His daughter Electra, fearing that her young brother Orestes would not be safe since he was the right heir of the kingdom, sent him secretly away to Phocis, where the king bred him up with his own son Pylades, and the two youths loved each other as much as Achilles and Patroclus had done. It was the bounden duty of a son to be the avenger of his father’s blood, and after eight years, as soon as Orestes was a grown warrior, he went with his friend in secret to Mycenæ, and offered a lock of his hair on his father’s tomb.  Electra, coming out with her offerings, found these tokens, and knew that he was near.  He made himself known, and she admitted him into the house, where he fulfilled his stern charge, and killed both Clytemnestra and Ægisthus, then celebrated their funeral rites with all due solemnity.