Here he was again without a choice, and Thanos’s heart twisted in defiance when he nodded.
“Then let it immediately be broadcast from every watchtower across the city!” the king bellowed. “And by the gods, let us hope it works.”
Thanos stood in shock. He didn’t think it would be announced so soon.
“Should we not ask her first?” Thanos said.
A few of the dignitaries chuckled.
“It is not a question, but a command, but if you want to let her know before she finds out some other way, you had better run,” the king said.
At once, the bells tolled through the city, signaling a royal announcement, the sound igniting Thanos to take action.
He turned on his heels and ran toward the bronze door at the end, and toward Ceres’s chamber, hoping he could tell her before it was too late.
But how could he ask her for marriage when he had just slaughtered her brother?
Would he be able to keep it secret?
CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE
Horrorstruck, Ceres stood by the window in her room overlooking Delos, the skyline filled with putrid black smoke rising from burning homes. Clamors filled with unspeakable pain reached all the way to her tower, and families with little ones rushed by in the street below, their faces obscured by panic.
For the past hour or so, she had done nothing but cry – cry for her people, cry for her friends, cry for her brothers, for they could be dead. And Rexus? It was more than she could bear to think about.
Unable to watch the dreadfulness unfold any longer, she walked over to the bed and sat, but just a moment later, she had to return to the window, thinking if she didn’t remain there, she was somehow betraying her people.
This? This was what Thanos was fighting for? She was still as furious with him as she had been when he left. He had somehow gotten to her, weaseled his way into her heart, made her care. She had hoped he was different from all the other greedy, power-hungry royals, but when it came down to it, he was the same, and chose to fight for the inequality and injustice that cursed this land.
There was a knock at the door, and Anka opened it.
To Ceres’s surprise, and great irritation, in walked Thanos.
“May I have a word in private?” he asked.
“No you may not,” Ceres said, glancing back out the window again.
“Please. It is of utmost importance,” he said.
After a few moments of hesitation, Ceres nodded to Anka, and the girl left, closing the door behind her.
Ceres stood immovable beside the window, her gaze still on the street below.
“Ceres,” Thanos said.
Unwilling to face him, she kept looking out the window.
“What do you want?” she asked.
“I realize you are upset with me for leaving, and I remember you said you never wanted to talk to me again. But can we for just a few minutes set our differences aside?” he said.
She glanced at him, considering his comment.
“I have something important to discuss with you,” he said. “What I have to say may save many lives.”
“All right,” she said.
She walked over to the chair in front of the fireplace and sat down, and he followed after, taking a seat straight across from her.
She could see he was anxious, his eyes shifting nervously about as if he were carefully considering what to say, but it did nothing to make her less angry with him; she simply couldn’t forget that when he had left to fight, it had crushed her and destroyed all trust they had built.
“Well?” she said after he hadn’t said anything for a while.
“I need you to listen with an open mind,” he said. “And heart.”
She stared back.
“I just came from a meeting with the king and queen, and they believe there is a way to end all the fighting.”
Now her interest was piqued, although her guard was still very much up.
“They suggested a marriage between a commoner and a royal,” he said.
Ceres nodded.
“I can see where that might work,” she said.
Thanos’s shoulders relaxed a little and his face lit up.
“You do?”
“If there is a union between the common people and a royal, perhaps the people will think there will be a change.”
Ceres looked him in the eyes, and even though she was as livid with him as she had ever been with anyone, and wanted to wring his neck in a fist fight, she also wanted to be closer to him, for him to close the distance between them and kiss her on the neck the way he had before.
She looked away. Those thoughts, those feelings – she would quash them with every fiber of her being until she could no longer remember them ever being there.
“Did they have anyone in mind?” she asked, thinking perhaps Anka since she had just come from the rebellion.
“Yes,” he said.
He stood up and strode two steps, vanquishing the distance between them. He knelt down before her, and it puzzled her why he would do such a silly thing.
“I have something for you,” he said.
From a small leather pouch hanging around his waist he pulled out a golden bracelet with a charm in the shape of a swan. Handing it to her, he smiled softly.
“It was my mother’s,” he said.
Even with how mad she was, she didn’t want to offend him and refuse the gift he had just offered her – it was probably the most valuable thing he owned. But did he expect her to forgive him because he gave her a present? How shallow did he think she was? How easily did he think she would forsake her principles? She would not be bought, not ever.
She opened her mouth to speak, but he spoke first.
“Ceres, it is you and I they suggested.”
She stared back, floored.
“I would be honored to have your hand in marriage,” he added.
She couldn’t speak, for suddenly there was a lump in her throat. She would not cry, no, she would not. He might think her tears happy, when all they were, were tears of sadness and resentment, of lost trust and lost friendship. There was no way she could say yes, she knew.
She thought of Rexus, fighting for freedom, risking his life day in and day out in hopes of offering liberty to all. Thanos, he fought against all that, and she could not love someone or marry someone like him. And here Thanos was proposing to her because the king thought it would lull the citizens into believing it might lead to equality. She knew it would not.
“It is not under ideal circumstances, but you have to know, before they suggested it, I had already fallen for you,” he said. “I meant what I said on the roof. More than anything, I want you.”
She looked away, still hurt and unable to open her heart to forgive.
“I went out to fight, Ceres, but when I did, I couldn’t get myself to kill the revolutionaries.”
She glanced at him, the news melting some of her anger away.
“I saw Rexus. I pulled him into the alleyway with me and knocked him on the head so he wouldn’t be killed by the Empire soldiers,” Thanos said.
“Truly?” she asked.
He nodded.
“But there’s more.”
Ceres nodded, now willing to listen, now feeling ashamed she had been so hard on him.
“I saw your brother Nesos.”
She reached for his hand and he took it.
“You did?” she asked, hope filling her chest.
“We fought on the roof top. I didn’t know it was him. I didn’t…”
“What happened?” she asked.
Thanos paused, and looked up at her with tears in his eyes, and she knew. She knew that look, the look of holding dreadful information from a loved one. The look of pain before it had been shared.
“He fell onto his sword and it stabbed him in the abdomen. I told him I didn’t want to hurt him, but he – ”
She shot to her feet so fast, the chair behind her screeched across the floor. There was simply nowhere to put the pain that was overpowering her, nowhere to contain something so mighty, nowhere to hide it or store it. It was everywhere all at once.