LITMIR.BIZ

      I

      Cassandra

      It was a black vision. Sand under my feet, the ocean roaring, the flames biting at the sky as the holy city of Ilium was consumed. Achaean voices in the night; harsh, triumphant, trumpets braying the death of Troy.

      It was not a vision. I smelt sweat, grease, salt, men, and burning. Always the burning, the reek of wood and flesh which soured my nostrils and seared my throat. I have no refuge. I am unarmed. I will not be here. I will not hear. I will not see. I will not feel.

      When we were three they took us, my twin brother and me, to the house of the Mother, the cave under Troy where Gaia the goddess dwelt, pregnant with life. I am told that we are identical, Cassandra and Eleni, both small square children with the golden hair of the house of Tros.

      We were not afraid, because we were never afraid when we were together. Nyssa, our nurse, led us to the entrance of the cave, and I remember hearing her voice quaver as she said, `Go in, now, and don't be scared.' We wondered that Nyssa was frightened.

      We could see nothing to fear. We joined hands in case there should be something interesting in the dark which one of us might miss, and toddled forward into the grateful dark. Both Eleni and I have always had sensitive eyes which cannot bear strong sunlight.

      It was not black, in the womb of the earth mother. A little light leaked in from the open door, and more through cracks in the beehive brick which made the dome. The floor was dry and sandy.

      The walls were decorated with frescos of dancers and bulls and we were fascinated. Eleni pointed and said, `Bull,' and we toddled over to touch the picture, tracing the proud horned head and the curves of the elegant acrobats, the bull-leapers, coloured ochre for male and white for female. In the centre of the womb rose the phallus of Dionysius the god, erect, pointing skyward, and when we ran out of bulls we sat down with our backs against it, beginning to be bored.

      There was a slither in the sand and two snakes came out of some hole and inched towards us. We were delighted. We had never been allowed to play with the house snakes, and these were much bigger than the rat killers that lived under every house altar. They were as fat as my arm, mottled a beautiful green and brown like the gauze on our Lady Mother's veil that came, she said, from so far away.

      The snakes paused, flicked the air with their forked tongues, and inched towards us. Eleni and I held our breath, afraid that we might scare them. They moved in a fascinating way, leaving v-shaped patterns in the dust. Although we could hear a scrape of scales, they seemed to flow, without effort, and the patterns rippled as they moved. They seemed to be creatures entirely divine, unearthly, purposeful.

      They split up and approached us. I stared into the dark, hoping that they would come closer. Eleni whispered, `Pretty,' and reached out his hands. They came closer, one snake for each twin, and rose up from the ground, so that we were looking for a moment straight into the serpents' eyes.

      There was something there, we both felt it: intelligence, or will. Slowly, as though they did not want to startle us, the heads swayed to left and right, and we giggled as the flickering tongues touched first one ear and then the other.

      The snakes withdrew. We were sorry. Then an old woman and a young man came in, looked at us, and went out again. The woman was ancient. Her hair floated like a white cloud, she was bent and toothless and leaned on a staff. The young man glowed with life.

      He had a fierce, wild face and he grinned at us with white teeth. He carried a vine staff in one strong brown hand and he was wreathed with vine leaves.

      It was the first time we had seen the gods. Mother Gaia as crone and Lord Dionysius in all his dangerous joy.

      We cried when they left, and Nyssa rushed in with two priests and took us into the temple. I remember it chiefly because they gave us honey. We had never tasted such sweetness before.

      The Lady Queen Hecube was our mother and the Lord King Priam was our father. They were magnificent, golden, and distant as clouds. Nyssa looked after us, the royal twins. She was fat and skilled and loving. Her eyes were black, as was her hair, and her skin was like the sea foam at the water's edge, where it is pale brown and crinkly. She was an Achaean and she taught us her language, as well as our own and the words for the gods, which were in an old and holy tongue. Nyssa's only child had died, and when we were born the Lady Hecube had given us into her arms. She loved us as if we were her own.

      Eleni and I were quick - or so Nyssa said - and we liked words and names. We would play word games between ourselves, learning the dangerous lesson that words can be used to cloak thoughts as well as reveal them.

      `What is Achaean for the father god?' eight-year-old Eleni would ask me as we lay down for our compulsory sleep in the heat of the day.

      `Zeus, the Sky Father, Compeller of Clouds,' I rolled the title over my tongue.

      `And the Trojan?'

      `Dionysius, Vine-Clad. What is the Achaean for the mother?'

      `Hera. I think.'

      `Yes. And our mother?'

      `Gaia, mother of all. But Cassandra, there is another lady other Achaeans have, Nyssa told me when you were out with the herb gatherers. What were you looking for in the marsh, anyway?'

      `Roots of comfrey, for wounds. What did Nyssa say?' I settled more comfortably into the curve of my twin's side. He was not interested in herbs, and I was. It was the first time we had not both been occupied in learning the same thing and he was a little jealous. So was I, of him, for getting

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