"How goes the war in Troy?" the older woman asked. "Will you shelter with us this night and tell us about it?"
"With pleasure," Kassandra said, "and we can talk at leisure about this war; though I am weary of it." She gave directions to the bearers to follow the Amazon, and herself rode at Penthesilea's side, toward a cave in a hillside; inside there were a scant half-dozen women, mostly elderly, and a few young girls. When last she had travelled with them there had been a good half a hundred. Now there were no babies, and no young women of childbearing age.
Penthesilea saw the direction of her glance and said, "Elaria and five others are in the men's village. I was afraid, but I knew I must let them go now or I would never dare to let them go again - that's right, you didn't know what happened, did you? Then our shame has not yet been told in Troy—"
"I have heard nothing, Aunt."
"Come and sit down. We'll talk as we eat, then." She smiled and sniffed appreciatively. "We have not eaten this well for many moons. Thank you."
Their meal had been supplemented with dried meat and bread from Kassandra's provisions. Penthesilea said, "All the same, we are not as badly off as the Kentaurs; they are starving, and soon there will be no more. Did you even meet with any of them?"
Kassandra told about her encounter with Cheiron, and the older woman nodded.
"Yes, we can always trust him and his men. In the name of the Goddess I wish—" she broke off. "Last year we arranged to go to one of the men's villages—we made an arrangement for trading metal pots, and horses and some of our milk goats, too. Well, we went as usual and it seemed that all was well. Two moons went by; some of us were pregnant, and we were ready to go. They besought us to stay another month; and we agreed. Then when we were ready to set out, they made us a farewell feast and brought us a new wine. We slept deeply and when we woke - it had been drugged, of course—we were bound and gagged, and they told us that we could not leave them; that they had decided they wished to live like men in cities, with women to tend them year round, and share their beds and their lives—" she broke off, shaking with indignation and grief. "Every animal has a proper mating season," she said. "We tried to remind them of this but they would not hear. So we told them that we would consider it if they would let us go; and they said we should cook them a meal because men in cities had women to cook for them… They even forced some of the women who were already pregnant to bed with them! So we cooked them a meal; and you-can imagine what kind of a meal it was," she grinned fiercely. "But some women wished to spare the fathers of their children -Earth Mother alone knows where they got such ideas. And so some of them had been warned, and when they were all spewing and purging, we made ready to ride; but a few of them forced us to fight. Well, we could not kill them all; and so we lost many of our number - the traitorous ones stayed and did not return to us…"
"They stayed with the men who - who had done this to you?"
"Aye; they said they were weary of fighting and herding," Penthesilea said scornfully. "They will bed with men in return for their bread, no better than harlots in your cities—it is a perversion of those Akhaians; they say, even, that our Earth Mother is no more than the wife of the Thunderlord Zeus—"
"Blasphemy!" Kassandra agreed. "This was not Cheiron's tribe?"
"No, them we can trust; they cling, like us, to the old ways," Penthesilea said. "But when this year Elaria led the women to the men's village we made them swear an oath even they dare not break, and we made them leave with us all the weaned children. We hide here in caves because with our strong young women away we have no warriors to guard our herds…'
Kassandra found nothing to say. It was the end of a way of life which had lasted thousands of years on these plains; but what could they do? She said, "Has there been much of a drought? Cheiron told me that food is harder to find—"
"That too; and some tribes have been greedy to own too many horses, and grazed more than the plains could feed, so they would have them to sell in return for cloth and metal pots and I know not what—and so it is those of us who treat the earth well are dying… Earth Mother has not stretched out her hand to punish them. I know not - perhaps there are no Gods who care any more what men do—" Her face looked strained and old.
"I do not understand," Adrea said. "Why does it trouble you so, that some of your women have chosen to live as all women now live within the cities? You women could live well, with husbands to care for you, and look after your horses; and you could keep your sons as well as your daughters, and you need not spend all your time fighting to defend yourselves. Many, many women live so and find nothing wrong with it; are you saying they are all wrong? Why do you want to live separately from men? Are you not women like any others?"
Penthesilea sighed, but instead of the instant scornful comment Kassandra had expected, she thought for a moment; Kassandra had the feeling that she really wanted this elderly city woman who disapproved of her so much, to understand.
At last she said, "It has been our custom that we live among our own kind and are free. I do not like to live inside walls, and why should we women spin and weave and cook? Do not men wear clothes, that they should not make their own? And surely men eat; why should women cook all the food that is eaten? The men in their own villages cook well enough when there are no women at hand to cook for them. So why should women live as slaves to men?"
"It does not seem slavery to me," the woman protested, "only fair exchange; do you say men are enslaved to women when they herd the horses and goats, then?"
Penthesilea said passionately, "But the women do these things as if it were an exchange for sharing their beds and bearing their children. Like the harlots in your cities who sell themselves -cannot you see the difference? Why should women have to live with men when they can care for their own herds and feed themselves from their own gardens, and live free?"
"But if a woman wishes for children, she needs a man. Even you, Queen Penthesilea—"
Penthesilea said, "May I ask without giving offense, ladies, why is it that you have not married?"
Kara spoke first, saying, "I would gladly have married; but I pledged I would remain with Queen Hecuba while she wished for my company. I have not missed marriage; her children were born into my lap, and I have shared in their upbringing. And like Lady Kassandra, I have met no man I loved enough to separate me from my beloved Lady."
"I honor you for that," Penthesilea said. "And you, Adrea?"
"Alas, I was neither beautiful nor rich; so no man ever offered for me," the old woman said. "And now that time is past. So I serve my Queen and her daughters, even to following Lady Kassandra into this Goddess-forgotten wilderness filled with Kentaurs and other such wild folk—"
"So there are other reasons than simple wickedness why a woman might choose not to marry," Penthesilea said. "If it is well for you not to marry out of loyalty to your Queen, why should Kassandra not remain loyal to her God?"
"It is not that she does not marry," said Adrea, "it is that she does not wish to marry; how can one sympathize with a woman like that?"
This was too much for Kassandra; she exploded with words she had been repressing for days. "I have not asked for your sympathy, any more than for your company; I did not invite you to join me, and you are welcome to return to Troy, where you will be surrounded by proper women, and I shall travel to Colchis with my kinswomen and their escort!" she said hotly. "I have no need of your protection."