Total pages in book: 101
Estimated words: 95187 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 476(@200wpm)___ 381(@250wpm)___ 317(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 95187 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 476(@200wpm)___ 381(@250wpm)___ 317(@300wpm)
Disappointment quells that small flip in my stomach. Icarus is a liar just like all the rest. I expected nothing less, but it still feels bad. All the same, he has a point about me needing to eat. It’s only when I’m standing across the island from him with my own full plate that he picks up his fork and begins to eat as well.
I expect the silence to be jagged and filled with peril, but it’s strangely comfortable. Icarus is moving stiffly, but he will be for quite some time with his injuries. I still can’t believe I misjudged Polyphemus so intensely. If I had known he was a danger to Icarus, I never would have left him in charge of our captive. That failure was paid for in Icarus’s blood.
Icarus takes another bite and shivers. “You know, this is amazing, even reheated. Your chef is something special.”
“Yes, Louis is.” This, at least, is a conversation easy to navigate. “He’s old enough to be a grandfather several times over, and I’m pretty sure his eyesight went out a decade ago, but his taste buds remain as youthful as ever.”
“Sounds charming.”
“I don’t know if I’d say that.” Charm and Louis hardly go hand in hand. He’s a cantankerous old bastard who treats me just like the two assistants I hired for him a while back. He’s bossy and snarls as often as he talks, and I enjoy spending time in his presence immensely—or I would if he wasn’t here, in this damned house. Louis says exactly what he thinks, and he never couches his words in hidden meanings. I know where I stand with him at all times. It’s a relief.
“You know, Hera’s plan won’t work. Circe won’t be satisfied with anything less than fully sacking the city.”
There’s no reason to feel disappointed that he’s turned our conversation back to the pending attack. It’s why I kept him here, after all. I need the information held in his beautiful head. “Do you know Circe well?”
“No one knows Circe well. I know her less well than most. My father wasn’t exactly proud of me, and he took great pains to ensure I wasn’t exposed to more of the council on Aeaea than absolutely necessary. That went doubly true for Circe. He was certain I would embarrass him and endanger his upward mobility. I’m the ultimate disappointment as a son, you know.” The words ooze charm, but his smile still doesn’t reach his dark eyes. A truth within a truth. His father’s disappointment cuts him like a knife. His father who has been dead less than forty-eight hours.
Guilt stabs me. Somehow, in all this, I’d almost forgotten. Athena’s people took Minos’s body, and it wasn’t an Olympian who killed him, but all the same, I should have remembered. I push my plate away. “I’m sorry for your loss.”
“No, you’re not.”
I shrug. “No, I’m not. But it’s the thing people say in situations like this. So I said it.”
Icarus surprises me by laughing. It’s not the calculated sound I’ve heard him make a few times when he attended the same parties I suffered my way through. It’s too loud, and he snorts. It’s cute.
He sits back in his chair. “I suppose it is what people say in situations like this. But to elaborate on what I said earlier, I may not know much of Circe personally, but I’ve had plenty of personal experience with people who interact with her daily. People talk. As a result, I know as much about her as anyone. She’s bent on revenge; I can’t imagine what you could possibly offer her that she wants more than Olympus burning.”
I understand it, at least in theory. I even met Circe once, long ago, at her wedding to Zeus. She was a beautiful bride, but that’s no surprise. Nothing but the best for that monster. Rumor had it that he saw her walking down the street and had to have her as his own. I don’t know why that translated into marriage for this particular victim, but even I could tell that she was filled with barely contained fury as she walked down the aisle to him. Throughout the reception, he kept her close, as if afraid she would try to escape. A few days later, they whisked away to their honeymoon.
A honeymoon he returned from as a widower.
“She was mistreated greatly by Olympus,” I say, my mind still in the past. “Not just by Zeus.”
“You sound almost like you agree with her.”
“Do I?” Damn it. I’ve let myself be too honest again—and with someone who I can ill afford to be open with. I clear my throat. “You may think dealing with Circe is a fool’s errand, but Hera tends to get what she wants. She might surprise you.” I dearly hope she does. There are so many innocents in this city, and even more are spread through the countryside. So many lives under the protection of the Thirteen, and we’re failing them. We have been for a long time, but it’s never been clearer than in the moment when the barrier came down and instead of taking decisive steps to protect the city, we’re still engaged in political manipulations and power plays.