A clutch of old priests at the oracle of the Flounder do not really believe that the sybil they appoint to speak for the goddess Artemis has any gift of prophecy. On the death of a reigning sybil, however, they make a mistake that they cannot undo in their appointment of a new one. To their chagrin, she is in every way the wrong choice to recite, parrot fashion, the verses of advice they craft for supplicants to the oracle. Much to their surprise, however, she turns out to have the one quality they do not value in a sybil. She has a gift of prophecy. Much to their annoyance, she is then overcome in a fit of prophecy to foretell not only the defeat in battle of their best client kingdom but the death of its king. A crisis befalls the oracle when the prophecy comes true. Do these priests value truth more than their immediate self-interests? On their answer to that question hangs the future of the Flounder.