She had lost count of the tediously limping days, that brought no greater adventure than a bundle falling from a wagon, and the whole line of wagons coming to a halt while it was gathered up and laboriously hoisted back up again.
On the eleventh or twelfth day—she had lost count since there was nothing to mark out the time—she was watching one of the tied bundles inching its way slowly backward under the tarpaulin which covered the load. She knew she should ride forward and notify the carvan master, or at least the wagon driver so that it could be lashed tight, but when it fell at least it would be a break in the monotony. She counted the paces before it would become unbalanced and tumble off.
"War," she grumbled to Star. "This is hardly an adventure, guarding the caravans; will we travel all the long way to the country of the Hittites? And will it be any more interesting than this?"
"Who knows?" Star shrugged, "I feel we have been cheated -we were promised battle and good pay. And so far there has been nothing but this dreary riding." She twitched her shoulders. "At least the country of the Hittites would be something to see. I have heard that it never rains there; all their houses are made of mud bricks, so that if there was ever a good rain, houses and temples and palaces and everything would wash away and their whole Empire would fall. But here, there is so little to think about that I am half tempted to invite that handsome horse-keeper into my bed."
"You would not!"
"No? Why not? What have I to lose? Except that it is forbidden to a warrior," said Star, "and if I had a child, I should spend my next four years suckling the brat, and washing swaddling clouts, instead of fighting and earning my place as a warrior."
Kassandra was a little shocked; Star spoke so lightly of such things.
"Haven't you seen him looking at me?" Star insisted. "He is handsome and his shoulders are very strong. Or are you going to be one of those maidens who are vowed to remain chaste as the Maiden Huntress?"
Kassandra had not thought seriously about it. She had assumed that for years at least she would remain with the Amazon warriors who took chastity as a matter of course.
"But all your life, Kassandra? To live alone? It must be well enough for a Goddess who can have any man she will," said Star, "but even the Maiden, it is said, looks down from Heaven now and again and chooses a handsome youth to share her bed."
"I do not believe that," said Kassandra. "I think men like to tell those tales because they do not like to think any woman can resist them; they do not want to think that even a Goddess could choose to remain chaste."
"Well, I think they are right," said Star. "It is what every woman desires; only among us, we are not bound to remain with any man and keep his house and wait on his wishes; but without men we would have no children, either. I am eager to choose my first; and for all your talk I am sure you are no different from any of us."
Kassandra remembered the coarse shepherd who would have violated her, and felt sick. At least here among the Amazons no one would insist that she should give herself to any man unless she chose; and she could not imagine why any woman would choose such a thing.
"It's different for you, Kassandra," Star said. "You are a princess of Troy and your father will arrange a marriage with any man you wish; a king or a prince or a hero. There is nothing like that in my future."
"But if you want a man," Kassandra asked, "why are you riding with the Amazons?"
"I was given no choice," Star replied. "I am not an Amazon because I wished for it, but because my mother, and her mother before her, chose that way of life."
Kassandra said, "I can imagine no better life than this."
"Then you are short on imagination," Star said, "for almost any other life I can imagine would be better than this; I would rather be a warrior than a village woman with her legs broken, but I would rather live in a city such as Colchis and choose a husband for myself, than be a warrior."
It did not sound like the kind of life Kassandra would wish for and she could not think of anything else to say. She returned to watching the heavy wagon's bundles as they shifted, and she was half asleep in her saddle when a loud yell startled her and the wagon driver fell headlong to the trail, an arrow through his throat.
Penthesilea shouted to her women, and Kassandra slung her strung bow swiftly to her breast, nocked an arrow and let fly at the nearest of the ragged men who were suddenly swarming on the plain, as if they had sprung like the dragon's teeth from the sand. The arrow flew straight to its target; the man who had sprung up beside the driver fell off screaming, and at the same moment the heavy bundle clanged to the rocky path, crushing one of the attackers who was trying to pull himself up on the wagon. Man and metal rolled together down the slope, and one of the warriors leaped from her horse and ran toward him, thrusting quickly with her javelin.
One of the running men grabbed at Kassandra's saddle-straps and hauled at her leg; she kicked but he dragged her off and she struggled to get her knife free.
She thrust upward and he fell across her, blood streaming from his mouth; another thrust, with the javelin this time, and he fell lifeless across her body; she struggled to get herself free of his weight. Then there was a javelin aimed at her throat; she thrust upward with her knife to knock it aside and felt a tearing pain in her cheek.
A man was gripping her elbow; she knocked the elbow into his mouth and felt blood and a tooth sprayed into her face. Over her shoulder she could see many men hauling at the bundles of metal, flinging them down into the roadway; she could hear Star screaming somewhere and the sound of arrows singing in flight. All round her was the high shrilling of the Amazon battlecry; Kassandra thrust her javelin and the man attacking her fell dead; she jerked her javelin free and found it covered with blood and entrails. Hastily unslinging her bow again she began shooting at the invaders, but as every arrow flew she was afraid it would hit one of her companions.
Then it was all over; Penthesilea ran toward the wagon, beckoning her women to rally close. Kassandra hurried to catch her horse, who, to her amazement, had come through the thick of the flying arrows untouched. The driver of the wagon was dead, lying back along the roadway. Star lay half crushed under her fallen horse; the beast had been slain by half a dozen of the strangers' arrows. Shocked, Kassandra ran to try and heave the horse from her friend's body. Star lay still, her dress torn, the back of her head smashed into a reddish mess, her eyes staring straight ahead.
She wanted a battle, Kassandra thought. Well, she had one. She bent over her friend and gently closed her eyes. Not till then did she realize that she herself was wounded; her cheek torn open, blood dripping from the flap of skin and torn flesh.
Penthesilea came to her and bent over Star's body.
"She was young to die," said the Amazon Queen gently. "But she fought bravely."
That was not, Kassandra thought, much good to Star now. The Amazon Queen looked her straight in the face and said, "But you too are wounded, child. Here, let me tend your wound."
Kassandra said dully, "It is nothing, it doesn't hurt."
"It will," said her kinswoman, and took her to one of the wagons, where Elaria washed the torn cheek with wine, and then dressed it with sweet oil.
"Now you are truly a warrior," said Elaria, and Kassandra remembered being told that on the night when she had killed the man who had tried to ravish her. But she supposed that a real battle made her more truly a fighting woman. She bore the wound proudly, the mark of her first battle.