The Oracles of Troy (The Adventures of Odysseus)

She had been given the creature by Apheidas in exchange for her prayers. He had been a follower of Apollo all his life, and though he bred snakes for the priests to sacrifice to the god, he was no priest himself. The Fates had made Apheidas a soldier, a powerful commander in the Trojan army, and with the deaths of Hector, Achilles and most recently – so rumour from the Greek camp had it – Great Ajax, he knew the zenith of the war had been reached. The conflict had endured for ten years because of the valour of these three men, and without them the end would come quickly for one side or the other. And so he had approached Cassandra with his gift, out of respect for her devotion to Apollo, and asked her to pray on his behalf so that the god would help him with what he had to do.

Cassandra pulled the satchel over her shoulder and let it drop to the floor. Her cloak followed, revealing white priestess’s robes. The icy wind that penetrated the ring of trees took away the heat that the cloak had retained and she felt her flesh stiffen beneath the gauzy material. Gripping the snake, she held it down against the altar and drew a dagger from her belt. The blade gleamed and Cassandra’s gaze hung on it for a moment before moving to the crude idol in the shadows. This had been carved from the trunk of a living tree long ago, when the temple had first been established, and the ravages of time and the weather had left it so featureless that only the horn bow and the bronze arrow that it clutched in its lumpish fists identified it as Apollo.

‘Protect your follower, Apheidas, son of Polypemon,’ she said. ‘Watch over him in battle. And aid him in this task he has taken upon himself, about which he keeps his own counsel but which he says is for the glory and preservation of Troy.’

She lowered the blade to the neck of the snake.

‘And I call on you to speak to me, lord. Enter me. Fill me with your presence and guide my inner eye. Show me the things I seek, show me how I, too, can protect Troy from the wolves at her gates. Lord of the bow and the lyre, show me and don’t spare me, even if I have to cross into the realms of madness to witness these things. Let me know what must be done to save my city.’

She pressed the knife against the snake’s skin, feeling the momentary tension as the scales resisted and then gave. The blade slid quickly through the flesh to the unyielding stone. Dark blood poured over the pale altar and, stopping her thumb over as much of the wound as it would cover, Cassandra hastily lifted the severed body to her raised lips. The warm liquid filled her mouth and spilled over her chin and neck to spatter her white robes. She squinted against the coppery taste and stumbled backwards, releasing the dead snake and the knife as she fell to one knee. She slumped forward onto her knuckles and her black hair fell over her face like a curtain, hiding the mixture of revulsion and fear on her features. Her heart was beating faster now, knowing from long experience that she had but moments left in the waking world, moments in which her mind remained connected to her body and could feel, smell, hear, taste and see the temple around her.

And then it came.