She turned round wildly, pulling so hard on the reins that her mare almost stumbled, and dug her heels into the horse's flank, fleeing across the plain, as if by fierce physical effort she could bring all her consciousness back into her own body. Penthesilea saw her riding away from the camp and quickly jumped to the back of her own horse and raced after her.
Kassandra, stretched out along the mare's back desperately' trying to shut out everything outside herself, sensed the pursuit and dug her heels harder. Nevertheless Penthesilea's horse was longer-legged and she was by far the better rider; gradually the gap between the two riders narrowed and the Amazon drew abreast of the girl, seeing with dismay Kassandra's flushed face and terrified eyes.
She held out her arms and scooped Kassandra from the back of her mare, holding her limp on the saddle before her.
She could feel the girl's forehead fire-hot as if with fever. Almost delirious now, Kassandra struggled against her, and the older woman held her tight in her strong arms.
"Hush! Hush! what ails you, bright-eyes? Why, your forehead feels as if you were sun-stricken, yet it is not a hot day!" Her voice was kindly, yet Kassandra felt that the older woman was mocking her, and struggled frantically to be free.
"Nothing is wrong—I did not mean to—"
"No, all is well, child; no one will hurt you, no one is angry with you," Penthesilea held her, soothing her. After a moment Kassandra abandoned her struggles and went limp in her kinswoman's arms.
"Tell me about it—"
Kassandra blurted out, "I was - with him. My brother. And a girl. And I couldn't shut it out, anything, anywhere in the camp—"
"Goddess be merciful," Penthesilea whispered. At Kassandra's age she too had borne the gift (or curse) of the wide-open seeing. Sharing experiences for which the mind or body were unprepared could indeed touch upon inner madness and there was not always a safe return. Kassandra was lying in her arms only half conscious, and her kinswoman was not sure what to do for her.
First she must get her back to the camp; so far from the other women, or the horses, there were likely to be strange lawless men in these wilds, and in Kassandra's present state, such an encounter might drive her sheer over the edge of sanity. She turned about, holding the reins of Kassandra's mare so it would follow her. She cradled the girl against her breast, and when they were within the circle of the camp, lifted her down and carried her inside the tent, where the new mother was resting beside her sleeping infant. Penthesilea laid Kassandra down on a blanket and sat beside her, her firm hand on her niece's brow, covering her eyes, willing her to shut out all the intrusions into her mind.
Silent and at peace, Kassandra's sobbing subsided and she slowly grew calm, turning her face into Penthesilea's hand like a baby, curled up against her.
After a long time Penthesilea asked, "Are you better now?"
"Yes, but—will it come again?"
"Probably. It is a gift of the Goddess and you must learn to live with it. There is little I can do to help you, child. Perhaps Serpent Mother has called you to speak for the Gods; there are priestesses and seeresses among us. Perhaps when it is time for you to go underground and face her…'
"I do not understand," Kassandra said. Then she remembered when Apollo had spoken to her and asked that she should be his priestess. She told Penthesilea of this, and the older Amazon looked relieved.
"Is it so? I know nothing of your Sunlord; it seems to me strange that a woman should seek a God rather than the Earth Mother or our Serpent Mother. It is she who dwells underground and rules over all the realms of women - the darkness of birth and death. Perhaps she too has called you and you have not heard her voice. I have heard that sometimes it is so with the priestess-born; that if they do not hear her call she will set her hand on them through the darkness of evil dreams, so that they may learn how to listen to her voice."
Kassandra was not certain; she knew little of Penthesilea's Serpent Mother, yet she remembered the beautiful serpents in Apollo's house and how she had longed to caress them. Perhaps this Serpent Mother had called her too; not only the bright and beloved Sunlord.
She had hoped that her kinswoman, who knew so much about the Goddess, would tell her what she must do to be rid of this unwanted Sight. Now she began to realize that she must herself control it, must find a way within herself to shut the floodgates before they overwhelmed her.
"I will try—" she said. "Are there any who know about these things?"
"Perhaps among the servants of the Gods. You are a princess of two royal houses; ours of the Amazons, and your father's; I know nothing of those Gods, but as one of us, a time must come when you must go underground to meet the Serpent Mother, and since already she has called you, it should be sooner rather than later. Perhaps at the next moon; I shall speak to the elders and see what they say of you."
Perhaps, Kassandra said to herself, this is why the God called me to be his servant. Yet she had herself opened these doors; she should not complain that she had been given the gift which she had asked.
Day after day the tribe rode, into the fierce winds and the raw icy rain. It grew colder and colder, and at night the women wrapped themselves in all their woollen garments and blankets; but this was not enough; they nestled in twos and threes, sharing blankets. Kassandra curled up next to her horse, sheltering in the warmth of the big sleek body. Eventually the skies grew clear and brilliant and the rain stopped. Still to the east the tribe travelled; when the women asked their leaders when they would rest and find pasture for their horses, Penthesilea only sighed: 'We must first pass two rivers as the Goddess has decreed."
The moon had waxed and waned again when they sighted the first human beings that they had seen on this journey; two solitary men dressed in skins to which hair clung, so that the women guessed that the art of tanning skins was still unknown to them.
There are pastures here, Kassandra thought, this might be the place to rest our herds and remain. But not with these men…
The men stared open-mouthed and loutish at the women, and Penthesilea drew up her horse beside them.
"Who owns these flocks and herds?" she asked, pointing to the sheep and goats grazing on the bright green vegetation.
"We do. What kind of goats be ye riding?" asked the men. "Never did we see goats so big and healthy."
Penthesilea started to say that they were not goats but horses; then decided that in their ignorance there might be some advantage for the tribe. "They are the goats of Poseidon, God of the sea," she told him, and he asked only, "What be the sea?"
"Water from here to the horizon," she said and he gasped, "Oh, my! Never do we see water but what's in some muddy hole that dries in the summer! No wonder they look rich and fat!" Then he smiled craftily and asked in his rude dialect if the ladies would care to pasture their herds beside his own.
"Perhaps for a night or two," said Penthesilea.
"Where be ye menfolks?" he asked.
"We have none; we are free of all men," said the Amazon, "but we will accept the hospitality of your pasture for this night, since we have been riding for a long time. Our animals are weary and will welcome a little of your good grass."
"They are welcome to it," replied one of the men, who seemed a little cleaner than the rest, and his garment a little more whole.