"You are a maiden, Kassandra; a birth-chamber is no place for you."
But Helen clung to her hand.
"She is my friend, Mother. And she is not only a maiden, she is a priestess. No chamber of women is forbidden to a priestess of the Mother."
"Have you brought holy serpents?" Hecuba asked.
"No; the temple serpents all died in the earthquake," Kassandra said.
The priestess, tucking an amulet under Helen's breasts with a muttered spell, raised her head to say, "Speak not of evil omens here."
"I cannot see why the deaths of serpents in the Temple of Apollo should be an omen, good or evil, for my baby," Helen said. "Apollo is not my God and I have no dealings with him for good or ill. As for Serpent Mother, she is no Goddess of mine."
The priestess caught Kassandra's eye and made a sign against evil fortune. Kassandra agreed with Helen - she was accustomed to the practice which made almost any random occurrence an omen for good or bad, but she still felt it nonsensical.
The priestess went to boil a pot of water over the brazier, and the room was filled with the steamy smell of the healing herbs she cast into it. Shortly before sunset Helen gave birth to a son; small and wrinkled, to whom she gave the name Bynomosa.
Hecuba looked at the small wriggling form with a slight frown.
"How long have you been among us, Helen? He is small… never have I seen a full-term babe so small. He weighs no more than a chicken trussed for the spit."
"Nor did I," said Kassandra, "as you have told me often enough. It's likely that with all the trouble and excitement - the disruption at the festival, the earthquake - no doubt this little one comes hither some days or weeks before his time; does it matter, if he is strong and healthy?"
Helen made a face and whispered, "She simply wishes to be
- certain it is her own son's son. Wanton I may be, but not so much as that; I knew I bore Paris's son before we fled from Agamemnon's house. But I do not know how to tell her what she really wants to know without shocking her further."
Kassandra giggled, but she did not know what to say either.
Creusa came to take her turn at holding the baby. She said tactfully, "I think he will have his father's eyes; babies who will be dark-haired have eyes of a smokier blue than those who will be fair."
Kassandra was startled, she had not expected such support from her half-sister. As a child Creusa had always had a talent for making a bad situation worse, as well as a tendency to throw fits of hysteria if she felt herself ignored. Perhaps marriage to Aeneas was giving her more maturity than anyone expected.
There was a step at the door, and Kassandra, recognizing it, went to let Paris in, saying, "Brother, you have another son."
"I have a son," Paris corrected, "and if you prophesy anything of evil about him, Kassandra, I shall rearrange the bones of your face, so that people flee from you as from the Medusa."
"Don't you dare to make threats to her," cried Helen. "Your sister is my friend."
Kassandra took the child in her arms and kissed him. She said, "I have no prophecy given me for this child. He is strong and well, and what fate will be his in manhood is not mine to say."
She laid the child in Paris's arms; he bent over Helen and Kassandra put her veil over her face.
"Are you going away, sister?" Helen asked. "I had hoped you would stay and eat the evening meal with us, since Paris will not remain in the women's quarters."
"No, I must go down to the market," Kassandra said. "Did you not hear? We lost all our serpents in the earthquake, and those who did not die forsook us, and have gone deep into the ground and will not return. Apollo's Temple cannot be without serpents; I must replace them."
"What a curious omen!" Creusa said. "What do you think it could mean?"
Reluctantly—she did not want to frighten them, nor anger Paris or her mother by repeating what they were so unwilling to hear - Kassandra said, "I think the Gods are angry with the city. This is not the first evil omen we have had."
Paris laughed. "It takes no evil omen to make snakes take to the deeps in an earthquake—it is simply the way of the serpent-kind. I have seen enough of them in the mountains. But I am sorry for the loss of your pets." He patted Kassandra lightly on the arm. "Go you to the market, sister, and choose carefully—perhaps your new snakes will prove more faithful."
"May the Gods grant it," Kassandra said fervently, quickly leaving the room.
She decided to stop briefly and see Andromache before leaving the palace.
"Kassandra!" Andromache greeted her with delight. "I knew not that you were here. Were you summoned for the birth?"
"Yes," Kassandra replied, embracing her friend. "Helen has a son, and both are well."
"I heard the child was a boy," Andromache said. "Nurse told me when she came to get the children. But," she grinned wickedly, ""Helen" has a son—not Paris? For shame, Kassandra, to even imply such a thing!"
"For shame, Andromache, to put such a meaning into my words!" Kassandra retorted. "Who was your father? You know full well that I lived among the Amazons long enough to think of a child as its mother's - particularly when I have just seen him born. Now if Paris had been lying there in labour…'
The two women clung together laughing. "That I would like to see," said Andromache, "and would he not deserve it well!"
Kassandra sobered abruptly, shivering. Before her she saw an image of Paris, lying convulsed with pain, on the pallet in the hut he had shared with Oenone. Oenone bent over him, wiping his sweating forehead with a cloth, and a golden breastplate lay on the floor beside them.
"Kassandra!" Hands grabbed her shoulders, guided her to a stool, and forced her head between her knees. "I am a fool to keep you standing here when you've doubtless not eaten since daybreak! Keep your head down until the faintness passes, and I'll get you some food." Andromache went to the door and called to a serving woman, then poured out a goblet of the wine that stood on a table at the far side of the room.
"Drink this," she ordered, "and eat at least a piece of the dried fruit." She extended a plate, and Kassandra took a bunch of raisins, put one in her mouth, and forced her jaws to start chewing on it. "For once, the children didn't eat everything in sight."
"Sight." Kassandra sighed. "I wish I didn't have it."
"They're bringing up bread and meat from the kitchens," Andromache said. "That will help close it down. My mother - always used to eat hot red meat and all the bread she could hold after a major scrying. And surely priestesses wouldn't fast before ritual work if it didn't help the Sight."
"No doubt," Kassandra agreed. "And in its own way, childbirth is a ritual."
"Very true," Andromache said feelingly. "Did Helen have a hard time of it?"
Kassandra shook her head.
"It would be that way for her." Andromache made a face. "Oh well, I suppose that if Aphrodite is going to lead Helen to take lovers, the least she can do is give her the art of bearing children easily. And speaking of children… did I see Oenone and her son at the spring planting?"