Page 19 of The Ruin of Eros

I almost think I hear a smile in his voice.

“But not so bad as the other.”

The other.

The sea is already far below, but not so far that I can’t see a flash of green; a long, scaled tentacle thrashing against the rock face. Not so far that I can’t hear a howl of its inhuman, disappointed rage.

“Where are you taking me, demon?” I whisper.

And then he murmurs a word—skotos,“darkness”—and that’s the last thing I hear before a great fog overtakes me, and everything turns to black.

Chapter Nine

I force my eyes open and blink—it’s like swimming out of a drugged sleep. But once I can focus again, I can’t stop staring.

I’ve never seen so much gold in one place. I’m gazing up at a ceiling that feels as tall as a temple. The walls are marble, inlaid everywhere with gold. The draperies are silk. When I turn my head I see shimmering fabrics laid across the floor, nothing like the hide or woven rugs we had at home.

Home.

Father. Dimitra.

Do they think me dead?

AmI dead?

I always pictured the Realm of Shades being a little…greyer.

My gaze shifts to the window. No, this cannot be the Underworld—there is a blue sky outside, and a blue sea. The water is still, utterly motionless. But it’s nothing I recognize. Wherever I am, it must be far from Sikyon.

I raise myself up a little and examine my surroundings. I’m in a bed, one that must surely be finer than the one even the King of Sikyon sleeps in. There are objects of luxury everywhere around me: marble and onyx statuettes, bouquets of flowers made of molten gold, and golden vines that climb the walls and twist their way to the towering ceiling. No mortal smith could create anything so fine. I sit up in bed, and the heavy feeling starts to lift. How long have I slept for—hours? Days? I frown, looking around me at this stately bed. It comes to me that this isnot an ordinary bed. It is a marriage bed.

And this silk garment I’m wearing, where did that come from? It’s finer than anychitonI’ve ever worn—these seams, the curve of them, they fit my body like a glove, with no need for brooches or pins. But it’s paper-thin, and evidently not meant to be day-clothing, for there is a fine gown laid out on the chair in front of me, together with the most luxurious undergarments I’ve ever seen.

What is all this? What place is this? How did I get here? I touch the back of my skull. I remember the cliff, the peach, and then…nothing.

I raise my hand to my face to brush back the loose hair matted against my forehead, and stop. That smell. Woodsy, like incense. I smell of him.

I look around me at the rumpled sheets, the wide marriage bed. Why can I remember nothing of last night? Nothing from when the demon lifted me into his arms, and I looked down into the water—after that, everything is blank.

As I draw in a breath, the scent of him hits me again. I shiver, then pull back the sheets and place a tentative foot on the floor. These floor coverings…the softness is extraordinary. It’s as if all my senses are waking up, or maybe it’s just that everything here is incomparably finer and more luxurious than anything I’ve felt before.

The bedroom’s gilded door opens noiselessly, and I find myself staring into a room that at first my mind cannot fully absorb. It makes the bedroom look humble by contrast. Here, there are murals on every wall that put the first craftsmen of Sikyon to shame. And the room is so enormous! It must have taken years to paint it all. The furnishings are lavish, too, and none more so than the tremendous dining table at one end of the room which looks as though it could host a king’s gathering. The table is heaped with food—figs, almonds, dates, yogurt,honey, bread with split seams of warm crust—and involuntarily, my stomach cramps and growls. How long since I’ve eaten; how long was I asleep? It seems like days that I’ve eaten nothing but that peach…

That peach.

Next to the dishes of honey sits a single peach, sliced open on a golden platter.

I want to approach the table. I want to devour everything I see there. But I would be a fool to do it: the last bite I took, took me here.

A door swings open across the room and I step back quickly, almost tripping over a lushly embroidered footstool. My breath hitches, but it’s not him—it’s an old woman. Her hair is bone-white, thin as spun sugar. Her face is deeply lined, her eyes black and beady.

She doesn’t look surprised to see me.

“Grandmother,” I address her as I would back home. “Please, tell me where I am.”

She says nothing, just looks at me with those birdlike black eyes.

I bow my head, then try again.

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