The other, less worthy reason I made the choice to go is that all of my close friends except Ficino were going: Axiothea, and Klio, and Lysias, and Kreusa. I went despite Ikaros, not because of him.

I have written already about how Ikaros raped me when I was young and naive. I had been sheltered and protected all my life until I came to the city, and I had no instinct for self-preservation. I went off alone with Ikaros, seeking answers to questions, with no idea that he imagined this was a sexual tryst. (It’s hard to believe I was ever so stupid.) I saw him as a man from the romantic and wonderful Renaissance, and I did not consider what that really meant. He had read Plato and loved the idea of the Republic, and he was prepared to concede that women had the philosophic nature. That didn’t mean he had entirely put away the appetites and expectations of his own era. He thought my protests were conventional. He thought I was saying no because society allowed me to enjoy sex only if it was forced on me in circumstances beyond my control. He believed I wanted it, even when I screamed and fought. He was confused, afterward. He tried to make amends. He gave me a book. I remained furious with him—for raping me, and for continuing to act as though he had done nothing. Others adored him, but I kept away from him as much as I could. I didn’t trust him, and I found it harder to trust any men because of him.

I spent eight years in the City of Amazons.

At first it was two thousand people camped out in the fields on the north side of the island. Building the physical city was a challenge. Klio persuaded Crocus to help us. Crocus was one of the two remaining worker-robots. In the debates that followed the Last Debate, both Workers had considered Sokratea, but decided to stay in the Remnant. They had good solid philosophical reasons, but also practical ones—they needed electricity as we needed food, and designing and installing electrical generators elsewhere would be a challenge.