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“I need to get back,” I told him. “They still think I’ve come here to tend someone who’s ill. Goodbye, Nessos.”

He moved aside, and I took the path into the woods. Damp leaves clung to my soles. The farther I went, the more the old trees felt like home. I could almost pretend this was just another ordinary visit. Until I remembered what I had to tell the women waiting at the shrine.

Somewhere beyond these woods, Eryx already knew he was to have a shrine maiden for a wife. I wondered what he thought that entitled him to.

2

The Maiden’s Bride Market

Eryx

The bride market near the village of Melia was different from the one in Asphodelia. Here, the forest served as the hall. Giant trees surrounded an open grove, their branches crowded with monsters.

Without my eyes, I couldn’t see them, not really. But even here in the Korinos Wilds, death energy was everywhere. Subtle, not like in Asphodelia, but still present. It wove around the tree branches, allowing me to distinguish the people perched overhead from those gathering among the roots.

Under different circumstances, I might have enjoyed it. There was something beautiful about a bride market, wherever it took place. In Korinos, the touch of a hand could tell a seeker whether their prayers had been answered. I’d given up hoping for a mate of my own after I’d lost my sight, filling my days with work until I stopped thinking about what else I might want. I still took pleasure in other people finding their matches.

Today, though, it was difficult to enjoy anything. Conversations faltered as I passed, only to resume in hurried whispers behind me. Evidently, I was now more interesting than the market. Half the gathering would have fled already if they hadn’t been so eager to see the famous woman meant to step onto the block.

To me, she was already my bride. Her father and the clan elders had settled the arrangement weeks ago. None of the people here knew that, but on some level, perhaps they sensed it.

“It’s him,” a dryad whispered sharply from somewhere above me. “The Ambassador of the Blighted Ones. I heard he skulks in that old estate at Petrion. Only comes out to steal children and eat them.”

I turned my head toward her. The injury that blinded me had left the power of my gaze intact, but the silk of my blindfold was firmly in place. The magic wouldn’t touch her. The dryad fell silent anyway, moving farther up the trunk.

“You could tell her you’re a healer,” one of my serpents suggested, lifting its head beside my ear.

“I have. The truth hasn’t travelled as far as that story.”

A few people had trusted me enough to come to Petrion for treatment, though they generally waited until dusk. They took their draughts and salves home. I could only guess what they told their neighbours afterward. Most likely nothing at all. The people of Korinos hated my kind so much they would see my patients as traitors.

It was pointless to expect anyone to contradict the dryad, and nobody did. Before anyone could shout an accusation, a staff struck the stone in the centre of the grove.

“Make room for the bride!”

The satyr beside the block had to repeat himself. All around me, men pressed toward the path, shouting over one another as my bride approached. I stepped aside when the auctioneer called her name.

“Thalia of Melia. Maiden of the Shrine of the Endless Forests.”

“I never thought I’d see a shrine maiden on that stone,” a satyr near me murmured. “How did that even happen?”

“A special call from the Endless Forests, I heard,” another replied. “A once-in-a-lifetime gift.”

Men who’d been whispering about me moments earlier called her name. A minotaur planted one heavy hoof in the path.

“Thalia! I’ve come a long way for the chance to take your hand.”

“Then let me reach the stone before you ask to take it,” Thalia replied. Her voice was firm, but kind. It was as sweet as the song of death we worshipped in Asphodelia, yet vibrant with living warmth.

The men around the minotaur laughed. He moved aside, and she thanked him as she passed. I almost smiled. I’d been told a great deal about her standing among her people. No one had mentioned what speaking with her might be like.

The Moirae had sent me from Asphodelia to establish a truce, and I’d managed to stop the Blight from advancing. That should have given the clans some confidence in me. Instead, their elders had proposed a marriage. If a woman they trusted made her home at Petrion, others might be willing to cross its threshold.

Listening to the welcome she received, I understood why they’d chosen her. She could answer a stranger sharply and have him laugh. I could offer to treat an illness and make the sufferer retreat.

And she was shining. My serpents never could distinguish the people of Korinos as well as they did my own kin, but with her, it was different.

“So bright,” a snake hissed. “So warm. The magic runs strong through her blood.”