The sea has no face.

Only motion. Only sound. Only the long, slow ache of wind pressing salt into cracked lips and calloused hands.

You’ve been out here a while.

The prow groans beneath your weight as the ship lists gently in the swells, tethered to nowhere, no land in sight. Just sky and water, each mirroring the other in endless, pitiless blue. Your cloak is thin. Your fingers are colder than you admit. But it’s quieter here—quieter than the shouting, the muttering, the way the men glance toward the captain’s tent like they’re trying to will him awake. Quieter than the hunger curling beneath your ribs.

You hear the footsteps before you see him.

A deliberate tread, familiar from a hundred nights beside campfires and cracked shields.

Eurylochus.

He doesn’t speak at first. Just stands behind you, breathing through his nose like he’s trying not to let you hear how winded he is.

You don’t turn. But you feel him watching you. And when he does speak, his voice is lower than usual. Quieter. Rough-edged, but not cruel.

“Have you been out here long?”

You nod. A beat passes.

“The storm is brewing west,” he says.

Another pause. He shifts beside you, metal clinking softly. When he sits, it’s with the slow grace of someone who hasn’t eaten properly in days. The same grace men use when they don’t want others to see how close they are to breaking.

You glance at him now.

His beard’s grown wild. The scar on his cheek looks older. His eyes are bloodshot from sun and salt and sleeplessness. But they’re sharp. Sharper than the men muttering behind the mast. Sharper than the ones circling the barrels, counting rations with shaking hands and sharper teeth.

“Odysseus still hasn’t woken,” he murmurs. “He breathes, though. Just barely.”

You don’t answer. There’s nothing to say.

The gods aren't talking. The sea isn’t softening. The food’s almost gone. The sun's getting cruel again. And the crew’s getting hungry in a way that’s starting to look like more than just hunger.

Eurylochus leans forward, bracing his arms on his knees. The wind pulls at the ends of his tunic. His voice drops again, barely louder than the sea foam curling against the hull.

“They’re looking at the cattle.” He doesn’t need to say which ones. You both know. The golden herd. The sacred beasts of Helios. Untouched, so far. But each day, the men look a little longer. Lick their lips a little more.

He doesn’t look at you when he speaks again.

“Do—do you think he’d blame us? If we did it?”

The question hangs there. Raw. Ugly. Real. It’s not a test. It’s not a trap.

It’s honest. And it hurts more than you expect it to. You remember hope. It’s quieter now.

Eurylochus rubs his hands together for warmth. "This hunger... it kills me."