She straightened, took a deep breath, and proceeded, forcing her feet in front of her in slow even steps.
Calliope tried, with great difficulty, not to look too interested as the three of them entered the cavernous entryway. Unlike home, this new place was not literally cavernous on the inside. It was, in fact, palatial. The huge hall was tall enough to accommodate Thelios at his full height, and was opulent in the extreme. Far more so than her own imagination had managed to concoct. Every inch seemed to be covered in variously hued marble, tiled mosaics, or carvings of detailed scenes of a sort one would only expect to find decorating the walls of temples. It was breathtaking. Literally.
She fought to keep herself breathing evenly and normally as her eyes drank in the spectacle.
No less stunning was the variety of living decor populating the hall and visible down side corridors and through the open doors of the rooms they passed. There were men, servants, and though there were some few like Demitri, the majority were beautiful youths as valuable for their aesthetic appeal, no doubt, as they were for whatever service they offered.
And then there were the women. Many of them seemed not human, they couldn’t possibly be, and their unearthly beauty was even more breathtaking than the statuary and mosaics they so easily outshone. Those who were human women were no less impressive in their exquisite clothes and jewelery, though often there seemed to be far more of the later than the former. She couldn’t help but cast a furtive glance at one woman with dark brown skin and large almond shaped eyes who seemed to be wearing nothing at all but jewelery, strategically placed to leave at least a little to the imagination. She wasn’t exactly in the minority either. Many of the women seemed to be wearing little more than a swathe of half-transparent clothe and were wrapped in bracelet’s and necklaces of gold and precious stones, their hair twisted intricately with ivory and silver combs and colorful flowers.
She and Demitri looked very much out of place. It was impossible for her to ignore the gnawing of self-consciousness as she silently and soberly made the comparison between these exotic blooms and herself. They were too beautiful to be real and most were dressed so as to make the skimpy gold dress she occasionally dragged out when she was feeling daring- the one she had been specifically asked Not to wear- look dull and conservative. Their painted eyes followed her along the hall, and she forced her own eyes to remain on Thelios’s back, afraid to look to closely, though why it should bother her as much as it did was a bit of a mystery. She was here for Thelios, and to do her job… that’s all that mattered, wasn’t it?
No, she reconsidered, no woman, however pragmatic, liked such a glaring comparison made of themselves. But, again she reminded herself, she was a servant, and it didn’t matter. She’d just have to get over it. She pursed her lips at herself and sighed.
Easier said than done.
As they proceeded through the halls, making their way from one resplendent sight to another, she dared another glance around and regretted it immediately when she spotted a group of creatures so lovely they couldn’t even be called women. The sight of them made her stomach twist with nerves, their beauty causing much the same reaction in her as her first glimpse of the master. It was almost terrifying. She guessed they must be nymphs though she’d never seen one before. They too wore a few bits of jewelery and wound flowers and gold thread into their hair, but only a little here and there. They clearly needed no adornment. They were literally so exquisitely beautiful that, as trite as it sounded, there were truly no words which could have properly described them. They very literally made the breath catch and the heart flutter like a caged bird.
If she were of the poetic bent she might attempt the heresy of describing them by saying that their skin was nearly iridescent, like pearls, their eyes like sapphires, emeralds, and onyx, and that their shining hair which fell about them in luxurious waves, looking as gleaming and soft as morning dew on the narcissus’s petal.
And probably just as vain, she thought idly, relishing her bitter little joke a moment before necessarily chiding herself for her obvious jealousy.
She pretended not to notice the half hidden glances and occasionally openly amused stares and kept her eyes forward and chin up. Her own elegant, but simple, white, ankle length toga, leather sandals, and unadorned knot of braided, black hair, made her feel like a duck among swans.
Demitri had warned her they’d be opulent here, but she had honestly not been prepared for this. She’d brought the nicer clothes from her little trunk, as she had been bidden, but it was obvious to her she was going to be laughably under dressed… or overdressed, depending on your definition of the term. She was every inch the proper and well dressed lady… which was apparently not the going style.
One of the ironies of this was that Thelios himself was as casually and minimally dressed as always, a fact accentuated by two creatures, giants also, who had appeared at the end of the hall to greet him. There were differences in their appearances, but they were without a doubt the ‘family’ he spoke of. One was significantly smaller than Thelios, with a more gracile face, long pointed ears, and curving horns which swept back from his forehead along with a thatch of thick reddish brown hair. He had an almost human look to his face though his skin was a reddish, light brown.
The other was a cyclops… a proper cyclops, which Calliope found rather unnerving, so she didn’t spend much more time than that examining him, no more than to notice that he was large like Thelios, and seemed taller… but that, she knew, was alterable. The thing that set Thelios apart however what the fact that the others both wore fine looking clothing, robes befitting the surroundings, whereas Thelios had kept his usual attire and looked like he’d just come in from another long day laboring in the sun. As per usual. And what’s more, looking perfectly at ease with the fact… not a trace of self-consciousness. Also as per usual. She only wished she could master such self-possession, and though admiring of it, couldn’t help but be irritated that she was alone in her discomfort.
She had no idea what to do with all this overwhelming information, so she fell back on her training. She stood back and folded her hands demurely in front of her and kept her attention on nothing in particular. She’d been brought up a lady, was dressed like one, so she’d act like one until told otherwise.
But she’d be damned if she’d admit any of that train of thought to Demitri. It would be an intolerable excuse for him to barrage her with ‘I told you so’s.