Kleomede - KLEE-oh-MEE-dee (Stole name from Cleomede, a Naiad nymph who is the mother of a Trojan ally. Reference photo "une nymphe dans la foret" painting by Lenoir, also cover)
Androkles - AN-druh-kleez (Stole his name from the fable Androcles and the Lion, reference photo Odysseus from Troy, 2004 played by Sean Bean)
Leonidas - lee-oh-NIH-das (means "lion," I couldn't resist)
Lysander - LIH-san-dur (real-life Spartan leader)
Morea - mor-EE-uh
I tried to use the non-Latinized names and spellings throughout (i.e. "Ilion" for Troy, "Klytaimnestra" for Clytemnestra, with the conscious exception of "Mykene" for Mycenae, because it's apparently pronounced my-SEE-nee and that was confusing to me)
**Spoilers beyond this point**
The more I researched the Bronze Age, ancient Greece, Greek mythology and culture, etc., the more I felt the need to give deserving fictitious folks a happy ending. I was so tempted to kill off Lysander (my husband came home one day and was concerned that I was giddy at the thought of killing someone...) but can you blame him for loving my heroine? So even he got his happy ending.
Agamemnon of course does not get a happy ending, but in the Epic Cycle Clytemnestra's lover, Aegisthus, kills him so his fate was already sealed.
YOU ARE READING
The Nymph
RomanceKleomede survives the seige of Troy, but finds herself at the mercy of a stranger- a Greek captain.
