“It’s all right, Geramou.”
“What if they’d killed you, Baba!”
He kissed the boy’s cheek. “Your baba doesn’t go down easy. It’ll take more than a Greek god to bring me low.”
Nephele didn’t speak. She merely fisted her hands in his hair and held on to him as if afraid to let go.
“Goodness, child. Why do you tremble so?”
Still not a single sound from her.
Worried about her, Urian let go of Geras so that he could stand and pull her closer. “Neph?”
Her lips quivered, but she kept them pressed tightly together as she wound her fists in his cloak. Urian held her by his side, assuming she was merely upset like her brother over the fact that he’d been badly injured and that they’d barely escaped the raid.
No one else spoke until after the fire began to burn low. And not until after the pyre had collapsed. Only then did Apollymi’s Charonte come in to finish the ceremony where Sheba’s remains would be gathered and taken to Apollymi’s sacred garden to be scattered in her orchard.
The same garden and orchard where Xyn lived.
He still hadn’t seen her and he was hurt that she hadn’t come for this. In truth, he’d expected her in the crowd. She’d always shown before whenever he needed her.
Never had she failed him.
Until today.
But as he lost count of how many came up to him to share their condolences, she wasn’t among them. And it hurt so badly that it was almost unfathomable. Indeed, he felt gutted. And the faces of the others and their words were lost to his own grief as he mumbled what he hoped was an appropriate response.
He remembered nothing really. Just the smell of pungent ash that stung his throat and burned his eyes. The hollow ache in his gut. And the deep stinging pain of a friend who couldn’t be bothered to put aside their spiteful words to check on him.
“Come on,m’gios.You should rest.”
This time, Urian didn’t protest when his father took him home.
Paris was the first to ask the insensitive question everyone else had avoided around Urian. “Why didn’t Sheba decay like we do when we die?”
Theo punched him in the arm. “God, you’re an asshole! Have some brains! Your brother’s in pain and you’d ask him that? Seriously? What is wrong with you?” He grimaced at Urian. “Say the word and I’ll beat his ass.”
Urian sighed. “It’s okay. Truth is, I don’t know why they don’t. I think it’s because of Koshchei the Deathless. He’s a trickster god. Would make sense that he wants to play havoc with Apollo. That’s my theory anyway.”
He entered his father’s home and drew up short at the sight of a group of his wife’s guards. A small remnant of those who’d survived their attack. “Small” being the operative word.
So few had been left. A pathetic number, really.
They immediately bowed to him.
Urian frowned. “Why are you here, Kisha?”
The tallest blonde came forward with a blue-tinted bottle. “We have nowhere else to go, Majesty. They’ve destroyed our home. Annihilated our people. You are still our king. We await your orders.”
How weird … he hadn’t considered that they would look to him for leadership and guidance. Especially since Sheba had never treated him as anything more than a favored decoration.
He glanced over to his father. For the first time in a long while, he felt like a child again. Like a lost little boy. A part of him wanted to ask his father what to do, if he should stay or go, but he curbed that petulant child and forced himself to meet his father like an equal.
Urian knew what to do. Most of all, he knew what Sheba’s people needed.
“Do I have your permission to bring our survivors here, Solren?”
His father appeared offended by the question.
