She shuddered. It was almost safer to be in the densely populated city center. A woman stood out less with more people around.
And all this in a vain attempt to end Punishment.
No one here knew what it was like to have magic coursing through their veins, to navigate at sea level, or to look at the true horizon instead of at a huge barrier circling them in. At best, someone really old remembered someone really old telling them about it, and yet it was all anyone could talk about. Killing tens of thousands of women over the years hadn’t changed a thing, and Bellanca couldn’t understand why no one saidstop.
But maybe that was her role.
Tightly, she said, “May Atlantis rise again.” She gave Carvera mock salute and turned her back on him, reaching for the sandals she’d left on the deep-set window frame to air out. She had a gods-awful job to get to.
Well, only parts of it were bad. It wasn’t worse than Carver going from a prince and army commander to a do-what-you’re-told soldier in King Eryx’s guard. At least she didn’t have to serve that sadistic bastard and his mean-spirited courtiers all day long. She knew what rotten royalty looked like, and while Eryx didn’t top her parents, and definitely not her brother, he was a vile piece of work. With magic, he’d be even worse.
Which was why she’d oust him the second he got his ancestral powers back. She could do it now, but that would be murder instead of conquest—and not the way she wanted to start her reign.
Bellanca strapped on her sandals with more force than necessary while she waited for Carver to leave. He never said, “Why in the Underworld did I follow you here?” but he had to be thinking it day in and day out, and all that did was drive a bigger wedge between them than if they’d been in two separate worlds.
The door shut behind him. He didn’t even slam it. She almost wished he had.
Bellanca squeezed her eyes shut. “I can do better than this.” Behind closed lids, she saw people she missed. Her sister, Lystra. Cat and Griffin. Jocasta and Flynn. Prometheus. She opened her eyes again.
She would’ve missed Carver the most. They always had each other’s backs—when they weren’t at each other’s throats. Why could they only get along when they were fighting someone else?
But she didn’t have to miss him. He was here—and a prickly bear of a housemate who never seemed capable of putting on more than half his clothes.
She seriously considered a new strategy of singeing off his chest hairs one by one until he learned to stay dressed as she locked the door behind her and headed down the stairs. She did her best to ignore the sounds and smells coming from the lodgings below theirs. Fried fish and wailing babies. She shuddered, not fond of either of those.
Outside, she turned toward the city center and headed for the huge agora below the castle. The central marketplace wasn’t far—another perk of having paid the steep price for the large set of top-floor rooms right on the southern edge of the main harbor. The focal point of the island for buying, selling, gambling, and gossiping, the agora bustled with people and activity all day, every day. She and Carver could’ve walked to work together, weaving through the already busy streets of Atlantapol, but they’d stopped doing that lately.
She’d wondered after yesterday’s teamwork if they might start again. But then this morning, they’d argued.
She bit her lip. How could her best friend, the one person she could always count on, also be the one person she had no idea how to talk to?
Fighting was easier. They did that instead, and they’d always been good at it. Besides, she’d rather watch anger shooting like lightning bolts through his storm-gray eyes than see regret for everything he’d left behind or the reminder that she owed him a debt so big she could never repay it.
Chapter 3
“May Atlantis rise again.” Theophania greeted her with the ubiquitous reminder that no woman was safe on this island. Twice Bellanca’s age and three times as haggard, Theophania hurried around as if her feet were on fire. She took breakfast plates to a table on the wide terrace overlooking the bustling agora. The castle half shaded them—thank the gods. It was already hotter than Hephaestus’s forge and would only get worse with every passing second.
“May Atlantis rise again,” Bellanca automatically responded, dipping her hands into the washing basin at the entrance to Spiro’s, one of Atlantapol’s many busy tavernas. Spiro owned, oversaw, and decided on everything within these walls because Atlantis was a disgustingly male-centric civilization. Atlantians sank to the bottom of the ocean and forgot to evolve. Maybe Atlantiscouldn’trise again because Spiro and his like were such a weight on progress and society.
The thought, while not funny, made Bellanca smile, and she ducked her head as she tied on her apron.
“What are you so happy about?” Spiro eyed her suspiciously from his throne of cushions in the center of his eating establishment, one hand reaching for a platter of various sweets and roasted almonds and the other holding a goblet of mulled wine that would inevitably leave him snoring. “You’re always plotting something.”
“Then why did you hire me?” Bellanca lifted three plates off the long counter dividing the spacious garden dining area from the tiny and suffocating kitchen. She wove through the tables that were already filling with patrons, bringing the steaming fare to the trio of men in the far corner. They were there every morning at the same time and never ordered anything different.
“I needed help at the taverna, and you were coordinated enough to carry two things at once,” Spiro answered around a mouthful of baklava when she neared him again. Bellanca had taken to eating the phyllo-encased walnut-and-honey dessert in the mornings, too, whenever she could and there was some available. It stuck to her ribs and kept her going until after the lunchtime rush passed and she could eat something again. In any case, she refused to eat pan-seared fish with a slice of lemon for breakfast, lunch,anddinner, which was what most people did here.
“I’m actually carrying three plates at once, so I should get a raise,” Bellanca called over her shoulder as she rushed to help Theophania serve the already seated customers.
Spiro chortled, making his huge frame jiggle. She grinned back at him, because that was the Atlantian Bellanca—one who smiled and teased and sashayed around tables. Spiro was a whale of a man and a product of his culture, but he wasn’t mean-spirited, and he loved his wife and daughter more than anything. Theophania worked hard and put the customers before her own comfort, which her husband admired. Maybe because he didn’t know how to do either.
They’d relegated their daughter, Lilika, to the kitchen with the new cook, Dimitri, because so many men in Atlantis were pigs, and the poor girl didn’t know how to defend herself. Lilika was as round and good-natured as her father, but unlike Spiro, she worked hard and stayed graceful on her feet. Her long darkhair, warm, golden skin, and irresistible smile drew more attention than she wanted and made working in the main part of the taverna difficult. Lilika never twisted an ear, stomped on a foot, or dumped hot soup in anyone’s lap. Bellanca had done all three in a matter of days and magically stopped being batted around the eatery like a plaything.
She couldn’t fathom why Carver thought she’d done something reckless. At least she hadn’t incinerated anyone.
Well,outsidethe conspirator’s cave. Inside, she’d done a number on those satyrs.
A mix of questions and excitement bubbled inside her. She was frankly an expert at burning things to a crisp, but she’d always needed to grab on to them first. Incineration from a distance was different. New. She could do worlds of damage just by throwing her fire, but an immense heat suddenly exploding from her and turning her foes to ash? It was fantastic. It was also terrifying. What if Carver had been closer to her when her magic detonated, or with fewer bodies between them? She’d managed to better focus her attacks after the first unexpected surge, but it hadn’t been easy. There was always a learning process with new magic, and this was just the beginning.
