" I take it you do not agree with your countrymen’s religious practices.’
‘Oh no,’ said Hippothous. ‘I am not Cilician by birth. Mine has been a long and tragic path. I was born in Perinthus, the noble city close by Byzantium. My father was on the Boule. When I was young, I fell desperately in love. Hyperanthes was nearly my age. Stripped for wrestling in the gymnasium, he was like a god. And his eyes – no sidelong glances or fearsome looks, no trace of villainy or dissembling.’
As they ate, Hippothous told them a tale of love, lust, subterfuge, murder, flight, shipwreck, loss and exile – a tale worthy of a Greek romance.
‘Probably from a fucking Greek romance,’ muttered Calgacus. "
― Harry Sidebottom , Lion of the Sun (Warrior of Rome, #3)