It was hard. It was hard, but faced with the reality that Askelpios was doing the duty that he himself should have seen to, Philammon forced himself to let go of the back of the chair. Circling around it, he dropped into the cushions and passed a hand over his forehead. Give her the benefit, Philammon, he told himself. Asklepios had well and truly shamed him. With a wince, he glanced to his brother, then back to the guest. Hard. Hard not to lump her in with the ones who'd done what they had to his aunts and his father. But he tried. All the gods above, he tried to be patient.
He wasn't sure what to make of the babbling goddess, either. Absently, he gestured toward the space between his chair and the chair opposite him, and drew up another for Asklepios. It wasn't a large apartment he had here, but it was comfortable enough for the quiet life he led. "I'm sorry," he said finally to Philotes. "Oizys... I haven't seen her since my return. I'd expected her to be here..." That wasn't true, either. He hadn't expected anything when he walked through his door, fresh from the unfruitful search for Artemis' body.
Artemis was dead. Artemis was dead. He shoved a wavering hand through his hair, then grabbed the glass on the table in front of him. "Artemis is dead," he murmured, mostly to himself, mostly to say it so he could make it real. It still didn't feel real. Then, more firmly (and this time for Philotes), "Artemis was apparently killed. On Olympus."
Even Philammon, uncertain as he was about this goddess, did not have the cruelty it would possess to add the rest: Killed by your family. There was more to the story, much more than just that. But he left the rest for now.