“But you didn’t want to, that time back in Corinth.” I strung more fish onto another stick.

She shook her head without turning around. “I don’t know why it should be. Lots of girls get caught when they don’t want it at all, but lots of women trying without really wanting it can’t manage it. And some who do desperately want it can’t, and that’s the saddest thing of all. I’d give up trying and fretting and just see what the gods send if I were you.”

“Lysias—”

“He’s a funny one,” Kreusa said, turning back and picking up the stick I held out to her. “He’s not Greek.”

“Neither am I,” I said.

“No, but you’re not what he is either.” She sighed and put the fish on the rack. “It probably makes no difference. Some men want sons to be their heirs. If he comes from that kind of family, well. Or even if not, if he wants children so much there’s nothing you can do about it. You’re not too old. But time is not on your side.”

I picked up another fish and another stick. “He says he’ll do all the work with the baby and leave me free for philosophy and teaching. Well, as free as I am now.”

She laughed. “Perhaps he will, but what will you do if he doesn’t? Men, eh?”

“We’re equal here,” I said. “In the City of Amazons there are more women than men, especially among the guardians. We can make a real difference.”

“And yet you’re still trying to have a baby because your man wants one?” She laughed bitterly, then began to turn the fish before they started to scorch.

“It’s very difficult,” I said.

I persuaded Lysias to eat more meat and less fish, even though he preferred fish, but it didn’t make any difference. My blood continued to come with infuriating regularity. At first we consoled each other, and then we stopped talking about it, until at last we only talked about philosophy and politics and other neutral subjects. All in all we tried to conceive a child for six years, with no result at all. Other women seemed to have no difficulty conceiving, even other Masters. I continued to help as a midwife as our birth rate rose, along with teaching and working and serving on committees. Ikaros and I opposed each other almost as a matter of course all this time. Axiothea joked that if we ever did agree then the matter was sure to be settled.