He undid her.
“Maybe,” he responded, pressing his forehead against her own. “I am expected to return home with men and ships, with promises of good fortune, with the kingdom of Sparta.” His thumb pressed against her jaw, following its curve down to her chin. “Not a stolen princess, and a borrowed boat.”
Even as she looked into his eyes now, blue as the oceans they sailed upon, she couldn’t regret her decision. “The gods could strike me down at this moment, Penelope,” he continued, his voice barely loud enough to be heard over the flapping of the sail. “I would die the happiest fool alive.”
“Not stolen,” she retorted, her own eyes sparkling with rebellion, “You don’t get to take the credit for my schemes, highness.” She smirked, swatting him playfully on the arm. “Now, teach me. We cannot possibly sail forever.”
Odysseus didn’t move, his gaze fixed on her. The intensity in his eyes sent a twist through Penelope’s stomach. He looked at her like she was something sacred. She couldn’t quite name the emotions etched into his features, but they felt heavy, unshakable.
Permanent.
He took a step backwards, leaning against the mast, his arm stretched behind his head as he watched the stars flicker against the ink-dark sky. The gentle creak of the ship and the rhythmic lapping of the sea against the hull filled the silence between them.
“You see those stars, just there?” He lifted a hand, pointing toward a tight cluster glinting in the heavens. “The Pleiades.”
Penelope followed his gaze, tracing the constellation with her eyes. “Atlas’s daughters,” she murmured. “The ones Orion chased.”
“Aye.” His voice was softer now, contemplative. “They ran, but the gods had their own designs for them. Now they’re bound to the sky, always together, always just out of reach.”
She turned to look at him, his face carved by moonlight, his expression unreadable. “And what does that say for us, king?”
He grinned, something boyish and wicked, as he tilted his head toward her. “I don’t have need of races across the sky, Penelope.” He dropped his voice lower, rougher. “I’ve already caught you.”
She huffed, shaking her head, but she could not suppress the warmth that bloomed in her chest, or the smile that threatened to break. “Let’s hope the gods don’t turn us to dust for it.”
“They can try,” Odysseus said, the twinkle in his eye matching the starlight above them. “But I think I would cross the Styx and back for you, Princess.”
29
PENELOPE WRUNG HER SKIRTS IN HER HANDS as she waited for her trunks to be unloaded from the boat. It had been decades since she had set foot on Spartan soil, and her anxiety was about to boil over.
It was odd to look upon the city that raised her. It did not feel like home. This palace felt like all the circumstances that she had grown out of, all the expectations that were removed from her shoulders the minute they stole that boat.
For a moment, she would have given anything to be back in the safety that Ithaca offered, back in her home.
“Do you want to know what was going through my mind as I listened to your suitors grumble and complain, right before I… stepped in?” His voice was steady, a wash of calm covering her as he stepped beside her. He gingerly placed his hand between her shoulder blades, steadying her.
It was moments like these where she wondered how she had survived as long as she did. She couldn’t walk into the home she was raised in. She was frozen in place, but with just a few words, the sound of his voice, and she remembered who she was.
She was better by his side.
When she didn’t respond, he continued, “They spoke of you like you were this goddess, this all-consuming woman whose coquettish nature and enticing interactions kept these aristocratic children champing at the bit.”
Her face flushed as she worried her bottom lip. As the suitors had gotten bolder, she had to as well.
“They spoke of you,” he repeated, “like you were theirs.” His voice was low, venomous, the memory curling like smoke around them both. “They sat there, Penelope, drunk on my wine, fat on my pigs, boasting about the softness of your voice, the sweetness of your smiles - braying like beasts over which of them you favored most.”
His fist clenched at his side, the rising sun lighting a sparkle in his eyes. She struggled to meet his gaze, to look anywhere but at her wringing hands.
“Antinous,” he spat the name like a curse, “laughed the loudest. He swore he had you figured out… that you liked the chase, that you wanted to be won. That every time you graced them with a glance, you were weighing them, savoring the power you held over them.”
He inhaled sharply, his breath a slow tempered thing. “Eurymachus agreed. Called you coy, said you ‘led them in circles like a siren on the rocks.’ That you knew exactly what you were doing.”
He let the silence stretch, long and taut. Then, with a wicked gleam in his eye, he laughed. “And gods help me, wife - sitting there, listening to those fools, I almost pitied them.”
Penelope stiffened, her breath catching in her throat. “Pity?” She asked, finally finding her voice amid his memories.
Odysseus leaned in, voice low, reverent, grin still stretching across his lips. “Because I knew. I knew the woman I married. The woman who wove lies into her loom and made them beg for every thread. The woman who wrapped them around her finger,who kept them grasping, reaching - never knowing they were walking straight into their deaths.”