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Pirithous
From Thalia’s bedroom, Pirithous could hear everything. But it wasn’t what he heard that provoked him into rising from her bed. It was the spike of Thalia’s pain through his heart, and the shame that seemed to settle over her after Nikki had left.
She had started this day in such good humor. Smiling and laughing and joyful. He could not stand to see it smothered into sorrow and self-disgust by foolish words spoken in anger. He dressed quickly, though he could not find his tunic in the mess of her things, and went in search of Thalia.
Still in the kitchen. She did not look as though she had moved since Nikki had stormed out the door.
“Thalia?”
She turned her face away and brushed at her cheeks. Trying to hide her tears. “Yeah. Sorry. I just...”
Pirithous took the yellow fruit from her hand, setting it on the counter. She wouldn’t meet his eyes, and when he ducked his head to look into hers, she closed them.
“You heard all that.”
“Some.” He crouched before her. Even if she would not open her eyes, he wanted to see her face.
“Maybe you should go,” she mumbled. “Last night was—I shouldn’t have let this happen.”
“Thalia.” He touched her cheek, turning her face to his. “Look at me.”
She shook her head, pulling away from his touch, but he caught her eyes when they opened. They filled with tears, and he sighed. Sweet Thalia. Nikki’s barb had lodged deep. And to what purpose? She was not even here to see her friend’s misery.
“She said those things in anger.” He brushed away the tears as they spilled free. “She was hurt, Thalia. That’s all.”
She hiccupped on a sob. “You don’t even know her.”
“I know you.” He rose when she tried to evade him by glancing upward and caught her by the chin, forcing her to look at him. “I know you are brave and loving, generous and kind. There are worse things in this world than to share those gifts with others.”
She sniffed. “You’re just saying that because you benefitted.”
He laughed, stroking her hair from her face. “I did and I do, but that is not the reason I say it. Send me away, if you wish, it will not change who you are one way or the other. Though I think you would be lonely, and it would make me unhappy to go.”
“I bet.” She wiped the dampness from her cheeks. “Who would want to sleep up a tree if they had free meals and a warm bed?”
He shook his head. “I did not return last night because I wished for food or a bed.”
“Then why? To get laid?”
He snorted at the expression. “To arrive and find you willing after the insults you gave me was the last thing I expected. You had made your feelings for me quite clear.” He caressed her cheek, his eyes dropping to her mouth. She bit her bottom lip and his body tightened. “I have never been happier to be wrong, and not simply for the pleasure it gave us both.”
“If you’re this charming as a fish out of water, I can only imagine what you must have been as a king.” She covered his hand on her cheek, turning her face to kiss his palm. “I still don’t understand why you came back, after what I said to you. I’m as bad as Nikki.”
He dropped his forehead to hers. “Release me from the promise I made you, and I will grant you every forgiveness.”
She pulled back, laughing, and the sound lightened his heart. “You’ve made me a lot of promises, Pirithous. Which one do you want to go back on?”
“Give me leave to protect you.”
“Oh, no.” She slid off the stool, backing away from him. He could see in her eyes she was nervous now, even if he hadn’t felt it. Nervous was still better than weeping, he supposed. “Please tell me you aren’t one of those guys.”
“There are centaurs in the woods, Thalia.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” She laughed, but it was high and sharp. “Centaurs!”
“Yes.” He did step forward then, but stopped when she put the small table between them.
His eyes locked on hers, but her disbelief was already flaring to life. Her hands gripped the back of a chair as if she might throw it between them if he came too near. “I’ve lived here my whole life, Pirithous, and I have never seen a centaur in the woods. Deer, wild turkeys, foxes, a coyote once, but centaurs? Give me a break.”
“They’ve followed me from Hades, and now they will hunt us both.” She opened her mouth to speak, but he held up his hand to stop her. He already knew what she would argue. She did not need another protector. She did not want to be coddled. He understood, so he continued on before she could refuse. “I wish only the freedom to defend you from the threats I have brought, that is all. Do not bind my hands in this, I beg you.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Only from the centaurs?”
“And any threats the gods might send after.”
“That’s an awfully broad catch all.”
“Any threats the gods might send after me,” he countered, his hands closing around the back of the chair in front of him. “But the centaurs first and foremost. Because they are here already, and if they believe they might use you to lure me, they will not hesitate to take you, nor to kill you if you stand in their way.”
She swallowed, her face paling. “You’re serious about this. There really were centaurs at your wedding.”
“There were.” His jaw tightened, and for a moment he heard Hippodamia’s scream, saw her body broken by the violence of rape. He closed his eyes, forcing out the false memory. They had not taken her. He had fought his way to her side. He and Theseus, with Antiope’s help, had saved her. There had been no broken body, split in two by the centaur’s lust, no matter how clearly he saw it.
The wood in his hands snapped and Thalia made a strangled noise, half-protest, half-alarm.
Better the chair than Thalia’s arm, but he forced himself to release it, breathing deeply. “Forgive me. The day haunts me, still.”
She studied his face, and for a moment he feared she would refuse him, but then she nodded. “From the centaurs in the woods and from anything else the gods send after you, but that’s it. Supernatural forces of darkness only, unless you hear me specifically ask for help with something else. Are we clear?”
His hands shook with relief. “Yes.” Thank you, Athena, for letting her see reason.
“You’re going to tell me I can’t go in the woods, aren’t you? Because of your centaurs. I can’t believe I’m even having this conversation.”
He smiled, willing even to compromise on that now that he could protect her, thank the gods. “It would be best. But if you must, at least do not go alone.”
She sighed, crossing her arms. “I don’t like this, Pirithous. And I’m warning you right now, if you start crowding me about anything else, I will kick your butt out of here faster than you can say centaur.”
“You need not worry.” He moved around the table, pleased when she didn’t edge away. Instead she raised her chin, her eyes flashing as he stopped before her. He ran the back of his fingers along the column of her neck, watching the blush return to her cheeks in response to his touch. “I have no intention of being father or brother to you, Thalia. I promise you.”
Her gaze dropped to his mouth. “I’m not letting you take that one back.”
He chuckled, leaning down to kiss her ear. “That much, I will swear even before the gods.”
***
THE SHADOW OF NIKKI’S sharp tongue still lurked, but Thalia had returned to better humor by the time she’d finished cooking their morning meal. Bacon, eggs, and something she called hash browns, which she spilled into a pan from a box, frozen solid.
They weren’t entirely offensive, more salty than sweet. Even so, everything but the eggs left a strange metal flavor on his tongue. He wished he’d carved some of the venison from the deer he’d left for Persephone last night and brought it for Thalia to cook. But that only reminded him of his duty to the goddess, and if he wished to protect them both, it would be better if he spent his day building an altar than finding pleasure in Thalia’s bed. He grimaced.
“You’re the pickiest eater I’ve ever met,” she teased, and he laughed in spite of his thoughts. “What’s wrong with your food now?”
“Find me rope for a snare and I will show you what food is meant to taste like.” He gave her horse-tail a playful tug and she pinched his ribs in repayment, making him grin. “The food is not at fault. It fills my stomach, and gives you strength enough to match me, and that is all that matters.”
“Yes, but will you be able to keep up with me? I think that’s the more important question.”
“Mm.” He rose from the table, taking what was left of his meal and his drink with him. He dropped a kiss on the top of her head. “I am the son of Zeus, Thalia. When it comes to the pleasures of the bedroom, I will never tire.”
She smiled slowly, her gaze lingering on his body. “You’re going to have to prove that, King Pirithous.”
He groaned at the look in her eyes and the suggestion in her voice, enough to make him harden with desire. But if he took her back to bed now, he would never rise from it, so he made himself move to the door. “Come, show me how you build a fire, now that I speak the right language to understand how scraping wood against a box creates flame.”
She raised an eyebrow. “It’s sweltering outside. Wouldn’t you rather wait until the sun goes down?”
He shook his head. “I should have made my offering even before we ate. Come, show me. Then you need not join me next time if you do not wish to.”
“Are you going to go to church with me on Sunday, if I do this for you?” But she was already rising, grabbing the box of sticks from the drawer where she kept them.
He shrugged, backing toward the door so he might watch her. “It is only right to honor the gods of the land that shelters you. If you will tell me how to make my offering, I would be happy to do so. I need no more enemies.”
She reached around him to open the door. “We’ve had war after war after war about whose god is the right god since the Roman Empire, and here you are, self-proclaimed son of Zeus, completely unbothered by the idea of worshipping at a different altar.”
“You are a very strange people,” he agreed, starting down the stairs ahead of her. He didn’t believe the centaurs would leave the shelter of the forest, but he still searched the trees for any sign of movement, and the ground for signs they had come to the house.
“Crap,” Thalia said, behind him. “I forgot my shoes, and I really shouldn’t be walking barefoot in the dirt after yesterday.”
He stopped on the bottom step and spread his arms, glancing over his shoulder at her. “Hop up.”
“You’re sure?”
“If you are certain you can hold on,” he teased.
He caught sight of her grin before her hands gripped his shoulders. She jumped up neatly, wrapping her legs around his waist and her arms around his neck. She kissed him behind the ear. “I thought I proved last night that I’m perfectly capable of riding you.”
“Mm.” She was going to be the ruin of him. Her legs wrapped around his body and her breath tickling his ear. Perhaps he should have sent her back inside, after all, before he took her in the grass. “Quite a talent of yours. Careful of your head.”
He balanced the glass of juice on his plate and ducked beneath the stairs to gather wood. The sweet citrus juice was not wine, but it would do for now. In the evening he would be sure to pour a portion of his wine into the fire before he drank. Thalia had said she would make ribs of some kind, and had promised him the bones. It was not the same as a blood sacrifice, but he could not hunt properly until he fashioned himself a bow, and he could not put a bow above the temple he owed Persephone.
“You’ll want the lighter fluid, too, or you’ll be at it all day,” Thalia said, pointing to a metal jug. “Swing around and I’ll grab it.”
He did as she asked, then followed her directions to another bin. She tucked the box of sticks under his chin and pulled out large sheets of something she called newspaper with her free hand. Perhaps it would have been easier to set her down in one of the chairs by the hearth first, but it would have been much less enjoyable.
With hands and arms full, he made his way to the hearth, tossing the wood into the center and setting his plate on a low table between the two chairs. Thalia dropped the newspaper in the seat of one chair, and the box of sticks atop it.
“Can you set the lighter fluid down on the table?”
He took it from her hand, then helped her slide off his back into the other chair. “Have you no flints?”
“This is better, I promise.” She leaned over to grab the newspaper. “So you just ball it like this, and then you put the wood in a tent over it, douse the whole thing with the lighter fluid, and light it with the match. But you don’t want to be leaning over it when you touch the match to the newspaper or you’ll burn off your eyebrows when the lighter fluid catches.”
He grunted, crumpling the newspaper as she showed him. “Flints only require wood and tinder.”
“Well if you want it to take an hour you can use the match and the logs, but it’s ninety degrees out here. And the newspaper is your tinder, instead of having to pick through the leaves and pine needles in the woods.”
He laughed. “You do not raise your own livestock, weave your own cloth, or even prepare your own food, but you do not have time to start a fire properly? What do you do with your day?”
“I was planning on spending it in bed with you, if you ever finish lighting the fire and making your offering.” She tucked her leg under her in the chair and leaned forward, plucking the metal jug from his hands. She did something he didn’t see and handed it back to him, open. “It’s a twist off thing. What did you have in Thessaly?”
“Cork.” He studied the lid, twisting it back on, then off again. “Something like this would have required a master metal worker and taken weeks to make fit. But we would not have wasted the metal on a jug.”
“I bet you’ll be a real pain about recycling someday.”
“Where does English find all these strange words? Recycling. Matchsticks. Noose-paper.” He splashed the fluid over the wood and paper, then placed the lid back on. “Show me how to make the sticks work.”
“First make sure the lighter fluid is closed tight and out of the way.” He snorted, setting it back on the table. She slid one of the sticks out of the box, and held it up. “See the red head on the top? You strike that against this strip here. Like a flint, I guess.” She dragged it across the box in one quick motion, and it burst into flame. “And then the friction and the chemicals make it light. Here.”
He took the burning stick from her hand and tossed it into the newspaper beneath the stacked wood. Fire jumped from the paper to the wood, leaping where the liquid had dampened the logs.
“Sometimes it takes more than one try,” she said, passing him the box. “Give it a shot.”
He ran his finger over the strip where she’d struck the stick, feeling the slight grit. “I would not waste them.”
“Pirithous, they’re like a dollar for the box. It’s not a big deal.”
“Dollar. Chemicals.” She kicked at him with her good foot and he grinned, pulling a stick from the box.
“Close it back up first so you don’t light them all on fire if your hand slips.”
He did as she bid, then drew the stick lightly against the gritted strip, testing the strength of both. The stick was a fragile thing and he had no wish to snap it, but clearly he would have to apply more pressure. There was not even a hint of a spark.
“Hard and fast,” Thalia said, and then she smiled much too innocently. “One of the many ways I would enjoy your company.”
“Later,” he promised, and the match popped, flame bursting from the tip. He watched it burn for a moment before tossing it onto the fire.
The wood had caught while he played with the matches, but he needed a moment to drag his mind from the image Thalia had conjured in his head before he made his offering. She would have made a very fine priestess for Aphrodite. And a very fine queen, too. Even Theseus would have found no fault in her.
He closed his eyes at the thought of his friend, breathing in the smoke from the fire. He dared not make his offering to the dead until he had served Persephone, or risk insulting the goddess, but Theseus’s fate weighed heavily on his heart. If only he knew for certain what had become of him.
Father, would it have been the same for me? Why grant Heracles a place upon Olympus, but not Theseus?
The fire cracked and he opened his eyes. The sooner he made his offering, the sooner he could put his mind to the rest of what was owed. Pirithous scraped the food into the flames, adding an appropriate prayer to Persephone in Achaean. Then he drew his knife, making a clean cut across his palm. The gods did not demand human blood, but since he had nothing else it seemed only right that he should give of himself, and better his blood than Thalia’s.
He let the drops of blood fall into the glass with the juice, swirling it gently.
Persephone, protect us. Know by this blood that I am your servant and consider it a renewal of my pledge. You will have your temple, if you will but grant me the time to build it.
He poured the juice into the trench he had made that first night, watching it travel toward the flame. The smell of citrus grew thick as the fire devoured it, spitting blue light, before flaring the deep red of a pomegranate seed.
Persephone’s sign. He loosed a sigh and felt the tension draining from his body with it. As long as she accepted his sacrifices, he had time. They both did.