Given that the Titan man seemed quite capable of following through with his threat, Pandora elected to shut her mouth. Through the limited view available to her, she watched the azure sea break and fall as they drew ever farther from her new home upon Ogygia. Eventually, the waters lightened to cerulean as they entered the Aegean Sea.
They passed through the Strait of Korinth. Was it even called thus at this point? Did Korinth yet exist? The city had been founded by the Ouranid Kreios, but she didn’t know if that was before or after the creation of the Ouranid League. Either way, in her day, the city was still ruled by Kreiads and owned by Kreios’s own grandson, Hephaistos.
Beyond the Strait, they at last came to Thebes. As they made port, Sirsir deigned to show himself once more. Without a word, he unshackled her, then ushered her above decks and over the gangplank to where Tethys herself waited, impassive stare fixed upon Pandora.
No sign of Enki, so maybe the other Titan had already departed the ship.
Sirsir left her again, diving into the sea all in silence. In the days coming here, Pandora had pondered what the mer had done to her mind. Something in his voice had hypnotized her, and the memory of it sent chills shivering through her.
“I trust you understand why I had to keep you bound,” Tethys said. She waved a hand to indicate Pandora ought to follow. Seeing no real choice, Pandora complied. After all, it was rather too late to make any escape back to Ogygia. “I could not chance you trying to leap overboard and get yourself killed, nor waste resources to have any of the Telkhines rescue you a second time.”
“I understood the reasons.”
“Well then, I hope the journey did not prove too taxing.”
Pandora glowered as the Titan led her beyond the harbor and to a great cliff, rising several hundred feet above them. A marble staircase cut into the cliffside led up to the polis above, though all she could see of it was an enormous wall peeking out over the clifftop. “I had to shit in a bucket in front of a dozen strange men. I cannot say I found the voyage the most pleasant I’ve ever taken.”
Tethys answered with a glance and narrowed eyes. A silent warning not to push her tolerance. “Be grateful you weren’t the one who had to collect the buckets and empty them.”
The climb up the stairs left Pandora breathless long before they reached the summit, and while they passed a landing halfway up, Tethys did not pause. Which meant neither could Pandora, though she saw other members of Tethys’s returning crew follow with greater leisure. The Titan herself seemed to possess unending stamina and expect the same from Pandora.
“I will keep you safe in Thebes,” Tethys said when they reached the stairs’ end.
Pandora stood there, hands on her knees, gasping as she looked about. Twin rivers cut around the city. One, she believed, would continue south past Korinth—once it existed—while the northern river pitched off the cliffside in a misty cataract some distance away.
Tethys allowed her a brief moment to rest—or perhaps to take in the grandeur of her polis—then led her through a great gate in the wall around the city. They followed the main street to an agora, and continued on, toward the acropolis, though the Titan now reduced her pace. Perhaps she had finally realized a mortal could not handle such a climb.
“I do not know where Prometheus is at present, but I will send word across Ogygia and Hesperides Island that I have brought you here as my guest. Knowing him, he would most like discover your presence regardless, but the missives can only help.”
So she truly intended to help reunite them. “Thank you,” Pandora said, somewhat ashamed of her gasping between words. Whatever Tethys had forced her to endure on the ship, she had saved her life. And if she brought Prometheus and Pyrrha back to her, it was all worth it.
Tethys led her through the acropolis and into her marmoreal palace and its maze of columns. That the Titan bothered to offer her a tour meant she must have reconsidered how she wanted to treat Pandora. Which meant Tethys had decided she wanted something from Prometheus. Did it rankle, treating a mortal with even this modicum of respect? Did Tethys seethe beneath her impassive visage? Pandora imagined she could see a storm-tossed sea behind those ocean-blue eyes.
Following the circuit of the palace, the Titan offered tidbits about each of the wings. There, the hall from which music rang out so clear every evening, where Tethys’s friend Mnemosyne had once sung in a concert that had extended from dusk until past dawn. Ah, and beyond, the corridor decorated with the grand mosaics cut from gemstones mined from the mountains of Kumari Kandam, across the Thalassa. Yes, and here, the water gardens in the caryatid-encircled courtyard, with their burbling fountains and overhanging cypress trees.
Amid the gardens, children splashed in a pond, disturbing lilies and, no doubt, fish. They seemed to range between eight and two in age. An older woman, perhaps mortal, oversaw their play, lingering beneath a cypress. Perhaps there only to ensure the play remained safe for her young charges.
“My children,” Tethys said. “The oldest is Hera, the boy is Poseidon. The younger ones are twins, Styx and Perse.”
The names had her stubbing her sandals upon the flagstones. To save appearances, she settled on the edge of a fountain, watching Tethys’s brood with a forced smile. Two future Olympians jumped about in the pond, hurling water and giggling. Zeus’s own wife was right in front of Pandora, bullying her younger siblings. Poseidon commanded all the mer in the
