The prophecy

“Bravest strongest and arrogant 

Bashful proud but diligent 

The un-vanquished city shall be his grave 

None but a sacrifice to Gods could save 

The Slayer of Knots would die by, 

A disloyal Ganymede on day nine: 

The cursed city would weal havoc 

A Golden Age would break forth 

The fire would spread through Hella’s heart 

A clash of two heavens would cause the spark 

  On the month of Daesius , die or do your part.” 

It was as if the words gargled out forth her unmoved lips. Eyes unfocused and lips slightly parted, Cassandra looked horrified as if any evil spirit has possessed her. It remained just for a few moments and then she tumbled down on the steps of Parthenon, unconscious. Silence prevailed wickedly all over. 

‘'What was that?'’, whispered Argus with a look of fear beneath his green eyes. Nobody said anything as if they were still enthralled in a trance. 

‘ It was what I was waiting for’, came a voice from behind. On turning round Argus found himself looking at the dark grey eyes of his father Damocles.  

-‘It’s a prophecy. The last of the many after such a long period of silence’.

-‘But. I don’t understand’, Argus tried to argue back. ‘ Whatever she uttered was gibberish’.

-‘Meaningless? Gibberish? What do you mean by that son? Don’t you understand the depth, the grimness of the lines she had uttered?’, Damocles cried out, waving his arms in front of his son. ‘The world is on the verge of collapse’.

-‘What should we do then?’, asked Fabian, a friend of Argus, for the first time.

‘ Why? We would send the news to Delphi at once for deciphering the contents’. 

Delphi was the only place that had the power to decipher Prophecies, provide premonitions and future tellings. It was the shrine of Apollo, the god of the Sun, and music and prophecy. The priestesses who worshipped and held the powers of the future at their fingertips were called Oracles.

         

                                                                      

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Cassandra still laid unconscious on the floor, unaware of the grave fate of all people of her land, that she has uttered. She was carried into the house in which they lived, in the vicinity of the temple. She was still dead to the world. Fabian had left some moments ago to bring some horses from his father, who was a horse-dealer. Damocles went to his room with the pretext of writing a note to Delphi about the prophecy that had been made.  Damocles was not surprised when his daughter spilled out the twisted lines of a prophecy. He had always known her to be different from others, just like her mother. She too could predict the future and destinies. 

Argus stayed back with Cassandra. He remembered the day she was born. It seemed it had just taken place a day before, for he could vividly cast his eyes back and retrace that woeful stormy night. He was five years old then, a baby crying silently in his father’s arms while his mother was wailing with labor pain. The midwife came out behind the curtain and said that there was a complication and either of the mother and baby can be saved. Argus loved his mother, he simply adored her. She always used to say to him that he was a blessing of Apollo, for Argus could aim very well even at a young age. His green eyes used to sparkle and his golden hair used to fall upon his brow when she complimented him for every perfect hit. 

But that night, though Artemis leaned down from Olympus to witness the birth of this child, as she had done when their king was born, the storm still raged. Both the son and father were raptured by the ravishing of the storm when his mother chose death to deliver Cassandra into the world. Father named her after the woeful daughter of Priam. He shut himself up in his room for a long period of time emerging only in times of prayers and rituals and it fell upon Argus to chaperon his sister. He loves his sister. She has his mother’s hair and her face was a perfect replica. He knew his father never had looked directly at her for she always made him remember his lost wife. From early childhood, Cassandra showed premonitory signs of being a different person altogether. Her gaze, especially the angry ones tend to break inanimate objects, the ‘gibberish’ she uttered seemed to culminate into reality. Once Fabian brought a new colt as a gift for her tenth birthday. On seeing it, she cried out ‘ O Fabian! Why have you brought me a dead horse?’. They could not understand how a young healthy horse seemed dead to her. But that night suddenly the colt fell ill and laid down. At dawn, it perished. It died of a snake bite. Many such episodes pushed Cassandra more into solitude; people were afraid of the greenish gaze and her cursed lips. Girls of her age evaded her and gave her a wide berth. Boys made fun of her by calling her moonstruck. This resulted in severe depressions during which Cassandra for days would not come out of her room. Only Argus could handle her. He never left her alone. For her sake, he gave up his chance of joining the king’s regiment as a general.

‘Brother! what are you gazing at?’, asked Cassandra slowly opening her eyes, breaking his reverie.  

‘At you, my Adelphi'! Are you okay? You fell unconscious at Parthenos.’ 

Slowly Cassandra stretched out her limbs and Argus helped her to sit. She looked around the scantily decorated room, with a bed, a reclining lounge, a campstool, and shelves full of prayer books and crystal vessels. It’s not the first time she had fallen unconscious, many a time she could not even recollect what she had said or did to meet such a fall. She had always felt responsible for her mother’s death and her father’s coldness. Although Argus always loved her, with him too she always felt doing injustice. For her concern, he could not join the army. She desired death to relieve herself from this curse of ‘seeing’. 

‘ I’m good. Just a little weak. What did I say? You look worried,’ Cassandra looked at her brother. Argus repeated the exact words of the prophecy she has uttered with pauses and breaks and then what their father’s reaction was. 

‘I’ll also come with you. I won’t stay here alone with ill-thoughts engulfing me’, Cassandra whispered after a moment of silence. 

-‘But my dear girl, how can you come? You are weak and the long journey to Delphi would be hazardous. We have to pass many kingdoms, barbaric villages, forests and we have to cross Thebes. I heard there has been a political breakdown. I can’t approve-’ 

-‘No! No! I can’t let you go alone. It’s me, who has predicted. So, I will come. And you are there to protect me, aren’t you?’ 

Cassandra blurted out in a single breath, hairs flaring all over her beautiful face. Argus smiled back. He has always felt a loss of words whenever his sister argued. After all, there was no one except his little sister who was the light of his eyes.