The Golden Mean - Annabel Lyon [75]
“No!” Pythias says as I turn to the door. “She’s mine!”
“You have others. That dark one you like, Herpyllis—”
“You said they were family. You said we don’t sell family.”
“They were never family. Look. Listen. It’s the natural order of things, the natural ends things are fitted to. Means and ends. Some people are born to be slaves, some masters. But sometimes life interferes with the natural order, and things get—confused. We’ve made a mistake with Athea.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I’ve made a mistake. She wasn’t meant to be a slave. She isn’t fitted for it. She wasn’t born to it, and she’s too independent and stubborn to accept that her circumstances have changed. If she were a man, she’d make a physician. I can’t in good conscience keep her.”
Pythias looks at me the way my father looked at me long ago, like something is happening to me, to my face, to the words coming out of my mouth.
“It would be unethical.”
“Free her, then.” Pythias shakes her head once, sharply, like she’s trying to rid herself of something. “Free her and pay her for her services. She’d stay with us as a freed-woman, I know she would. Where else would she go?”
“We’re arguing in circles. I don’t want to keep her. She’s disobedient. You think that will improve if we try to keep her as a servant instead of a slave? It’ll only get worse, and set a bad example to the others. They’ll think we’re afraid of her, don’t dare tell her what to do, don’t dare get rid of her. We have only one option.” An idea occurs to me, a cruel idea. Little Pythias is newly walking now. She clings to Athea’s skirts, following her everywhere, singsonging the slave’s name in her deep little voice. “The baby will miss her, it’s true.”
Pythias goes still.
“And she will miss the baby. They’re very close, those two, aren’t they?”
“She’s a witch.” Pythias raises her eyes to me, slowly. “I’m sick.”
“She hasn’t made you so, and she can’t cure you. Sticks and stones and bones?”
“You will cure me.”
I bow, as though to agree. I’m out of this conversation, anyway, out of this room.
AT THE MARKET THE slaving stalls are crowded, a bad sign for me. War brings uncertainty, tightens purse strings. There’s a glut in the market at the moment and the goods don’t move. The first man I approach sees me coming, gives her a single glance, and shakes his head. The second asks what she does without looking at me or her. He can’t take his eyes off a cockfight a few stalls away.
“Wonderful cook. Good general house slave. Loyal. Good with children.” All true enough, mostly.
“Why do you want to sell her, then?”
“My wife doesn’t like her.” The slaver gives her a tired onceover. “You know how women are. Likes and dislikes coming out of nowhere. You can’t reason with them.”
“Not much to be jealous of there.” The slaver’s eyes drift back to the cocks.
“Hey fuck you,” Athea says.
We try another stall out of sight and hearing of the one we’ve just left. “No talking,” I tell her. I should have brought Callisthenes, I suppose, who’s better at anything requiring charm, but I’m embarrassed that he was right in the first place.
“Or what you do?”
“How much?” the next slaver says.
I quote something low.
“What’s wrong with her?”
“Hey fuck you,” I say, pre-empting Athea and hopefully shutting her up. “She’s healthy. I just don’t need her any more. Household economy and so on. Trimming the fat.”
“You gamble?” He looks interested. He thinks he’s got my number. It’ll do.
“Mind your own business,” I say, in a way I mean him to take for yes. And I probably look like a loser, too, a mild, daintily dressed man with soft hands dragging a grinning slave from stall to stall and finding no takers.
He offers a price, less than half what I paid for her.
“She cooks,” I say.
“Take it,” Athea says. “He look okay.”
The man’s eyebrows go up and a grin starts. He looks back and forth between us, waiting for something to happen. I’m supposed to hit her, I suppose.
“I’ll take it,” I say.
The grin blooms. Even in this market, even for back-talk, he’s got a deal.