 | Anaxandra is taken from the island of her birth when she is 6 years old. For the next 6 years, she grows up in the home of Nicander and Petra, as a playmate to their daughter, Princess Callisto. The family is very kind to her and treats her more as family than a hostage, and she grows up loving them and their island. But the island is attacked when no-one is prepared, and Anaxandra can do nothing as Nicander is killed on the beach and Petra is taken as a slave. When one of the pirates is about to kick Nicander's body into the sea, Anaxandra sinks under the water, finds an octopus, and rises with it on her head. She walks across the rocks that barely touch the surface of the water and cries out that she is Medusa, scaring away the attackers. When King Menelaus turns from his course to examine the destruction, he finds her standing next to the grave of Nicander, and she refers to Nicander as her father. Menelaus assumes that she is then Callisto, and she doesn't correct him, realizing that a princess's name would more likely keep her from slavery. In Menelaus's home, Anaxandra now Callisto befriends the princess Hermione and falls in love with this new family that has taken her in. Except for one person - the king's wife Helen. Paris arrives in the home of Menelaus, and the events that lead the characters into the Trojan war begin. This is an excellent book to get lost in. |
