Page 42 of The Gods Forbid

“It’s her namesake.” And a reminder. A much needed reminder.

Calpurnia hummed, then said, “And you think by calling her that, it makes you Hades?”

Well, she thought she was just the most brilliant person to walk the planet, now didn’t she? “We already have a Hades and I don’t think she has any romantic interest in Persy. She’s married, after all.”

When I said it, guilt threatened to weasel its way through my stomach, sinking my heart like a stone. I shoved it away. I only had the capacity to feel empathetic towards one person at the moment, and that certainly was not the goddess of the Underworld.

“You didn’t answer my question,” Calpurnia said pointedly, tapping her pen against her clipboard twice.

I rolled my shoulders back, feeling an odd itch between my shoulder blades. “Why would I want to be Hades?”

That was fucking ridiculous. The Underworld was the opposite of everything I loved—was supposed to love.

Calpurnia, once again, wasn’t even remotely deterred by my tone. “It paints you as a villain. The Hades and Pluto lines have been historically feared.”

I laughed under my breath. “I don’t see a problem with that.”

Calpurnia’s eyebrow shot sky high. “You like to be a villain.”

It was my goal, really. “Better than the hero.”

“See, that.” Calpurnia snapped her fingers, lurching forward like she was a bear lunging for a fish in a gushing river. “I think that’s forced.” My jaw clenched down, hard. “Why don’t you like to be liked?”

“I think I’m plenty well-liked,” I gritted out. Though our lovely king and his little friends did a spectacular job of garnering love and attention from their patrons, there was something about Apollo that drew people in like a moth to the flame.

No one could deny the pull of the sun.

Whether or not I liked that attention was irrelevant.

“And you’d throw that away?” Calpurnia’s voice was edged with something close to doubt, like she was choosing a question she didn’t quite believe in. “You really thought that people would happily embrace you after you overthrew Adrian?”

“They’d accept a leader who didn’t throw their world to shit.” Those words, though sounding as natural as poetry on my tongue, still felt rehearsed to my own ears.

Calpurnia nodded, letting several seconds go by. “Persy told me that you were behind most of the unrest we’ve experienced with the gods over the past years. Particularly that string of articles exposing all of Lord Jupiter’s sins.”

I felt my mouth curve into a grin. “Your point being?”

“Quite a lot of effort for something you don’t care about.”

I breathed in carefully, forcing myself to respect the craftsmanship behind Calpurnia’s answer, rather than the defensive rage twisting my chest tight.

Apparently, Calpurnia was content to drop that statement without further explanation. Forcing me to sit with it without the opportunity to push it away from me with pretty words and careful charm.

“What does Persy have you doing?” she asked, finally leaning back in her chair. Fuck, this felt exhausting. It was much simpler pushing it down until I forgot about it.

“Reconnecting with my power,” I said, uncaring that my tone had a considerable bite to it.

Calpurnia smiled regardless, shaking her head. “Persy is very good at her job.”

“There was doubt she wasn’t?” I shot back, before I could consider whether that came across as hyper-protective or not.

She raised one eyebrow, a silent message that she was reading into that statement but was choosing to set it aside for now. “She’s young. She’s incredibly kind. People sometimes associate that with a lack of talent, unfortunately. But if that’s the solution she came up with when you were at a state more hostile than this, I might be out of a job.”

“I doubt she has any interest in therapy.” It was true, which in my mind, made it okay to say. You didn’t have to spend more than a few hours in Persy’s presence to know that she appreciated silence and doing. She wouldn’t like a career that relied this much on talking.

This time, Calpurnia decided to voice her thoughts. “You seem to know her quite well.”

I sighed, dragging my hands down my face. I at least knew when to accept defeat, and Calpurnia was not going to let this go. “In certain contexts, I can understand the way she functions. May relate to it. Despite our age difference.”