the gods and men have said they require to have a child. I have made offerings and libations. Taken all manner of potions and mixtures. Laid flat, stood up. Had intrercorse twice--three times a night and day. I pracitally lived in the temple! I have done all I knew to do, mother."
She did not believe me. My father grumbles day and night about having a barren daughter on his hands. He will not be able to make any other marriage contracts for me now--even with an old widower. It is known that I am barren, so no one will make offers for me. My father has been giving thought to what to do with me now. Tonight at dinner he said that perhaps it would be a good thing to take me to a brothel--a nice one mind you, not one of those low street places. My looks were not ruined by child bearing. I would look rather nice if given the right clothes and cosmetics. His friend, Cronas has a friend who owns a good house. It is even frequented by clients that belong to nobility. My father says he has not the money to give for a dowry for anyone to take me into their house as a wife. I would do better as a sexual companion. Who knows, maybe I could be noticed by a rich man and made his mistress. I am still young enough.
So this is my fate. So be it.

Daily life

This morning was the same. I rose before dawn to make my offerings and give the slaves their orders for the day. Methos did not return home last night. I know he was with one of his other women. My mother has told me I take this too much to heart. As a good wife my only duty is to keep an orderly house and produce an heir. I have failed in the second. Men always have other women, but Methos does not know that I feel for him things that I have been told only a lower class of women feel for men. It is so confusing. A good wife does not feel such disire for her husband. If I do not bear a child soon, I fear my mother-in-law will convince Methos to give me back to my father's house-and that would be a disgrace, as well as a pain for me. Methos is not really a cruel man, his business worries him. I worry him. I wonder sometimes if maybe it would be better to go back to my father's house. I would not get offers for marriage, I know, because I am barren. There are other things women can do. My mother does not know that I have heard whispers of these things.. she thinks that like all well bred girls, I ignored my father and brother's talk of those things. Methos openly talks of them to me. He often says that he should have married one of his other women. Then there would be children in the house. What would it be like to be a compainon? To talk with a man on equel terms, to sit at a table with them in fine dresses and be able to go out alone, unveiled?

What I long for

Methos beat me again tonight. Not with his fists this time, thought sometimes those beatings are much easier to endure. I can cover my face when those happen. This evening the beating was with his words, which bruise more than his hands ever could. Methos said he would no longer be sharing a bed with me. He said I was useless and he had made a bad bargain when he married me. He was not going to send me back to my father though. It would mean repaying my dowry, which is already spent to expand the business. He told me, with many references to my barrenness and undesirability, that since I was a good housekeeper and managed the slaves well, he would keep me as wife in name. He is going to appeal to the city counsel to have one of the spawn of one of his slave mistress or the priestess to be declared legitimate. What have I done that the gods look so unfavorable on me? I have made offerings, attended ceremonies faithfully, searched myself for any thing in my life that might displease them. I have done all I could to make myself fertile and desirable. Why must I be punished like this?

Making an offering 

visit to the temple

I went again to the temple to make offerings to the gods. There was a new young priestess there. She looks so alone. I approched her and gave her my offering for fertility. She recomended that I burn insense under my robe. If the smoke came through my robe and up into my nostrels directly, it would mean that my womb was open and receptive. Or so she says. It sounds foolish, but the ways of the gods are not to be questioned.