Chapter 26 #2
“You know nothing about us,” she snapped, “and whatever this emotion is you’re feeling… Bury it. Who Augustus and I are to each other is not for you to decide.”
Roman lengthened—he had to have a full foot on her—and he looked at her as if for the first time. As if he were indeed staring at a stranger. It was how it should have been from the beginning.
Finally, he nodded and refused to meet her eyes. “Come on. She’s waiting.”
They strode through a perimeter of smaller huts and eventually reached a bustling epicenter teeming with movement. The villagers were gathered around several horse-drawn wagons, unloading crates.
“Necessary provisions,” Roman said in response to Selene’s wandering gaze. “The Mother and a few others sail to the mainland a few times a year for food and medicine, though we’re fairly self-sufficient otherwise.”
Selene couldn’t believe he was finally offering information. “So you’re not fully hidden from the world. The Okosians must know you’re here.”
“They know, and they allow us our privacy.”
“Was that how it was before? When you lived in Perean, I mean.”
A spot beneath his brown eye twitched. “No, we lived among the people. That was a very different time.”
“How so?”
He paused at the edge of the village near a towering cliff, where a structure of polished stone blended into the natural surroundings. The roof was thatched with layers of palm fronds, and vines adorned with tiny blue flowers climbed the walls.
“We’ll have to continue this conversation another time,” he said, leading her inside.
The spacious interior was cool and smelled of damp earth and herbs. Animal hides lined the floor, and lanterns made from woven reeds illuminated the room.
Selene half-expected to find the Llinunae Stone here, though a part of her sensed it elsewhere. Deep inside the cliffs themselves, maybe.
Instead, she found herself in someone’s home. Furs draped the carved wooden furniture, and bookshelves were made from twisted tree branches. Tapestries hung from the walls, a few faded by centuries long past—the Kirrane Mountains set the background in some.
Standing several feet away, a woman who couldn’t be more than a decade older than Selene stood from a chair.
Her skin was a shade darker than Roman’s—almost black—and her eyes—one brown, one blue—narrowed on Selene.
She was a very thin woman, even more so than Selene had been during her years as a slave.
The woman was outfitted in a tan linen dress with a red scarf wound around her neck several times. Her long, tightly coiled brown hair looked windblown.
Selene thought she should recognize this woman—feel some sort of familiarity—but all she felt was a dark, hollow feeling that made her want to take many steps back.
A squawking sound startled Selene, and she spun toward the familiar sound of a dronsian. But it wasn’t him, her nameless friend.
The black-scaled dronsian was chained at the ankle atop a wooden perch. The slack of his shackles likely gave him three feet, at most.
Any disappointment she might have felt was quickly overridden by anger.
Selene shot over to him, and his big brown eyes stared longingly up at her. Unlike her dronsian, he didn’t smile with his tongue flopping out. There was nothing carefree in his overall aura. Sadness drenched the air around him.
“Hello there,” she said and cupped underneath his warm snout. His head nuzzled into her palm, and a purr vibrated through him. And his name came to her like a sudden thought. A whisper. A gift. “Turos?”
She knew this to be his name as well as she knew he longed to fly free. He wanted to see the island, and the next one, and the next. He wanted to skim the seawater with his underbelly. To rise, spin, and dive again until the clouds swirled behind him in dizzying circles.
“Hello, Turos.” Selene offered him a smile. “I’m Selene.”
“How do you know his name?” the Mother asked.
Selene whirled on the woman, furious. “Why do you keep him like this?”
The woman—Mother—flashed her teeth. “Who are you to question me?”
Roman stepped between them, hands raised. “Mother, please. Eva doesn’t remember our way.”
Selene’s patience snapped. “Don’t make excuses for me, and stop calling me that.” She turned her ire on the woman. “And what am I to call you?”
“I am the Mother.”
“No. Your name.” She wouldn’t use an honorific she’d already determined was undeserved. “Names seem important to you, and I want to know yours.”
The Drynopian woman stood to her fullest height and inhaled deeply before responding. “Aspasia.”
“I’m Selene. And I—”
“You can’t be here.” Aspasia turned her full attention to Roman. “Had I known she was here, I’d have come directly.”
Roman’s chin dipped. “She’s one of us. I only meant to make her feel welcome.”
“She chose her path a long time ago,” the woman said coldly.
Selene’s feet carried her forward, drawn toward the information locked inside this woman. “What path did I choose, and why? Help me understand, and I’ll go. You never have to see me again.”
Aspasia laughed from a deep well in her chest. “It’s far too late for that now. There’s another girl with you?”
Roman blinked. “How did you know?”
“Because, several days ago, a ship of pirates tore through Okos looking for them.”
Cold slunk through Selene.
Thorne.
“He was holding us captive,” Selene said.
“And you just happened to land here?”
Selene swallowed back the answer. Until Aspasia opened up in kind, Selene wouldn’t give her anything.
Aspasia scowled and began pacing back and forth, muttering under her breath.
“Mother—,” Roman began.
Aspasia held up a hand to stop him, and her words came louder, though she still spoke to herself. “He won’t be far behind then. The gods would have made sure of that. They never could keep their hands out of this.”
Roman’s chin dipped, and he fell back a step.
The movement caught Aspasia’s attention. “I’m right, aren’t I? You knew the risk, and you still—” The fires of Hadate lit her eyes. “Time hasn’t made you any less a fool, I see.”
“There was no mention until this very hour,” he explained, hands raised. “I had no reason to believe he was still around.”
“Of course he is!” she shouted. “Her very presence will bring him right to our doorstep!”
Selene waited for Roman to say something more, add to the mystery. She didn’t understand how or why, but this was about Augustus. Aspasia was…afraid.
“We need more time,” Aspasia said, resuming pacing, eyes darting.
“Michail won’t know she’s here,” Roman said, trying to reassure her.
The name struck something deep in her chest. A memory unfurled—brief, blinding.
Soldiers. Shouting. A struggle.
And dust…gods, it was like a choking cloud, sticking to her sweat-soaked skin. Sunlight reflected off strong arms and flushed faces.
Michail, blood on his mouth and fury in his eyes—the armored men dragged him backward. He fought like a storm.
Until he saw her, and everything in him stilled.
“You know me, Eva.” His voice cracked like thunder. “You’re the only one who does.”
Of course she did. She always would.
She started to run to him—
Roman stepped between them. Not the Roman she knew now, but older, colder. He blocked her view with a final glance over his shoulder. “His lies have hurt us long enough. Leave him to his fate.”
The memory snapped shut like a door slammed in her mind.
Selene sank back a step, her heart fluttering like butterflies in a jar—beautiful, frantic, doomed.
She wasn’t safe here.
She never was.
Aspasia frowned at Roman, then shook her head. “I’m sorry, but we have no choice. There’s only one thing to be done.”
His fingers were curling into his hands. “Yes. We protect her. We remind her of what’s at stake.”
Aspasia yanked a blade from her belt.
Selene drew hers in response and fell into her fighting stance.
Roman put his body between, hands up. His voice came low and rumbling. “Mother, I won’t let you do this.”
“We put her body in Okos, where he can find her. Dead women can’t speak of things they shouldn’t, and this buys us time to prepare.”
“No.” The single word landed like a hammer to an anvil. “You’re not going to kill my mate.”