Page 105 of A Vow of Embers

I was sure she would give anything to be queen of Ilion and would have the full support of her father. Perhaps Pelias could be persuaded to Alexandros’s side if the prince promised to marry Chryseis. I was sure Pelias would love to have both his children ruling two different nations.

Or, if he were the kind of man who wanted power for himself, he would most likely side with Erisa and Kyros so that he could rule through them.

Quynh returned then, looking sheepish. “There’s no other glassware available, so I brought you this. It’s what the servants use.”

It was a white clay cup and I took it from her. “This will be fine. Thank you.” I wished that I could silently communicate with her but I knew that it wasn’t wise. So instead I looked down at the cup in my hand.

And noticed that the water was tinged slightly green. Odd.

My first thought was that it might have been poisoned, but given that Quynh had fetched it herself from Io’s room, I knew that was impossible. Zalira hadn’t left that room since the moment she’d seen Stephanos, so there was no way someone could have snuck in there and done it.

I took a quick drink, and it tasted exactly the same as it had when I drank it in the temple. “Does this look green to you?” I asked Alexandros, wondering if my eyes were deceiving me.

“No. We are sitting over here.” Then he took me by the wrist and I made certain to hang on to my cup this time. I did my best to ignore the way my skin burned everywhere that his hand touched me. He led me to a small pavilion, where a blanket had been laid out. There was a tented roof above us to block out the sun but all the sides were open.

We could both see and be seen.

He released me and we sat down. Now that he was no longer touching me, it allowed my brain to start working again and my thoughts turned back to the water.

The water that Maia had insisted we drink.

Water that tasted slightly metallic and was tinted green.

Like the eye of the goddess.

My heart started to pound loudly as I thought about what this might mean. All the women in the temple were extraordinarily strong, including me. And that strength wasn’t limited to the temple grounds.

But in the two other times I’d had that strength, at the source of the spring and here at the palace, I had been drinking this water the same day.

What if the water was making us strong?

What if the eye of the goddess was somewhere in the fountain? It would be the height of irony that I had pulled water from that fountain every morning to clean the temple without knowing that I had been that close to the eye the entire time.

I had to tell my adelphia. Well, I would tell them part of it. That I suspected the water gave us our strength. Then I would have to find a way to return to the temple and check it.

It had been hard enough to get past the guards when I lived there. I couldn’t imagine breaking in would be any easier.

“Why does she wrap her arms?” The prince lay on the ground, propped up on his right elbow, and his gaze was directed toward Suri.

Who continued to follow along behind Ahyana and Rokh to make sure that our sister was all right.

“Why do you think that’s any of your concern?” I asked. I was the only one who knew about Suri’s scars, and I wasn’t going to tell Alexandros about them.

“I was only curious,” he said.

“You can ask her if you’d like.”

He turned his face toward me. “Isn’t she the one that doesn’t talk?”

“Yes.”

Again, it looked like he was trying to fight off a smile. “Your attendants are armed.”

“Ilion is not a safe place for women,” I said pointedly. He raised his eyebrows slightly, and I realized that he was trying to make conversation with me and I was being difficult.

This was meant to be part of our ruse. We should look relaxed and as if we were enjoying each other’s company. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?”