“And what she did to Sokrates?” Kallikles asked.

“He was her votary. You can do whatever you want to your votaries. And no other gods can do anything to them.” He looked ashamed. “We don’t always behave as well as we should.”

“And it’ll be made into art?” I asked.

“Eventually, inevitably, yes,” he said. “Everything we do will be.”

“What?” Kallikles asked.

“I told Arete this. Our lives are art. It’s part of being a god.”

“And for a hero?” he asked.

Father shrugged. “It depends on their deeds.”

The three of us looked at each other, and then back at Father. He shook his head. “Just be careful. And try to be careful what other people see. They’ll react to you very differently if they know. Think carefully.”

“Rhea,” Kallikles said. Of course, she would be his first thought. “I’ll have to tell her as soon as we get back.”

Father looked at him sympathetically. “Maybe she’ll understand the way Simmea did.”

Erinna, I thought, sadly. There were already too many gulfs between us. My age, and Father’s nature, and her silver rank, and now this.

Then Phaedrus gasped, and we turned to him. He was a little way behind, and he was walking a handspan or so above the pine must of the forest. It didn’t seem strange, and then it did, to see my brother walking on air unsupported. Bold Kallikles took a leap and joined him. I hesitated, but Phaedrus put out his hands to me, grinning. I reached for his hand and took a step up onto nothing, and the nothing held me up, and we were all standing above the ground, walking on air. The strangest thing was that it didn’t take any effort and didn’t feel unnatural. It was as if I’d always been able to do it but had been shuffling away on the ground out of habit. I ran a few steps up the air, laughing, until my head was almost at the top of the pines. Then I saw Father, still scuffing his feet down in the must, and stopped.

“All right,” he said. “Now before you go any further up, show me how you’re going to come down.”

Coming down was difficult, much harder than going up. We couldn’t do it for a moment. I figured it out first—I took big exaggerated steps downward, as if descending an invisible staircase, and the boys copied me. When my feet touched the earth I felt unexpectedly heavy and almost fell. It reminded me of how walking on Amorgos felt strange after the motion of the ship. I took a cautious step, and then another. The boys were down now too, staggering and shaking their heads.

“What else?” Phaedrus asked. “What else can we do?”