Chapter 46

Cas came back and said he didn’t know what kind of sheets I liked, but he left cotton, microfiber, and silk in both bedrooms. Pax and Benji pointed it out before I could really notice, but Cas was going to need me to care for him just as much as he was going overboard to take care of me.

I cared less about the sheets right now. I was putting on a brave face, but Athena and Hannibal were still out there somewhere. Pax said Hannibal was the leader of the Coalition. He was an egotistical, greedy fuck, and this was going to make him look bad. If my friends didn’t find him, he’d be doing damage control.

The Coalition had sympathizers everywhere, even law enforcement. He’d want us rounded up and placed back in our little torture boxes. The chances of him finding this place were pretty slim since humans hadn’t so far. Not unless a certain god who was still pissed I dared get raped in her temple decided to swoop in and tell him.

Which I wouldn’t put past her. The whole fucking reason I ended up in a Coalition basement was that Di had to leave for work and she swooped in and fucked up my life just recently. Her magic was running through my veins because of her curse, so she could always find me.

I was getting dizzy and having trouble breathing. My heart was pounding, and I felt hot and cold at the same time. I actually thought I was dying. Maybe Athena found me and finally decided to put me out of my misery.

I was in Cas’s arms in seconds and being pressed between Cas, Benji, and Pax. I knew they couldn’t protect me from a god, but I instantly started feeling better.

“Breathe. You’re having a panic attack. Focus on me. Name three things about me. Anything and they don’t have to be nice,” Cas said.

“Your eyes are insanely blue. That white hair looks super soft. And I can’t get over how good you smell.”

“Good. Now, name three things in this room.”

“You all have really good taste for not having a woman live here. It’s also very clean. Those paintings on the wall are amazing.”

“Your heart rate has slowed. How are you feeling?”

“Better. I can’t believe that worked. The last time that happened was right after Poseidon and Athena and there wasn’t really a name for it. I thought I was dying then, too. It’s just been so long since it happened, I forgot how bad it felt.”

“I had them, too, when I escaped. There wasn’t a name for it then either, but Cas helped me through it. It gets better,” Benji said.

I needed to warn them about Athena. I couldn’t let anything bad happen to them.

“Athena didn’t just curse me thousands of years ago and send me on my way. She keeps popping up when I get settled and happy and blowing up my life. It was her fault I got caught by the Coalition. Athena won’t bother me if Di is here, but he won’t come back until his work is done and right now, he’s focused on New Eden Asylum. She could blow all of his up and send the Coalition here. If you want me to leave, I understand.”

“Never,” Pax said. “We’ve got precautions in place.”

“She’ll tear through any wards you have set. She’s a god.”

Cas shook his head.

“I don’t think she would expose this place to get to you. All Di told us was that we were rescuing a god-touched green witch, and dropped enough hints that it was Athena. We did a deep dive into Athena because we thought we were on one of her hero quests. She’s the patron god of heroes and there are a lot of those in this village. Some of these people are Coalition victims turned people who help them.

“We just helped a lot of people and so did you. I lead one of the biggest networks for getting supernaturals out or away from the Coalition if they think they’ve been had. I don’t know what Di meant about you being the key to stopping them, but maybe Athena has figured that out, too. You’ve met her and we haven’t. Do you think she’s petty enough to make every single supernatural in the United States suffer?”

I blew out a breath because the answer should have been no. Athena was a brilliant strategist, and she always saw the bigger picture.

“Athena is a patron god of heroes and the arts. She’s a god of war, but she’s also the god of peace. She’s not usually about taking innocent lives, but she cursed me and Arachne. It wasn’t my fault Poseidon raped me and Arachne beat her fair and square. Athena is not exactly rational when she thinks she’s been wronged.”

Benji just laughed.

“I did my research, too. She’s the fucking Patron God of Heroes, which means she isn’t going to come here herself. She can hero bless some fucking humans to do her dirty work and betray every supernatural who ever worshipped her and trust me, there are people in this village who still leave offerings to her or she can calm her ass down and let you be.”

If Athena was creeping on me, I hoped she heard that.

“I don’t know what they used to take me down when Athena showed up and broke my glasses. Same with the gas in the basement. I was helpless and out like a light. Pax told me they were disbursing angel tears in the air. I don’t know why, but it took away my magic. They might be humans, but they can do a lot of damage.”

Now Pax was laughing.

“So can black salt. We’ve got a ring of it around the village for protection and we refresh it every full moon. We also have some pretty boring precautions against humans. Cas owns the town at the bottom of the mountain. He takes care of it and the people down there. They know he lives up here with a bunch of folks that aren’t really bothering anyone and have a copacetic relationship with a bunch of local businesses.

“I’m sure they suspect we are supernatural and they don’t give a shit. I know if someone showed up and said the Coalition had us and they needed their help to bring us back, they’d tell them to get fucked and run them out of town. They are all good people down there,” Pax said.

Cas just gave me this goofy grin.

“If she tries to rally anyone else, it’s going to be pretty expensive for them. I don’t own the mountain, but I own the valley. People have tried to take it from me for the longest time. We used the old forge to make some really tall poles and had the eagle shifters and pixies stretch magically infused rope across the entire valley.

“It’s an added layer of protection and apparently really pretty if you’re flying over, but it also let me trademark the valley as a work of art. No one has bothered me about buying my valley again because it got really expensive to talk to me. No one with any training is going to go into the mountains blind to fight supernaturals.

“Humans are greedy as fuck. Most of them like money more than they like being heroes. It wouldn’t be too hard to find out I have a lot of money and so do most of the people who live here because we are so old. They’d have to take all of us to avoid getting sued into oblivion.”

“Public opinion wouldn’t be on their side,” Pax said. “The tide has really turned on rounding innocent people up. The only reason some people still think the Coalition should still be around is that they believe the propaganda that they are only snatching us when we break the law.

“We have this whole place wired with cameras. If our wards are breached, the footage is not only going to get sent to Cas’s network, it’s set to live stream so everyone can see we weren’t doing a damned thing wrong when they invaded our home. They are welcome to try, but even if they manage to take us, the public outcry would get us all released soon.”

I shuddered. That was honestly a lot I didn’t want to deal with when I could barely stand up.

“I swear to shit, if Di meant me getting my ass beat by the Coalition while it gets live streamed for bringing them down for good, I’m going to find a super creative way to get back at him.”

“We all will because fuck that,” Benji said. “Mates don’t do that. I went to Save Mart and bought tampons. Di needs to learn to carry his weight if he wants to be a sister husband.”

“You bought tampons?” I asked.

What was happening right now?

“You don’t even want to know what happened on the tampon aisle at the Save Mart, just know Kat and a human woman nearly beat his ass. Why don’t we table that conversation until the morning? You’re exhausted, and it’s been a long night. Why don’t I show you to the extra bedrooms?”

I was exhausted and looking forward to sleeping in an actual bed. There was also a part of me that was terrified and overstimulated after being out of that windowless cell for the first time. I hated that cell, but there was also only one entrance. If anyone tried to breach it, I just had to look at them.

This place was cozy but unfamiliar. It had a ton of natural lighting, which the green witch in me loved because there were plants everywhere, but the part of me that had been kidnapped couldn’t stop thinking about how easy it would be for someone to get to me from one of those windows.

I could feel a panic attack coming on again at the thought of sleeping alone, but I had three amazing mates here who had done nothing but take care of me since they broke me out. Benji seemed to have big opinions about the Save Mart, but he went anyway and bought me tampons.

“Can I sleep with one of you? I don’t want to pick and I probably never will. Can I sleep with one of you and it not be complicated?”

Cas chuckled and kissed my forehead.

“We’ve got separate rooms for when we want privacy, but the beds in each room are big enough that you can comfortably sleep with all three of us.”

Seriously, how perfect were they? I would have felt safe with one of them, but all three were even better. Everything they’d done here was amazing, but the only thing that would stop Athena from showing up herself was Di.

I could relax and that missing part of me would be complete when Di got here.