“Of course,” he murmured, suddenly behind me. “Though next time, you might want to admire something that doesn’t make you bleed when touched.”
So not you, then, I thought to myself as I glanced down at my finger where the blood had already begun to crust at the edge.
And then I realized … he’d noticed I was bleeding. That meant he’d been watching me right back.
“It’s a little late to be training,” I finally said, wanting to venture to a safer topic if I couldn’t drag myself away from him like I needed to.
He glanced back toward the palace, then at his blade. “I train when I can. The days are … too full of ceremony.”
I cocked my head, bile rising in my throat with the thought of how the palace danced and toasted while the rest of Sparta buried their dead. “What, the endless parade of parties and celebrations are too much for you?” I snapped, the words bitter as ash, Calismae’s letter still burning behind my ribs.
The moment they left my mouth, I winced.
Gods, that had been disrespectful. I was sure the king had stricken others down for less, and this was his captain I was talking to.
But Achilles didn’t bark a reprimand. Didn’t scowl or stalk off or draw his blade to gut me like I half feared.
Instead, he looked at me, really looked at me, like he was seeing something new. Something he hadn’t expected.
His brows lifted slightly. Just a flicker. And then, “Something like that,” he murmured.
I glanced sideways, heart thudding. He didn’t sound upset. If anything, he sounded … surprised.
A curious reaction.
The silence stretched, long enough that the echo of my words faded into the night. He let out a breath and then sheathed his blade with a smooth motion and crossed to a nearby column, bracing one hand against it as if he suddenly needed the support. His forearm flexed, golden in the torchlight.
“You still haven’t told me why you dared Nomiki’s wrath and came out here,” he said after a moment.
My throat tightened. The words pushed up, jagged and ugly. “I received my first letter from home tonight. I found out that a child died.”
His body went still. I wasn’t sure why I was telling him this, but now that the words were out, I couldn’t stop more from coming.
“One of our neighbors. Their youngest daughter. She ate something, bad grain, maybe, and then got sick. Of course, there was nothing to do to help her, no resources to make her well.”
Achilles didn’t speak. The shadows clung to his face, unreadable.
I swallowed, hard. “You’d think I’d be used to it by now,” I whispered, more to myself than him. “Someone’s always getting sick. Someone’s always dying.”
A breeze tugged at my veil. I caught it before it slipped back, my fingers trembling as I tucked it into place.
“Sometimes,” I continued, eyes still fixed on the stone path, “it feels like I’m watching them all die from behind glass. I’ve been training for years … while everyone I’m trainingfordisappears.”
Achilles stepped closer, the air tightening around us, his warmth pressing against my back like the edge of a flame.
“And the worst part is,” I said forlornly, “even after all that training … I think I’m failing.”
The silence that followed settled like weight in the air, dense and waiting, until—
“You’re not failing.”
I turned and scoffed. “And how would you know that? Visited the concubines’ quarters lately?” I lifted an eyebrow, a little proud of how the captain’s cheeks darkened.
He cleared his throat. “I know what I see,” he said simply. “A girl who turned Menelaus’s eye and wouldn’t accept defeat.”
“I still won’t accept it,” I said staunchly.
His gaze locked on mine even through the veil. “Then fight.”
