“Hours. Days.” Bel wrinkled her nose. “It’s all blending together at this point.”
Carver shrugged. He agreed in a way. Time was racing, and yet he could pull out specific moments with utter clarity. Good, bad, terrifying… They all left their mark.
The salt breeze captured a hint of summer cherries, and Carver inhaled deeply. Now that Bel wasn’t hiding her magic anymore, her radiant hair and occasional flickers perfumed the air around her almost constantly. The aroma never failed to arouse him. “What’s the first thing you want to do when we get home?” he asked.
She groaned almost erotically. “A bath.”
Heat billowed through him. Suggestively, he lifted his brows. “Together?”
She slanted him a dubious look. “Considering the size of our bathtubs, we could probably each fit a leg in and kick each other, if you want.”
He chuckled. “How about a meal?”
“If you’re cooking,” she tossed back.
His smile widened. It was all too easy to picture them at their kitchen table. It was his favorite place in Atlantis. That table was where they’d come together daily, morning and evening, no matter what else was happening or what worries plagued them. Now, he could bend Bel over the wood, lift her skirts, and she could burn more handprints onto the surface.
“We’ll save that bath together for when we have the royal bathhouse,” he said a little huskily. A huge pool, and only them to occupy it. Perfect.
Barely taming her smile, Bel shook her head at him. “We might boil the water.”
He winked at her. “One can hope.”
Heat colored her cheeks, and she laughed as a stronger breeze blew over them, whipping some sparks from her hair. “At least I don’t have to worry about burning you anymore.”
“True.” Over the last few days, they’d carefully tested Bel’s usual fire and her new sun-flare magic on him, finally working up to full-blown blasts. Nothing had hurt him. Carver’s awareness of the mark they’d been calling a tattoo had grown and then stabilized into something he was conscious of but not bothered by. A constant prickle of magic lived in his chest now, right beneath the symbols. The odd tension felt like a breath held, or a cloud on the cusp of bursting, or a foot about to step off a precipice. It felt like potential.
The sea breeze turned noticeably colder. The sky darkened, and Carver looked up, frowning. Not a cloud in sight.
His eyes met Bel’s. She frowned back at him, and magic licked down her arms. “That’s a fell wind,” she muttered.
Carver stopped and turned. Zeph and Arete had already moved closer together, some instinct driving them to converge. The soldiers darted worried glances toward the sky, some drawing lightweight cloaks around their shoulders. Their footsteps slowed.
“Be on your guard,” Carver called out, unease blooming beneath his medallion-shaped tattoo. “Move the injured into the middle. Everyone else, draw your swords.” He did the same, unsheathing his weapon. His blade barely made a sound as it left the soft leather casing on his back, but it still rang like the start of battle in his ears.
Bel’s magic-bright gaze narrowed on the increasingly agitated sea. “You know who can affect the weather?”
Carver’s jaw hardened. “You think she’s coming?” He couldn’t help glancing north toward Mount Olympus.
“I have no idea.” She started walking again. “Let’s hope not.”
Carver followed, rolling his shoulders to try to relieve the growing tension there. “These men can’t fight a goddess.”
Bel darted him a somber, sidelong glance. “Neither can we.”
“You have the completed amulet now. Persephone said it would amplify your magic to almost godlike power.”
A cynical smile twisted her mouth. “The key word there isalmost. Besides, because of Hera’s ultimatum, no matter what I do, I lose.”
Carver hated it but couldn’t argue with that. Fury roughened his voice. “Atlantis was supposed to be your gift, not your punishment.”
“What do you mean?” Confusion dented her brow.
The wind stayed cool, the sunlight unnaturally dampened, and Carver’s hand twitched on his sword. Wary of the unfriendly air around them, he lengthened his stride and moved faster across the uneven terrain. “Punishment was supposed to prevent the terrible power and resource gaps that sprang up between Magoi and Hoi Polloi in Thalyria. It mostly did, but something else happened here.”
“A huge gender-based divide.”
He nodded. “Zeus wanting to end Punishmentnowmight be wholly self-interested, but he choseyouto do it—a woman, and a nearly unparalleled Magoi who’s not hungry for power and riches or indiscriminately violent.”
