The Firebrand (62 page)

“He drives his chariot like the very Battle-God himself,” he remarked. “Princess, he is your brother?”

“Yes; the son of both my mother and my father,” she replied.

“Tell me, what is he like? Is he truly as much a hero as he seems?”

“He is certainly brave and a valorous fighter,” she said.
But was it bravery or simply a lack of imagination? Paris could simulate bravery, but only because he feared being thought a coward more than whatever else it was he feared.

“But more than that,” she said, “Hector is a good man, apart from being a good fighter. He has other virtues than bravery.” The man looked a little startled, as if he could not imagine any other virtues. “I mean he would be worthy to admire even if there were no war.”

And that, she thought, could hardly be said of any of her other brothers; they seemed little more than animate weapons, without much thought for what they were doing or why. Paris had some good qualities—although he seldom showed them to a sister: he was kind to Helen, showed kindness as well as respect to his aging parents and had been a loving father to his children while they lived. He was kind even to Helen’s son by Menelaus. Aeneas too had this kind of character—
or do I think so only because I love him?
she asked herself. The sandalmaker still lauding Hector’s attributes, Kassandra said, “He will be pleased to know that he is so well thought of in the city” (which certainly was true), paid for her purchases and stepped out into the street. She immediately had to snatch Honey out from under the feet of the crowds blocking the way and surging back from the street where four chariots, driven by Aeneas, Paris, Deiphobos and the Thracian captain Glaucus, were thundering down in the wake of Hector’s toward the great gate.

Had Priam decided to send his best champions against the Akhaians regardless of the fact that Akhilles was not with them—or in hopes of luring Akhilles forth? The thought revived her curiosity; Honey was already trying to run after the crowd, so Kassandra went down toward the wall and once there, up the stairs inside to the women’s favorite observation point.

As she had expected, she found Helen, Andromache and Creusa there with Hecuba. They all greeted her with affection. Helen, she observed, looked less worn. Soon she confided to Kassandra that she believed she was pregnant again.

Andromache said, “I do not see how any woman could in good conscience bring a child into the world when there is this great war. I said so to Hector, but he only answered that this is when children are most needed.”

“And children die when there is no war,” Helen said; “I lost my second son to a midwife’s carelessness, and three of my sons died in an earthquake. They could have fallen to their death bird’s-nesting on the rocks, or been trampled by an escaped bull at the games. There is no safety for children anywhere in this mortal world; but if we all decided not to bear children because of that, where would the world be?”

“Ah, you have more courage than I,” said Andromache. “Just as Paris is more daring with his chariot than Hector—look how he races out of the great gate!”

It was hard to tell which man was driving most wildly; all five chariots exploded out of the gate almost at once, Hector’s foot soldiers streaming after them. The Akhaians had not yet formed any battlelines; Kassandra saw the chaos and disorder of the Argive camp as the troops sprang out between their tents, yelling, searching for weapons. The line of chariots thundered down on the camp, and on through. Now she saw that each chariot bore a brazier of coals and something else—tar? pitch?—and an archer swiftly preparing arrows by dipping them into the blazing stuff, and shooting at the lines of ships that lay in the harbor beyond the camp. For a few minutes, while trying to bring down the chariots, the Akhaians did not see the objective of the attack; then a great cry of rage rang out—but by this time the chariots were actually on the beach and several of the ships already ablaze.

Hector’s foot soldiers were well organized, attacking the still-surprised troops of Agamemnon.

Ship after ship, each with a blazing arrow in the folds of its furled sails, took fire, with sailors unready to fight the flames jumping overboard and adding to the confusion. Now Hector’s men turned their attention from the ships to the armies’ tents. There were screams and immense confusion all through the camp as men tried halfheartedly to organize ways of fighting the inferno and tended to the wounded. One of the ships (she heard later it had a cargo of oil) had already burned to the waterline and sunk. A great cheer went up from Hector’s men.

The Trojan chariots were surrounded now by Akhaian foot soldiers trying to pull the riders down; but the archers continued to shoot their fire-arrows into the tents until the women on the wall could not see into the Akhaian camp at all through the smoke. Another ship sagged and settled down into the harbor, the flames subsiding in the water.

The women cheered; then there was a commotion among the guards along the wall, and Trojan soldiers ran past them to a vantage point where some archers were stationed. There were loud yells, a combination of cheers and jeering cries, and a great crash. When the captain of archers came back, Andromache asked what had happened. Saluting her respectfully, he said, “At first we thought it was Akhilles himself and that he’d picked this time for a diversion. ’Twasn’t him, though; it was that friend of his—what’s his name—Patroklos; climbed right up the west wall where there’re stones loose from the earthquake.”

“Did you get him?” Andromache asked.

“No chance, Lady; we sent a good few arrows whizzing round his head, though, and he lost his balance and slid down. Then his archers returned our fire and covered him while he showed us a good pair of legs back to their camp,” the soldier replied. “Shame we missed him; if he’d wound up with an arrow through his gullet, maybe Akhilles
would
get discouraged and take off home.”

“Never mind,” Andromache said; “you did the best you could. And at least he didn’t get into the city.”

“Begging your pardon, Lady,
best we could
won’t be good enough for Prince Hector,” said the soldier pessimistically. “But I reckon you’re right: nothing to do about it now, and no use worrying about what we can’t mend. Maybe he’ll give us another chance one day and we’ll pick him off.”

“May the War-God grant it,” said Andromache. The women looked out over the wall again; the chariots had withdrawn now from the camp and were racing back toward the gates of Troy; Kassandra, though she could not at this distance distinguish one chariot from another, counted them and noted that they were all there. The raid on the ships, then, had been a total success.

Below them the watchman shouted, “Ready there to open the gates!” and they heard the creaking of the ropes that opened the great gate. Helen and Andromache went down the stairs to greet their husbands; the other women remained behind.

Hecuba approached Kassandra, and she asked, “The King was not with the chariots?”

“Oh, no, Kassandra,” said her mother; “his hands no longer serve him to drive. The healer-priests have treated him with their healing oils and spells, but every day it grows worse. He can hardly tie the laces of his sandals.”

“I am sorry to hear it,” Kassandra said; “but for old age, Mother, there are no healing spells, even for a King.”

“Nor, I suppose, for a Queen,” Hecuba said, and Kassandra, looking sharply at her, realized how frail her mother was, her back stooped and so thin that her bones seemed to protrude from the skin. Her complexion had always seemed fresh and bright; now it was grayish and sallow, and her hair a dirty streaked yellowish-white. Even her eyes seemed to have faded.

“You are not well, Mother.”

“Well enough; I am much more troubled about your father,” Hecuba said. “And Creusa; she is pregnant again, and there is likely to be a scarcity of nourishing food in the city this winter. The crops were not good, and the Akhaians burned so much of what there was.”

“There is food enough in the Sun Lord’s house,” Kassandra said. “What is shared out for me and for Honey is always more than we can eat; I will try to see that Creusa has enough.”

“You are good,” Hecuba said gently, reaching out to stroke her hair; her mother had rarely caressed her since she was a very small child, and Kassandra felt warmed.

“We have not only food but healing herbs in plenty; you must always come to me if anyone at the palace is ill or in want,” she said. “It is taken for granted that we’ll share what we have with our families. I will send some herbs for Father, and you must steep them in hot water, and soak a cloth, and apply the hot cloth to his hands. It may not cure him, but it will ease his pain.”

Hecuba looked past her to Honey, who was sitting on the wall, playing with some pebbles. Kassandra remembered a similar game when she was very small; she and her sisters, the other daughters of the royal house, would choose nice round little stones and set them in niches on the wall to bake, as if they were buns or loaves, examining them every few minutes to see if they were cooked enough. She smiled at the memory.

The chariots were inside the walls now, and the gates closing. Hecuba asked, “Will you come and dine at the palace? Though you will surely be better fed in the Sun Lord’s house . . .”

“I think not tonight,” Kassandra said, “though I thank you; I will send the herbs down by a messenger. I hope they do Father good—we cannot spare his strength in these days. Not even Hector is fit to rule Troy, even if he should survive his father.” She stopped herself, but Hecuba had heard and stared at her in shock.

She did not speak. Kassandra knew what she was thinking:

The charioteers had left their chariots; Hector and Paris, accompanied by their wives, came up the stairs, and Aeneas joined Creusa. Kassandra picked up Honey; if she did not intend to join them this night at the palace, it was time to take her leave.

Creusa came to her and said, “I will walk with you to the Sun Lord’s house, Sister.”

“I would be glad of your company; but the sun is still high in the sky. I need no escort,” Kassandra protested. “You should not tire yourself with that long climb.”

“I will come,” Creusa insisted. “I would like to speak with you.”

“Very well, then; as I said, I am glad of your company,” Kassandra said. Creusa gave her small daughter to a servant, instructing the woman to take her home, and to feed her if Creusa had not returned by her suppertime; then she joined Kassandra, who was tying on Honey’s broad-brimmed hat against the sun.

“She is well grown for her age,” she said. “How old is she now? When was she born?”

“I am sure Mother has told you that I am not certain,” Kassandra said, “but she cannot have been more than a few days old when I found her, and I left Colchis near the middle of last winter.”

“Nearly a year then; she must be close to my own daughter in age,” Creusa said; “yet she is taller and stronger, and already walking beside you like a big girl. Little Kassandra still crawls on all fours like a puppy.”

“Well, those who know children best say that each one walks and talks when the time is right for her—some early, some late,” Kassandra replied. “Mother says I was early to walk and talk, and I remember things that must have happened no later than my second summer.”

“That’s true,” Creusa said. “Astyanax did not walk or even talk till he was past two years old; I know Andromache was beginning to wonder if he had all his wits.”

“That must have been very worrying,” Kassandra agreed. She felt confused; surely Creusa had not undertaken this long climb to speak with her about the growth and feeding of little children, when the palace was filled with so many nurses to consult.

Whatever it was, Creusa was finding it hard to come to the point; but just as Kassandra was beginning to wonder if Creusa had somehow found out what she had said to Aeneas (but how? some spying servant? She would swear they had not been overheard) and to feel vaguely guilty, Creusa said, “You are a priestess and they say you are a prophetess; it was you who gave warning of the great earthquake, was it not?”

“I thought you were there when I gave the warning,” Kassandra said.

“No; Aeneas came and told me not to sleep under a roof that night, and to take the children outdoors,” her sister said. “What have you foreseen?”

Creusa knows as well as I do that I have seen death, and the destruction of Troy,
she thought, but she was sure her sister had some reason beyond the ordinary for asking. She said, hesitating, “Are you sure you want to know? Priam has forbidden anyone to listen to my prophecies. It might be better not to anger him.”

“Let me tell you, then, why I ask,” said Creusa. “Aeneas told me that you prophesied that he would survive the fall of Troy.”

“Yes,” said Kassandra, embarrassed. “It seems the Gods have work for him elsewhere; for I have seen him departing unharmed, and behind him Troy in flames.”

Creusa’s hands flew to her bosom in a strange gesture. “Is this true?”

“Do you believe I would lie about it?”

“No, no, of course not; but why should he be chosen to be spared when so many will die?”

“I do not know; why were you and your children spared when Helen lost three sons in the great quake?”

“Because Aeneas heeded your warning and Paris would not.”

“That is not what I meant,” Kassandra said. “No one can say why the Gods choose one to die and another to live; and perhaps those who live may not be the most fortunate.”

I wish I were sure that only death awaited me,
she thought, but she did not say so to Creusa.

“Aeneas has ordered me to leave the city as soon as I can, and take the children,” Creusa said. “I am to go, perhaps, to Crete, to Knossos or even farther. I was thinking I should refuse to go, to say that my place was at his side, come war or death; but if it is true that he is certain to survive, then I can understand why he wants me to go . . . so that we may meet in safer country when the war is over.”