I frowned, feeling suddenly cold all over and unable to take a deep breath. “Wh… what?”
I thought she might snap at me again, because this hadn’t at all been what I’d expected to hear when I’d come. Deep down, I realized I’d been hoping to be told the oracle had been high on fumes and wrong about everything, that no woman of snake and stone would be twined through my life. Yet this wasn’t what I was being told.
Her eyes closed, and a pained look crossed her lovely features. “My sisters and I, we’ve begun to see a great many things that, for the first time, we can make no sense of. But they will be made sense of.”
I cocked my head. A Fate admitting that she did not understand was tantamount to suddenly discovering that the Olympians hadn’t really overthrown the Titans and that this was nothing but an elaborate illusion.
“This woman of snake and of stone, she is not that yet. She is merely a female named Medusa. A woman of blood and flesh and water. She has a kindness that I fear will be killed off by those closest to her. And I’ve seen this happen in life enough times to know that when it does, nothing will ever be the same again. So the choice is yours, God of War. Either accept your destiny or don’t. But either way, what will be will be. Now go. I’ve much work yet to do.”
She flicked her wrist, and before I even had a chance to ask her to explain herself, I was gone from the chamber and back in the garden. This time, I knew that even if I fed the land blood, the door would not be opened for me again.
But I knew her name now. Lachesis was right. I had a choice to make—go home to Olympus and try to figure out what was happening to Aphrodite and why she seemed so disinterested in me of late, or seek the destiny given me a hundred years ago.
Standing upon that rocky cliff overlooking miles of nothing but seawater, I knew what I must do.
With a swipe of my hand, I opened a time portal and murmured only one word.
“Medusa.”
Chapter 50
Medusa
Percy and I lazily stroked the seawater with our hands and feet, bobbing just along its sapphire-blue surface. Apollo’s rein upon the day was coming to an end. The air was growing cooler with the promise of Nyx’s return, and my skin was starting to pebble from the cold. I shivered softly. It was nearly time to go, but my heart was heavy and had been all day. I knew Perseus could sense it because he kept giving me contemplative looks. We’d been friends long enough now that he knew me almost as well as I knew myself.
Sighing and still not sure how to broach this subject without it turning into a big thing between us, I again stared at the unnaturally calm waters we swam in. A rumor had been spreading throughout the village for near a month now that a giant squid, or some other form of monster, had recently taken up residence in these depths, frightening off the fish and making the waters impossible to catch anything from.
They might be right. We’d not even seen a glint or flicker of a scale today. But I had managed to capture some sardines from the water close to my home for Percy’s lunch earlier. He’d be forced to go hungry tonight, but at least he’d eaten once today, which was a lot better than how things used to be for him. I might have been annoyed with him, but I still cared enough to make sure his belly was filled.
I had about another hour before Mother expected me home.
I knew I should just go. It wasn’t like I was very talkative. Percy had sensed my mood all day, and no matter how much he tried to draw me out, I simply didn’t feel inclined to open up to him about it. Because the truth was, it completely involved him.
Percy was my oldest friend, and I’d known him since we were youth. When I’d been younger, he’d never been able to do any wrong in my eyes, but lately, it seemed he was habitually stepping over the line with me. He was doing and saying things that weren’t altogether appropriate, giving me pause and making me wonder, filling my head with doubt that he could have meant to be intentionally cruel and hurtful. I was coming to an uncomfortable realization that my friend wasn’t who I’d once thought him to be. And it was both upsetting and saddening. The worst part of it was, I didn’t even feel like I could talk to him about it. Percy’s moods were so wild lately, up and down and all over the place, that I didn’t know whether I was coming or going, only that I didn’t want to rock the boat and make waves. But I also knew that wasn’t healthy either. If we were truly friends, we should be able to talk and share things.
And my heart was grieving and sore over what, deep down, I knew he’d done to me. I just didn’t know if he would deny it or fess up. All I knew was this one was kind of a big deal, and if he lied to me, I wasn’t sure I would ever be able to forgive him for it. My shoulders slumped as I slapped at the surface with my palm, hard enough to send water droplets shooting off in all directions.
I felt his side-eye glance before I heard his heaving sigh.
“Medusa, I cannot bear your coldness another minute. You must speak with me. Please. What have I done wrong? Let me at least try to make amends, if I’m able.”
I thinned my lips, still not wanting to talk with him. But my brain and my body weren’t in agreement for once. My fingers were clenched tight, my nails driving stinging circular half-moon shapes into my palms, and I couldn’t stop trembling. But it wasn’t from being too cold.
Kicking upright so that I would look him eye to eye, I felt the damnable words spill off my tongue before I had a moment to think them through. “Today as I walked through the village, I heard something.”
I hadn’t even needed to go any further than that before he was closing his eyes and groaning. And I knew he knew, and I also knew that the rumor hadn’t been rumor at all. That knowledge burned me up, lit a flame in me, and what I’d swallowed all day came pouring out like hot vomit.
“Why, Percy? Why? Why would you say that to Herodites? That we were lovers? You knew how I felt about him! He is a decent male who comes from a respectable family, and my being a lesser goddess had never been an issue for him! Mother expects me to enter into a union soon. Though why I’m sure I don’t know,” I shrugged, “considering how very anti-man she’s always been with me but I told you she was pushing for me to find legitimacy and respectability and he was probably my best chance at a normal life. I’m not sure I can ever—”
He was suddenly swimming over to me, grabbing my wildly flailing hands and squeezing them tight, his eyes dark with panic. His handsome face twisted into a mask of desperation. And it was when he got this way that my anger slackened and my feelings began to bloat with doubt.
Maybe I was overreacting. Maybe he hadn’t meant to hurt me this way. Not him, my oldest and dearest friend. But at my core, I couldn’t seem to convince myself of this. Not anymore. I’d made far too many excuses for him in life, and the truth was, I was growing tired of them.
“Medusa, you think I did that to be cruel, but I would never. You know me. I spared you a lifetime of misery with that cad! Do you know how many women he’s used and tossed aside? Plenty, and I never wanted you to be one of them. Not you. Never you.” He brushed his fingers rapidly over my cheeks, trembling mightily, and my head was so confused.
That didn’t at all sound like the Herodites that I thought I’d known. He was shy, quiet, but with an affable smile that tugged at my heartstrings. He’d had a terrible stutter growing up but had grown out of it, and though he was by no means as handsome as my best friend, he had an attractive quality that mostly stemmed from him simply being a really decent fellow. That made him even more good-looking in my eyes. I hated that I did not trust Perseus, but sadly, that trust between us had been eroding for years, not just days or weeks or even months. Too often, I’d caught Percy in lies, and too often, I’d let them go. But this was a big one. This one stung too much. Herodites had been perfect for me, the absolute best I could hope for in this small coastal village.
Not to mention his love of animals, a sentiment that I, too, shared, and most importantly—at least to Mother—he came from a respectable line of merchants. My sis
ters and I would have been well taken care of, which was all Mother and Father wanted. I still couldn’t really make sense of why she was suddenly pushing me to go off and marry, but that didn’t exactly mean that she okay with me being alone with men either. She wanted me bound to one and one only. And that one had to come from good breeding.
It wasn’t that I was necessarily in love with Herodites, but I knew that I could do so much worse, plus the hope of companionship was a surprisingly strong lure for me considering I’d believed my fate was to always remain single. And I wasn’t a romantic sort. I’d been raised knowing I would not get a chance to choose my own destiny. I’d pinned my hopes and dreams on him, too, long ago. And the fact that in one fell move, Perseus had ripped the rug out from under me was a bitter pill to swallow. Herodites would never want me now, and even if he did, his parents would no longer allow it. They’d thought me exotic and eccentric once. I could have been their claim to fame, a talk piece amongst their wealthy clientele, but not now. Not anymore. Not after the things Percy had said about me. I clenched my jaw.
With a little tug, I slipped out of Percy’s hands. He frowned down at them, looking confused and disappointed by my reaction, and I began to feel those familiar pangs of guilt.
Maybe he hadn’t meant anything by it. He was right. I did know him. Right? Percy would never knowingly sabotage my ability to secure a strong future. If he’d done so, he surely must have had a good enough reason for it. Those familiar refrains filled my brain, but shockingly, I wasn’t buying them this time.
Because if I picked through our past, I was starting to notice too many instances of this type of behavior. Him taking liberties. Me getting angered by them but eventually forgiving him because he sounded so forlorn and miserable, and I was too softhearted to make him dwell on his bad deeds for long.
Cocking my head to the side, I looked at my friend through new eyes, wondering if I’d ever even known him at all. With my stomach twisting and diving, I was pretty sure I knew the answer. And it made me despise myself. I’d always thought I was a strong woman, but I wasn’t. I was weak and pathetic, so easily led on by his countless lies that I’d known all along had been nothing but untruths to cover his tracks. He’d never been any good at deception, but I’d allowed him to believe he was. What kind of person did something like that?
A weak one, I was sure. Shame filled my bones.
“Percy, I’m only going to ask you this once, and if you truly love me as you say you do, I’m going to demand your total honesty.”
He looked up at me, and once again, I saw the old familiar pain in his dark eyes. He’d been abandoned as a child by his mother and knew that he had a father who was the king of all men, women, and beasts. But he also knew that his vaunted bloodline was more of a curse than a blessing, and since said god also did not want him, my friend had serious rejection issues. I’d learned that long ago, which meant I needed to tread lightly.
That was partly why I’d always managed to overlook his countless quirks, but it was becoming harder and harder to do the older we became.
“I promise, Medusa. You know me.”
My brows dipped. But did I, though? I was beginning to wonder.
“Then whatever you tell me now, I will believe it. Because you are my friend, and I know that you only want what’s best for me, yes?” I asked softly, making sure to emphasize the last bit. Percy’s pride was a fragile but powerful thing for him. If I played up to it, I might actually learn the truth.
He nodded, but I could sense his reticence. He often reminded me of a streetwise scavenger, the kind who saw the trap coming from a mile away and knew how to avoid it while getting at the scraps he wanted. I’d seen how Percy interacted with others. He could be a liar and a thief, a crook in every sense of the word, saying and doing whatever he needed to get what he wanted.
It was part of growing up on the streets, which had heightened his sense of survival at any cost. But I was also hoping that his obvious affection for me would make him be truthful and honest despite whatever survival instinct flared up in him. We were supposed to be different. With me, he was supposed to feel free to be soft and vulnerable. I always had with him. Percy knew me inside and out. I’d told him my fears, my dreams, my hopes. I’d flayed myself open for him, and I’d always hoped he’d done the same with me.
To soften my words, I grabbed his hand. As I drummed my fingers along his hard knuckles, shivers ran through him.
“You are my only true friend, Medusa. I will tell you whatever you wish to know,” he said somberly, his voice deep and scratchy with obvious emotion.
And finally, I knew he meant it.
I nodded and kicked my feet, swimming closer to him, drawing as near as I comfortably could, close enough that the tips of my wings brushed his body. Again I felt the shivers take him, and his eyes, which usually had a hard and calculating gleam, were soft and full of tenderness.
A stab of guilt wormed through my consciousness. I didn’t necessarily enjoy tricking him in this way, or leading him to believe that I wished more from our relationship than what we currently had, but I had to discover the truth, one way or another.
“Perseus.” I said his true name, and this, time his shivers weren’t gentle but almost violent.
“Medusa,” he murmured hotly, and it was my turn to tremble, but not from desire—it was from the pain and the realization of what I was doing to him and how betrayed he might feel once he realized what I was really up to. I wasn’t normally a manipulative sort, but something felt wrong. Desperately wrong.
His strong arm slid around my middle, and I let him drag me tighter into him. That was when I felt the thick girth of his body brush between my thighs. I froze, never having felt a man so close to me in such an intimate part of my body before.
I remembered the boy I’d first met, gangly and scrawny, with long limbs and an awkward gait. He was none of those things now. Perseus had been training with the other boys of the village for over a year and had developed a soldier’s body. He was all hard lines and strong, supple muscle.
I wanted to dry heave, and my skin crawled from the touch of him upon my thigh. But I knew he could not control his body’s reactions, so I ignored my revulsion.
He gripped my wrists loosely, constantly stroking my flesh. The sensations weren’t in the slightest bit pleasant. In fact, I wanted nothing more than to push him back and swim as fast and far away from him as I could.
I wasn’t sure when I’d begun to have these visceral reactions to his nearness, but ever since I’d come into my womanly curves, I’d felt those sensations. A protective instinct that never allowed me to get too close to him, the sense that I never wanted to lead him on and make him believe I felt more for him than mere sisterly affection. I knew my actions of now were probably confusing to him.
“Tell me the truth, then,” I said, my voice strong and clear as a bell, even though inside, I was a wrecked and terrified mess.
He sucked in a sharp breath, and his fingers instantly tightened, not too hard but uncomfortably.
I swallowed my cry and held still, not wishing to overreact and lose my advantage, meager though it was.
A panicked gleam had entered his eyes, and his head gave a small, almost involuntary shake. “What?”
“The truth, Perseus. Because I know Herodites, and he’s never been any of those things you’ve said. Our village is small. If he’d done as you said to countless women before, I’d have heard about it. You know I would have.”
His face was as flat as stone, his eyes hard like flint, and a darkness had gathered that I’d never sensed in him before. An edge of violence lingered in the air, and my mouth grew dry as my heart rate sped up. I shivered as his fingers tightened around my wrist, inflicting a sharp stab of pain.
I hissed.
“How could you even entertain the notion of that fat arse?” He tossed out the words like a stone from a sling.
I winced. “What?” I was shocked by the vehemence in his tone.<
br />
His face was no longer smooth and handsome but a twisted amalgamation of things I’d never seen before. Fury. Rage. Violence.
He snapped his hands back, dragging me so tightly into him that not an inch of space existed between us. I was rigid as a pole, gone completely still. Some inner voice told me not to panic or even move. He was like a disturbed serpent, ready to strike at the slightest provocation.
“You could have any male on this godsforsaken island, and yet you would set your eyes on him!” He tossed the words out almost like a spear.
I flinched at the implied insult that laced his vitriol.
“Smiling and smirking at that whoreson. Using your body and feminine wiles to ensnare him in a web of lies and deceit. You don’t want him. Your mother wants him. I know you, Medusa. I saved you from that fate! A lifeless, empty marriage full of screaming, blubbering brats you would not want suckling at your withered teats, body forever altered and changed, all beauty gone from you because you married something that could never truly treasure you as you deserved.”
I gasped, and without thought, I slapped him so hard that my palm stung from the contact. His head bounced back for a brief second, and when he looked at me, the rage in his eyes was hot and explosive. His upper lip curled upward, exposing his blunt canines, and he rubbed at his scarlet-colored cheek.
But I was so angry I forgot to censure my words, forgot to remind myself that this was my only friend, even if he’d insulted me in every conceivable manner and had decried me the whore of Babylon. I forgot that he’d once meant something to me, because in that moment, all I could focus on was the fact that someone I’d cared for had been selfish, petty, and downright awful.
Kicking back so there was space between us, I shook my head. “How could I have been so wrong about you? All those wasted years I gave you.”
The Greek Gods of Romance Collection Page 63