Goddess

by Josephine Angelini

  Helen kept her dagger in its sheath until she needed it, and climbed the steep, rocky hill to the temple where Cassandra lived in solitude. Many times over the years, Helen had stared up at the gleaming pillars of Cassandra’s plush prison and thought that her husband’s little sister was like the moon. She was higher than any of them, remote, and so very alone.

  A few steps farther, and Helen heard some unmistakable sounds. Impossible, Helen thought as she heard the two voices cry out in unison.

  Helen darted from column to column and made her way through the forest of marble in the interior of the temple, until she was close enough to the inner sanctum to confirm with her own eyes what her ears had already told her.

  Aeneas and Cassandra were lovers. And from the surprised look on Aeneas’ face as he lay next to Cassandra, still panting, Helen could see that their intimacy was a new development.

  Aeneas sat up in the pile of discarded clothes and torn-down draperies that had served as their bed and ran a hand across his sweaty face like he had no idea what to do next. He looked around at the knocked-over amphorae, the ripped curtains, and the general havoc that their union had wreaked on the now-defiled temple, and then down at Cassandra, completely stunned.

  “Did I hurt you?” he asked her urgently.

  It amazed Helen that a brutal warrior like Aeneas, who had spent the last ten years of his life shedding rivers of Greek blood, could have such tender emotions. He was more concerned for Cassandra’s well-being than he was for the fact that he had just committed a crime that was punishable by death.

  The Oracle was sacrosanct. Helen couldn’t believe that the Fates had allowed this union at all. From what she understood, fate itself stepped in and kept Oracles from finding intimacy with men. Oracles could try, but the man they wanted would inevitably meet a fatal accident, get shipped off to a faraway land and never return, or there’d be some other devastating misfortune before that love could be consummated. For whatever reason, that obviously was not the case here. The Fates either wouldn’t—or couldn’t—interfere with Aeneas.

  Cassandra smiled and reached up to touch her lover’s pretty mouth with her fingertips. “I hear that’s to be expected the first time. It was worth it a thousand times over,” she said quietly.

  He took her hand in his and turned it so he could kiss the center of her palm. “I’m sorry, anyway,” he whispered, placing her tiny hand over the thick muscles that hid his sensitive heart.

  Cassandra gazed at him hazily, her eyes swimming. Aeneas scooped her up, pulled her onto his lap, and kissed her. Cassandra swooned for a moment in his arms, but then seemed to steel herself. She pulled away from his kiss and shook her head.

  “You must go,” she slurred, drunk on him. “Now, before anyone discovers us.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” Aeneas responded with a low laugh. “I won’t dishonor you by running off to save my own skin.”

  Aeneas shifted so that Cassandra could sit comfortably astride him and still see every change of his face as he pledged himself to her.

  “I am free to remarry,” he said, smiling softly. “My wife died in childbirth years ago, and my mourning is long over. Your brother may want my life for what I’ve done to you, but I have every right to ask for your hand before it comes to that.”

  Cassandra edged away from Aeneas, pushing him back so both of them could see more clearly.

  “I am not simply my brother’s sister, and this is not a silly tryst that can be excused with a hasty marriage,” Cassandra said, like he was missing the point entirely. “I am Cassandra of Troy and the vessel of the Fates. You have defiled that vessel, Aeneas. The punishment for you is certain.” Cassandra spoke to him harshly, trying to make him understand the stakes. “You must run. Tonight. Now. Or you will die.”

  “I won’t leave you, Cassandra. I’ll take my chances, throw myself on Paris’ mercy. I’ll beg him to allow you to be my wife if I must. But I won’t run.” A pained look crossed his face as a troubling thought occurred to him. “Don’t you want to be my wife? I thought . . . since you gave yourself to me . . . that you loved me.”

  Cassandra dropped her head into her hands. Aeneas tried to soothe her. He caressed her, held her, and urged her to look up at him. When she finally met his gaze again, her piercing blue eyes sank deep into his bright green ones, and she spoke with all the authority of Fate itself.

  “I couldn’t love you more if you came to me holding the sun in your right hand and all the stars in the sky in your left,” she told him, her voice as final as a funeral dirge. “I could live a hundred lifetimes and never wish for a more perfect man than you. I have loved you since the second I saw you, and unfortunately for me, I know for a fact that I will never love anyone or anything as much as I love you.”

  Helen’s heart jumped into her throat. She ducked behind the column that hid her and stuffed a hand over her mouth to keep her heart, and the choked sound that followed it, from leaping out. Cassandra knew Troy was going to fall that very night. She had seduced Aeneas on purpose in order to force him to run away. It was a desperate attempt to save his life.

  Cassandra had risked angering the Fates to save the man she loved, but instead, her plan had turned back around and devoured itself like a snake eating its own tail. By loving Aeneas, Cassandra hadn’t made him want to flee Troy as she had planned, but rather, she had given him an unshakable desire to stay. For all her foresight, the one thing Cassandra hadn’t accounted for was that Aeneas might fall madly in love with her. But it had happened. And now she had to change his mind or watch him die at the hands of the Greeks.

  “I know Paris will support our marriage,” Aeneas said, making excited plans. “You’ll have to leave your high station at the temple, of course, but that wouldn’t be so bad, would it?”

  “It would be paradise,” Cassandra admitted sadly. She climbed out of his lap, sought out her chiton in the heap, and put it on as she spoke. “But you have more to fear than just my brother. We all do.”

  “Are you talking about the fall of Troy again?” he asked, his face wary. He braced himself, like he was getting ready for Cassandra to start raving.

  “No. I’ll never speak of it again,” Cassandra said quietly, and Aeneas relaxed. “I’m talking of another matter that has nothing to do with prophecy.”

  So he might believe her, Helen thought, trying to figure out Cassandra’s strategy. Her curse is that her prophecy is not to be believed, not other truths she might know.

  “You must leave Troy before the sun rises, or Apollo will see that you have become my lover.”

  “How does this concern Apollo?” Aeneas asked cautiously.

  “I refused him years ago. The only reason I’m still alive is because even he fears the Fates, and they claimed me first.” Cassandra’s voice faltered when she saw the horrified look on Aeneas’ face, but still, she continued. “Apollo comes with the sun. If he sees that I gave myself to you he will curse you, your boy, and your father.”

  Aeneas stared at Cassandra, his face paling in the torchlight.

  “I’m sorry.” She reached out to him but Aeneas threw her hands off and pushed away from her.

  “Why?” he asked her desperately. “Why did you do this to me?”

  “I’m sorry,” she repeated. He stood up, searched for his chiton, and tied it angrily.

  “I was ready to die for you if that was my punishment, but my son and father have nothing to do with this. You should have told me.” His voice shook with betrayal. “You’ve cursed my family forever.”

  “No,” Cassandra said, dashing tears off her cheek. “If you leave now, take your father and your son and get out of Troy before dawn, Apollo will not chase you.”

  “Of course he will!” Aeneas yelled, finally raising his voice at her.

  “No, he won’t be able to touch you ever again, I swear it!” she yelled back. That made Aeneas pause. Oracles did not swear lightly. “Shortly after dawn, Apollo will be trapped on Olympus by a vow that Zeus ha
s made on the River Styx. Zeus thought it would be impossible for the demigods to accomplish their end of it, but by dawn, it will be so. Zeus’ unbreakable vow binds him and the Twelve to stay imprisoned on Olympus for many generations.”

  “And what is this impossible thing the demigods will have accomplished by dawn?” Aeneas asked, like he was starting to be convinced.

  “You won’t believe me.” Cassandra sighed like Atlas had just rolled his burden onto her shoulders. Then she laughed, and muttered to herself. “A giant wooden horse. Ridiculous.”

  “What about the horse?” Aeneas asked, his voice dropping dangerously. “The one outside the great gate?”

  “It’s already too late,” she said, shaking her head. “Get your son. Get your father. Leave Troy. If you stay, Apollo will punish us all.”

  Aeneas’ shoulders shrank, and the wounded expression on his face made him look as young as he had been when Helen first met him a decade ago.

  “I actually believed you when you said you loved me,” he told her quietly.

  “Maybe someday you’ll look back on tonight and believe it again.” Cassandra bent her head, and Aeneas left her.

  Andy woke long before dawn. She was alone in Ariadne’s bed for the first time since the Delos family had taken her in, and it felt too weird. She’d gotten used to Ariadne’s snoring and Helen’s thrashing about. In a few short days, it had started to feel like the three of them had grown up piled on top of each other, and now that the room was quiet, it felt too quiet to sleep.

  It also didn’t help that every time she closed her eyes the only thing she could see was Hector rising up out of the water to come to her rescue, soaking wet, bare chested, and not exactly sleep inducing. Giving up on getting any more rest, Andy swung her legs out of bed and rumpled her short, dark hair with her fingers until the back stood up in spikes. She decided to go downstairs to see what she could do to help Noel and Kate set up for the monumental breakfast they were going to serve before Daedalus and Phaon’s dawn duel.

  Noel didn’t expect Andy to do chores, but Andy insisted. She’d been taking care of herself her whole life, and she wasn’t comfortable sitting around while other people waited on her. If she was going to be protected by this family, she figured the least she could do was help out. Plus, there were milk and cookies in the kitchen—Kate’s cookies, no less. Andy may not have been on Nantucket for very long, but she’d already learned that Kate baked the kind of cookies that made a person want to get out of bed.

  Creeping into the kitchen, Andy saw a big, dark shape sitting at the table and gasped in surprise.

  “You’re not thinking of trying to go for another swim, are you?” Hector asked quietly.

  “No,” Andy whispered, pulling up the strap of her nightgown. Ariadne was a bit bigger than Andy and most of the clothes she’d borrowed seemed to fall off her shoulder in an inadvertently seductive way. “I couldn’t sleep.”

  “I know,” he said, watching her. “I heard.”

  “How could you . . . ,” Andy began, and broke off when she saw the gleam of his smile in the dark. Of course he could hear her tossing and turning in bed. He was a Scion. He could probably hear her sighing his freaking name in her sleep. The thought made her want to turn and run back upstairs, but instead she stayed rooted to the spot, staring at his shape while her eyes adjusted to the dark.

  “Get a glass.” Hector gestured to the bottle of milk and plate of cookies in front of him.

  “Aha. Kate’s cookies. You beat me to it.” Andy chuckled. She took down a mug and slid in next to Hector on the bench. He was only wearing a pair of well-worn sweatpants that said REAL MADRID in fading letters down the side. “Don’t you ever wear a shirt?” she asked. She was attempting to joke but her voice came out shaky and breathy, ruining the cool-girl effect she was going for.

  “Not to bed.” He smiled and took her mug to fill it. Andy watched the muscles in his forearm flex and relax as he poured. His hands fascinated her. She liked the way he held things in such a solid, sure way. Andy’s hands had a tendency to flutter daintily when she moved, something she blamed on her siren heritage. But when Hector’s hands touched something, they took control of it.

  Andy nibbled on a cookie and found herself marveling at the difference between them. Hector was unapologetically masculine in everything he did, and just sitting next to him made Andy feel more feminine than she ever had before. Femininity was something usually equated with weakness in Andy’s mind, but now that she was near Hector, Andy realized that really feeling like a woman was just about the most empowering thing she’d ever experienced.

  “Do you like soccer?” she asked, gesturing to the logo on his sweatpants.

  “I like Madrid,” he replied. “My family spent a lot of years in Spain. I’d love to go back someday.”

  “I liked Spain, but I think I prefer Scandinavia. Have you ever swum in a fjord?” He shook his head. “The ice glows milky-blue underwater. It’s . . .” She broke off and smiled shyly. “Maybe we can do that together someday.”

  The silence stretched out between them as they stared at each other. She could hear her pulse pounding in her ears and knew that Hector could hear it, too.

  “Did you travel a lot growing up?” he finally asked.

  “When I was young. Before my mother, ah . . . went her own way.” Andy looked down at her mug. “Sirens don’t raise kids like humans do. My mom stuck around a lot longer than most would have. She really tried with me.”

  “When did she go her own way?” Hector asked, using Andy’s phrase.

  “When I was seven she left me at boarding school.” She saw Hector wince. “Wow. Out loud, that sounds just awful, doesn’t it?”

  “Yeah,” he laughed quietly. “This must be a shock to you. Suddenly being a part of my big, crazy family.”

  “No, I like it,” Andy replied immediately, conscious of the fact that he’d included her in his family. “I love it, actually.”

  It felt like a warm bubble was expanding inside her, filling up spaces she didn’t even know she had, and she suddenly wanted to touch Hector very much. She leaned closer to him, hoping that if she invited him nearer he’d come the rest of the way.

  “Andy. You’re a guest in my house. There are rules about this,” Hector whispered pleadingly. She looked up at his face, arrested by his tone. “You haven’t spent much time around men. Have you.” It wasn’t really a question, but she shook her head in answer, anyway. “Fix your nightgown,” he said softly.

  Andy caught at the fallen strap with her fingertips and slid it back over her shoulder, loving the way Hector’s eyes followed every move she made, like he was trying to read something written on her skin.

  “Come on,” he sighed regretfully, standing up and taking her by the hand. He led her back upstairs to his sister’s room, pausing outside the door.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, sensing that she’d done something wrong.

  “You don’t even know what you’re apologizing for, do you?” Hector asked with a humorous glint in his eye.

  “No idea,” she admitted, feeling a bit silly.

  He leaned close to her and brushed his lips against her cheek. Andy felt a shiver radiate out from where he’d kissed her, like ripples spreading on the surface of a pond.

  “I’ll show you later,” he promised, his voice shaking slightly.

  Hector opened the door to Ariadne’s bedroom and gently pushed a very confused Andy through it.

  Helen sat up in bed. The sound of lapping waves greeted her and clear sea air, sweetened with the scent of rain-forest flowers, wrapped Helen in dewy heat.

  She ran her hands over the crisp sheet under her and felt the dent next to her that still smelled like Lucas. She swung her bare legs to the side, parting the gauzy curtain of mosquito netting that hung over the wide, white bed. The teak floor was glossy and cool underfoot. A seashell wind chime announced where the entrance to the hut was, and Helen padded barefoot toward it.

  Outside,
sparkling blue-green water harbored teeming coral reefs. Beyond the watery expanse, impossibly steep and verdant islands jutted up out of the dazzling aqua water like the elbows of giants.

  Helen walked the circumference of the wraparound deck and saw that their little hut was raised up on stilts in the middle of the water of the shallow cove. She found Lucas—out for a dawn swim.

  Helen sat down on the deck next to a skeptical sea turtle and watched Lucas goof off with a lemon shark. She knew animals weren’t pets here, because she had made it so.

  The sea turtle wasn’t about to risk getting in the water with anything that had as many teeth as a lemon shark. Helen didn’t blame her. Respect for the power of other animals was something that Helen wasn’t about to monkey with, not even in paradise. Why have a shark at all if it wasn’t dangerous? Where was the thrill in that?

  Lucas seemed to be aware of the fact that the lemon shark was not a toy, and he met it in the water with all the respect that creature deserved. But they darted under the waves almost like they were having a game of tag.

  It reminded Helen of how Lucas moved around the ring when he and Hector were sparring. She decided that was what Lucas was doing. He was honing his reflexes and bettering his fight skills with a creature that he’d never had the opportunity to spar with before. Maybe the lemon shark was as well.

  Lucas noticed Helen watching him. He floated under the water, angling himself toward her, his arms spread out like wings. Helen’s tummy hit the floor and she smiled at him, amazed that he could still do that to her after everything they’d been through. Lifetimes that she could remember—some that lasted only a few brief years, and others that lasted decades—and he still made her all tingly like a girl who had never been kissed.

  He pulled himself out of the water and sat next to her, dripping wet and soaking in the newly dawning sunshine.