Pherenike - Chapter 145

It happened in an instant. The lion, which had been silently staring at the old man, suddenly leapt high into the air. The great shadow of the beast swallowed the old man whole. The soldiers went pale.

“Aaagh!”

As the old man hit the ground, he screamed in agony as all his insides were crushed. He stared, almost in a daze, as the lion’s white fangs sank into his belly—his last sight in this world. The lion’s teeth tore through his skin as easily as ripping loose cloth, pulling out his entrails and scattering them onto the ground.

The old man, gasping desperately as he saw his own organs spilling from his body, died within seconds. The lion didn’t eat any part of him; it simply raised its blood-stained face, red with the old man’s blood.

Terrified, the soldiers stumbled back. The handmaiden had long since disappeared.

Yet Pyra still stood there, holding the dog’s leash tightly, unmoved.

“…You do understand human speech, don’t you?”

“Pyra, we need to get inside the hut—please, let’s go inside.”

“You know the princess is your old master’s daughter. And that this stray dog belongs to her. Yes, you know everything, don’t you?”

Oblivious to the horrified stares of the soldiers, Pyra continued speaking gently to the lion, as if coaxing a kitten.

“The princess loves this dog dearly, doesn’t she?”

“Pyra, please…”

“And you saw this poor dog take a beating for fear of exposing you, yet it didn’t make a sound or resist. It might not be as clever as you, but it’s very smart. That’s why the princess cherishes it as well.”

“……”

“If this pitiful creature were to lose a leg and limp forever after, can you imagine how sad our little Princess Leuce would be?”

Atalanta narrowed her eyes and stepped forward. Pyra, as if she’d been waiting for this, yanked the dog’s leash close and pressed a dagger to its throat. Watching the lion dig its claws into the earth, Pyra gave a mocking little nod.

“Good.”

Meeting Pyra’s gaze, Atalanta slowly lay down in place. Pyra smiled, a deep, satisfied smile.

“Animals really are clever, aren’t they?”

Dexikos waited for the sun to set. When the distant sky was ablaze with the red of twilight, he waited for night to fall. The woman had told him to wait for the right moment.

And so, like a well-trained hound, he remained, patiently waiting for his former mistress. Since coming under Deucalion’s eye, most of his youth had passed this way—waiting, watching, as the proud silhouette of a girl seated alone in the sanctuary gradually matured into that of a woman.

His old mistress, still under the watchful eyes of the guards, knelt by the window, forehead pressed to hands folded atop the wide sill, pretending to pray. But Dexikos, through long experience, knew full well that this stubborn woman was certainly not seeking any god at a time like this.

Dexikos could tell just by looking at the back of Pherenike’s head. Right now, she was simply making sure that no one dared approach her. Perhaps, in truth, she wasn’t even bothering with that—perhaps she was just holding herself in check, alone.

Every child raised in the sanctuary learned, usually through the pain of beatings, that false prayers were the very first thing to unlearn, long before true faith ever took root.

Pherenike herself had been struck countless times by her old teacher’s rod. Yet, as far as Dexikos knew, not once had she ever repented or learned a lesson from those punishments.

So after the old woman became nothing but a name—Kybellaune, the High Priestess—and was no longer able to discipline her, what could possibly have taught Pherenike anything new? She had always committed little blasphemies before the goddess without a hint of hesitation.

She never really had the temperament of someone chosen by the gods. But even a shepherd in the fields can’t treat every sheep with perfect fairness; even in a pot of identical green plants, there are always some that catch the eye more than others.

If the storytellers in the city weren’t simply making fun of the gods, then it was true: the gods always loved in ways mortals couldn’t fathom. After all, who could hope to understand Kronos’s son? The great Zeus’s love was not simply measured by the number of nymphs and princesses he brought to his bed.

Perhaps the gods’ love was just that—gazing down from on high, favoring whatever they found most beautiful. If so, then surely it wasn’t strange for the goddess to choose a troublesome daughter over all her faithful handmaidens. The gods, after all, always love in unfathomable ways.

Once, long ago, a priest’s son had wept that the goddess’s sacred love was being wasted on a wicked girl, and received a slap across the face from his father. Young Pherenike had watched that little farce without so much as blinking.

Maybe the story was always destined to turn out this way. Reverence and rejection have always resembled each other—whether to look up in awe or to trample down, it all begins with separating one from the group, leaving it to stand alone.

Kronos: The youngest son of Gaia (Earth) and Uranus (Sky), who overthrew his father to become the ruler of the gods, only to later be overthrown himself by his own son Zeus. Here, Kronos is referenced as Zeus’s father.