CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX #3
“They would come at our call,” Rhad stubbornly upheld.
Scylla pursed her lips. “Perhaps, but they would die if they did. Even with their armies in your pocket you’d be no match for the collective force we possess.”
Honestly, she could be right.
“Deimos is just a place,” said Eacus. “Claiming it won’t make you Sovereigns.”
“No,” allowed Daedalus, “but dethroning you three will make the dominions bow to us.”
“Us,” Minos echoed. “The four of you intend to rule as one?” He let out a derisive snort. “That would never happen. You would kill each …”
The rest of his words got lost as a ringing sound built in my ears. It got louder and louder, until it was all I could hear. A crazy energy surged through me out of nowhere, flooding every part of me; awakening every nerve-ending; making my heart beat fast and erratically.
The energy kept building and building. My scalp tingled. The pads of my fingers buzzed. Vibrations ran through my teeth. My veins felt as though they were clogged by thick heat.
The sensations repeatedly stabbed at me—foreign and frightening and other.
I was distantly conscious of the sky turning black, of a breeze picking up, of a sense of static snapping the air taut. But I had no mental room to ponder on it. Not now, when I felt overloaded with energy that threatened to split me in half. It made my head feel heavy and full and overstretched.
Lightning flashed, zigzagging across the sky. Cracks of thunder boomed so loud I thought something had exploded. A howling wind abruptly picked up, whooshing over my skin and tossing my curls everywhere.
Then it happened.
Something slipped into my mind. Something powerful and timeless and ethereal. Something that pushed my own consciousness aside as it lowered my bow and arrow. “You would disregard what was declared by us?” The female voice was deep, cold, and echoed with a dozen other muted voices.
The robed figures stared up at me, their lips parted, their expressions various degrees of shocked.
Yeah, well, their shock had nothing on mine. Because the being currently wearing my skin was an actual goddess. Hellyne, Goddess of Fate and Rebirth.
I sensed the officiates near me begin to edge away, and I couldn’t say I blamed them.
She lifted a brow imperiously. “No one will speak?” A mocking huff. “You had plenty to say mere moments ago.”
Theseus cleared his throat. “Hellyne,” he realized, a combination of awe and fear in his tone.
“Yes, though I speak for all of us,” she said, her voice again carrying the muffled whispers of others—some male, some female.
Dread flickering in his eyes, Theseus raised his hands. “We mean no disrespect by coming here. Not to you. The Sovereigns have lost their way. They no longer lead, they only dominate. They do not deserve seats of power.”
“And you do?” She challenged.
He lowered his arms to his sides. “If we were to take the thrones at Deimos, we would rule fairly.”
“Deimos is not yours to claim. It was never yours.” Hellyne slowly turned her head to sweep her gaze over the Sovereigns. “Or yours. You rule in our steed; no more. And I would have to agree that you have lost your way.”
“We merely ensure that the half-bloods ruling the dominions get no grand ideas to overthrow us,” said Minos.
She flicked up a brow. “And the humans? What grand ideas could they possibly have? What makes you believe you have the right to treat them as you do?”
Minos visibly fought a snarl. “If it bothers you so much, why have you not interfered? You care nothing for what goes on in this realm, in truth. You care nothing for us.”
“You care nothing for yourselves. None of you do,” Hellyne accused, addressing the Sovereigns and robed figures below. “You only seek to destroy and fight and conquer. Your hunger for power has eaten away at your honor, mercy, and sense of loyalty.”
Just then, I sensed the laelaps creeping along the battlement to gather around me. No, around her.
“It isn’t power we seek, it’s an end to the current way of things,” Daedalus swore.
Hellyne shot him a dismissive glance even as she absently petted the dogs. “What you seek is war. Always war. You have fought among yourselves since you were children.”
“If that was all we wanted,” Scylla timidly argued, “we would have come here with an intent to attack. We didn’t.”
“But you plan to do so in the near future,” Hellyne pointed out. “You would ruin this city and kill its people in your bid to acquire it.”
Her cheeks crimson, Medea flapped a hand toward the Sovereigns. “You would leave them on the throne? They do not honor any of you.”
Hellyne granted her an arch look. “Nor do you. Only the humans have continued to honor us and pass on our teachings. Even though our children mistreat them, they have still not forsaken us.”
“And so you chose one for a Sayer,” Rhad remarked, a bite to his tone.
Hellyne pinned him with a somber glare. “We all chose Anara. It is a pity I cannot trust that any of the half-bloods here will respect that. Heed me when I say it would be a mistake to harm her. She belongs to us.” Again, several voices were mixed with hers.
“Why assume we would be a threat to her?” asked Eacus. “We have not harmed her.”
“You put her life at risk when you forced her to endure Xalbia,” Hellyne pointed out, her tone clipped. “Her death would mean nothing to you, despite that we anointed her. And if you won’t protect her, they will.”
Uh, they?
I heard a rumbling sound. Stone grating stone. Stone cracking.
Something exploded on the battlement a few feet away as bits of stone and debris went flying. A loud roar split the air and, oh hell, a damn dragon had broken out of the statue. It stretched out its wings and snarled down at the demigods there.
Three other explosions sounded, swiftly followed by more roars. And I knew without looking that the other dragons were now no longer statues.
Well, fuck.
Shock had me in a tight grip. Apparently, the entire race hadn’t died out during the Uprising. Four had in fact been encased in stone by the gods, just as some had believed.
Talon approached the winged beast a few feet away. It was a sight to behold. Fierce, majestic, and huge with serpentine gold eyes, shiny dark scales, a barbed tail, and wicked talons. Typhaos, I thought, recalling the drawing I’d seen of him.
He stared at Talon, his large nostrils flaring. The Cardinal held out his arm, and Typhaos nuzzled his palm. Something passed between them. A heart-squeezing moment of recognition and familiarity.
Hellyne again peered down at the newcomers. “Leave here. Do not return unless it is under a flag of peace. In exchange, there will be no retaliation for your actions here today.” She again looked at the Sovereigns. “That will gall you, yes, but you will let this go so long as they obey me.”
Minos ground his teeth. “What kind of rulers would ignore an attempt to overthrow them?”
“Rulers who seek to maintain peace, just as you were ordered to do when we first made you and your brothers the Sovereigns of Cathadonya,” Hellyne stated. “It seems you have forgotten that.”
Minos snapped his mouth shut.
Once more addressing every half-blood, she said, “Put down your metaphorical swords. Live and let live. Be satisfied with what you have. Cease fighting over what will never belong to you. Treat the humans better.” A pause.
“Or don’t. And endure the consequences.” With that silken threat, she disappeared in a rush.
I stumbled, my knees buckling. I blindly reached out and grabbed Khalida’s arm.
“You’re okay,” she soothed.
No, I wasn’t. At all. A freaking goddess had just spoken through me.
“The silver ring in your eyes is glowing,” Khalida told me.
I took deep breaths as the foreign energy inside me gradually subsided. It left a lingering though nonvisible mark, however. My skin remained hypersensitive, and my brain seemed to be operating a mile a minute.
Even stranger, the ‘call’ that had been plaguing me for weeks burned brighter. Sharper. Clearer. A divine call to listen, trust, and serve. I just hadn’t understood it before.
Talon slowly stalked toward me, balling up his hands as if wrestling back the urge to touch me. Unsurprising. I knew he wouldn’t do it in front of the Sovereigns. They were the type to use what mattered to you against you.
“We heard no whisperings of a Sayer,” Theseus claimed, as stunned as his companions. I knew their shock wasn’t merely a case of Sayers not having been utilized by the primordials in a very long time. It was that I—a human—could act as a divine conduit. It rightfully should have killed me.
Minos ignored that. “You heard Hellyne. Leave. Do not return.”
The four trespassers exchanged hard looks and took one long glance at me. Then, as one, they pivoted on their heel. They made no slow, casual retreat. They moved at inhuman speed as they vanished into the forest.
Rhad turned to a nearby Phoenixian. “Go. Send word to us if they do not vacate the isle.”
The officiate nodded, his wings snapping out, and then took to the air.
All three Sovereigns focused on me. I tensed, and the Laelaps edged closer to me protectively. At the same time, a grating growl scraped at the back of Typhaos’ throat.
His lips thinning, Minos turned to Talon. “Bring her to the audience chamber. There are things to discuss.”
Yeah. Yeah, I supposed there was. Still, watching the Sovereigns march off the battlements, I had the thought that I could honestly set fire to their audience chamber and think nothing of it.
Talon crossed to me, his neck corded, his prominent jaw tight, his muscular back ramrod straight. His usually expressive face carefully inscrutable, he studied me from head to toe, likely searching for a sign that being a vessel for Hellyne had somehow harmed me.
“I’m all right,” I rasped, my throat sore—likely from the strain of having a goddess speak through it. My teeth still tingled from the power that had coated her voice.
“You don’t look it,” said Khalida.
“My head aches. Probably because it’s recovering from briefly homing the consciousness of a freaking goddess.”
“The half-bloods always claimed a human would never be strong enough to act as a vessel for the gods.” She hummed. “It seems they were wrong.”
Yeah. And I really didn’t know what that meant for me. Or if the exiled half-bloods would return. Or if the Sovereigns would obey Hellyne in not retaliating. Or what she’d meant by how the seven half-bloods would ‘endure the consequences’ if they disregarded her warnings.
I knew one thing for certain: If the primordials returned and yet another war broke out between the gods and their descendants, we were all screwed. Every single one of us.