A Mist of Prophecies

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The last time I saw Cassandra…

I was about to say: the last time I saw Cassandra was on the day of her death. But that would be untrue. The last time I saw her-gazed upon her face, ran my fingers over her golden hair, dared to touch her cold cheek-was on her funeral day.

It was I who made all the arrangements. There was no one else to do it. No one else came forward to claim her body.

I call her Cassandra, but that was not her real name, of course. No parents would ever give a child such an accursed name, any more than they would name a baby Medea or Medusa or Cyclops. Nor would any master give such an ill-omened name to a slave. Others called her Cassandra because of the special gift they believed her to possess. Like the original Cassandra, the doomed princess of ancient Troy, it seemed that our Cassandra could foretell the future. Little good that accursed gift did either of the women who bore that name.

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