"You did, and so did I," Kassandra replied. "She came to catch a glimpse of Paris. I fear she still loves him."
"Much good may it do her." Andromache said.
A servant entered with food from the kitchen. When she withdrew, Kassandra continued, "Oenone was my friend. I feel guilty that I cannot help loving Helen. And now Paris forgets even that he has a son by Oenone."
"I think that everyone loves Helen," Andromache said. "Priam himself is never gruff with her, and he is well versed in the wiles of women and not easily charmed. As for Paris—well, what do you expect? If you had the Goddess of Love for your bed, would you turn away to a water-nymph—and how would the Goddess deal with you if you did?"
Kassandra shivered. "I do not like this Akhaian Goddess," she said. "May she never lay her hands on me."
Andromache looked very serious. "I would not wish for that," she said. "I would be sorry to think you should never know what it is to love."
"What makes you think that I do not?" Kassandra asked curiously. "I love my brothers and my mother, my serpents, my God—"
Andromache smiled a little sadly.
"I am fortunate," she said. "My love is for the man I was given for my husband and I cannot imagine loving another; from what little talk I have had with Helen I understand it was so with her until the Goddess laid her hand on her; and then she could think of nothing but Paris."
"Surely then such love is a curse and not a gift," Kassandra said, "and I pray it may never befall me." z6o
Andromache embraced her gently and said, "Have a care what prayers you make, Kassandra. I wished to travel forth from Colchis, and to have a husband of great honor and renown. And that prayer brought me here away from my mother and my Gods, to a city at the far corners of the Earth; in these dark times." She caught up a little of the salt that lay at hand on the tray with the meat and cast it into the air with a whispered word Kassandra could not hear. Kassandra, cutting herself a small slice of the roasted meat and laying it on a piece of bread, raised her eyebrows in question.
"I prayed for you," Andromache said,"that your prayers might, be answered only in the way you would have it."
Kassandra embraced her friend and said impulsively, "I do not know if the Gods ever honor such requests - but I am grateful to you."
When she had finished her evening meal with Andromache, and helped her put Astyanax to bed, she left the palace. She was strolling through the darkened stalls of the evening market when she remembered that she had intended to ask Andromache what it might mean when serpents deserted a temple. Then she recalled that Adromache would have nothing to do with serpents.
She resolved to ask all the priestesses she could find if they knew of a lore-mistress or master, a priest or priestess of Serpent Mother or of the Python, before she bought a single snake for the house of the Sunlord. Somewhere in this great city of Troy there must be someone versed in such wisdom.
CHAPTER 11
Since the raid at spring planting, Khryse had fallen into a deep depression; he neglected his assigned duties in the temple, spending much of his time standing near the high rampart which looked down on the Akhaian camp below.
"Please go and tell him to come down," Charis said to Kassandra. "He likes you; perhaps you can persuade him that life is not over."
"It is not liking he has for me," Kassandra remonstrated, but she did feel compassion for the troubled man, and later that day she joined Khryse on the high place.
"The evening meal is prepared," she said, "and they await you."
"Thank you, Kassandra, but I am not hungry," he said. He had not bathed nor shaved since the raid; he looked unkempt and dirty, and smelled of strange herbs. "How can I eat and sleep in comfort when my child has been taken? I cannot bear to think of my poor little girl down among those savage soldiers."
"You cannot improve her lot by fasting and neglecting your person," Kassandra pointed out fastidiously. "Or is it that you think that seeing you in this condition will soften the hearts of the Akhaians?"
"No, but it might soften the heart of some God," he said, surprising her with the sincerity in his voice.
"Do you really believe that?"
"Perhaps not," he said, sighing so heavily that the sound seemed ripped from the very depths of his body. "But I have no heart for food or rest when she is there…'
"She has certainly not been given to the soldiers," Kassandra said. "She will be a cherished prize for one of the leaders, perhaps even for Agamemnon himself."
"Do you think that is any comfort to me?" He sounded dis-pairing; Kassandra would have tried to speak comfort but a surge of darkness rippled before her eyes and for a moment she did not know where she was or what she had been saying.
"Why did I guard her maidenhood so carefully all those years only to bring her here? I might as well have sold her to a brothel keeper!"
Now Kassandra was angry.
"No; you sold her to Apollo Sunlord, in return for a life of comfort for yourself. As for the girl, if maidenhood dwells not in the soul it is useless to guard the body. If you wish for Apollo's protection, or for revenge, I cannot advise you. I can say only that he is unlikely to intervene when you have made yourself worthless to us all. If you want his help—or his mercy - you must first serve him well; you cannot bargain with a God."
She stared over the rampart at the thick sea-fog obscuring the Akhaian ships below. It had come to where she hated to look on the sea because of that dark fringe of ships against the ocean's edge. Khryse turned on her with such fury that for a moment she thought he would strike her; then he restrained himself, visibly sinking back into his apathy.
"You are right," he said slowly. "I will go to the evening meal -but first I will go and bathe and restore myself to the proper appearance for a priest of the Sunlord."
She said softly, "This is wise, my brother," and saw something kindled in his eyes that she would rather not have seen; cursing herself for her momentary impulse of sympathy, she went on her way.
Early the next morning there was a sound at her door, and when she went to answer it, she found one of the youngest priests, who were used as messengers within the Sunlord's house.
"You are the daughter of Priam?" he asked respectfully. "You are wanted at once in the room at the gatehouse; a man there says he is your uncle and must have speech with you at once."
Kassandra wrapped herself in her cloak, wondering what - or who - it could possibly be. She did not know any of her father's brothers and certainly Hecuba had none. Too late she began to wonder if it was a trick of some sort, and when, within the room, she had a glimpse of three men in Argive cloaks, she started back, ready to call out for help.
"It is I, Kassandra," said a familiar voice, and the man pulled back the hood concealing his face.
"Odysseus!" she exclaimed.
"Not so loud, my girl; you will get us all killed!" he implored. "I must see your father—and as things are now, I could not land among these Akhaians and walk through them up toward the gates of Troy for a parley; they'd have lynched me. My ship lies hidden in a cove I discovered when I was among pirates; I stole in last night under the cover of the fog, and I must speak with Priam and see if there is still any honorable way to avert this war. I thought perhaps, here in this temple, some way could be contrived."
"But you cannot just go out at the front gate and down to the palace either," she said. "I am sure there are Akhaian eyes and ears in the market and even here in the Sunlord's house; pilgrims, spies in the guise of petitioners. You would be recognized at once. Let me see first if I can contrive something. For you, I am sure, my father will waive the vow he has sworn, to make no civil parley with any Argive. But who are your companions?"