Since even Diana had no idea what the so-called "trial" entailed, Thea decided to stop worrying about it entirely. The time wasn't fixed, and that "divine oracle"? Please. Who were they trying to fool? You name a hulking black-skinned warrior "Artemis," and we're supposed to believe the gods personally approved?
The rules would obviously be written by a few ancient crones tilting the field in their own favor. They'd slap the word divine on anything to make it sound sacred. Fine, Thea thought, her expression calm and detached, you old frauds play priestess all you want. She tugged along the still-brooding Diana and went back to the temporary quarters.
Diana, all enthusiasm and genuine warmth, had already decided to move in with her. She'd told her mother she wanted to "understand the world outside" better—really, she was just dying to talk to someone who'd seen it.
Thea was sorting through her remaining gear. She didn't have much left; anything enchanted she'd tucked into the mark-space within her tattoo. The flash drives gifted by Atom and Captain Cold were sealed there too—she'd wrapped them in a bit of magic on instinct before the explosion, and now that space was locked. Who knew what condition they were in.
Her Kevlar armor had reappeared automatically once the fusion form broke, the hoverboard had survived because she'd stuffed it into a side pocket, and her mechanical arm was disguised as jewelry. Somehow, all of that had made it through.
The only true loss was her bow and the infrared goggles that had accompanied her for nearly two years—now scattered somewhere in the cracks of time. She sighed.
Just as she was brooding over the limits of her sealed storage, Diana showed up carrying several neatly folded robes.
"These are for me?"
Thea held up one of the rough linen dresses, examining it critically. "Charming. Everyone's size, no style whatsoever."
Changing was easy—mainly a matter of un-changing out of the battle suit—but the process left Diana wide-eyed.
"Oh! That's underwear, isn't it? I've seen illustrations in books but never the real thing! It's so smooth—let me touch—hey, don't run away!"
Getting flirted with by a purehearted Amazon was not on Thea's bingo card. She grumbled, shoved her arms through the shapeless robe, and tied the cloth belt around her waist.
"Where exactly are we going?" she asked as they left the quarters. Diana led the way down a torch-lit path toward a cliffside cavern. Thea followed, increasingly suspicious.
If she hadn't already known this woman would one day be Wonder Woman, she might've thought she was being dragged off for something… unmentionable. "You do realize it's the middle of the night? What's in the cave?"
"The Bathing Pool! A gift from the gods," Diana said as if it were obvious. "Don't you outsiders bathe? I heard the outside world is still full of the Black Death—"
"Stop! Stop right there!" Thea nearly choked. "No plague. None. And yes, we bathe."
She finally understood: the girl's curiosity about the outside world was explosive. The more her mother forbade her from leaving, the more obsessed she became, feeding herself on every old scroll she could find. Thea sighed inwardly. She'll leave this island someday. Hippolyta knows it too—that's why she let her tag along with me.
The cave opened into a pool of shimmering green water, the color a trick of light off the stone walls.
Amazons, Thea realized, had an extremely simple concept of modesty. Diana shed her half-armor, unfastened the battle skirt, and kicked off her sandals. And that was that—nothing left.
Her beauty was… overwhelming. The divine blood in her veins had perfected her body to the edge of human symmetry. Even with all her own miraculous transformations, Thea still fell short by a notch—especially in certain departments best left unmentioned.
Still, refusing to be outdone by a woman from antiquity, Thea stripped down too, dropping the coarse robe and unhooking her undergarments. She tested the water. Warm. Faintly herbal. Pleasantly clean.
"Not bad. You Amazons do know how to live." She turned to comment—and nearly fell face-first into the pool.
Because Diana, completely unabashed, was holding Thea's bra, rubbing the fabric between her fingers with a look of deep fascination.
"Diana!" Thea snatched it back. "That's private. Very private."
"Oh—sorry. It just smells nice. Do all outsiders smell like you?" Diana apologized at once, but her curiosity remained perfectly intact.
Two naked women having a perfectly serious conversation—it looked absurd even to Thea. She dragged the girl into the water until the surface hid everything and finally felt she could breathe again.
As for that "smell," embarrassing as it was, Thea had noticed it herself. Her cycle hadn't come in months. The more sunlight she absorbed, the less human her body felt. Whether she was becoming divine or mutating into something else entirely, she couldn't say.
"I'm a hero," she said with a smirk. "You can't expect everyone to be like me." If the average human had her physiology, Kryptonians would've been the ones worrying about invasion.
"What are you doing?" she asked when she felt Diana leaning closer, expression intent, nostrils flaring slightly.
"You're different," Diana murmured. "Your scent—it's beyond anything recorded in the texts. Are you a child of the gods too?"
Thea blinked. Malcolm would die laughing if he heard a demigod call him a god.
But this was clearly a misunderstanding, and a harmless one. She turned slightly, showing the unicorn tattoo on her shoulder blade. "This is my blood-mark. My power comes from here."