I wanted to know about the conference. Maia wouldn’t talk about it, but my brothers told me everything.

Ikaros had come to the conference. I asked Phaedrus to heal him while he was in town. He was reluctant. “He couldn’t help but notice!” Father had talked to us seriously about not being caught using our powers.

“He already knows about me. We can arrange it so that he thinks I’ve healed him,” I said. “Come on Phaedrus, think about it, he’s nearly blind and he loves reading.”

“He wouldn’t tell anyone,” Porphyry assured him.

“All right then. But not until after your initiation. You won’t have time to pretend it’s you until then.”

I had to be content with that.

The day after the conference was the Ides, and therefore the day set for me to swear my oath to the Republic, and become an ephebe and be given my metal. It wasn’t the grand affair it had been when the Children swore, or even five years ago when my brothers swore. Then there had been so many new ephebes that almost the whole city turned out to see them swear. But nevertheless, it was an occasion. Since all the envoys were still in town and many of them knew me and wanted to come, it was going to be a big public event, with a proper feast afterward, with a sheep roasted on a spit, and bannocks, and cream cheese, and plums stewed with honey. Hebe, one of my friends in the Florentine kitchens, told me about the preparations.

I had a new kiton, dyed orange and blue in the wool and woven in ocean pattern. Mother had been embroidering the hem when she died, and I had thought I’d wear it with the pattern unfinished. But Euklides had finished it for me while I’d been away. I could see where he’d taken it over, the lilies and scrolls were less even, and the colors less precise than the ones Mother had done. But it was wonderful that he had taken the time to finish it for me. I felt loved as I put it on for the first time on the morning of the Ides. I kept my hair loose for the ceremony.