Chapter 8
Dance of the Deep
Since the unsuccessful visit to Demeter’s temple, there had been no sign of the shade. Now there were even days where Danae barely thought about it. Perhaps Dionysus had answered her prayer after all. Or perhaps the creature was biding its time.
“I think I should tell Ma and Pa today,” said Alea.
Her sister stood by the table they’d carried into the yard, Arius balanced on her hip.
“Hmm?” The heat of the outdoor oven blasted Danae’s cheeks as she peered in, watching the honey cakes she’d just slid into its fiery belly.
“It’s Arius’s first birthday, what better time to tell them who his father is?”
Danae’s head snapped round. “Alea, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
Given their mother’s reaction to Danae trying to convince Eleni about the shade, she could only imagine the reception Alea claiming Arius was Zeus’s son would have.
“But what if he comes to see his son today? He will come eventually, Danae, he must. And Ma would never forgive me for not warning her.”
Danae’s chest tightened at the hopeful expression on her sister’s face.
Every time Alea brought up Arius’s father, she was forced to face the kernel of doubt buried deep inside her.
The little voice that whispered that Alea had created this fantasy of Arius being a demigod to protect her from the truth of what had happened to her.
Danae could not explain why the shade had taken her sister, or why it had continued to watch her nephew, but try as she might, she could not convince herself that of all the women in Greece, the King of Heaven had looked down from Olympus and chosen her sister.
Heracles’s mother was a princess, as was Perseus’s.
Alea was beautiful, but she was cut from the same humble cloth as the rest of their family.
No, the terrible truth was that, however strange the events surrounding the Thesmophoria, Alea must have been raped by a mortal man.
And if it was brought to light, their parents’ scrutiny might tear down the walls her sister had built around her pain.
If that happened...she didn’t want to dwell on what Alea might do.
“Don’t let those cakes burn, Danae!” Eleni shouted as she emerged with a jug of water, which she set on the table.
“The honey alone cost...” she trailed off, watching Arius gurgle with happiness as he played with Alea’s hair.
A contented smile spread across her lips, and she bustled back into the hut.
The yard gate creaked.
Alea gasped, and Danae spun around to see Santos stepping into the yard. His young sons, Egan and Minos, scampered out from behind his legs.
“Danie! Danie!”
Cakes abandoned, she rushed over to them. The boys flung their arms around her, and she hugged them tight.
“Look how big you’ve got, little bears!”
Minos puffed out his chest. “I’m not a bear, I’m Heracles!”
Egan shoved him. “No, it’s my turn to be Heracles! You’re the hydra!”
They began to chase each other around the yard. Their mother, Kafi, came striding from behind her husband. She made straight for Alea and Arius.
“He looks so like you. He’ll grow to be a strong, handsome man, I can tell.”
Alea smiled. “Would you like to hold him?”
Kafi’s face broke into a toothy grin, and she took her nephew in her arms.
“Danae, the cakes!” With a clatter, her mother set down the bowls and cups she’d carried from the hut and rushed toward the smoking oven. “You had one job!”
She had been so absorbed in watching the exchange between Kafi and Alea, she’d forgotten the honey cakes. She winced as the tray emerged, the cakes blackened at the edges.
“Don’t worry, Ma, I like them charred.” Santos strode across to their mother and pulled her into an embrace. As he drew away, he looked at his feet. “I’m sorry we’ve not come as often as we should.”
Danae threw an arm around her brother. “You’re here now.”
He smiled and walked over to Alea. “I was inspired by my own sons when making Arius’s birthday gift.” From his tunic pocket he drew out a wooden figurine of Heracles.
Alea took the doll and ran her fingers over the carving. It was lovingly detailed, even down to the famous lion hide the hero was known to wear.
“Oh, Santos, it’s perfect. Now he will know what his brother looks like.”
Danae’s heart tripped a beat. Santos looked quizzically at his sister.
Not now, not like this. Please let us have this day.
She felt a tug on her tunic. Egan was beside her.
“Play with us!”
She seized the opportunity to create a distraction. “You are both the mighty Heracles, and I am the terrible many-headed Hydra!” She launched after the boys, gnashing her teeth and jabbing her hands like pincers, as her nephews squealed and scurried away.
Santos laughed and ran after them, holding his fingers to protrude from his jaw like tusks. “And I am the fearsome Erymanthian boar!”
“Honestly you two, we’re about to eat!” The scold in Eleni’s voice was tempered by the smile she could not prevent from curling her careworn mouth.
Alea laughed and took Arius back from Kafi, her world narrowing to the rosy glow of her son’s face.
As Danae sprinted across the yard, the knot in her stomach loosened. Alea’s secret was safe once more. At least for now.
Danae woke drenched in sweat. The mat she’d slept on since Arius’s birth was sodden. She rolled over to stare at the pallet her sister now shared with her nephew. As the darkness solidified into shades of gray, the clarity of their sleeping bodies came into focus, and her fear abated.
She’d been woken by the same dream for weeks.
In a starless sky, the moon and sun loomed together over the beach, both burnt to blood-red craters.
Danae stood paralyzed in the shallows, feet rooted to the seabed by some invisible bond.
Then threads of golden light cracked through the darkness.
They cleaved the air, growing brighter and brighter, until the night shattered.
She threw her arms over her head, expecting to be flattened by a falling shard of moon or sun, but the blow did not come.
She lowered her arms. The celestial bodies were gone, so too was the spider’s web of glowing threads.
The heavens were empty, and her limbs were coated in a fine film of black dust.
Her mother told her once, dreams come through two gates, one of horn and one of ivory. The dreams fashioned from horn reveal the truth of what is to come, but those cast from ivory are woven with tricks.
Her gaze drifted to the wooden figurine of Heracles lying forgotten on the floor.
Toward the end of the day, Alea had shut herself away in the hut.
Her mother had accepted the excuse that her sister was weary and needed rest, but Danae knew the real reason.
Zeus had not come, and Alea was bitterly disappointed.
Despite the lie tasting acrid on her tongue, Danae had tried to convince her sister that a mortal celebration was too lowly a place for the King of Heaven, and he would surely honor his son in his own way.
But Alea had still cried herself to sleep.
Danae didn’t know how much longer she could keep doing this.
She blinked. Perhaps some remnants of sleep still lingered, or the night was casting illusions, but she could have sworn the miniature Heracles just moved.
A ripple seemed to pass through the air, drifting beside her sister’s pallet. Danae rubbed her eyes. It was as though she was looking at the bed through an undulating pool.
Then the breath solidified in her chest.
Arius was floating. One minute he was asleep in Alea’s arms, the next he was levitating in the air.
She must be dreaming. She pushed herself up and dug her nails into her palms. Pain spiked across her skin. She was definitely awake. At the sound of her movement, the air around the baby shimmered, and dread seeped into her limbs.
The space around Arius blurred, then a pair of crimson eyes twisted toward her.
She screamed.
In a heartbeat, the creature bolted for the door, Arius in its clutches.
Danae staggered to her feet and raced after it.
Half blind in the dark, she ran through the yard, following her nephew’s cries through the swinging gate.
She barely heard her sister’s screams as she tore down to the beach.
Stones cut her bare feet, but she didn’t slow.
As her toes sank into sand, the moon emerged from behind a cloud, illuminating the earth in silver light.
She scoured the sand, searching for the shade’s footprints. But there were none.
Frantically she ran back and forth, calling Arius’s name into the night. For a wild moment, she thought she heard the beating of wings. But both sky and land were empty.
Arius was gone.
When her family caught up with Danae on the beach and she told them what had happened, Alea collapsed onto the sand.
The cry that tore from her sister cut her to the bone.
After that, Alea would not move. Eventually, her parents had to carry her between them.
Danae walked behind, like a specter, watching their bodies shake and strain in the moonlight.
Alea wept for days. The sound of her sobs accompanied the silence of their exhaustion.
It was a painfully familiar sight, watching her father leave at first light to hunt for Arius.
Odell searched the beach, the village and the surrounding land.
This time, only Santos accompanied him. No one else was interested in wasting precious time on the bastard of a whore who danced with the Maenads.
Eventually, Alea stopped crying. Somehow that was worse.
Arius’s absence was like dust. Its particles drifted through the air, catching in the throat and scratching the eyes. There was not one corner of the hut, one crumb of bread, one breath of wind it did not smother.