Procyon threw her a warning glance. Frantic for something, anything, to brace herself against, Tethys’s eyes darted from face to face in the crowd.
Her eyes locked with a woman. Two tiny knitted boots dangled from a scarf wrapped tightly around her torso. Tethys thought of the blonde half god the old crone saw in her runes. Was the babe simply fiction? Even if the vision was false, she couldn’t shake the thought of him. If tensions didn’t simmer, an immortal heir born of both realms would be an alternative solution. And if Obscuros didn’t push for a child, Procyon would.
The woman bounced her rousing infant, keeping her tired eyes fixed on the steps. Tethys hadn’t considered motherhood in her future. She didn’t consider her future at all, in fact. Time was an endless commodity, and yet, she couldn’t envision even the next sunrise. How could she possibly subject an innocent babe to the cruelties of this world? Even for the sake of peacetime?
Procyon’s grip around her wrist ripped her from her thoughts, and Tethys’s skin crawled as she realized every face was turned to her. Every scowl. Every frown. All attention focused, like a blazing beam, on her.
Procyon clenched his jaw. They were waiting for her to speak. Had he asked her a question? Were they expecting a speech? Tethys swallowed the bile rising in her throat and glanced back at the woman and her babe. She’d turned away from the steps.
Unimpressed and unconvinced.
Seconds ticked by as Tethys debated her words carefully.
“Canissa is a beautiful realm. Thank you for allowing me into your city,” she said, shielding herself with a dazzling smile. Snickers and murmurs rose from the crowd.
“Forgive our queen. She’s had a long journey from Venia,” Procyon said. Pain shot up Tethys’s arm as his griptightened to near bone breaking strength. “Recite the Harvest prayer for us.”
The goddess froze. Procyon knew how sacred the verse was. He also knew it was forbidden for another Immortal Child to recite them. They belonged to him and him alone. And yet he asked this of her? Had he lost his damn mind?
“Shouldn’t you recite the verses, Proc?” she whispered beneath her cramping smile.
“Say the words, Tethys,” he growled.
His grip tightened. One small jerk of his hand and her bones would snap. Her body reflexed against the pain, but she forced herself still. All eyes remained on the immortal couple, watching, waiting. Their expectations were set. She swallowed the panic rising through her body and grounded her feet into the earth beneath them. The Canissaens were silent with held breaths and anticipation.
“Ex terra. Ex Caelo. Ex mari. Ex Astris.”
From the earth. From the skies. From the seas. From the stars.
The prayer was opposite the verses said during Venian’s equinox celebration, Ostara. Another reflection of the opposition between Canissa and Venia. Death and Life. Dusk and Dawn. Not only that, but they were forbidden outside of the western realm. The words caught on her tongue like cotton to sandpaper as the crowd shifted and snickered.
Tethys felt the verse in her bones, the utter wrongness of it coming from her lips. Regardless of dormant ripples of magic under her skin, every fiber of her body tensed. This wasn’t an honor granted; it was a curse. Procyon proved his ownership over her, over the realm, gods, even over Venia itself.
This journey to Canissa, she realized, had never been about promoting peace or their unbreakable union. It was a power play. To force such a public display of his strength over her, Procyon secured his claim over Tethys and Veniaalong with her.
“Let Harvest commence!” he exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air. Tethys’s wrist throbbed with its release. She didn’t need to glance down to know it was already bruised.
Chapter 15
“How dare you humiliate me in front of my own people.” Procyon’s roar was the low and menacing kind that sat on her chest and seeped, like poison, into her very core.
“Proc, I’m sorry. I couldn’t breathe in that damned dress. I did what you asked. I recited the verses,” Tethys pleaded. Her brother’s eyes blazed from across the bedchamber. They’d stay in Procyon’s home for their remaining time in Canissa, however long that would be. “You knew it was forbidden, yet you asked it of me, anyway.”
A woven tapestry hung behind where he stood, at its center a golden stag with massive antlers. As Procyon stepped closer, Tethys couldn’t tell if it was a trick of the candlelight or if her brother, in his unrelenting rage, sprouted antlers just like the stag’s. He was terrifying in this form, unstable and unrestrained.
“You clearly weren’t present during that processional. I had to repeat myself, sister. You made a fool of me, and for that...” He took another step toward her. Tethys froze likea doe facing an arrowhead. She couldn’t think. Couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t even tremble before the tidal wave of fury that approached.
“Please Proc, I—”
“Shut yourfuckingmouth,” he seethed. “My patience only spreads so thin.”
Her heart slammed into her chest as his eyes cut into her. This very well could be her last moment of life. Taken from her at the hands of one who’d sworn to protect her. To cherish her. To honor her.
Those were the marital vows, were they not?
“It won’t happen again,” she whispered, the words like sludge on her tongue.
The autumn king closed the distance between them, his very essence dripping with malice. Their noses brushed as his gleaming brown eyes bore holes into hers. It was physically painful, withstanding those bronze depths.
