Selene ran.
She ran from the Pantheon. From her father’s decline and Theo’s disgust.
And eventually, as the sun cast its first piercing beams across the city streets, she found herself drawn once more to the River Tiber to heal the wounds to both body and soul.
The Host in Rome would never threaten her again, and with Saturn gone, any other secret branches of the cult would collapse. But death still stalked her father, and she couldn’t quite believe his Tartarus plan would work. As for Theo … It’s not the lack of his love that hurts, she told herself. I wanted him to find happiness with another woman—I truly did, for his sake. It’s the loss of his respect that feels like a javelin’s point drilled through my heart. With no passersby in sight, she sprinted onto the arcing bridge and stopped in the center, panting. I’ve stopped talking to him, even in my own mind, she realized. Why bother, when now I know he doesn’t want to listen?
She climbed over the stone railing. And jumped off.
She floated there for a moment beneath the river’s surface, her head suspended in sun-warmed water, her feet dangling in the murky cold. Her heart pounded with the memory of her near-drowning in the Lake of Mnemosyne, but she forced herself to stay submerged for another few seconds, letting the power of the fresh running water dispel her weariness and heal her battered body. With the familiar invocation to the Tiber’s rushing flow, she felt the whip slashes on her cheek knit closed. A warm surge of power flooded her limbs, returning the strength that Death had stripped from her.
She kicked her way to the surface and, bracing her hands on the ledge, hauled herself from the river. She sat on the lip, her feet dangling, water dripping from her hair and clothes to puddle around her.
The flowing water had fixed her body. Her heart still felt broken.
She’d run from the Pantheon, but she didn’t want to go back to her apartment either. How could she bear to face Flint’s pleasure when he realized she’d failed so utterly with Theo? Or Scooter’s grief when she told him their father was still in danger?
I want to go somewhere dark. Quiet. Deep in a forest, where there are no people to protect—or disappoint. Perhaps it’s time to change my name again. I wouldn’t even tell Scooter or Flint. I could just disappear.
But her father needed her to join the rest of the pantheon in his crazy quest, and she hadn’t freed him from the Host only to abandon him now. She hung her head and stared down at her hands. Such long fingers, their strength renewed by the Tiber’s waters. It will be many years yet before I fade away completely. And as long as I’m here on this earth, I have work to do.
There’s only one problem—I’m not sure what that work is anymore.
She closed her eyes and tuned her ears to the sounds of the just-waking city. Somewhere, she was sure, a woman begged for help. A child needed protection. A dog howled in pain. The Protector of the Innocent would hear their cries.
She sat there for a very long time. If the people of Rome called out for her aid, she couldn’t hear them.
Eventually, the sun set fire to Saint Peter’s gilded dome and dried the river water from her clothes. Traffic hummed along the streets; pedestrians crowded the bridge above her. Still, Selene didn’t move.
A steady flow of tears tracked silently down her cheeks. She leaned her elbows on her knees, her head bent above the river. The drops ran off her nose, disappearing from view before they joined the Tiber’s languid flow.
I miss New York, she finally admitted to herself. I miss my dog. I miss my river. I miss my island.
I miss Theo.
It took her another several minutes before she found the strength to return to the apartment where her family waited. Despite her newly strong legs, the five flights up had never felt so long.
To her relief, Scooter wasn’t there. She wasn’t sure she could bear to see him without losing her composure; he loved their father as much as she did. And he’d been the one to urge her to seek Theo out in the Pantheon in the first place.
“I’ll take care of Pop,” he’d said when they’d finished settling Zeus after returning from Saint Peter’s. “Go find your thanatos.”
“Why in the world would I drag him back into something he clearly wants to be done with?” she’d demanded.
Scooter laughed. “You really think he wants to be done with you?”
“That’s exactly what I think.”
“Then you’re a fool, sister mine. He loves you. He gave his life for you more than once. He might be pissed, but trust me, he’s willing to be convinced. Just shake your pretty hips and—”
Selene shot out a hand to grab Scooter by the jaw, gripping tight. “You forget who you’re talking to.”
Her brother wrenched away. “Ouranos’s balls, Selene, you’re a pain in the ass. I just mean that he may be a Makarites, but he’s only human. He can be persuaded.”
“Even if that was true—which it’s probably not—why would I try?”
Scooter rolled his eyes. “Because you love him.”
“I …”
Her brother had looked over his shoulder toward the living room and lowered his voice. “You’ve lived with Flint for how long now? Six months. And in all that time, did you ever feel for him what you felt for Theo?”
“It’s not—”
“Yeah, that’s what I thought. Flint may be damaged goods, but he’s got the shoulders of a god, he can’t keep his eyes off you, and I’ve heard he’s got a certain hairy appeal. Yet you haven’t fallen for him. In fact, if I remember rightly, you’ve fallen for two, and only two, men in your entire overlong life. Orion the Hunter and Theo the Nerd. One of them’s dead, and one of them’s waiting for you to come get him right now.”
She laughed now at the memory; she’d been a fool to believe Scooter. Her bitter humor quickly stuttered into a choked sob as she pinwheeled from self-loathing to grief. This emotional fragility is probably just another effect of my journey through the Underworld, she decided. That’s what’s wrong with me. She felt new and raw, her emotions bubbling too close to the surface for comfort.
Despite the early hour, Flint was awake, sitting at the dining table in the center of their small living room. For once, he didn’t have a pile of gears and wires in front of him. Nor did she see Mars’s spear. Flint had never condoned his brother’s bloody ways; no doubt he’d stowed the divine weapon somewhere where it couldn’t be used to hurt anyone. He looked tense, as if the whole time she’d been sitting beside the river, he’d been here waiting. His eyes went first to her bare neck—she hadn’t put back on his necklace. Hurt flashed across his face, but she didn’t have the will to explain. What would she say? It feels wrong to wear your gift with Theo back in my world? Why should that matter when Theo wanted absolutely nothing to do with her?
“Schultz isn’t coming back,” she said instead, “in case you’re wondering.”
Flint’s shoulders lowered; his face relaxed. She could’ve sworn he hid a smile beneath his beard. His obvious pleasure made her angry. But angry was better than despondent.
“Did Scooter get back from the Pantheon with Father yet?” she asked.
“Yeah. Then he went out again. Your dad’s taking a shower, and Saturn’s still locked up and unconscious.”
“Fine.” She considered telling Flint about Zeus’s Tartarus plan, but she knew the Smith would want nothing to do with it. Saving her father from brutal murder to prevent Saturn’s rise was one thing—saving Zeus from the inevitable decline they all faced was another. Eventually, she’d have to convince Flint to come so they could complete the pantheon, but she couldn’t quite summon the strength for that argument yet.
“Oh, and Father just brushed me off like a useless puppy,” she said instead. “So in case you’re keeping score, two more men I care about are leaving my life. More room for you. So congratulations.”
Flint’s lips tightened. He didn’t shout back at her or tell her she was being unfair. He didn’t need to. But a hint of red colored his cheeks, and his massive hands tightened on the edge of the table before he pushed himself upright. He wasn’t wearing his leg braces, and he had to hold on to the furniture to support his body. His withered legs buckled and twisted as he hobbled toward his bedroom.
I’m punishing him, and myself, for the pain I’ve caused, she knew. Theo doesn’t think I deserve to be happy—I’m making sure he’s right by pushing Flint away. She could reach out to him instead, seek solace in his strong arms and unquestioning devotion. But that felt like one more betrayal to add to her list of sins. Instead, she simply crossed her arms on the tabletop and buried her face in her elbows.
Exhaustion overtook her. Maybe Father was right. I need to regain my strength before Olympus. She couldn’t fathom the idea of climbing a mountain anytime soon. Zeus had said he had months, maybe years, before the fading overtook him. I should try to convince him to wait a bit and think this through, she mused wearily. His plan to rush off to Olympus and break open a mythical pit that might not even exist seemed half-baked at best. If I think he’s being reckless, then he’s really in trouble.
She didn’t realize she’d fallen asleep until a loud crash ripped her from her nightmares. She rushed toward the bathroom as Flint charged out of the other room in his leg braces.
Zeus lay naked beside the bathtub in a steadily growing pool of blood, the red brilliant against the white tile. One leg lay awkwardly over the tub’s lip, the papery skin of his calf torn open on the sharp rail of the glass door. He wasn’t unconscious, not yet. His eyelids fluttered, and his mouth worked wordlessly. His entire body seized and jerked, sending splatters of blood across Selene’s face as she bent over him.
“Help me,” she gasped to Flint, grabbing a nearby pillowcase and making a quick tourniquet on Zeus’s leg. Flint pressed another piece of linen against the wound. She held her father’s head in both hands so he would stop knocking his skull against the floor.
“It’s okay,” she said uselessly. “You just overdid it by going to the Pantheon. You’re going to be fine. Calm down, calm down, Father,” she begged. But she knew the spasms weren’t under his control. His chest heaved; water droplets ran down the stark tracks of his ribs to pool in his hollow stomach. She couldn’t avoid the sight of his penis—a limp, curled worm, nearly hidden by a nest of gray hair. Proud Zeus, lover of a seemingly infinite array of gods and mortals, now unable even to care for himself. She grabbed the bloodied bath mat and laid it gently over his lap.
Flint fetched a first aid kit from the medicine cabinet. In a matter of seconds, he’d bandaged the wound; Zeus wouldn’t die from blood loss. Yet the seizures didn’t stop.
“Please, Father,” Selene whispered, over and over, until finally, after what felt like an hour, his body stilled and his eyes stayed closed. She could hear his heartbeat from where she sat, but she pressed her ear against his chest anyway, wanting the closeness. “It’s erratic,” she said. “And very faint.”
Flint helped her hoist him into the bed. She dried him as best she could, then tucked an extra coverlet around his frail form. Another image flared to mind: her mother in a hospital bed, an old woman swaddled in a thin blanket like an infant. For all the pain of her mother’s passing, at least Selene hadn’t faced it alone: She had her twin beside her.
What would Apollo do now for our father? she wondered desperately. But then she remembered how he’d comforted her when she found him beside the Lake of Mnemosyne—with melody. Selene had never been much of a singer, even in her days as an immortal. The careful constraints of melody and pitch had been her civilized brother’s domain; she preferred the wild abandon of the dance. But now she reached back for a nearly forgotten hymn and sang.
“I will sing of Zeus, chiefest among the gods and greatest. All-seeing, the lord of all, the fulfiller who whispers words of wisdom—Help!” she begged Flint. “Sing with me.”
The Smith tried, adding his own tuneless, rough voice to hers. Finally, Zeus’s eyes crept open. He stared blankly at the ceiling above him.
She kissed his scarred cheek. “I thought you were gone,” she murmured hoarsely.
He clutched tight at her hand. “I will be,” he said, his voice barely audible.
“Stop it. Don’t say that.”
“I tried …” His face twisted with effort. “I tried to tell you. What little strength I have comes in fits and starts, but I’m dying, daughter. I thought I’d have at least six months, but I was wrong. I dreamed again of my fate—my death comes swiftly. Two days. Mount Olympus … Tartarus … It’s the only way. The only cure that can defeat death.” He slipped once more into unconsciousness.
“Seek the Wise Virgin,” Selene whispered. She chafed her father’s hands, willing him to wake up, to come back to her. “Not in Athens is her seat, but where the Virgin is tall. There the cure is the spear that can conquer the greatest foe.”
“What are you talking about?” Flint asked.
“It’s the prophecy.” She explained quickly how she and her twin had emerged into classical Delphi in their journey from the Underworld. Flint listened, wide-eyed. “I’d asked how to save an Athanatos from death,” she added. “I thought the oracle was just telling me how to get home, but maybe it actually explained how to save Father. The Wise Virgin holds a cure to conquer the greatest foe—death itself.”
“So then what was your father saying about Tartarus?”
She related Zeus’s plan to open the ancient prison, throw Saturn in, and let the divine pneuma escape to strengthen them all.
Flint grunted. “I thought we knew only sacrifice could return a god’s lost strength.”
“I know, but my father is the King of the Gods. He may know something we don’t. I thought we had more time, but obviously I was wrong. We have to try to save him.”
“But if he’s right about the pneuma from Tartarus, why do you need some wise virgin’s cure?”
“I don’t know! But Apollo told me that when death comes for those I love, I should remember his prophecy. He spoke as the Pythian God, and it was one of the last things he said to me—I can’t ignore the warning. But I didn’t understand Apollo’s prophecy then, and I understand it even less now. Who holds the cure? The Wise Virgin—I assumed the Pythia was talking about me.” She shook her head. “But no,” she answered herself. “I’m not a virgin anymore.”
She saw Flint tense, but she didn’t care anymore who knew her secret.
“The wise virgin.” He growled. “That doesn’t sound like you either.” He shifted away, as if he couldn’t stand to be close to her. “The oracle must’ve meant Athena.”
Selene flinched, surprised that his words could hurt. He was right; wisdom had never been one of her attributes. And yet she couldn’t help feeling he’d just called her stupid. Anger—more at herself than at him—flattened her lips. Since when do I let a man’s opinion of me matter?
Before she could form a retort to Flint’s insult, Zeus moaned in his sleep and began to shake. All Selene’s ministrations could not soothe him. His heart continued to beat unevenly and too slow. No singing or prayers seemed to help. Flint stayed in the room, but he had no words of comfort or advice.
“Maybe you should just leave,” she snapped at him finally, frustrated by his looming presence.
“I don’t want to leave.”
“Then do something.”
His jaw twitched. “Tell me how to help and I will.” He sounded like a man compelled by forces outside his control. But he didn’t leave. Even now, when he knew she’d shared her body with Theo, he stayed beside her, bearing the blows of her anger like a caged bear with a broken spirit. And I’m the cruel mistress with a whip, Selene thought with a stab of guilt. She felt tears prick at the back of her eyes and took a deep breath to center herself. Flint must have seen the shame on her face because he didn’t ask her to apologize. He simply reached for a glass of water on Zeus’s bedside table and passed it to her.
“Drink,” he ordered. “Your body is still recovering.”
She obeyed, then found the strength to say calmly, “If Athena is the only one who can help, then we need to find her.”
She watched his nostrils flare above his pinched lips. Just like Theo, he wants this to be over with. But unlike Theo, he isn’t walking away.
“The problem is,” she continued, “that she’s been in hiding for thousands of years and doesn’t want to be found. I warned my father that we might need her to make the ceremony on Mount Olympus effective—that must be what the oracle meant. She’s the only one who can cure Father. We have the clues to find her. Her seat is where she’s tall. What does that mean?”
“For Athena, I would’ve thought that meant the place with her colossal statue—atop the Acropolis in Athens.”
“Except the Pythia said specifically, ‘Not in Athens is her seat.’”
Flint grunted, clearly frustrated. “Then I have no idea.”
“What about all your fancy technology?”
“She’s the Goddess of Wisdom. If she wants to stay hidden, there’s no way she’s got a damn Twitter presence.”
Selene dropped her head in her hands. “You’re right. If it was that easy, Scooter would’ve found her a long time ago.”
“And even if you could find her,” Flint said defensively. “You wouldn’t convince her to come. You remember Athena never liked you, or me, or any of the other Athanatoi—especially your father. She won’t listen to us.”
Flint was right. As a virgin like Artemis, Athena had nothing but disdain for the male gods of the pantheon. Her relationship with their father, Zeus, had been strained to say the least. And she was equally competitive with most of the goddesses. It was the battle of egos between Hera, Aphrodite, and Athena that had started the Trojan War. But there was one group to whom Athena had always shown favor: men like Odysseus and Perseus. The great Greek heroes who relied on the Gray-Eyed Goddess to help them in their epic quests, to lend them her cunning, her strength of arms, her indomitable will. All those men had shared the same title: Makarites. Blessed One.
Selene groaned aloud. Theo doesn’t want to help, she knew. And I certainly don’t want to ask him.
But it looks like neither of us has a choice.