Ghost Queen in the House of Love

26. Onia

When I ask the stratigos who the man who attacked me was, if there's any possible way to identify him, she shakes her head; his smoldering body is almost unrecognizable as someone who was once a man. From what I saw of his clothes, coarse and frayed at the edges, he wasn't a person of means. I remember when I met Ismene, and her desperation and grief poured off her. This man, even with the crime he tried to inflict on my body, had a similar pain.

I instruct the stratigos to bury him like any other citizen, and her face twists in confusion.

"My queen, refuse like this doesn't even deserve a proper grave. Allow us to toss him to the bottom of the nearest mountain chasm." She leans close, the world reeking of flowers and smoke. "And if you were to do so, it'd teach others who learn about this that they will not experience external shame

I consider her words seriously. it isn't as if I'm allowing him to be wreathed by burial-women, and after all, the man is dead; I killed him. In the end, he will shuffle in the Underworld, either among the asphodels or rivers of liquid iron and blood.

Raising my chin, I say to her, "If perhaps he had a loved one who died of the red scourge, it might've driven him to desperation or madness. We can't say. Bury him with respect. Make sure no one finds out." Even when I take care to consider her perspective, I must leave no doubt that she must listen to my choice.

Plainly, she says, "Yes, my queen, of course."

***

Kalypso, the sea-witch, the woman who I thought was Kora, has been restrained. The stratigos has chained her hands and feet to a chair at the end of the war room table.

The war room, despite the opulence of the rest of the palace, is remarkably spartan.

In front of the door is perhaps the most decorative part, aside from the emblems on the wall: a long table perpendicular to it with the world engraved on it as the Greeks first conceived it: a long tapestry of land in water, leading to a long abyss. On it, small statuettes fashioned into banners mark important landmarks. A hearth blazes behind it.

On the ivory walls are also banners of the gods: the blood-red of Ares; the sea-green and seashell-pink of Aphrodite; Athena's banner an electric blue like the Greek fire caches under the city. And of course, the peacock-blue and heavens-blue of Hera and Zeus.

Braziers cast an orange Tartarean glow amid the shadows. The flames cut angular, dark lines into the wall. I wonder how I must look in this stark contrast of light and darkness. And in the corner, a simple table in the corner where a reader can light candles and look over documents.

On the war map, my fingers glance over the hills and rivulets of the surrounding land, tracing the curves of the peninsula. Dwelling at the edges of the map are sea-dragons, seething, scaled whorls with steam hissing out of their nostrils.

I pass the hearth the flames bathe the room in heat, and the shadows around the fire writhe, boneless. Ionic pillars and an open balcony to my back; bound kalypso in front of me at the other end of the tactic table. I make my way to her and pause. We are not alone.

Glancing up, I pierce Circe and the stratigos with my gaze. "Leave us."

They both hesitate, Circe with a storm in her eyes, the stratigos with a protest on her lips. But in the end, they both comply. The stratigos starts to leave first, bound by duty, but she pauses and waits until Circe breaks my gaze and goes. Her crackling energy lingers in the room.

I confront Kalypso, the second sea-witch I've met, a deceptively small woman with pale skin and ice-blue eyes, her hair a deep brown with a single wave. She sits, deceptively docile. Silver runes which occasionally twitch blue line her arms.