His eyes opened. “Name one hero who was happy.”

I considered. Heracles went mad and killed his family; Theseus lost his bride and father; Jason’s children and new wife were murdered by his old; Bellerophon killed the Chimera but was crippled by the fall from Pegasus’ back.

“You can’t.” He was sitting up now, leaning forward.

“I can’t.”

“I know. They never let you be famous and happy.” He lifted an eyebrow. “I’ll tell you a secret.”

“Tell me.” I loved it when he was like this.

“I’m going to be the first.” He took my palm and held it to his. “Swear it.”

“Why me?”

“Because you’re the reason. Swear it.”

“I swear it,” I said, lost in the high color of his cheeks, the flame in his eyes.

“I swear it,” he echoed.

We sat like that a moment, hands touching. He grinned.

“I feel like I could eat the world raw.”

A trumpet blew, somewhere on the slopes beneath us. It was abrupt and ragged, as if sounded in warning. Before I could speak or move, he was on his feet, his dagger out, slapped up from the sheath on his thigh. It was only a hunting knife, but in his hands it would be enough. He stood poised, utterly still, listening with all of his half-god senses.

I had a knife, too. Quietly, I reached for it and stood. He had placed himself between me and the sound. I did not know if I should go to him, stand beside him with my own weapon lifted. In the end, I did not. It had been a soldier’s trumpet, and battle, as Chiron had so bluntly said, was his gift, not mine.

I could recognize him by touch alone, by smell; I would know him blind, by the way his breaths came and his feet struck the earth. I would know him in death, at the end of the world.

When he died, all things swift and beautiful and bright would be buried with him.