Athens was buzzing with the promise of the Dionysia, but the celebration was a feverish mask on a sick face. The air was a tapestry of contradictions: the sweet aroma of myrrh and barley cakes tried in vain to suffocate the stench of plague rising from the alleys. In the Agora, politicians in embroidered tunics debated the war, while masked actors recited verses to an audience with glazed eyes.
Roxana climbed the hill of the Acropolis, Alcibiades's invitation burning in her hand. In the courtyard, magistrates drank, their voices echoing emptily.
— Ah, the messenger from Lesbos! — Alcibiades's voice, slick and oily, cut through the air. He emerged, his smile calculated. — You still carry that look of a wounded eagle. Charming.
Roxana forced a smile that didn't reach her eyes.
— I came for the verses.
— Verses? — He laughed, pointing to a stumbling poet. — Listen to this fool! He's babbling about submerged queens. Drunkard's poetry. Even you could do better.
She tried to move away, but he was already pulling her into a circle of generals. Roxana feigned interest, her mind analyzing the scene. Poetry was a weapon, and here in Athens, they wielded it poorly, like children playing with daggers.
It was then that Alcibiades's voice rang out, triumphant and cruel:
— Gentlemen! We have had talented artists. However, today we have a true jewel of the muses. Roxana of Lesbos, disciple of the legendary Sappho!
He pointed her out like a hunter displaying his prey. Roxana froze. The chatter ceased. All eyes, curious and predatory, turned to her. The applause began, a trap closing in.
Alcibiades met her at the foot of the stage, offering her a cedar lyre, his gaze a mixture of malice and challenge.
— Honor the muses, Roxana. Show these barbarians what true art is.
The blood boiled in her veins. Punch him, the Survivor's voice hissed in her mind. But the Poetess, more cunning, regained control. She snatched the lyre from his hand with a contained violence and raised it like a shield, silencing the crowd.
— Alcibiades is too kind. This honor belongs to Sappho, my master. If I sing today, it is with her voice.
The audience murmured, recognizing the name. Roxana sat on the fragile stool. Her heart hammered. Breathe. Let the verses pass through you. And then, she made her choice. She would not sing to entertain. She would sing to confess. She chose Sappho's poem of farewell, an open wound disguised as art. They would hear the pain of a famous poetess; she would bleed for the sister she had lost.
She closed her eyes. She didn't see the crowd. She saw Serylda's face, the burning port, the smell of salt and ash. Sappho's hands guiding hers over the strings. When her voice emerged, it was not a whisper, but a river of restrained pain, soft and deadly. The melody wrapped the courtyard in a reverent stillness.
I tell you, I honestly wish I were dead.
She left me, undone by her tears, saying:
"Ah, what a bitter fate is ours!
Sappho, I swear, I leave against my will."
"Go then, and be happy," I said,
"And remember all the love I have for you..."
When the last chord dissipated, the silence remained, dense, heavy, more real than any applause. Then, her eyes opened and swept across the crowd. Confused faces. Bored faces. Drunken faces trying to look moved. And then, they landed on a single face.
Leaning against a column, at the edge of the celebration, was him. The Spartan.
He was motionless, not applauding. His face was a mask of stone, but his eyes... in them, Roxana saw no admiration. She saw recognition. A mirrored pain, an understanding so deep it stole her breath. For an instant, he gave the slightest nod of his head. Not a bow. An acknowledgement. A soldier saluting another's scar.
In that farce of a party, he was the only real person in the courtyard.
The spell, however, did not last. The silence was shattered by forced applause and the chatter of business deals resuming with full force. The moment of truth had been swallowed by banality. Alcibiades was already dragging her to the center, where politicians praised her "exotic grace" as if appraising a rare vase. He had tried to make her an object, and she had answered with her soul. But in the end, he was still selling her.
As night fell, she looked for the man by the column once more. He was gone, leaving behind only a stain of wine on the marble, red as the blood she knew so well.