At that, Sirsir chittered something in some foreign tongue, and Tethys cast another look at Enki, her expression concealed from Pandora. When she looked back, her visage had become as implacable as the sea she loved.
“Hold her,” she said.
Before Pandora could even react, Sirsir’s webbed, cold fingers seized her biceps. “No! I have to reach them.”
Tethys laid a hand upon Pandora’s cheek, a hint of gentleness in her caress. “If you are his lover, he’ll appreciate me not allowing you to kill yourself. You cannot return to him until we have Kronos.”
Pandora jerked her arms side to side to free herself. She might as well have tried to push over an oak tree with her bare hands for all the mer moved. “You cannot do this.” It was the kind of petulant objection indignant fools raised. Because, of course, Titans could do aught they pleased. But Pandora had suffered abduction and captivity as a child and would not allow herself to suffer it once more. Not again. Not again. “Release me!”
That earned her a roll of Tethys’s eyes and a few snorts from those close enough to hear.
“Be still,” Sirsir said, his voice suddenly deep as the ocean. It reverberated in her skull and dragged her mind through a watery haze. She felt her arms go limp and, for the life of her, couldn’t even remember why she’d been trying to struggle. “Follow,” the mer commanded.
And, of course, she did, as he guided her to a bench amid the oarsmen. After she sat, she blinked, the mire in her head starting to thin. Sirsir raised a warning finger in front of her face. A webbed, clawed digit that left her squirming at the sight of it. Perhaps thinking her cowed, the mer then set about fastening a bronze manacle to her ankle.
Pandora forced herself not to whimper. Similar fetters bound some, though not all, of the other rowers about her in this part of the ship. Slaves forced to serve in the bireme at Tethys’s pleasure.
But the oar for this bench remained locked in place and Sirsir made no move to force her to attend to it. Just as well, as she doubted she could have kept rhythm or maintained it without someone else to join her.
Instead, she busied herself looking about her new prison. Some few men around her leered at her, licentious thoughts writ so plain upon their faces as to prove almost comical. Looks Pandora had seen all too oft, but at the moment, had not the least interest in emboldening. Rather, she favored the gawkers with such a disdainful stare the most of them looked away. Men like these wanted to see a woman writhe in discomfort at their attention. They couldn’t handle one who returned the challenge.
Most of those about her, though, seemed too sweat-drenched and overwrought by their backbreaking work to give her the least notice. Soon, the drums started up again, and the oarsmen began their labor once more, their small respite over.
On some of the oars, blood stained the wood, where men’s blisters had ruptured. How long had Tethys pushed these poor bastards?
The Telkhine had saved her life, without doubt, but Pandora could not let herself forget one truth. Tethys was still a godsdamned Titan. The race of Man still lay prostrate beneath her plodding sandals.
Some things never changed.
And perhaps not even the Golden Age had offered so much better times than Pandora had once believed.
Part IV
For seven years the Ambrosial War raged, Titans slaying one another in desperation to control the distribution of Ambrosia out of Atlantis. In the end, rather than see the World burn, the six strongest Titans agreed to a pact where they and they alone would control the distribution of Ambrosia. This pact ended the Ambrosial War and formed the Ouranid League that would rule the Thalassa world for over two thousand years. This time, we call the Golden Age.
— Kleio, Analects of the Muses
24
Artemis
201 Golden Age
The polis of Sardeis lay on a wide plain between the sea and the mountains. Upon the mountains lay woodlands Artemis had hunted in her youth and spent a great deal of time training in, honing her senses. A part of her would have rather headed there now than toward the city’s arching gate, bent on her mission.
Especially with Apollon by her side. Her golden-eyed twin had a perpetual smirk about him, as if he had done her some great favor by convincing their father to let Artemis ‘attend him’ on this endeavor.
She cast a wary glance at him. He no doubt thought he truly had done right by her. She was the one who slew Khione and saved Helion. She had fought for Father in the year since, defending his island. But now, it was Apollon that he sent to Phoeba to broker peace with their grandmother.
“Gratitude would not be amiss,” he said, having read her ire on her face.
“Nor would humility,” she snapped.
He shrugged. “No, but I thought that too much to hope for.”
Petty, obnoxious little prick …
Having no choice, really—unless she wanted to abandon any chance at earning honor—she paced along beside him as they made their way up to the acropolis. A servant moved to welcome them, but Aidos raced past him.
Their cousin almost toppled Artemis over when she threw her arms around her. “I heard you were coming!” Aidos chirped, actually hefting Artemis off the ground. She punched Apollon on the arm. “I see you brought the Heliad, too.”
“She did not bring me,” Apollon tried to object while Aidos pointedly ignored him.
The daughter of their maternal aunt Asteria, Aidos had spent as much time growing up in Phoebe’s court as Artemis herself. Since their grandmother had fostered Aidos for years, in some ways, she was more sister than cousin, though Artemis had seen little of her in the past few decades.
Artemis saw little of most people, of late, preferring the solitude of sylvan haunts over bustling
