“They have always been here,” she told him. “Baba says they are the names of young people who came here to worship Artemis and Apollo, perhaps as long ago as the fourth century before Christ.”
“More than two thousand years ago?” Stefanos’s eyes bulged. “And they are still here, not washed away.”
“Remembered for always,” she said, her throat tight with emotion. It had always moved her, this place. The whisper of the waves could so easily have been the murmurings of the past, voices of those who had deemed this island special. Katerina slipped her bag from her shoulders and opened it, taking out the pot and small brush. There was an empty space on the wall, not far from where they’d come through from the first chamber, and it was here that she began to paint her name. Only when she finished did she turn to Stefanos.
“Now you,” she said, and he nodded, striking a second matchand passing it across to her. The flame danced, throwing warped shadows, though she held it as still as she could. He had a steadier hand than she and finished his inscription more quickly. Afterward they stood, shoulder to shoulder, admiring their work.
“I need to tell you something.”
Katerina stiffened.
“Tell me what?”
Stefanos sighed and, taking her hands, turned her to face him.
“I have to leave.”
Time slowed, paused, stood still.
“Leave?”
“The war is coming closer,” he said. “I hear the thud of the enemy’s boots.”
“It is not our war,” she hissed. “It is their war.”
“Óchi,katsikáki, it will become Greece’s war soon enough. The people will resist, and I must be there to fight alongside them.”
“Why?” she insisted. “Why does it have to be you? Why not every other man in Greece before you?”
He attempted to draw her closer, but she pulled away.
“Why?” she said again. Her nose was stinging, eyes burning.
“You would have me be a coward?” he said. “Hide beneath your skirts while the Axis powers trample across my country, kill my people?”
“It is not brave to die for nothing,” she told him, furious now—with him but also with herself for not having prepared a better argument.
“I will not die,” he said, urgent now. “But if I did, it would be for freedom, for the most important thing of all.”
“Then, I will come with you,” she began, but he shook his head. “Why is it acceptable for you to go but not for me? I am strong like you. I am braver than you think, Stefanos. And I love my country. I love Greece.”
“You are strong,” he said, lowering his head to hers. “You are strong and brave and patriotic—it is why I love you.”
Katerina’s head jerked backward.
“You—you love me?”
“Éla re.” He slid his hands to her waist. “Of course I love you.”
“Then stay,” she pleaded. “There is nothing more important than love, not even freedom.”
When he said nothing, Katerina felt her body sag with despair. How could she survive without him? What would she do if the worst were to happen?
“When?” she asked, barely daring to hear his answer.
Stefanos drew her close against him.
“Soon,” he said. “I will go with Michalis to Athens, and from there to the north.”
