*
Iambe slept at last, thinly and miserably. Callithoe left their room silently, creeping like a cat. She went to the kitchen with some notion of helping with dinner.
Doso, alone there, put olives in the press to extract oil. She glanced at Callithoe, frowning. "You do her no favors. Empty promises, that's all you offer her. She has sensed the way of things, the truth, but you will not allow her to keep it."
"What? Are you talking about Iambe?"
Doso grimaced, exasperated. "Of course, Iambe. I know that she weeps at the cruelty of the gods."
Emotion rose up in Callithoe. "How can you know such a thing? Have you spied on us?"
Doso gave a harsh laugh. "I have no need to spy. I smell the loathsome piety all over you, the scent of the laurel tree."
"How dare you speak to me with such disrespect!"
Doso shoved aside the press with sudden violence, and approached like a mad thing, like a wild woman. Callithoe shrank back. Doso's words flew like poisoned arrows.
"Is it disrespect to speak of truth to one who believes lies? You do not know what I know, maiden. You do not know how young life can be snatched in a cruel instant. How even though you sheltered her and nourished her, and carefully planned for her life – her blessed life – the gods might despise your feeble efforts." Doso's voice resonated through the room, past the close walls, like the shrieking of a bird in distress – high and relentless.
Spittle flew from her lips. Her eyes blazed. "Oh, no. You don't know how they turn on everyone – even on their own, and they snatch away that sweet young thing, that beautiful, innocent daughter. They call it a slip, an accident. 'She hit her head on the rocks, mother. It is no one's fault.' But you know the truth, that the King of Hell took her – he who rides a chariot pulled by dark frothing steeds. He dragged her down into the underworld. She tried to come back to you – she would always try to come back – but he wouldn't let her."
She paused, eyes travelling far away, as though she had just heard the words she had spoken. Tears erupted, then. "I looked for her. I flew from place to place, crying after her ..." Her voice petered out, transforming into sobs. Bitter, lonely sobs. They sounded like flesh tearing, like the wailing of the damned on the sea of fire. Doso keened, pulling at her hair, her face twisted.
Movement attracted Callithoe's attention. Metaneira and Cleisidice, both of them dark-haired and solemn-faced, stood in the doorway. Of course they had heard. Of course everyone had heard.
Little footsteps ran up. Demophon, wide-eyed and solemn. He took in the scene without fear. To his child's mind tears were no strange thing.
"Nurse!" he cried. "Don't cry, dear nurse."
He went to her, and put his hand on her arm, heedless of her red face and the grief so explosive that she shook with it. He buried his face in her breast, hushing her like she had hushed him so many times.
"Dear nurse," he repeated. "Dear, dear nurse."
The torrent of tears increased for a few moments as she clung to him, her gnarled hand gentle as she stroked his hair.
"You are feeding the rivers, nurse," he told her, after a moment.
She gave a little laugh, sniffling. Callithoe recognized the words as ones Doso herself had used when Demophon wailed about something so devastating and trite that he forgot about it in the next moment, as children do so often.
Callithoe felt the approach of her mother and sister behind her. The three of them withdrew as of one mind, letting Doso gather what comfort she could in the arms of the youngest among them.