Chapter Fourteen
We traveled as a group back to the tannery, Phile at the center with Eleni once again by my side. As on the walk that morning, Eleni spoke incessantly until the moment the gates to the courtyard came into view. Then she fell silent, and her skin turned ashen gray.
Following her gaze, I noticed two women I had not seen before. One was at least a decade older than myself. The other’s age was impossible to tell, for she clutched at her stomach and hunched so far forward her face was obscured.
Phile hurried toward them, breaking into a sprint. Never had I seen an older woman run in such a manner, and the moment she reached the pair, she scooped the hunched one into her arms.
“That is Chrysothea,” Eleni whispered into my ear. “Her husband used to beat her daily, but he stopped when they discovered she was with child. I hope the baby is safe, that she has not lost another one.”
“Another one?” Sickness swelled within me. The woman had been given a child, only for her husband to take it away. Where were the gods in these moments? Where was Eileithyia, the goddess of expectant mothers?
Another woman joined Phile and took Chrysothea from her, and together, the four women disappeared into the house.
“What do we do now?” I asked.
Eleni offered a small shrug, her face creased with worry.
“Thalia will help her. She is skilled at such tasks. If you do not need your wages today, you should head home. If you do, we can wait in the courtyard.”
I was not keen to spend any extra time in the tannery, but I could not return home without my coins.
Not without risking Morsimus’s wrath. So I headed through the courtyard and into the cold, dark room where the raw wool was cleaned and spun.
The scent of lanolin permeated the air, as thick as the threads it was spun into.
For a while, I remained there alone. Eleni had gone home, and the other women had formed clusters, no doubt discussing the current situation.
Althea and Iphinone were talking together, and I hoped to integrate myself into the conversation, only I had barely plucked up the courage to approach them when Phile reappeared in the doorway.
“Otrera, come with me.”
My pulse drummed and nervousness filled my veins as I followed Phile out of the compound and into the walled garden that led to her home.
Phile moved quickly, and I had to quicken my step to keep up.
When we finally entered a room, she took a seat behind a wooden desk, a reed pen and inkwell sitting on her right and a purse filled with coins on her left.
“You must decide how much you wish to leave with me. To keep hold of so that it cannot be taken from you.”
I barely heard her.
“The baby?” I said instead. “Did she lose the baby?”
I did not need to hear an answer, for Phile’s face said it all. The darkness shrouded her, enveloping the room in an unnatural chill and anchoring my grief within me.
“She will recover,” Phile said, breaking the silence. “The gods have been merciful in that.”
“But the baby?”
“The baby is lost.”
I covered my mouth. My soul ached for Chrysothea, this woman I did not know, and for her unborn child.
“It is not the first time we have encountered such a thing in this village, and I doubt it will be the last.” Phile spoke with detachment.
“We harden ourselves to it, because that is all we can do. There will always be something here to break you if you let it, Otrera, so refuse to let it. Now tell me, have you decided about your wages? Do you wish to take everything or leave some with me for safekeeping?”
I knew I could not deflect again, but I was unsure of my answer.
I did not know this woman. It would have been wise to take every coin she offered and leave nothing to chance.
After all, I could have found my own hiding places to keep a little away from Morsimus.
So far, he had barely ventured from his chamber to the courtyard, so it seemed unlikely that he would be struck with the sudden urge to move furniture.
But when I stood at her desk, my certainty flickered.
It was the ledger on which she wrote the women’s wages that made me second-guess my decision.
Rather than parchment, she used a soft, yellow-tinged sheet of vellum.
I had seen such a material before, created from the skin of young goats.
It seemed fitting that she, as owner of a tannery, would have access to such things, but the expense was significant.
I could not imagine vellum being used for a task so menial as recording women’s wages, yet there it was.
My eyes moved from the coins to the ledger to Phile before I finally spoke.
“Why do you do this? What do you gain?” I asked.
“You could earn twice as much money—three times, I suspect—if you bought slaves to do the work. You could move to any part of Hellas, to Attica or Thrace. You could marry Hirtus. Why this? Why here? Why bring these injured and broken women into your home? What do you gain?”
I spoke bluntly, perhaps more bluntly than I ever had, and to a woman who held my life in her hands.
But I needed an answer. I wanted to know whether I was as safe under her as the other women claimed to be.
But rather than replying, Phile inhaled deeply, pressed her lips together, and gestured to the chair in front of her.
“Take a seat.”
I hesitated. Women like me did not sit at desks. We sat at looms or couches or on blankets on the ground.
“Otrera?”
The old woman’s eyes were trained on the seat before me. Realizing she was waiting, I did as expected and took my place.
As I sat, she moved the ledger aside.
“Otrera,” she said. “Tell me, what are your fears?”
Unexplained anger rippled within me as I sat at this stranger’s desk. She had been my employer for barely one day, yet there she was asking me to divulge my most intimate secrets. To use them against me, no doubt.
“My fears?” I repeated.
“Yes. Don’t worry. I will tell you mine, but I think it would help you understand my choices if we can share this with each other.”
I hesitated. My coins still remained in the purse by her side, so it seemed necessary to answer, though it took some effort.
“I used to fear that I would not see my parents again,” I told her, speaking like the child I did not realize I still was. “But that has come to pass. I cannot imagine a future where I will see them again. Now? Now, I fear that I will never have a child.”
“For your husband?”
“No, for me.” Morsimus’s desires were nothing to me now.
“I fear I will never feel the heartbeat of another inside me. That I will never know that pure love.” Words spilled from my tongue, and I found myself unable to stop them.
“I fear that one day Morsimus will not show restraint and that I will end up dead at his hand. Or that he will make good on his promise and sell me to a whorehouse. Then, if he sells me and I do birth a child, it will be in such a place, and their future…”
I could not continue, for the tears were clogging my throat, constricting the air, and cracking my voice.
Phile nodded, a signal that I could stop.
“Your fears are just indeed. And I promise I will do all I can to ensure they never come to pass. But you will only believe that if you understand my great fear. That which terrifies me more than anything else. The Asphodel Fields.”
“The Asphodel Fields?” I frowned, not sure I understood. “You fear death? The underworld?” That seemed the most likely interpretation, but Phile shook her head.
“No. Not death. The Asphodel Fields. You understand what those are, do you not?”
“Of course,” I said. “They are where mortals roam in the underworld as wraiths. Full of the asphodel flowers for us to feed upon.”
“Yes and no,” Phile responded. “They are where most mortals will reside in the underworld. Those who have committed the most atrocious deeds will end up in the depths of Tartarus. The mortals destined for such a place are the most vile of all the sinners, the most wretched of souls. They are bound to endless sorrow, doomed to an eternity of suffering and agony, fitting for their mortal crimes. When I was young, I feared Tartarus, that I would be one of the wretched, destined to suffer. But as I grew older, my concern lessened. I am not a murderer, nor one who takes advantage of the weak or innocent. I will not be sent to Tartarus. But the Asphodel Fields…those certainly seemed possible.”
“The Asphodel Fields are in all our futures, are they not?” I asked, confused. “Unless we are heroes. Only they get to Elysium.”
Phile pointed her finger at me, her eyes wide.
“Exactly! Only heroes gain entrance to those blissful meadows, a place more beautiful than even Olympus. They taste all the sweetness of the earth, while the only food the wraiths may eat is a single white flower. It is the only sight they will ever see.”
I knew all this. Yet why Phile spoke with such bitterness remained a mystery.
A gentle smile formed on her lips, softening her anger.
“An eternity of half existence as a wraith is not enough for me. My time with Hirtus has shown me what joy is. He has shown me what it is to truly feel. I wish to experience laughter and love beyond the boundaries of life, and such a gift would only be granted to me in Elysium.”
I frowned. Was the old woman mad? It certainly appeared that way. “But you are not a hero?” I said slowly, unsure of how she would react.
“Am I not?” Phile leaned back in her chair and pressed her index fingers together.
“What does a hero do, Otrera? They battle monsters. Protect innocents. I realized before I was wed that I was not Atalanta. I would never gallop on horseback or slay malevolent centaurs with my bow. But I could protect the innocent. When I moved here, I knew at last what I was meant to do. I fight the monsters that infest women’s homes.
I offer safety, heal the injured, and provide courage and hope to those who would otherwise have none.
And maybe, maybe if I do that enough, the gods will look down on Hirtus and I, recognize our deeds, and allow us to be together forever in Elysium. Do you understand?”
As her eyes bored into mine, I saw the truth in her words.
What must it be like, I wondered, to love so deeply that you wished to spend all eternity with another?
So deeply that one lifetime, however blissful, was not enough?
I could not imagine ever feeling such a way.
Still, my heart burned with a new admiration for this strong, honorable woman.
I dipped my chin, first to answer yes and then to gesture to the ledger at her side.
“I will leave a third of my earnings with you,” I said.