Chapter 3

When my mother wheeled me out the door, Apollo's frown deepened. His eyes swept over me again. He took in my hair, the paint on my lips, and the way I sat slumped in the chair because my strength couldn't hold me upright anymore. I saw something flicker across his face.

It was probably disgust or pity, and I couldn't tell which was worse.

"What is wrong with you?" he said. "You were spoiled as a child, and you are still spoiled now. A minor divine backlash at the altar should have cleared up by now, yet you still make your mother push you around."

I smiled at him with the calm and practiced smile I had perfected over eight years of lying to everyone I loved.

"The temple healer said the backlash damaged my nerves," I said. "My legs simply will not obey me."

Chloe jumped in before Apollo could respond. She looped her arm through his and leaned into his shoulder to stake her claim.

"Don't mind him, Aria. He has been in the frozen north for too long, so he is cold to everyone except me."

My chest tightened. It was true that Apollo was cold to everyone now. In our youth, he used to carry me on his back along the sunlit riverbanks whenever my feet grew tired. He would whisper jokes in my ear during sacred assemblies just to make me laugh. That bright youth was completely gone now.

But once, with me, he had never been cold. Once, I was the only person who could bring out his warmth.

I pushed the feeling down and looked at Chloe. "Do you really want me to come with you to help pick the venue and the rings?"

She nodded eagerly. "Of course I do. As I said, I trust your taste."

Apollo said nothing and simply stared at me with a tight jaw.

"All right," I said. "I will come."

We made small talk for a few more minutes. Chloe asked me how I had been, which was the kind of polite question no one actually wanted an honest answer to. I gave her the usual lies about being fine and busy. Apollo did not speak again. He stood there with his arms crossed and looked at everything except me.

Then they left.

That night, I was lying in bed and staring at the painted ceiling when I felt it.

A whisper of golden divine power brushed against my consciousness.

It was light and tentative, like a soft knock on a door he was not sure would open.

I held my breath. My heart started slamming against my ribs so hard that I was sure my mother could hear it in the next room.

Eight years ago, after I pretended to betray him, I severed our sacred soul-thread. I did not want him to feel my emotions through the divine bond. I did not want him to sense my guilt, my grief, or my desperate love for him, so cutting him off completely was easier.

I thought I would never feel his mind-whisper again. I thought that ancient bond was sealed forever.

But now it was open just a crack.

He did not speak at first. The divine resonance just hung there, pulsing with a dark energy I could not name. I could feel everything churning behind it, including anger, disgust, and something else that he was trying very hard to bury. It felt almost like longing.

No, that could not be right. Why would he long for me when he had Chloe now, a sacred marriage ahead, and a brand new life?

I waited.

Finally, I sent a quiet thought back into the golden thread. "Apollo?"

A long pause followed, so long that I thought he had cut the connection.

Then his voice came through. It was low and cold, sounding like the northern wind sweeping across a frozen plain.

"Tomorrow. The venue. I will pick you up in the morning."

My throat tightened because I had missed the sound of his voice so much. Even now, cold and distant and bitter as it was, it wrapped around me like a long-lost memory that I had been searching for in the dark for eight years.

"All right," I said.

There was another pause, and I could feel him hesitating as if there was more he wanted to say.

Then a woman's soft voice drifted through from his end of the thread. "Apollo, come help me..."

It was Chloe.

I swallowed hard. "Goodnight, Apollo," I whispered.

He severed the golden link instantly.

I buried my face in my pillow and let the tears fall. I cried until my head ached, my eyes grew swollen, and the linen was soaked through.

I had prepared myself for this and knew he belonged to someone else now. But feeling it, hearing her voice in his private quarters, and knowing she was in his palace and in his life still tore me apart.