“If someone must be taken, then why not take him? Maybe you could give him to Ares,” Piers cautiously suggested. “See how well he fares?” That would’ve been Kaia’s fate if Piers hadn’t offered to take her place. Ares had accepted, but then Athena swooped in and snatched Piers for this. Ares was down one soul he should’ve commanded, and Novalight could be it.
Athena pursed her lips. “Unfortunately, that’s not possible. The Moirai have decreed his bloodline too important to future events. He must go on to produce children here on Earth.”
Piers’s heart sank. Not even Zeus could overrule the will of the Fates. So, this was it. It would be him.
Or gods forbid, Sophie.
“Here on Earth? What are you two lunatics talking about?” Novalight’s wary gaze darted over them both, then to Piers’s sword again.
“We’re talking about life and death, the fate of men in the cosmos, and the role of destiny,” Athena said blithely. “And really, this world considers him a genius?” She rolled her eyes.
Piers barely registered her scorn. His gut had turned to stone the moment his bargaining chip got swept off the table. His only concern now was Sophie andherlife—making sure she lived it in peace.
Novalight chose that moment to lunge at him. Piers brought the hilt of his sword up whip-fast and cracked him in the face. This journey had begun with a broken nose. It might as well end with one.
Novalight reeled back with a gasp. Piers’s mouth twisted in disgust. He didn’t even hit him that hard. And if Athena couldn’t take the bastard to another world or let Piers kill him, how would Sophie ever be safe?
Desperation filled him. Piers prided himself on solving problems, but he didn’t know how to solve this. All the book learning and battle experience of his life couldn’t free Sophie from a man protected by the Fates.
Nevertheless, he took a menacing step toward Novalight. “How doyoulike being faced with someone bigger and scarier?” he ground out. “Think about how Sophie felt when you sent your men after her again and again.”
Novalight hyperventilated, sucking in blood and half choking on it as he backed toward the door.
Glaring at Piers, Athena cocked out a jean-clad hip and flicked her hand toward the scientist. “Now I have to fix that.”
Fury and confusion clashed like cymbals in Piers’s head. Whowasthis goddess? Not the Athena he…really didn’t know. He stopped in his tracks.
A noise clicked behind Novalight, the door flew open, and Sophie burst into the room.
“No!” Piers shouted.
“Yes!” Athena clapped.
“You!” Novalight grabbed her and dragged her against his chest.
Piers reacted on pure instinct. He freed Sophie from Novalight’s hold with a sharp downward strike, spun her out of the way, and threw the man against the wall so hard the son of a Cyclops shattered the plaster and dropped.
“Ugh. Now I have to fixthat.” Athena scowled at him again. “And the bathroom. You’re in Attica now, so you need to get something through your thick, Thalyrian, he-man-warrior head. Destruction and maiming:bad. Piers and Sophie live happily ever after:good.”
“But…” Piers’s heart pounded. He kept an eye on the unconscious Novalight as he reached for Sophie. “Call a god, lose a soul. One of us…” He gripped Sophie tighter, whispering to her, “You shouldn’t have come back.”
“I had to.” She wrapped her arms around him. “I couldn’t just leave you.”
“You should’ve.” Athena wasn’t the only danger here. There was Novalight—not that Sophie had known that.
Athena fluffed her hair. “The Fates say I can’t have Novalight—although I think he’d make a fun tool for Hephaestus or good target practice for Artemis. Lucky for you both: different place, different rules.” Her mouth quirked up. “I’m nottechnicallybound to take a soul from Attica. Thalyria is the only place where that rule is set in stone. People there wanted Olympians to intervene entirely too much. It was getting out of hand and had to be controlled.”
Shock and cautious hope tightened every muscle in Piers’s body. Summoning had definitely been controlled. Those scrolls had beenburied. And the information half lost and misunderstood.
“Are you saying…we’re free?” He hesitated to understand—in case hedidn’t. He feared a trick that would leave him devastated.
Athena’s head swiveled toward Novalight, sliding in a way that reminded him she wasn’t at all human. “Oh, I can do better than that.”
A stick appeared in her hand. She waved it. “Bibbidi-bobbidi-boo.” Athena winked at Sophie. “I’ve always wanted to say that. Or at least, for the last seventy years or so.”
Novalight rose to his feet like a ragdoll. Athena spun him around several times with glittering, swirling magic, bringing him back to consciousness and fixing his nose. She hit him over the head with her stick, and he disappeared.
Piers blinked hard, making sure the man was really gone. Sophie’s relieved laughter unraveled the knots in his chest.
