At last he opens his puffy eyes. Every other part of him is dark, but his irises are a pale gray, the color of stone. “Who…?” He stops and licks his lips. Clearly it’s painful to talk, and I know what he’s asking anyway. But I can’t tell him. He’d never believe me.

“I’m a friend,” I say. “Who are you?”

He tries to sit up, and a rattle echoes from deep within his chest. I don’t know much about mortal health, but that sound can’t be good.

“Lay back down,” I say, pushing his shoulders gently. He’s in no condition to fight me, and thankfully he doesn’t try. “I have food and water if you want it.”

He licks his lips again, and I take that as a yes. I pour a trickle of water into his mouth, and though he coughs, he manages to swallow most of it.

“Where…?” His voice isn’t as rough now, but it’s still hard to make out what he’s saying.

“You’re on my island. You’re safe here, I promise.”

“With you.” It isn’t a question. Even though I’m a stranger to him, he looks at me not as a threat, but like I’m some sort of savior. Maybe to him I am. There’s a certain sort of tenderness in the way he watches me, as if he knows I’m the reason he’s still alive even though he’s barely conscious, and it warms me from the inside out. I squeeze his hand affectionately. He is lucky. If Ares had been the one to find him, he would have had him by the tip of a sword the moment he’d stumbled across his broken body.

“Do you have a name?” I say.

Silence. The young man watches me with those pale eyes of his, and I bite my lip. I’m used to everyone staring at me. I enjoy it. But something about the way he looks at me—it’s like he can see past the beauty, and it makes me squirm.

“Rest,” I say. It’s the most I can offer him. “I’ll be here when you wake up.”

His eyes flutter shut once more, and I’m almost relieved. I don’t know who he is or where he comes from, but those gray irises speak of things I can’t even imagine. There’s a reason he survived—a reason the Fates didn’t cut the thread of his life. Whatever it is, I vow to make sure he finds out.

* * *

For sixteen days, the stranger is silent.

I watch over him while Eros remains in the care of my most trusted nymph, and in my head I call him Cyrus. It doesn’t exactly do me much good to name him; chances are it isn’t his real name, after all, and I never call him that aloud. But in my mind, Cyrus is more of a person, and it makes me feel better about the risks I took to save him.

Daddy doesn’t show up. Not on the first day, not on the second, not half a lunar cycle later. I’m on guard at first, ready to make my case and stomp my foot again if I have to. But either Daddy wasn’t watching Apollo closely, or for some reason he’s decided not to chase after me. I hope it’s the first. The idea that Daddy doesn’t care enough to try hurts too much.

Cyrus heals slower than I thought he would, but soon enough he’s sitting up. He eats and drinks everything I offer him, but he never asks for more, and I constantly worry that he’s not getting enough. Food’s important to the healing process for mortals, I know that, but how much is appropriate gnaws at me. I give him an extra bowl of berries, and he eats that, too. But he still heals too slowly.

His silence unnerves me, and I catch him watching me far too often, but it’s the love that radiates from him that baffles me. I’ve always been able to sense love, but this—it isn’t the kind of love I’m used to. It isn’t made of heat and desire, like Ares’s. It’s tender. It’s gentle, as if he wants to take care of me, even though I’m the one taking care of him. And even though I’m with Ares, even though he could come home any day, I slowly start to give in. I can’t help it—it’s one of my gifts, the inability to receive love without returning it, but I think even if it wasn’t, I would grow to care for him deeply. He’s kind, kinder than Ares has ever been, and his presence calms me even when I’m certain Daddy’s going to walk through the entrance to my grotto at any moment.

It doesn’t matter, though. He’s mortal, and even if I let him stay with me until Ares returns, he might die long before then. It’s a temporary love at best, and in a way, that helps ease my guilt. And it makes it easier to accept the connection that grows between us, even though he never utters a word.

On the sixteenth day—I know this because every evening Eros brings me a pebble he’s found in the pool of clear water—Cyrus sits up and watches me with those eyes of his. They’re still uncanny, even though I’ve had time to get used to them.

“May I have some meat?” These are the first words he’s spoken since he asked where he was, and I’m relieved.

“Er, you mean, like…rabbit?” I say. I’ve never even thought to kill and cook a rabbit. My nymphs would be furious.

“Or fish,” he says. His voice is soft, and I have to strain to hear him.

“Fish might be possible.” And the nymphs would probably swallow that a little easier. I stand. “I’ll go ask my uncle.”

“Your uncle?”

I blush. Right. He has no idea who I am. “Er, yeah. I’ll be back.”

I hurry off. The beach isn’t far from the grotto, and Poseidon offers me a few fish for Cyrus. I don’t like asking for his help—he’s one more person who might tell Daddy where I am—but I don’t know the first thing about catching fish. And if meat will help Cyrus heal faster, then so be it. It’s not like I haven’t risked everything already.