Orpheus doubted his wife, even as he dragged her soul from the peace of death. He thought it was love, but those tainted with godhood are rarely permitted such simplicity. It was greed, and and it was arrogance; his aim was simply to prove he could take what others held.

 

Emerging from the cave into Thrace, he swore himself off women, but his vanity and greed drove him to instead seduce their husbands.

 

He assumed, again, that the women would forgive his misdeeds because of his beauty and song.

He was wrong.

 

Women near that cave still wear tattoos of weapons to remind all who need to know: “We killed a god.”