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 nod, or maybe I just jerk my head in a shudder. She doesn’t need any further instruction. She moves around the cramped kitchen, quickly finding some old mugs and washing them while the kettle heats.
Circe slumps down against me, our blankets crinkling against each other. “You s-s-saved me,” she says in between stuttering shivers. “Why?”
I don’t have an answer to that. The smart call would have been to let the river take her, let it end what the ocean began all those years ago. I couldn’t let her go, not then and not now. It’s an intrinsic flaw I don’t think I’ll ever exorcise.
Right now, I can admit to myself that I don’t want to.
27
Atalanta
Circe is the worse off of the two, but I manage to get her temperature regulated after some concentrated effort. The moment her shivers ease, she passes out again, this time in a deeply necessary sleep.
I refresh Hecate’s tea and press it into her hands. “I’m going to check outside.” There has been a lot of noise, but the only windows in this place are small and have their view blocked by another building. Surely that was intentional to preserve Hecate’s secrecy, but it means it’s virtually impossible to get an idea of how bad it is out on the street.
“That’s not a good idea,” she murmurs. Her gaze slides to Circe and then back to me. “It’s better to lie low.”
“You lie low. She sure as shit needs to.” I push to my feet. “I’m not going to go far, but we need to know what we’re dealing with. You have this place stocked okay, but it was clearly meant as a stopover for you, not three of us. We can’t stay here more than a day or two, and even that might be asking too much.” There’s also one other—pretty fucking vital—component. “Once she wakes up, she’s going to be a problem. What’s to stop her from running right back to her people?” What’s left of them, anyway.
“I know.” Hecate sighs. “Go. I’ll keep an eye on her.”
From the way her blinks are becoming longer and longer, she’ll be passed out the moment I turn my back. That’s fine. It means she’s not going to be getting up to nonsense during the few minutes I intend to stick my head out the door.
And maybe walk a few blocks over if that’s what it takes.
I slip out of the apartment and pause to look around. There isn’t a sound coming from the other doors. Either they’re empty, or their residents are smart enough to hunker down in response to the uproar outside. Smarter than me, in any case.
Outside, the sounds feel muted somehow. I don’t bother to flip my hood up or keep my head down as I walk along the sidewalk, listening for the mob in the distance. They’re louder than they were on the bridge, shouting interspersed with screams.
“Fuck,” I breathe. With a guilty glance back at the door I just exited, I head for the tallest building close to me. It’s an apartment building, but unlike Hecate’s place, there is no code on the door. I just walk right in and head for the stairs.
I’m tired. No, tired is a state that can be pushed through. I’m reaching the point of shutting down entirely. My shoulder throbs insistently, but it’s nothing to the way every muscle seems to groan in protest, the way my brain is functioning in fits and starts. All I want is a couple hours of sleep.
But if I can’t guarantee we’ll be safe for that long, exhaustion will be the least of my worries. I have Circe and Hecate—Hermes—in close quarters. Both are people the mob will target happily. Me too, I guess.
It takes a little trial and error to find the door to the roof. Clearly they don’t want people up here, where the dingy concrete is weathered by time and a couple heating units chug away gamely.
I walk to the edge and look out over the bits of the city I can see. I’m about nine floors up, which is plenty high enough to see Juniper Bridge and the spot where Hecate pulled Circe out of the river. The binoculars I brought show the scene on the bridge in stark relief. The bodies of Demeter, Artemis, and several of Circe’s people are flung across the ground, broken toys left behind by the mob as they moved in search of someone to blame. The blond who shoved Circe off the bridge is there, too. That’s going to hurt her, and badly.
I start to scan away, but movement brings me back with a snap. There’s someone else on the bridge. It takes a beat to realize I know exactly who this is, even with his head covered: Hades. He gathers Demeter’s body up, lifting her easily and almost reverently, and walks back through the barrier without a single hitch in his step.