Thais did so, pressing both her forehead and her temples to the time-polished stone, but didn’t hear either a light hum or the barely-there shaking of the wall. Rhea-Kibela knew nothing, and therefore nothing threatened the hetaera in the near future. Thais rose, then almost ran toward Ceramic and her house, moving so swiftly that Talmid grumbled behind her. Laughing, the hetaera waited for the athlete, threw her arms around his neck and rewarded him with a kiss. Slightly overwhelmed, the big man snatched her up in his arms and carried her home, despite her laughing protests.
On the day Thais designated for her departure, the weather changed. Gray clouds piled up in the mountains and hung low over the city, powdering the golden marble of statues, walls and columns with a tinge of ash.
Euriclidion, a strong northeast wind, justified its nickname of “the one rising broad waves” and swiftly propelled Thais’ little ship toward the island of Aegina.
Thais stood at the stern, turning her back to the departing shore of Attica, and giving herself up to the soothing roll of the ship over the swell. She couldn’t shake off the memory of a stranger she had met the day prior, a warrior with scars on his arm and face, which he’d half-covered with a beard. The stranger had stopped her at the Tripod Street, near the statue of Satire Periboeton, by Praxiteles.
Clear perceptive eyes had stared at her, and the hetaera felt deep in her soul that she could never lie to this man.
“You are Thais,” he said in a deep low voice. “And you are leaving our Athens to follow Chrisocoma the Spartan.”
Thais nodded, silent with awe.
“Athenian state must be doing poorly, if beauty is abandoning it,” he said. “Beauty of women, arts and crafts, all things beautiful used to converge here. Now they run away from us.”
She felt a need to defend herself. “I feel, stranger, that my compatriots are more occupied these days with cheating their competitors in war and trade, instead of admiring that which their ancestors and their land has created.”
“You are right, oh young one. I am a friend of Lysippus the sculptor, and a sculptor myself. Soon we shall be off to Asia to meet with Alexander. You are headed the same way. Sooner or later, we shall meet there.”
“I do not know. It is unlikely. My fate draws me in the other direction.”
“No,” he said calmly, shaking his head. “It shall be so. Lysippus is there. He has long wanted to meet you, and so have I. But he has his own desires, and I — my own …”
“It is too late,” the hetaera said, genuinely sorry. Attention of one of the greatest artists in Hellas was flattering to her. There were beautiful legends told of love between Praxiteles and Frina, Phidias and Aspasia.
He smiled. “I didn’t say now. You are too young. We require maturity of body for our purposes, not fame. But time will come, and you will not refuse me then. Geliaine!”
The stranger departed without naming himself, taking broad dignified strides. The bewildered hetaera returned home with the memory of their meeting imprinted on her mind.
Chapter Three: Escape to the South
Thais thought of the stranger as she stood on the deck of her small ship. Could it be that when the life force of the people and the country weakened, the beauty became scarce as well, and those seeking that beauty went off into the distant lands? That was what had happened to Crete and to Egypt. Was it the turn of the Hellas? Her heart ached at the mere memory of the divine City of the Maiden. Corinth, Argos and now-demolished Thebes were nothing compared to Athens.
Clonaria approached Thais, stepping awkwardly across the rocking deck. “Do you wish to eat, Mistress?”
“Not yet.”
“The helmsman says Herculea is coming up soon. See? Aegina is already rising from the sea.”
“Where is Hesiona?”
“The Daughter of the Snake[10] sleeps like her foremother.”
Thais laughed and patted the girl’s cheek. “Don’t be jealous. Go wake up the Daughter of the Snake.”
Hesiona appeared before her mistress, having quickly splashed some seawater over her face. Thais asked the Theban of her further intentions. Hesiona had begged her to take her with her, the hetaera had argued, feeling Hesiona was making a mistake by leaving Attica. In Attica she had a greater chance of finding her father because the largest slave market in Hellas was in Athens. Several hundred people were sold off its platform every day. There was a possibility she might find something about philosopher Astiochus through the traders, connected with all cities of Hellas and lands surrounding the Inner sea. Hesiona admitted that she had gone to a fortuneteller after Egesikhora’s nighttime visit. The man had asked her to give him something that had belonged to her father. Not without trepidation, the Theban had handed him a small cameo on a thin chain, which she carried in the knot of her hair. It carried the profile a skillful carver had created of her father on the surface of a greenish “sea stone”, beryllium. Her father had given it to her on her nymphean day, the day she had become old enough to be a bride. That had been only three years prior. The fortuneteller held the cameo briefly in his strange, square-tipped fingers. He had sighed and stated with certainty that the philosopher was dead, and in all likelihood the same fate had befallen Hesiona’s brother.
“You are all I have now, Mistress,” Hesiona said, stubbornly continuing to call Thais by that title, despite Thais’ objections. “How can I not follow you and share your fate? Do not turn me away. Please?” the girl begged, clinging to Thais’ knees.
“Must be fate,” Thais agreed. “But I am not a wife. Nor am I a daughter of an aristocrat, or of royal blood. I am but a hetaera, a plaything of fate, entirely dependent on accidents.”
“I shall never leave you, Mistress, no matter what happens.”
Thais glanced at the Theban, her knowing eyes twinkling with mischief. She stuck out the tip of her tongue, and the girl blushed.
“Yes, yes. Aphrodite herself fears the power of Eros, to speak nothing of us mere mortals.”
“I do not love men,” Hesiona said with disgust. “And if I fall in love, I shall kill him and myself.”
“You are much more a child than I thought judging by your body,” the hetaera said slowly, squinting her eyes at the Herculean harbor.
The little ship was expected in Herculea, since they had correctly calculated the length of their trip. Thais saw Egesikhora, surrounded by a group of soldiers, her mighty stature noticeable from afar. She waited for Thais on board the same ship that had taken her away from Athens. They departed for a three day voyage to Gitius, not far from the delta of the river Eurot. Gitius was in the heart of the Laconian harbor, where Spartan ships were constructed and equipped. Had Euriclidion continued to push them on, the journey could have been as short as two days, but southeast winds were not steady this time of year.
Egesikhora’s friend was in Gitius, assembling his big detachment. His hecatontarchus, squadron leader, was in charge of the ship. Thais didn’t like him because of his overt ogling. He was constantly trying to see through her himation. Egesikhora ordered the soldier around as she wished, not at all bothered by the sincere adoration of smaller commanders, simple spear-bearers who also served as rowers, or of the old one-eyed helmsman, whose only eye — round like that of a Cyclops — noticed everything around him. The man seemed to be everywhere. The slightest imperfection in the strike of an oar, a delay in the turn of the tiller causing a slight loss in their speed, everything caused an abrupt shout from the one-eyed helmsman, followed by a sarcastic joke. The soldiers nicknamed the man a Finikian for his wicked temper, but treated him with respect.
10
Reference to Isis who was frequently portrayed with a snake and, according to legend, had power over serpents.