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I smiled before I could stop myself because I knew he was right. They couldn’t turn off their instinct to keep me safe any more than I could do the same for them. I was just going to have to show them that I didn’t need to be wrapped in cotton wool because I didn’t know how I was going to get into that pit otherwise.
And it had to be me.
“There has to be a middle ground,” Dare said quietly, stepping forward. He reached for me, more hesitantly than usual, and I practically threw myself into his arms, wrapping myself around him and hugging him tight. As much as I didn’t want to be treated like spun glass, I couldn’t stand the idea of upsetting Dare either. Not when everything was already so uncertain and the others weren’t here. What if he disappeared too? I didn’t want to waste any of the moments we had being upset with each other. “We’ll leave Wild and Riot a note or something. A code only they understand.”
“I don’t want to stray too far from the pit,” I reiterated, voice muffled against his chest. “As much as you don’twantto accept it—and trust me, I understand why—that is where I’m going. It’s what all this suffering and death and destruction isfor, Dare.”
He made a strangled sound, holding me a little tighter as Vasileios appeared in the doorway, clearing his throat awkwardly.
“We’re going to take turns on watch duty. We already have a schedule from when we were on the road traveling here.”
“Well, let’s hope the pit monster gives us plenty of warning before flying here faster than we can blink,” Dare sighed.
Vasileios hummed in agreement but politely said nothing if he was questioning my sanity.
I swallowed thickly. “Let’s begin the burial rites. Worrying about the monster can wait until we’ve said our goodbyes.”
There was a pyre at the bottom of the garden.
Or the remnants of one at least.
While agathos—and daimons, apparently—were traditionally cremated with a gold coin, it was mostly done at cremation facilities these days, not on the ritual pyre. Was the pyre always here? Or had Eirene built this as her bonded had started dying one by one?
Estrella and Rue, one of the other daimons, helped me lay out Eirene’s body in the house on a makeshift stretcher and I went through the motions of lighting the cast-iron fire in the living room with shaky hands and setting a pot of water to heat. Once it was warm, I washed her face, gently pushing her jaw shut, her eyes already closed as the rites dictated. I’d learned them—years ago in my agathos classes—but I’d never carried them out myself. It wasn’t my place really. Eirene’s daughters or sisters should be doing this part, but they weren’t here, and I wasn’t going to disrespect Eirene by not following tradition.
Instead, I pretended in my head that shewasfamily. A beloved grandmother being laid to rest after living a long and happy life, surrounded by loved ones. That was the ending Eirene’s lifewouldhave had if the world hadn’t fallen apart, if the goddesses hadn’t gone to war. Her children were scattered because of all of this, denied their final moments with their mother. There was such an abundance of unfairness that I’d borne witness to recently that I sometimes worried I’d become desensitized to it, but I was feeling that injustice acutely now.
Estrella appeared with a small glass bottle—the oil used for anointment—and a gold coin.
“It was all already sitting there on the shelf,” she rasped, setting them down next to me.
I nodded, drying my trembling hands. “She would have used them recently. And perhaps she… knew.”
“Thank you for your kindness,” I whispered to Eirene, unstopping the bottle of olive oil and brushing the golden liquid over her brow, down the bridge of her nose, and over her cheekbones with my thumb. “For taking us in when we had nowhere to go, and showing us that agathos of any generation can embrace change if they choose to. You gave me hope—more than I even realized at the time—and I wish I’d told you that.”
I pushed the coin, Charon’s payment, between her lips before slipping into the bathroom for a moment to wash my hands and collect myself. There were logistics to consider, things I hadn’t even had a chance to think of yet. Eirene had children, all scattered around different sacred agathos sites. How were we going to tell them? A note seemed so impersonal, but there was a good chance we’d have to leave before they returned home.
One thing at a time.
I returned to the living room and together, Estrella, Rue, and I shrouded Eirene’s body in the largest white sheet we could find, and Ovie and Dare quietly met us at the door to carry the stretcher down the length of the garden, Milos at my side each step of the way.
Night had fallen, and the moonlight shone down on us, stars glittering in the distance. I thought I’d hate the darkness after Nyx had veiled the world, but strangely, it was like seeing an old friend again. Comforting and familiar.
Vasileios handed me a heavy, wrought iron torch, already burning. My arm ached under the weight of it as I held it out in front of me, leading the way to the pyre. It was a silent procession except for the crunch of dead plant life beneath our feet. What had this garden been like before the darkness? I imagined lush green leaves and brightly colored flowers, fat bees buzzing around on a hot summer’s day, maybe a light breeze floating through the walled-in garden, rustling the plants.
That world was gone, and wehadto get it back. We couldn’t live in this desolate, lifeless place. I wasn’t liberating those gods unless theypromisedto fix what had been broken.
I stood aside with the others as Dare and Vasileios laid the stretcher on top of the pyre. Dare had already stacked branches beneath it in preparation, and the torch felt even heavier in my hand at the thought of lighting the tinder.
“It’s so unfair,” I whispered to Dare as he came to stand at my side. “Eirene deserves to be farewelled by loved ones, not strangers.”
“We may not be standing on a battlefield, but we are in the middle of war, Grace,” Dare murmured. “And we’re honoring the fallen. The others may not have known her, but she was still their ally. And she was our friend.”
“You’re right,” I whispered, my throat tight. “Perhaps she won’t be farewelled by loved ones, but she’ll be welcomed by them in the underworld. I think that’s better.”
And with that, I stepped forward and kneeled on the ground to set the branches alight, praying quietly under my breath that Eirene would have a peaceful journey to the underworld, that the gods in the land of the dead would be kind, that her bonded were waiting to welcome her with open arms. I promised to tell her children about how wonderful she’d been to us, and to assure them that their mother had been given full burial rites so she could pass to the underworld. One day, when peace reigned again, I’d visit them and make sure that their lives were good and happy like she would have wanted.
Milos let out a mournful howl, laying on her belly with her head resting on her front paws. I was going to take care of her too, somehow. Vasileios took the torch from me as I stood, pulling me into a rough hug before leading the others away to give me and Dare a moment.
