So bonus points for Hera.
“The child?” Hera snorted and I pressed my lips together to keep from laughing. “Hardly. You know I just like to have my fun.” She swirled her finger along the ivory armrest and pouted her lips prettily. “I thought that was the lie Nixy was feeding everyone these days. We need the patrons again. We’ll die without virgin sacrifices. We cannot possibly survive another century unless we feed on the prayers of the weak minded and easily confused,” she said with all the gusto of a doomsday prophet. She dropped her chin and her sparkling onyx eyes became stone cold with their brutality. “Who wants the prayers of the stupid anyway? Not me. I prefer my patrons to be from more substantial stock. Heroes, dragon-slayers, ship captains that command fleets and fleets and fleets. Poseidon wants to trick them into loving him. But the fun is in the chase.”
Hermes let out a long suffering sigh. “You mean the fun is in the seduction, don’t you?”
“Careful, brother,” she sneered, acid dripping from each syllable. “Sister or not, I am still your queen. And until my husband returns home, you answer to me.”
Hermes did not look impressed. “The point is, Poseidon doesn’t care what you think or what you do. He plans to invade Olympus and make it his own. How are you going to stop him?”
Her mouth stretched into a wide smile, transforming her beauty yet again. I felt my head spin as I tried to keep up with her mood. She had yet to speak to me directly and I was okay with that. “He doesn’t have to invade Olympus. He’s always welcome. This is his home too.” She took a few steps forward until she stood in front of us. Her eyes flitted over Ryder, taking in his form with hungry eyes. I immediately felt like scratching them out. When her attention turned to me, I felt the same sentiment rolling off her in waves. She wanted to kill me. “You’re the reason for all of this… drama?”
I shrugged one shoulder, not sure how she wanted me to respond. “Like you said, Nix wants to force people to worship him.”
“And you think you have the ability to control an entire species?” Her black eyes flashed with lightning. The clear sky overhead turned sinister and dark. The sun disappeared, replaced with heavy gray clouds that blotted out all of the light.
“No,” I answered honestly. “I think it’s ridiculous to believe I have that much power. I’m just a girl.”
Hera’s face softened, but the sky remained as black as her mood. “Don’t play with me, Siren. We have no time for modesty.”
“I’m not being modest,” I snapped. “I’ve tried to control people before; the most success I’ve gotten was complete mayhem from maybe thirty men. I would have no idea how to go about controlling all of the male population around the world.”
She leaned forward, bringing our faces closer together. She smelled like exotic spices and something I instinctively knew was ambrosia. It smelled like the rarest fruit and heaven. “But that was then, wasn’t it? And now you’re eighteen and on the brink of your greatness. Only an insignificant number of years before you come into the fullness of your power. You were a child. Now you’re a woman. Start acting like it.”
I took a step back. I hated that I let her know she’d intimidated me, but I couldn’t help it. She was terrifying. And she said terrifying things. And if I could pinpoint one of the hundred emotions assaulting my chest, it would be terror.
“I will never do what you think I can do. Even if I am capable of it.” My voice trembled, but the conviction I felt was clear.
Hera pulled back and glanced first at Hermes, then at Aether. “Time will tell,” she finally said. With a sweep of her hair and her silky white gown, she turned toward her throne and took a seat. She didn’t glance at me again; instead she looked at Ryder and addressed him for the first time. “And Orpheus? What do you think of all of this?”
Ryder’s jaw ticked with frustration. “I am not Orpheus.”
Hera smiled patiently at him, giving him all of the good grace she kept from me. “Of course you are. Only Orpheus has been able to control a Siren’s power. It’s the gift your mother gave you.”
“My mother?” Ryder’s already gravelly voice turned raw with confusion.
“Calliope, of course.” When Ryder and I stared at her blankly, she added. “The mother of the muses.”
I rocked back on my heels and let that settle over me. “Oh.”
“Oh?” Ryder’s eyes went big and he looked close to choking on his tongue.
“It makes a lot of sense actually,” I mumbled. “You’re really good at the guitar. And at singing. And you are immune to my powers.”
Ryder shook his head incredulously. I squeezed his hand and hoped he didn’t start hyperventilating.
“She didn’t adjust well to the human form,” Hera said with the smallest note of sympathy in her voice. Her eyes slid to me and I didn’t understand the severity behind them when she said, as if in warning, “Sometimes that happens.”
I thought of Smith immediately. He had said almost the exact same thing and blamed his brain tumor on that. He had recovered though. Was it possible that a god or goddess could die from adjusting to human life?
Why couldn’t that have happened to Nix?
That would have simplified my life by like a million.
“So, now you are on my mountain. What do you plan to do?” Hera asked with one lifted eyebrow. Her power had yet to recede. The storm clouds churned overhead, creating an ominous vortex directly above us. Lightning flashed hotly between the clouds, reminding us of her ancient power.
“Stop Nix,” I answered quickly.
A sardonic smile lifted one corner of her mouth. “You’ve set out to do what none of his other brothers and sisters have accomplished. The Furies could not contain him. Skolopendra, Charybdis and Scylla could not destroy him. Yet you, a girl of only eighteen, a child that does not know the power she is capable of,youattempt to kill a god amongst gods?”
