If I broke my vow of chastity, the consequences could be dire.
I sighed as I finished picking up the fallen arrows from the training female warriors practicing in the field. As goddess of the hunt, Athena made sure that any of her devotees learned the art of archery.
But as a pacifist, I didn’t particularly relish the notion of learning how to kill another person. I even hated killing my food. It was a pain in my soul every time I plucked a fish from its waters. If it weren’t a necessity, I would never bloody do it.
After replacing the arrows within the quivers, I stood to the side and watched dispassionately as the women released their next round. One woman in particular, her squid-ink black hair caught up in an elaborate braid behind her head, wasn’t simply a bad shot but a heinously bad one. Every time I had to fetch for her, I was forced to go scouting off into the woods where none but beasts and me roamed. She was powerfully strong, able to send the damned thing flying for what felt like miles, and I was growing more and more vexed that the duty had fallen to me to recover her arrows. I’d tried to get Alaria to swap duties with me, but the bloody minx had merely laughed and skipped off. For four hours, I’d been forced to fetch for the Braided Crazy, and I was sick unto death of it.
But as Mother reminded me day in and day out, this was my penance for lying to her for so long. My life was never to be my own again. I would wake up, come to temple, remain until the sun set, go home, rest, then tomorrow do it all over again, endlessly, until the day I died. This was my godsforsaken existence, and it almost brought me to bitter tears to think of it.
I watched as Braided Crazy released her arrow and wept inwardly as that damned thing flew for what seemed like an eternity deep into the darkest reaches of the woods. Squeezing my eyes shut, I groaned like a wounded animal.
“Well, go fetch it, you bloody useless slave!” One of the other girls growled at me and gave me a hard shove.
I curved my hands at her. But since I had no claws, the threat was entirely for show. She and the rest of the girls surrounding her all laughed at me.
“What are you going to do, Medusa? Huh? Tickle me to death?” Then she started laughing, which set off a ripple effect of more braying laughter from her posse of sycophants. “But you know”—she shrugged—“I really shouldn’t be surprised you’re so terrible at your duties to the great goddess. You’re not even a virgin.”
I scoffed. “Of course, I’m a virgin!”
The girl with plaited blond hair snorted. “Oh yeah, well, that’s not what I heard.”
“I don’t care what you’ve heard,” I growled and got in close to her face. “It’s not true. You know what the goddess does if you’re not a virgin, and considering I’m still here, I’m clearly still pure.”
But commonsense reasoning failed to work with her. She pressed on as though I’d never even spoken. “Heard you like to take it up the bum hole.”
I gasped as all the other girls tittered with nervous and excited laughter.
“I mean,” Blond Plait said as she tapped her chin with a long finger, “it’s really smart if you think about it. When the priestess examines you, you’ll still be intact, but you’ll know the pleasure of touch. Still, the bum…” She mock shuddered. “You’re so vile.”
“Take that back!” I snarled and began to rush at her, but one of the priestesses whose name I didn’t remember was suddenly there and grabbing hold of my tunic, tugging me back by the neck.
Another priestess was grabbing Blond Plait and dragging her off.
I looked up into the kind eyes of a gray-haired priestess. “She… she said I… I—”
Tears threatened to squeeze out the corners of my eyes but not from pain—more from rage than anything else.
The kindly priestess tsked and tucked a curl behind my ear. “Pay her no mind, Medusa. That’s simply Zephinia’s way. She will be handled.”
“But I didn’t do what she said, I promise.”
“Of course you didn’t, child.” She hugged me close for a moment before pushing me back and clasping hold of my shoulders. “You are right. If you were tainted, the goddess herself would exact vengeance upon you for it. You’re as pure as I am, I’d imagine. And as I’ve said, Zephinia will be dealt with.”
I still shook, but I was mollified by the kindness in her tone and sniffed once. The other girls were back a fair bit, and they were all still looking at me as though I really had done as Zephinia had alleged.
“Go now and fetch the arrows. We will break for lunch at noon. Take as long as you need to find them, dear.”
She was telling me to walk it off, and I nodded. Use of my wings was forbidden me on holy ground. So I turned and walked in the opposite direction of the arrows. I needed to get away from all of them.
Even the kindness of the elderly priestess felt suffocating. There were so many things I wished I could change, like ever befriending Perseus. That decision was what had led me directly here to this hell that would forever be my life.
My lungs heaved, and I worked hard not to wail as I so desperately wished to do. I’d made my bed. Now I had to lie in it. I’d chosen to break Mother’s rules, and I was forced into a life of servitude for it. I entered the tree line and didn’t look back. I wanted to fly away and leave this wretched place, this terrible island. Just go far away to some place where no one knew me. But I could never leave.
Mother was tied to the waters, as was Father. Anywhere I went, they would always find me, and my lot would be even worse then. At least I could still walk freely.
After getting to the center of the woods, I plopped down onto my butt and curled my legs up, then wrapped my arms around them before laying my head upon my knees. I squeezed my eyes shut. Technically I was not allowed to fly, but no one had ever said that I could not release my wings.
So I did. I stretched them wide before quickly collapsing them tightly around my body. It would not do to have any of the other girls catch me doing aught. They weren’t above lying to get me in trouble.
My heart was unbelievably heavy with sadness, and I sighed wearily and hugged myself, breathing choppily in the thick darkness encasing me. What if I simply never returned? I could do that, right? Just sit here until I died. That would be a better fate than this, surely.
As I sat in the dark, my mind wandered, thinking about whatever naturally popped into it. Like how much I missed the taste of fish. The temple served us mostly lamb, and not that I was opposed to lamb per se, but fish made me think of freedom somehow. Of all the times I’d risen high into the sky before diving like a shooting comet into the depths below. I’d been free and able to do as I’d willed then.
Now I was just handed a plate of something, and half the time, I didn’t even like it. They were big on hand-picked salads here. Dandelion leaves and wild spinach and lettuce and such.
But this was my punishment, my penance for lying for so many years to Mother, and all for a boy who’d first ruined me then utterly abandoned me. Not that I was unhappy that Perseus hadn’t made an effort to come visit or see me again. I’d seen other girls receive visits from boys, so I knew there were ways. But the truth was it was best that Percy and I never saw one another again.
I didn’t scare easily, but he’d scared me that day just by the level of malevolence that I’d felt flowing off him to me. How bitter and nasty he’d been with those terribly cruel words he’d spewed with such venom and force. How wild his eyes had looked when he’d gazed upon me, like he hadn’t simply hated me but wished to stamp me out of existence entirely. I’d come face-to-face with evil that day, and I regretted every second that I’d lied to Mother, and all for a boy who’d never been worth it in the end.
The worst part was, Mother rarely talked to me anymore. And she’d yet to tell me the truth of the Olympians and why she’d reacted as she had when she’d seen Ares. My only option was to piece together a probable theory, but I was sure it was riddled with holes.
The only concrete thing I knew was that all of this, o
ur separation from Father and the land of Olympus, had something to do with me and a terrible prophecy Mother had received after my birth. It was the only explanation for why we’d been cast out as we had. I wondered if my sisters had also received such terrible readings or whether they were being punished because of me too.
I rubbed one foot atop the other, sighing heavily. I wasn’t a particularly religious woman, but I found myself muttering nonsense to Athena more often than not nowadays, trying in vain to learn whatever I could from whomever I could.
“Great Goddess Athena, if you’re listening to me right now, I need you. I’m most desperate to understand all of this. And no one will speak with me. All I want is the truth. No matter what it might be.”
But as always, I never got a response. Snarling, I ripped up a chunk of grass and angrily fluffed it through my fingers.
“My sister isn’t exactly known for being all that altruistic with her parishioners.”
I yelped, instantly recognizing the gravelly timbre of the male’s voice. My flesh prickled with heat, and my lower stomach pitched violently. Snapping my wings behind me, I looked up and was snared by the most mesmerizing eyes I’d ever seen. Fire burned within their dark depths.
Ares wore a whisper of a smirk upon his full and handsome lips. He was dressed in full battle armor, and I swallowed so hard it was almost painful.
“What… what are you? How? How are you here, God of War? This is Athena’s sanctified land. You’re… you’re not allowed here.”
He snorted and glanced around the manicured forest of Athena’s hunting lands then, with a casual shrug, gracefully sat. His movements were leonine, elegant and yet no less predatory. My blood raced like Apollo’s fiery chariot through my veins, making me feel both exhilaration and nausea.
“Are you telling me to go away, little bird?”
I curled my nose. “I’m no bird, Ares. I’ve told you this before.”
Tipping his head back, he gave a great big booming peal of laughter that sounded like rolling thunder in the distance. And all I could do was sit, entranced at the sight of War himself laughing so openly and freely before me.
“You are a sassy one. Glad to see my memories of you weren’t wrong.”
I thinned my lips, hiding my unusual feelings of excited curiosity by feigning annoyance. But I was far from irritated with him. If anything, I felt exhilarated. My wings shivered behind my back, tingling with the need to speed through the skies and sail as high as the very sun itself.
My fingers danced over my peach-toned skirts. “Why are you come?”
“You really are telling me to go away.”
I thought he might be irritated, but I wasn’t hearing it. Instead, there was wry amusement in his tone. “Do you know how many mortals would be genuflecting at my feet right now if I showed myself to them as I have to you? After all, you did call for a god.”
I snorted. “No, I called for your sister. Who didn’t come, as usual. But I don’t recall ever having said your name. So for the final time, War, why have you come? To make trouble for me again?”
He lifted one finely shaped brow. “What trouble could I have possibly made for you, girl?”
I gnashed my front teeth at his use of that name. I was no girl, as I’d often reminded him. I swore he said it to vex me. I was a woman by all accounts, and well he knew it. I glared at him, and the bastard seemed utterly amused by my little show. His flames danced like twinkling lights in his dark eyes, and I hated that my heart went pitter-patter at the sight of it.
I huffed. “Do you not see where I am? I’m not here for my own perverse amusement. Mother banished me after she caught you with me. In fact, she told me never to speak with you—” I made to stand, snapping out my wings for balance, but his hand was on my wrist in a split second, his touch firm but surprisingly gentle.
“Don’t,” he whispered harshly, his voice sounding quivery and strange, unusually raw and honest-sounding coming from him. “Don’t leave. I will behave.”
He’d almost sounded genuine, which wasn’t possible. At all. My uncertainty gave me pause, and I cocked my head, my wing tips still trembling with their need to flex.
The movement must have caught his eye because he slowly and very gently lifted his other hand toward the nearest feather. Without even a word of warning, he traced the one nearest him.
I sucked in a sharp breath, shivering from head to toe as I felt the stroking of his hand move like a phantom’s touch all the way through me. The sensations made me feel hot and cold and desperately longing for more of something I’d never felt before.
I looked at his face. His eyes were wide, his handsome mouth slightly parted, and his nostrils flared. Then he clenched his jaw, and I stared hypnotized at the flexing of his muscle as though he waged some internal battle within himself that I couldn’t possibly begin to make sense of.
Then his hot gaze found mine, and the frozen moment we’d shared instantly vanished. He withdrew his hand, now tightened into a fist, and coughed once. “I’m sorry, bird, if I made you uneasy. I… I wished to speak with you, in truth.”
I knew I should go. The memory of Mother’s wild eyes and her pleas that I never be alone with any of the male gods of the pantheon burned in my memory bank. But Ares had an intense vulnerability that drew me in like a moth toward flame.
“You will hurt me.” I hadn’t meant to whisper the words, hadn’t ever meant to speak them to life, but without thinking, I’d simply let them spill out of me.
Fear clutched at my throat, and my pulse beat like a drum in the side of my neck as I gazed at him in wide-eyed horror. I should never have said that to him. Should never have spoken so freely with a god.
“I… I…” I backed up on my heels, ready to fly away, consequences be damned. I didn’t care if I had to clean the temple baths for weeks for daring to fly within Athena’s temple grounds.
I began to turn on my heel, but suddenly I was wrapped up in such powerful arms that it was like trying to move through stone.
“I’m sorry, Medusa. Don’t leave. I will leave if you need me to. But don’t leave.”
“Release me at once!” I screamed, more from terror of the emotions flooding through me than from any real fear for my life.
Shock gripped me, because he did release me—instantly. So swiftly, in fact, that I nearly face-planted forward. I had to windmill my arms and wings to keep from landing in a heap upon the gravel-packed earth.
Wings still fluttering for balance, I glanced at him. His eyes were wide, and his pulse hammered in the vein at the side of his neck. And I swore but I was sure it was truth reflected back at me.
“I’m… I’m sorry, little bird. I should not have co—”
After winging myself upright, I latched onto his elbow and gripped it tight. His arm felt like smooth, hot metal. He was surprisingly solid. He glanced down at where I touched him, and there was something on his face that I couldn’t even begin to describe.
Visibly swallowing, he slowly looked up at me with a question mark on his brow.
It was my turn to release him as though I’d been scalded. “I’m sorry.” I whispered the very same words to him. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. You’re a god. I should not have yelled at you, and I certainly should not have touched you. I’m so—”
His finger, strong and powerful, was suddenly upon my mouth. I could feel the tension quivering in his body through that one touch.
“Don’t say it. Don’t act as though you’ve done wrong, because you haven’t.”
He gently pulled his hand away from me, but I still felt him pressed tight to my mouth, felt the tingles of his touch burning through me. My breath came out in a shivering sigh, and my chest heaved as though I’d run for miles.
He was the first one to blink as he rubbed the back of his head with his large palm. “I should not have come,” he murmured.
“Why did you?”
I wasn’t sure he would answer, but he surprised me yet again when he cocked hi
s head much like a curious bird and said, “I don’t know. I… I just felt drawn here.”
I remained silent, digesting what that could possibly mean.
After several seconds of silence, he whispered, “Does that scare you?”
“Should it?”
He smirked and gave his head a gentle shake.
“What’s so funny?” I asked grumpily.
He snorted. “Gods, you’re unusual.”
“Is that a good or bad thing?”
Shrugging, he rolled his wrists. “It’s a thing. Good or bad, I’m not sure yet. But you’re unlike anyone I’ve ever known before.”
“Ares, will you hurt me?” I asked him again. This time, my words were softer, gentler. More vulnerable. “Mother thinks you might. Though she won’t tell me how or even why. Only that I should never be alone with a male, let alone a male god. If she were to learn of this, I fear what might…” My words trailed off as I shuddered, imagining all that she might do to me if she were to discover my latest duplicity.
Sometimes I was tempted to call my new lot in life hell on earth, but the truth was I’d not even begun to feel the pain if Mother should ever discover where I was at this very moment.
Blowing out a frustrated breath, I gazed at him from beneath my lashes. I knew I should fear him. Mother’s fears weren’t for nothing. She wasn’t that kind of woman. She was stalwart and rarely given to emotion. I could not have done half of what she had if the slipper had been on the other foot. Leaving a man I was so obviously in love with, willingly making myself smaller and inconsequential, even in the eyes of gods she could so easily crush if she’d truly had a mind to. And all of it done for the love of a child. I admired her. But I was also annoyed by her.
She wouldn’t tell me the prophecy, and I wouldn’t lie—I wasn’t scared of Ares, though I knew I should be. I simply couldn’t work up the emotion. I knew who he was, but when he was with me, I didn’t see the bloodthirsty god. I simply saw a curious man who intrigued me as much as I seemed to intrigue him.
The Greek Gods of Romance Collection Page 67