10. The Heraion
The Heraion
Andie
The first thing that hit me when I awoke was the headache. My head was pounding hard enough to make me scream. Gods, just how much did I drink last night?
No… Something else was wrong here. Hangovers didn’t smell like cypress and oleander.
I forced my eyes open against the stabbing daylight. I was surrounded by white walls decorated with much too familiar-looking carvings. Gauzy curtains drifted in the breeze from an open window. The humidity settled on my skin like a second layer, thick and cloying.
The sheets were pure silk, expensive and soft against my bare arms. I pushed myself upright, ignoring the protest from my skull.
My mouth tasted like cotton and copper. The last thing I remembered was the damned Eurydice-themed wedding.
The bride’s sister had said something that triggered absolute chaos. The cake had fallen. Then, nothing.
“What the hell happened?” I murmured to myself. “Where am I?”
There was only one way to find out. I threw off the sheets and crossed to the window on unsteady legs.
The view stole what little breath I had left.
Endless Aegean blue stretched to the horizon, waves catching sunlight like scattered diamonds.
White buildings cascaded down the hillside below, their architecture ancient and weathered.
Olive and apple trees dotted the landscape, their leaves shimmering in the breeze.
It took me seconds to realize what should’ve been obvious from the start. This was the Heraion in Samos. My mother must have kidnapped me while I was unconscious. Because that’s what Olympians did. They took what they wanted, when they wanted, consequences and consent be damned.
I was once again the captive of my blood. “No. I don’t want this.”
“I know,” a familiar voice said from behind me. “But it’s what you need, anyway.”
I pivoted on my heel and turned toward the door.
And there she was, my mother, wearing a pristine white robe that somehow managed to look both ancient and expensive.
The fabric draped perfectly despite the humidity.
Weather-appropriate elegance, because Helena Winters never looked anything less than flawless.
“I’m so glad to see you awake, dearest,” she said, her voice emanating maternal kindness.
I would’ve believed that tone once. When I was six and she’d bandaged my scraped knee, singing Greek lullabies while I cried.
When she’d been my whole world, the sophisticated mother who showered me with attention and gifts.
Before I’d been old enough to see the rot underneath House Hera’s perfect facade.
Before I’d chosen Elias and Robert over her manipulation and control.
“We were so worried about you,” she continued.
“We?” I turned from the window to face her fully. “You and who else? Do Elias and Robert even know you’ve kidnapped me?”
They weren’t here. My fathers weren’t here to stand between me and her, weren’t here to protect me from the family I’d rightfully rejected. The absence carved hollow spaces in my chest.
“It’s not a kidnapping.” Helena closed the door behind her with careful precision. “You’re only here to receive help. You need it.”
“The only thing I need is to be away from you and Alexander Stormwright.”
The slip I wore suddenly felt wrong against my skin, the fabric scratching like burlap despite its silken softness. Helena moved closer, her expression shifting into something almost vulnerable. Almost human. “You’re not wrong to blame me and him for everything that’s happened.”
“Good. Because I do.”
“But it’s a little more complicated than that.” She stopped a few feet away, eyeing me with cautious eyes. “You’re under a curse.”
The words hung in the humid air between us. A curse. Like this was some fairy tale instead of my life being systematically destroyed by Olympian politics.
“A curse,” I repeated flatly. “You dragged me, unconscious, across international borders to tell me I’m cursed?”
“The Hera Curse.” Helena’s composure cracked at the edges, something desperate bleeding through.
“It’s why you can’t stand Alexander’s presence.
Why you attacked him at the wedding. Why every event you plan falls apart into violence and chaos when he’s near.
It’s an ancient affliction that affects House Hera Omegas when they form connections with House Zeus Alphas. ”
“So you’re saying this is my fault?” I asked in disbelief.
“No.” She shook her head, the silver streaks in her dark hair catching the sunlight. “I’m saying this is our fault. Mine for not warning you. His for not staying away. The curse doesn’t discriminate when assigning blame. It just destroys everything in its path until someone stops it.”
“Then why were you acting so friendly at the Fairmont wedding?” I stalked toward her, my bare feet slapping against the cool tiles. “If he’s the source of this curse, if he’s destroying my life… Just keep him away from me and be done with it.”
“That’s not the way it works,” my mother answered between gritted teeth. If I hadn’t known any better, I’d have said she was shaking.
“Then explain how it does work,” I hissed. “Use small words so your cursed daughter can understand.”
“It is a curse of jealousy and anger, Andie.” Helena bit her lower lip, uncharacteristically hesitant.
“When he is absent, you will always suspect him of seeing other women. When he is present, you’ll always despise him.
The paranoia feeds on itself, growing stronger with each cycle.
Now that the curse is active, you can no longer afford to turn him away. ”
The logic twisted in on itself, a snake eating its own tail. Stay away from him and go insane. Stay near him and want to murder him. Perfect Olympian solution. There was no real solution at all, just choosing which variety of suffering to endure.
“So your answer is what? Lock myself in a room with the man I hate most in the world?” I almost couldn’t believe my ears. “Force myself to accept his presence until the curse decides I’ve suffered enough?”
“There are treatments. Methods House Hera has developed over millennia—”
“If there were methods, you’d have already used them,” I shot back. “This is just another one of your Olympian games. Another way to control me, to force me back into the fold I rejected. You’re lying to me.”
Helena didn’t answer. Something inside me snapped. All the rage and terror of the past months erupted through whatever thin control I’d been clinging to. I lunged at her, my hands reaching for her throat, for her robe, for anything I could tear apart.
White-clad figures materialized from the shadows, as if they’d been waiting for exactly this moment. Four House Hera priestesses moved with coordinated precision and caught me before I reached Helena.
They pressed me down to the floor with a terrible gentleness.
It was almost as if they were restraining a child mid-tantrum rather than a grown woman fighting for her freedom.
One priestess held my right arm, another my left.
A third braced my shoulders while the fourth positioned herself to block any attempt to reach Helena.
I thrashed against their hold, but they’d done this before. They knew exactly how much pressure it took to immobilize someone without leaving bruises. It was professional control practiced over centuries of dealing with cursed Omegas who’d lost their minds to a divine affliction.
“Let me go!” I yelled. They ignored me, my protests as meaningless to them as my free will.
The door opened again. Another figure entered, this one wearing House Hestia robes. The healer’s presence carried that distinctive warmth all Hestia Omegas possessed. It was like standing near a banked fire, and any other day, it would have brought me comfort.
“Helena, is this really necessary?” the woman asked.
“I wish it weren’t,” Helena murmured. “But you know in your heart that it is.”
The healer crossed the room with measured steps, her amber eyes holding genuine compassion. She knelt beside me where the priestesses held me immobilized.
“My name is Cassandra Reed,” she offered. “I’m sorry that you have to experience this… discomfort. But we’re trying our best to help you.”
The laugh that burst from my throat bordered on hysteria. “Discomfort?” I twisted against the hands holding me, achieving nothing except making my shoulders ache. “Now you have House Hestia doing your dirty work, Mother? This is low, even for you.”
Helena just looked at Cassandra with pleading desperation. “Cassandra, go on. Help her.”
The distinctive House Hestia healing fire manifested around the healer’s hands. Cassandra raised her palms toward my face, keeping her movements slow and steady.
“Don’t touch me.” I tried to jerk away, but the priestesses held me in place. “Don’t you dare—”
Cassandra’s hands pressed against my temples. Heat flooded through my skull, not burning but soothing. The healing fire flowed through my body in waves of impossible comfort.
My muscles started to unclench despite every screaming instinct to fight. The unbearable rage began to ebb, quieting to something manageable. My mind became a little clearer.
I tried to fight it. Tried to hold on to the fury that had sustained me through Alexander’s stalking, through my fathers’ worried looks, through every sleepless night. But the healing fire didn’t care about my determination or my justified anger.
“Stop,” I whispered, too weakly for my liking. “Please stop.”
“I’m sorry.” Cassandra’s voice seemed to come from very far away. “But the curse has damaged more than your mind. Your body is suffering too.”
The healing fire intensified, spreading through my chest, down my arms, into my legs. The priestesses’ hands on my body felt less restraining now, more like anchors keeping me from floating away entirely. My eyelids grew heavy despite every attempt to keep them open.
“You’re going to be all right,” my mother insisted. “I promise, dearest. You’re going to be all right.”