Free The Marathon Conspiracy by Gary Corby Page A

go. Gaïs was one of those. She grew up here.”
    “It’s a wonder she isn’t married,” I said. “She certainly should be.”
    “Yes, I wondered about that too,” Diotima said. “I never expected to find her still here.”
    It was the norm for girls to have marriages arranged for them by the time they were fifteen. Any significant age past that, and eyebrows were raised: people would start to wonder what was wrong with the girl. Diotima had been preserved to twenty because of her unorthodox parentage, but that was all to the good, because it had saved her for me, who otherwise would never have met my perfect girl. Gaïs had no such excuse.
    I thought about the temple complex. Although it was beautiful, it was also very small; a world totally enclosed, with the same priestesses, who never came or went, and children who were replaced every year. A child who lived here had no chance to make any permanent friends. It was no wonder Gaïs went crazy. Then I thought about what the crazy woman had said. I hesitated, slightly afraid to ask, but I wanted to know.
    “Diotima, why did Gaïs say that Artemis would prevent you from marrying?”
    “I’d rather not talk about that, Nico.”
    “Oh.” I was taken aback. I’d thought we had no secrets.
    “Didn’t we just agree she was crazy?” Diotima said. “Crazy people say crazy things.”
    I asked, “What was she going on about, with all that talk of the dead drinking dust in Hades?”
    “It’s true,” Diotima said.
    “The subject doesn’t usually come up in casual conversation.”
    Diotima hesitated. “I don’t know. It sounded to me like she thinks Ophelia’s dead.”
    “Or she
knows
Ophelia’s dead.”
    “You might be right,” Diotima admitted. “I don’t like Gaïs, but I’d hate to think she had something to do with this.”
    “Let’s find out.” I nodded in the direction of the Sacred Spring. Torches had been set up there, the spikes of their long, thin wooden poles pushed into the soil. In the flickering yellow-red light, I could see only silhouettes, but the shape of Gaïs was distinctive, even when she was wearing clothes. She was taller than the girls, but thinner than every other priestess. No one could miss her as she jumped and spun. A handful of the Little Bears were with her. They all weaved in and out of the light, and as they moved they sang. I could barely hear the words, but it sounded like a hymn to Artemis. Gaïs seemed to have a thing for Artemis even above what you might expect of a priestess.
    I helped Diotima to rise, and together we walked to where the girls danced. I noticed that though the spring was nearby, the torchlight didn’t quite extend to its edge. I hoped nobody would fall in.
    Diotima and I watched the dance for a few moments. It was something you’d never see in Athens, where girls are mostly kept inside, and certainly never allowed out on their own. It occurred to me that the only girl-children I’d ever seen in Athens were eitherslaves or the daughters of citizens out on errands in the company of their mothers, or on special ceremony days when the girls would lead the public processions. But girls playing in the street? It never happened in the city. Only boys played outside. Here, it happened every day. I wondered how a child might react to such sudden freedom. It was a good thing they had a sensible woman like Doris to keep them in line, like the mother she was. Gaïs, I could see, being so much closer to the girls in age, was more like a big sister. She danced with every bit of the same energy as the children, as she laughed and sang to her Goddess. There was nothing now of the oddness that we’d seen in Gaïs that afternoon.
    I waved to the leader of the pack. “Gaïs! Can we have a word with you?”
    Gaïs started. She hadn’t noticed us, standing in the dark. She told the girls to keep going and walked over to us. She was dressed in a priestess chiton, but one she had torn down to fit her slimness. She