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Hector’s forces tear through what is left of the Achaean ambush.

It wasn’t enough, and Hector was too late.

Hippolyta’s screams fill the air. Each hollow wail wrenches my soul in pieces. I still lay on the ground, my body battered. My eyes flutter open briefly, tears leaking from the corners as she sprints past me for the prone body of her sister. I turn my head just as she cradles Penthesilea’s body in her lap.

She rocks back and forth. A keening wail climbs her spine and bursts from her lips. Just the sight fills me with even more pain. My midriff burns with the fires of Hephaestus’s forge.

A cool, gentle touch, like the falling of snowflakes, trips up my side. It dispels the fire, breathing new life into my shattered lungs.

Persephone looks down upon me, frowning. She cups my cheek, and the burgeoning fever retreats. “I cannot heal you too much now, my sister, or they will know.” She places the softest kiss on my brow. “I’ll come back for you later.”

She moves on, leaving behind the scent of pomegranates and wheat. I’m healed enough now to at least rise onto my elbows, though my back still burns. Even Artemis’s Midas Curse wasn’t enough to hold back the enormity of Ares’s rage.

I crawl across the sand to a still sobbing Hippolyta, tears beginning to pour down my own cheeks. She ignores me, rocking and crying. I crouch beside her in silent vigil until the sun falls beyond the bloody foothills.

Once the stars begin to dot the dark purple sky, she finally stands. Penthesilea’s bloody body cradled in her arms, my friend shuffles toward the great wall. What remains of the Amazon army falls into line behind her and we march along the sandy path.

Great pyres are already being built. Hades’s presence here is as tangible as a hand atop my spine. His wife is no doubt flitting among the crowd, looking for wounded she can marginally heal. At least I have earned the alliance of the Queen of the Underworld, even if I have proven a failure almost everywhere else.

Arms wrapped around my frame, I watch as priestesses rush forward to take Penthesilea from her sister. Hippolyta hugs her body tighter, face screwed up in pain and rage. One attendant, whose face I would recognize anywhere, lays a hand upon my friend’s arm.

“Your sister has earned a place in Elysium,” Persephone says. Her voice is low and soothing, each word sweeping over Hippolyta until her grip eventually slackens. “You will see her again, there. But first you must set her free.”

With one last pain-filled sob, my friend lets go of the Amazon queen.

Persephone scoops up Penthesilea’s body and carries her over to the towering pyre built of cedar and pine. The goddess is dressed in simple red, the color of a priestess, her Olympian powers dimmed in this moment to blend among the others. Her dark ebony hair is loose, blowing in the warm southern winds of the god Notos.

Hippolyta accepts the torch Persephone hands her next and, with tearstained cheeks, lights the pyre. Her warriors take up an Amazon paian, a solemn battle hymn, their mournful voices filling the valley. My voice cracks as I take up the song alongside them.

Hippolyta’s face twists in pain. From the corner of her mouth, eyes still fixed on the blazing fire, she asks, “Who did it?”

Ignoring the burn in my throat, I say, “Your father.”

She nods curtly but says nothing.

After the rest of the dead are laid to rest, she and I walk slowly back to the city gates. Her steps drag, her usual grace gone with the sister she sent up in flames. As we walk, she becomes more rigid, her movements clipped. Finally, at the base of the stairs that lead up to her palace, she turns to me and says, “Your secrets will make you a martyr, Daphne.”

I take a step back. “What secrets?”

Fury flickers on her features for an instant. “You have the audacity to ask me that? I know of the games you play with the gods. I’ve seen you walk side by side with Apollo and brawl with Ares in this very war. What aren’t you telling me?”

I chew the inside of my cheek. “I haven’t been purposefully keeping anything from you, Lyta. I—”

“Enough lies!” She cuts a hand through the air. “If I find out that this war started because of you, it will be your body next on that pyre.”

She turns, storming up the stairs without a backward glance.

I stand there, gaping, until my assortment of wounds protest that they cannot keep me on my feet much longer. Bruised, beaten, and with barely enough strength to stand, I drag myself across the city to King Priam’s palace. I limp down the hallways, arms wrapped around myself, and jerk to a halt when a tall, dark form steps in front of me. I immediately reach for the Adamantine sword.

“Perhaps you wouldn’t be so cautious if you brought your best men with you.” Lykou’s arms are crossed over his broad chest, his face unreadable.

I lean a wary shoulder against the wall. “I’ll remember that next time.”

“Be sure that you do.” His mask slips, and he rubs a hand over his face before I can read his expression.

A sigh threatens to escape me. “Not you, too.”

That’s when he snaps. The wolf erased so long ago takes form in his features, a sharp snarl pulling back his lips and twisting his nose. “Not me what, Daphne? Not me angry that you left me behind while you fought and lost a battle? Left me behind again.” He steps forward and his arms drop, fists tight at his sides. “I won’t ask if you know how it feels to be forced to watch from this city’s walls as your people die on the battlefield below.”

“I’m sorry, Lykou.” Shame weighs atop my shoulders.

“You’re sorry?” He makes a harsh sound in the back of his throat and shakes his head. “What about watching as the woman you love slaughters your people left and right? Or how it feels to wonder if she is among the dead herself?”

He jerks forward, forcing me to take an awkward step back.

Close enough now that I can smell the wine lacing his breath, he whispers, “I was your fool last summer and you played me like a lyre. You are no better than them.”

The gods. He means that I am no better than the gods.

I clutch a hand on the wall behind me, mouth opening and closing around apologies and promises and other useless words. Because nothing can change the fact that he is right.

Then, as gentle as a moth, he reaches forward and catches the tear now slipping down my cheek as he says, “I am done being your fool, Daphne.”

He storms past me, so fast that when I turn around to stop him, he is already gone.

I dread what verbal lashing now awaits me from my queen. I enter our suite, fully braced for her wrath.

But, sitting on the edge of my bed is someone else entirely.

“I was too late,” Apollo says. Behind him, strewn across the cobalt furs, is my armor from Hephaestus.

It is gold, as seem to be all my gifts from the gods. I can tell even just by looking at it that the armor will mold to my body like a second skin, matching my every muscle and curve. The shield is black leather and painted with a golden swan.

“What is with Olympian obsession with giving me gold things? A curse, two different sets of armor. A sword.” Gold and glittering like the sun just before it sets beyond the mountains on a cloudless day.

“For Helen,” Apollo explains, dragging a finger over the domed surface of the shield.

“A bull’s-eye for everyone who wants my head, no doubt.” I sigh.

Apollo chuckles darkly. “Don’t insult Hephaestus. He thought of that as well. The armor will appear the same as whatever army you’re fighting for.”

I shift on my feet. “I’ll have to make sure to thank him profusely the next time I see him.”

“I was curious how you traveled to Lemnos, but my answer hangs from your hip.” Apollo’s eyes drop to the Adamantine sword. “Hermes gave you that.”

“He’s been more honest with me in a single day than you have in a year.” My voice rises with each word until I’m practically yelling in his face. He takes it without blinking. I have no right to be furious over lies. Not after my friends just threw my own falsehoods in my face. Lip trembling, I stab a finger in the air. “No more lies. From me or you.”

I look down at my hands, still sticky with blood. I rip free of my leathers, cursing the ties and shredding the cloth beneath in an effort to remove the gore and memory of today. Trembling, I stand naked before him.

My throat bobs. “Just tell me the truth, Apollo. I bloody deserve it.” He doesn’t say anything, his eyes never leaving my own. His smile has fallen and a pained frown replaces it.

I stride for the pool. The water ripples around me, swirling with red and sand. The delicious cold rinses away most of my aches and pains. I dunk my head and scrub my face.

When I surface, Apollo sits at the pool’s edge, legs hanging in the water. “What do you want to know?”

The air leaves my chest in a giant rush. What don’t I want to know? I duck my head quickly once more and swim to the edge beside him, resting my arms and chin on the cool marble.

I should pick what is least likely to get me killed for knowing. With a small voice, I say, “Tell me about Koronis.”

Apollo gives no reaction, his lovely face impossibly still. He drags a hand through the water, turning to stare at the waves he creates. “She loved the water.”

I blink. “If you think that’s enough to make me trust you, better think again. I—”

He silences me with an irritated look. He rolls his eyes toward the ceiling. “All this time and you are still as stubborn as that day on Mount Kazbek’s slopes. You would have rather fallen to your death than accept my help.”

“Can you blame me for it?” I soften the words with an upturned smile in the corner of my mouth.

He does not return the smile. “The princess of Phlegyantis was as lovely as the dawn, and sweeter than honey. A princess has no right to be so perfect. They should all be hindered by some kind of malady or misfortune, but Koronis was absolutely faultless.”

Even with hundreds of years passed, his voice is laced with tenderness as he speaks of her. It forms an ache of a different kind deep in my stomach.

“What started as a tentative friendship quickly bloomed into something more. She told me of her desire to form trade ties Greece has never known, encourage the crafts and arts, build a theater, and allow women to join their army. She was loved wholeheartedly by her people, but none more so than myself.”

He waves a wrist and the oil lamps around the room flicker to life. Their golden glow paints the sharp line of his jaw, the way his mouth twists in pain.

“Ares told me.” I pause, swallowing. “In Tartarus, he told me that she did not return your love.”

“He had half of the story.” Apollo kicks a spray of water across the chamber. “But that much is painfully true. She instead fell in love with a mortal named Iskhys. He and I weren’t the only ones enamored with the lovely princess, though. Tales of her perfection spread across the kingdom and reached the most powerful of ears. Zeus.”

The water is suddenly too cold. I climb out, goose bumps prickling my skin. In a blink, Apollo is beside me with a lavender chiton, wrapping it around my wet frame. His thumb grazes the underside of my arm, making me shiver.

“What did your father do?”

“He chased her relentlessly,” Apollo bites out, cursing under his breath. “She was pregnant with Iskhys’s child and her lover was killed in a storm while out fishing. I have no proof, but I believe with my whole heart that my father and Poseidon are to blame.”

“So you stole her away.”

He nods. “It was for her protection. If I hadn’t, my father would have done far worse if he ever found out she carried another’s child. Artemis took her to an island far from my father’s reach. For my sister’s deception, she was banished to the Taygetus mountain range, allowed freedom only when called upon. For my involvement, I was cursed to centuries of guarding the Muses in the Garden of the Hesperides. And, a lover scorned and vengeful to no end, my father bade Poseidon swallow the kingdom of Phlegyantis whole in an earthquake.”

The room is deathly silent, not even a crackle from the oil lamps or murmur from the city below.

“And Koronis?” I reach out, hand shaking as I take one of his. “What happened to her?”

His eyes are rimmed with red. “When she heard of Phlegyantis’s fall, she took her own life.”

My earlier words sit sour in the pit of my stomach, threatening to make me sick. There are no words I can give him that will ease his pain, so I remain silent and hold his hand tight.

Apollo’s callused thumb rubs my palm. “That necklace you wore last summer was my last gift to her. She still had it around her neck when she leaped from the cliffs. I thought she was lost forever, and Poseidon refused to bring me her body. I found out centuries later that her child lived, taken by Hermes to Chiron to be raised in Foloi. The child’s descendants were drawn to the sea of their ancestor’s undoing, eventually migrating to Eleusis.”

Apollo glances to my abdomen, where the Midas Curse spins beneath the wet chiton. He finally meets my gaze again and, voice edged with hatred, says, “Though I have no choice but to fight for my father, I have no love for the man. Haven’t since the day Artemis and I were forced to hide Koronis from his claws.”

There are no lies in Apollo’s words. I know this from the precarious trust we had built between us last summer. Forged from equal bloodshed and tears. And now, hatred simmers inside me, too, a poisonous and oily thing that had already been bred there over a year ago. Not for the god beside me, but for the deity that rules atop his mountain far across the sea.

Apollo leans closer. His mouth, those plush lips, is mere inches from my own. If I dared, I could press high on my toes and kiss him. That sweetness, that underlying spice of his kisses, is intoxicating. It calls to me like nothing ever has before.

The only sound in the room is our own rapid breathing.

“More answers,” I say—no, demand—with a ragged voice.

He takes a step back, dropping his hand. “Defend the gates, Daphne. Point Hector’s troops toward guarding them day and night. The wall may be magicked, but I do not trust Nyx, Ares, or even Hermes and their tricks.”

His gaze lingers on my face before he steps into the shadows. “I won’t let you share the same fate as Koronis. Even if it means that my father will throw me from Olympus.”