Cordelia chuckled in her throat, left the chair and came to him. She ran her hand through his tangled hair as he knelt. "And why were you so at odds with the world ... Hercules?" she murmured.
He saw the answer. "I was parted from you," he got out. Then suddenly, because he must do something in his shame, he grasped her about the knees and pulled her to him. His face he buried in soft darkness.
"Oh," she gasped. "Oh—not here—wait—" But her hands were pressing his head close. He forced her down to the floor. She laughed without sound and tried to roll from him. He used his strength to pull her back. The frail spidery silk ripped open in his fingers. "Beast!" she said, her lips stretched wide, her eyes closed.
Outside, the boy faltered for an instant, then recollected his orders and continued the song. It dealt with a legionary in far Asia remembering his mother.
Afterward Cordelia led Eodan to her sleeping chamber. A maid brought them wine and cakes. She drooped an eye at him, her mouth quivering faintly upward, and he recalled that once she had agreed to meet him after moonrise.
"Hercules," said Cordelia, not heeding the girl at all. She snuggled herself against Eodan's side, as they lay on the bed, and nuzzled his cheek. "You big crazy Hercules."
He did not feel the stallion's contentment she had given him before. Tonight she had only left him hollow, in some fashion he did not understand. He had never felt he was betraying anyone—until now. He held his wine cup in slack fingers and asked, "Mistress, why will you not try to speak my right name?"
"Because anyone might bear it," she said, "but there is only one son of Alcmene."
He could not speak what he really felt, not if he wished to live. But he could at least shake off all canine eagerness to please. He could say bluntly, "Mistress, you have been kind to me, but it was my habit once to give kindness. It hurts to receive it, and to make no gift in return."
He wanted to roar out: I am no pet animal, no toy of yours, I am a free man with my own name my father gave me. I am not ungrateful for ease, and chains removed, and your body. But between us is merely a shallowness. On your part, an amusing few weeks; on my part, a slave's scrabbling for what he can get, a slave's sly revenge on his master, and a slave's worry about what will become of him when you grow weary. I will be no more a slave, I will go hence to my wife.