Chapter XXII
XXII
That night, my parents order our cooks to prepare a special meal to celebrate my temporary homecoming.
It is no great feast—certainly, there is less on our table tonight than there was for the spring feast earlier in the year—but I still find myself quietly awed by how much food has been prepared for five people, four of whom don’t even need to eat.
My eyes take in the roasted meats, the assortments of sliced fruit, the flatbreads and cheeses, and I think about the Athenians to whom I and the other acolytes distributed sacks of grain.
This meal alone could feed at least twenty of those people well.
It all feels so excessive—though if anyone else notices or shares my sentiments, they don’t say so.
My parents still argue from their end of the table, while my sisters talk about mindless things at the other.
Slowly, I realize I’m a stranger in my home; Athens is becoming the place where I feel more like myself. It is an unmooring sensation.
We’re still dining when I feel a subtle but undeniable shift in the air. I know I’m not the only one who notices it, because at once, my father looks up, frowning, and my mother tenses.
“What is it?” she asks no one in particular.
My father turns to stare at the main doors to the hall, his sea-foam-white brows furrowed.
Stheno, Euryale, and I exchange a look as a salty breeze blows into the room, tickling my skin and brushing my locs over my shoulder.
Then I hear it: the unmistakable echo of footsteps in the corridor just beyond the doors my father is staring at.
No one speaks as the footsteps come to a stop on the other side of the doors.
Then they swing open with a bang, and I have a sense of déjà vu as another Olympian enters our great hall. This time it isn’t Athena, though.
Poseidon himself stands before us.
“My king!” My father stands as though he’s been struck by lightning. He comes around the table at once and bows as Poseidon strides into the room. “This is a wonderful surprise!”
“Phorcys, Ceto.”
A pleasant shiver runs the length of me as Poseidon’s warm voice fills the room. I watch as he embraces my father like an old friend and then offers my mother a courteous nod. “Please forgive my intrusion, but I found myself in close proximity to your island tonight. I hope I’m not imposing.”
“Not at all, my king.” My mother’s voice is nearly a purr.
“For the second time this year, you honor us.” I can practically hear the smugness dripping from her voice.
No doubt, she’ll boast of this impromptu visit to the other goddesses of the Sea Court as soon as she has the chance.
“Please, join us for dinner. Our table is yours.”
Poseidon nods. “Thank you for your hospitality.”
My father snaps his fingers, and a flurry of slaves run toward the table, moving plates and goblets around to make space for the sea king.
I hope he might pick a seat next to mine, and I fight off a wave of disappointment when, instead, he sits beside Stheno.
My heart starts to pound. I last saw Poseidon the night before last, when he escorted me back to the Acropolis.
Suddenly, my mind is overrun with memories of the way his lips felt on mine, the way his hands seemed to burn pleasantly in all the places he touched me.
I say nothing as he settles into his seat and then turns to address us all.
“I enjoyed the feast your family hosted earlier this spring,” he says. “It was entertaining.”
“Thank you, Your Grace,” says my mother. “We were just thinking of hosting another in the autumn.”
This is news to me. It feels strange, no longer being totally apprised of the happenings of this household. I look to my sisters. Was this planned feast another attempt to find suitors for them? I make a note to ask them about it later.
“That would be splendid,” says Poseidon. “If you did host such a feast, perhaps I could extend the invitation to some of my siblings.”
Silence falls.
“Forgive me, my king,” my mother says cautiously. “But you do have so many siblings. Which…?”
“Zeus, Hera, perhaps Demeter.” He pauses thoughtfully. “Hades so rarely leaves the Underworld these days, but it’s always worth trying.”
My mother’s eyes go wide, and I can only imagine what she’s thinking. I know now why she hates the Olympians, Athena specifically. But if she and my father managed to host several highly ranked Olympians, the king of the gods among them…
My parents exchange a look.
“It’s settled, then,” my father announces. He is maintaining a facade of calm, but only just. “We’ll begin the planning at once.”
“I’m sure I will enjoy it immensely,” says Poseidon. His eyes land on me for the briefest second, but I still jolt in my seat. He smiles, then turns back to my parents.
—
My father dominates the rest of the dinner conversation with sycophantic questions for the sea king—how relations fare between the estranged Demeter and Hades, whether it’s true that Zeus has sired yet another mortal bastard.
I wait for a break in their talking, hoping I might find an opportunity to add something of my own to their conversation, but when the hour grows late, my sisters and I are dismissed before such a moment presents itself.
I am loath to go, and I lie in bed for hours listening to the distant sounds of Poseidon and my father talking well into the small hours between night and morning.
Eventually, the conversation ends, or perhaps I simply fall asleep.
When I wake up next, all is quiet, and one of the slaves has dimmed the hall’s candles, so that only a tiny golden flickering is visible beneath the crack in my door.
It is that quiet that allows me to hear the soft pad of approaching footsteps, and at once, I sit up.
I rise from my bed, gently pry my door open, then peek outside.
At first, I think no one is there; then something shifts in the shadows.
“Who’s there?” I ask. “Eury? Theo?”
“Forgive me, little priestess.”
My heart stutters as Poseidon emerges from the dark. His smile is careworn. Tonight, he is wearing a white tunic, but everything else about him is exactly as it was that night in Athens. A sea breeze abruptly blows through the hall, ruffling his blue-black hair.
“I’ve woken you,” he says. “I apologize.”
I don’t know what prompts me to step out into the hall, only that I do so without thinking. I’m aware than I’m wearing only a thin silk night slip—not a garment that would usually be considered appropriate for an audience with someone like Poseidon—but I find I don’t care as our eyes meet.
“You didn’t wake me, my king.” At his raised eyebrow, I remember what he once asked me to call him. “Poseidon.”
The sea king’s smile grows. “It’s good to see you, Medusa. I have thought of you.”
He’s thought of me. I suck in a sharp breath. I so want to ask him what he’s been thinking, but I’m not brave enough. We stare at each other for several seconds before he goes on.
“There’s something I need to speak to you about.” His gaze drops, and he looks abashed. “The other night, after I escorted you back to the Acropolis, we…”
“I remember.” My face warms.
“I shouldn’t have kissed you,” he said.
Something in my heart plummets.
“It was impulsive on my part, irresponsible,” he goes on. “But now there’s a more serious problem.” Suddenly, he looks directly at me. “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it.”
If what he said just before stopped my heart’s beating, this sends it in a frantic new cadence. I almost can’t believe the words I’ve just heard.
“You’ve…you’ve thought about it?”
Poseidon nods, looking pained. “The way I felt with you…” He shakes his head and laughs, but it’s a humorless sound. “I don’t understand what you’ve done to me.”
Poseidon is the king of the sea; I am just the mortal daughter of two lowly sea gods. The idea that I might have any power or effect on someone like him thrills me, terrifies me, intrigues me.
“I have to confess something else,” he says. “But I would ask you to keep it a secret, something between only us.”
He trusts me with a secret. Me. I’m nodding before I’ve even processed his words. “Of course.”
Poseidon’s smile turns wry. “I was not entirely honest when I told your parents why I’ve come here.”
“You weren’t?”
“No.”
A familiar current of energy races through my body as Poseidon takes another step forward, closing the gap between us.
“The truth is, when Athena mentioned in passing that you’d gone home, I came to your island to see you, to give you this.”
My breath hitches as he reaches into the pocket of his tunic and withdraws my seashell necklace.
“You found it.”
“It was on the streets of Athens,” he says. “I thought you might want it back.”
“Thank you.”
“I’ll put it on you.” Before I can speak, he’s moved behind me and gently shifted my locs from my neck.
I shiver as his knuckles graze my skin, warm to the touch as he carefully ties the cord of the necklace so that its shell falls to the middle of my chest. When he is done, his fingers trace down my neck, stopping at my shoulder.
He pinches one of my locs, and when I turn my head slightly, he’s winding it gently around his finger.
“You favor your mother and sisters,” he whispers. “But you’re prettiest.”
Warmth floods me, starting in my core and working its way to all my extremities. Slowly, I turn to fully face Poseidon. He is still holding one of my locs.
“Thank you. You’re kind.”
Poseidon’s eyes drop to my lips. “How old are you, Medusa?”
I think of the way he leaned in and kissed me in Athens, how I want him to do that again. “Seventeen.”