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"Then I shall watch as it&039;s ht red as he poured the flour out and showed hi under his breath, the vendor added ht There was aze for Merus once he had the sack resealed and shoved it toward the boy

"Merus?" Acheron said, keeping his gaze locked on the vendor who couldn&039;t see his face

The boy looked up at him "Yes, ain or should anyone here ever hurt you, I want you to go to the palace and ask for Princess Ryssa Tell her Acheron sent you and she&039;ll make sure that you&039;re treated fairly and that anyone who hurts you is punished for it"

His eyes lit up even as the vendor&039;s darkened "Thank you, entle hand on Acheron&039;s forearods bless you for your kindness, my lord Truly, you are an asset to this world Thank you"

Her words touched his heart and brought a lump to his throat If only they were true But they weren&039;t and the old wo the arods be with you," he breathed quietly before he started away fro up to him

"My lord?"

It was so strange to have someone address him like that "Yes?"

"I knoe&039;re beneath you, my lord, but my ya ya wanted me to ask you if you&039;d take bread with us so that she can thank you for your kindness I know she&039;s blind, but she&039;s a wonderful cook We bake bread for the baker who sells it to the king and his court"

Acheron looked back to where the old woh she couldn&039;t see any of the activity bustling around her Beneath himIf the child only knehat he really was, he&039;d be shunning him like everyone else

They both would

Still, Acheron hesitated He should go before they learned the truth of him, but he didn&039;t want to insult them and make them feel as low as people made him feel

So instead he nodded "I should like that very "

The boy srande of the market

"He&039;s with me, Ya Ya"

The kind lines of her face crinkled as she smiled and spoke in the opposite direction froht not be as fancy as you&039;re used to, but I promise you you&039;ve never tasted better"

"We&039;re over here, Ya Ya"

Her cheeks pinkened "Forgive me, my lord I fear I&039;m a little directionally inept"

"I don&039;t es fro "I&039;ll carry these if you wish to help your ya ya home" He was a, Merus took his grandh the crowd

"My name is Eleni, my lord"

"Please, just call me Acheron I live at the palace, but I&039;m no one of any iot very nice clothes and shoes, and he&039;s really, really tall"

She tsked at her grandson "It&039;s not nice to contradict people, Merus Remember what I&039;ve told you Looks can often deceive you A poor man can don the robes of a prince and a prince can be shoeless in the street We judge people by what their actions are, not by the clothes they wear" Her smile was one of complete serenity "And by Lord Acheron&039;s actions today, we know him to be noble and kind"

Acheron paused as her words touched hi other than a whore, yet here, with two people ere dressed in rags, he felt like a king It was such a foreign sensation that he actually lifted his chin a degree

Merus opened the door to a s a row of theh the short doorway as he followed the two of them inside The main room was sy to the place that let hiether

However, it made him appreciate how much space he needed in order to iven himself a concussion two seconds after he&039;d entered

"Are you all right, Lord Acheron?" Merus asked

Acheron nodded withouthis hand away from his forehead that throbbed from its collision with the wood

"What happened?" Eleni asked in a panicked tone

"As I said, Lord Acheron is extre"

Eleni&039;s eyes widened She approached hi in front of her

Acheron took her hand in his and put it on his shoulder so that she could tell just how tall he was

"Oh, ods"

Yet another thing that made him a freak to normal people-it&039;d also made Estes and Catera a lot ofof power they had over sorace that was unfathomable to him, Eleni crossed the floor as if she could see every item in it and pulled out a chair for hi our tiny hoh he was fearful of colliding with more objects, he rather liked her peaceful home

"Fetch us some milk, Merus"

The boy ran out the door

Acheron watched as she went to her stove and stoked the fire there effortlessly He was a was There were no missteps or burns

"My lord?" she asked as she pulled a knife fro question?"

"If you wish"

"Why are you so sad?"

He started to deny it, but why? She didn&039;t know him and he didn&039;t know her Honestly, he was stunned that she could pick up on his mood without any visual clues "How can you tell?"

"The sound of your voice when you speak I hear the weight of sadness in it and a strong lilt of Atlantean"

She was unerringly astute as she cut, then placed bread on a stone trencher to warut knotted at the thought of Artemis "A friend"

"Then I ith you," she said, her tone co "I&039;ve lost many friends over the years, and my children Loss is always hard But I have Merus and I take so rowth He&039;s such a fine boy You&039;ve no idea how much a son means to his parents I&039;m sure yours must smile every time they look upon you"

Unable to bear the wounds she opened, Acheron stood "I should probably be going"

She looked stricken "Did I say so?"

"No" He didn&039;t want her to feel bad when her intent had been to comfort him It wasn&039;t her fault that the only person who loved him was his sister and that his parents had both cursed him since the moment of his birth "I was headed toward the stadiuo before I miss anymore of it"

She took his hand in hers, then froze as her fingers touched his slave&039;s brand Her grip tightened "You&039;re a slave?"

He felt his face heat as humiliation washed over him He wanted to curse at her accidental discovery "I was I&039;m sorry I shouldn&039;t have come here"

But she didn&039;t release him She covered his hand with her other one and offered him a smile of friendship "Take your cloak off and sit, Acheron You&039;ve done nothing to apologize for I ad to help us It&039;s nothing for a nobleman to do so, yet they seldom bother to help those less fortunate For a freede and character What you did is all the more noble and kind, and I would be honored to have you sit at my table with us"

Acheron couldn&039;t breathe as ehten his throat He wasn&039;t used to anyone co, she patted his hand before she let hio "You know, my father used to tell me all the time when I was a child that e first meet someone we never recall later as said or what they wore What we rerandson feel irateful for that selfless act Thank you, child"

And the two of theht He&039;d re, breathless "I&039;ve plenty of milk, Ya Ya Is the bread ready?"

"Almost, dearest" She took the ht a cup for Acheron and set it before hiht many battles, my lord?"

He lowered his cowl to smile at the innocent question "No, Merus None, and please, just call ently "Acheron doesn&039;t like titles"

Merus got his own cup and then ran back to the table with it He cliht with a sword?"

"Not at all"

"Oh" he looked disappointed by that "So what do you do?"

"Merus," his granduests" She shook her head "Forgive hi"

"He doesn&039;t bother "

Merus squealed with laughter

Eleni brought the bread to the table and set it before Acheron along with a jar of honey and butter "You have a e"

Merus scratched his ear as if he was confused by his grand-mother&039;s words "But what if he&039;s not what he seems? You always tell me that people sometimes put on masks and we don&039;t knohat&039;s inside theht, scamp We can never really see into the hearts of others When I wasn&039;t e ht he wasto his own children My brothers hated hi poor?" Acheron asked

She shook her head "No My family actually had quite a bit of money because my father was a miser with every coin People hated him for that too, yet what they didn&039;t understand was that as a boy, he and his family been thrown out of their home for lack of coin His baby sister, the one he loved , became ill from homelessness She died of starvation in his arms and he swore then that no one he loved would ever die because of poverty again"

Acheron felt for the poorknown such poverty hi There was nothing worse than starving Nothing worse than living on the street with no protection from the elementsor other people

Merus cocked his head "But why did he charge your brothers if he had plenty of money?"

Her features softened as she cupped his chubby face "He was putting all that money aside for when my brothers were ready to wed"

"Why, Ya Ya?"

She still didn&039;t lose patience with him "Because you can&039;t marry until you can afford a bride price and you must have a home to take your wife to When my brothers found those wives, my father pulled out all the money they&039;d paid his so that each of my brothers had a sh In the end, he wasn&039;t the ht him to be What he did was for their benefit since it was oes to show that we never knohat&039;s in the heart of people e judge them Actions that sometimes seem mean aren&039;t Rather they are done by the ones we love in order to protect us without our knowing it"

Merus held the plate of bread out to Acheron "Ya Ya says that coets first choice"

Acheron smiled before he took a piece and buttered it "Thank you, Merus"

The boy served hirandmother The normality of it all slammed into Acheron Here he sat, with his head uncovered and neither of thelances that they were trying to conceal No nervous movements

He was just another person to theht," he said after he sed his bread "This is the best I&039;ve ever eaten"

Eleni lifted her chin in pride "Thank you I learned the art of it from my mother She was the most skilled baker in all of Greece"

Acheron s better than this"

"Her pastries," Merus said around a hed "I i over food"

Merus smacked his lips "Trust me, it&039;s worth the humiliation"

Eleni ruffled his hair "Eat up, child You need to grow strong and tall, like Acheron"

Acheron didn&039;t speak as he finished the bread He delayed as long as he could, but all too soon he was done and it was tiain," he said to them

Eleni stood up with him "Our pleasure, Acheron Feel free to return anytirinned at him "I&039;ll have a hankie ready"

"I&039; his cowl, Acheron made sure to cover hiods be with you"

If she only knew Acheron carefully ducked out of the door and made his way back toward the hill where the palace was set Strange, he&039;d set out to escape into the world of fantasy through the plot of a play and instead had his spirits lifted even higher by an unexpected encounter with real people Eleni and Merus had given hiiven him nor to hi time

At least until he returned ho of nobles and senate members ere accompanied by their families Not that it should be that much of a surprise, but no one had told him there was to be a party

Had he known, he&039;d have stayed locked in his rooone well Of course, in the past, he&039;d been the uests A chill swept over him as he remembered the times he&039;d been paraded around and pawed at before so his coer, he kept to the shadows as he made his way to the stairs With any luck no one would approach him

Yet as he drew even to the ballroom, his father&039;s voice stopped hi to celebrate withis so blessed"

Acheron crept closer to the doors to see his father on a dais Ryssa stood to his left with Apollo by her side The god&039;s arm rapped possessively around her shoulders Styxx was to his father&039;s right He held hands with a tall, beautiful dark-haired wohter, the hu his child and to yptian princess Nefertari May the gods bless them both and may our lands forever flourish"

A bitter jealousy tore through hi so deep in his heart that it was all he could do not to lower his cowl and call out to his father that he did indeed have another son But to what purpose?

His father would only deny him and then have hier overrode the jealousy as his father proudly kissed Ryssa and then Styxx

"Toshout rose up from everyone except Acheron who couldn&039;t breathe froony and rejection

I am the eldest

"You are a deformed whore and a slave" Estes&039;s voice echoed from his past "You don&039;t speak unless you&039;re addressed You are never to look anyone in the face You should be grateful I even tolerate you in et on your knees and please me"

Acheron wanted to die as sha about hi that warranted any kind of pride Hanging his head, he made his way up the stairs and to his bedroorateful there was nosave the scorn of decent people

"Acheron?"

He froze at the whisper behind him "What do you want, Arteainst the tears that he hid inside himself He wanted so desperately to have value to someone Anyone Not for what he earned for them, but because they cared for him

Artemis moved to stand just behind him So close he could feel her presence as if they were touching "I&039;ve missed you"

He wanted to rail at her To screa her not to ever hurt his of the gods He was only a little closer to one than the others

"A himself for the subservient question

"Yes" She pressed herself to his back and wrapped her ar his teeth, he forced himself not to stiffen or shove her away "Thank you"

Artemis wanted to weep at the joy she felt She had her Acheron backShe couldn&039;t believe how much she&039;d missed him How afraid she&039;d been of his rejection