Oracles of Delphi - Chapters 1 - 6

He wasn't even sure how she died. She was on him, tearing at his clothes, biting his shoulder, his neck, one moment trying to flay his back, the next turning blue. Now she was dead. He didn't care about her brother-the wolves were welcome to feast on his bones-but he couldn't leave Charis to be devoured like carrion. In the morning Apollon's priests would find her on the temple steps wrapped snug in her winter cloak. Philon and Kleomon would wait for her brother to claim her, and then, eventually, they would give her to Phoibe for burial. 

He cocked his head and listened. Not even a leaf rustled in an occasional spring breeze. Around him, Delphi slept shrouded in darkness. Under the new moon, dull patches of snow clung to nooks and crannies up and down the mountainside. The Oracle wouldn't start hearing supplicants for another few weeks and without a swarm of pilgrims, Delphi was just another remote mountain village.  

Calmer now, he took a deep breath, ran his fingers through his hair, brushed the dust from his clothes, and strode down the path toward the Dolphin's Cove Inn.

CHAPTER 2 

Aithera pulled the covers over her head and tried to ignore the insistent rapping at her door.  

"Are you awake?" Theron called. 

"Go away." 

The rapping stopped and she heard muffled voices in the hallway. 

"Aithera. Aren't you up yet?"  

"I am now," she groused. She threw the covers back, swung her feet onto the cold, tile floor and stretched. A few wisps of smoke rose from the gray coals in the brazier. Nephthys, the new Egyptian handmaid Praxis had bought for her, was already up and gone.  

"Can I come in?" 

"No. I'm not dressed." 

"Well, get dressed. Menandros is impatient to give us a tour of the theater." 

She wrapped a blanket around her shoulders and opened the door. "It's too early for a tour of anything."  

Theron, her childhood tutor and now her mentor and confidant, scanned the room and then strode in and opened the shutters. She flinched and shaded her face as early spring sunlight assaulted her eyes.  

"Nice view," he said. "Our host obviously gave you the best room in the house. Praxis and I are sharing what I suspect is a broom closet." 

"I'm sure you both deserve it. Punishment for some heinous act you committed in the past or at least for waking me up so early." 

Theron laughed. With sharp, gray eyes, a close-cropped head of thick graying hair, and weathered skin creased with laugh-or worry-lines, Theron looked every bit the world weary traveler he was. He folded his arms across his broad chest and leaned against the window frame. "He's trying to bribe you. He hopes you'll support the theater of Delphi like your father supported the Dionysia in Athens." 

"My loving husband is the one he should be bribing." 

"Lycon is not here." 

"And we're all thankful for that," Aithera sighed. Forced to marry her cousin to keep her father's fortune within the oikos, the family unit, her husband and kyrios controlled everything in Aithera's life-her money, her property, her body. Luckly, Lycon, was more interested in spending time at the gymnasium and gambling on his lover, an Olympian champion pankriatist, than in paying any attention to Aithera. He was diligent about doing his once-a-month husbandly duty in the bedroom, but the rest of the time, Lycon behaved as if Aithera was nothing more than a moderately interesting piece of furniture.