Sequel: The White Doe ›
Status: 1 of 7 volumes. Complete.
A Good Run
Two
She is twelve years old and has been a slave all her life.
Her mother is a dream memory who died before she could talk and Thessily has been raised in the household of Meltinias of Athens, a fabric merchant. She has been well treated or at least never abused, because only a fool abuses a slave; they're just to expensive to replace. She has never argued or been difficult, but Meltinias has seen it in her eyes.
Defiance exists in Thessily and she is biding her time.
Meltinias thinks she is trouble. Smart for a slave, perhaps too smart and growing dangerously attractive. The girl has hair blacker than the night sky, cold blue eyes that seem to judge everything and skin that is pale like the skin on the statue of Pallas.
Thessily is exotic and Meltinias has already pocketed several coins by charging other men for the simple pleasure of looking at her. Now that she is getting to be old enough, he is considering other ways he could make more money off of his prize slave.
In truth, he might have done so already were it not for the un-blinking stare Thessily so often turns his way. The look is unnerving. He thinks, perhaps, it is a look from Hades. It is a look that will certainly lead to trouble.
But not anymore, because today Meltinias has sold his exotic, Hades-in-her-eyes slave to Thoas, the high priest of the Eleusinian mysteries.
Thoas is the hierophant and if anyone knows how to deal with Hades, it is he. The hierophant, after all, is the one person in all of Greece who can guarantee safe passage into the afterlife.
Meltinias watches them go, the tall, thirty-something priest and the pale-skinned girl.
Thoas was almost desperate to purchase the girl and Meltinias will live well on the sale for months to come. Meltinias breaths a sigh of relief.
Meltinias catches his breath not but a heartbeat after taking it into his lungs, because Thessily, now outside the door, has turned and looked back at him and smiled.
And the smile is from Hades, too.
Her mother is a dream memory who died before she could talk and Thessily has been raised in the household of Meltinias of Athens, a fabric merchant. She has been well treated or at least never abused, because only a fool abuses a slave; they're just to expensive to replace. She has never argued or been difficult, but Meltinias has seen it in her eyes.
Defiance exists in Thessily and she is biding her time.
Meltinias thinks she is trouble. Smart for a slave, perhaps too smart and growing dangerously attractive. The girl has hair blacker than the night sky, cold blue eyes that seem to judge everything and skin that is pale like the skin on the statue of Pallas.
Thessily is exotic and Meltinias has already pocketed several coins by charging other men for the simple pleasure of looking at her. Now that she is getting to be old enough, he is considering other ways he could make more money off of his prize slave.
In truth, he might have done so already were it not for the un-blinking stare Thessily so often turns his way. The look is unnerving. He thinks, perhaps, it is a look from Hades. It is a look that will certainly lead to trouble.
But not anymore, because today Meltinias has sold his exotic, Hades-in-her-eyes slave to Thoas, the high priest of the Eleusinian mysteries.
Thoas is the hierophant and if anyone knows how to deal with Hades, it is he. The hierophant, after all, is the one person in all of Greece who can guarantee safe passage into the afterlife.
Meltinias watches them go, the tall, thirty-something priest and the pale-skinned girl.
Thoas was almost desperate to purchase the girl and Meltinias will live well on the sale for months to come. Meltinias breaths a sigh of relief.
Meltinias catches his breath not but a heartbeat after taking it into his lungs, because Thessily, now outside the door, has turned and looked back at him and smiled.
And the smile is from Hades, too.