One of Sebastian’s eyebrows arched with amusement. Whatever. I bet she’d been waiting
It was true, though; he had been stone. . . .
“Unfortunately, Auntie Athena is not dead,” Menai went on. “She’s in a world of hurt, which is nice for a change. But she has those who are loyal to her, and she is fighting your curse, Ari, and slowly winning.”
I rubbed my neck. “And . . . ?”
“Recall your power from her body. Once the Hands are found, she wants you to resurrect her child. In return she will untangle the curse placed upon you.”
I let out a laugh. And there it was. In the span of a few hours, two offers to lift my curse where before that notion had seemed like an impossibility.
“There is no one more able to set you free than the one who cursed you in the first place,” Melinoe added.
I shared a glance with Sebastian. Anger swirled in his eyes. We both wanted Athena to pay for her crimes. She’d not only hurt us both, but she had also killed so many of her own monstrous creations, turning on them, using them, torturing them. . . . We had a better understanding of why she’d gone nuts and killed or imprisoned most of the Greek pantheon, including her own father and several brothers and sisters, and then going on to wage war on other pantheons. Her father had attempted to murder Athena’s infant child. But none of that knowledge diminished what she had done. None of it.
It killed me that I’d stood right in front of that broken statue known as the Hands of Zeus. I’d looked upon those strong marble hands holding a basket with an infant child, and had never known the significance. Never known those hands were the
Athena wanted the Hands because she thought I could bring her child back to life. And she might be right. I had all the power of a gorgon, but I could also bring back to flesh that which had been turned to stone. I’d only done it once, and the result of that effort was standing by me with a frown on his handsome face.
“And once I’m fully human and she’s healed, I’ll be dead with the flick of her wrist. No thanks.”
“She said you’d say that,” Menai responded. “Athena is willing to offer blood-bound vows to leave you and anyone you name unharmed. I would suggest thinking long and hard about that, for your wording must be perfect. But she will make the vow, Ari. If you’re the one to find the Hands, you’ll have something she’d die for, has started wars for, killed her own father for. You will hold power over the Goddess of War. Think about that. As a gesture, she gave this to me to give to you.” Menai handed me a glass vial filled with Athena’s blood. “When you have the Hands, use her blood to open a gateway to her temple. Or send an emissary to set terms for a meeting. You might not want to visit our neck of the woods, given what happened last time. If the Hands are found without your help, she will send me to escort you to her temple for the resurrection.”
I took the vial. “What do you know about the Hands?”
“I was born last century, so not much.”
“And you, Melinoe?”
“I am much older. But I am forbidden to speak of it.”
Sebastian crossed his arms over his chest. “Forbidden or don’t want to?”
“I speak of it and I am no more,” she said simply. “That was the vow I was forced to make to the goddess, like everyone who survived her war and ended up at her mercy.”
“Are you forbidden to talk about who Athena was involved with before the war?” I asked. “Romantically, I mean.”
Traditionally, Athena was a virgin goddess. But that was in ancient times, over two thousand years ago. And maybe back then she was, but so much of what happened between then and now was mostly unknown. One of a few things we did know was that she had given birth to a child.
“I should not speak of it,” Melinoe said slowly, as though considering the repercussions.
Figured. I stared at the vial in my hand, feeling the warmth of the blood through the glass, even though it should have been cold by now.
“So?” Menai prompted. “What should I tell her?”
I was tired, tired of all the fighting and drama. I just wanted it to be over with. Maybe the best answer was to give Athena what she wanted, so all this would just go away. “Tell her I’ll think about it. Tell her to leave us alone, and I’ll look for the Hands.”
“Good enough,” Menai said. “See you around, god-killer.”
Menai turned, coming face-to-face with Henri, who stood with his back and one boot braced against the wall. “How’s the tummy, shifter?”
His hand went to his stomach, where Athena had shot him with his own shotgun, but his gaze stayed steady on Menai. Henri was definitely into her. “It hurts. You want to rub it?”
She laughed. Menai stepped up to him, cupped his jaw and kissed him right on the mouth, and then sauntered out of the house, leaving Henri shocked and infinitely pleased. “Hell, if I knew getting shot in the belly was all it took to get her attention, I’d have done it sooner.”
Melinoe followed Menai, but as she went to step over the body by the door, she stopped and knelt by the creature. “Still clinging to life,” she murmured with a soothing voice, like an angel of mercy.
The creature lifted its head, looking pathetic and hopeful. A pang of empathy went through me. I knew from experience that not all of Athena’s creatures were mindless killers. Some were intelligent, starved for attention, or starved for an end to servitude and torture.
Mel ran her white hand over its head in a comforting gesture. The creature closed its eyes and shuddered, leaving me wondering if it had ever been touched so gently before. But it wouldn’t see the angel of mercy tonight. Mel placed her black hand over its forehead. Its body trembled, then arched up as she lifted her hand, pulling a black haze with a bit of brightness in its center from the creature’s head. When the haze withdrew completely, the creature’s body went limp and its head fell to the side.
Mel turned her hand over, staring raptly at the soul in the palm of her hand. Then she crushed it in her fist. Light spilled from the seams in her fingers and then died out. She opened her hand, glanced over at our astounded faces, and blew the ashes at us like a kiss good-bye.
An eerie silence descended in the wake of her departure.
Dub sat down beside me and let out a loud exhale. “That chick’s messed up. Makes the rest of us freaks look like the all-American family.” He shivered. “Gave me the heebie-jeebies. She’s even weirder than Vi.” He gave Violet an affectionate smile, which she returned. At some point she’d come back into the foyer, and I wondered how much she’d seen.
“I like her,” Violet remarked as she stared at the open door.
“Yeah, we could tell.”
Crank stepped over the bodies, head down, searching. She stopped and pulled her hammer from one of the minions’ skulls, made an “ick” face, and, muttering about how gross it was, took her hammer into the kitchen.
I got up, needing to shake off the creep factor Mel had left us with. “I don’t know about you guys, but I’m hungry.”
“Hungry,” Henri repeated flatly. “Standing in a room full of dead monsters and you’re
“What? I worked up an appetite.”
Sebastian’s soft laugh drew my attention. “It’s not like they’re going anywhere, Henri. We can drag them into the backyard and burn them later.”
We all went back into the kitchen as Dub regaled Sebastian with his awesome ironlike baguette.
FOUR
THE IDEA OF DRAGGING CORPSES through the house and into the backyard was met with a lot of groans
