Then she raised her eyes to Hecuba.
"Thus speaks the Messenger of the Gods of Olympos to you; you bear a son under an evil fate, who will destroy the city of Troy."
Hecuba caught her breath in consternation, but felt her husband's fingers clasping hers, strong and warm and reassuring.
"Can anything be done to avert this fate?" Priam asked.
The priestess shrugged. "In seeking to avert fate, men often bring it closer. The Gods have sent you a warning, but they have not chosen to tell you of what you must do to avert this doom. It might be safest to do nothing."
Priam frowned and said, "Then the child must be exposed at birth," and Hecuba cried out in horror.
"No! No! It was but a dream, a dream…"
"A warning from Hermes," said Priam severely. "Expose the boy as he is born; hear me!" He added, in the inflexible formula which gave the words the force of laws carved into stone, "I have spoken; let it be done!"
Hecuba crumpled weeping on her pillows, and Priam said tenderly, "I would not for all Troy have given you this grief, my dearest, but the Gods cannot be mocked."
"Gods!" Hecuba cried, frantic. "What kind of God is it that sends deceitful nightmares to destroy an innocent little child, a newborn babe in the cradle? Among my people," she added, resentfully, "a child is its mother's, and no one but she who carried it for most of a year and brought it to birth can say its fate; if she refuses to suckle it and bring it up, that is her own choice. What right has a man over children?" She did not say a mere man, but her tone of voice made it obvious.
"The right of a father," Priam said sternly. "I am the master of this house, and as I have spoken, so it shall be done—hear me, woman!"
"Don't say woman to me in that tone of voice," Hecuba said, angrily. "I am a free citizen and a Queen and not one of your slaves or concubines!" Yet for all that, she knew that Priam would have his way; when she had chosen to marry a man from those who dwelt in cities and assumed rights over their women, she knew she had consented to this. Priam arose from her side and gave the priestess a piece of gold; she bowed and departed.
Three days later Hecuba went into labour and gave birth to twins; first a son, then a daughter, as like as one rosebud to another on the same branch. They were both healthy and well-formed, and cried lustily, although they were so tiny that the boy's head fitted into Hecuba's palm, and the girl was smaller still.
"Look at him, my lord," she said fiercely to Priam when he came. "He is no bigger than a kitten! And you fear this was sent by some God to bring disaster on our city?"
"There is something in what you say," admitted Priam. "Royal blood is, after all, royal blood, and sacred; he is the son of a King of Troy…" He considered for a moment, "No doubt it would be enough to have him fostered far away from the city; I have an old and trusted servant, a shepherd on the slopes of Mount Ida, and he will bring up the child; will that content you, my wife?"
Hecuba knew that the alternative was to have the child exposed on a mountain, and he was so small and frail that he would die quickly. "Let it be so, then, in the name of the Goddess," she said with resignation, and handed the boy to Priam, who held the child awkwardly, as one unused to handling babies.
He looked into the child's eyes and said, "Greetings, little son." Hecuba sighed with relief; after having formally acknowledged a child, a father could not have it killed, or expose it to die.
Hector and Polyxena had been allowed to come and speak with their mother. Hector said now, "Will you give my brother a royal name, Father?"
Priam scowled, thinking it over. Then he said, "Alexandras. Let the girl be called Alexandra, then."
He went away, taking Hector with him, and Hecuba lay with the dark-haired baby girl in the curve of her arm, thinking that she could comfort herself with the knowledge that her son lived, even if she could not rear him herself, while she had her daughter to keep. Alexandra, she thought; I will call her Kassandra.
The princess had remained in the room with the women and now edged close to Hecuba's side. Hecuba asked, "Do you like your little sister, my darling?"
"No; she is red and ugly, and not even as pretty as my doll," said Polyxena.
"All babies are like that when they are born," said Hecuba. "You were just as red and ugly; soon she will be just as pretty as you are."
The child scowled. "Why do you want another daughter, Mother, when you have me?"
"Because, darling, if one daughter is a good thing, two daughters are twice blessed."
"But Father did not think that two sons were better than one son," Polyxena argued, and Hecuba recalled the woman's prophecy. Among her own tribe, twins were thought to be, in themselves, an evil omen, and were invariably put to death. If she had remained with them, she would have had to see both infants sacrificed.
Hercuba still felt the remnant of superstitious fear—what could have gone amiss to send her two children at one birth, like an animal littering? This was what the women of her tribe believed, yet she had been told that the true reason behind that for the sacrifice of twins was only this: it was all but impossible for a woman to suckle two children in a single season. Her twins had at least not been sacrificed to the poverty of the tribe; there were plenty of wet-nurses in Troy, she could have kept them both. Yet Priam had decreed otherwise; she had lost one child but, by the blessing of the Goddess, only one, not both.
One of her women murmured, almost out of hearing, "Priam is mad! To send away a son and rear a daughter?"
Among my people, Hecuba remembered, a daughter is valued no less than a son; if this little one had been born in my tribe I could rear her to be a warrior woman! But if she had been born to my tribe, she would not have lived. Here she will be valued only for the bride-price she will bring when she is married as I was to some King!
But what would become of her son? Would he live in obscurity as a shepherd all his life? It was better than death, perhaps, and the God who had sent the dream and was therefore responsible for his fate might yet protect him.
CHAPTER 3
Light gleamed in eye-hurting flashes from the sea and the white stone. Kassandra narrowed her eyes against the light and tugged softly at Hecuba's sleeve.
"Why do we go to the Temple today, Mother?" she asked.
Secretly she did not care. It was a rare adventure for her to be allowed outside the women's quarters and rarer yet to go outside the palace altogether. Whatever their destination, the excursion was welcome.
Hecuba said softly, "We go to pray that the child I am to bear this winter will be a son."
"Why, Mother? You have three sons already. I should think . you would rather have another daughter; you have only two of us girls. I would rather have another sister."
"I am sure you would," said the Queen, smiling, "but your father wants another son. Men always want sons so they can grow up to fight in their armies and defend the city."
"Is there a war?"
"No, not now; but there are always wars when a city is as rich as Troy."
"But if I had another sister she might be a warrior woman, as you were when you were a girl, and learn to use weapons and defend the city as well as any son." Then she paused to consider. "I do not think Polyxena could be a soldier, she is too soft and timid. But I would like to be a warrior woman. Like you."
"I am sure you would, Kassandra; but it is not the custom for women of Troy."
"Why not?"