We’ll do it without the war you fear…
I wish that were true. But it’s not, and my Gods, is he in for a disappointment.
CHAPTER 11
We free the horses to graze and approach the hovel on foot, stopping a few paces from the ramshackle porch. The Chaos Wizard doesn’t move a muscle for more than an hour. He just stares straight at me with those all-seeing eyes. His timeless gaze is disconcerting, to say the least.
The last time I saw Thanos, I asked if he knew anything about the wizard’s swirling eyes. My childhood protector dropped his voice to a reverent whisper and leaned his battle-scarred face close to mine. “His knowledge is Chaos, infinite but without form. The dark pupils hold all the Gods’ worlds combined. The golden irises reflect the whirling of the stars and the passage of time.”
I don’t know how Thanos knew about the wizard’s mesmerizing eyes. When I asked, he just looked at me in that inscrutable way of his. I was the princess, and he was my guard, and yet I knew better than to question him. If Thanos said jump, I jumped because it meant someone was swiping at my feet.
The Chaos Wizard finally speaks, his deeply resonating voice at complete odds with his fragile appearance. “Catalia Andromeda Eileithyia Fisa.”
He greets me by my full name, which doesn’t bode well for my whole keeping-the-prophecy-a-secret-at-least-for-now ambition. I’ll tell Griffin. I will. It’s just that acknowledging it to another person makes it that much more real.
Guess what? You want to make a better world? Good luck with that, because I’m going to destroy it.
That conversation is bound to go well.
I lift my hand in a small wave. “Hello.” I don’t know his name, I don’t think anyone does, but I figure it’s polite to at least respond. My own name still echoes in my ears, and my pulse picks up—walk, trot, canter—until my heart is galloping under my ribs.
But nothing else happens. Eventually, the Chaos Wizard’s eyes glaze over again, although his strange stare stays fixed in my direction. I sit down facing the wizard’s porch. I tell the others I think we’re in for a long wait—he stared at me for hours the last time I was here, too—but they stay standing, the Frozen Lake on our left and the grassy field swaying around us.
After a while, Kato slides me a sidelong look. “Andromeda? Fantastic second name.”
A dry smile lifts my lips. “She stamped me from the day I was born, as if that would somehow make it easier to bend me to her will.” I pick a blade of hellipses grass and start peeling the tough layers apart. “Where Mother’s concerned, I do love to disappoint.”
Kato glances at the wizard. “How does he know?”
“He knows everything. That’s why he’s completely mad,” I say, winding my finger around in circles next to my head.
The men glance anxiously toward the house, but the wizard isn’t paying any attention. My antics are of supreme disinterest to a being like him.
After another half hour or so, something cool licks at my skin. At first, I think it’s just the wind, but when it happens again, goose bumps break out on my arms. The same persistent coolness dips into my head, probing.
I sit up straighter. I know this feeling. Two Oracles have demanded my thoughts and tasted me with their frosty tongues. This is both subtler and more powerful, and my fingers tense reflexively around the torn-up grass in my lap, all of me stiffening. After one slightly panicked breath, I force myself to relax and open my mind. I’ll lay myself bare in a way I rarely do, even for myself, if it means helping Griffin avoid a war.
The feeling of icy habitation recedes just as a gust of wind blasts through the valley. It’s chilly, even for me. Next to me, Flynn shivers. His brown eyes flick to mine.
“Shouldn’t you stand?” he whispers nervously.
“You whisper really loud,” I whisper back really loudly.
Flynn scowls. “I feel like we should light candles and pray. Like this is a temple.”
“That,” I say, pointing to the hovel, “is a hovel.”
Flynn gasps. It’s funny, especially since the wizard seems to have finished exploring my mind, and we’re not dead.
“Do you see those marks?” I point to the grassless depressions littering the field around the shack. “Those are from God Bolts. The wizard has a direct line to Zeus, whose favorite weapon is the thunderbolt. If he wanted us gone, we would be. Permanently. As in disintegrated. Poof. Nothing but ash.”
Flynn’s eyes dart from side to side, taking in the dozens of charred pockmarks scattered all around us. “People the wizard, or Zeus, decided shouldn’t be here?” he asks.
I nod, and he looks suddenly grumpy. Or like he has an upset stomach. Or maybe both.
“You failed to mention that before we got here,” Flynn says tightly.
I shrug. “I was pretty sure we’d be fine.”
Carver snorts. “‘Pretty sure’ is a pretty big gamble.”
I wave off his concern. I wasn’t worried. Not really. “Not killing us doesn’t mean helping us, though.”
Griffin sits down next to me, his eyes on the impossibly still man and his creepy black staff. “‘Pretty sure’ from Cat are odds I’ll take any day.”
I offer him a small smile. His confidence both warms and scares me. “Zeus is my ancestor. I think, I hope, he’ll point us toward the Ipotane.” I can’t explain exactly why I think Zeus favors me, and I have no real proof that he does. Except maybe that booming voice at Ios, that crack of thunder and flash of lightning. I think Zeus may have helped me heal Griffin and then chastised me for praying to his brother Poseidon, my go-to God, when I should have turned to the king of Olympus instead.
I’m here now, Zeus. What’s next?
Glancing north across the lake, I give myself an inward shake. Great. Catalia Fisa. Humble as ever. I almost wonder if the sky will open up and rain down lightning bolts.
Evening approaches, and the biting wind dies down as the sun sinks in the west. The wizard, motionless as ever, looks like he grew right out of his porch. I’m not nervous anymore, I’m bored. Luckily, Griffin chooses to be bored along with me. The guys, starting to finally relax and act normal again, play dice games where they set up camp a few dozen feet away. Two rabbits cook on a spit over a fire in one of the God Bolt pits, and Flynn tends to the evening meal, as usual.
The smell of roasting meat makes my stomach growl. “I’m hungry.”
Griffin retrieves the saddlebags and unloads bread, cheese, cured meat, and a plump orange. I try to hand back the meat, but Griffin won’t take it.
“Just a little,” he says. “To keep up your strength.”
I wrinkle my nose, dangling the dried strip between my thumb and forefinger. More disgusted than usual by it, I drop it in his lap. The smell of aged cheese reaches me next, and my stomach turns over. Grimacing, I push away everything but the bread and fruit.
Griffin frowns. “I thought you were hungry.”
“I’m starving.” I tear into the orange, free a quarter, and then ram the entire thing into my mouth.
Griffin watches me inhale the orange, an odd expression on his face.
“What?” I lick pulp and juice from my fingers. I’m a mess. I hardly stopped to chew. My eyes widen. “Did you want some? Was that the last one?” He’s not fond of fruit, so I didn’t think to ask.
“No. And no.” He sweeps his thumb under my lower lip, catching a drip. He licks the juice from his finger, and the intimacy of the simple act thumps me in the chest.
He hands me the dried meat again, but I shake my head.
“Eat it,” Griffin says, “or I’ll sit on you until you do.”
My mouth drops open in what I’m sure is a very attractive way. “I knew you were overbearing, but don’t you think that’s taking it a bit far, Your High-Handedness?”
“I knew you were stubborn, but don’t you know you
can’t survive on oranges alone? That’s practically all you’ve eaten for days.”
“I have bread!” I hold up the bread.
“Bread fills the belly. It does little to nourish the body.”
I start to argue, then stop and scowl. “It’s annoying when you make sense.”
“Would you rather I were a fool?” he asks.
“Yes.”
“Meat.” He slaps it into my hand. “Eat.”
I roll my eyes. “You could rival Calliope with poetry like that.”
“My ability to get what I want is legendary.” It’s not a boast. It’s fact. “I’ll do this every day if I have to, all day, until you stop arguing and eat some damn meat.”
I glower at him, secretly enjoying his gruff concern and domineering ways, something I’ll never admit to—not on my deathbed or beyond. “Fine. But I’ll wait for the rabbit. We should save our dried supplies for the Ice Plains.”
Griffin gives me a hard I’m holding you to that look before putting the cured meat away.
Compromise. I guess it’s not so bad.
While the rabbits hiss and cook on the spit, I settle against Griffin’s side, breaking off bits of bread to eat and also feeding some to Griffin. My mind wanders to our time in Kitros. Too close for real comfort to Castle Tarva and the enemy royals who live there, Griffin and I rarely left our room at the inn while Carver, Kato, and Flynn took care of replenishing supplies and replacing damaged items.
Heat blossoms low in my abdomen at the memories that flood to mind. Staying out of sight and “resting” extensively furthered my understanding of Griffin’s thorough and inventive nature. I never knew what to expect when his eyes turned that stormy gray and he prowled toward me, clearly intent on stripping me bare. His lovemaking can be long and slow with soft touches and gentle words. Or it can be fast and hard with fevered hands and shuddering breath. I’ve had my back against the wall—and my front. I’ve had his mouth between my legs until I scream and thunder shakes the room, and I’ve been naked on my knees with my hair gripped tight in his fists doing things that definitely don’t require a bed.
I lift my face and kiss his scruffy jaw, the heat from Griffin’s big body matching the warmth now swirling through mine.
A smile curves his wide mouth. “What was that for?”
I flush, certain my heart and my thoughts are in my eyes. “Kitros.”
“Ah, Kitros.” His silver gaze glitters like the first stars at twilight. His arm tightens around my waist, and he lowers his head, his breath warming my neck as he presses a lingering kiss to the sensitive spot below my ear. His lips are firm but soft. His stubble rasps. Tingles ripple down my spine.
I slide my fingers into his windblown hair, desire licking through me. “If we were alone, I’d want you inside me right now.”
He groans softly. “Right now?”
“Right. Now.”
“With only a kiss on the neck?” His rough whiskers lightly scrape the shell of my ear.
I shiver, shifting closer to him. “I was ready without the kiss on the neck. Now I’m desperate for you.” I grip his hair, keeping his dark head close to mine. Our cheeks brush as I whisper in his ear. “Just thinking about the things we did in Kitros makes me hot and wet. You’d slide right in, and I’d clench you so hard your mind would go blank.”
Griffin’s hand convulses on my hip. His grip is possessive. Deliciously hard. I hear him swallow. His voice comes to me a shade deeper, and a good deal rougher. “You have no idea how much I want that.”
I moan quietly. “I want it more. I want you. There’s a pulse between my legs. If you touch me, I’ll explode.”
He tenses, like he’s holding himself back. “We have an audience.”
I move restlessly against him, nearly in his lap, mostly sheltered by him. “The guys aren’t looking, and the wizard is probably in a trance.”
“We can’t leave in case he decides to talk.”
“We don’t have to leave. We don’t have to undress. Just touch me. I need you.”
Griffin curses softly. His eyes searing, he straightens away from me. “I love you to the point of desperation, but it’s a mood, and it’ll pass.”
I reach for him again. “I’ll be quiet.”
He grabs my hand. “You’re never quiet.”
“I can try.”
He chuckles at that, but it turns into a husky, almost pained groan. Squeezing my hand, he exhales slowly. “You’ll be the death of me, Cat.”
And just like that, my blood freezes over. Lust crashes, leaving behind a tangle of foreboding and fear.
Griffin senses the change in me instantly. “It’s a figure of speech.”
I draw back. “And in our case, horribly fitting.”
He shakes his head. “Stop doing that. You’re not responsible for everything that happens around you. Whatever the Fates have in store for us is decided before we’re born. Whatever happens to me, to any of us, it will never be your fault.” He tilts my face up, forcing me to meet his now steely gaze. “And I have no intention of dying.”
“That’s what we all say. That doesn’t stop it from happening.”
“Eventually, yes. But for now, don’t add shadows to the dark.”
It’s hard to believe that just moments ago, I was so wild with desire I was ready to disregard our surroundings. I do like to put on a good show, but not that kind of show. Now, there’s a chasm in my chest. “My sister died because of me.”
“Your sister died for you. It’s not the same.”
“And if you die for me, will that make it any easier? You’d do it. Don’t deny it. We both know it’s true.”
His mouth flattens, his jaw hardening until it seems carved from stone. “What worries me is your sacrificing yourself for me, agapi mou.”
I gape at him. “You can’t have one standard for yourself and another for me!”
“And you can’t keep living your life like everyone matters except for you!”
“That’s…” Damn, that’s a good argument. “I don’t want to die any more than you do. But I’ve been on borrowed time for years. Sometimes, I can’t believe I even made it this fa—”
“Stop. Don’t finish that thought.” Griffin’s eyes glint dangerously, reflecting the moon’s first rays. “If you won’t put yourself first for you, then do it for me. For our family.”
“We don’t have a family.”
“We are a family!”
The vehemence in his voice slaps me so hard that I jerk. Tiny daggers start stabbing at the backs of my eyes, making them sting and water.
Griffin takes my face in his hands. His fingers press into my head. “I may not be holding you with a magic rope anymore, but I will never let you go, and I will never leave you. I would defy creatures, and Gods, and terrible, brutal queens to keep you safe and by my side. I would move Mount Olympus itself to hold you in my arms and feel your heart beat against mine. You are my soul, and yes, I will fight for you and protect you until my dying breath.”
His vow stuns me into silence. I swallow hard as the force of it ignites the magic in my blood, proving its utter truth. A quiet sob rattles my chest. I gulp it down, but that effort goes to waste when Griffin pulls me into his lap and wraps his arms around me. All the knots inside me unravel, and a floodgate opens. It’s loud. And ugly.
His jaw brushes my temple. “I thought cats didn’t cry.”
I sniff. “They don’t.” Usually.
Griffin slides his hand up and down my back, letting my uncharacteristic breakdown run its course. “Ee-lee-thia,” he says after a while, his pronunciation of my second middle name hesitant. “That’s nice.”
I let out a watery snort. Kind of a hiccup. Is this what love does to a person? Uncontrollable emotion?
“Eileithyia’s not bad,” I agree. It’s a lot better than Androm
eda.
“Goddess of childbirth, right?”
I nod, wiping my eyes with the backs of my hands. “Prepare yourself. With a namesake like that, chances are I’m really fertile.”
Griffin has the good sense to look like that doesn’t bother him at all.
Flynn brings us a rabbit to share, not commenting on my strange behavior, if he even noticed it from over by the campfire. While we eat, Griffin cuts some of the longer hellipses grass around us, stacking the wide, dry blades into a neat pile next to him. He eventually binds the stalks with a leather cord and then carefully slips the whole stack into the bottom of his saddlebag.
“What’s that for?” I ask around a bite of admittedly succulent rabbit. Flynn’s a good cook. The meat is never dry. He even carries herbs.
Griffin smiles faintly. “There’s something I might want to make. And the grass here is good. Strong.”
I’m curious about his ability to create. I saw the grass crown he wove for Kaia. It was beautiful and intricate even though it was just for play, and I’m sure it pleased her more than all of her new jewels combined.
“Why didn’t I ever see you weaving when we spent all those weeks traveling together before?” I ask.
Griffin turns slightly and looks out over the darkening meadow. In profile, the rugged contours of his face and his aquiline nose stand out more prominently. There’s nothing delicate or bland about his strong-boned face; he’s a magnetic, masculine work of art. His gaze stops on the lake, its now smooth surface a vast shadow splashed across the center of the valley. The moon hangs low and yellow in the sky, already lighting a shimmering path across the water. Icebergs reflect the moonlight, the hulking, jagged mounds like a Giant’s stepping-stones to the snowcapped mountains beyond.
“If there’s one thing Sinta doesn’t lack, it’s dusty plains and dry grasses. There’s never a shortage of hellipses grass. It’s even here, in Fisa, and so far to the north.” He looks at me then. “Weaving reminds me of all the times our tribe had to make everything we could from something that costs nothing at all.”