How can I be overcome by the sun? I am the beloved of Apollo Sunlord - but she did not say this aloud, murmuring her thanks and setting the cup to her lips. The water tasted a little of clay and was not over cool, but it felt good to her parched lips and throat.
"Will you rest for a moment inside my house, Princess?"
"No, thank you." She kept her eyes averted. "I am quite well; I will sit here and rest for a moment." The light hurt her eyes; she shaded them with her hand, looking down at the clear dazzling reflection of the harbor. For a moment the sun blurred her sight, then she saw clearly and all but cried out; the clear blue of the sea was dark with the sails of many ships.
So many! Where had they come from?
They were not her father's ships; and as she tried to focus on any one of them she was suddenly no longer sure it was there. After a few moments of this, the harbor burned empty with dazzling blue sea, broken only by the shape of one old Cretan ship which had been loading paints and lumber for the past three days.
It had been only a vision, then; a hallucination.
She wrenched her aching eyes from the illusory sea, slowly got to her feet and began to climb upward. She kept her eyes slitted narrowly against the sun, which glared like fire spreading down across the walls of Troy, and kept climbing, slowly, against a growing sense that to run away like this was folly, that one did, not flee to a God like a strayed goat bolting from the flock. She should have come, oh, yes, but she should have come like a princess of Troy, attended properly, and bearing the proper gifts for the House of the God.
Nevertheless it would be wrong to turn back now. Unless the deceitful vision of ships had been meant as a warning…? No; even so, she could not take back her commitment to the God.
She climbed on, approaching the temple of the Sunlord.
A flare of light, haloed by a flash of summer lightning, drew her eyes to the heights, where the Temple of Pallas Athene stood, and suddenly doubt assailed her. She had been made priestess of the Goddess, sent into the Underworld to seek her, and had been accepted; was it not Earth Mother who had called her since her earliest childhood, and had spoken to her with the voice of prophecy? Was she then abandoning her loyalty to the Divine Mother, Maiden and protectress of maidens, forsaking her for the beautiful Sunlord?
Sudden panic flooded her, so that for a moment she thought she would vomit, and swallowed spasmodically; her whole body was filled with a fear she could all but taste. She heard hard steps pursuing her and for a moment the sky above her was dark, and there was but one thought filling her mind to the brim, submerged in the dark waters… I must reach the Temple of the Maiden, there alone will I be safe… no man would dare lay hands on any whom she protects…
Kassandra blinked incredulously. There was no peril, no flame, no pursuer. The harbor gleamed empty and blue; the street around her contained only a few women, watching her climb sedately toward the great gates of the Sunlord's Temple.
Is it the God who has sent madness on me? She paused to catch her breath and stepped over the threshold into Apollo's Temple.
There was a sudden rush of wind, as if a giant hand pushed her across the threshold. Kassandra, patting her hair distractedly into place, looked about, almost disappointed that no one seemed to take notice. What did I expect? That the God himself would come out and make me welcome?
A woman in the ordinary dress of a priestess - a white tunic and a veil dyed with saffron to a sunny golden colour - raised her head and looked at Kassandra; then stood up and came toward her. She said, "Welcome, daughter of Priam; have you come here for an oracle or an omen, or to offer sacrifice?"
"None of these things," Kassandra said, self-consciously, not knowing how to say what she had come to say. "I came - because the God has called me to come - to be his priestess—" and she broke off, feeling more than a little foolish.
But the older woman smiled in a kindly way and said, "Yes, of course; I remember that you came once to us when you were only a little girl, and seemed so much at home here, I thought perhaps one day the Sunlord would call you. So now come inside, my dear, and tell me all about it. First, how old are you?" she asked. "You seem well-grown to womanhood."
"My mother tells me that I shall be seventeen soon after midsummer," Kassandra answered as they went inside. She remembered the waiting room where many years ago she had eaten a piece of sweet melon while her mother awaited the oracle, and found it hard to believe that it had changed so little in so many years. She wondered about the serpents she had seen and caressed at that time; they had been a short-lived species, probably they were long dead. The thought saddened her.
The priestess gestured to her to sit.
"Now tell me about yourself; everything which makes you think you have been called to our Temple."
When Kassandra had finished the priestess spoke. "Well, Kassandra, if you wish to be one of us, you must live for a year here within the Temple, to learn to interpret the oracles and the omens and to speak for the God."
Kassandra said, feeling a surge of upswelling happiness, "I shall be happy to live in the House of the God."
"Then you must send one of the Temple servants to fetch your belongings; only a few changes of clothing and perhaps a warm cloak, for you must wear the common dress of a priestess; we are all as sisters here, and you may not wear jewels and ornaments while you dwell in the shrine."
"I do not care for jewels," Kassandra said, "and indeed I have very few. But why is it not permitted?"
The old woman smiled. "It is a rule of the Temple," she said, "and I do not know why it is so. Perhaps it is because many of the folk who come here to consult us are poor, and if we were hung with jewels they might feel that we were enriching ourselves upon their offerings. My name is Charis," she said, "which is one of the names of Earth Lady. I have dwelt in the house of the Sunlord since I was nine winters old, and now I am seven-and-forty. We are long-lived here, unless we are chosen to bear a child to the God and it should chance that we die in childbirth; but that does not happen often, and many of our brothers and sisters are healer-priests. Have you your mother's or your father's leave to dwell in the House of the God?"
Kassandra said, "I do not think my mother will object; I have spoken with her of this. As for my father, he has so many sons and daughters, I do not think he will know or care whether I am in the God's house or his. I have never been one of his favourites." 'But tell me," she asked the priestess, "may I have my serpent to live with me in the Temple? She was a gift from Imandra, Queen and priestess of Colchis, and no one else in Troy loves her; I fear she will be neglected if I am not there to care for her."
"She will be welcome," Charis said. "You may have her brought here."
The old priestess now summoned a servant, and Kassandra instructed her as to which of her possessions she wanted fetched from the palace. "And go to my mother Queen Hecuba," she said, "and tell her that I beg for her blessing."
The servant bowed and went away. "And now, if you wish," Charis said, "I will show you the dormitory where the virgins of Apollo sleep."
So began the time that Kassandra remembered later as the happiest and most peaceful of her entire life. She learned to consult the oracles, to read the omens, and to serve the shrine with the appointed offerings. She cared for the sacred serpents, and learned to interpret the meanings of their movements and behaviour.
As she had foreseen, her mother made no difficulties; she sent by the servant the requested belongings, and a message: 'Say to my daughter Kassandra that I bless her and approve what she has done; tell her I send her many kisses and embraces."