“You sold it? Theftandfraud—what a naughty girl.”
“You barely ever looked at it. And I only got back what I put into your house, so as far as I’m concerned, we’re even.”
“We are not even,” he snarled, reaching for his crutches. “Not even close.”
Skye shied away as he hauled himself upright, getting to her feet at the precise moment her mother reappeared.
“Where are you going?” she called as Martyn reached the door.
“To call for a taxi that will take me back to my hotel,” he said. “There’s a ferry tomorrow at five o’clock, so you have until then to contact whoever it was you sold my watch to and organize for it to be returned.”
“And if I don’t?” Skye said faintly.
“Then I’ll have no choice but to report you,” he said. “Like I said, wifey, you can run, but you can’t hide.”
Forty-eight
November 1941
Katerina could not stop her hands from shaking.
The temperature had cooled, though that was not the cause. She could not place the blame solely on the shoulders of Gaia. Mother Earth was not the one who had blocked the seas; she had not seen fit to starve the people of Greece alongside their captors.
A splatter of ink dropped onto the letter. Katerina cursed quietly. There was a pencil in the pocket of her skirt, and she drew it out, tossing the pen into the dirt. A puddle of blue spread like a squashed berry. Two words. That was all she had written.
Dearest Stefanos,
She was the only person who ever wandered this far across the mountains of Folegandros. Katerina was alone, yet the urge to look around carefully was insistent. The Italians had made it clear: Anyone found to be writing letters, diaries, or other accounts of the occupation would be marked for death.
“There is no reason to take such a risk,” Leni had warned. “We cannot send these letters, even if we write them.”
It was true. Stefanos could not be reached, but writing to him was something. A line cast out with an empty hook.
The scratch of the pencil was soft, rhythmic.
When at first the invaders came, strong lines were drawn between us and them, though the hardship of these months has blurred them. We are united now, foe and friend, by hunger.
Katerina stared at the words she had written.
It was not only the line between Greek and Italian that was fading. Her own neighbors had become thieves. The bakery windows had been smashed, the wood panels nailed across them ripped apart by those seeking sustenance.
She bent her head to the paper once more.
The brothers tell me it is worse on the mainland. The German army has mounted blockades that prevent the farmers from moving produce into the cities. In Russia, the horses are being eaten. Cats and rats hunted. Glue made into a meal.
Even as she noted them down, Katerina could not quite believe these reports. Whispers that had begun their journey so far away must have become distorted. A tale grew each time it was shared, the storyteller adding a flourish, a salacious detail, something new for their audience.
People would not eat glue. It was an absurdity.
Where are you, I wonder, my traveling warrior, my stubborn patriot, the beat in my heart?
She froze. The pencil immobile.
Had she imagined it?
Katerina held her breath, every muscle pulled tight. Then it came again, gentle, certain, a nudge from somewhere deep within. She pressed a hand to her abdomen.
“Geiá sou, thavmatáki mou.”
