Psyche

Chapter 16

Psyche had asked to be taken to the bluff alone, with only a pair of palace guards. There had been an argument over whether she would wear a blindfold, but since Psyche had already logically deduced which bluff they were going to take her to meet her fate, the blindfold seemed silly and superfluous.

She had bid goodbye to her parents and carried her own small bags to the spot where she was to wait.

It was, thankfully, a beautiful Atlantean day. The fresh, sweet air filled her lungs, and the sun shone brightly. Flowers bloomed, birds sang, and a gentle wind prevented her from breaking a sweat on the long climb up the bluff.

Psyche wondered precisely what was about to happen to her. Was she really going to be swept up and given in marriage to some sort of supernatural creature? She had heard many tales of supernatural goings-on over the years, but she had never witnessed anything she couldn't explain by science and logic.

It had occurred to her that her "marriage" might be some kind of metaphorical ritual. She knew that in Sumer, which was part of the Babylonian kingdoms, when a man married the goddess, he was really engaging in sexual relations with one of the temple priestesses.

I suppose it's too much to hope for that I am to be given in marriage to some handsome young priest of Ares who likes to create mathematical theorems in his spare time, she thought.

This wasn't a likely scenario. Young virgins, she had read, were far more likely to be thrown into the mouths of volcanoes in a marriage to Hades or tossed in the sea as a marriage offering to Poseidon.

Psyche had to accept that it was very likely that she was to be killed rather than married. It was not a pleasant thought. She did not wish to die.

On the other hand, another possibility troubled her. The possibility that nothing would happen to her at all, that she would sit on the bluff all night and be there in the morning. In that case, she could not return to the palace. While it was nonsense, word of the prophecy had been announced to the people, and they believed it. Some of them even had the good grace to be sorrowful about it. However, if she was not somehow married to the monster of the prophecy, it would cause people great anxiety.

Worse still, the next natural disaster that struck Atlantis would no doubt be blamed on her being somehow rejected by or rejecting the monster, and, although Psyche hated to think ill of her people, many would blame her father for their woes.

Psyche decided to form a plan in her head, in the likely event no magical monster appeared to snatch her away and make her his bride. She had a plain dress of muslin in her bag. She would change into the dress and make a veil for her hair out of one of her scarves. She would make her way to the city and offer her services as. . .something.

Atlantis was a far less dangerous place than other nations she had heard of. Euphemia had told her many horror stories of humans, especially young boys and girls, trafficked into slavery. Even though her father might insist such things never would happen in his kingdom, Psyche was not so naive. It may have happened less, but it happened. She would have to be cautious if she wandered into the capital city alone.

She had never done physical labor, so becoming a washerwoman or a housekeeper was probably not a wise course of action.

However, she did know an awful lot thanks to her hours and hour in the library and the fact that she had benefitted greatly from Nikolas's lessons.

She decided she could easily become a schoolteacher. As she walked and walked toward the bluff, she even started to like the idea of a classroom full of children to whom she could impart knowledge.

She could find a simple, small house where she could walk to the school, perhaps she could even secure such an arrangement near the great library of Atlantis, which was open to all citizens.