Antigoddess

yours. We die so you can live, just like always.”

“That’s not true, Cassandra,” said Odysseus.

“You’re blind,” she growled. “And you.” She turned on Athena. “I’m not helping you. Not here. Maybe not anywhere. I’m getting out of here. And you’d better find a way to tell Hera I’m gone.” The bruises on her throat cut inside like broken glass when she spoke. She had to turn away quickly to hide the tears prickling the corners of her eyes.

“Wait.” Athena reached for Cassandra’s arm. The goddess’s touch sickened her, ignited a heat deep inside her head and in her chest. Her arm trembled. She wanted them out, all of them; she wanted to break them down with her bare hands. The goddess’s grip was iron. Athena had forgotten everything about being soft, or compassionate, or human, if she’d ever known in the first place. Without thinking, Cassandra drew back her free hand and slapped Athena hard across the face. In the half second it took for Athena to recover from the surprise, Aidan got between them.

“I’m not going to hurt her.” Athena stood still, her hand against her face.

“Of course you’re not. You need me.”

Odysseus narrowed his eyes from where he stood at Athena’s shoulder. “Don’t be so sure. Might be just as smart to get rid of you. At least then Hera couldn’t use you either. Level the field a bit.”

Cassandra felt the muscles in Aidan’s arm tighten. Odysseus was lucky Athena stood in his way.

A half-hearted, hurried knock broke the tension just before the door swung open and Andie and Henry burst halfway through, blinking in the sudden change of light from the dark parking lot. Cassandra looked from them to Athena and back again. They’d sworn they would stay in the car.

“You were taking so long.” Andie fidgeted. The way she looked at Athena and Hermes, Cassandra knew her friend could sense something was off. Even if she hadn’t known there were gods in town, she would’ve sensed it —that something was unnatural about these strangers.

Andie stared wide-eyed at Athena’s slightly shocked face. Her gaze dragged slowly down and then back up without blinking, like she could discover some secret behind the human costume.

“She looks less human than Aidan. Even with those tattoos. Why is she looking at us like that?”

“Leave them alone,” Cassandra warned.

“But you told them already,” Athena said. “Hector and Andromache. They look so much the same. Untamed. And he’s still so tall and broad-shouldered. He could help, if we woke them up.”

“Don’t touch them. Aidan, don’t let her touch them.”

Odysseus gestured to Henry. “They’ll kill him too, if they find him. They’re after Achilles. That means they’ll kill anyone who could possibly stand against him, and that means Hector.”

“What are you talking about? Who are you?” Henry asked. Andie backed into him to get him to shut up.

“I know what you’re thinking.” Aidan stepped just to the center. “That you should just get it over with. Wrap your hands around their throats and let Odysseus bring them back. Then you’d have two soldiers instead of a pile of questions. But it should be up to them. Let them decide. That’s justice.”

“Since when are you the authority on justice?”

Athena shifted her weight, her eyes on the lines of Henry’s muscles. Cassandra nudged Aidan’s side, and he stepped farther forward.

“Aren’t you tired of using them? Aren’t you tired of moving them around and spending their lives like pocket change? You’re a monster, but you’re also a god. Don’t you have any grace?”

Athena’s eyes snapped to his. “It’s not like we have the luxury of time. It’s a hard choice, but this is why I lead. No one else has the stomach to do the unpleasant things that sometimes need doing.”

Odysseus cleared his throat. “Do they really need doing? Look at him.” He nodded toward Henry. “You already killed him once.”

Cassandra’s eyes snapped to Athena. Odysseus had caught her off guard. She didn’t know what to say.

“Take them,” Athena said finally.

“Come on.” Cassandra shoved them out the door like children. Aidan followed behind, but she still glanced once over her shoulder, half convinced that she’d see Athena coming after them with hooked fingers.

* * *

Athena listened to the car peel out of the parking lot. She thought of the boy behind the wheel. Hector. Who was now called Henry. When she’d stared at him, he’d stared back with strong brown eyes. Shell-shocked for sure, but he didn’t run. He never ran. That’s why it had been so easy to trick him onto the battlefield to face Achilles.

I lied to him. I put on the disguise of an ally and said he was blessed. That he wouldn’t fight alone. So he came and stood face-to-face with a madman.

She still remembered the look on his face when he realized he’d been tricked. And later, the look in his eyes when Achilles drove the spear into his chest.

Odysseus was right. She’d killed him as surely as if she’d thrust the spear in herself. Back then, Andromache’s screaming could barely compete with her own laughter.

“Well, now what?” Hermes threw up his hands and collapsed on the bed with a bounce.

“Athena.” Odysseus moved in front of her.

“What?”

“Your face.” He stared at her cheek, which still tingled where Cassandra had slapped her.

Tingling. Almost burning. But she’s just a human.

She twisted to look into the mirror. There was a red handprint painted across her cheek.

“Why are you smiling?” Odysseus asked.

Athena studied the impossible wound. As she watched, it tingled and burned deeper.

“Because even though Cassandra doesn’t feel any different”—she pressed a cool palm to her face—“she is different. More than a prophet. A weapon.”

18 FATE’S A BITCH

The scent of granite hung on the air. Whether it was real or just in her imagination, Athena didn’t know. The sleet had stopped, leaving the world wet and black in the absence of the sun. She inhaled; the scent faded. It probably hadn’t been there in the first place. The air was completely still, no breeze to carry news, or to dry the slushy puddles in the street.

It didn’t matter. She stood at the tree line along the highway where she and Odysseus had walked into Kincade. This was the way that Hera would come. She would follow them in, rising up behind them like some gruesome specter. The move had bravado. It had menace. Doing it any other way wouldn’t even cross her mind.

The city of Kincade was cut through by one large river and five tributaries. There was also a lake, Lake Reilly, medium-sized but quite deep, and fed into by the river.

Athena’s eyes scanned the horizon. The tributaries were no problem; they were too small for any water- dwelling bastard to move through that quickly. But the river and the lake were perfect hiding places for Poseidon. As for Aphrodite, well, they’d probably leave the sniveling brat back home. Or they would, if they were smart.

She heard footsteps coming cautiously up from behind. Odysseus. She’d only been gone from the motel for twenty minutes.

“What are you doing?”

“Getting my bearings,” she replied without turning. “Preparing for battle. Doing what I do.”

He came up to her shoulder and tried to rubberneck around the front of her to see her cheek.

“Quit it.” She jerked away. “It’s gone.”

“But what was it?”

“An injury put on me by a mortal. And if she can do it to me, she can do it to the others.”

“But it was just a handprint. I don’t even think she knew what she was doing. It could be nothing.”

But it wasn’t nothing. It was something. Only she had no idea what, and it seemed Cassandra wouldn’t have