Page 101 of The Mortal Trials

“He would’ve looked there, too. You should’ve buried it in the sand,” I tell him.

His shoulders fall and he curses. Colorfully. “Is that where you hide the spear?”

I shrug. I’m not about to divulge that piece of information in case he’s spying.

“Hey, Callalie!” A twenty-something unchampioned guy walking with Thoth’s mortal, Yuuki, cups his hands around his mouth and playfully yells from across the temple. “Don’t fuck this trial up for the rest of us like you did the feast last night. Some of us had almost secured a champion!” He turns to his friend, laughing as he pinches two fingers together and laments, “I was this close.”

I laugh, tossing him an exaggerated pout. “Does your lover say that a lot?”

Elias cackles as he dramatically offers in an array of voices, “I was this close!”

“I walked into that one. Well played, Ryan,” the guy concedes with a smile, hands up as a chorus of laughter and taunts erupts.

I hope every mortal in the arena is chuckling, and every god watching from their luxurious box bristles at the sight of us teasing one another instead of looking afraid.

Niall and Elias help Koda down the steps. Tae, August, and I descend behind them.

Torsten, with his sandy hair braided back crouches on the stone above us, examining his sharpened sword. The edge gleams. He watches Koda descend the steps with the spear and smiles.

We pause at the bottom of the stairs as Koda enters the portal first. Niall follows. Then Elias.

Over Torsten’s shoulder, Veronia, Kallik, and Hazi hover.

Hazi stares at Tae like he might follow her instead of his allies. He goes as far as to move toward her but stops when she flays him with a sharp glare before disappearing into the swirling gold portal.

21

Once August kisses his palm for good luck and blows it away, he and I put a palm to the portal. It repels his and swallows mine. I meet his blue eyes. “Guess that means it’s my turn.”

“We can win,” he rasps, squeezing my hand in time with each word.

I swallow my fear. “We can win.”

A thousand more words and wishes pass between us, our mouths never moving as he grabs my free hand and doesn’t let go until he’s forced to.

The room I enter is tranquil and opulent. Pale marble veined with gold. Enormous columns support an ornately painted ceiling. Luxurious potted plants grow all around the space. A small pond with fragrant water lilies and orange-scaled fish is seated in the floor to my left.

In the center of the room, a woman sits on a tall, three-legged stool. A small crevice stretches across the raw stone beneath her. Steam rises from the break.

Beside the fissure is the conical omphalos stone to mark this place, the navel of the Greek world.

She wears a simple blue chiton. A sheer purple veil covers her head, concealing everything but her mouth. The veil is held in place by a wreath of fresh laurel.

She’s the Pythia, Apollo’s blessed oracle and high priestess. The women who have served in this role through the centuries have offered ambiguous advice that’s led many a hero astray. Which is probably why Ares sent me to her. I look for a way out.

“The gods sent you here for a prophecy.” Her voice is rusty.

“I don’t want one.”

She draws her legs up and folds them beneath her. “You’ll need this divine advice. But you have a choice to make. The Celtic seers can’t guide you,” she rasps. “You can consult me, or you can choose a seer from your other bloodline.”

That bloodline has no seers.

Two acolytes in ice blue robes appear. The first sets a tall table beside the oracle. The second places a golden chalice on it. With curved, subservient spines and eyes that never look upward despite the lofty god they serve, they scurry away.

I can’t help but wonder if one of them was my mother. She serves somewhere in a temple like this. I’m not sure which deity she left us for. Abuela never told us. She may not know. But I imagine that her back has the same curve. That she is bent and broken like them. Like she wanted to be. I hope it was everything she imagined and that she found leaving us to be worth it.

The Pythia takes the cup and sips. She smiles, revealing teeth that gleam with fresh blood. “You’re lucky, you know, to have been raised by a wise woman. Some of the others with the old blood have forgotten or forsaken it. But not her.”