It was cold; a high wind was blowing through the streets between the high buildings; and all the leaves were gone from the trees and bushes. She sat holding her serpents high so that the women in the streets could see them clearly. Imandra's chair was ahead; Kassandra could see the Queen's form, heavily pregnant now, her loosened hair flowing down her back. The streets were crowded with women, many of them pregnant, rushing up to the carriages, pushing through the guards, reaching up their arms to beg for the blessing.
The wind chilled her; she was glad for the cosy weight of the serpent about her waist. The snakes were sluggish; they do not like the cold any better than I do, she thought, longing for the warm sun of her home.
She fell almost into a trance, looking at the tall figure of Imandra on her carriage, shadowed with the powerful magic and glamour of the Goddess. Women rushed to hold up their hands, crying out for good fortune, fertility, and just the good luck of touching the pregnant Queen who embodied the Goddess. Automatically holding up her serpents, she heard the women calling to Imandra and Earth Mother, to Arikia, and the Serpent Mother, and then from somewhere in the crowd she actually heard someone call, "Look, it is the Trojan priestess, the beloved of Apollo!"
That brought her to sudden awareness. Was it still true? Or had Apollo forgotten her? Perhaps it was time, she thought, that she should return to Troy and her own people and her own Gods; serving the Goddess, women were more free here, but what good was the freedom if she must dwell forever among strangers? Then her heart smote her; she was well loved here and had many friends, could she bear to abandon them and to return to a city where women were regarded as little better than prostitutes or slaves?
The sun grew hotter; she pulled her veil over her head and dipped her kerchief into a bowl of water to moisten the snakes' heads. "Soon, little ones," she murmured,"this will be over and you will be where it is cool and dark." One of the serpents was trying to crawl into the darkness of her dress; the crowds were thinning, so she did not try to prevent it.
The chair-bearers slowed; then came to a halt. Servants were carefully lifting Imandra down from her seat - not easily. She walked heavily toward the chair where the priestesses sat surrounded by their serpents.
"Kassandra, my friend, will you come this evening to the palace and look for me into your scrying-bowl?"
"With pleasure," Kassandra replied. "As soon as I have cared for my serpents - if Arikia will give me leave," she added, glancing at the senior priestess, who smiled and nodded permission.
At the temple of Serpent Mother, she helped the bearers to settle Arikia down on her bed in a darkened room; then she helped to unwind the snakes and bathe them in the fountain in the inner court. After swallowing a little fruit and bread, she dressed herself in her simplest robe and went out again into the chill of early afternoon. It was a little warmer—what heat there was in the sun was full strength now—and the noonday streets were full of people, but none of them recognized the slight dark-haired woman in her plain tunic as the priestess who had been carried, robed and crowned in her serpents, through the streets.
The Queen's women conducted Kassandra to the royal apartments. It was pleasantly warm there, with a fire in a fireplace. Imandra was lying in a hammock, her hair unbound and her huge body mounded high against the cushions. She had shed the glamour of the Goddess and now looked weary, her drawn face would have been pale, except that she had not even troubled to remove the paint from her cheeks.
She should have kept Andromache here in Colchis instead of sending her to Troy; then she would not need to expose herself to the dangers of a belated childbearing, Kassandra thought, surprised at herself; now she needs a daughter to rule after her in Colchis. As if some hint of Kassandra's thought had reached her, the Queen opened her eyes.
"Ah, daughter, you have come to keep me company," she said. "I am glad; I think the little one—" she laid her hand across her belly, "may be born today; but at least the procession was completed and I need not give birth to their Queen in the streets. Soon I will summon the palace women—they will be cross if they are not told at once; they are entitled to their festival. Kassandra, how old are you, my dear?"
Kassandra tried to reckon up the years; in Troy they did not keep track of a woman's age once she had arrived at puberty.
"I think I shall be nineteen or twenty this summer," she said. "Mother told me I was born near to midsummer."
"A year older than my Andromache," Imandra said, "and you told me that Andromache's oldest son, is old enough for his first bronze helmet and lessons in swordplay. I do not think I know any woman of your years who is not married. Sometimes I think you should have been my daughter, since you cleave to the old ways in Colchis, and Andromache seems happy in Troy, even as an obedient wife to Hector." Her lip curled a little, almost in scorn. "But you are Priam's daughter, and a Trojan. Is it your will to remain unmarried all your days, my dear?"
"I had thought of nothing else," Kassandra said. "I am sworn to Apollo Sunlord."
"But you are missing all that makes life worth the living," Imandra said, and sighed.
Imandra frowned and lay motionless for a time, then said, "Will you look into the scrying-bowl and let this old woman once set eyes upon my daughter's child?"
Kassandra demurred. "Perhaps just now you should think first of this child. You must save all your strength and energy until she is safely here among us, kinswoman."
"Spoken like a priestess - and they are all full of nonsense," said Imandra crustily. "I am not a maiden of fifteen in my first childbed; I am a grown woman and a Queen, and no less a priestess than you yourself, Kassandra of Troy."
"I had no thought of suggesting—" Kassandra began defensively.
"Oh, yes you did; don't deny it," Imandra said. "Do as I ask you, Kassandra; if you will not there are others who will, though not many who see so far or so well."
Everything Imandra said was true, and Kassandra knew it.
"Oh, very well," she agreed, mentally adding you stubborn old creature. "Call your women," she said, "and let them prepare you for the birth. Hold me harmless of it if what I say gives you pain or sorrow; I am but the messenger, the wings of the bird on which such greetings fly." She knelt down, making the preparations for kindling the witchfire for the spell of sight.
Imandra's women came and went in the room, making all ready for the birthing. Among them were Kassandra's two waiting-women, who came to greet her and ask quietly out of earshot of the Queen, "Are we to stay in this foreign city forever, Princess? When shall we return to Troy?"
"That shall be as Queen Imandra wills," Kassandra said. "I shall not leave her while she has need of me here."
"How can she have more need of you than your own mother, Lady? Do you truly think Queen Hecuba does not long and grieve for you?"
Kassandra said indifferently, "You have my leave to return to Troy whenever you will; this very night if it should please you. But I have made a promise to Imandra and I will not break it." She rose and strode to the high bed where the women had placed the Queen to rest till it should be time for the birth-chair. The room was slowly filling with the women in the palace, come to witness the royal event.
"I wonder," Imandra mused fretfully, "if it ever happens that the Earth Mother sends the babe to the wrong womb? From what I know of her, Hecuba would have thought Andromache her perfect daughter, and you were always misplaced in Troy." She clung hard to Kassandra's hand, "No, don't leave me, the Gods will wait on the Sight till our eyes are ready to see…'