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Pirithous
He supported Thalia as best he could, keeping her from falling when she stumbled and tripped, her eyes unfocused and her breathing sharp with shock. He prayed they would reach the house before the pain struck her fully.
She had stopped her weeping some time ago, though he would not have blamed her had it lasted longer. Death was not an easy thing to witness, even when it was a monster slain. He had seen young men respond this way, after their first raid. The shock of battle and their wounds making them sick. And Thalia had not been raised in Achaea. She did not even hunt for her own food, had rarely if ever bloodied her hands for any reason. He should have known it would take her this way, should have prepared her somehow. But she was so brave, so insistent, and they’d had so little time...
“It is not much farther,” he promised, steadying her with his good arm around her waist. His other hand held Cyllarus’s head, that he would have something to offer Persephone in thanks, for injured as they both were, the rest of the centaur’s carcass would have to wait. “See the thorned berry bushes ahead?”
She licked her lips, her gaze flickering too quickly. Alexandros would not forgive him if he saw her this way. And Pirithous would not fault him for it. Not this time. He clenched his jaw. No woman should have seen what Thalia did, and he had been fool enough to give her a knife, to encourage her when he should have sent her away.
But Thalia would not have gone. She had proven that, and better to give her the means to defend herself than to see her taken, tortured and raped. Pirithous grimaced. She had done well, at least. And without her distraction, and the injury she had given Cyllarus, he would not have had so easy a time defeating the beast.
“I’m all right,” she mumbled, bracing herself against a tree. “I just—my arm.”
Cyllarus’s blow had broken her arm, just above the elbow. How badly, he could not tell, for she had barely allowed him to splint it, never mind feel for the break, even while the pain was dulled. At least it was not the joint. He had known men who lost the proper use of their arms after such an injury, and he thanked Apollo for sparing her that.
“Come,” he urged, parting the bushes for her to pass without further injury. She had been scraped and scratched enough for one day. His gaze went at once to the glassed windows of the house, following the shadowed movements behind them. Nikki and Alexandros, of course. Waiting. The door flew open before they had left the shade of the trees.
“Thalia!”
Nikki ran down the stairs, and Thalia shrank back from her friend, shielding her injured arm behind his body. “I’m fine, Nikki. We’re both fine.”
“What happened?” Nikki asked, stopping short.
“Cyllarus is dead,” Pirithous answered for her, tossing the centaur’s skull toward the hearth. It was only then he noticed the fire, burning low, a wine bottle cracked within the coals. Later. He would find out later. After Thalia had been seen to.
She bit her lip, her eyes closing, and he felt a wash of her pain. The shock of what had happened wearing off at last. He caught her when she swayed, tucking her against his side.
“Thalia is hurt,” Pirithous said quietly to Nikki, glancing at Alexandros to be sure he could not hear the exchange. Thalia’s brother stood at the top of the stairs, glaring. He would not fault Alexandros for being angry, that was true, but now was not the time to upset Thalia with the argument that would come. It would wait until she was well—all of it would. “She needs a physician.”
Nikki’s eyes widened, all her attention shifting to Thalia at once. “What happened? Where?”
“My arm,” Thalia admitted with a grimace.
Alex had started down the stairs now, his expression dark. Pirithous clenched his jaw.
“I think it’s broken pretty badly. If you could just drive me to the hospital? Preferably before my brother has a fit. It really hurts, and I think I’m going to pass out if I have to stand here and listen to him go on about whatever he’s pissed off about this time.”
“Yeah, of course,” Nikki said. “Let me just get my keys. I’ll meet you out front in just a minute.” But she stopped before she had even turned away, and Nikki’s eyes met his, a hand falling to her abdomen, pressing there. “Thank you. Whatever Alexandros says—I owe you my life, Pirithous. The life of my—of our child. I won’t forget that.”
“You’re pregnant?” Thalia asked, her voice thin. And then at the tight line of Nikki’s mouth, she let out a breath, a wave of understanding washing through her. “You’re pregnant,” she repeated. “Of course.”
Nikki turned then, guiltily, right into Alexandros, but Pirithous did not believe it was accidental. Alex caught her in his arms, and she pushed him back. One step, then two, then three. Alexandros glowered over Nikki’s head, but Pirithous gave no sign that he noticed.
“What did you do to my sister?” Alex called.
“Stop it,” Nikki hissed.
Pirithous swept Thalia up into his arms, careful not to jar her arm. She grunted, her gaze going to his shoulder, but he shook his head. It ached and burned, but it would heal quickly. As it had already. And she mattered more.
“What did you do?” he demanded.
“Leave him alone, Alex,” Thalia said, but her brother surged against Nikki’s hold.
Pirithous pressed his lips together and met her brother’s eyes. “I protected her, Alexandros. As I have sworn to. That is all.”
***
“THANK YOU,” THALIA murmured, when he carried her past a glaring Alexandros to her bed, much later. The physicians had given her a splint that would not have to be reset or retied, a plaster casing spanning from beneath her elbow to her armpit, and a sling of cloth to support it.
“You need not thank me for doing my duty.” Pirithous covered her with a light blanket and kissed her forehead.
Whatever potion the physicians had given her with the setting of the bone, she had been more than half-asleep since. For the best, he imagined. Thalia did not seem to suffer nightmares, and she needed rest to heal. They both did, after today.
She made a soft noise in the back of her throat. “Duty, shmooty.”
“Shmooty is not a word I know.”
“S’not a word at all,” she said. “Just nonsense. Like what you said.”
He could feel Alexandros behind him, glowering. He had hoped to ask her about the wine in the hearth, but he did not dare to do so while her brother listened. “I am to be your husband. Caring for you, safeguarding you, that is my duty and my honor. It is not nonsense.”
She touched his arm, her fingers brushing his injured shoulder. “S’long as I get to safeguard you back.”
“I would have it no other way, Thalia.” He caught her hand and kissed it before tucking it back beneath the blanket. Until he had said the words, he had not realized how truly he meant them. And he could give her this, if nothing else. She had more than earned the right. “Rest now.”
“You too?”
“Soon,” he promised.
When he pulled the door shut behind him, leaving Thalia to her bed, Alexandros was gone. Pirithous could only hope her brother had heard enough.