Piers stared at the screen as if he didn’t even hear her. “Zeus Eleutherios,” he murmured. “Protector of freedom.”
Sophie’s heart started to pound. “Is that where we need to go? Should we bring the shard to the Statue of Liberty?”
Aaron’s cryptic message had been burned into her mind since the second she put all those torn-up pieces of paper together. She saw it again.
The Greek gods are REAL. Contact Athena and GIVE THE SHARD BACK TO THE GODS OF OLYMPUS.
Sophie glanced at the glowing ice shard. She swallowed. At first, she’d just wanted to avoid getting caught and losing the shard to a murderous megalomaniac like Novalight. Then Piers showed up, and the wholeContact Athenathing went from pure fantasy to possible reality. Same withmagic. Now, he was staring at the screen in utter shock, as though the Statue of Liberty were just the temple they needed to finally contact the gods.
Or maybe it was something else?
“Piers?” He had a really weird look on his face.
The news channel switched to an advertisement for car insurance, Lady Liberty disappeared, and Piers lost it. No, he didn’t just lose it. He lost it like a boss, grabbing his head, curling in on himself, andhowling.
Sophie froze in shock. Her own massive freak-out took a backseat to Piers’s sudden breakdown. She watched, her jaw sliding loose as he wrapped his arms around his head and rocked, groaning and muttering names she knew from hearing him talk about his family. Griffin. Kaia. Cat.
Fear jackknifed through her. She reached for him. “Piers? What is it?”
He abruptly stood and brushed her off. Pale as snow before it hit the New York sidewalk, he turned away from her. Sophie’s heart clenched. Something was seriously wrong with him. She tried again, reaching out, and he strode to the bathroom and closed the door. A second later, she heard a huge crash.
She flew to the door, knocking. “Piers? What happened?”
A second huge crash and a bellow.
Jesus. Her pulse throbbed in her ears. “I’m coming in there.” She turned the handle. It didn’t budge. “If you break it, you pay for it, sostopbefore I can’t afford clothes for either of us.”
Total silence, then the door flew open. He stood there, his hair in disarray, his chest heaving. Sophie glanced behind him. He’d shattered both big glass panels to the shower. There wasn’t any blood on him, so maybe he’d kicked them. The chrome towel rack caught her eye amid the wreckage. He’d ripped the bar from the wall and bent it. How freaking strong was he?
“Holy shit.” Sophie snapped her mouth shut. She wanted to be angry at Piers for going all caveman on the hotel bathroom, but he looked so devastated. Beyond devasted—wrecked. His eyes glistened, and her heart broke for him without even knowing what happened. She stepped closer and wrapped her arms around him.
Piers stood there for the longest time, stiff and unmoving. Finally, he gripped her back and ducked his head into her neck, holding on as though she were his lifeline. “It’s all my fault,” he whispered.
She tried to comfort him, smoothing her hands through his hair. She kissed his temple, his forehead. “Whatever it is, we’ll figure it out. Just tell me what happened.”
“There’s nothing to figure out. I made a huge mistake, and now I’m paying for it. I’m here forever. In exile.”
The dull monotone of his voice scared her. His will to live seemed to have blinked off faster than a bum string of Christmas lights. At the same time,here foreverdidn’t sound that awful to her. It was too selfish to say aloud, but she didn’t want to lose him, even if it meant he couldn’t go back to his family.
“And you suddenly remembered?” She pulled back enough to look at him. “What just happened?”
“It was your colossus of Eleutheria. Libertas.” The Roman equivalent didn’t roll off his tongue as easily. “It all came roaring back. Athena said I wouldn’t remember at first—that something would trigger my memory when the time was right.” His voice turned rough. “That time is now, I guess.”
“Athenasaid?” Sophie was getting good at suspending disbelief, but…Athena?“Well, that’s good, right? We need her.”
Piers speared a hand through his hair and started pacing. “No, it’s not good at all. I tried to get Cat exiled from Thalyria to keep her from bringing more danger to my family. I didn’t want her dead, just gone—permanentlygone—and she’s always picking fights and getting into battles, so I stupidly thought I’d give her a taste of her own medicine and turn her over to Ares, the god of war. I managed to get his attention, which was a colossal error. He would definitely take someone away with him, just not Cat. I didn’t count on how strongly the gods favor her, the plans they have. Three Olympians showed up and debated who to seize in Cat’s place. Ares threatened to take Kaia—to take my little sister away forever and throw her into endless wars—so I did the only thing I could think of to fix the mess I’d made. I offered myself instead.”
Sophie swallowed hard. Of course, he did. She wasn’t surprised at all.
“And Cat… She forgave me. Griffin didn’t. He won’t.” Piers’s voice rasped hard. He cleared his throat. “Ares could’ve taken any of us—whoever he wanted. I could’ve doomed my brother or my little sister to eternal war, but Athena stepped in and argued that I could be useful here, in her world.”
“You’ve been useful to me,” Sophie whispered.
Piers prowled back to her, his gray eyes two pain-filled thunderclouds. She’d almost stopped noticing his slightly swollen nose and scraped chin, the scratches on his arms…
“Did you fight with Griffin?” she asked, gently touching his jaw.
“With Cat. She could’ve killed me. She didn’t.”
