Pherenike - Chapter 41

The exchange of life was something no previous Kybellaune could attest to while alive. Naturally, the dead have no voice. And of course, few of her predecessors would have engaged in such foolishness. Pherenike couldn’t foresee the outcome in advance.

The goddess had made too great a sacrifice for her vow. Perhaps, even the gods did not know how to revive a once-dead human anew.

Thus, what if a living being was pulled out of a certain time and brought back alive?

Pherenike now roughly knew the outcome. The price was learned through the body.

The more she used her power, the more clearly she broke down. She felt pain like death before she was broken. When the Althea left her fingertips, pain visited the spot where she had cut her stomach open. The pain deepened daily, and now it was hard to conceal in front of others.

The resurrected Deucalion had forgotten the pain of death. He didn’t even know he had once died. In contrast, Pherenike’s body remembered the pain of death. It could even revive that moment’s agony indefinitely.

It seemed less an exchange of life than an exchange of deaths.

That was the price. To continuously endure the pain of that moment. To live in unending pain, not ending in death.

Losing strength, fading away.

That day’s pain couldn’t kill her again, but it gradually dragged her body down. She saw visions of dying. Pherenike gave up and further wrecked her body.

It didn’t matter if she viewed it all as a tool. She didn’t think of Deucalion in a world without her. Her real life ended the day Deucalion died at Actor’s hands. She left it there.

All that was true of her self was buried with the first Deucalion, her beloved. In the deserts and the sea. In all those times he didn’t remember, she left it all. Now, all of her was just a worthless fake.

And yet, why…

Of course.

“…I’m carrying Actor’s child.”

For the first time, Pherenike cried. She cried like a child.

At the end of the cave in Ogygia, where Deucalion awaited her like a statue, he moistened his dry lips and slowly opened his arms to embrace her.

It’s okay. It’s your child.

It’s okay…

He spoke with a look as if he was already dead. It was like someone who had forgotten what ‘okay’ meant.

Another season changed. A long, harsh summer ended, and autumn rains began, marking the start of Evdokia’s farming year.

The year in Evdokia always began with the first autumn rain. Autumn was the first season.

Farmers ventured into the wet fields, sowing wheat and barley, praying in the temples. Fires lit up the fields where sacrifices were held. Though everyone had different gods, they all wished for Demeter’s smile.

Fortunately, it was a year of good omens.

Nine days into the new year, the Queen, leading the Sybylles to the banks of the Salonica River, personally offered a sacrifice for abundance. It was the spot where, according to legend, the founding King Pelagon had crossed the river in the form of a wolf.

This year’s offerings came from Paetusa. Nine bulls from the fields of Paetusa and nine mountain goats from the cliffs of Paetusa.

The Sybylles and priests slaughtered these animals one by one on the riverbank, opening their bellies and removing their entrails. The sacred riverbank transformed into a slaughterhouse. Blood from the altar overflowed from a small ditch between the stones and flowed into the river. The dying cries of the animals echoed over the water.

Yet, death was always momentary. The priests’ prayers of abundance swiftly drowned out the final screams of the animals.

Pherenike was the last to wield the knife.

It was considered a highly honorable sacrifice among the Sybylles to take the life of a bound offering. Not everyone did it. The Sybylles were the ears of the sanctuary, listening to the goddess’s voice, and were treated with utmost respect. No one was forced if they chose not to.

Among them were those who had never willingly harmed even a small insect in their lifetime. There were those who devoted their lives to healing others, without seeking any personal gain. To ask such hands to hold a knife.

The sacrifice meant facing the powerless, miserable, and desperate eyes of an innocent creature and extinguishing that light with their own hands. It was more than just feeling like a great villain; it was about willingly killing that gentle creature.

The animal was held by the horns, and the human wielded the knife. It was an utterly one-sided execution. A truly cowardly act of evil.

Never forgetting this fact was crucial when lifting the knife in front of the sacrifice. Their goddess desired the guilt of a good servant girl more than the burnt flesh of the offerings.

The remaining task for the noble priests among the men of the sanctuary was to open the bellies of the animals sacrificed by the women, they took out the entrails and distributed them to their rightful recipients. The lions, the wolves, the eagles, and the humans.