Page 93 of A Veil of Gods and Kings

I shut the door and turned the lock, a headache pinching at the corner of my temple. Apollo dropped back into his chair. “You can be such a badass.”

I shifted towards him. “A badass?”

He grabbed the reed and tapped it against a page in a rhythm. “You’re like one of those flowers that eats things.”

“What are you talking about?” I strode over to my seat opposite him and eased into it.

“You know, the flowers that eat bugs and frogs.”

I spread my fingers out on the desk. “That cannot be a real thing.”

“It is.” He scratched something out and flipped the page over. “And you’re like that. A beautiful, silky exterior, but don’t fuck with you.”

I chuckled. That was the most ridiculous description of myself I’d ever heard. “What kind of plant would you be, then?”

He offered me a smile, but his expression tightened, the radiance of him dimming as his voice dropped. “I’m not a plant, Cyn. I’m a locust.” He raised his face again, and his eyes seemed to glow as if he’d drawn back his veil, a warning hovering over his features. “You should be wary of me.”

I cocked an eyebrow up and leaned against my chair. “Can this frog-eating-flower of yours also eat locusts?”

Apollo hesitated a moment, and then he chuckled. “I guess so.”

“Maybe you should fear me too then.”

His smile split across his cheeks. “Maybe so. All right. We need to get work done.” And he bowed his head over the page and returned to the numbers he jotted down.

And so days passed that bled into weeks. Apollo and I continued our strange routine we’d arranged. My mornings started alone, dressing, rushing into meetings where advisors growled and complained to me. And then my heart lightened as I all but raced to meet up with Apollo. We worked and then spent the evenings together, often slipping off somewhere eyes couldn’t follow us, hands grasping, our bodies humming, our mouths finding the other.

And I didn’t push any further.

But gods if I didn’t want to.

Hera’s lot if I didn’t wish to pin him beneath me, peel away the layers of him, feel the warmth of his flesh seep into mine.

But I would leave that up to him. I had to.

Something held him back, and I had stopped suspecting it was me. Whatever it was also caused a shadow to flicker over his face when I mentioned that he was a god. It wasn’t just me being human—after all, gods had sex with mortals, I knew that personally. Something heavy and painful brought about Apollo’s reluctance.

I wanted to know what.

I wish I could wipe it away with my fingers, lead him into the gardens and tuck him there, safe from whatever haunted him.

But that wasn’t my role, was it?

Who was I? A mortal prince. And nothing more.

I mused over that one afternoon when Apollo lifted his face. “Do we have plans for tonight?”

“Actually”—I pushed away from the desk and rose, stretching—“the palace has a theater, and there’s a performance. Do you want to go?”

He made a noise in the back of his throat. “Of course your palace has its own theater.”

“It’s for the high lords as well,” I said, rolling my eyes.

He twisted his mouth up, and I longed to step over and press my lips to his, to let his taste bloom on my tongue, to tangle my fingers into his hair.

But, no, I wouldn’t push anything with him.

It was up to him.