I park the borrowed car on the mostly empty street. The lower city didn’t evacuate the way the upper city did… Why bother when they have their very own barrier to protect them? Even so, the people here aren’t going about business as usual. The streets are nearly as empty as in the upper city.
“Athena.” I don’t mean to speak. My position is best served with silence and a keen eye. As important as my placement withArtemis—that vindictive bitch—was, I’ve learned loads more since joining Athena. She runs a tight ship and keeps her cards close to her chest. She’s one of the most capable of the current members of the Thirteen, a perfect Athena to stand at Zeus’s right hand. It should be enough to make hate her.
But, damn it, I don’t. Yes, it’s a problem that she’s too focused on the mission of Olympus and too determined to keep things exactly how they’ve always been. So is every other member of the Thirteen, excepting Hermes. I don’t want Athena to fall victim to Circe—or the inevitable change coming.
“Yes?”
Hermes and I intended to keep things disrupted and scattered to ensure the Thirteen wouldn’t have the opportunity to rally. If the political structure of Olympus crumbles, it will force the entire city to reckon with the corruption flourishing in the upper tiers of society. The population will finally get the stars out of their eyes and wake up to reality; the Thirteen and legacy families have been leeching off their hard work for generations. Without the confidence of the population, the titles aren’t worth the breath it takes to speak them. There would be space for something new. Somethingfair.
Except our plan died the moment Circe decided to call for the deaths of all of the Thirteen.
I take a slow breath and tell my thrumming pulse to calm. “Do you see a way out of this that doesn’t involve the downfall of the city as a whole?”
Athena meets my gaze in the rearview mirror. “I’m working on it.” Her tone suggests I shut the fuck up. She doesn’t like to bequestioned, even in private—at least not by me. There are others higher up the ladder who have that luxury. I’m too new, and if she keeps me close, it’s because she doesn’t trust me fully.
It’s on the tip of my tongue to tell her what I really think of her honor and misguided allegiance to the Thirteen. That she’s wasting a brilliant mind serving a system that will never give a shit about her. That the only people she’s truly benefiting are the rich and powerful. That…
I don’t say it. I swallow down my truth just like I have every other time for the last ten years, first under Artemis and now Athena. They don’t want to hear the truth. If the Thirteen were so easily swayed, it wouldn’t have required stakes this high to rattle them.
It’s second nature to turn off the car and walk around to open the door for her, already scanning the street for threats. We don’t want Athena dead; we don’t wantanyof them dead if there’s another option. Even with the chaos erupting in the last couple days, there’s the assassination clause to consider. Plenty of Olympian citizens look to the Thirteen with covetous eyes, and the assassination clause gives them just the excuse they need to go for it. All that’s required is taking the life of one of the current members of the Thirteen, a witness, and a specific set of words.
Then there’s nothing left to do but ascend the stairs and knock on the massive door. Truly, this place is absurd. The feeling of stepping into another world only gets stronger when Charon opens the door and ushers us inside.
The foyer is luxuriously appointed, the carpet thick beneath our shoes, the walls painted some soothing shade that’s difficult to define in the low light.
Charon fits right in, the big white man dressed in an expensive suit that’s tailored to hide the gun in his shoulder holster. Even without the weapon, he’s dangerous. He’s been Hades’s second-in-command for all of his adult life, and if he’s a quiet man, that just makes him more dangerous.
He nods at Athena—and at me, which only makes me respect him more. A lot of people look right past me in the meetings I’ve attended as her security. I’m the muscle, after all. The whole point is to blend into the background so people underestimate me.
Charon doesn’t.
“This way.” He turns without another word and leads us down a series of halls to a study. Hades sits behind the desk, his fingers steepled before his mouth, Persephone at his shoulder. But they’re not alone. Zeus and Hera are here, too.
Shit.
3Circe
“How does it feel to finally return home?”
I don’t look at the woman sitting next to me, keeping my attention on the buildings passing by as we lead the convoy of civilians through Olympus toward the university. A calculated move on my part. Dodona Tower stands the tallest in the upper city, but it’s inextricably tied to Zeus. I want no mistake made: I’mnotstepping into the place his death will create.
I am something new.
“Home is a funny word, don’t you think?” I cross one leg over the other and sit back, finally turning my attention to Demeter. She looks as pristine as always, a white woman in her middle years, hair still dark and hazel eyes still bright, but with enough lines andsoftness to generate instinctive trust when she turns a calculated, empathetic look your way. Her floral wrap dress completes the earth-mother image she’s cultivated. A clever decision, neatly sidestepping the obsession with youth so many of the legacy families fall victim to. In the decade she’s held her title, she’s allowed herself to age gracefully—with some careful cosmetic procedures to slow the march of time rather than stop it.
“Circe,” she says carefully. She’s been oh so careful since we discovered her eldest daughter and son-in-law escaped our confines. Or maybe it started when she realized exactly what I intended for the legacy families—and how that would affect two of her daughters, pregnant by legacy titles. She smiles, all warmth and an invitation to divulge my secrets. “You don’t have to pretend with me.”
I’ve played this game nearly as long as she has, and I’m all too aware of the strings to pull to generate favorable responses in the people around me. Demeter excels at garnering loyalty among the citizens of Olympus, and her people specifically. It was a boon when she approached me to join forces, but that doesn’t mean I trust her in the least.
“Home is a myth.” I wave a graceful hand at the world outside our armored SUV. “It’s a comforting lie we tell ourselves is a place or a people, but really all it does is make us complacent. If you’re comfortable in yourhome, you’re not looking to your neighbor or farther afield to the dangers that hunts you both.”
Her smile is a bit too tight to be believable. “You have a lovely way with words.” She glances behind us to the car that holds Psyche and Eros, her daughter and son-in-law—the ones I still have incustody. Neither took this recent turn of events well, buttheydidn’t manage to slip from my grasp.
Neither did Hera and Zeus—at least not without help. The dead guards outside their hastily constructed cell speak to that. I have no reason to believe it was Hecate—Hermes, as she goes by now—but I know it to be true. She’s the only one in this damned city capable of foiling my plans, and she seems intent on doing just that.
My chest aches at the thought of standing on the other side of a war from her, but I’ve come too far to be swayed by softer emotions. She barely wasted any time after my alleged death, becoming Hermes the moment the old one passed. For nearly ten years, she’s held that title and done nothing with it but party and fuck and play the jester to the same court that enabled the last Zeus to snatch me off the street, force me into a wedding, and then attempt to drown me on our honeymoon. Once upon a time, she saw things my way. She will again.
In the meantime, I have work to do.
