All that honesty and I feel as though I am naked. Despite the feeling, I wear Hephaestus’s armor, black leather that ripples with gold undertones and is dotted with hidden daggers. Twin swords hang from my hips as I stride beneath the moonless sky. Selene’s gaze is turned elsewhere, the dark clouds covering her face.
Lyta and Lykou flank me. The latter is as silent as a wolf on the hunt, and the former just as intent. We press against cypress trees along the muddy plain, having exited the city via the smallest of Troy’s gates, the southern. The trees have soaked up most of the rain, and the path is drier here, not gripping our ankles like hands reaching from the Styx.
A dark form separates from the trees and stalks toward us. Lyta and Lykou immediately whip out their blades, but I stop walking and raise my chin. I could recognize that gait anywhere.
Apollo stops before us, balancing dual swords like my own. “I will help you.”
“We don’t need your help,” Lykou growls.
Apollo’s gaze flicks among the three of us. “The Achaeans have desecrated my temple, and the temples of my family. Agamemnon and his men are due a visit from me.”
“But Zeus bound your powers,” I say.
“With or without Olympian magic, I’m deadly with a blade.”
Of that, I know very well.
Lyta rolls her eyes and marches on. “As long as you’re more helpful than you were in Foloi. I had to save you from being skewered by a centaur twice.”
“In my defense, I was wounded from taking an arrow for Daphne,” Apollo says, following.
Guards patrol the reaches of the Achaean camp in twos and threes. We’re at the base of a cresting dune, lying on our bellies in the sand. With a wave of his hand, Apollo blends our group into the shadows. We watch them pass for an hour.
“They have no pattern,” Hippolyta whispers.
“Makes it harder to infiltrate the line. Cannot predict when the next scouts will pass,” Lykou says with equal quiet. “Must be Odysseus’s idea. He is the army’s strategist, after all.”
“When the other kings allow him to have any say, that is.” Apollo leans forward, watching as another pair of scouts pass below our dune. “There’s been lots of bickering among the kings since they landed on Troy’s shores.”
“Where were your insights before I lost half of my army?” Lyta’s voice cuts through the darkness with deadly calm.
“My father has kept me firmly under his thumb.” I can feel Apollo’s gaze on me. “But I have my limits.”
Hippolyta mutters something under her breath that I do not hear as three more guards patrol beneath us, bearing shields with Ajax’s white snake.
Apollo points beyond the men to three temples. “Those are for Hera, Poseidon, and Ares. The Achaeans have stored their food in my brother’s temple, thinking that he will protect it from rot and rats. I have infested that building again and again, but the food remains safe. Either my brother’s powers have grown substantially since I last saw him, or another goddess aids him. The prisoners are kept in Hera’s temple, and I cannot see what they keep inside Poseidon’s temple. No doubt they believe that Hera and Poseidon aided them when they crossed the Aegean, so they believe their stores are safe there.”
“Are they?” I ask.
Even deep in shadow, I can see a wicked smile pull at the corners of Apollo’s mouth. “No.”
“You and that sunshine brat can free the prisoners.” Lykou points at my face. “Hippolyta and I will take care of the food.”
The Amazon grins. “It will be an absolute joy to break into my father’s temple and knock over his statue.”
Heady pleasure thrums through me at the image, including Lyta smearing Ares’s face across the marble floor, snapping his spine beneath my heel.
“Should I worry about that look?” Apollo whispers, grinning.
“We move. Now.” Lykou goes first and we follow, careful of our every breath and sound.
We split into two, Apollo on my heels as we flank the southern side of the camp and make a beeline for Hera’s temple. Her golden statue is like a beacon in the night, lit by the fires around her.
The deeper into the camp we trek, the more crowded it becomes. There is no laughter in this army, no sounds of happiness or even mourning. As if a sickness swept through.
A slight drizzle has started to fall, plastering my hair to my face. I press against the canvas wall of a tent as a man passes, followed in quick succession by five more.
“Do these men never rest?” I whisper to Apollo at my side. “Or do they just meander the camp at all hours of the day?”
“There is something dark at work here, even fouler than the meddling of Ares.” Apollo leans close, his lips brushing my ear.
A rumble above sounds Zeus’s irritation at that very fact. The lightning that cracks across the sea in the distance does nothing to stir the men around the camp. They barely look up, continuing to slog through the muck.
“We should have come up with a plan before barging in here,” I say.
Apollo grins. “Not having a plan never stopped you before.”
“My point exactly.”
I peer around the corner of the tent.
Two men sit in morose silence on a soaked rug, staring blankly at the plates before them. The food on the plates, though fine and not littered with mold, looks untouched.
“What I would give for a soft caress, right now,” one says. His hair is dotted with white. Far older than the typical soldier.
“All the lovely ladies are being hoarded by the kings,” the other gripes. “But we could fuck the rats that seem to infest this place if we were truly desperate.”
I steal one of their cloaks. Apollo’s walk is that confident prowl I hate to be on the receiving end of, but it works. Nobody gives us a second glance as we cut through the camp. Nobody doubts our motives, or our attire.
We’re mere yards from Hera’s temple when Apollo catches me by the wrist and holds up a finger. “Wait.”
I open my mouth to ask him why, but he points over my shoulder. I turn and look toward Ares’s temple in the distance, on the other side of camp.
“No. Anyone could see us here.”
He shakes his head and rolls his eyes to the sky. “Do you have to argue with me about every little thing?”
“I just love when you roll your eyes, Apollo,” I snicker quietly as I walk. “What was it you called it? An endearing, mature habit?”
“Glad to know that you at least listen to me, even if you always ignore me.”
“Too bad you haven’t found a way to break free of your father’s bind on your powers. Invisibility would be helpful right now. Or that ring Hermes stole,” I say as I look for a place to hide.
Apollo’s standing so close I can hardly breathe. “The Ring of Gyges?”
“I think that’s what he called it. Let’s wait in that tent.” I point to a dark one just beyond our goal, the shadows beckoning. “Care to check it first to make sure that Nyx isn’t lurking within?”
“You could do that yourself, you know.” Apollo eyes the soldiers that pass.
“Her scent.” Like a field of overgrown lavender.
There’s none of that here, thankfully. I usher him inside and we press into the folds of the canvas. Apollo’s body curves into mine in the tight space. Behind us, a set of silk curtains partition what must be the sleeping quarters of another soldier. Hopefully he doesn’t come back anytime soon.
“I feel like we’ve been here before, kataigída,” Apollo says, voice like silk. He breathes, and the muscles of his abdomen press along my chest. I look up into his face, suddenly breathless.
Swallowing, I say, “I don’t think we were ever forced to hide in another man’s tent last summer.”
“No”—he reaches up and brushes a lock of my hair behind an ear—“but I keenly remember the feeling of your body against mine beneath a dark sky.”
“The circumstances were very different.” I soften the words with a light chuckle. “How much longer do you think Lykou and Lyta will be?”
“I’m in no rush.”
I meet his eyes, the brilliant blue dimmed in the shadows. The barest hint of a beard brushes his sharp chin, the scar I noticed on his cheek barely visible but still definitely there. The mortal Apollo I fell in love with lingers beneath the surface of this god.
“Nothing good ever comes from falling in love with a god,” I say. “Please don’t ask it of me.”
“Not for mortals, no.” He cups my face. “But I’ll wait.”
“What does that mean?”
A barking laugh cuts off his answer, if he was planning on answering. Two men stride past us into the tent. I was so distracted by Apollo that I didn’t even notice their approach. What else did I miss?
It would be impossible to miss the next laugh, and the voice that follows it.
“You live in such squalor, Pyrrhus.”
“I do not have the luxury of furs and ladies, Patroclus,” my brother says. His brilliant red hair shines as he lights the oil lamp in the corner.
Apollo wraps an arm around me, pulling both of us deeper into the shadows of the tent flap’s folds. The scent of roses and musk wafts over to our space. As unmistakable as a hand around my throat. Aphrodite’s power fills the tent. Curiosity and horror raise the hair on the back of my neck. Of course her help would be two-sided.
“I have offered my own furs many times.” Patroclus reaches out and grazes my brother’s bicep with a narrow finger. “As has Achilles. Many times.”
“I will earn those furs.” My brother pats the threadbare cloak he uses for a bed.
“You have, sýntrofos. Tenfold.” Patroclus’s voice is gentle, like my brother is a wild animal that needs coaxing. Which might not be too far from the truth.
He very well might be an animal still. I wonder how much of the stag lingers in Pyrrhus like the wolf in Lykou.
Apollo’s arm around me is firm and warm, pressing around my back to pull me against his chest. It’s an effort to hold my breath so that my brother doesn’t hear us.
“I would be nothing without you and Achilles.” Pyrrhus looks down at his callused hands. “A traitor to my country and king.”
“The mistakes of your family are not your own.” Patroclus’s legs tangle with my brother’s. “I know that very well.”
I catch my lip between my teeth. Heavy footsteps barrel for Pyrrhus’s tent. Apollo’s grip tightens as Achilles passes us, throwing aside the partition.
“Starting the party without me, lads?” The warrior king’s profile is hungry as he looks over my brother and his lover. Their lover.
“We would never.” Pyrrhus’s eyes burn into Achilles.
Heat flames my cheeks as the Myrmidon swoops down to sit between them. His perfect lips capture my brother’s with expert ease before next claiming Patroclus’s. My mouth pops open, and I slowly turn my face into Apollo’s chest.
With Olympian quiet, he whispers, “Perhaps we should have chosen another tent.”
I’m saved from spying further on my brother by the acrid stench of smoke. A gray plume begins to fill the tent, suffocating the goddess of love’s floral scent.
“What in Hades’s realm?” Achilles barks a curse and leaps to his feet.
All three men storm from the tent. A fire roars on the horizon in the unmistakable direction of Ares’s temple.
“That’s going to infuriate her father,” Apollo says.
The temple is living flame, reaching higher and higher into the cloudy sky. It rages hard, the rain barely touching it, and even from here, I can see the hot mist that forms an impenetrable barrier around the temple. Soldiers from every corner of the camp run toward the fire. Commands are shouted, lost in the roaring din.
“Let’s go.” I lead the way between the tents, pulling my cloak tight.
There are no guards to hinder us when we reach Hera’s temple, though. A great boulder has been placed in front of the temple door. I merely nod at Apollo and he begins rolling it away. His muscles ripple in the distant firelight. He clenches his teeth, spitting as the great stone finally moves from the doorway. It tumbles from the promenade, falling to the earth with a great crack.
Thunder rumbles above our heads, blanketing the crash and giving us a moment more. I stride into the temple, sword raised.
Women cower against the painted walls. They are all bloody and haggard. Achaean trophies.
My lips curl around a dozen curses. “May Nemesis burn this entire camp to the ground.”
Sword raised above the lock holding all the women’s chains in place, I turn to Apollo. “Did my brother know about this?”
Apollo’s grim silence is answer enough.
Sparks alight in the cramped temple, illuminating the teal and purple peacocks painted on the walls. The women whimper and huddle together, even when the chain between them goes slack. Their feces are everywhere, these women forced to lay in their own filth. Bruises dot their arms and legs, many sporting blackened eyes and broken lips.
How could Hera just let this happen? Some of these woman are wives, surely. They all have families. She is the goddess of marriage and women. I can’t understand how her hatred of mortals, of me, is so strong that she is willing to forsake her own image. Anger rips through me, clenching my muscles and making me grind my teeth. I tuck that feeling away, to use later, and grab the nearest and oldest of them roughly, dragging her to her feet. She cries out, her halo of pale blonde curls oily and flecked with sand.
I cup her face with both hands. The whites of her eyes are wide.
“Listen to me.” With my thumbs, I brush away the tears that stream down her cheeks. “We haven’t the time to sit and cry. There is no room for fear or pain. We must get these women out of here, now.”
Her eyes shutter, then go blank. Her lips press in a firm line.
Apollo’s hand lands on my shoulder and gives it a firm squeeze. “Let me.”
He gets down on his knees before the woman. “Chryseis of Lyrnessus. Sister, cousin, priestess.”
She looks at him, her eyes still carefully blank.
“We cannot begin to understand what has happened to you and these women, but I do know that if we wait only a moment longer, it will happen again. My sister cannot protect you. Hera and Athena and Demeter cannot protect you, either. You must protect yourselves now.”
I’m keenly aware of the growling army just outside, looking for blood. It won’t take them long to check here for those responsible for burning their food stores.
Chryseis blinks, then turns to the women still cowering against the wall. With the command of a queen, she says, “To your feet now!”
On weak and bruised legs, the women tentatively stand. I usher them out, but when the god of music moves to follow, I lay a firm hand on his chest.
“I need you to stay.”
Hurt flickers in his eyes, gone in an instant.
“Not because I don’t want you to follow, but because I have no chance of getting all these women out of here without one last distraction.” I press up on my toes and lay a gentle kiss on his cheek. “Make them fear you, Apollo.”
“A distraction I will give you, kataigída,” he says. He pulls free his swords and holds them aloft.
I turn my back on him and hustle the women through the camp. They stumble and fall, but courage seems to have finally taken root in their heels, because nonetheless they fly. We pass empty tents and break through the final line. I usher them over the dunes.
A bloodcurdling scream pierces the night. Three Achaean soldiers charge for us as we crest the sand.
The women break for the line of cypress trees and I whip out my twin swords. The Achaeans meet me on the sandy expanse. I swing out a kick. One ducks, but another doesn’t have time. My heel meets his jugular and he goes down. Two to go. I’m a cyclone of black metal, parrying the soldiers’ swings and jabbing in the next movement.
One soldier roars as his blade cuts toward my midriff. I spin from his reach and plant my sword in his spine. His roar echoes into the night, no doubt attracting every soldier’s attention for miles.
My heart leaps up into my throat, but I swallow it down. The soldier I kicked has finally regained his footing. I aim another blow, this time catching him in the groin. As he doubles over, I pounce for the third and final soldier. His blade meets mine in the air.
A wild scream erupts from behind me. I have just enough time to duck before a sword slices the air above my head.
And imbeds in my opponent’s neck.
The man’s body thuds to the sand. Hippolyta towers above it, panting. “Themyscira sends its regards.”
Lykou runs up after her and grabs my hand. “We have about thirty Achaeans on our tails. Run!”
We sprint, catching up to the straggling escaped prisoners. The thunder of hooves echoes behind us, slowed down by the low branches of the cypress trees and the mud still lingering on the plains.
“Open for Hippolyta of the Amazons,” Lyta screams as we cross the final yards to the northern gate.
We reach it as a volley of arrows sing overhead. Men and horses scream from behind me as the deadly tips find their target. The door opens, frustratingly slow. The freed prisoners squeal, trying to force their way through the crack.
I spin around in time with Lykou and Hippolyta, swords aloft and ready to defend them in their final moments of freedom. A man leaps down from his horse and charges us. He is quickly felled. But more men follow, one after another.
My arms ache and lungs burn. The rain has stopped, the air now humid and warm. Lykou’s dory spins, iron head cracking a man’s skull. His blood sprays my feet and legs. We back up as another volley of arrows fly overhead.
“Hurry,” Hector yells from behind us. “We won’t hold the gate open for much longer!”
“Are all the prisoners inside?” I bark over my shoulder.
Lykou can afford nothing more than a curt nod. He jabs his dory at an encroaching soldier and the man dances from his reach.
“Let’s get inside, then.” I grit my teeth, tasting sand.
We back up, weapons out. I’m the last to pass through the gate. A dozen of Troy’s strongest men rush forward and slam it shut, sliding the locks home with a thud of finality.
And I finally allow myself to smile, watching the former prisoners run forward and embrace their loved ones. My elation quickly disappears as Paris strides forward.
“Are you insane?” His face is red with fury, brown hair flaring behind him. He strides right up to my face and jabs a finger into my collarbone, hard enough to bruise. “Your recklessness almost lost us the city. If those soldiers got through the gate…” He spits at my feet. “All the deaths would have been on your shoulders.”
“What about Achaean deaths?”
We turn toward Lyta. Something sparks in her eyes, something that I thought had died with her sister.
“What did you say?” Paris is incredulous. “You think that any men you killed on this foolish mission are worth what we could have lost?”
“I don’t usually deal with what-ifs.” Hippolyta picks her nails with a dagger. “But I was referring to the Achaeans who will die the slow, painful death of starvation now that we’ve set all their food on fire.”
Everyone quiets. Paris takes a step back from me. His finger is still raised, but it curls into a fist that he drops to his side. He turns from Lyta to me, a sneer lingering on his face. “I will talk to my father about this.”
He leaves, followed by a battalion of Trojan soldiers. Lykou claps me on the back. His hand rests on my shoulder, gripping it tight. I look up at him. His sharp features are brushed with dried blood. Mud flecks his black curls, which fly as he shakes his head, grinning.
I rub my face and release a shuddering breath. I can’t even remember when we first arrived in Troy, or how long we’ve been preparing for war and fighting it. Has it truly been that long since Artemis brought me to Olympus and Zeus commanded me to fight in Spartan games?
Apollo’s face flashes behind my eyes and I sprint for the stairs that run along the wall, taking them two at a time. I’m gasping by the time I reach the top. I spin, looking out over the battlefield to the smoky Achaean camp beyond.
I may have defended Troy all this time, but there was nothing defensive about what I did tonight. All this time, my loyalties have been as hazy as Hermes’s. Tonight, though, was a very firm declaration that I fight for Troy.