Once upon a time, as they say in all the old fairy tales, there was a duke named Theseus
who was the ruler of the kingdom of Athens in present-day Greece.
His wisdom and his skill at fighting wars had made him the fiercest warrior of his generation.
There was no one greater.
He'd fought in many wars and conquered many other kingdoms, including even the women warriors
of Amazonia, which used to be called Scythia.
After defeating the Amazons, Theseus had married their queen, Hippolyta, and took her back
to Athens with him along with her little sister, Emily.
They traveled back to Athens in a boisterous victory march.
And it's here, on their journey back to Athens, where my story begins.
Oh, I wish I had the time to tell you all about what the kingdom of Amazonia was like
before Theseus arrived, and about the great battle between the Athenians and the Amazonians,
and the capture of the beautiful and powerful Queen Hippolyta.
And I wish I could tell you about their wedding feast and the parties and all the hubbub that
their return back to Athens caused along the way.
But, God knows, I'm not a great storyteller, and the part I do want to tell you about is
long enough without all that.
Besides, I want to be fair and make sure that each of us gets a turn to tell a story on
the way to Canterbury so that we can see who wins that free dinner!
So, let me just start the story where I left a minute ago, with Theseus, Hippolyta, Emily,
and the victorious Athenians marching back to Athens.
Now, when the happy and victorious Athenians were just outside the city, Duke Theseus noticed
out of the corner of his eye that there was a group of women kneeling in the middle of
the road.
They were arranged in two columns, dressed all in black, and were crying and wailing
at the top of their lungs.
You never heard anything like it.
They continued wailing until one of them grabbed the bridle of Theseus's horse.
"Who are you people who dare to interrupt my victory march home?" asked Theseus.
"Are you so jealous of me and my success that you're complaining like this?
Or has someone else hurt or offended you?
Tell me why you're all dressed in black and if there's any way we can make things better."
The oldest lady in the group nearly fainted at hearing this.
She looked almost like Death itself, and she looked so miserable that everyone pitied her.
When she recovered, she looked at Theseus and said, "My lord, Fortune has favored you
and made you victorious.
We aren't upset about your success at all.
Rather, we ask for your kindness and your help.
Even the tiniest drop of pity from you will make us poor women feel better.
In fact, all of us women were once duchesses and queens.
But now, as you clearly see, we are miserable nobodies.
The goddess Fortune never promises anything to anyone, which is why we went from having
everything to having nothing.
We've been waiting for you in this temple for two weeks, and now that you're here, we're
hoping you can help us since you have the power to do so.
"I look wretched now because I've been crying and wailing so much.
But I used to be the wife of King Capaneus, who died at the Battle of Thebes, damn it
all!
All of us miserable women you see here lost our husbands in that battle when the city
was attacked.
And just the other day, that good-for-nothing tyrant Creon—who defeated our husbands,
conquered Thebes, and now rules the city—ordered that the dead bodies of our husbands be piled
up so that he can let them rot like trash.
He won't let us bury them or even burn them, but lets the dogs eat them out of spite."
And at that moment the women started crying again and threw themselves face first on the
ground, saying "Have mercy on us poor women, and take pity on us!"
The noble Theseus did feel sorry for them and thought his heart would break after hearing
their story and seeing how poor and miserable these once royal women now were.
He got off his horse and hugged them all and swore an oath to them that he would avenge
their husbands' deaths and make the tyrant Creon pay for what he'd done.
In fact, he promised the women that he would let everyone in Greece know what Creon had
done and why Theseus had killed him in vengeance.
He ordered Queen Hippolyta and Emily to wait for him in Athens.
And right then and there he got back on his horse, turned around, and took his entire
army to the city of Thebes.
He didn't even make any stops along the way and would camp every night by the side of
the road.
It all happened just like that.
The red symbol of Mars, the god of war, with his spear and shield, adorned Theseus's royal
white flag.
It gleamed in the sunlight, which made the surrounding fields glisten.
And on Theseus's lance hung another banner, this one made of the finest gold, which bore
the symbol of the Minotaur, the ferocious creature that was half-man, half-beast that
he had killed on the island of Crete.
Theseus rode off to the city of Thebes like this in full glory until he stopped in a field
he thought would be a good place for a battle.
And to cut to the chase, Theseus gave Creon an honorable death in battle and then chased
Creon's army of out town.
Then he captured the city of Thebes, tore down the city walls and beams and rafters,
and returned the bones of the dead King Capaneus and noble Thebans to the wailing widows so
that they could properly bury them.
It'd take too long to tell you all about the great fuss and wailing that occurred at the
burial or about how much the women thanked Theseus for helping them, so I'll skip all
that.
I really am trying to keep this story short.
And after he'd killed Creon and conquered Thebes, Theseus slept quietly in his tent
on the battlefield that night and enjoyed the fruits of victory.
Meanwhile, looters ransacked the dead bodies on the battlefield looking for armor and weapons.
And while they were searching they found two young knights lying side by side, badly wounded
and on the brink of death.
They wore matching clothing and armor that identified them as cousins—the sons of two
sisters in the royal family of Thebes.
One knight was named Arcite, and the other was named Palamon.
The looters gently took the wounded knights to Theseus, who ordered that they be put in
a prison in Athens.
He decided that they should remain there for the rest of their lives, even if someone offered
to pay a ransom for them.
Soon after, Theseus himself returned to Athens a hero with a victory crown made of laurel.
And there he lived happily and honorably for the rest of his life, with Arcite and Palamon
stuck in prison for the rest of their miserable lives too.
This went on day-after-day, year-after-year.
And then one day something happened.
On a fine spring morning in the month of May, Emily—who'd become more beautiful than the
finest flower and fresher than even spring itself—was walking through the garden at
sunrise, singing like an angel and gathering flowers to make a garland that she could wear.
She wore fresh new clothes, and her blond hair was tied in a single braid about a yard
long down her back.
Her cheeks were so rosy that I couldn't even say if they or the roses were a truer red.
She'd woken up early because May itself had seemed to say, "Wake up!
Get out of bed!
Spring has sprung!"
Now, Arcite and Palamon were locked away at the top of a thick, strong dungeon tower,
from which they could see the entire city below.
It also happened to be next to the garden, where Emily was singing and picking flowers.
It was a bright, clear sunny day, and Palamon, as usual, was pacing back and forth, feeling
sorry for himself and wishing he'd never been born.
And by chance, Palamon caught a glimpse of Emily through the thick bars of a tower window.
He went pale and cried out as though he'd been stabbed in the heart.
Arcite jumped up at the sound and rushed to Palamon, saying "Cousin, what's wrong?
You're pale and look half dead.
Why'd you cry out?
Did someone hurt you?
For the love of God, you know we can't do anything about being in this prison.
That's just the way it is.
Fortune has given us this fate, as has the god Saturn, who aligned the stars in the sky
against us.
This was our destiny from the moment we were born, and it would have turned out this way
even if we had done everything in our lives differently.
We just have to endure our imprisonment.
It's as simple as that."
"No, no, it's not that at all, Cousin," Palamon answered.
"I didn't yell because we're stuck in this prison.
I shouted because of what I just saw that struck my heart and will surely be the death
of me—a beautiful maiden wandering in the garden below.
I'm not sure if she's a woman or a goddess, but she must be the goddess of beauty, Venus
herself."
Palamon dropped to his knees and said, "Venus, if you really have decided to take the shape
of this beautiful woman and show yourself to me, the wretched creation that I am, then
help us escape this prison.
But if it's my fate to die in this prison, show some compassion to us, a family ruined
by tyranny."
And at that moment, Arcite also caught sight of lady Emily through the window as she walked
back and forth in the garden.
Her beauty shocked Arcite just as much as it had stung Palamon, if not more so.
He sighed rather piteously and said, "That lady is so beautiful it's killing me.
All I know is that if she doesn't even allow me to see her any more, I'm going to die."
Palamon, upon hearing this, turned to Arcite angrily and said, "You're kidding me, right?"
"No," answered Arcite, "No joke, I swear.
God help me, you don't joke about stuff like this."
Palamon furrowed his brow and said, "You really shouldn't joke around like that or kick me
while I'm down.
I'm your cousin, your blood brother.
We swore a serious oath that, even upon pain of death, we'd never let a woman or anything
else come between us until the day we died.
We both promised that we'd always be there to help each other out in anything the other
chose to do.
I know that you know this too, which means you're supposed to support me in this matter.
And now you're going to stab me in the back and try to steal the woman I love and would
do anything for until the day my heart stops beating?
No, Arcite, I won't let you!
I fell in love with her first and confided in you, my brother who'd sworn to always help
me.
For that reason, you're under the obligation as a fellow knight to help me out.
Otherwise, you're just full of crap!"
Arcite haughtily replied, "You're more of a traitor than I am.
In fact, I'll be honest with you: You are a traitor.
I loved her first before you even saw her, and you're not even sure whether she's a goddess
or a flesh-and-blood woman!
You're in love with a goddess!
I, however, am in love with a woman, which is why I told you about her because I thought
you were my cousin, my blood brother.
And even if you'd fallen in love with her first, haven't you ever heard the saying 'All's
fair in love and war?'
I swear to God that love is more important than anything else in this world, especially
anything that one man promises to another.
Laws and promises are broken every day in the name of love by all kinds of men from
all walks of life.
Every man must love—even if it kills him—whether she's a young girl, a widow, or his wife.
There isn't anything he can do about it.
Besides, it's not like you or I will ever be able to meet this girl or do anything about
our love for her anyway given the fact that we're locked in this tower.
You and I both know we're stuck in this prison forever, without any possibility of anyone
buying our freedom.
You and I are like two dogs who spend all day fighting over a bone only to have a hawk
swoop down and steal it from both of us.
It's every man for himself out there, brother.
That's just the way it is.
You can be in love with her if you want.
I know I will always be.
That's really all there is to it.
We've got to suck it up and take what we can get."
There was some pretty bad blood between these two guys for a long time, and I'd tell you
all about it if I had time.
But let me just cut to the chase and tell you the important thing that happened next.
To make a longer story short, it happened one day that another duke named Perotheus
came to Athens on vacation to visit Duke Theseus.
The two had been best friends since they were little kids, and they were so tight that they'd
do anything for each other.
In fact, the story goes that when one of them finally died, the other journeyed all the
way down to hell in search of him.
Oh, but that's another story entirely.
Anyway, Duke Perotheus also happened to be good friends with Arcite, whom he'd known
in the city of Thebes for a number of years.
Perotheus begged Theseus to free Arcite, and after many requests and prayers, Theseus finally
set him free.
Perotheus didn't even have to pay him a ransom or anything.
There was a catch, however, which is what I'm going to tell you about next.
To put it simply, Theseus freed Arcite on the condition that Arcite never return to
Athens for the rest of his life, no matter what.
If Thesus ever caught Arcite in Athens again, then he'd slice off his head with a sword.
These terms were non-negotiable, and Arcite had no choice but to go back to Thebes and
know that it'd be off-with-his-head if he ever came back!
It sucked for Arcite!