Alcmene dabbed color along my cheeks, her touch brisk. “Close is careless,” she said, her voice clipped. “And careless will get you killed.”
I nodded because I didn’t disagree, and stared into the mirror in front of us. I barely recognized the face staring back anymore. My cheeks had thinned despite having more access to food than ever before, my lips were colorless, my eyes were ringed with shadows too deep for powder to hide. I was wan. Hollow. A fading outline of the woman I’d come here as.
And that was despite Achilles’s best efforts to bring me back to life.
What would Anysa think of me now?
The thought slid in cruelly.
Would she look at what I had done with my queendom so far and see strength? Would she understand why I endured what I endured? Why I bent instead of broke? Why I stayed silent when silence felt like a betrayal?
Or would she think I’d squandered the life she lost—that the crown she died for had swallowed me whole?
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, squeezing the wood on the table so hard that a splinter came off and burrowed in my skin.
The pain didn’t make me feel better because … I wasn’t sure.
I was also still feeling that same thing from last night, that pulse of something strange threading through the marrow of the world, the whisper of what had walked out of the sea and unsettled the very silence around us. It pressed against me like a weightless, unseen hand on the back of my neck … impossible to shrug off.
“You’re still the most beautiful woman in all the land,” Alcmene said, as if that meant anything, a slight tremble to her voice.
I squeezed her hand, thinking that may be so, but without figuring out how to channel it for true power yet … it was useless. “I would say I’m blessed to have you as my handmaiden,” I told her as I stood.
Taking a deep breath, I squared my shoulders, watching as Roz jumped from the table to the floor. “Take care of yourself,” I called after it as it slipped back under the dresser. Roz left me a last squeak in reply.
“Come,” I said softly to Alcmene. “Let’s go.”
Her lips pressed tight and she nodded and moved ahead to open the door. “We will not flinch,” I whispered to her as I passed. She nodded in reply and then followed me out.
Outside, soldiers stood waiting with shields braced and spears held rigid at their sides. Tension wound through their ranks. They shifted around me the moment I stepped into the hall, closing around us in a cage of iron and silence.
Alcmene’s hand brushed mine briefly, as if she feared I might vanish if she let go. My spine held straight, though my stomach pitched with every step as they escorted us forward.
The corridor stretched endlessly and the walk to the Great Hall seemed to take twice as long. I could faintly hear the sound of Menelaus’s voice ringing out from within, barking commands I couldn’t make out.
At the threshold, the soldiers halted. One broke rank, strode ahead, and pressed both palms to the doors. His jaw tightened, a muscle jumping in his cheek, before he pushed them open.
The groan rolled outward like a warning, swallowed by whatever waited within.
I drew a deep breath, gathering the weight of my crown, my title, my spine. “Don’t flinch,” I whispered, to myself as much as to her.
Alcmene dipped her head in acknowledgment and fell in behind me, her footsteps soft as I descended into the mouth of yet another unknown.
The Great Hall was dimmer than usual from the clouds hanging heavy outside. Crimson banners hung motionless from the ceiling, their fabric heavy in the unnatural stillness.
Menelaus slumped in his throne like a man paying dearly for last night’s excess. His robes sagged from one shoulder, rumpled, his crown tilted so far itseemed ready to slide off altogether. One hand dangled heavy over the armrest, the other rubbed at his temple between sluggish taps against the marble. His face sagged; his eyes were bloodshot. And even from across the hall I could smell the sourness clinging to him.
It struck me then—whyhad he drunk so much?
Menelaus enjoyed wine as much as any Spartan soldier, but he rarely let it loosen his grip on the world. He prided himself on vigilance, on a discipline sharper than any blade his army carried. Yet last night he must have emptied goblet after goblet, drowning himself in wine until he’d lost control entirely.
Had it been the news a soldier had delivered before the feast?
Another village had been struck by the Dread. The reporting soldier had also mentioned, with clear unease, that the soldiers had discovered an altar to Apollo built in the square. The soldiers destroyed it on sight, but his voice had quavered as he recounted the story, as though he wasn’t entirely sure they had done the right thing.
Of all the news, it was that detail that had unsettled Menelaus most.
The king’s eyes found me now, and they narrowed. For a moment, my breath snagged. Was this it? The moment he confronted me? My chest tightened, waiting for the blow that could shatter everything.
