The woman grunted and set about pinning the fresh lizards to the barbs wedged into the cracked stone.
Danae’s heart lurched into her throat. ‘Surely Heracles and Atalanta should build up their strength before they travel?’ She gazed imploringly at Metis.
‘I’m fine,’ Heracles spat between clenched teeth, hauling himself up the stone wall for support.
Telamon moved towards Danae blocking the entrance. ‘Daeira, move aside.’
She looked up into his freckled face and stood her ground. No longer would she play the part of dutiful servant of the gods, the seer willing to take orders from heroes. It was time to shed her old disguise once and for all.
‘My name is Danae.’
Telamon made a disparaging sound in the back of his throat. ‘All right,Danae, let us pass.’
Her skin was too tight, her blood racing.
‘I can’t do it on my own,’ she whispered.
Metis paused halfway through skewering a lizard’s tail and turned to look at her.
‘What are you talking about?’ asked Telamon.
Tears pricked her eyes. Of all the things she had done, all the terrors she’d faced, nothing had exposed her quite like this.
She needed them.
She had broken their trust, perhaps irrevocably. But she had to try and rebuild it. She stood before them, barefoot, draped in the torn dress Hades had given her in the Underworld, her shoulder-length hair barely contained in its unruly braid. All semblance of her old seer’s disguise stripped away.
‘Please, just listen to what I have to say. Then if you still want to leave, I won’t stand in your way.’
‘No one wants to hear it,’ snarled Heracles.
‘I do.’
Everyone looked at Atalanta. The warrior was scowling at Danae, arms crossed. ‘I want to hear what she has to say.’
Metis slunk into the shadows of the hut, watching them all with bright eyes.
‘You should sit,’ said Danae. ‘This might take a while.’
Telamon and Heracles looked at one another, but neither voiced their dissent as they lowered themselves down around the hearth. Danae moved into the hut and joined their circle.
‘I was born on Naxos …’ The first few sentences stuck in her throat like tar, but as she gained momentum they ran swift as a tumbling spring. She told them of her family, of the island she grew up on. When she spoke of what Zeus had done to Alea, of Arius’ disappearance and Alea’s death, silent tears fled down Atalanta’s cheeks. Heracles would not look at her, his eyes hardening with every word.
Danae pressed on, describing how she had accidentallydestroyed the oracle at Delphi by shattering the omphalos stone with her powers, meaning the one remaining shard, now lost in the Underworld, was the only true source of prophecy left in existence. She told of Manto’s revelation of Prometheus’ prophecy and her fierce friend’s heroic death at the talons of the harpies.
While she spoke, the sun’s light faded from the hut, the sky blushing into twilight. After a while, Metis rose, quietly working around them to light a fire. Danae expected one of the group to interrupt and condemn her story or threaten to leave, but all remained silent. She continued to tell her tale until the only light came from the hearth, its glow flickering over her companions’ drawn faces. She told them of why she had joined their group, and her quest to reach Prometheus at the end of the world. She repeated the truth of that fateful night with Dolos outside Colchis. She told them that she was a Titan, what that truly meant and all that Prometheus had revealed to her atop the Caucasus Mountains about the false gods. Finally, she spoke of the Underworld, of Orpheus’ tragic death, the Missing and the terrible truth of the shades’ origins.
Her voice had grown raw by the time she fell silent, the sky beyond the hut dark and star-cast. Her truth expelled, she felt empty, like a husk plundered of its soft insides.
No one spoke for some time. Danae felt so light she might laugh. There were no more lies left to weigh her down. They knew who she was, what she was, and what she must do.
‘Gods, I wish we had wine,’ Atalanta murmured.
‘It is true. All she has said.’ Metis stared at Danae, her dark eyes gleaming in the firelight. ‘Prometheus, the Titans, the false gods. It is all true.’
‘Why didn’t you tell us before?’ asked Telamon.
‘Would you have believed me?’ countered Danae.
