"Very well," muttered Teiresias, and the boy led him away. The rituals and sacrifices continued for some weeks, but neither the citizens of Thebes nor Oedipus' underlings could find the killer. Oedipus met each day with dread, both for the continued destruction of Thebes, and the haunting admonishment of Teiresias. His dreams became violent and confused, the blood of the battlefield intermingling with the flesh of the marriage bed. In desperation, he went into solitude deep within his palace, forsaking even the company of his wife Jocasta.

One night, Oedipus had a particularly troubling dream. He saw as outside himself, his younger body walking in the woods and coming upon two snakes copulating. As he walked closer to the writing mass, he was that it was not two snakes, but one, twitching madly as it tried to swallow its own tail. "You cannot separate them," said an unfamiliar voice. Oedipus looked from behind his own shoulder and saw a man resembling Teiresias. "For who can separate a thing from itself? I ask you again," spoke the figure, who had taken on the naked form of Jocasta, "would you know the truth? Or would you fly from it again?"