"Poor motherless child," Kassandra said. "I will care for her as if she were my own."
"You have no children of your own, Lady?"
"No," Kassandra said. "I am a virgin of Apollo."
She felt herself blushing at the look he gave her and said quickly, "They are beginning to bring in offerings and to consult the shrine; I must go and be ready to speak with them."
The first man had brought an offering of a jar of good wine; he asked, "Priestess, I wish to ask the God how shall I get my sister well married; my father is dead and I have been away from my village for many years serving in my king's army."
Kassandra had been asked similar questions many times; she went into the shrine and dutifully repeated the question. She did not believe it was important enough for the God to answer; nevertheless she waited several minutes in case the God had something to say. Then she returned to the waiting man and said:
"Go to your father's oldest friend and ask for his advice out of friendship for your father; and forget not to give him a generous gift."
The man's face brightened.
"I am grateful to the God for his advice," he said, and Kassandra nodded to him courteously, holding herself back by force from saying If you had used what wit the God saw fit to give you, you would have saved yourself the trouble of coming here; but since any sensible person could have given you such an answer, we might as well have a gift for it.
Later when Khryse asked her, "How do you know what to answer? I find it hard to believe a God would trouble himself with such matters," she told him that the priests had worked out proper answers to the commonest questions.
"But never forget to be silent for a few moments, in case the God has another answer to be given. Even the most foolish questions - from our point of view—the God sometimes sees fit to answer," she warned him.
After a little, another man came carrying a great basket of excellent melons and asked, "What shall I plant in my south field this year?"
"Has there been fire or flood or any great change on your land?"
"No, Lady."
She went into the shrine, sitting for a moment before the great statue of the Sunlord, remembering how the first time she saw it as a child she had thought it a living man. When the God did not speak to her she returned and said: 'Plant the crop you planted there three years ago."
This answer could do no possible harm; if he had been rotating his crops as the headmen of most villages now advised, it would not conflict with their advice, and if he had not, it would make things no worse. As he thanked her she felt the common exasperation; this was the safe answer for any farmer in any year, and she felt he should have known it without asking; but they would all enjoy the melons, anyway.
The morning went slowly, with only one question which gave her a moment's thought; a man brought a fine kid as an offering, and said that his wife had just borne him a fine son.
"And you wish to give thanks to the Sunlord?"
The man shifted his feet uneasily, like a guilty child.
"Well, not exactly," he muttered. "I wish to know if this child is mine, or has my wife been unfaithful to me?"
This was the question Kassandra always most dreaded; her year among the Amazons had taught her that a man's suspicion of a woman usually meant that he did not feel himself worthy of a woman's regard.
Yet she accepted the offering calmly and went into the shrine; sometimes this question was actually answered, apparently at random: If you are not certain, expose the child at once. But there was no answer, so she gave the suitable answer for such occasions: 'If you can trust your wife in other ways, there is no reason to doubt her in this."
The man looked enormously relieved, and Kassandra sighed and told him, "Go home, now, and thank the Goddess for your son, and forget not to make apology to your wife for doubting her without reason."
"I will, lady," he promised, and Kassandra, seeing that there were no other worshippers waiting consultation, turned to say to Khryse, "At this hour we should now close the shrine, and rest until the sun begins to decline; it is the custom to take a little bread and fruit before we return to see anyone who comes."
He thanked her and added, "The lady Charis told me you are the second daughter of King Priam and of his queen. You are nobly born, and as beautiful as Aphrodite - how is it that you serve here in the shrine when every prince and nobleman on this coast and southward to Crete must have been seeking you in marriage?"
"Oh, not so many as that," she said, laughing nervously. "In my case, the Sunlord called me to his service when I was younger than your daughter."
He looked skeptical. "He called you? How?"
"You are a priest," she said. "Surely he has spoken to you."
"I have had no such fortune, Lady," he said. "I think the Immortals speak only to the great. My father - he was a poor man - pledged me to the God's service when my elder brother was spared from the fever which raged in Mykenae a score of years ago. He thought it a fair bargain; my brother was a warrior, and I, he said, fit for nothing."
"That was not right," Kassandra said vehemently. "A son is not a slave."
"Oh, I was willing enough," Khryse said. "I had no talent for becoming a warrior."
Kassandra laughed a little. "Strange; surely you are stronger than I, and I was a warrior for several years among the Amazons."
"I have heard of the maiden warriors," he said, "and I have heard also that they kill their lovers and their boy children."
"Not so," she said, "but men dwell apart from women there; male children are sent to their fathers as soon as they are weaned from the breast."
"And had you a lover when you dwelt among them, beautiful Amazon?"
"No," she said softly. "As I told you, I am sworn as a virgin to the Sunlord."
"It seems a pity," Khryse said,"that so beautiful a lady should grow old unloved."
"You need not pity me," Kassandra said indignantly. "I am well content with no lover."
"That seems to me the pity of it," Khryse said. "You are a princess, and beautiful, and you are kind too—so you showed yourself to my daughter - yet you live alone here and give yourself to these wretched petitioners and serve here as any low-born maiden might do—"
Abruptly he pulled her close to him and kissed her; startled, her hands tried to push him away, but he held her so tightly she could not escape. Her mouth was surprised at the warmth of his lips.
"I mean you no dishonor," he whispered. "I would be your lover—or your husband if you would have me."
She pulled away frantically and ran from the room; flying up the stairs as if pursued by demons, her heart pounding and the sound of her own blood beating in her ears. In Phyllida's room she found Chryseis rocking the baby and singing to him in a small thin voice. Phyllida was sleeping, but she sat up as Kassandra burst into the room.
Kassandra had been ready to pour out the whole story; but looking at Chryseis, she thought: If I complain of him they will send him away; and then this child will be again at the mercy of the chances of the road.
So she said only, "My head aches from the sun; Phyllida, will you exchange duties with me this afternoon, and take the offerings in the shrine, if I care for the baby? I can send someone to fetch you when he needs to be fed."
Phyllida agreed gladly, saying she was weary of staying indoors with the child, and it was really time he should be weaned anyhow. When she had gone Kassandra put the baby to play in the sunshine, and sat down to think about what had happened to her.