Chapter V
V
The halls of our palace are quiet and still as I make my way to Prince Maheer’s bedchamber that night.
It’s late, the air humid and thick with the promise of a summer storm.
Every few steps, I falter, expecting to run into a slave, but the halls are all empty.
I am alone. I inhale and exhale slowly, trying to keep calm as a small cloth sack thuds against my hip.
I’ve gone over my plan more than once, practiced my words a dozen times, but that does nothing to stop the trembling in my legs or the sweat gathering at the nape of my neck.
I swallow hard, remind myself why I’m doing this.
For Eury. For her, you can do this.
I reach the door to Maheer’s chamber and knock softly. My pulse leaps as the door opens seconds later and the prince himself appears in its frame.
“What’s this?” His eyes drop to me. “I didn’t call for a slave.”
He does not recognize me, I realize. In a way, it makes sense. Tonight, I’m wearing only a modest calf-length tunic, and my locs are loose about my shoulders. From the smell of him, I gather that the prince has been drinking.
I bow. “I am the sister of your betrothed,” I murmur. “I’ve come to speak with you, in private.” I look up and see recognition. The prince smiles.
“Ah yes, of course. Please, come in.”
My father has designated the third-largest wing of our home for Prince Maheer, a collection of rooms decorated with fine silk linens and thick animal pelts spread about the marble floor.
I follow the prince inside, watching as he collapses onto one of the chaises and stretches like a cat.
I note that there’s an almost full pitcher of wine on a nearby table.
“Sit,” the prince commands, gesturing toward the settee across from him. I obey, and he offers a lazy smile.
“I’ve brought a gift,” I begin. “It’s—”
“I hope it’s better wine,” he says. “The stuff the last slave brought in tastes like fermented piss.”
I do my best to hide my surprise. Now that the marriage between him and my sister is confirmed, it seems the prince has utterly abandoned any facade of chivalry. I keep my expression composed, my head lowered.
“I have no wine, my prince, but I do bring something else.” I have to work to keep my hands from shaking as I withdraw the purse from my sack.
Prince Maheer’s eyes snap to it with interest, then widen as I pull out a single blue sapphire.
It’s the size of a grape and sparkles brilliantly in the candlelight.
The prince gapes. “Gods,” he says softly. “That’s magnificent. Where on earth did you acquire it?”
“Trinkets wash up onshore all the time. I collect them.”
This is only a half lie. I do collect the odd objects that occasionally wash up on the island’s coast, but that’s not where I procured the gems I’ve brought with me tonight.
In truth, I stole them all from my mother’s overflowing trove, confident that she would not miss them among the many she possesses from centuries of hoarding.
The prince seems to believe me, though, because he’s still studying the sapphire.
“I can give you more,” I say quickly, taking advantage of his keen attention. “But I would need you to do something for me.”
The prince tears his gaze from the sapphire to look at me again. I’m disheartened to find that he now looks entertained. “And what might that be?”
I take a deep breath before answering. “You must rescind your marriage offer to my sister.”
I’m pleased to see at least a flicker of surprise on the prince’s face. It’s clear that whatever he might have expected me to say, it wasn’t this.
He sits up, frowning. “Why would I do that?”
Because you are a wretched, monstrous man.
I bow my head, feigning sadness. “Because I love my sister. If you marry her, she’ll be taken far away.
I fear I may never see her again.” When I look up, a hint of mirth has touched the prince’s eyes.
He looks pitying, which makes me hate him all the more.
“Your love for Euryale is touching,” he says. “But marriage is a woman’s sacred duty, second only to motherhood. Would you truly deny your sister that?”
Not for the first time, I feel a pang of guilt.
However repugnant I might find Prince Maheer to be, I know a part of him is right.
If I am successful tonight, I will be denying Euryale something I know she wants, at least in part.
I don’t want to imagine what she’ll say if she ever finds out I was here, if she ever learns what I’m trying to do.
It’s for her own good, I tell myself. It’s to keep her safe.
I temper my guilt and look up at Prince Maheer. “I just want her to stay here a little longer. I just need a little more time.” And perhaps, with more time, Euryale will receive a better marriage offer.
“Don’t we all?” the prince murmurs.
I hold up the sapphire again. “Will you take it, then, and tell my father that you no longer wish to marry her?”
Instead of answering, Prince Maheer leans forward and plucks the gem from my palm to examine it more closely. A smile tugs at the corner of his lips. “This is less a gift than it is a bribe,” he muses aloud. “If your father learned of this…”
“Please don’t tell him.” I try—and fail—to keep the panic from my voice. “He must never know. Please.”
A strange smile touches the prince’s face. He places the sapphire on the table between us and gives me a curious look. “And what would you give me, in exchange for my silence?”
I pull a ruby from my purse and place it on the table beside the sapphire.
The prince’s eyes stay fixed on me. “What else?”
His question confuses me. “I…I’ve brought nothing with me but the gems,” I admit. “They’re all I have to offer. But I know from my scrolls that they’re worth a great deal.”
Prince Maheer stands, crosses the room to pour himself more wine, and drinks deeply from his goblet. Only once he’s drained it does he look at me again. There’s a new glint in his eye that unsettles me.
“I won’t tell your father about all this,” he says, gesturing to both me and the two gems. “But I’m afraid I cannot accept your offer.”
My pulse quickens. I look to the sapphire and ruby still on the table, then look up again, confused. “But I thought…?”
“They’re beautiful stones,” Prince Maheer acquiesces, “but did you know, my homelands are rather famous for having a great deal of precious stones embedded in the natural rock? My people mine them, then sell them to the Greeks and Egyptians and anyone else who wants to pay for them. Naturally, I always take the best for myself. So, I have no real need of these.”
The blood drains from my face.
“What I do need is a wife of respectable birth,” Prince Maheer continues. “Euryale is pretty enough and the daughter of two formidable sea gods. I think she will do nicely.”
My head begins to pound as his words sink in. Foolish, some voice in my head says. This was a foolish idea.
Prince Maheer takes a step closer to me and cocks his head. “Remind me, what is your name?”
“Meddy, my prince.”
“Meddy…” he repeats. “That’s an odd name.”
“It’s what my sisters call me,” I say quietly. “My real name is Medusa.”
He takes a second goblet from a nearby table, pours wine to its brim, then offers it to me.
“Drink, Medusa.”
It is not a request, I am smart enough to understand that.
I cross the chamber, take the goblet from him, and raise it to my lips, careful to allow only a swallow’s worth to pass through them.
When I lower it, he’s moved closer to me, too close.
Gently, he pinches one of my locs and examines it.
Again, he looks at me that same way he did in the garden just yesterday.
“How old are you, Medusa?” His eyes are still trained on my loc.
“Seventeen.” I inch back just slightly, but he mirrors the movement.
“Seventeen.” The prince nods. “And have you begun to bleed monthly yet?”
I fidget. I have only ever talked about my monthly blood with my sisters. “Yes,” I admit. “I started three years ago.”
Prince Maheer lets go of the loc and meets my gaze. “So, you’re a woman,” he murmurs. “Though I see your body isn’t fully developed yet.”
I take another step back.
“You misunderstand.” A smile touches his lips as he mirrors the move a second time. “It isn’t a bad thing. In fact, I prefer a woman’s body before it changes.”
“You’re to marry my sister.” I can’t keep the trembling from my voice now. I take a third step back, well aware that I am coming close to meeting the wall. Maheer seems to understand that, too, because when he takes another step closer to me, it is unhurried.
“It is not uncommon for men in my kingdom to take multiple wives.” He drinks deeply from his goblet. “Euryale is beautiful and immortal. She’ll make a fine queen for me. But you…” There is a new huskiness to his voice. “You’re just the age I like them.”
I reach back with my free hand, and my fingertips graze the wall. The hairs on the back of my neck stand on end as the prince grabs at his own groin, and I notice that there is a new bulge there.
“Take off your clothes.” His charm is suddenly gone. His eyes are deadened, void of any emotion. “Now.”
“I—” Any words I might have said in answer lodge themselves in my throat.
Foolish. This was a foolish idea.
I did not come to the prince’s chamber unarmed.
After what Euryale had told me that morning, I made sure to stow one of Theo’s small carving knives in my sack along with the gems. But now that knife is across the room, useless to me.
It occurs to me too late that I should have kept it on my person.
I know that what I should feel in this moment is fear.
Fear because I’m alone in a room with a man who’s looking at me the way predators look at prey; fear because I don’t know what Prince Maheer intends to do next.
But the fear doesn’t come. Instead, a familiar anger flints against my skin.
Helpless. I’m always helpless.
All my life I have been a victim in some form or fashion. Never in my life have I had the ability to protect myself. Never have I known how to fight, only flee.
My eyes shoot to the door, and Prince Maheer follows my gaze.
It happens too fast. He closes the gap between us, placing his hands on either side of my head so that I am pinned between him and the wall.
The smell of wine and spiced perfume assaults my senses, and all reason abandons me.
I strike my still-full goblet of wine against the side of the prince’s head, and he cries out in pain, stumbling back.
As soon as there’s space, I slip away from him, grasping at the wall as I try to think of the best way to get around him without putting myself within his reach again.
Maheer blinks several times, then looks at me, teeth bared. Red wine drips from his soaked hair.
“You bitch!” he seethes. “You stupid, ugly little—” He stops. “My eyes!” His voice rises with new panic as his eyes screw shut. “What have you done to my eyes?”
I stand, frozen in confusion, as he begins crushing his fists into his eye sockets. He groans and doubles over. The wine has gotten into his eyes. He begins shaking his head over and over, like a wet dog.
“They’re burning!” he screams. “My eyes are burning—help me!”
My gaze cuts to the pitcher of water on another nearby side table, but I don’t move. I do not immediately recognize the feeling rising within me. It is surprisingly warm, calming even. For once, I realize, I am not helpless.
“Stupid bitch!” Maheer’s eyes are screwed shut again. He is fumbling around, his arms flailing and reaching aimlessly. I edge farther along the wall, farther away from him. I know I could slip past him and get to the door; I just have to time it right.
“I’ll kill you for this!” he bellows. “I’ll have you flogged. I’ll—”
Maheer steps back, tripping over one of the animal pelts on the floor.
It sends him tumbling backward, and I see what is going to happen a second before it does.
The prince falls, and the base of his skull collides with the corner of the table.
I hear a terrible crack, hear the sickening splinter of wood and bone, then I see the brief surprise in Maheer’s eyes as they fly open.
His body slumps to the floor, and I draw in a breath as dark red blood pools under his head.
Seconds pass, but I don’t dare even breathe.
“…Maheer?”
The bastard prince doesn’t move. His eyes are still open, but now they are unmoving, staring blankly up at the ceiling. I move closer, nudging his bare foot with my sandaled one.
“Prince Maheer?”
There is no answer, only silence.
I do not know how long I stand there, staring at Maheer’s body as it grows stiff and loses color.
He is dead, I know that, but the relief I expect to feel does not come.
Maheer was evil, of that I have no doubt, but his death cuts closer than expected.
It reminds me that—in some small, unsettling way—he and I are threads pulled from the same cloth.
He was the son of a god—an Olympian—and it didn’t matter at all.
Death still found him easily. It would be just as easy for death to find me.
I close my eyes and imagine my sisters finding me dead, finding my body in a pool of blood like this.
My mouth grows sticky, and at that moment, I begin to truly panic.
If someone heard Maheer’s screaming, or heard him fall…
I need to leave.
Something tickles the back of my mind, but I take little notice of it as I retreat. I edge along the chamber’s walls, my gaze trained on Maheer’s body, until I feel for the door’s handle.
Then I flee into the dark.