“I hate the Agon,” Lore began.
“No,” Athena interrupted. “I think not. You hate what it cost you, but this world bore you. You belong to it. That is your birthright. You were always meant for glory, but it was taken from you, and now you will never feel satisfied—never whole—until you possess what you deserve.”
In her mind, Lore heard her younger self say the words again. My name will be legend.
“It’s not about deserving,” Lore said, forcing herself to get the words out. “I don’t want to become the kind of monster they are.”
“You are no monster. You are a warrior,” Athena said. “And were you not meant for some greater role, you would have perished with your family.”
“Don’t say that,” Lore whispered. Please don’t say that.
Longing tore at her. The thought that everything that had happened hadn’t been her fault, that it hadn’t been for nothing—her whole soul ached for it to be true.
“There are far worse things to become than a monster,” Athena said.
“Is that what you told yourself when you punished Arachne for her hubris?” Lore asked. “When you turned on Medusa?”
The goddess seemed confounded by the question. “What is it you accuse me of with Medusa?”
“Poseidon raped her in your temple, and instead of stopping him, instead of punishing him, you—” Lore choked on the word. “You made being the victim the worse crime. You made her a monster, and then you sent someone to kill her.”
“Is that what you believe?” Athena asked.
“Your father, your brothers . . . they took so many women against their will. How could you not understand Medusa’s experience, when Hephaestus had tried to force himself on you?” Lore took a deep breath, steadying herself. “They took whatever they wanted. Why would the men of the Agon treat their women and girls any differently? They make us believe our lives are our own, even as they slip the collars around our necks. Even G— Even Hermes. At any point, they can pull the leash.”
“Is that why you abandoned your path as a warrior?” Athena asked. “You did not wish to be controlled? I would have thought the deaths of your family were at the root of the decision, but you continued your training, did you not? Yet something drove you from the hunt . . . from this world.”
For years, Lore had steadfastly refused to recall what had happened that night. She’d hoped that if she buried it deep enough in her heart, it wouldn’t make her feel half as sick or terrified of being made to answer for it.
But Lore found herself speaking now, the words unfurling with such force, she wasn’t sure she would be able to stop them if she tried.
“When Iro’s father ascended to become the new Aphrodite, he had no son,” Lore began, “and no immediate male relatives. A second cousin became the interim archon of the Odysseides. He never came to the estate for the first two years I lived with them. During that time, I focused on my training with Iro. I told myself that even if I had nothing else, there was the Agon. I could still bring honor to my family.”
Athena watched her, waiting.
“And then the new archon of the Odysseides came. He stayed. He seemed to be everywhere at once, his eyes always trailing after us. Watching us from the window as we drilled and sparred, across the table at meals, as we swam in the lake . . .” Lore said, her hands curling at the memory. “He would find any excuse to touch me—to correct my stance when I didn’t need it, to stroke my arm or leg as he passed. My instructor told me to never speak of it to anyone, or else the archon would find out how ungrateful I was for his favor and attention. I would be thrown out into the street without so much as a knife to defend myself. No money, no future.”
Lore’s hands tightened into fists.
“One night, after dinner, he told me to go to his office and wait for him there,” she continued. “The others at the table must have known what would happen, but they did nothing. The servants looked away. Iro was so excited. She thought he was going to offer me a place as a léaina.”
She needed to draw a deeper breath, to collect the right words. Bile rose in her throat.
“His office was dark except for the fire in the hearth. He locked the door. He told me that I wouldn’t be continuing my training. That I would serve only him. His needs.”
Athena hissed.
“I knew he was right. I had no one else. I had no family. It was the moment I realized my future was entirely in his hands—it just—”
Lore drew in another breath. “He put his hands on me. . . . He forced his mouth on mine and pinned me to the desk. He was bigger. Heavier. And I thought, I am not special, or chosen. That was the shield I’d used against the truth for years—the certainty that I was meant for something more. But that moment, with him over me, that’s when I understood what that world was. There would always be a man deciding my fate, whether it was my father, an archon, or a husband.”
The goddess’s eyes glowed, the sparks flaring into riotous spirals. It made Lore think of the fire in the office again, how much brighter it had seemed as her terror set in.
“I never had a choice,” Lore said.
At least, not one whose consequences she understood before giving her answer.
“He took away the last of the illusions.”
The archon’s breath had hitched with excitement as he’d watched her realize as much.
“Gods were supposed to be my enemy. The other bloodlines. Not the archon of my mother’s house—the one that had taken me in. Sheltered me.”
The knob to the desk drawer had dug into her hip. Her body moved to protect itself, when her mind couldn’t. Her fingers closed around the cold metal. She pulled, slipped her hand inside. He pressed himself to her, and it was like nothing she had known in a fight.
“I found the letter opener. I cut myself pulling it out from the drawer. He gripped my chin and forced my head back, so I would have to look at him.”
He pulled the collar of her shirt until it tore. The fabric gave easily, but not as easy as the skin across his throat.
“I realized I had always had choices, even if I hadn’t seen them,” Lore said. “And I made one. I chose not to belong to him. I chose to kill him, so he couldn’t hurt me or anyone else.”
The memory of his blood spilling, staining his white skin and her dress, the weight of him slumping against her as he struggled to kill her in retaliation, even in the throes of his own death, came back in a cold rush. She touched the long scar on her face, the last cut he’d made as she’d slipped out from under him. Sweat broke out across her body, and she was shaking, scarcely able to draw a breath.
But what Lore remembered most from that night was her rage. The way it burned through her fear and shock and devastation and gave her what she needed to survive.
Lore had done what she’d been trained to do, knifing his body until it was still and there was no air moving in his lungs. It had been rage that carried her on bare feet across the fields and unpaved roads. It had been rage that kept her alive and moving. Her rage had fed her when she went hungry.
And then Lore had done exactly what Athena accused her of. She had suppressed it, making it smaller, making it feel irrelevant and undeserved. And then Hermes had found her, when she was almost empty.