“Piss off, kid.”
“‘Kid’? You’re barely older than me!”
The girl rolled her eyes. “The stag. Gimme it.”
A booming laugh came from beside us as Thratta suddenly materialized. For a giant woman, she was unnervingly light on her feet.
“You mean this?” she asked, letting the dead stag fall heavily to the ground. “Go on then, small one. Take it.”
The girl’s eyes widened as she stared at the creature. It was easily triple her size.
“What’s the matter?” Thratta grinned wolfishly. “Changed your mind?”
The girl scowled up at us, her hatred as keen as the arrow at myback. But then I noticed something gleaming in her eyes, a frayed and frantic hollowness I knew all too well.
The girl was hungry.
No, not just hungry. She wasstarving.
As I looked her over again, I noticed how thin she was, her ribs visible beneath her tattered tunic, cheeks sunken. My attention then narrowed to her wrists and the familiar blistering there.
“How long ago did you escape the slaver?” I asked, turning slowly to face her.
The girl sneered, pulling the bow taut, the arrow now trained on my heart.
“Don’t do anything foolish,” Thratta warned.
“The way I see it, you have two options here,” I said, still holding my hands up. “You can take my dagger, cut off however much of the stag you can carry, and be on your way. But then you’ll have to survive out here on your own. I’m guessing you’re not from Ithaca. You came in on the slave ship, right?”
The girl clenched her jaw, saying nothing.
“How long do you really think you can last? A few days at most?”
“Long enough,” she spat.
“Long enough for what? To sneak onto a ship and get away? Believe me, I’ve thought of every possibility for getting off this island, and all of them end up with you back in the slaver’s hands.”
Her eyes hardened. “What’s the other option then?”
“You come with us.”
The girl’s brows rose at that, the bowstring slackening a fraction. Beside me, I felt Telemachus mirroring her surprise, while Thratta’s smirk only widened.
“What?” the girl snapped.
“You come with us to the palace. You’ll be given a bath, fresh clothes, a warm bed, food. You’ll be safe there.”
“I’ll be aslave.”
“It won’t be like any kind of slavery you’ve known before.”
Her eyes narrowed at that.
“I can’t offer you freedom, but I can offer you a place where you will be cared for.”
The girl hesitated. “How do I know you won’t just turn me in?”
“You can’t, not yet. Trust must be earned, right? But if you come with me, I assure you I will earn yours.”
