Page 56 of The Gods Forbid

I didn’t have confidantes.

I must have been getting sick or something. That was the only reasonable explanation for how tight my shoulders or how hot my skin felt, each of those sensations growing more severe with every word that fell from Persy’s full lips.

I’d never been sick. Gods didn’t catch colds or whatever humans called it when their nose got all stuffy and they got snot everywhere. I only knew how to heal it.

“Can I help?” Persy asked, shutting the book softly when she realized I’d turned off the burner to the stove. She could help by staying far, far away from me, but that went without saying.

She was being slightly jumpy. I didn’t like it.

“You can sit down,” I said, ignoring her attempts to reach for a plate behind her. I turned, blinking hard to try to shake the image of her perched on a countertop from my mind.

This sickness was invading my mind too, making me do incredibly stupid shit like try to brace my hands on either side of her legs before I realized that would likely earn me a knee to the groin.

Nevermind the fact that was a complete and total invasion of her privacy.

I was engaging in some truly spectacular mental back flips trying to separate the obvious fact that she was the most beautiful person I’d ever seen in my life from any sort of … attraction related to that.

I could appreciate art, and art she was, without letting my brain conjure up dangerous images about her.

Or I thought I could. I was doing a mediocre job of it so far.

Persy grumbled something under her breath, but it was muffled by the sound of her feet hitting the floor with a light thud.

I let out a breath, relief snapping through my chest.

I made quick work of plating the food, a rice and meat dish that cooked for hours and was intended to be a welcome distraction. I could feel Persy’s eyes on me with every movement.

With a deep breath, I tried to calm myself. It wasn’t her fault that she was more observant than anyone I’d ever met. That was a gift, a talent.

My reaction to it was my problem to deal with.

That sounded like something someone with a moral code would say, but I was ignoring that.

By the time I was seated across from Persy, I was feeling itchy and tense. There were too many reminders of why I went through life the way I did.

Calpurnia this morning, trying to pry trauma or history or whatever it was she thought would help her understand me.

Penn this afternoon, reminding me of Penelope and the way she viewed the world, everything in intense, almost painful swaths of color.

“I really am thankful for your offer to help Penn,” Persy said, studying me over the rim of her wine glass. “He’s…” she trailed off, her eyes going slightly unfocused. “He needs grace. Kindness.”

“I am capable of that, despite what you might think,” I snapped defensively. Persy jerked back, blinking rapidly as her eyebrows lifted in the center.

“That’s not what I meant,” she said softly, and damnit if that dulcet tone didn’t make me feel like an asshole. I let out a noncommittal sound, hoping she took my silence as leave to speak.

She had a habit of doing that. A habit I wouldn’t mind if it stayed.

And she talked alright.

“Why did you tell Reyna that you wouldn’t involve me in your plan?”

Thank the Fates I wasn’t holding my wine glass or it would have shattered in my hand. “Who told you that?” I gritted out, the words barely making it past the clench of my jaw.

Persy blinked, somehow more shocked in the face of that brutal tone than she had been in the early days of my confinement in the old cells. “Your—” she cut herself off to clear her throat, which only felt marginally more painful than having to hear her stumble over her words. “The antidote. It worked. Reyna told Adrian everything and he sent me an Iris letter earlier asking if I could ask you and I figured it would be better if you heard it from me but that’s—” Another deep breath and her sentence was lost.

I took a matching breath, practically begging my body to comply and calm the fuck down. I didn’t think I was scaring her, but if I was, I’d launch myself into the sun. “I don’t like to snuff the light out of beautiful things.”

Persy’s eyes flared in a way I’d never seen. Like brilliant white rays of sunlight punching their way through thundering clouds. “Would you have killed me?”