Throughout the fall, Agamemnon came to Cassandra every night. Though she wanted to hurl vicious words, to let him know the depth of her disdain, she never denied his advances, and only spoke when he demanded it.
As the weeks continued, her self-loathing reached a height she'd never seen, and Cassandra plunged into an abyss of depression she'd never recover from. But she continued to care for herself, to eat, drink, and bathe like expected.
When Cassandra had proven she wouldn't attempt to escape if the opportunity presented itself, Agamemnon allowed her to wander the gardens' paths to her heart's content. A soldier had to accompany her, and she couldn't speak to anyone, but she exercised the offer.
Cassandra found no beauty or solace in her once-beloved gardens, but she relished the change of scenery.
Then, as winter drove away fall, Cassandra's health changed. More days than not, exhaustion kept her in bed. Every part of her body ached. She often woke in the middle of the night, overheated and lightheaded.
She didn't mention her problems.
Cassandra thought the gods had finally answered one of her prayers and she was dying in a fashion that wouldn't upset the Greeks; that wouldn't get her loved ones killed. Salvation was at hand, and she didn't want to risk anyone curing her condition.
Cassandra kept her ailments secret even after she started vomiting at odd points throughout the day. When she couldn't eat her meals, she hid the food until she went to the gardens and buried it. She demanded face powder (with the excuse of pleasing Agamemnon) to mask her hollow cheeks and sunken in eyes.
Almost two months since her illness' start, her charade collapsed.
Agamemnon came to her like always and disrobed as soon as he shut the door.
All day Cassandra had battled an extreme bout of nausea and didn't think she could handle the activity to come. But she didn't speak up and let Agamemnon have his way with her.
Mid-act, and without a chance to give warning, Cassandra vomited on the King of Mycenae. He was on top of her, and the bile splattered on his chest. He cursed and climbed off her and the bed. Agamemnon rushed to the bathing chamber.
In his absence, Cassandra expelled what little she still had in her stomach into a water jug.
Once done, she pulled the soiled bed linen off her mattress and threw it near the door. Then she sat in the chair in front of her roaring fireplace and waited—with tears in her eyes—for Agamemnon's return.
Not long after, the King of Mycenae left the bathing chamber; clean of her vomit. He didn't yell or lash out but narrowed his eyes. "Was that a mistake?"
Cassandra nodded. "I-I'm sorry, my King. I... haven't felt well."
"For how long?"
She battled her urge to lie. Agamemnon had the disturbing ability to know when a person did, and if they did, his responding fury could terrify a god. "I—About two months."
"Any other problems?"
Cassandra listed them.
Once she finished, he crossed the room, put on his discarded chiton, and left.
Before Cassandra could debate her next course of action, Agamemnon appeared with his Greek physician and two city-women-turned-slaves.
While the slaves cleaned the mess in both the bed and bathing chamber, the physician examined Cassandra. She complied with all he asked and did, though her nudeness and Agamemnon's presence unnerved her.
The physician turned to the King of Mycenae when the examination ended and brushed his hair behind his ears. "It's just as you suspected."
A grin stretched Agamemnon's lips, and Cassandra knew her death wasn't imminent. "When?"
"Without complications, in mid-summer."
"What's wrong with me?" Cassandra blurted.
The physician patted her knee, but Agamemnon answered her. "You're carrying my child."
The same midwife who'd overseen Hecuba's last pregnancy tended to Cassandra. Though the physician didn't find it necessary, Agamemnon had the midwife—a sour-faced, middle-aged woman named Hagne—care for Cassandra's every need.
Cassandra couldn't lift a finger without Hagne materializing beside her and taking over. A cot was put in Cassandra's bedchamber for Hagne to sleep on, and the King of Mycenae even rewarded Hagne's service with delicacies only available to him and his generals.
Often, Cassandra caught Hagne gazing at her with pity. The midwife didn't dare comment, but Cassandra knew the woman thought Cassandra was in the worst circumstance: having the child of the man who'd destroyed all that mattered to her.
Cassandra never let on she agreed.
A few weeks after the physician's assessment, Cassandra could once again sleep through the night, energy filled her, and her nausea disappeared. Sore, enlarged breasts, shooting hip and back pains, and ravenous hunger followed.
Hagne did her best to soothe Cassandra's many aches and tried to get Cassandra to eat what her body required, but Cassandra refused. She believed if she denied the child within her proper nutrition, it'd perish. Alone, she murmured curses and horrible words at it.
Short of inflicting harm on herself and the child (something Cassandra fantasied about but never did), nothing seemed to discourage Agamemnon's offspring. It shouldn't have been possible, but Cassandra's too-thin body filled out, her hair and nails shined, and her skin glowed.
She looked better than she had in years.
Agamemnon continued to come to Cassandra at night, though not as often as he once had until the pregnancy showed.
To Cassandra, it seemed to happen all at once, and despite her hatred for what Agamemnon had done to her, she marveled at her body's change.
When the child moved for the first time, Cassandra burst into tears as an errant wish overtook her: she wanted so badly for the life within her to have been created by Othryoneus.
She allowed herself a moment to wallow in her sadness and longing, then walled off her feelings in fear they'd convince her to care for the child.
Five months into the ordeal, Cassandra's abdomen had swelled to twice the size she remembered her mother's being at this point. Hagne and the physician speculated she either carried a massive child or, more likely, there were two.
Cassandra flew into a rage after the physician told her this and wrecked her room. Hagne had two discreet slaves clean the mess once Cassandra had worn herself out and fallen asleep.
Toward the end of her pregnancy, Agamemnon decided he wanted his child born in Mycenae like his other children. The physician didn't think it wise for Cassandra to travel so close to the child's arrival, but Agamemnon ignored his concerns.
He organized the trip, gutted Troy of all its valuables, sent his generals on their way, and then left the city he'd occupied for almost a year.
For most of the journey, Cassandra stayed in her living quarters with Hagne. She didn't like being on the ship, and neither did the child. It kicked and punched all day. Hagne gave Cassandra concoctions meant to calm the child, but nothing worked.
With little sleep, Cassandra turned into a miserable ass who lashed out at everyone and everything. After the first handful of times, she stopped apologizing.
Then, two days before their predicted arrival, a clenching, bloated pain started in Cassandra's lower abdomen and pelvis; woke her early that morning. It came and went at odd intervals, and while it irritated her, the pain wasn't worse than any of the other ones she'd experienced throughout her pregnancy.
But mid-day, the pain increased and lasted for more extended bouts.
It got so intense, Cassandra had to chew on the inside of her cheek to hold back her screams. She did her best to keep her face expressionless, to keep Hagne unaware. But not much escaped the midwife, and if it did, never for long.
Hagne pressed a cold hand to Cassandra's flushed forehead. "Describe your pain."
Through clenched teeth, Cassandra did.
Hagne nodded. "I feared this would happen." She rose from the cot she and Cassandra sat on. "I'll retrieve the physician. When the pain comes again, take slow, deep breaths, and walk around as much as possible."
The midwife left the small cabin.
Cassandra didn't give Hagne's advice high regard and considered ignoring it altogether. Until another wave of pain hit her. A guttural moan escaped her. She wanted to cry loud enough to shake the heavens but chose the midwife's plan instead. Cassandra struggled to do the breathing Hagne had described.
She did, though, and it eased a bit of her agony.
The horrible sensation lessened to a bearable level, and Cassandra stood. She had to sit back down when a vision dragged her under. She hadn't had one in months, not since the sacking of Troy, and had almost forgotten how all-consuming they were.
For the longest time, she only saw blackness. Then four flames, two more prominent than the others, flickered into existence; highlighted a room with furniture Cassandra couldn't see well. As she tried to focus on an object before her, a door to the room opened, and a blurred figure crept inside.
The way it moved seemed familiar, but before Cassandra could figure out why, the figure swiped its hand through the two larger flames. It turned to the remaining two but froze.
An image of a man with eyes blacker than coal and as shiny as polished pebbles, a handsome face paled by lack of sunlight, and brown-blond hair kept at shoulder-length appeared over the figure and two flames. He looked to where Cassandra felt she was in the scene, and the saddest expression contorted his features.
"I'm sorry I haven't responded before now. Circumstances have... prevented me."
The man had a soothing, friendly voice, and it struck Cassandra as odd. She'd always been told he'd sound the opposite, that when he spoke, her soul would quake with dread. Yet he seemed the nicest of all the—
What?
Cassandra grasped at the thought but couldn't remember the end.
But it didn't matter.
The man continued talking. "I wish I could tell you what you've just witnessed can be avoided, but what's been woven can't be undone. Yet, I've used my pull, and the rest of the weaving has yet to happen. What remains of this vision is yours to decide."
He smiled, and the melancholy in his face vanished. "I know it's not much but thank you for remembering me. Mortals so rarely show me the level of acknowledgment you have."
Cassandra wanted to respond, but she couldn't make a sound.
Her visitor nodded like she had, then disappeared.
His act ended the vision.
Cassandra returned to the present just as Hagne entered the cabin with the physician. The physician fired questions at Cassandra while he inspected her.
In her recurring pain, she forgot the details of her vision.
The physician gestured to Hagne. "She's in labor." He pointed at Cassandra. "Ready her."
Cassandra had worried labor would be a grueling ordeal like it had for her mother. But, thank the gods, once her body realized what needed to be done, she didn't have to suffer for long. Her laboring was as quick as Creusa's had been.
The pain worsened to the point Cassandra feared she'd pass out just as the physician ordered her to push. She screamed about his ineptitude while she complied. Her pelvic muscles released, and the pain subsided.
"Good. Good," the physician said.
Then the sound Cassandra had heard many times filled the cabin: the howls of an unhappy child. Though unlike in the past when the wailing had irritated her, her heart clenched, and rage flooded her veins.
Who had hurt her child?
Cassandra propped herself up on her elbows and watched as the physician handed the red, wet, tiny figure to Hagne. The midwife carried the squealing infant over to a bowl of warm water set on a table. She went to quick work cleaning away the birthing mess.
"No, let m—"
Another series of miserable anguish hit Cassandra, and she wailed louder than her child.
The physician returned to his previous position between her bent knees. "That would be the other one," he mumbled to himself.
A few heartbeats later, and her second twin entered the world.
Like with the first, the physician handed the infant to Hagne, and the midwife performed her job. While she did, the physician helped Cassandra birth what more her body needed to.
Then, with Hagne's help, he cleared away the evidence of labor.
While they worked, Cassandra entered a daze. She wanted to sleep but couldn't until she held her children. Until she ensured their safety and contentedness.
Finally, Hagne and the physician completed their tasks.
The physician told the midwife to dress Cassandra in presentable clothing while he went to inform Agamemnon of his wonderful fortune.
Hagne did as instructed and assisted Cassandra to her cot.
Once situated, the midwife placed Cassandra's twins in her arms.
Hagne described how to feed the infants, but Cassandra didn't listen as she inspected her children.
Both had quit their crying but still whimpered on and off. She peeled away their blankets and discovered she'd birthed sons. She counted their toes and studied their small bodies for imperfections. They appeared as healthy as any child Cassandra had ever seen.
Her sons' eyes were the color of Cassandra's. The one in her right arm had hair as red as hers, and his nose and lips were the shapes of his father's. The one in her left arm had hair like Agamemnon's, yet Cassandra thought he resembled Priam.
As her inspection continued, her sons' whimpers increased.
This stopped when Cassandra ran her fingers over their soft skin.
They watched her and even sighed when she kissed her cheeks.
Hagne cleared her throat.
Cassandra's attention snapped away from her sons. "What?"
Clear distaste contorted the midwife's face. Her gaze flitted from the twins to Cassandra. "Why?"
A part of Cassandra—the part that didn't understand her overwhelming motherly instincts and resented her easy compliance—understood the midwife's confusion.
Since she'd learned of her pregnancy, she'd wanted nothing more than its termination. Though Cassandra had felt guilt for her dark thoughts against the unborn child within her, she hadn't been able to stop herself from believing Agamemnon, the king of vile, would only produce offspring as rotten as him.
Now, she resented herself for her past ideas and the bit of her that sympathized with the midwife. And Cassandra wanted to rip out Hagne's throat for thinking along the same terrible lines that Cassandra had.
Her sons didn't have to become their father. They had a blank slate and could very well do the world a lot of good.
Cassandra held her sons tighter. "Get out."
The midwife's head jerked like she'd been slapped. "B-But... I just—You can't—"
"Get. Out."
"What about the King?"
Cassandra shrugged. "You'll come up with a convincing explanation. Hopefully."
Hagne gazed at Cassandra for many heartbeats. Her eyes pleaded, but Cassandra didn't relent.
The midwife gave up and exited the cabin.
After Hagne left, the twins fussed again.
Cassandra figured they were hungry, and though she'd ignored the midwife's instruction, she did well in getting her sons to latch onto her breasts and eat. It took more effort than Cassandra had expected.
Exhaustion hit her, and just after the twins had had their fill, she fell asleep with them snuggled close to her sides.