Chapter 20 #2
“You are infected. You cannot understand Anesidora’s plans with this infection upon you,” Harmony replied softly, something akin to pity on her face.
“You cannot receive her blessings in this state. You must be cleansed for your own good, for your family’s, and for the community’s, so your miasma does not spread.
Once you are cleansed, we will pray for your new bonds to form. ”
Before I could respond, my mouth and nose was filled with salt water and I was choking and spluttering on the jug of ocean water she’d dumped over my face. I turned my head to the side, to cough up as much as I could while my lungs burned.
Harmony’s bonded approached the altar with their own jugs, dumping more and more water over me, drenching my body in the cleansing liquid.
“Apo pantos kakodaimones,” Harmony began chanting, and the rest of the spectators joined in. Away, every evil spirit.
Every daimon .
I gritted my teeth against the strange fluttering in my chest. I would fight Anesidora myself to keep my connection with Riot. He was mine . She could visit the mortal realm and rip the bond out of my body if she wanted it back, and even then, I’d still choose him. Bond or no bond.
Riot and I gave each other a place to just be —no expectations, no masks, no judgment. I would never give him up.
Harmony assessed me with her head tilted to the side like she was expecting something to happen, and I stared right back, glaring with as much venom as I could considering I had water in my eyes. She sighed heavily, continuing to chant as she motioned for someone just out of my line of sight.
One of Harmony’s bonded moved forward out of the shadows, carrying a ritual terracotta amphora with a grim depiction of an animal sacrifice painted on the outside in the traditional black-figure style, and handed it to an expectant Harmony.
I knew without a doubt it contained some poor creature’s blood, and my muscles tensed in anticipation of what they were going to do.
It was an aggravating feeling to be so defenseless.
I was aggravated with myself that I’d never learned some kind of self defense, or anything that would help me in this situation.
Why would I have, when I was supposed to find four men who adored me and would always be by my side?
All those years spent learning the art of hosting dinner parties and how to sit like a lady as per my mother’s instructions had resulted in zero practical skills when my life was on the line.
The unsettling chanting continued from every side as Harmony held the vase up to the ceiling in offering to the goddess, before tipping the blood over her hand and smearing it over my face, painting lines of it down my nose, over my forehead, down my cheeks.
It was colder than I expected, and I shuddered at the revolting sensation of it dripping down my already wet skin, pressing my lips tightly together to stop the blood from getting in my mouth.
The darkness, my monster, the thing that had been keeping me icy and detached from this situation was morphing, shifting into something fiery and furious. Something reckless .
I’d been reckless once before, and it had brought me Riot. Maybe I wasn’t defenseless after all. Maybe I’d just been too cautious.
“Goddess of Night,” I whispered, trying to open my mouth as little as possible while also struggling to speak from the salt water burn in my throat. “I ask for your guidance—”
“Stop it,” Harmony hissed, glancing around her nervously.
“—I am proud to serve the light, but I care for Riot—”
“Stop it!” Footsteps drew closer to the altar, but I couldn’t stop now. Not when a cool breeze blew through the closed room, drifting over my midsection as it seemed to wind through the space like a snake.
“—I believe that I can do both, that our lives don’t have to exist in opposition to one another—”
With a satisfying whoosh , the flaming torches in the sconces went out, like an invisible force was traveling around the room, extinguishing them all one-by-one.
My lips curved into a tight-lipped smile that was probably a little feral. I was beginning to think the Goddess of Night liked me.
“Light the candles!” Harmony ordered as bodies scrambled around in the dark. “Keep chanting!”
“Apo pantos kakodaimones,” echoed, my mother’s distinct voice the first to speak.
I was shivering so hard in my drenched dress that I could feel rope burns developing on my wrists and ankles despite my best attempts to hold still, but no one seemed particularly bothered about me possibly freezing to death while they fumbled around in the dark basement to relight the candles.
I could hear amphora vases knocking together, and men hissing instructions at each other in the darkness as they struggled to find matches, but I wasn’t about to make this easy for them.
“—You have shown me that the agathos are wrong about the daimons, but maybe they’re not so wrong about us. Maybe we’re wrong about ourselves—”
“SHUT UP!” Harmony screeched, her hands landing on my forehead in the dark, scrambling around until she pressed both hands over my mouth. I fought to turn my head to the side, but one of her hands moved to my hair, holding me in place.
I hadn’t even known what I was saying, what exactly I was asking for, but I’d planned to keep talking. To make it clear exactly how I felt about the people who had trapped me in this room. To maybe gain an ally in a shadowy goddess I’d been raised to fear.
The sole door that led to the altar room opened with a bang that echoed against the stone, letting light into the pitch black space and startling the Basilinna who was looming over me.
She snatched her hands back like she’d been burned, whirling away from me to face the entryway.
I couldn’t see past her, but I didn’t need to.
The achy hollowness inside me eased. The thread that always felt like it was stretched too thin whenever I was at work slackened. Rage didn’t so much brush at my skin as curl around it like a welcome second defense, a shield against the world.
Riot was here, and he was furious .