Steven Saylor - A Mist of Prophecies

"When it was over, she gradually came to her senses. She remembered nothing. I told her what had happened. She said it had happened to her before, and she begged me to tell no one. I told her the master would have to know, that he'd find out sooner or later. But she made me promise not to tell him. She said perhaps it would never happen again. But it did, at least once more before I left Alexandria. That time, too, it was in our room, and no one but me saw it."

Cytheris studied my face. "This is familiar to you, isn't it, Finder? Did something similar happen to Cassandra on one of your visits to her? She told me about your visits. I know that you called on her more than once."

I took a deep breath and evaded the question. "I was thinking of something my son-" I stopped myself from speaking Meto's name. "I was thinking of something I once was told about Caesar. For a period of time, during his youth, he suffered from such seizures. He, too, tried to keep them secret. Gradually they stopped, and they've never recurred. A priest once told him his seizures were a sign of the gods' favor. Caesar himself believes they were the result of a blow to his head when he was kidnapped by pirates as a young man."

Cytheris considered this. "I don't know how Cassandra accounted for her spells. But when I saw her again, here in Rome, I remembered them, and I began to wonder. What if everything I'd heard about this madwoman in the Forum was true-that she didn't merely pretend to see the future or imagine such a thing, but that she really was subject to divine visions? Why not? Perhaps her seizures in Alexandria had merely been precursors to the full-blown gift of prophecy she had since acquired.

"So which was it? Was Cassandra putting on a deliberate performance? Had she gone mad, imagining herself to be the Trojan princess she'd played in the mime shows? Or in the years since I had last seen her, had she truly become a seeress and somehow ended up here in Rome, a beggar in the streets? I remembered the Cassandra I had known and loved in Alexandria, and I had to know the truth.

"I told the litter bearers to draw alongside her. I could see her through the gauze curtains, close enough to touch, but I didn't think she could see me-you know how such curtains work. And yet, even as I was reaching to draw back the curtains, she turned straight toward me and spoke my name. That gave me a start! Such an uncanny sensation shot through me, for a moment I hesitated to draw back the curtain. When I finally did, my hand was trembling. But when I saw her, all my trepidation melted away. She was smiling, trying not to laugh. Even with her unkempt hair and the smudges of dirt on her cheeks, she was the same Cassandra I had known in Alexandria.

"I burst out laughing and drew her into the litter. I closed the curtains and told the bearers to take me home. That night we drank Falernian and talked until dawn."

"And what did she tell you?" I said. "Which of your hopes or worries for Cassandra turned out to be true? Was she mad? Deluded? Pretending? Or something else?"

Cytheris smiled and at the same time wrinkled her brow. She shook her head. "I wish I knew!"

"But if she was the same Cassandra you had known… and if the two of you talked for hours…"

"We talked about old times in Egypt. We talked about my fortunes since I came to Rome. We talked about Antony and Antonia, about Caesar and Pompey, about the state of the world. But when it came to talking about Cassandra-how she had come to Rome and why-she drew a veil of secrecy."

"You allowed that?"

"I respected it. Clearly she wasn't mad, not in the sense of having lost the spark of her old self; I could see that at once. But had she been touched by a god, given the gift of prophecy? Or was she acting a part? Had she come to Rome on her own initiative? Or had she been brought here by someone, for some purpose? I can't tell you the answers, because I never knew. Not for certain, anyway. I asked Cassandra-cajoled her, teased her, even begged her a bit-but she wouldn't tell me. She would only say that in the fullness of time I might know everything; and until then it was best if I knew nothing about her comings and goings, and told no one what I knew about her past.

"I finally agreed to stop badgering her. A woman must be allowed to keep secrets; I have a few myself, so why shouldn't Cassandra? Secrecy is sometimes the only power a woman has in this world."

I nodded slowly. "And after that night, after your long visit when you reminisced about the past, did you see her again?"

Cytheris hesitated. "Perhaps I did…"

"I know that you saw her at least one more time, late in the month of Martius. She came here immediately after leaving Antonia's house."

"And how do you know that, Finder? No, don't tell me. Antonia had Cassandra followed, didn't she? Suspicious harpy!"

I cleared my throat. "You might ask your neighbor to trim the branches of that fig tree in front of his house. An agile man could climb onto the roof next door and look down into this very garden." I gazed up at the line of the roof, and saw that a tiny bit of the neighbor's higher roof could indeed be seen above the scalloped row of red tiles.

Cytheris nodded. "I see. And might such a watcher be able to hear every word that was spoken?"

"Apparently not."

"Thank Venus for that, at least!"

"What did the two of you talk about during that visit?"

Cytheris clicked a long fingernail against her cup, a signal to Chrysippus, who stood at the far corner of the garden, to come and pour her more Falernian wine. She took a sip and for a long moment made no answer. At last she smiled. "Very well, here's the story. But you must swear to me by Venus that you'll never divulge this to Antonia. Gaze at her statue and swear it, both of you!"

Davus looked at me and raised an eyebrow. "I swear by Venus," I said quietly, and Davus did likewise.

Cytheris laughed. "Actually, I've been dying to tell someone. It might as well be you, Finder. You see, even though Cassandra wouldn't tell me exactly what she was up to, I had my suspicions that it might be something-well, a bit devious. So I made a deal with her."

"A deal?"

"I agreed to press her with no more questions and to tell no one of her origins, on the condition that she would do a small favor for me. Perform a favor, I suppose I should say."

"And what was that?"

"Antonia is the type who can never be left out of any activity she presumes to be fashionable among her sort, whether it's wearing one's hair in a bun or worshipping some new goddess from the East. I knew that sooner or later she would seek out Cassandra, looking to have her fortune told. I'm afraid I couldn't resist the opportunity to stir up a bit of mischief."

I nodded. "You suborned Cassandra to deliver a false prophecy to Antonia?"

"I'm afraid so. Was that terribly wicked of me? I told Cassandra: Make it grim. Tell her that not only will Antony abandon her in the end, but so will Dolabella, and she'll grow old and toothless with no companion but that harpy brat of hers. That's why Cassandra came here at once after she left Antonia's house, to tell me that Antonia had finally consulted her and that she'd done as I'd asked. We shared a good laugh about that."

"I see. Unfortunately, Antonia had Cassandra followed, and she made the connection to you and to your mime training. Antonia's not stupid, Cytheris. I'm afraid she saw through your little scheme to upset her."

"Too bad. Even so, I think we managed to give her a nasty shock, while it lasted."

"Perhaps. But once Antonia made the assumption that Cassandra was an actress and a fraud, she made another assumption: that Cassandra was a professional black mailer."

Cytheris pursed her lips. "Perhaps. I considered that possibility myself, but I don't think so. The Cassandra I knew in Alexandria didn't have the temperament to be a black mailer. She didn't possess that kind of cruelty."