Cruel Beauty

I sat down beside him. “You remember the world from before,” I said.

He didn’t move. “That’s a safe bet, since I’m the demon who tore you from it.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“You didn’t ask a question.”

“So you don’t remember.”

“. . . I remember the night,” he said softly. “Do your lore books mention stars?”

I’ve held the nearest thing we have left between my hands, I thought, but there was no chance I would ever tell him how much I knew about Shade. Instead I laced my fingers together and said calmly, “‘The candles of the night.’ Yes.”

It was a line from one of Hesiod’s minor lyrics; I had pored over the page a hundred times, mouthing the words and trying to imagine flames in the night sky.

He snorted. “Your lore is stupider than I thought. They weren’t like candles. They were . . . Have you seen lamplight shine through dusty air, setting the dust motes on fire?” He waved a hand. “Imagine that, spread across the night sky—but ten thousand motes and ten thousand times brighter, glittering like the eyes of all the gods.”

His hand dropped to the grass. I realized I had stopped breathing as his words danced through my head, sparking visions.

“If you loved the true sky so much,” I said, “why did you seal yourself in here with us?”

“No doubt malice aforethought.”

“You don’t remember,” I said slowly. “You’ve lost your memories.”

“Well, I don’t remember springing from the womb of Tartarus.”

“Do you remember your name?”

His mouth thi

“I suppose it makes sense that you want your wives to guess,” I went on. “What happens to you if someone gets it right?”

“Then I don’t have masters anymore.” He rolled onto his side and smiled at me. “Want to save me, lovely princess?”

“I’m not a princess.”

“Then I shall continue to languish.” He lay back, waving a hand lethargically. “Alas.”

“You don’t sound too worried.”

“If there’s one thing I’ve learnt as the Lord of Bargains, it’s that knowing the truth is not always a kindness.”

“That’s a convenient philosophy for a demon that lives by lies.”

He snorted. “I tell almost nothing but the truth. And how many truths have ever comforted you?”

I remembered Father telling me, “Our house owes a debt and you will pay it back.” I remembered Aunt Telomache saying, “Your duty is to redeem your mother’s death.” I’d heard those truths, in deeds if not in words, every day of my life.

I remembered my last words to Astraia, and the look on her face when she learnt the truth about me and the Rhyme.

“None,” I said. “But at least I’ve never learnt that I lived a lie.”

He sat up. “Let me tell you a story about what happens when mortals learn the truth. Once upon a time, Zeus killed his father, Kronos—but since he was a god, nobody seems to blame him for it.”

“I have read the Theogony,” I said with dignity. “I know how the gods came to be.”

“Then you know that the demon Typhon was one of the monsters that fought to avenge Kronos.”

I shivered, my throat closing up. Last night, he had called the shadow-demons Children of Typhon. They were still waiting behind that door, behind the ragged sky, ready to drag me back—one is one and all alone—

Ignifex was watching me as closely as a cat stalking a mouse. “Yes,” he said quietly, reading the fear off my face. “Typhon started a family.”

I forced myself to meet his gaze. “I already knew that,” I gritted out. “The Theogony calls him ‘Father of Monsters.’ And Zeus threw all the monsters into Tartarus. How did these ones get into your house?”

“Well, that’s a fu

A gust of wind set the grass shivering around us. I blinked, then crossed my arms. The voice of my enemy should not be comforting.

—the shadow bubbled out of my skin and it looked up at me as it dripped down my arms—

My nails dug into my arms. “Then how did they get out?” I demanded.

“Well, you see, Prometheus loved the race of men and gave them fire against the will of Zeus.”

“And Zeus chained him to the rock and set an eagle to eat his liver every day.” I knew the story well; there had been a book with a garish picture that made Astraia squeal in horror.

“What has that got to do with the Children of Typhon?” I managed to get the name out without a quaver.

“Oh, have the Resurgandi forgotten that bit? Zeus didn’t punish him for the fire. He didn’t dare risk another war between the gods. Instead he set a trap. There were not yet any mortal women, and Zeus refused to make any, saying that future generations might rebel against the gods. He knew that Prometheus, who loved mankind more than reason, could not stand by while the race died out. And indeed, Prometheus offered to make a bet. Zeus would create a mortal woman and let her bear children, but he would also set her a test of obedience. If she failed, mankind would be cursed with misfortune and Prometheus would be chained for the eagle, but if she passed, mankind would live in blessedness forever.”

“That was a stupid bet,” I muttered.

Ignifex plucked a daisy and twirled it between his fingers. “I suppose gods as well as men become stupid when they have a chance to get everything they want.” He crushed the flower, his face for a moment ferocious.

Then he smiled easily at me. “So Zeus created Pandora, the first mortal woman, and for a dowry he gave her the jar of shadows, with the strict injunction that she must never open it. She married a mortal man and bore him children and you would think they all lived happily ever after. But Zeus had made Pandora’s face as lovely as the dawn and her soul as wandering as the wind, so it was not long before Prometheus fell in love with her and she with him. Pandora begged him to take her away from her husband, but he refused: for she would die soon in any case, and he thought it better to let her live out her days with another mortal.”

I knew what was coming and I clenched my hands, not wanting to hear the words, not wanting to show my fear.

“Pandora went lamenting her fate in the silent woods, and then out of the woods came a whisper. Perhaps it was my masters, perhaps something else equally mischievous. It said: ‘Open your jar. If you have the courage to face every evil thing that emerges, at the bottom of it you will find this hope: that you will never die, but become like Prometheus for all eternity.’ So she opened the jar—”

“Because you should always trust bodiless voices in the woods,” I muttered, nails biting into my palms as I tried not to imagine the pop of the stopper, the first whisper of song echoing from the jar’s mouth.

“—and all the Children of Typhon rushed out and began to ravage the world, inflicting sickness and death and madness on the race of men.”

I remembered the shadows bubbling out of my skin, the people screaming in Father’s study, and if that were done to the whole world at once—

“But because they had looked into Pandora’s eyes as they emerged, they were bound to her. They could be locked up again only if Pandora were cast into the jar, and as she begged for mercy, this is what Prometheus did. Then, having lost the bet, he turned himself over to Zeus, who chained him for the eagle.

“So Zeus got what he wanted: Prometheus was locked away, while the damage done by the Children of Typhon guaranteed that mankind could never flourish enough to threaten the gods. Prometheus got what he wanted: Pandora’s daughters remained behind and the race of men continued. And Pandora got what she wanted: she never died, but became exactly like Prometheus, for they were both trapped in eternal torment.”