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The eve of Nikolas Aetos’ wedding arrived with snow flurries and songs. Spirit wine flowed freely and freshly butchered meats abounded. Mystikos spent the morning conducting their own mock games for the entertainment of our guests, while the honored philosophers traded discourse with the young heroes in the afternoon. When evening came they all gathered to enjoy a feast with my elder cousin’s companions.

This entire day was itself a celebration in preparation for the ceremonies tomorrow. The only portion of the cult not present for the pavilion feast was the Aetos family itself. Instead we were to welcome the newest addition to the family with a grand symposia, hosted in the main estate.

I’d cleansed myself in the bath house with my cousins and donned my finest cult attire for the occasion. The quiet slap of my bare feet against the marble floors of the hall were the only sound to be heard as I made my way to the symposia chambers. The pavilion feast was already well underway. My own would begin soon enough. Then, tomorrow, the wedding. After that, farewell to Nikolas once more. Then…

I paused. In the low light of the sunset, I saw something truly ludicrous taking place in my courtyard. My legs carried me into the gardens and pools of their own volition.

“What are you doing?” I asked the slave tending to one of my ancestors’ filial pools.

“What does it look like?” Sol asked. I tilted my head.

“It looks like you’re draining the pool with a spoon.”

And so he was. As I watched incredulously, the slave dipped a shallow silver spoon into the filial pool and deposited its meager contents into the clay jar beside him. There were seven more jugs off to the side, and three of them were full. How long had he been doing this?

“Why are you doing this?” I asked, when it became clear that he was letting his actions speak for him. He glanced up at me, storm gray eyes flickering with something that was almost annoyance, almost amusement.

“Your cousin’s orders.”

I blinked. “Heron?” Sol nodded, and I found myself laughing. Once it started it didn’t stop. I gripped his shoulder as a brace, nearly doubled over in mirth. “He made you use a spoon?” I finally gasped.

“He did.”

“And you’re actually doing it?” This was too much.

“It was an order from on high.” He shrugged and dipped his spoon back into the water, depositing another few drops into the jar. “Besides, what else is there to do?” My laughter died down to low chuckling, and then faded to a thoughtful silence. I considered the filial pool and its sunkissed waters.

What else was there to do?

“Tell me something, slave,” I said, dipping my spoon into the pool. Sol hummed. “How long do you plan to suffer this?”

“Suffer what? Enslavement?”

“Obviously,” I said. He stared at me for a moment, lost for words. “Has it not lost its lustre yet? Or is it the kiss of the whip that gives you pleasure? I knew Romans were deviants, but still.”

“You’re still upset about the games?” Sol asked. I snorted, dipping my spoon. It really would have been faster to just use our cupped palms.

“What am I, a woman? No, I’m genuinely asking. There’s only so much a man can do to punish himself before it becomes gratuitous. If you keep this up there won’t be anything left of you for the Fates to torment.”

His expression shuttered, right on cue. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“No, that’s where you’re mistaken. I’m the only one who knows what I’m talking about.” I grabbed one of the full jars and dumped it back into the pool. Sol glared murderously at me, but hells, what else was there to do?

“Day in and day out, we’re all just staring up at heaven. Waiting for the sun to rise and thinking to ourselves that this is the day we’ll finally catch it in our hands.” I filled my spoon with water and deposited it in an empty jug, then grabbed another full jug and dumped it back in the pool. “We cultivate virtue so that we can someday break bread with the gods, but what does cultivating virtue mean, really?”

“You’re about to tell me,” Sol muttered. I bared my teeth in a grin and flicked a spoonful of water at his face.

“We exist, body, mind, and spirit. The philosophers preach that the tripartite soul is a balancing act, that we must restrain with reason the hunger in our souls if we are to ascend. Disdain our heart’s natural passions in the pursuit of virtue. Why? For what purpose? Is it our filial duty to be dull?”

“Temperance is virtue,” Sol said.

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“Virtue is performative excellence,” I corrected him. “We agreed before that a man’s purpose was to ascend the divine mountain and throw off his destined threads. Whatever path leads him there, by default, is a virtuous one. Isn’t that so?”

Sol eyed me.

“Results are all that matter. Cultivation is all that matters. If I strangled you here and now, drowned you in this pool, and in so doing ascended to the Sophic Realm, the act would become virtuous by default. Isn’t that so?”

“No.”

“Explain yourself.”

Sol tapped the fingers of his free hand against the pool’s marble rim, his manacle’s severed chain swaying to and fro. “A man is more than just a number,” he said.

“More than just a rank,” I added. He ignored me. Continued to play dumb.

“It isn’t enough to be blessed by heaven,” he said. “Cultivation only makes us more of what we already are.”

Therein lay the issue. There was a reason that some men rose to perilous heights on the shoulders of virtue while others languished in the lowest realms despite living as they should. Heroes and Tyrants were the product of epics. Beloved by the Muses and reviled by the Fates, they were all connected by a common thread. Wicked or kind, monstrous or just, they were interesting. Nikolas had given himself fully to this concept. Enslaved himself to it.