Her teardrops form pearly rings,
On blood-red anemone’s bloom…’
As the melody curled around Danae’s mind, she was struck by a sudden realization. Before the vision that had led her to Athens, the omphalos shard had shown her a songbird singing alone into an empty cave. Only, now she realized it hadn’t been a cave. It was a mine. A flare of hope swelled in her chest, another grain of proof that, despite what the voice believed, fate was on the side of finding her sister.
With Orpheus’ song, Hylas calmed and returned to the earth, the panic fading from his eyes.
The musician tailed off, his singing stifled by tears. ‘I told you, my voice is not what it was.’
‘It’s still beautiful,’ she whispered. ‘Thank you.’
Orpheus wiped his eyes. Then he delved into his bag, brought out a torch and bashed two stones until the end, wrapped in oil-soaked rags, burst into flame. He proffered it to her.
‘You keep it. I’ll need my hands free for whatever we meet down there.’
Orpheus paled but he nodded. ‘You never told me who you’re looking for.’
Her instinct was to lie, yet the musician’s song had disarmed her.
‘My sister.’
‘I hope you find her.’
‘And you your Eurydice.’
She might be making a grave mistake, but what else could she do? Kill him? Bind him in rope and leave him helpless in the mine to starve? Like her, he walked a life strangled by grief. Who was she to deny him the chance to find his wife?
They shared one last look then, side by side, walked into the darkness.
5. The Mines of Taenarum
As they entered the mine, Danae kept her hand on Hylas’ neck, drawing comfort from his warmth in the cold darkness.
‘It’s all right,’ she whispered, attempting to soothe herself as much as the horse.
Her skin prickled as they stepped further into the murky depths of the cavern, the light behind them dwindling, replaced by the fire of Orpheus’ torch. The air grew increasingly dank and stale, trapped by the tightly packed walls of earth. The torchlight illuminated the remains of several campfires scattered about the abandoned mining equipment. Travellers perhaps, desperate for shelter, or local children daring each other to prove who could last the longest before the ghostlike shadows sent them fleeing for home. In their youth that was just the sort of thing Danae’s brothers, Calix and Santos, would have done.
The spacious cavern narrowed at the rear, funnelling into a passageway just large enough for Danae and Orpheus to walk beside Hylas. There were track marks on the floor, an abandoned cart lay turned on its side, and gleaming chunks of green marble spilled across the ground. The locals must have truly feared what lay ahead if they had left this much valuable stone to gather dust.
Danae caught sight of a roughly daubed mark across the passage’s lintel that looked as though it had been hastily scrawled. The all-seeing eye of the Twelve. A desperate attempt to protect the town of Taenarum from the horrors the locals feared had been set loose inside the mine.
The air grew colder as the passageway sloped downwards. The walls here were made of sheer rock, rather than packed earth, and they glistened with silvery condensation tracks – the supposed tears the local lad, Georgios, had spoken of.
Hylas huffed out a misted breath, his tail flicking his flanks. Danae glanced back over her shoulder, her neck twinging from continually checking the length of tunnel in their wake. Every few yards she imagined red eyes looming out of the darkness.
‘Do you think there’s any truth to it? What the locals believe about this place?’ asked Orpheus.
‘That it’s haunted?’ Her own voice sounded strange, distorted by the blood thrumming in her ears. ‘It’s not the dead I’m worried about.’
The torch trembled in Orpheus’ hand. ‘I pray Hades will be merciful. I would give anything to bring Eurydice back home, even if it means taking her place.’
Danae remained silent. She had grown up believing, like everyone else, that there was an uneasy alliance between Olympus and the Underworld. It was said, at the birth of the world, Hades was begrudgingly forced to rule over the land of the dead while Zeus gave their other brother, Poseidon, dominion over the seas. Even if the tales were false, like so much of what she’d been told, he was still one of the Twelve and the younger brother of Zeus, King of the Gods. The deity whose reign she was destined to destroy. She must avoid Hades at all costs.
‘Do you think he will look kindly on us because you are his niece?’ continued Orpheus.
‘What?’
‘Poseidon is your father, is he not?’
