I tried not to be sick. Was that her battle look?
I turned to Isadora, “Have you seen the outcome to this battle?”
A victorious smile played across her mouth. “There are too many variables to something like this,” she explained. “Too many possible outcomes. It’s impossible to predict exactly how this battle will play out.”
“What happens if Nix wins?” I asked bravely. I watched him from across the distance. He had been working his way toward me, killing everything that got in his way. He held a deadly trident in one hand and used his free hand to choke anything that dared to get close enough to taste his power.
“You will be his,” she said finally. “The whole world will be his.”
My mouth went dry. “I thought I would be yours?”
“In due time,” she said serenely. “We’ll let him break you in first. We want nothing to do with this rebellious mind.”
I ground my teeth together. In my spirit I knew I would never submit to him, but I believed them in this one thing.
I had no doubt Nix would drag it out of me… he would reach his bare fist into my soul and pull it out of me if he had to.
“What happens if Zeus wins?”
“You will still be ours,” Enid laughed. “Or haven’t you figured that out yet?”
Isadora smiled too. “Zeus will never be able to kill you, or haven’t you figured that out yet? And your musician is in love with you. It’s a pity he couldn’t keep his distance. Should we blame you for that?”
“Or your Siren charm?” Veda snickered behind her hand.
“The deal we made?” I ignored their extras and got straight to business. A plan was forming in my head, but I needed all of the information I could before I jumped in with both feet.
“It’s still in effect,” Isadora promised. “If you kill Nix, you are free to go.”
“But you won’t,” Veda added in her little girl voice. “You can’t.”
Enid leaned in and in a taunting whisper, added, “You don’t have it in you. You’re not a killer, Siren.”
“I’m not,” I agreed. “But he is.” I pointed at Ryder as the sword arched over his head in a wild swing before taking the head of an angry looking minotaur with horns the size of my thighs and muscles covering every inch of his hairy body. The creature had been twice the size of Ryder. He had been forced to take a running leap and launch his human body into the air before coming down with his beheading.
The Fates hissed with disgust at his display of power.
“He’s human,” Isadora sighed. “He might take a few Greeks with him, but he will never reach Nix.”
“Orpheus is too easy to kill,” Veda explained. “Someone will get to him. It’s only a matter of time.”
That was the key. Time.
The longer this dragged out, the more chances someone had to kill Ryder, the more Greeks died, the closer Nix got to his goal. I needed to end this as quickly as I could.
But looking at the carnage in front of me, I couldn’t figure out how to do that.
Greeks appeared from thin air. It was like Zeus had put up the Bat Signal and called everyone to him. Nix’s army seemed never-ending. They poured from around buildings and flooded the plaza.
Olympus’s streets became rivers of blood. Centaur fought centaur, cyclops battled gigantes, god killed god. There was no end to the mayhem.
Gold bracelets glinted off the flash of lightning and pulled my attention to the steps of the temple. Delphi’s dark head bobbed in and out of battling Greeks. Her blue eyes flashed my way before she spun around to cut off the head of a nymph that jumped from above to attack her.
The sword was unmistakable. Even from this distance.
I didn’t know how she’d gotten it or where she’d found it, but I would never forget the shape of that blade or the unique curve of the hilt. The god-killer was here.
New hope bloomed inside of me and for the first time all day I actually believed I could win this.
