“For now.”
His serious amber gaze struck me speechless. Its intensity warmed me straight through. Our surroundings fell away, and I was bathing in his light, dazzled.
I blinked, and Theo glanced off into the darkness.
The night rushed in around me, bringing with it a new sense of solitude and confusion. I wanted to see that look of his again. I wanted to understand it.
“What other songs did you and Charmain sing together?” I asked, then yawned.
Theo’s voice, soft but with an undercurrent of an emotion I couldn’t discern, carried on the wind. “You should rest. Dawn will wake the world soon.”
I rested my head on my arm. “Good night, then.”
“Good night, Althea.”
He began to sing again, more melodiously than any flute. My heart slowed, and my drowsy attention drifted to the infinite vault of stars . . . to looking for the return of the Star Eater . . . to the man across the deck . . . his unguarded expression when he looked at me, as if I were the woman who would end his madness.
8
Splashing drew my gaze away from Theo. I had spent too many of the past twelve hours pretending not to stare at him, hoping for another glimpse of his softer side like I saw last night.
He pointed out to sea. “Althea, Bronte, look!”
Bronte still slept soundly, her face sticky with sweat. I shaded my eyes with my hand and sat up.
A pod of dolphins swam alongside us, their silvery bodies dancing on the waves. Seafarers believed dolphins were a good omen from Oceanus.
Theo changed our course slightly, and the dolphins followed. This continued for about an hour until he pointed at a slice of land on the horizon.
“Crete,” he said.
The dolphins split off from us, turning east. We stayed the course south. Had Oceanus blessed our journey? The god of the sea was the only brother of Cronus’s who hadn’t helped him dethrone their father. Did Oceanus know about our mission?
We approached the leeward side of the island, and I gently jostled Bronte awake. “We’re here.”
She crawled to the side of the boat and pressed her cheek against the rail.
“Do you need to retch again?” I asked.
“No,” she said hesitantly. “Yes. Perhaps in a moment . . .” She poked her head over the rail, then laid it back down. “Wake me when we make landfall.”
I joined Theo on the middeck. It was into the afternoon, later than he had predicted we would arrive, but I didn’t point this out. He was so exhausted that a stiff wind could have blown him overboard.
Theo drew the sail, and the two of us rowed toward shore. The navy waters paled to crystalline aqua as we approached the beach, revealing the colorful sea life darting about under us in the shallows. A school of small bright-orange-and-red-striped fish scattered from the end of my oar as I dipped it in the water, and seabirds searched for clams in the tide pools, but no people were visible anywhere on land or sea.
The bottom of our boat ran aground. I shook Bronte, rousing her. We stepped into the surf and sloshed together over the sharp, slippery rocks. My knees wobbled a little from disuse, but the feeling of having my soles on solid ground was a relief.
Bronte sat on the beach and picked up fistfuls of pebbles. The color was already returning to her pale face. “I have never been more grateful to have my feet on dry land,” she said loudly in a singsong voice.
Up the sloped shoreline, seagrasses sprouted from the reddish stony ground, then shrubberies blended into a forest of leafy trees. A cascade of mountains towered across the skyline, the highest peak still white with winter snowfall.
Theo wrestled the boat out of the water and past the tide line. His soaked shirt clung to his trim stomach and waistline, and his face and upper chest, where his neckline split, glistened with sweat and salt water in the late-day sun. I caught Bronte eyeing him.
“What?” she asked. “Don’t pretend you don’t notice.”
How could I not? He was right in front of us.
“He reminds me of someone,” Bronte said, more to herself than to me. “I cannot think who . . .”
Theo trudged over to us. “We should make camp before nightfall.”
Bronte scanned the thick woodland. “Is Crete inhabited by natives?”
“A tribe is thought to reside deep in the interior of the island.” Theo examined the tree line with a critical eye, then started off.
“Shouldn’t we stay close to the boat?” I asked.
“The woods are safer than the beach,” he said. “Sea dragons inhabit these waters.”
Sea dragons were known for both sliding out of the surf on their bellies and leaping out of deeper waters to ambush their prey. They didn’t hunt the waters as far north as Thessaly, but tales of them snatching people off beaches fed many children’s fears.
I hastened after Theo into the brush, Bronte trudging behind us. He paused every so often to listen to the insects, the birds, and the other stranger noises of the woods. The longer he listened, the closer I listened, and the less certain I was about why he was on alert.
Bronte paused to pick a handful of black currants from a bush. I spotted red berries next to them and reached for one. She snatched my hand in midair, halting me.
“Those are poisonous,” she said.
“Those berries?” I asked.
“Those berries will make you sick to your stomach. That snake will kill you.”
She let go and pointed. A bright-green snake was coiled, camouflaged, around the branch I’d almost harvested from.
“One bite from that viper, and you wouldn’t live through the day,” Bronte said.
I stepped away from the bushes. Bronte wasn’t afraid of snakes, but she was cautious as she collected the edible currants. Then we hurried to catch up to Theo.
Bronte passed me half the black currants. I popped a few into my mouth and chewed, bursting their sweet tartness. Theo turned them down, so Bronte kept the rest for herself.
The woodland dimmed little by little, and then abruptly, as though the sun had been covered with a curtain, night fell around us. Long, eerie shadows deepened, and I had to squint not to trip over roots or collide with low-hanging branches.
Theo stopped in a rocky clearing, lit by the ghostly moon and encircled by dense oak trees. “Here,” he said, dropping the pack.
He tasked Bronte with building a firepit while we gathered wood. Her side had mostly healed, yet she moved carefully, favoring it.
Nightfall laid down a blanket of cold that pushed into my tired bones. Bronte set to work lighting the fire, and her fifth attempt bore a spark that she coaxed with patient breaths. We soon settled around the flames, huddling close. Theo drew a crude map of Crete in the dirt and indicated the mountain range that ran down the island like a spine.
“Ida Mountain,” he said of the highest peak. “The oracles said the Boy God dwells there.”
“What else did the oracles tell you?” I asked. And why hadn’t they told me where on the isle to find the Boy God?
“They said he was the youngest of Cronus’s legitimate children.”
The oracles hadn’t told me that detail either. Their predictions felt less special when divided between the two of us. Theo might have been an experienced military officer whom they might confide in with more detail, but he didn’t seem worthy of that privilege. His service to Cronus should have counted against him.
“That’s it?” Bronte pressed. “They told you nothing more?”
“Nothing of consequence,” he replied.
I suspected he was lying. The oracles told me personal things that I was unwilling to share with him too.
Bronte threw a branch into the fire, sending sparks into the night. “Does anyone else think it’s odd that the God of Gods doesn’t know he has a living son?”
“Gods are fallible,” Theo said, shrugging.
Cronus’s ignorance gave me hope. If something that momentous could be hidden from the Titans, we might actually have a c
hance at helping to overthrow Cronus. But Bronte’s suspicion was understandable. Cronus was the mightiest Titan in all the world. How could a Boy God even have remained hidden from him, let alone rise to defeat him?
“Theo, what do you know about Cronus?” I said.
A slight vibration coursed through the air, lifting the hairs on the back of my arms and quieting the birds and insects in the woods.
“The Almighty is obsessed with protecting his throne,” Theo answered in a hushed voice. “He has reigned for nearly four hundred years, though his army and armada were formed just seventy-five years ago. He has a deep-seated fear of his Titan siblings or their offspring overthrowing him, and it has worsened. He used to travel to see his brothers at the four pillars of the earth. Now he spends most days in his great hall at the top of the highest tower, hidden under a misty gloom, watching and waiting for his enemies to rise against him.”
“What enemies?” I questioned. “Oceanus?”
“Cronus is suspicious of everyone, but I imagine he is more concerned about his mother gaining allies. Since the fall of her husband, Gaea has been livid at Cronus for neglecting to release her other children from Tartarus, the Cyclopes and the Hecatoncheires, which he had agreed to do when she handed him the adamant sickle. This may be speculation, but I believe Cronus is on guard for her retribution.”
This portion of Cronus’s history was always omitted from the plays about his illustrious ascension, although it might have been the most crucial part. Without Gaea giving her son the adamant sickle—in exchange for the release of her children, whom Uranus had imprisoned—Cronus could not have prevailed over her husband. Now Cronus assumed that others would betray him, just as he had betrayed his parents. No, we never saw that on the stage.
“The Cyclopes and Hecatoncheires don’t belong in our world,” Bronte said. “They’re monsters.”
“Not to their mother,” Theo replied. “To Gaea, all creations are beautiful.”
“How did Rhea hide the Boy God from her husband?” Bronte asked.
“I don’t know,” Theo admitted, yawning widely. “I worked as a palace guard while Rhea was with child. She handed over the swaddled infant to the Almighty, and he swallowed the babe whole, just as he had his previous five children.”
“Did you see it happen?” Bronte asked.
“No, but my mother did. I swear on the sun, moon, and stars, she aged ten years that day. The only other time I saw her that distraught was when the God of Gods welcomed Stavra to the palace.”
Iciness washed over me. I wanted to hear more, but after listening to Decimus recount how Cronus received Cleora, I didn’t need my mother’s introduction to the palace in my head too.
“What did the Almighty do?” Bronte asked, her question punctuated by the crackling campfire.
“It wasn’t what he did, it’s what Stavra did.” Theo sounded amazed, even proud. “She threatened him.”
“What?” I replied, my astonishment tumbling out. “What did she say?”
Theo tried to cover another yawn and shook his head, as though disappointed in his own fatigue. “My mother wouldn’t tell me. She only said that when Stavra finished whispering in the Almighty’s ear, she had never seen him angrier—or more fearful. I thought you might know what Stavra said.”
Bronte and I exchanged glances, searching both each other’s faces and our memories for an explanation. She shook her head.
“I don’t know either,” I said.
“Could anyone else have heard her?” Bronte asked.
“I asked every slave and soldier in the throne room,” Theo replied. “No one else heard what Stavra said, only that her tone was threatening. To this day, my mother refuses to tell me.” He unloosed another cavernous yawn.
“I’ll stand guard,” I offered.
Theo murmured his thanks, lay down on his bedroll, and fell asleep.
Bronte lay down beside me. I twisted my ring, and the string glowed softly, as radiant as the moon. High above, the Titaness Selene spied on us with her all-seeing pearl eye. Unlike Helios, the sun god, the moon was ever-present in the heavens, dwarfed by the daylight yet never fully retreating from her throne. Selene’s rule in the heavens was fixed and safe. Did Cronus look upon the moon and despise her security?
Bronte and Theo breathed in quiet rhythms. I was too anxious to sleep. Tomorrow I would meet the Boy God, the second-generation Titan fated to dethrone Cronus.
Stars, I wished I knew what my mother would have thought of all of this.
Thinking of her, I took my velo out of the satchel. Mama warned me I would grow to despise having to wear my modesty mask, and I had. I detested what it stood for, but part of me also loved it as much as my arm cuff. I loved that it had been my mother’s.
A column of gloom fell over the clearing, a shift so slight that Nyx, the Protogenos goddess of the night, might have flown above and cast her deathless shadow over us. I thought I saw a woman’s face in the forest’s umbra, but it disappeared in a blink. The memory of the Erinyes’ ghoulish faces and long claws sent a shiver through my mind.
Stop it, I told myself. I had crossed a sea today. My efforts to honor my oaths had to count for something. I shuffled closer to the fire, nearer to its light. A crunching noise like a footstep sounded behind me, but before I could look around, a hand clamped down over my mouth.
9
A man bore down on me, one hand over my mouth and the other on my shoulder. I froze until I realized it was Theo. He crouched beside me, so close the darker flecks of amber in his eyes shone in the firelight. He lifted a finger to his lips, motioning for me to stay quiet, then let go.
“We have company,” he whispered.
Bronte slept soundly as he rose and drew his sword.
A masked woman stepped out of the woods. In addition to the shield and sword she carried, a braided sheep’s-wool sling hung at her waist. Her golden velo resembled my own, with fiery wings flaring out from her eyes. Below the mask, her full lips and slim, pointed chin were visible. She wore leathers and animal furs, knee-high sandals, and a shell necklace with an insignia of a dove in flight with a rose in its mouth—the crest of Aphrodite.
Behind her, emerging from the brush, came at least two dozen armed female warriors sporting identical half-winged masks and necklaces bearing Aphrodite’s crest.
“Weapons down!” shouted the one in the lead.
Bronte startled awake and hauled herself to her feet.
“Disarm yourselves!” the leader yelled.
Theo lowered his sword to the ground and raised his hands. “I’m Colonel Theo Angelos of the First House guard. We didn’t mean to cause you alarm. We’re looking for a resident of the isle.”
“You’re trespassing,” the leader snapped. “No men are permitted on Crete.” She whistled, and her comrades rushed in around us.
Theo’s expression remained calm as they yanked his arms behind his back and tied his wrists together. They patted him down and took his knife. Next, they bound my sister’s hands, and then mine. A warrior went through our only bag.
She held up my velo. “Euboea, look.”
The one barking orders plucked my mask out of her comrade’s grasp. Seeing it beside theirs, I had no doubt they were identical.
“Where did you get this?” Euboea asked.
“It belonged to our mother,” I replied. “I’m Althea Lambros. My sister there is Bronte.”
Euboea shook the mask in my face. “Who was your mother?”
“Stavra Lambros.”
Several warriors whispered to each other.
Euboea stepped closer, her eyes narrowing. “Where is Stavra?”
“Dead,” I answered without inflection. “Cronus took her seven years ago. She died giving birth to his half-Titan babe.”
The warriors continued their whispering.
“Your man said you’re looking for someone,” Euboea said.
“He’s not my man.” And if men weren’t allowed on Crete, where was the Boy G
od?
“We were directed here by oracles,” Theo replied.
“Oracles?” Euboea laughed—a dry, coarse sound—and sauntered over to him.
He stiffened as she lifted her sword. “Our apologies for trespassing,” he said. “We mean no harm.”
She held her blade to his throat. “Men mean harm.”
Theo held perfectly still. Even with his hands bound, he was bigger and stronger and could easily defend himself—he took down four soldiers without becoming short of breath—but he meant it when he said he would do them no harm. His damned honor was going to get him killed.
“Euboea,” I said sharply, drawing her attention. “Colonel Angelos is a celebrated soldier in the Almighty’s army. His absence would be noticed.” Her blade dropped marginally from Theo’s throat, just enough to reveal her unease. “You don’t want to incur Cronus’s wrath.”
“The God of Gods has no authority here,” she said, lowering her sword from Theo’s bobbing gullet. Then to her comrades, she said, “Bring them.”
“But the man—” one warrior said.
“If he so much as sneezes on anyone, slit his throat.”
A guard hit me squarely in the back, knocking me to my knees, then she struck Bronte to the ground. Theo started to kneel, unprompted, but they smacked him anyway. Theo flinching in pain was the last thing I saw before they covered my head with a sack.
The warriors led us across rocky ground. Disoriented under the sack, I stumbled along, concentrating on putting one foot in front of the other. The earth beneath me changed to softer soil, then grass brushed against my bare ankles.
Pounding music came from ahead. The drums were punctuated by metal clanging, like spears banging against shields. We followed the drumming, getting closer and closer until it was all around us.
Rough hands yanked me to a stop. Not a heartbeat later, the clanging halted.
In the abrupt silence, my breaths boomed in my head. The sack tugged across my lips, drying out my mouth. Sweat rolled down the sides of my face, sticking my hair to my clammy skin and adding more moisture to the already-musty sack. My hands were bound so tightly that my wrist bones pushed against each other. I tried to wriggle them, but that only hurt worse.
Wings of Fury Page 10
