The Firebrand

by Marion Zimmer Bradley

  She wanted to weep at the love in his voice; she knew it was this, and not any great belief in her warning, which had prompted him to this kindness. She got to her feet, feeling as if every bone in her body had been beaten with wooden cudgels. “I must go back,” she said, “and see the folk in the Temple, and the serpents, and my daughter. . . .”

  “Ah, yes, Creusa told me you had a little girl. A foundling, I suppose?”

  “Yes, as it happens; but how did you know?”

  “I know you too well to imagine you would ever disgrace your family by having a child outside of honorable marriage,” he said; and she thought, Even my own mother did not trust me as much as that.

  “Well, then, will you walk up with me?”

  “Gladly,” he said, “but you ran out without your cloak. Let me fetch you one, or you will be cold.” He brought her a long, thick garment which she had seen Creusa wear, and she wrapped herself in it. The night had grown chilly, and even in the heavy cloak she shivered, less from cold than from some subtle danger which remained in the air. It was as if far beneath the ground she could hear the very earth groaning; a heaviness weighed intolerably on her mind and heart. She could hardly summon the strength and will to put one foot before the other, and she leaned on his arm. Then, when he bent to kiss her, she moved away.

  “No, don’t,” she said. “You should go back—you have a wife and a child at risk to care for when it comes. . . .”

  “Don’t remind me of that,” he said, and drew her within the curve of his arm again. After a moment he said, “I love you, Kassandra.”

  He was touching her gently in that way she found so disturbing, and she drew away from him.

  He said softly, “My poor little love. I swear, if only I had the right, I would beat Paris for hurting you so. If he ever touches you again, I swear he’ll find it the most dangerous thing he ever did. It is not his place to rule you.”

  “He does not realize that,” she said. They had reached the great bronze gates of the Sun Lord’s house, but she did not go inside. Sitting on a low wall, she said, “I have no husband, so my brother thinks it is his right to direct me. I suppose, to those who do not see and hear what I do, my prophecy must sound like madness. They try to protect themselves against it by refusing to believe. I am just as ready as anyone else to ignore what I do not want to know.”

  “Yes, I have seen that,” said Aeneas, gently and meaningfully, and drew Kassandra against him under his cloak. She let him kiss her, but sighed with weariness, so that he let her go. He said, “We will talk of this again tomorrow, perhaps—”

  “If there is a tomorrow,” she said with such exhaustion that he blinked in astonishment.

  “If tomorrow should not come, I will regret even beyond death that I have not known your love,” he said, so passionately that Kassandra felt her heart clutch as if a fist had squeezed it.

  She said in a whisper, “I think I would regret it too. But I am so tired . . .” and she began to cry.

  He kissed her gently and said, “Then let us pray there will be a tomorrow, my love,” and let her go. The weight of the trembling world felt as if it were about to crack and descend on her uneasy head as she watched him walk away.

  Inside the Sun Lord’s house, people wrapped in blankets were sleeping in the courtyards. All seemed peaceful—except for the violent throbbing in Kassandra’s head, which made it seem as if her every step were taken on rolling waves. She went up to the court of the serpents; there the children slept, and Kassandra lay down beside Honey, taking the child in her arms. She imagined the earth as a great serpent coiled about the waist of Serpent Mother, whom she saw as a woman large and stately like Queen Imandra. The ground seemed gently to rock beneath her, and as she drifted into sleep she half expected the coils to wind around her too.

  Instead, she seemed to drift through clouds, acres and fields of cloud, and a great expanse of sky; and at last she drifted unseen to the surface of a great mountain, and knew that she stood alone on the summit of the forbidden mountain where the Gods of the Akhaians gathered, and heard the distant sound of thunder as They spoke. She saw Zeus Thunderer as a tall and imposing man in the prime of life, with a full graying beard; it seemed that little flares of lightning moved around His hair like a wreath as He spoke.

  “Now that this absurdity of a duel between Paris and Menelaus is over, it is obvious that Menelaus has won; I suggest that We bring this foolish war to a close and get back to Our proper business.”

  “How can You say Menelaus has won when he did not kill Paris?” inquired Hera. She was a tall, imposing woman, rather stout, with hair dressed in a crown about Her head. “I insist that Troy be brought to destruction; its rulers and its people do not properly serve Me. Also, I am patron Goddess of Marriage; and Paris has personally insulted Me, and fled to Troy, where Helen has been received as Paris’ wife without any rites or sacrifice to Me.”

  “All the same, they pay homage to Me, and I have blessed their love,” said another Goddess in gleaming garments, Her hair crowned with roses. Kassandra knew from Her resemblance to Helen that this was the golden Aphrodite.

  Hera sniffed and said, “Your rites are not those of lawful marriage.”

  “No, and I am proud of it,” Aphrodite said, “for Yours are only the tiresome bonds of Law and Duty. Paris and Helen do honor to real love, and I am on their side.”

  “You would be,” said Hera. “Nevertheless, I am Queen of the Immortals, and it is My privilege to demand the destruction of Troy.”

  Zeus looked distressed at Her tone, as harried as Kassandra had seen Priam look when his women were arguing. He said, “My dear Hera, no one questions Your right to demand that. But it must be done properly; We cannot simply destroy the city. If the Trojans can defend their city, they cannot simply have it taken from them. Athene—”

  Kassandra saw the helmeted Battle Maiden, with Her flashing spear like an Amazon’s, as Zeus beckoned to Her. But it was the regal Hera who spoke:

  “Go, My child, and counsel the Akhaians; they are disheartened and about to sail away. Bid them resume the fighting, and tell them that I, Hera, will not allow them to be defeated.”

  “This seems to be against all wisdom,” the tall and solemn Athene said gently, “for the Trojans have done no wrong. And the Akhaians are proud. If You give them the city of Troy, I tell You, they will commit such evil acts in their pride and wickedness that they will offend every God known to mankind. But I have no choice but to obey Your voice, Royal Lady.” She bowed to Hera and flew away, and Kassandra, watching the flaming light of Her helmet, like a comet, found herself standing on the plain before the city of Troy where Athene came to rest. Before Her, a great white stallion blocked Athene’s way to the Akhaian camp.

  Athene said, “Poseidon Earth Shaker, what do You do here?” and the figure of the horse rippled like an image underwater and became first a Kentaur—half man, half horse—then a tall and strong man with seaweed for hair.

  Poseidon, brother of Zeus, seemed to speak with His godly Brother’s thundering voice.

  “You have been sent to betray My city; I will not let You enter it.” As He spoke, He stamped his foot; a great roll of thunder followed, and the ground shook. . . .

  Kassandra awoke in the serpent court, with the two children still sleeping at her side. But the ground was rippling like water, and she could hear the sound of thunder—or was it Poseidon’s stamping feet? She screamed aloud, and Honey woke and began to whimper. Kassandra sheltered the child in her arms and watched the great arch above the gates rocking back and forth in the gray light of dawn; then it crashed to the ground.

  In the corner of the courtyard a lamp had been placed; it rocked and fell over, and a tongue of flame licked at the cloth on which it stood. Kassandra leaped up and extinguished the fire. All over the Temple there were cries and shrieks of terror. The ground was heaving upward and buckling; a great crack opened in the earth, raced across the courtyard and closed again. Kassandra watched silent
ly, feeling the great weight in her mind dissolve. It had come; she was delivered of it.

  If they had sacrificed to Poseidon, might He have held back His hand? She did not know and could not guess. She put down the jug of water with which she had doused the fire, and ran down through the courts. Several of the buildings had indeed collapsed, including the dormitory where the maiden priestesses would have been sleeping; so had the post that supported one of the bronze gates of the Sun Lord’s house, which now hung twisted on its hinges. The Temple was a ruin. Kassandra looked down into the city from the gap at the gates; houses had fallen into rubble and fires were springing up everywhere.

  Should she go down into the palace? No; she had given her warning there, and Priam had forbidden any to heed her; neither he nor Paris was likely to be well pleased if she came saying “I told you so.” But she had. Why were people so unwilling to hear truth spoken?

  Slowly she went back into the Temple of Apollo. At least her own people had listened to her warning; it seemed that all had survived, and the few fires had quickly been put out. She could do no good in Priam’s palace. She went back to the children. They would have been frightened by the quake and would need her.

  3

  THE REBUILDING of the Sun Lord’s house began almost at once. So many buildings had been destroyed, and some on such a scale that, Kassandra thought, it would demand the fabulous reputed strength of the Titans to set the walls up again. Some of the great stones could not be restored with the labor now obtainable; too many of the able-bodied men in the city were out there fighting Akhaians under Hector’s command.

  Thanks to Kassandra’s timely warning, no lives had been lost in Apollo’s Temple. A few of the priests had been injured—broken legs, twisted shoulders, a shattered ankle—by falling over stones that were no longer where they were supposed to be, and there were a good many burns incurred in the extinguishing of fires. One or two of the serpents had escaped in the confusion, or taken refuge under fallen stones, and had not yet been found. One of the oldest priestesses had gone mad with fright and had not spoken a rational word since; the others treated her with herbal potions and played soothing music, but the most experienced healers felt it unlikely that she would ever fully recover her wits.

  Still, comparatively, Apollo’s household had escaped lightly. In the Temple of the Maiden, it was said, some priestesses had died when the roof of their dormitory fell in. No one knew how many, and Kassandra was frantic about her sister Polyxena, but had no leisure to seek news of her. She comforted herself with the thought that if Polyxena was dead, word would be sent to her.

  As always, the city’s poorest districts, with their flimsy wooden houses and inadequately guarded open fires, had suffered the most. Had the quake come a few hours earlier the havoc would have been worse, but since the hour was late, fires lighted for cooking the evening meal had mostly been extinguished.

  Still, a dreadful number of dead lay in the streets, except where the burning houses had given them funeral pyres. Some corpses still were lodged under fallen buildings which would have to be torn down to recover them, as the ghosts of the unburied dead all too frequently sent pestilence in revenge. The priests of Apollo worked night and day, but it would take time, and everyone feared the vengeance of so many unburied corpses.

  Nor had Priam’s palace escaped unscathed. The buildings were of Titan stone that had resisted even the strength of Poseidon’s fury, but one room had collapsed—the room where the three sons of Paris and Helen were sleeping. Most of Priam’s family, including Paris himself and Helen, were uninjured.

  Helen’s son by Menelaus, young Nikos, had been hiding with his playmate Astyanax from their nurses. The two children had been sleeping in a courtyard out-of-doors (which they had actually been forbidden to do), and both boys had escaped unhurt—and unpunished. Still, the palace was plunged into grief for Paris’ sons, and the truce had been briefly extended for the rites and burial of the children.

  Kassandra went down to join in the mourning in the women’s quarters of the palace—since none of the boys had been as old as seven, the warriors would take no official notice of their death, little children still being under the women’s care. Paris was there, attempting to comfort Helen. She looked pale and weary, and Nikos, who had been officially committed to his father’s care only a few days before, was there too, as if to remind his mother that she still had a son.

  Helen came at once to Kassandra and embraced her.

  “You tried to warn me, Sister, and I am grateful to you.”

  “I am so sorry,” Kassandra said. “I only wish—”

  “I know,” Helen said. “This grief is not new to me. My second daughter did not live; she was a year younger than Hermione, and two years older than Nikos. She never breathed, and when Nikos was born strong and healthy, so that I had both a Queen for Sparta and a son for Menelaus to bring up as a warrior, I swore I would bear no more children; but nothing went as I had decided.”

  “It seldom does, in this world of mortals,” Kassandra said. Paris approached them in time to hear this and said with an angry glare at Kassandra, “So have you come to gloat to us?”

  “No,” she said wearily, “only to tell you how very sorry I am.”

  “We need not your sympathy, you crow of ill omen!” Paris said wrathfully. “Your very presence brings us more evil fortune!”

  “Be quiet, Paris! For shame!” Helen said. “Have you forgotten that she came to try to warn us of Poseidon’s wrath? Or what welcome she had for her pains?”

  Paris only scowled; but Kassandra thought he did look somewhat ashamed. Well, she could live without his good opinion; she would rather have Helen’s.

  The children were duly cremated and their ashes properly entombed. The truce lasted two more days and then was broken by a Trojan captain (he, like the Akhaian who ended the truce before, said that one of the Gods had prompted him, though he refused to say which one), who let off an arrow and wounded Menelaus, painfully, but (unfortunately, Priam said) not fatally. If Menelaus had been killed, the King said, the Akhaians would have had a good excuse to end the war and go home. Kassandra was not so sure; perhaps the Gods were really eager to destroy the city as she had seen in her—had it been only a dream?

  Only the women were troubled by the end of the truce; Hector, Kassandra thought, was glad to get back to the fighting. In his chariot he led forth the Trojan armies the next day, riding up and down the long line of foot soldiers, encouraging them while the Akhaians were gathering for battle. The women, as usual, watched from the wall.

  “Hector is certainly the finest charioteer,” said Andromache, and Creusa laughed.

  “You mean he has the finest charioteer,” she said, “and I think Aeneas comes at least close to that. Who is Hector’s charioteer? He drives like the wind—or a fiend.”

  “Troilus, Priam’s youngest son,” Andromache said. “He wanted to take part in the fighting, but Hector wanted the boy under his own eyes. He’s worried because he is no more than twelve, and still unseasoned in battle.”

  “Does Hector really think Troilus will be safer in his chariot? It seems to me that that is where the fighting will be thickest, and certainly Hector will have no leisure to protect him,” Kassandra said, but Andromache only shrugged. “Don’t ask me what Hector thinks,” she said.

  Of course, Kassandra thought, Troilus was nothing to her, only her husband’s youngest brother. She would mourn his death, but only in the same way that she grieved for Helen’s children; from family duty, no more.

  Helen still looked wasted and worn with sorrow, her eyes red and burning, her hair lusterless; she had hardly troubled to pull it back out of her eyes, much less to scent it and brush it with oil. She wore an old bedraggled gown; it was all but impossible to recall the incredible glowing beauty that had inhabited her as the Goddess of Love. Yet Kassandra remembered, with the tenderness she always felt for her sister-in-law. Was this a sign of Paris’ neglect? Was it that he cared so little for
his children? She could guess Helen was grateful that her firstborn had not been lost in the earthquake, yet she sensed that Paris’ sons were dearer to Helen than the son she had borne Menelaus.

  She turned her eyes down to the battlefield, where Aeneas was riding up and down the line in his spendid chariot, calling out what she imagined was a challenge. Battle among opposing armies, she had seen, often took the form of a series of duels between champions. It was not at all like the pitched battles she had fought when she rode with the Amazons, battles that were a muddle of fighting in which you killed as many as you could, any way you could.

  “There,” said Creusa, “he has found someone to take his challenge. Who is that?”

  “Diomedes,” said Helen.

  “The one who exchanged armor.”

  “The same, yes,” Andromache said; “but I think Aeneas is a stronger fighter, certainly with that chariot and those horses.”

  “His mother was a priestess of Aphrodite—some say Aphrodite’s self,” Creusa said, “and she gifted him with these horses when he came to Troy. . . . Look, what’s going on?”

  Below them, Diomedes had ridden like a madman at Aeneas, and managed with his spear to overturn the chariot, tumbling Aeneas out on the ground. Creusa screamed, but her husband sprang to his feet, evidently unharmed, his sword out and ready. But Diomedes had cut the harness of the horses and seized their reins; it was obvious from his gestures that he claimed horses and chariot as his prize. Aeneas shouted in protest and rage, so loudly that the women could clearly hear his voice, but not the words. He turned on Diomedes, and as they watched, he seemed before their eyes to grow taller, and his head to glow with a shining aura; it flashed through Kassandra’s mind, Why, I did not know his hair is the same color as Helen’s! Then she knew that she saw before her the beautiful Goddess Herself, turning on Diomedes in the fury of an Immortal. Diomedes visibly flinched—he had not been prepared for this. But his courage did not fail; he dashed at the towering form of Aphrodite and thrust with his sword, wounding the form of the Goddess in the hand.