conquests and their offspring. Take Io. I transformed her into a cow so that she would escape your notice and your ire…'
'A cow. So gallant of you.'
'…and what did you do? Turned yourself into a gadfly and so tormented her with your stinging that she galloped halfway round the world in a maddened frenzy. If that's 'putting up with,' I'd hate to see what you're like when you truly take against someone.'
'Speaking as Semele's son,' said Dionysus, very drunk as was customary by this point in the evening, 'I admit that my stepmother and I have had our misunderstandings, but we have managed to overcome them. Yes, she arranged for me to be torn limb from limb, and yes, she wasn't best pleased when I was presented to her dressed as a girl in the hope that she wouldn't recognise me and realise I had survived her murder plot. Weren't fooled for a moment, though, were you, O Hera the Fulfiller? But then I'd never make for a very convincing female, not with this beard.'
'Maybe with those fat man-breasts of yours you would,' said Ares.
'Thank you and fuck you,' said Dionysus. 'All I'm saying is, Hera can be forgiving, in the end. The fact that I am here, in the bosom of the family, regarded as close kin, proves it. Same goes for the twins. For Demeter too. There aren't many wives who'd happily sup at the same table as one of her husband's ex-lovers, let alone become good friends with her.'
'I can be forgiving,' Hera agreed. 'But forgiveness is never boundless, Zeus. You'd do well to bear that in mind. There comes a point when enough is enough. An extramural indiscretion is one thing, but to flaunt it, to rub our noses in it, is quite another.'
She didn't look at Sam when she said this, but then she didn't need to. Everyone present was aware who was the true focus of these remarks.
'There are acts no wife should be expected to support or tolerate,' she added, laying down her napkin and pushing back her chair. 'Decide sooner rather than later what it is you want to do, my husband, or the decision will be made for you, forcibly, permanently, and in a manner that will cause considerable distress to one of the parties concerned. Do I make myself clear?'
So saying, she left the dining hall, and Athena and Demeter followed her out in a show of solidarity.
Zeus broke the ensuing awkward silence. 'Well. I, for one, have no idea what all that was about? Does anyone else?'
The joke fell flat. Only Dionysus found it funny, but then he was so deep in his cups that anything and everything seemed funny to him.
Hades, however, seemed very pleased by the turn of events, as though Hera's threat to Sam promised some kind of windfall for him.
66. MARTYRS
Sam stayed in her room for the next couple of days with a feigned illness, lying low, venturing out only to grab leftover food from Demeter's kitchen and scurry back to eat it alone. She had no desire to mingle with the Olympians, not now that Hera had so openly declared her hostility. Anyone could see that Zeus had been set an ultimatum. Whatever his intentions towards Sam were, he had better act on them, otherwise his wife would step in and cut through this particular Gordian Knot herself.
The impulse to escape, and the impossibility of it, warred within Sam, the one hemmed in tormentingly by the other.
On the morning of the third day, beginning to get stir crazy, she headed out into the frigid dawn air. No one else was around other than the ever-present, ever-vigilant Harpies, cawing and cackling on their roosts. She roamed, enjoying the semblance of freedom that being on her own gave her. Her wanderings took her eventually to a corner of the stronghold she hadn't explored before. Here she came across a low-built edifice, like a large mausoleum, sandwiched between a tall rock outcrop and the inner flank of the stockade. This had not been on the itinerary of the tour Zeus had given. Curiosity piqued, she tried to door, tugging on its large round brass handle. The door, banded with iron, did not budge. There was no evidence of a lock but something, certainly, was holding it fast. She circuited the building but found no other entry point, not even a window. Returning to the front, she searched for some outward sign of the structure's purpose but found none. It had one unusual feature, a copper lightning rod attached to the vertex of the roof, two metres long and greened with oxidation. Other than that the place was plain and nondescript, almost ostentatiously so, given the general grandeur and ornateness that could be found everywhere else in the stronghold.
Perhaps it was some kind of storage unit.
Or perhaps this is where they're keeping my TITAN suit.
The thought galvanised Sam. She'd given up her battlesuit for lost, assuming Zeus would have destroyed it by now, but if by chance it was here, if she could be reunited with it, then a bid for freedom stood a substantially improved likelihood of success.
She resolved to come back after nightfall armed with something she could use as a crowbar to pry the door open.
Moving on, she shortly found herself passing the entrance to Argus's lair: a gap in a rockface surrounded by a carved-out portico, with giant bas-relief peacocks standing sentinel on either side. She had no intention of going in. Even the thought of Argus — that blubbery malodorous body, that wire-sprouting head — gave her the willies. But then a low, rippling voice called out from within: 'Who's there? Someone's there. I'm picking up the sound of footsteps. I'm glad you've come. I need to talk to someone.'
Sam started tiptoeing away, but Argus became plaintive and insistent. 'Please. You must listen to me, whoever you are. It's urgent. Something important is happening. The mortals are up to something.'
That was too intriguing to ignore. Turning, and bracing herself for the smell, Sam entered the chamber.
'Oh,' said Argus. 'It's only you, Samantha Akehurst.'
'Only me.'
'I need Zeus. Would you fetch him? I have intelligence I need to share.'
'What's it about? I could pass on a message.'
Sam glanced around as she said this, and noticed that several of the screens were tuned to surveillance satellite images — orbital views of Greece and the Mediterranean — while on others there were news broadcasts showing smartly dressed people, quite possibly diplomats, stepping out of limousines and walking quickly into imposing buildings. One screen featured warships at sea, another a series of military transport aircraft taking off. This was as much as she could take in before, with an 'ah-ah-ah!' Argus swapped all these feeds for his peacock insignia. Hundreds of feather-mounted eyes glared reprovingly at Sam.
'Zeus,' Argus said. 'Not you. Kindly go and get him.'
She came back shortly with a yawning Zeus. He didn't tell her to wait outside, so she went in with him.
'A bit early for our morning update, isn't it?' Zeus said to Argus.
'I regret getting you out of bed, but it just couldn't wait. Although,' Argus added, 'perhaps this should be for your ears only.'
With a look at Sam, Zeus said, 'Perhaps I should be the judge of that.'
'But she's a mortal.'
'So she is. But presumably what you have to tell me is news from the mortal world, meaning other mortals will know about it already, so why not her too? Besides, Sam is one of us for the time being, whether she likes it or not. Your tact is commendable, Argus, but unnecessary.'
'As you wish, Cloud-Gatherer.' The screens reverted from the peacock to the disparate images they'd been showing before. 'This began late yesterday evening. I've been monitoring developments overnight.'
'What am I looking at?'
'We have what amounts to a military coup taking place in the United Kingdom.'
'What!?' Zeus exclaimed.
'General Sir Neville Armstrong-Hall is the instigator,' said Argus. 'Although he's calling himself Field Marshal now, because he believes Britain is on a war footing. He's invoked a law drawn up during the Cold War that's
