The large Frieshian horses galloping in all their hearts’ content, like breaking free from all of their burden. They chased after the three smaller horses running ahead of them. Leaving the Kataratos settlement, Pryne held tight on Aethon’s saddle while Arete was on top of her with a two point position. Pryne was not skilled in horse riding, which made Arete feel a little doubt about the decision of bringing her along their journey.

Her strategy worked accordingly as the Friesian horses chased after them. Without their horses, Harald and his men might stay at Kataratos until the resources from Thebes arrive. The risk she took was to trust him that they would not do any harm towards the villagers.

The next thing she had in her mind was to escape from those Freshian horses. They were large in size and would have caught people's attention if they followed them along. Arete took a peek at the rising sun, estimated that they had been traveling for about an hour. As she expected, the Frieshains slowed down, and some of them fell to the ground.

“What? Did you poisoned them?” Agave asked in surprise.

“I just feed them the flowers!” Arete replied. She noticed how the flowers worked on Harald, and used it on those horses. Although she could not guarantee it would work on animals, she simply let luck play its course. When she noticed those horses were no longer following them, she slowed Aethon down. She then plucked an acorn from the nearby oak tree and threw it towards Agave, hitting her head.

“Ouch! That hurts!” She shouted, clueless about why Arete suddenly did that.

“Stop staring! Pervert!” Arete was aware of Agave who kept staring at her in a peculiar manner.

“I’m not staring at you! Why does she have to sit in front of you by the way?”

“She’s heavier than me! Obviously! How do you expect a horse to gallop if she sits behind any of you?” The decision was the best that she knew of, since Agave and Matea were both heavier and it was impossible for Pryne to sit behind Agave while she was carrying a gold thyrsus. She also noticed that Matea was shying away, keeping her distance behind both of them, avoided looking at that beautiful lady in front of her.

“Alright, I must reduce some load from Aethon. He is tired.” Arete grabbed Pryne’s hand to release her from Aethon’s saddle. She then pushed the lady to the side while Aethon was still trotting.

“Ah!” Pryne lost her balance and screamed. She was about to fall, but Arete knew Matea would come to her side and pulled her to the back of Black as she expected.

“Hey! You should at least tell me if you want me to switch over!” Pryne shouted angrily at Arete, but Arete was intentional. Confirming that Matea had been staying alert even though she was not looking at them.

“Hmm… I’m glad that you have developed a new interest other than doing harm.” She leered at Matea with a smirk.

“Yes ma’am.” she replied with her usual two words. An expression which Pryne found rather unfamiliar, as Matea used to be slightly muddle-headed based on the few weeks they stayed at the camp. But her response to Arete made Pryne feel as if Matea was a different person.

The bulls slowly pulling a large metal carriage along the way towards Eretria. The entourage of the Empress Sporus included troops of Roman cavalry, and multiple wagons that carried exotic animals and treasures. Chlorus was sitting in one of the carriages, while the Three Elders were on another simpler wagon. The journey was significantly slowed down due to that large unknown metal carriage. A thing that the Empress insisted on bringing along to Eretria as an offering gift for the Teleios of Eretria.

“General Chlorus! We saw an abandoned village in front of us!” a troop reported.

“It is about 20 stades away.” he continued when he saw Chlorus come out of his carriage.

“Describe the scene!” He ordered.

“The village was abandoned. Nobody was there but we saw some dead bodies in a nearby shallow tomb. The corpses were without wounds.” he described.

“That’s probably due to disease!” Chlorus took a deep sigh.

“Order the troops to change course! We shall not pass through that area! The Empress is with us, we cannot risk getting sick on our journey.” He ordered.

“Sir, this will further delay our journey. The Elders will not be happy to hear that.” his advisor said.

“Let the Empress talk to them. I’m sure she wanted this journey to be safe for her own sake.”

Eretria, the city-state flourished with the offerings brought to the temple of Aphrodite, mainly for the service of their hetairas, especially from the foreign ship captains who could spend dozens of talents for a night. For this lucrative reason, thousands of beautiful and attractive men and women had given their bodies to the goddess.

Hence, their culture had a deep problem of prejudice against less attractive people. Under the rule of a demigod archontes named Heracle, those who did not qualify for their standard of beauty were believed to be cursed by their goddess, and would be deported out from the city-state. However, some believe that it was merely an excuse used by the archontes to eliminate his rivals.

After two days of travel from Kataratos, Arete and the ladies arrived at Eretria on their horses. Pryne guided them to a secret passageway near the city gate. When the guards saw her, they were all excited.

“My Lady, you’re back!”

“Quick, prepare the clothes for Lady Pryne to change into!” The maids called.

“Get me everything, and dress up our guests too,” Pryne ordered.

They entered a room; it was a large extravagant room full of mirrors and marble statues, finished and unfinished. Those statues all looked like Pryne.

“That… is very… narcissistic.” Arete whispered in disbelief.

“Hey, it’s not what I wanted!” Pryne replied. The room was large and Arete’s whispers could easily be heard.

Pryne removed her cloak. Her perfect figure was far more beautiful than all the statues in the room. Those statues were mostly nudes, every part of the body was carved in detail.

Arete, hugging her own thin and flat body, thought, “I’m still young, I can still grow.”

Agave, squeezing her tummy, thought, “Why can’t my fat gather at the right places?”

“Pst, Cuz…” They looked at Matea, who kept her eyes looking at the ground.

“That’s a familiar expression of ‘low self-esteem’…” said Arete.

“Corset, breast pads, dyes, makeup, organza, silk, jewelry…” The maids brought the items into the room.

“You need to disguise yourself to fit in, Eretrian will recognize you as outsiders if you don’t make yourself presentable.” said Pryne.

The maids helped them to dress up and put on makeup.

“My Lady, we have a difficult case here…” the maids called.

“How shall we dress her?” They realized that Matea was full of scars. She drew herself back when the maids tried to approach her to remove her linothorax.

“Let’s just dye the hair black and dress her up as a cupbearer.”

Scars… Something just came to Arete’s mind.

“Pryne, you were attacked by a bear a week ago, why is there no scar left on you?”

Pryne was stunned by Arete’s question.

“Our mission in Eretria is to find the Teleios of Eretria…” Arete continued.

“According to our information, she’s the most beautiful woman and all statues and paintings are based on her image.”

Arete had been suspecting Pryne to be the Teleios according to vitellus’s description. With all the statues in the room as evidence, she just needs Pryne to admit that she is the person they are looking for.

To be continued…