Page 96 of This Divine Revelry

He slaps me so suddenly I don’t realize what has happened until my chin collides with my collar.

‘Too many men let you run your mouth.’

Is that it? My way out? To play along and let him think he’s broken me. Perhaps even garner his trust. And then run?

I settle for lowering my gaze, only so he cannot see the hatred there. He chortles. ‘Better. That god of yours is a scourge – women out in the streets. Leaving their husbands, their homes, their families … undoing the carefully constructed rules that keep society functioning. Rules that say men lead and women follow.’ He grasps my chin, forcing me to face him. ‘You think you’re happier like this but it is a lie. You’ve been – what? Left for dead, shot, imprisoned.’ At this he smirks. ‘Because you refuted your nature. Because you denied the role carved out for you by millennia of generations before you – do you hate those women, Ariadne? Think their femininity something shameful?’

I swallow down a retort – easy only because I do not know what retort to make. It is all so ludicrous and evidently so firmly believed that I’m not even sure where to begin. How do you explain your personhood to someone? To show them proof of your capabilities when they will only dismiss it entirely as unnatural?

So I stay silent, as that is evidently the sort of woman he wants.

‘Where is Dionysus’s sacred land?’

I stay silent to that too.

‘Foolish girl, I came close to tracking him in Cabarnis. Close enough to know it’s somewhere on Naxos. He’s not powerful enough to claim the entirety of the largest island in the Cyclades – so it must be an inlet, a mountain, a small, barren corner.’ He lays a map out on the table – and I see Cabarnis, Delos, Naxos … ‘Tell me where.’

I look away, in case he sees something in my gaze.

‘He’s going to die. He’s going to lose.’ Perseus slams his hand on to the map. ‘And when he does, what exactly do you imagine I’m going to do to his widow? I can’t see another man rising up against me when I’ve got his bitch pouring my wine. So I’d really start begging for kindness now.’

‘I thought you didn’t like wine,’ I snap. ‘Not very masculine, is it, clinging to a sweet little drink like mead.’

But if I’m hoping to rile him again, it doesn’t work. He ignores me and pushes the parchment towards me. ‘The map. Now.’

I keep my mouth closed – but this time I don’t look down. I glare right at him.

‘His symbols, then,’ he says. ‘Pine cones, you said. Ivy? What else?’

Still, I say nothing.

‘Wine? Vineyards? That damn panther that follows him around? What’s actually sacred and what’s extraneous?’

Nothing.

And so he goes on, demanding, and I stay quiet, until finally he sighs and rolls that map back up.

‘We all saw how weak he was in Cabarnis. He couldn’t even put out a fire, couldn’t sail his ship. The only thing that’s changed between then and now is you. So I’d start talking. Because he’s weak, and he’s going to get weaker – weak enough to bleed. I’m going to destroy those symbols one by one. And until you give us something better, the easiest thing to eradicate is you.’

He starts towards the door, but pauses before he reaches the threshold. ‘You want to live? You’ll tell me everything. Every person he’s ever cherished, every trauma he’s ever suffered, every wish he’s ever made. But let’s start small. You want to be fed; you’ll locate his sanctuary on that map.’

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

THEY THROW ME BACK IN that dark little room. It must be low, deep – because I can feel each and every wave.

Sailing away from Dionysus – wherever he is. That he’s not here is my only reprieve – but still, bound as I am, sick and starving, I keep returning to the fact that he was missing when I fled Crete.

He has to be okay. He must.

Because if he’s not and I’m here …

I try to escape, of course. Though it’s not much use when I can feel the boat moving.

My powers, when they have appeared, have been instinctive.

Now, with hours spent locked in the bowels of the ship, I try again and again to channel them. To do it on purpose.

And there’s no true escape – no path to tread on the ocean. But a way out … Each slight tug on the rope, the next strand, the next coil. And I feel that path unfurl, just the slightest amount to tell me this is the first step.