The Firebrand (6 page)

One morning she slipped out of the palace and took the route through the streets that led upward to Apollo’s Temple.

She had no desire to climb to the Temple itself, no sense that the God had summoned her. She told herself that when that day came, she would know. As she climbed, halfway up she turned to look down into the harbor, and saw the ships. They were just as she had seen them the day the God spoke to her; but now she knew that they were ships from the South, from the island kingdoms of the Akhaians and of Crete. They had come to trade with the Hyperborean countries, and Kassandra thought, with an excitement that was almost physical, that they would reach the country of the North Wind, from whose breath were born the great Bull-Gods of Crete. She wished she might sail north with the ships; but she could never go. Women were never allowed to sail on any of the great trading ships, which, as they sailed up through the straits, must pay tribute to King Priam and to Troy. And as she stared at the ships, a shudder, unlike any physical sensation she had known before, ran through her body. . . .

In a moment between a breath and a breath, it was gone, and she was standing on the steps, the ships distant in the harbor below her. Yet a moment ago, she
knew,
she had been lying in one of those ships, a captive—the hard deck under her body, the salt wind over her, the flapping sound of the sail and the creaking of the wooden boards of the ship. She felt again the terror and the curious exhilaration which she could not understand.

She had at the moment no way of knowing what had happened to her, or why. She turned around and looked upward to where the Temple of Pallas Athene rose white and high above the harbor, and prayed to the Maiden Goddess that what she had seen and felt was no more than some kind of waking nightmare. Or would it truly happen one day . . . that she would be that bruised captive in the ship, prey of that fierce hawk-faced man? He did not resemble any Trojan she had ever seen. . . .

Deliberately putting away the frozen horror of her—nightmare? vision?—Kassandra turned away and looked inland, to where the great height rose of the holy Mount Ida. Somewhere on the slopes of that mountain . . . no, she had dreamed it, had never set foot on the slopes of Ida. High above were the never-melting snows, and below, the green pasturelands where, she had been told, her father’s many flocks and herds grazed in the care of shepherds. She rubbed her hands fretfully over her eyes.
If she could only see what lay there beyond her sight . . .

Not even years later, when all things which had to do with prophecy and the Sight were second nature to her, was Kassandra ever sure whence came the sudden knowledge of what she must do next. She never claimed or thought she had heard the voice of the God;
that
she would have known and recognized at once. It was simply
there,
a part of her being. She turned round and ran quickly back to the palace. Passing through a street she knew, she glanced almost wistfully at the fountain; no, the water was not still enough for that.

In the outer court, she spied one of her mother’s women, and hid behind a statue, fearing that the woman might have been sent to search for her. There was always a fuss now whenever she went outside the women’s quarters.

Such folly! Staying inside did not help Hesione,
she thought, and did not know what she meant by it. Thinking of Hesione filled her with a sudden dread, and she did not know why, but it occurred to her that she should warn her.
Warn her? Of what? Why? No, it would be no use. What must come will come.
Something within her made her wish to run to Hesione (or to her mother, or to Polyxena, or to her nurse, anyone who could ease this nameless terror which made her knees tremble and her stomach wobble). But whatever her own mission might be, it was more urgent to her than any fancied or foreseen dangers to anyone else. She was still crouched, hiding, behind the pillar; but the woman was out of sight.
I was afraid that she would see me.

Afraid? No! I have not known the meaning of the word!
After the terror of that vision in the harbor, Kassandra knew that nothing less would ever make her feel fear. Still she did not wish to be seen with this compulsion upon her; someone might stop her from doing what
must
be done. She hurried to the women’s quarters and found a clay bowl which she filled with water drawn fresh from the cistern, and knelt before it.

Staring into the water, at first she saw only her own face looking back, as from a mirror. Then as the shadows shifted on the surface of the water, she knew it was a boy’s face she looked on, very like her own: the same heavy straight dark hair, the same deep-set eyes, shadowed beneath long heavy lashes. He looked beyond her, staring at something she could not see. . . .

Troubled with care for the sheep, each one’s name known, each footstep placed with such care; the inner knowledge of where they were and what must be done for each of them, as if directed by some secret wisdom.
Kassandra found herself wishing passionately that she could be trusted with work as responsible and meaningful as this. For some time she knelt by the basin, wondering why she had been brought to see him and what it could possibly mean. She was not aware that she was cramped and cold, nor that her knees ached from her unmoving posture; she watched with him, sharing his annoyance when one of the animals stumbled, sharing his pleasure at the sunlight, her mind just touching and skimming over the occasional fears—of wolves, or larger and more dangerous beasts . . . she
was
the strange boy whose face was her own reflection. Lost in this passionate identification, she was roused by a sudden outcry.

“Hai! Help, ho, fire, murder, rape! Help!” For a moment she thought it was he who had cried out; but no, it was somehow a
different
kind of sound, heard with her physical ears; it jarred her out of her trance.

Another vision, but this one with neither pain nor fear. Do they come from a God?
She returned with a painful jolt to awareness of where she was: in the courtyard of the women’s quarters.

And she suddenly smelled smoke, and the bowl into which she still stared clouded, tilted sidewise, and the water ran out across the floor. The visionary stillness went with it, and Kassandra found that she could move.

Strange footsteps clattered on the floor; she heard her mother scream, and ran into the corridor. It was empty, except for the shrieking of women. Then she saw two men in armor, with great high-crested helmets. They were tall, taller than her father or the half-grown Hector; great hairy, savage-looking men, both of them with fair hair hanging below their helmets; one of them bore over his shoulder a screaming woman. In shock and horror, Kassandra recognized the woman: her aunt Hesione.

Kassandra had no idea what was happening or why; she was still halfway within the apartness of her vision. The soldiers ran right past her, brushing so close to her and so swiftly that one all but knocked her off her feet. She started to run after them, with some vague notion that she might somehow help Hesione; but they were already gone, rushing down the palace steps; as if her inner sight followed, she saw Hesione borne, still screaming, down the stairs and through the city. The people melted away before the intruders. It was as if the men’s gaze had the quality of the Gorgon’s head, to turn people to stone—not only must they avoid looking on the Akhaians, but they must not even be looked upon by them.

There was a dreadful screaming from the lower city, and it seemed that all the women in the palace like a chorus had taken up the shrieks.

The screaming went on for some time, then died away into a grief-stricken wailing. Kassandra went in search of her mother—suddenly frightened and guilty for not thinking sooner that Hecuba too might have been taken. In the distance she could faintly hear sounds of clashing warfare; she could hear the war-cries of her father’s men, who were fighting the intruders on their way back to the ships. Somehow Kassandra was aware that their fighting was in vain.

She did not know whether to hope that she herself need not suffer it, or to be ashamed that she wished it instead upon her beloved young aunt.

She came into her mother’s room, where Hecuba sat white as death, holding little Troilus on her lap.

“There you are, naughty girl,” said one of the nurses. “We were afraid that the Akhaian raiders had gotten you too.”

Kassandra ran to her mother and fell to her knees at her side. “I saw them take Aunt Hesione,” she whispered. “What will happen to her?”

“They will take her back to their country and hold her there until your father pays ransom for her,” Hecuba said, wiping away her tears.

There was the loud step at the door that Kassandra always associated with her father, and Priam came into the chamber, girt for battle but with some of his armor’s straps half-fastened as if he had armed himself too quickly.

Hecuba raised her eyes and saw behind Priam the armed figure of Hector, a slender warrior of nineteen.

“Is it well with you and the children, my love?” asked the King. “Today your eldest son fought by my side as a true warrior.”

“And Hesione?” Hecuba asked.

“Gone. There were too many for us and they had gotten to the ships before we could reach her,” Priam said. “You know perfectly well that they care nothing for the woman; it is only that she is my sister and so they think they can demand concessions and freedom from harbor tolls—that is all.” He set his spear aside with an expression of disgust.

Hecuba called Hector to her, fussing over him till he moved away and said irritably, “Have done, Mother—I am not a little one still holding your skirts!”

“Shall I send for wine, my lord?” Hecuba asked, putting down the child and rising dutifully, but Priam shook his head.

“Don’t trouble yourself,” he said. “I would not have disturbed you, but I thought you would like to know that your son came honorably and unwounded from his first battle.”

He went out of the room, and Hecuba said between her teeth, “Battle indeed! He cannot wait to get to his newest woman, that is all, and she will give him unmixed wine and he will be ill! And as for Hesione—much he cares for
her
! As long as they do not disturb his precious shipping, the Akhaians could have us all and welcome!”

Kassandra knew better than to ask anything further of her mother at that moment; but that night when they gathered in the great dining hall of the palace (for Priam still kept to the old custom in which men and women dined all together, instead of the new fashion whereby women took their meals separately in the women’s quarters—“so that the women need not appear before strange men,” as the Akhaian slaves put it), she waited until Priam was in a good humor, sharing his finest wine with her mother and beckoning to Polyxena, whom he always petted, to come and sit beside him. Then Kassandra stole forward, and Priam indulgently motioned to her.

“What do you want, Bright Eyes?”

“Only to ask a question, Father, about something I saw today.”

“If it is about Aunt Hesione—” he began.

“No, sir; but do you think the Akhaians will ask ransom for her?”

“Probably not,” said Priam. “Probably one of them will marry her and try to claim rights in Troy because of it.”

“How dreadful for her!” Kassandra whispered.

“Not so bad, after all; she will have a good husband among the Akhaians, and it will perhaps for
this
year stave off war about trading rights,” Priam said. “In the old days, many marriages were made like that.”

“How horrible!” Polyxena said timidly. “I would not want to go so far from home to marry. And I would rather have a proper wedding, not be carried off like that!”

“Well, I am sure we can arrange that sooner or later,” said Priam indulgently. “There is your mother’s kinsman young Akhilles—he shows signs, they say, of being a mighty warrior. . . .”

Hecuba shook her head. She said, “Akhilles has been promised to his cousin Deidameia, daughter of Lykomedes; and I would as soon my daughter never came into that kindred.”

“All the same, if he is to win fame and glory . . . I have heard that the boy is already a great hunter of lions and boars,” countered Priam. “I would gladly have him for a son-in-law.” He sighed. “Well, there is time enough later to think of husbands and weddings for the girls. What did you see today, little Kassandra, that you wanted to ask me?”

Even as the words crossed her lips, Kassandra felt she should perhaps keep silent; that what she had seen in the scrying-bowl should not be spoken; but her confusion and her hunger for knowledge were so great she could not stop herself. The words rushed out: “Father, tell me, who is the boy I saw today with a face so exactly like my own?”

Priam glared at her so that she quivered with terror. He stared over her head at Hecuba and said in a terrible voice, “Where have you been taking her?”