“Plato says brothers and sisters can marry if the gods allow it,” Hilfa said, looking up. “We could ask Arete. Or Pytheas.”

“No,” I said, as firmly as I could.

“Pod formation is always difficult,” Hilfa said, undeterred. “But we’re a good team. We’ll work it out.”

He walked off down the street towards his own house. It had been a long evening full of strange conversations, but that might have been the strangest of all.

19. Marsilia

19

MARSILIA

The next morning, Alkippe and I went to Florentia for breakfast, the way we did every day. I put on my best kiton, because there was a Council meeting. The meeting of the previous evening seemed to have happened long ago, because so much had happened since and my priorities had shifted so much. Even counting the extra time I had spent with Hermes collecting Athene’s messages, it couldn’t be more than a day and a half’s worth of hours, but it felt like years. Time was a strange thing even when it didn’t have gods messing about with it.

It was a beautiful day, with warm sunlight, though a chilly edge to the wind whispered that summer was over. Dad was sitting at our usual table, eating nut porridge with Arete, Klymene and a couple of Bronzes I didn’t know. We made our way across the room, greeting friends and the morning’s servers as we helped ourselves to porridge and fruit. Alkippe slid in next to Dad, and I sat opposite them, next to Klymene. Dad introduced the strangers as Akamas, the human, and Slif, the Sael. “We’ve been up all night at the spaceport,” Dad said. “Akamas works the communications there, and Slif has been starting to learn the space-human language.”

“How’s it going?” I asked.

“Pretty much on track,” Klymene said. “I think they believe us, and I think their initial delegation will come down tomorrow morning. They’ll be three humans and six Workers. They have much better medical technology than we have—that’s something we haven’t been able to trade for with the Saeli or the Amarathi.”

“Sixty-One is back on duty translating now, and the new shift have taken over,” Dad said. “I’m going to go to the meeting and then sleep all afternoon.”

“I’ll be very very quiet if you’re sleeping in the afternoon,” Alkippe said. She was holding a spoonful of honey above her porridge bowl and turning it so that it fell in a slow spiral.

“You’ll be in the palaestra, so you can be as loud as you like,” Dad said.

Alkippe laughed and stirred her porridge. “I’d have to be very loud in the palaestra to wake you at home!”

Dad grinned back at her. “Maybe if you were wrestling and you brought somebody down with a big thud and a loud grunt!”