She grinned, reaching for the menu. “You got it.”
~7~
Piers had twowords to describe Sophie. Incredible. Terrifying. Her idea to visit a museum filled with works from what she called “Classical Antiquity” and find sculptures of ancient Greek gods, especially Athena, seemed solid. A good place to start, anyway. If nothing about the ice shard’s behavior or any of the statues gave them a hint as to how to return the shard to an Olympian, they’d try a museum with more modern interpretations of Greek mythology.
He shook his head. What he called reality, she called mythology. What he called every-day life, she called ancient civilization. It was enough to make a man feel old and senile.
And what manner of idiot had decided to call important houses of knowledge Met and MoMA? They sounded like names you’d give pets, not places.
At least Sophie had a plan, which was more than Piers had. But the idea of her being exposed and vulnerable on city streets and in public places made him feel as if he were trying to breathe underwater. It was funny—no,frightening—how a single day could change his entire existence. And he wasn’t even talking about the inexplicable world-hopping. He meant Sophie.
Piers got it now. Why Griffin would choose Cat over anything. Why Carver lost himself when he lost Konstantina. He was just like his brothers. The right woman hit them like a lightning bolt and scorched herself down to their very essence. Sophie was his lightning strike. He had no doubt the Fates had thrust them together to keep the Shard of Olympus out of the wrong hands. And now that their life threads were weaving the same tapestry, he was going to make damn sure they didn’t get cut short or unravel.
Which made Sophie’s reckless running around New York City almost unbearable. He grumbled about it again, scanning the surprisingly vast wilderness in the heart of the city for signs of danger.
Sophie sipped coffee from a cup made of paper, his protests rolling right off her. “I haven’t been to the Met since I was a kid. I can’t wait to see the Greek sculptures again.”
“Why Greek instead of Attican?” Piers asked. “Isn’t that where they’re from?”
She shrugged. “Back then—and now—Attica was just one region around Athens. Ancient Greek civilization spread all over the Mediterranean. It was made up of independent city states that shared a similar culture and language.”
“And gods.”
“And gods.” She nodded.
Piers understood and could even picture what she meant, just as he understood more about this world by the minute. He now knew that Sophie could show him a detailed map of ancient Greece with a few taps of her finger. At the time, it seemed the people there had called their land Hellas.
Why stories of the Hellenes and their ancient kingdoms came to Thalyria as tales from Attica, he could only guess. Perhaps Athena had liked her glorious role as the patron goddess of the area and spread to Thalyria only the information she liked best.
Sophie’s phone fascinated him. He could understand why the little rectangles were glued to everyone’s fingertips. They’d used hers several times today already. They could buy entrance tickets to this Met. They could check the incoming weather. They could listen to music—if one could call the oddthump thumpingand endlessla la laingmusic. She could even contact her family, her thumbs flying over little letters, to say she’d try to be home soon and not to open the door to any strangers.
Piers wished he had a magic rectangle. But there was no contactinghisfamily with Sophie’s phone, no matter how powerful the tool seemed to him.
A horse and carriage rolled by. At least that was something familiar, although he preferred a fast two-wheeled chariot if he wasn’t riding. Bells jingled from the harness, and the horse’s breath steamed the air. The driver had dressed himself as one of these jolly, red-robed men with big white beards Piers kept seeing everywhere. Sophie said they were Santa and related to the upcoming holiday, although he still hadn’t grasped why they wereallSanta or why one city needed so many of them.
The horse and carriage trundled away, and Piers rubbed his hands together, feeling nostalgic for his home, his horse, and his warm weather.Good gods, it was cold here.
“The Met.” Sophie pointed to a huge columned building. It looked a lot like Castle Sinta.
Piers stared at it. It was far bigger than any knowledge temple he’d ever been to. “Do they only have these buildings in New York City?” he asked.
She arched her brows. “Well, there’s nothing quite this grand in Connecticut.”
Ah. Her homeland. “Could I maybe…visit thisCunnetakitwith you?” It was a bold question, and worry tightened his lungs. What if Sophie said no? What if for her, this,they, were only temporary?
A frown slid over her expression. “I would never just abandon you in the city.”
Piers nodded, but there was a difference between abandoning someone and bringing a man into your life as a partner. A lover. He decided not to press. It was good enough for now that Sophie planned on keeping him by her side. He’d convince her offoreverlater.
She flashed her phone to gain them entrance to the Met, and they went through a security scan. She’d warned him to leave his weapons at the room, which Piers had wholeheartedly resisted. He understood better now. He’d have been forced to give them up anyway, and Sophie had been worried his sword and daggers looked so “authentic” that the museum might ask questions they couldn’t answer.
As they strode through the classical rooms, Piers had to admit, if only to himself, that he hated it. Here was absolute proof that his gods had been abandoned. Left to rot, fall apart, and be scattered throughout museums for people to gawk at without even an inkling of the power the Olympians still wielded across the cosmos. At least the marblework was appealing when it wasn’t disintegrating. These statues were the first things to truly remind him of home—but only to prove just how very far away he was.
“Any difference in the shard?” he asked as they stared at yet another rendition of Athena. This one had a hand missing. And half a nose.
Sophie discreetly pulled up her sleeve. She’d fashioned a bracelet to hold the shard out of some thin wire she’d had in her car—leftovers from a school project to build a model of the Eiffel Tower, whatever that was. She shook her head. “It feels the same. Glows the same. Pulses the same. It’s still really cold.”
“And inside you? Is there a vibration? A call?”
