Athena was in the best mood she’d been in in a long time. She had taken the opportunity that morning to sleep in as she hadn’t been able to in a long time. There always was so much to do with the war in Egypt and Athenia slowly descending into chaos. She just needed a day to reset and refocus. Of course, with everything going on, she couldn’t just entirely ignore the goings on in the world, but she would take some time to go through some of the easy tasks she had been neglecting. Thus she found herself still in bed, reviewing the things that had been donated to her temple.



At first it was nothing interesting, mostly animals, a few trinkets here and there. Then there was something that caught her eye. A large blue diamond. It was nothing if not intriguing. Not normally the kind of thing she found donated to her. Rocks were more Hephestus’s style. Intrigued, she sat up in bed, her feet on the floor. Who would have given such a gift? She got to her feet and started pacing about excitedly as she saw the name attached to the sacrifice.



Ah, Hector of Arcana. A name she was well familiar with, and not a bad soldier if she did say so herself. And she could say so herself having had the opportunity to fight by his side in Egypt as Phaedra when she helped them sabotage one of the Egyptian mines. This was a man she could always trust to do the right thing, and she wasn’t remotely disappointed. He had found an invaluable item and chose to give it to her instead of use it for himself. He could have kept it, he could have sold it or traded it for food for his family, or at least he could have if there was any food to be had in Athenia. That thought darkened her thoughts only for a moment.



All the mismanagement of her country, the country she was supposed to protect, wasn’t going to upset her now. Hector had proven his loyalty to her, and he deserved to be rewarded. That he should be rewarded was no longer a question. The only thing that remained was how. Now that was something she would have to think on. It should be something that would be not only useful to him, but to Athenia and to Greece as a whole. That he would be properly grateful for it, she had no doubt. If there was one thing you could count on Hector for, it was that if something good happened to him, he’d be right there thanking Athena for it.