18

While the others remained on the balcony, I wobbled dizzily away, Maera at my side.

I recovered on my bed, then stood. Softly, so the floor didn’t groan, I danced while Maera wagged at me. Up on my toes. I raised my arms. Swayed. Right foot across my left, left foot behind my right, the length of the nook and back. I picked up Maera’s front feet and danced her too, for just a moment because she didn’t like it.

Ah, joy. Ah, peace such as I hadn’t felt since before Apollo poured his gift into me. Relief so deep it touched the center of the earth.

Hector would live a long life. Troy’s women would keep our freedom. Our beautiful city would become more beautiful, because Hector would extend the Way of the Immortals to the west gate.

My own lot would improve as the taint of my disappearance faded. I thanked Apollo for his gift. The curse hadn’t mattered.

The crows flapped into my nook. My heart seemed to freeze.

“Upon a lake, three ducklings sleep,

their nest far from the storms that roil the sea,

not virtuous, just favored by the gods.

Cassandra, though, is punished for good deeds.”

What did they mean? I peered further into my future and saw myself at my loom in thirty years with grown daughters weaving at my side. You’re wrong, crows!

Eurus would be waiting and wondering if we’d really saved Troy. I left my nook. Mother sat next to her loom, weeping into her hands at the loss of Paris, not knowing her good fortune that he was gone.

I rubbed her back. “Maybe it—” I cut off my prophecy. How could I comfort her? “Polydorus looks sweet.” I crouched and rubbed his belly through his swaddling cloth.

Maera made a grumbling noise, resenting my attention to the baby.

Mother smiled at me through her tears. “You’re a good daughter, regardless.”

I sighed and smiled back.

In the kitchen, I filled a basket with offerings, including enough for Eurus and me. Maera whined. She knew what the basket meant.

In the sacred grove, I went from altar to altar, thanking the gods. When I finally reached Eurus and he saw my smile, we danced together, though Trojan men and women never did. I praised him again and again for the ravens and the snake. He preened and laughed.

At last, he sobered. “Is this the end of our traveling?”

“I’d still like to visit Delphi.”

“That’s all?” He pulled an apple out of my basket and sat on the altar.

“Where should we go?” I stretched out on the grass below him. Above me, his legs were muscular and shapely. “Where do you like best?”

“I like many places best!” He swept out his arms, still holding the apple. “The Rhodope Mountains of Thrace! You’ve never seen so many shades of green! In the fall, the reds and golds! The froth of the waterfalls.”

We began to plan again. Eurus went on and on about our choices and educated me in the wonders of the world.

At home, I began to weave his himation.

If I went away with him, I wouldn’t marry a man of Troy and have his children.

But I wanted to go! Eurus and I were happy in each other’s company. I wouldn’t be able to see him after I moved to my husband’s house. Eurus would miss my offerings—and me. I’d mourn the loss of him.

So I’d go with him and be an outcast at home. I smiled and didn’t pursue my thoughts further.

Two weeks passed. He and I were walking along the seashore when we settled on our first three excursions: to Delphi, to the Rhodopes, and to the palace at Knossos. I was at the edge of the water. Wet sand squeezed between my toes. I picked up a snail shell—pink, streaked with brown.

“See how perfect it is.” I held it out.

“Lovely.” He returned it to the sand. “We can leave for Delphi anytime.” He paused. “Cassandra? Did you know that five years ago Boreas married Orithyia?”

I walked backward ahead of him. Boreas was the north wind, Eurus’s brother. Why was he bringing this up? “Do they live near Delphi? And who is Orithyia?”

“She was a princess of Athens before they wed.”

A mortal marrying an immortal.

“And”—his voice cracked, then deepened—“Eros and Psyche have been married for years.”

Everyone knew the story about the god of love and the mortal girl. Heat began to travel up my neck. I stopped and stared down at my sandy feet. If he was saying what I thought he was, this would be too much happiness.

Nervously, I said, “Before we go to Delphi, we should make sure Paris and Helen won’t go there for advice during our visit. I’ll look a little ahead to see.”

“Cassandra, we—”

“Ai!”

“What’s wrong?”

“Paris and Helen are about to enter my father’s palace! Helenus is with them!”

“Should I find more dead ravens?”

Helenus must have met the pair on his way home. He would have foreseen where they’d be.

“Any dead animal.” I had a new idea. “First, bring Oenone and Corythus.” They might remind him he once had a more beautiful wife than Helen—and a son by her.

I rushed off. On my way home, I decided what to do and say, though I doubted I’d matter. The outcome would almost certainly hang on Eurus’s omens, Oenone, Corythus, Paris, Helen, and my twin.

Maera met me at the city gate and ran with me. In the salon, Father and his councilors stood a few yards from the returned couple and Helenus. My mother hovered between the groups, her arms held out to her sons. As before, the other palace women leaned over the balcony railing. Maera and I stood on the edge of the men.

Helenus was in the middle of saying something: “—them just in time, or they—”

“Brother Paris! Sister Helen!” People turned. I ran and embraced Helen, who was limp in my arms. I kissed her smooth cheek and released her. Growling, sensing my true feeling, Maera jumped up on her legs.

I made Maera sit. “How glad I am you’ve come back, brother. Since you left, I’ve heard Apollo’s crows cawing in my ears. I’ll tell you what they say.”

No one interrupted me—they were probably too bewildered by the unfolding drama.

By now I knew how the crows phrased their messages:

“Dew on grass at dawn,

in each shining drop a mirror to the sky.

When has beauty ever augured ill?

Helen is heaven-sent to Troy!”

I hoped people would disagree with Helenus when he argued for keeping the pair, since they always disagreed with me. And I was giving Eurus more time.

From the balcony, Melo called, “The ravens were sent by the gods to warn us.”

Helenus put his arm around my shoulder. His fingers dug into my flesh. Maera growled again.

My twin said, “When bees hum and dogs bark, mortals listen, though the meaning is unclear. Who knows what deity put truth on my sister’s tongue today?”

I decided the next thing I’d say would be clearly false and strange. “How gray and aged you are, brother. Oh, see! A ship sails into the colonnade, its sail—”

All heads turned to the entryway, where Oenone stood with Corythus.

She came in slowly, dignity in her bearing despite Corythus tugging her along.

He pulled free of her. “Father!” He ran to Paris and leaped.

Caught off guard, my brother stumbled backward, barely managing to hold his son and not fall. He looked weak, almost overmastered by a little boy.

“Our grandson!” Mother took him and held him easily.

“Husband,” Oenone said, extending her hands. Unlike Helen, she wore no jewels, suggesting her person was enough.

Paris didn’t take her hands, and she lowered them.

Corythus wriggled free of Mother. “Pretty.” He hugged Helen around her hips.

She stroked his hair, and there was something in the slowness of her hand, the dreaminess of her face, that made me feel as if my own hair were being caressed.

The men smiled vaguely, looking as dazed as I felt. I wished that Eurus would rain down a few omens, but he must have still been collecting them.

“Have you missed me?” Oenone’s voice was honey and butter. “I’ve missed you.”

“Oenone—”

“Come home! Weren’t we happy on our mountain?”

“Oenone—”

She went to him and rose on tiptoe to kiss him on the lips.

Let her kiss taste sweet, I thought, though I felt embarrassed to be watching.

He kissed her back.

I looked at Helen, who gazed at the air just below the balcony. Her peaceful face suggested that none of this concerned her.

When Oenone and Paris separated, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, as if her kiss had been distasteful.

My father coughed and introduced himself and my mother to Oenone.

The nymph ignored him. “You’d wound the mother of your son, Paris?”

“Oenone—”

“Yes, darling?”

“The past is gone. I loved you then.” He turned to Helen. “My queen, what shall I tell my former wife?”

There was no feeling in Helen’s polite tone. “Tell her that fate governs all. If the gods had willed it, you’d still love her.” She nudged Corythus toward his father. He went, stepping backward, watching her.

“Paris, you want her only because other men do too.” Oenone moved close to Helen. Her finger circled Helen’s eyes and mouth. “The age lines are thin, but they won’t be in five years. I have no lines, nor will I. Which of us is more comely?”

Oenone was as far above Helen in beauty as a butterfly is to a moth. The delicate shape of the nymph’s nose, the gentle slope of her jaw, the roundness of her bare arms were surpassed only by those of the great goddesses. She smiled. “Decide, my love.”

He stepped back. In the moment he did, Helen leaned toward him. Her eyes widened; her gaze sweetened; the corners of her mouth curled up; her lips opened. She was as I first glimpsed her: unguarded, tender, unbearably precious.

Helenus whispered, “Oh. Ah.”

What could I do?

Oenone, unaware of what Helen had done, smiled brilliantly, radiating certainty of her charms. She was complete in herself, meant for someone who wanted an equal.

Helen sought completion. Her face promised that she and her darling would be fused in their love. Each would fulfill the other.

Paris’s Adam’s apple bobbed. “I prefer my now-and-forever wife, Helen.”

I rushed to Oenone and caught her as she started to collapse. Holding her under her arms, I hoped no one could see she wasn’t supporting herself.

For an instant, Helen’s expression registered satisfaction before it dulled. Maera growled again.

The future Troy still didn’t burn, but I thought it would.

Oenone gathered herself and stepped away from me. “Paris, my love, you’re welcome to your fluff-over-wood woman. Corythus, come!”

“I want to stay with Father.”

“Come!”

Reluctantly, he did.

The two left the palace.

Helenus coughed.

All eyes went to him.

He addressed our father. “Paris told me of dead ravens falling on him and his wife, but no priest or prophet interpreted their meaning, though everyone knows the gods speak in riddles.”

Father rubbed his eyes.

“Apollo gave me the gift of future sight. Isn’t that true, Cassandra, my dear?”

“As much as I have it.”

“This is the future I see: Menelaus will come with his fleet of heroes to besiege the tall towers of Troy, but we have—”

Eurus dropped a two-headed calf at Helenus’s feet.

Everyone gasped, even Helenus.

From the balcony, Aminta said in the quiet that followed, “This portent needs no interpretation. Troy will suffer if these two stay.”

“My children,” our father began.

I started to hope.

The monstrous calf was still alive. It lowed pitiably through two throats.

“I will not risk—”

Helenus, who seemed to have recovered, held up a hand. Father stopped.

“Which god do you imagine sent the monster? We all know Poseidon adores the Greeks. Achilles’ mother, Thetis, wants her son to be safe, and everyone knows he’s to die young if he goes to war.”

I saw where this was going. What could I do?

Helenus listed gods and goddesses who were more friendly to the Greeks. Then he said, “They fear us. Our heroes surpass theirs—Hector, Aeneas, Agen—”

Eurus dropped a dead raven on him, but Helenus used it to fuel his argument. “One of them wants to frighten us.”

The calf moaned again.

When it stopped, Helenus said, “I prophesy this with the power that Apollo gave me: Troy will defeat Greece. Tribute will pour in from the city kingdoms.”

Three crows flew down—real, living crows. From their flight, Eurus couldn’t have blown them in. They landed on Helenus’s shoulders and pecked his cheeks. Everyone saw them. I know because Mother ran to him and bravely shooed them away.

Speak, crows! Tell my parents that Troy will fall!

They flapped away.

Father said, “Son, if you’re right, then the seer who foretold about Paris at his birth was wrong. If you’re wrong and Troy will be destroyed, those events will happen. No one can evade destiny.” He turned to Paris. “You and your wife may stay.”

I saw Troy burning.

Eurus didn’t finish what he might have meant to say to me on the shore. We doubled each other’s sadness. I stopped visiting him, because I reasoned he’d be happier without me, but I sent a servant with offerings every day and continued weaving his himation.

I played with Maera and predicted small moments just before they arrived. I didn’t look further into the future than a few minutes ahead. My gift allowed me to spend more time with Hector than I would have without it. After he and Andromache married, I smiled at her working at her loom across the women’s quarters. I rarely visited her there because I wanted her to have friends.

In a year, the Greek ships sailed into our harbor.

When Agamemnon and Menelaus entered the palace after the Greeks made camp, I didn’t hang over the balcony to see them. They had come to negotiate for Helen’s return, but she wouldn’t be returned. Why watch it happen?

The next day, the war began.