“Before you ask, we don’t know the answers,” Pytheas said. “We don’t know if or how he transformed Metis into Athene, or what it really means that she’s his daughter, born from his head. We think it might have something to do with how he treats her, but we might be wrong.”

“I don’t understand,” Thetis said. I didn’t either.

Pytheas smiled at her, not unkindly. “None of us do. I’m not sure even Father understands. He didn’t create the universe, and some of the ways things work are Mysteries even to him.”

“You are speaking of your Father?” Hilfa asked, quietly.

“Yes,” Pytheas said. He looked down at Hilfa.

“Your Father Who is also Parent of the Saeli gods?”

“He’s the father of all the gods in the universe, as far as I know,” Hermes said, smiling at Hilfa with a strange smile. Hilfa didn’t turn towards him.

“And yet you speak so lightly of.…” Hilfa hesitated, and looked at Marsilia.

“We simply say his,” she said. “If you prefer to say gla we will understand.”

“Of gla wrath,” Hilfa finished.

“Yes we do, because we’ve experienced it,” Pytheas said. “And however he may appear in the Saeli pantheons, and whatever he may have done to your people, he is not, to us, a god of wrath. Well, except when we’ve done something to deserve it. Like Metis.”

“Tell us about Jathery,” Marsilia said to Hilfa. “A god of wisdom, but also a trickster, yes?”

“Yes.” Hilfa swung around to face her, his back to Hermes, and counted the aspects off on his long fingers. “The five things that go together: wisdom, trickery, riddles, name-changing, and freedom.”

“Might he have tricked Athene into this?” Marsilia asked.

“She as much as admits that she suspects him of it,” Pytheas said, tapping the letter. “It seems they’ve been friends for some time. Jathery may even have had a hand in persuading her to set up the Republic experiment.”

“Aren’t you forbidden to mingle with gods of other pantheons?” Marsilia asked.

Pytheas and Hermes looked at her with the same puzzled expression. “No,” Hermes answered. “Why would we be?”

“Then why don’t you?” she asked.

“Aesthetic reasons,” Pytheas said. “We live in our own context, our own fabric, culture, framework. They each have their own. We don’t have any reason to meet, to interact. We stay in our own circles because that feels right. But if Athene felt ecumenical, nothing stopped her being friends with Jathery. More’s the pity.”

“And nothing would stop you doing the same?”

“Nothing except context, culture, having nothing in common, and no need.” Pytheas frowned.

“Or how about Yayzu?” Marsilia asked.