“Objection.” Mithra pulled something off the seat next to him and plunked it down on the table.
A bottle of water. What most people would think was an empty bottle of water.
It was not empty.
It was full, bursting, roaring. With song. With power.
My heartbeat thrumped up and up, faster, harder. The god powers sang to me, called to me, recognizing that I was their guardian, I was their path and bridge back to Ordinary, back to the deities to whom they belonged.
Mithra tapped his fingers on the table, a blunt counter-beat to my pulse.
“This can not happen, Delaney Reed. God powers. Bottled. Stolen. By a human.”
“She’s more than a human. You know that. You sent her to steal them.”
He lifted two fingers, halting the tapping long enough to brush away my words. “She is still human. And these are still god powers. In a bottle.”
Ryder exhaled a little shakily next to me. I hadn’t forgotten he was there, but hadn’t been paying him much attention either.
I could feel the nervousness rolling off him now.
Yeah, that was a lot of power sitting on the table in front of us, barely contained behind that thin plastic coating.
I wasn’t even sure how Piper had managed to get the powers to fill the bottle, nor how they still remained there. But from the steady intensity Mithra was aiming my way, I decided he was probably behind it, behind all of it—Piper going after the power, Piper conveniently possessing a water bottle that could actually contain the powers, Piper giving him the powers in trade for that long-ago debt that he had tricked her mother into.
Mithra was a little bit of a dick.
“You have no right to hold those powers.”
“Contracts have been broken. I am the judge here, not you. Bow to me, Delaney. Become my warden. You have twenty-four hours to tell me yes.”
“Or suffer what consequences?”
“I will keep these powers for my own.”
Ryder stiffened next to me, and he opened his mouth. I reached over and put my palm on his thigh to keep him quiet and let him know I could handle this. The sweat on my palm probably didn’t help my case much.
“You don’t have the power or right to claim those powers. They belong to the gods in Ordinary. All they have to do is step out of town, and the powers would be theirs again. If you’re trying to threaten me, you’re using the wrong leverage.”
“I’m not threatening. I am upholding the justice for these powers, for these gods, for that town you were sworn to guard. I am giving you exactly twenty-four hours to accept the position of the warden.”
There was anor elseattached to that.
“Or?” I prompted.
“Or I will offer the position to someone else.”
My stomach dropped, but anger quickly overran the sickness I felt. “You can’t do that.”
“I can.” He leaned forward and the smile was smug. “And I will. When you refuse me. Because I know the truth of you, Delaney. You are too much like your father. You will never compromise your own sense of morals to follow me, not even if it would be the right thing to do.”
“Ordinary doesn’t need a warden. We’ve been doing just fine for years without a warden. It’s not even written into the rules of Ordinary that a warden is allowed.”
“A warden is not only allowed, it is necessary.”
“Says you.” I realized I was squeezing Ryder’s thigh a little too hard, so I tried to relax my fingers and calm down before I relieved a little tension by punching Mithra in his face.
“Look. I understand there was a mistake made by allowing Crow to put away his power before he had spent a year outside of Ordinary. I understand that is a breach in the laws. There were circumstances that lead us to believe his power had the flexibility to allow him to stay.
