“You deserved death,” Andromache said.
“Was I wrong, Andromache? Has not Odysseus proved a deadly enemy?”
Andromache awoke on a couch on the eastern terrace overlooking the barracks stables. The sounds of the horses—their gentle whinnying and the clop of their hooves—came to her ears mixed with the distant shouts and oaths of the soldiers. The dream clung to her with misty fingers, bringing guilt and sorrow.
Beside her couch her servant Axa was sitting in a straight chair working on a piece of embroidered linen, squinting from time to time at the tiny stitches. She looked up. “Oh, you’re awake, lady. Can I get you anything?”
Andromache shook her head and closed her eyes again. Was there no escape from such guilt? she wondered. I could not have saved Laodike; the wound was too deep. But then Kalliope’s face appeared in her mind, and her heart sank. When she had seen the assassin draw back on his bow, she had thought the arrow was aimed at her and had flung herself to the ground. If only she had called out a warning, Kalliope might have avoided the speeding shaft.
Opening her eyes, she sat up and took a deep breath. The truth was that guilt was ever present, and not just for the loss of her friends. It seemed that it was a cloak suited to every occasion. She even felt guilty for the joy in her life. In spite of the war and the fear and deprivation it was bringing to Troy, in spite of the fact that the two men she loved were away fighting, in spite of the fact that her family in Thebe was under threat—in spite of all those things she was happier than she had ever been in her life.
The cause of that happiness slept in the room behind her. Astyanax lay, she knew without looking, on his back with his arms and legs flung out like the starfish they had found together on the beach one day. They had brought it home in some water, but it had died and the child had forgotten about it, but Andromache had hidden it in a box of discarded jewelry and still took it out from time to time as a reminder of that happy day and the toddler’s breathless delight at finding the tiny sea creature.
The mere thought of the boy made her chest close up, and she fought down an urge to rush to him and hold his sleeping body, warm and milky, against her own.
The birth had been difficult, as Hekabe had predicted. Andromache’s narrow hips had seen to that. The labor had taken most of a night and the following morning, the pain harsh and rending. Yet it was not the moment when they laid the babe in her arms that always brought a lump to her throat when she recalled it. It was the time, some days later, on a bright cool morning, when he had looked up at her. His eyes were a brilliant sapphire blue.
Helikaon’s eyes.
Axa’s voice cut through her memories. “Kassandra was here to see you,” she said.
“Kassandra? Where is she?”
“You needed your sleep. I didn’t want to disturb you. So I sent her away,” Axa said, a little defiantly.
“You sent her away?” Andromache almost smiled. The princess Kassandra, daughter of the king, sent away by a servant. Then a small fear struck her. “If King Priam hears of such an affront, he is likely to order you beaten. Send a servant to ask her to come back. No, better still, go and ask her yourself.”
Axa, looking contrite, gathered up her sewing bag and left the terrace. As she went, Andromache heard her mutter, “She won’t come.”
Andromache thought she was probably right. Kassandra had been difficult as a child. Her feyness and gift of prophecy had always made people shy away from her. Even those who loved her, like Andromache and Helikaon, feared her uncanny ability to predict the future. Now the girl was fourteen, and since the death of her mother she had turned in upon herself, becoming quieter and more reserved. As a child she had always spoken up boldly; now she guarded her words with a care that was almost painful to watch. She stayed in the shadows of the women’s quarters and the temple of Athene, and Andromache saw less and less of her.
It was Kassandra who had sparked Andromache’s most recent argument with Priam. The king had announced that the girl was to be dedicated to the isle of Thera, as her mother Hekabe and Andromache herself had been. Kassandra had accepted the decision without complaint, but Andromache had been furious when she heard.
She had confronted Priam in the megaron, the scene of so many of their battles. He had watched her as she walked the length of the great hall to stand before him, his eyes roving over her body. She had heard the king was ailing, but he looked strong, though he wore a wine-stained robe and his eyes were unnaturally bright.
“Andromache,” he said, “you are a stranger to my palace these days. But I can guess why you are here. You have not come to pay respects to your king. Interfering, I suppose, as always.”
“I heard Kassandra is to be dedicated to the Blessed Isle,” she said quietly. “I thought you might seek to consult me, as I spent two years there.”
He laughed. “And what would you have said, Daughter, had I consulted you?”
“I would have said, Father, that the journey to Thera is too dangerous. I had a friend who suffered the horror of rape and the threat of death from pirates. And there are now enemy fleets in those waters.”
“A friend?” He sneered. “You talk of Kalliope the runaway, whose treachery to her calling created the need for me to send my daughter to replace her. Still, what else could one expect from the daughter of Peleus—a family steeped in treachery and vileness.”
Andromache’s response was instant and icy. “Had it not been for the treachery of Kalliope, I would now be moldering in a tomb, and my son would never have opened his eyes on the world.”
At the mention of Astyanax his expression softened. “It was always intended,” he said, “that Kassandra would serve the Sleeping God. Her mother Hekabe wished it, and Kassandra herself foretold it.”
“You never believe Kassandra’s predictions,” she said angrily.
“No, but you do.”
Andromache knew that was unanswerable. She had spoken to Priam in the past about the accuracy of Kassandra’s prophecies. She could not now argue that the girl was wrong.
“She will be escorted to Thera by Helikaon’s fleet,” Priam said, “early next spring. Nothing you can say will alter my decision.”
A slight breeze was blowing through the balcony window, and Andromache rose from her couch, stretching out her arms. She heard a sound on the terrace behind her and turned, expecting to see Kassandra, but saw instead the dark-haired Prince Dios step out from the shade of the palace.
“Dios!” She almost ran to greet him, and he held both of her hands in his. “You are back quickly. What news from Thebe?”
“Your father is well, Andromache. And your brothers. They are preparing for war, but they are all safe as yet.”
“Is there news of Hektor?” she asked. “I inquire every day, but no one seems to know.”
“The situation in Thraki is confused by the civil war,” he said. “And it is hard to estimate the truth of any information we receive. Hektor and the Trojan Horse were fighting in the mountains the last we heard.”
“How can the Thrakians be fighting among themselves when the threat from Mykene is so great?” she said angrily. “It is so stupid.”
“How much do you know of Thraki’s recent history?”
“Very little,” she admitted. “King Eioneus was a good ruler, and there were no wars. Now the land is beset by rebellion.”
Dios sat down on the couch and poured himself a goblet of water. “Shall I tell you of Thraki, or shall we talk of happier matters?”