According to her tutors, the fighting had reached the walls but never breached them, in part because the Telkhines, Tethys’s mer allies, had attacked Kronos’s ships. The harbor, though, had been drowned in blood. There was also the whispered rumor that, upon Okeanus’s death, Tethys had unleashed a drakon upon Kronos’s ships. That its saurian bulk had slithered beneath the waves before scuttling hulls and dragging men into the deep.
In the darkness, she could not help but feel the vague sense of something watching her, out in the far distance. Not a ghost like those in the harbor, but something … timeless and momentous. A presence that filled up the whole of the night with its enormity. Papa had warned things older than shades and far more dangerous could move through this Penumbra, using it as a transitory space to access the Mortal Realm. It seemed to her, the Veil protecting her world was a very good, fragile thing.
Pushing her fears aside, she took in her more immediate area. This late, few men were still up in the world of the living. Those she spied around the harbor were indistinct to her, blurred and dreamlike while she looked through the Veil.
On the pier, she paused, watching a flickering phantom ship. Kronos’s warriors poured from it in silent waves, though she could imagine their screams as they hefted their weapons, their blood up. They came, brandishing spears and javelins, the wealthy among them clad in panoplies. Some of the phantoms vanished the moment their sandals touched ashore, but others persisted, engaging Tethid warriors, both sides diaphanous.
Frozen moments of rage and terror and pain.
Then, across from them, the same dolphin-plated Titan she’d seen before rose up, leading the Tethid forces in a counter charge. Unlike the phantoms, he had more substance, only the very fringes of his garb breaking away into translucent tatters. Were she not looking closely, she might have mistaken him for a living man, and some of those he led, as well.
The ghost engaged the phantoms for a moment before his gaze fixed upon Pyrrha, and his eyes widened. Once more, he opened his mouth, and now she saw clearly the empty space behind his palate, flickers of starlight shining through it. Whatever he wanted to say was lost in a chorus of moans.
“I don’t understand,” Pyrrha said, raising her hands.
The ghost’s face darkened, and he took a threatening step toward her, brandishing a xiphos.
Pyrrha fell back, keeping her hands up between them. “I want to help you, but I don’t know how. Can you show me what you need?”
The inhuman hate that washed over his face stole her breath. Her hand went to her mouth. His form flickered, reappearing mere feet from her. His massive hand snared her hair and yanked her forward, his sword point hovering a hair from her eye. Pyrrha whimpered, heart hammering, unable to move. The palpable rage that wafted off this entity choked her, unlike aught she had ever felt in her life. It threatened to swallow her whole.
Then, without warning, something else seized her and hefted her bodily away, to crash upon the ground. For a moment, she lay there, groaning, trying to focus. She blinked through the pain and realized she’d lost her grip upon the Sight. The real world had returned, the cool autumn evening still warmer than the nether cold she’d left behind. The buildings had shifted back into sensible shapes, and the light had a full spectrum once more.
When she looked up, Hera towered above her, face a mask of utter disdain. “What kind of deranged freak goes around killing dogs?” The Titan woman stood, hands on her hips, looking for all the World like a marble statue.
Pyrrha rubbed her head as she rose. “You murdered my dog.” Bitch.
Hera’s scorn slipped into actual loathing, and she took a threatening step toward Pyrrha, forcing her to fall back. “That animal assaulted my sister and I defended her. Only a warped soul would compare that to grabbing someone’s house pet that hadn’t hurt anyone.”
Technically, it was a stray. Still, Pyrrha fell silent in acknowledgment of the point. Yes, she had indeed murdered a hapless animal who had done her no wrong. It had seemed, at the time, the only means of pursuing the truth of what haunted her and of finding Mama’s soul.
Apparently deciding her not worth the trouble, Hera offered up a final sneer before turning to leave Pyrrha alone. For a time after the Titan left, Pyrrha stared after her, willing Hera to burst into flame. Her and Tethys’s whole royal brood, and their sparkling halls and entitled attitudes. Let the Underworld rise up and claim them all.
The woman would have shit herself if she’d seen half the things Pyrrha had. Not one of them probably began to imagine the truth: that the dead were here, tormented, wandering around outside their precious city. How many of the fallen had died just to protect the royal brats?
Muttering under her breath, Pyrrha made her way down by the water, stopping to claim an oil lamp. Even with the moon almost full this night, wandering without light wasn’t a mistake she would repeat. Out there, in the waters beyond the pier, something splashed around.
Telkhines? They mostly preferred the night, true, which made it harder to spot them when they came to trade or report to Tethys. For a time, she stood and squinted out into the waves, hoping to catch a glimpse of a mermaid or merman. Mostly, when they came, a messenger would fetch the Titan Queen, and she’d come down here and speak to them alone. Oh, to have had the chance to stand in on one such meeting, even if she was forbidden to ask questions.
What was their kingdom of Pontus like? Did they truly reach Realms beyond this one? Did they speak to fish? Did fish speak back? Pyrrha allowed herself a smile as her mind flitted over
