“Memnon,” I say, alarmed as he lays me out against the cold marble. My diadem tumbles from my head, hitting the marble altar before clattering to the ground. Memnon pulls out of me entirely so he can, using his hands and magic, flip me onto my stomach, leaving my upper body draped across the cold altar while the bottom of my torso hangs off it. He leans over me. “Yes?” he whispers against my ear, nipping at it. I breathe in sharply. “We cannot do this—not on the altar.” “Why not?” he asks, grabbing my hips and lifting them. Even if these Roman gods are not our own… “This is a holy place.”
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