"So like I said her name's Melite," I explained before taking another bite of my pizza slice. Then after munching on that I continued, "Her dad had the coins made, I think she said there were only a hundred of them? They were supposed to commemorate her arranged marriage to some Achaemenid dude named Kleisthenes. Except obviously that never happened, thank the goddess."

Uncle Bruce and Aunt Mary exchanged a bemused look. Then my uncle asked, "And you said this all happened at Methymna? But you don't know when exactly?"

After washing the pizza down with a gulp of cola I shook my head, "I don't know what year it was on our calendar, but I'm sure you could figure it out. I know it was a couple years after some big revolt? That failed, and the Achaemenids reconquered the whole area including Macedonia and Thessalia. I think? Or maybe it was Thrace. Anyways there were rumours they were building another fleet so they could come back and fight some more. I think they were going after Attica and Laconia next, wherever that is? That didn't happen while I was there, but we were all worried it was coming."

"You said the coins were struck by the girl's father," Bruce asked. "Do you remember who he was, his name or anything? I'm assuming he must have been someone important, if he was minting silver tetradrachm with his daughter's face on them."

I shook my head, "It's a distater, not a tetradrachm. Although I still don't know what's the difference?"

My uncle smiled, "Different monetary systems. A distater is two staters, tetradrachm is four drachma. In practice they're very similar though, only a gram or so apart in weight. In general terms staters were an older standard, drachm were newer."

"Oh ok," I nodded. "Anyways Melite's dad's name is Timoleon. He's the magistrate of Methymna, except some people called him a tyrant."

"I only saw him a couple times," I continued, although I scowled a little at the memory, "But from what I could tell the guy's a real jerk. I know my dad's not great, but the worst he ever did was cheat on mom a bunch. And maybe burned down our house, unless mom did that. Anyways Timoleon was a total coward and a traitor. He worked for the Achaemenids, and according to Melite he even turned some of his own people over to them to be executed. Or worse."

Then as I reached for a second slice of pizza I added, "The first time I saw Timoleon I actually heard him brag about sucking up to them. He made a big deal about how he answered to some guy called Artaphernes, who supposedly worked directly for King Darius."

Aunt Mary grimaced as she shook her head, "It's all so incredible. And a little hard to believe."

"You can say that again," Bruce agreed. He helped himself to another slice as he looked to me and added, "If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes I certainly wouldn't believe it myself. I saw it though, and it's true. You vanished into thin air right in front of me, then a half minute later you were back. Then next thing I knew an actual goddess was there talking to you, like she'd come straight out of ancient Greek mythology..."

I couldn't help smiling at that, "She didn't come straight from the past, she came out of the sporting goods show. And I'm pretty sure there's not a lot about her that's straight. Other than her arrows."

My uncle rolled his eyes, "Yeah ok you got me there. And for that matter she didn't even look like you'd expect for an ancient goddess. She could have been any normal modern-day young woman. But what she did to you..."

"And you're sure this is what you wanted?" my aunt asked after Bruce's voice trailed off. "You're happy like this?"

I nodded emphatically, "Yes ma'am, I'm positive. Melite helped me figure myself out, she helped me understand that I'm trans, I was meant to be a girl. Being there with her and sharing her body I felt so much better, so much happier and more alive than I ever did in my original masc body."

"I'm Chloe," I added happily. "If Lady Artemis hadn't come and helped me this afternoon then I'd have been talking to some of my trans friends online and looking into how to transition the normal way right now."

My aunt and uncle exchanged another look then Mary commented, "I'm glad you figured yourself out Chloe. I wonder if that's why you were so quiet and withdrawn before? I'm sure it wasn't easy carrying that burden, even if you weren't aware of it at the time."

"Yeah," I nodded slowly.

The conversation seemed to pause there for a bit, but as near as I could tell Bruce and Mary both seemed to believe the stuff I'd told them. And more importantly, they both accepted me as their niece. Neither seemed to have a problem with me being trans, it was the magic and ancient history stuff that was the hard part. Luckily Bruce was there to see the magic happen, and even though Mary didn't witness it herself she trusted her husband.

The silence lasted for a couple minutes as we all focused on our food for a bit. Then after enjoying another bite of pizza I looked to my uncle and grinned, "Thank you very much for getting this. The food we had at the temple was ok, but eating the same thing every day for months on end got so boring! I've been craving pizza and burgers and junk food for ages."

"You're welcome uh, Chloe," he replied with a little smile. "It's been a while since Mary and I had pizza, so it's a bit of a treat for us too."

We didn't get anything too fancy, just an extra large thin-crust with pepperoni and mushrooms, and extra cheese. It wasn't from one of the typical franchise places either, Uncle Bruce went and picked it up from a little family-owned pizzeria. And it was fantastic.

"The crazy thing is I just know I'm going to end up missing the ladotyri," I added after pulling a long string of mozzarella off my slice. I popped the gooey blob into my mouth then continued, "I didn't even like the stuff at first, like I couldn't understand why anyone would want oily cheese? But it turns out they coated it in olive oil to help preserve it or something."

After a pause I stifled a giggle as I corrected myself, "Actually no. The even crazier thing is I could probably make it myself, if I really wanted some. That was one of the chores Hektor had us doing on the farm. Except I doubt I'm going to find any sheep's milk around here."

My aunt and uncle exchanged another bemused look. Then Mary commented, "I don't know if sheep's milk is even legal here, but if it is then I'm sure you could find it somewhere if you looked hard enough. Or if not, maybe you could substitute something else? Maybe goat's cheese?"

"Nope," I shook my head. "Ladotyri has to be made with sheep's milk. You can put a little goat's milk in there too if you want, but not very much."

We continued talking about food for a bit, but it wasn't long before we'd all had enough to eat. The rest of the pizza was wrapped up and put in the fridge, then my aunt and uncle and I sat down together in their living-room. Bruce got his laptop out, along with a couple big old history books. Then together the three of us started looking stuff up.

"So Methymna still exists," Uncle Bruce commented after checking the maps app on his computer. "Slightly different spelling nowadays, but it's the same place. It's just a small town though, barely two thousand people live there."

Then after checking one of his old history texts he announced in a slightly awed voice, "Based on everything you described I think you were in four-ninety-one or four-ninety-two BCE. The Ionian Revolt lasted from around four-ninety-nine to four-ninety-three BCE. Then there was a year or two of peace, before the Achaemenids came back to try and conquer Athens and Sparta."

"Damn," I mumbled to myself as that sank in. "It's just like Lady Artemis said. I really was two and a half thousand years in the past."

Aunt Mary looked a little uncomfortable as she asked, "How are you feeling about that, Chloe? Are you ok?"

I took a deep breath then let it out as a long sad sigh, "I guess? I still have a hard time thinking of Melite and Daphne and everyone else as being gone though. Like I was just there, it's only been a few hours since we saw Attis and Lais. Then Hector had Daphne and me mucking out one of the animal pens."

"In my mind it's like she and Melite are still there," I added with another sigh. "I can practically see them scratching their heads and wondering where I vanished to. Or maybe by now they'd be back in our little sleeping alcove, sharing some bread and honey and drinking some wine. Maybe they know I returned home again, or maybe they're still worrying about me..."

Uncle Bruce slipped an arm around my shoulders and gave me a supportive hug, "I'm sorry Chloe. You heard what Artemis said though. Your friends had a long and happy life, they raised a family together. That's about the best any of us can hope for."

"Yeah. I guess," I mumbled softly.

After Bruce let go Aunt Mary gave me another hug just in case. Then as she held me she asked softly, "Speaking of family have you thought about what you're going to tell your parents? I hate to say it Chloe but I'm a little worried about how they'll react. As much as I'd like to think my sister would handle things in a calm and reasonable manner, I'm afraid with everything else your mother's got going on right now she might not take this very well. And that goes double for her soon-to-be-ex husband."

That made me grimace, "I don't know yet Aunt Mary. It feels bad to admit this, but even after all that time away I still don't really miss them? Like I know they're my mom and dad, but honestly I missed you two way more than either of them."

Bruce and Mary exchanged another look at that point, like they were probably surprised to hear me say that. Or maybe it just made them feel awkward or something. They had to know I wasn't exactly enjoying my stay with them up until getting unexpectedly sent back in time and all. So I could imagine them both being a little weirded out to hear me say I was happier seeing them than my own folks.

Then my uncle cleared his throat and said, "I know the original plan was for you to head back out west in a couple days Chloe. But if you like, you're welcome to stay here with Mary and I a little longer. Or..."

His voice trailed off for a moment, then he seemed to come to a decision. "Look I know things have been bad for you back at home for a while now. And I know it's been a little awkward here too, but I'm just going to come out and say it. You're welcome to stay with us Chloe, for as long as you like. Maybe we could even get your college records transferred to a school out here, if that's something you were still interested in pursuing."

It took a moment for me to process what he was actually saying, then I felt myself getting a little emotional about it. I had to wipe my eyes before responding, "Thank you sir. I really appreciate that. I might need a day or two to think it over? But I'm definitely not ready to head back out west just yet, so I'd love to stay here at least another week or two. If not longer."

"Of course hon," Aunt Mary said as she pulled me into another hug. "You have a place here with us, for as long as you like."

"Thank you ma'am," I mumbled as I hugged her back.

It took us all a few minutes to get past the emotions and everything, then Uncle Bruce had even more questions about my experiences. Not that I could blame him, being a history teacher it was kind of his big special interest.

After all I basically had like four months worth of real life experience living in ancient history, so in some ways I was better than an encyclopaedia and a dozen scientific papers on the subject. And although I didn't actually know much about the big picture stuff that ended up in history books, I knew a lot of little details about every-day life stuff that usually wasn't written down anywhere.

So we talked about that sort of thing for a while, until about fifteen minutes later when Bruce ended up frowning at his map app and a wiki search on his laptop. "Huh. There's nothing at all here about a temple on Mount Lepetymnos. I mean the mountain's there, obviously, but there's nothing at all about a temple."

"There's lots of information about the temple at Messa though," he added. "And some information about Pyrrha, although the city was destroyed by an earthquake back in the Hellenistic era."

I frowned, "Well the temple's definitely at Mount Lepetymnos. It's part-way up on the north-west slope. I don't know when it was founded, but it was originally set up by people from Anatolia and dedicated to Cybele. By the time I got there they also had altars to Athena, Apollo, Dionysus, and Artemis of course."

Uncle Bruce rubbed his chin as he considered that. Then he shrugged, "Odds are it just hasn't been rediscovered yet. If it was lost in ancient times it's possible people just forgot about it. I wonder if we could tip off some local archaeologists to go have a closer look at the area?"

"Maybe," I pouted. It was really hard to think of the place as some lost and buried archaeological site though, when I was just there this morning with my friends.

Fortunately Aunt Mary seemed to realize the topic was starting to upset me, so she gently suggested Bruce let it go so we could move on to something else.

And that's how the three of us ended up doing something I never would have believed in a million years. Or at least twenty-five hundred years. With Bruce in the middle, Mary on the left and me on the right, we all looked at my uncle's collection of ancient coins together, so I could point out the ones I recognized.

"That's a sigloi," I announced as I pointed to a blobby oblong silver coin with the kingly archer dude on the front. "Melite and I had a couple of them. We left them as sacrifice to the gods though."

Bruce smiled as he corrected me, "One of them is a siglos. Sigloi is the plural form. How many did you have?"

"Three," I replied. "I left one for Lady Cybele, one for Lord Apollo, and one for Lady Artemis."

My uncle smiled and slowly shook his head, "Amazing."

A moment later I pointed at another coin in his collection, "That one with the two boars bumping heads, that's a hekte. Also known as one sixth of a stater. We had a couple of those, but we spent them when a merchant visited the temple a couple months ago. I got a pair of sandals, and we got a bolt of fabric and some thread so me and Melite could mend our and Daphne's clothes."

"You learned how to sew?" Aunt Mary asked.

I nodded, "Yeah. Melite taught me. I also learned how to spin and weave, but we didn't do much of that. Mostly it was messy stinky farm work. Temple chores were a lot easier, but all of it was important."

"Anyways that's another one I recognize," I said as I pointed to another item in my uncle's collection. It was a tiny little thing, less than ten millimetres across and almost wafer thin. It had Athena wearing a helmet on one side, and the other side had a sea turtle inside a square.

"We had a few of those," I elaborated, "But they weren't worth much. They were good for those times we got sick of bread and ladotyri, then one of those was enough to get us some fruit or preserves or whatever. It's funny, I never thought I'd get excited about half a pomegranate or some jam."

Bruce smiled, "Incredible. That's a hemiobol, or half an obol."

I nodded, "Like Charon's obol, right? That's the coin you needed to pay the boatman after you died."

"According to myth, yes." he replied. "So you'd need two of these, assuming he was strict about the price of a fare."

That was the last of his collection I had personal experience with, but we spent another hour or so looking at the rest of his old coins and talking about ancient history. Or the last four months of my life, as I liked to call it. It was only about half past nine when the sun set, and sure enough I started yawning not long after.

I finally bid Bruce and Mary a good night, then made my way up to the guest room. I didn't even think about pyjamas or a night-shirt or anything, not that I had anything like that anyways. Instead I just got myself ready for bed, then slipped naked under the sheets.

I lay there awkwardly for a while, as I found myself almost missing the stupid cramped little alcove back at the temple. The bed was soft and the pillow was nice and the sheets were good. But I was alone in my head again, and there was nobody to cuddle with.

Eventually I slipped out of bed and dug that chunky silver coin out of my hoodie pocket, then sat cross-legged on the bed as I studied it. There was just enough moonlight filtering in through the window to make the details on it almost glow. And as I slowly turned it over in my fingers I felt something stir within the cold metal.

"Oh wow," I whispered to myself, as my expression shifted to a smile.

I suddenly understood what my goddess meant when she said she had a solution to me being a nymph but not standing out in public. And about the coin being important. She'd enchanted it, so if I focused on the bunny side I'd transform into my small bunnygirl nymph form like I'd had for the past four months. And focusing on the portrait side would turn me back into my normal human girl form I had right now.

"Thank you Lady Artemis," I mumbled as I looked up at the full moon hanging low in the sky outside.

I sighed to myself and added, "And thank you Melite. I hope wherever you are, you and Daphne are happy."

With that I was finally able to sleep, curled up under the sheets clutching the enchanted coin to my chest.

~ The End ~

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