Total pages in book: 102
Estimated words: 95458 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 477(@200wpm)___ 382(@250wpm)___ 318(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 95458 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 477(@200wpm)___ 382(@250wpm)___ 318(@300wpm)
I blink. “Noted.”
“Thank you, Iaso. I’ll arrange your payment…” Dionysus hustles Iaso out of the room, shooting a worried look at Hermes as he does.
And then we’re alone. Me, lying here helpless and vulnerable. Hermes, staring down at me with her heart in her eyes. A heart that I’ll never have, not in full.
She sinks down next to the bed and takes one of my hands in both of hers. “I can take it from here.”
“What?”
“You have to go to the lower city. Athena won’t want to lose you, and she’ll ensure you’re on light duty until you heal. This will be over by then.” So reasonable. So damned stubborn.
I give her the look that goofy-ass statement deserves. “Because you’ve been handling it so well for the last day? Because things are going so well for all of us?”
She flinches and looks away. “When we set this plan in motion and I successfully became Hermes, I didn’t think it would be so difficult to keep from caring about…all of them. The Thirteen. The legacy families. I didn’t expect to make friends.” She takes a deep breath. “Eros was my friend, Atalanta. He might have hated me at the end, but he was my friend.”
And now he’s dead.
I sit up, ignoring her protests, and pull her down on my uninjured side so I can wrap my arm around her. Hermes is larger than life in all aspects; I forget she’s such a tiny thing, so easy to tuck against my body. Or maybe I never knew. We haven’t exactly sat like this before.
She relaxes by increments until she slumps against me. “He’s really gone.”
“I’m sorry.” Those words are so damned inadequate. Meaningless, even. I can’t rip apart the fabric of time and go back to save him and spare her this pain. I can’t do anything but put one foot in front of the other.
“Me too.” She shudders out a sigh. “It’s not going to stop. Hades won’t back down. I was a fool to think that could even be a possibility. And now that his wife and child are on the line, any chance of Zeus listening is gone too, which means Ares will go down with him.” She presses the heels of her hands to her eyes. “If we could have convinced them to step down…”
“It doesn’t matter.” She tenses, but I keep speaking before she can rip my head off. “Circe was always going to come. We didn’t know that when we put this whole thing into motion, but it is fact. Our plans were never going to go off without a hitch.” Though Circe is one bitch of a hitch.
And her expression as she stabbed me… It was almost reluctant. As if she’d just shattered a priceless artifact instead of conquered an enemy she was intent on killing. She could have killed me. I was utterly helpless in that moment, shock and pain overwhelming everything. Instead, she walked away. Whether she knew she was giving me the opportunity to escape or not…
“She’s not what I expected.” The words emerge from my confusion even though not talking about Circe has been something of an unspoken rule, at least until recently.
“I know.” Hermes slowly sits up, taking her wonderful heat with her. She gives me a sad smile. “She’s wonderful, isn’t she?”
Yes. I stifle that response before it gets past my lips. “You have a strange definition of the word.”
“I’m a complicated woman, Atalanta.” She gives me a long look. “We need to get moving. I know Dionysus is using a burner phone, and he’s very good at not being found when he sets his mind to it, but there’s no reason to tempt fate…or Circe.”
“I’m ready when you are.” The words contain so much. I know better than to pressure her, especially now with everything going on, but there’s a part of me that wonders if this is all pointless, if it’s always been pointless. We’re trying to save people who don’t want to save themselves. Maybe we should have left Olympus to rot.
“I have somewhere safe where you can get some rest.” She helps me to my feet. “Things will look better in the morning.”
14
Circe
Hecate has once again slipped through my grasp. I shouldn’t be surprised, not when she’s always been impossible to hold. Now there’s Atalanta in the mix as well, which clearly contributed to this escape. I stare down at the end of the blood trail and then look at Nerissa. “You searched everywhere.”
It’s not a question, but she bobs her head all the same. “Even with a map of the campus, the hallways are extensive. I think I found where they left—through the maintenance tunnels—but they’re long gone. I’m sorry.” She touches the bruise turning her temple a wild array of colors. “I didn’t even see her coming.”