their adventures in the oceans and with the other gods. All Kore ever did was tend to fields with her mother, and that wasn’t an interesting story to tell.
Now, Kore could tell them everything about the most revered place to their kind. And she did. Kore described every detail, including the way the marble floor gleamed in the sunlight and the fine fissures of dark grey she’d seen in it.
She described every god. Hermes and his winged shoes. Apollo and how handsome he’d been, even though he’d also been rude. Ares with his blood red helm, and Poseidon with his strange moving beard.
Maybe she embellished. The oceanids thought the gods were above reproach. They didn’t want to hear how her bottom had been grabbed. If Kore had been in their place, she wouldn’t have wanted to hear it either. It was more fun to listen to the good rather than the bad.
The only thing she didn’t tell them about was the handsome, shadowy gentleman who had helped her while she sat on the bench.
Somehow, their interaction felt private.
Kore would likely never see the god again. She probably wouldn’t go back to Olympus with her mother. Besides, her mother was right. All the Olympians were grabby, foul mouthed monsters. They expected too much from her. And Kore...
Well, she just didn’t fit in. What had she expected, really? She’d been raised by nymphs and naiads.
She should be happy among them.
But even as she giggled with them and let them brush her hair, she didn’t feel like she was one of them. She never had.
Kore was more than a nymph. She could make plants grow with a thought and wither fields with her mind. She could grant blessings to mortal men and women who prayed to her and her mother.
Although very few even knew Kore existed. That was the primary reason she could go with her mother to the festival. The mortals thought she was a handmaiden.
“Look up,” Cyane murmured, a stick of charcoal in her mouth warping the words. She placed her fingers delicately underneath Kore’s chin. “Open your eyes wide, please.”
Kore opened them as much as she could and stared over Cyane’s shoulder. “I’m just saying, Olympus was beautiful, but I don’t think I’ll go back.”
“Why not?” One of the oceanids asked. She was more like a naiad than the others. Her darker hair shone with green rather than the deep blue of her sisters. But she was pretty enough. One of the lesser gods, or maybe even a remaining Titan, would snatch her up as a wife.
“I’m not sure,” Kore replied, but it was a lie.
She still dreamt about Poseidon’s hands on her bottom. She could still feel the bruising squeeze of his fingers and his laughter as the others didn’t even try to stop him. If Artemis hadn’t been there, who knew what would have happened.
Poseidon might have dragged her away into some hidden alcove with his hand over her mouth. And all Demeter’s nightmares would have come to life.
Kore held herself very still as Cyane circled her eyes with the charcoal. She told herself she was calm, but really, she felt frozen like she had with Poseidon. “I don’t think it’s very safe, is all. Maybe Mother was right.”
The naiad snorted. “Your mother would lock you up like a bird if she could. She’s put you in a cage, Kore.”
She was in a cage. But maybe that was better when gods like that existed.
Footsteps echoed across the stones, and only one person would stomp toward a pool full of oceanids. Kore tensed and Cyane slipped with the charcoal. The rough stick poked Kore in the eye.
She flinched and Demeter seized her by the shoulders, hauling her out of the tide pool. “What are you doing?”
Kore pressed a hand to her injured eye. “The oceanids were helping me get ready for the harvest festival.”
She could almost feel her mother’s glare. It wasn’t aimed at her daughter. Instead, Demeter glared at the oceanids who she’d blame for this transgression. At least it was better than her mother’s thundering scream followed by a month locked up in yet another cage of her mother’s making.
“You,” Demeter growled. “You know Kore is supposed to be in her chambers. I sent you to prepare her, not to take her off on another dangerous adventure with you!”
Oh no. Her mother’s wrath slashed at poor Cyane, who would likely be broken for months now. “Mother,” Kore tried. “It wasn’t her fault, I asked to come here.”