The Firebrand (45 page)

“A little lady like you going so far alone? If you were my daughter, I wouldn’t have it; but I suppose the God knows that what belongs to Him is safe anywhere,” said the soldier. “Pass, then, Lady, and may Apollo guard you. Give me His blessing, I beg you,” he added with a reverential gesture.

That was the last thing she had expected, but she extended her hands in a gesture of blessing and said, “Apollo Sun Lord bless and guard you, sir,” and rode past.

She could see so far from the top of the walls of Troy that she had forgotten how long it took to travel; they camped that night and several nights thereafter within sight of the city and woke seeing the flash of sunlight on the house of the Sun Lord. She remembered her trip with the Amazons; she could hardly believe that from that hour to this, she had dwelt behind the prisoning walls of her city. Troy, her home, and her prison. Would she ever see it again?

In THE long interval between proposing the trip and finally managing to leave she had had ample time for preparation, and she had had two tents made: a lightweight one of oiled linen cloth, and one of leather such as the Amazons had used in rainy weather. For the first days the weather was fine and the tent under the stars was pleasantly cool at night, although her two chaperones, interpreting her mother’s instructions literally, made her sleep with her blankets spread between the two of them. Kassandra, always a restless sleeper, lay awake sometimes for hours, feeling every rock and lump of ground under the tent’s floorcloth dig into her hips, hating to change position for fear of disturbing one or the other of her companions. Nevertheless, she could hear the wind and feel the cool breeze outside the tent, and at least it was different from the unchanging wind at the heights of Troy.

Day after day, their little caravan slowly toiled without incident across the great plain. They met few travelers on the road, except for one great train of wagons bringing iron bound for Troy, and when they heard that the city was under siege, they wondered if they should turn about and go northward into Thrace or even back toward Colchis.

“For the Akhaians will not trade with us for metal,” said the leader. “They prefer their own kind of weapons, and most likely they will not let us pass into the city at all; then we will have to go back with only the journey for our pains; or else the Akhaians will seize our whole caravan.”

Kassandra thought this very likely indeed.

“Do you know any of the Akhaians who are there?”

“Akhilles, son of Peleus; Agamemnon, King of Mykenae, and Menelaus of Sparta; Odysseus—”

“Now, that’s different,” said the caravan leader. “We can trade with Odysseus, same as we would with Priam; he’s an honest man and an honest trader.” He raised his voice to his drivers: “Looks like we’ll be going to Troy after all, fellows.” And then, of course, he wanted to know what she was doing, traveling without her kin, and when she answered he gave the now expected reply that if she were his daughter he wouldn’t permit it.

“But I suppose your father knows what he’s about,” he concluded, doubtfully. And Kassandra saw no point in explaining that Priam had not been asked for his permission and had been given no chance to consent or refuse.

“Can I carry any messages for you to Troy, little lady?”

“Only to let it be known in the Sun Lord’s house that I am alive and well. The message will be passed on from there to my mother and father.” And with mutual expressions of goodwill and blessings they parted, moving slowly apart across the great plain like two streams in opposite directions. After a few more nights, she knew, her party would arrive within the borders of the country of the Kentaurs.

“The Kentaurs?” said Adrea, one of her chaperones.

“Oh, not the Kentaurs!” cried Kara, the other.

“Why, yes, Nurse—they live in this country and we must pass through their territory. It is almost inevitable that we shall meet one or more of their wandering bands.”

But the women had been brought up on the old nursery tales.

“And are you not afraid of the Kentaurs, Mistress Kassandra?” asked Kara, and she replied, “No, not at all.”

She supposed that was an unwomanly answer; Kara looked as if the very fact that any woman might escape the fear of what frightened her so much actually gave offense. Kassandra sighed and finished the wine in her cup. “We must drink this up,” she said, “it is beginning to turn sour and will not keep in the heat. We can get some more at the next village, in a day or perhaps two,” and the rest of the talk was of simpler things.

TRUE TO HER prediction, they saw the Kentaurs early in the next day. At first, riding the sea of endless grass, Kassandra could see nothing; then, very far away, at the edge of her vision she could see movement and shadows, and at last made out a small form . . . no, two . . . no, three, riding, dark against the golden waving of the grasses. They seemed to see her little caravan advancing, then drew together, conferring; at one point she thought they would all flee. Then they wheeled and came riding toward the Trojans.

Kassandra stopped her donkey but made no other move of withdrawal; she knew from old that one should never let a Kentaur believe you feared him or he would take ruthless advantage of it.

She said softly through the curtains of the litter where the ladies rode, “Nurses, you wanted to see a Kentaur. There is one.”

“I?” said Adrea. “Not likely”; but nevertheless she thrust her head out and peered between the curtains. Kara followed suit.

“What funny ugly little men,” she whispered, “and shameless; naked as an animal.”

“Why should they wear clothing when there is no one to see or care? When they come into cities, they have garments they can wear if they choose,” Kassandra said, and looked at the approaching band. The foremost among them was gray-haired and gnarled, his legs even smaller and more bowed than the others’. He wore a necklace of lions’ teeth about his throat; Kassandra recognized him, shrunken and old as he was.

“Cheiron,” she said, and he bowed from his horse’s neck.

“Kinswoman of Penthesilea, greeting. When last we met, we had honey found in the wild. Our tribe is poor, these days. Many, many travelers on the plain; scare away the game, trample down wild plants. Our she-goats give no milk even for the littlest boys. We hunger much.”

“We are traveling to Colchis,” Kassandra said. “Can you show us the way?”

“With pleasure, if it is your wish,” the old Kentaur said in his barbarous accent. “But how come ye to be riding
away
from Troy? The whole world’s going there for this war, it seems. If not to fight, then to sell something to the fighters, one side or the other.”

This was so true there seemed no purpose in commenting on it.

She had before leaving Troy asked the kitchens for a good half dozen loaves of bread, knowing that the Kentaurs neither grew nor ground grain and that it was a most unusual luxury for them. When it was unwrapped and given, the little man’s eyes gleamed—Kassandra thought it was with real hunger—and he said, “Priam’s daughter is generous. Does her husband fight in the great battles before Troy? If he does, I will gift him with magical arrows which will never fail to bring down her enemies even if they do not strike in a vital part.”

“I have no husband,” she said. “I am sworn to the Sun Lord and will have none but Him. And I need none of your arrows, envenomed with poison brewed from toads.”

For a moment the little man looked at her and glowered; then he leaned back and broke into a great guffaw of laughter, and did something, Kassandra could not see what, that made his horse rear up and prance, and then bow down.

“Huh-huh-huh,” he chortled. “Priam’s daughter is clever and good; no man of all my people will harm her as she passes through my country, or anything belonging to her. Not even the old women who peer at my men lustfully from behind their curtains! But if you have no use for the old toads, give them to my men; they are no good for bang-bang”—he accompanied the meaningless syllables with a gesture which made his meaning obscenely clear—“but we could boil them for arrow poison, huh-huh-huh?”

Kassandra struggled to keep her face straight.

“By no means; I do not want to travel without my women; they are good to me,” she said, “and I would not travel through your country with young and pretty ones.”

“Huh; clever,” he said, wheeled his horse and rode quickly away.

She held up her hand to signal that she had not finished her parley, and he wheeled back and returned a little way. She asked, “Does the wise leader of the Horse People know where Penthesilea’s women pasture her mares this summer?”

He gestured and gabbled out a quick explanation. Since it would not mean going too far out of their way, Kassandra decided she would ride in that direction. Again she took leave courteously of Cheiron, who had begun sharing out the loaves with his men and already had crumbs around his mouth.

AFTER ANOTHER long day of riding in the direction the Kentaur had indicated, Kassandra saw in the distance a mounted figure. The stranger carried a bow such as Penthesilea’s women bore slung across her back. Kassandra beckoned to her, and the woman approached.

“Who rides in our country with an escort of men?”

“I am Kassandra, daughter of Priam of Troy, and I seek my kinswoman Penthesilea the Amazon,” she said.

The woman, clad in the leather tunic and breeches of the tribeswomen, her long, coarse black hair knotted atop her head, looked at her suspiciously; and finally said, “I remember you as a child, Princess. I cannot leave my mares”—she gestured toward the scattered scrawny herd grazing across the spare grasses of the plain—“and it is not my place to summon the Queen. But I will send a signal that she is wanted, and if it seems good to her, she will come.”

She dismounted and kindled a small fire, throwing something into the flames which emitted great clouds of smoke; she covered it, then let the smoke billow up in successive triple puffs. After some time, Kassandra saw a tall figure on horseback making its way across the plain. When the figure neared, she recognized her kinswoman.

Penthesilea’s horse approached and she could see the puzzled look on the Amazon’s face; after a moment Kassandra realized that her kinswoman had not recognized her. When Penthesilea had last seen her she had been a young girl; now older, robed and attired as a princess, a priestess, she was only a strange woman.

She called out her name. “Don’t you know me, Aunt?”

“Kassandra!” Penthesilea’s taut sun-browned face relaxed, but she still looked tense and old. She came and dismounted, and embraced Kassandra with affection. “Why do you come here, child?”

“Looking for you, Aunt.” When she had last seen her kinswoman, Penthesilea had seemed youthful and strong; now Kassandra wondered how old she really was. Her face was lined, with hundreds of small wrinkles around mouth and eyes; she had always been thin but was now positively scrawny. Kassandra wondered if the Amazons, like the Kentaurs, were actually starving.

“How goes this 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 little girls. When last she had traveled 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 don’t know what happened, do 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. “All the same,” Penthesilea said, “we are not as badly off as the Kentaurs; they are starving, and soon there will be no more. Have you even met 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 depart. 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.