24 Ariadne

24

Ariadne

I wake up to a text from Asterion.

Asterion: We have a problem. Minos wants us to move forward next week. Doesn't care about casualties.

I read it, then read it again. It still takes my sleep-clogged brain another minute to process what he's saying. What it means. "No." I sit up. "No, no, no." If the tower comes down like that, without Hera and the rest having an opportunity to come up with a reason to evacuate the building, a lot of people will die, and I'm a special kind of monster because even knowing that, the first thing my mind jumps to is my brother.

Hera won't protect him if we defy her. She might throw me to the wolves, too, so I won't even have a chance to do it myself. I fling off the sheets and call Asterion. I barely wait for him to pick up to say, "I thought you had this under control."

"I thought I did, too." He sounds tired, more tired than I've ever heard him. "I'm working on it, but he's already given the command to the team. The plan is in motion. His plan."

My stomach lurches, threatening to revolt. "What do we do?"

"You don't have to do anything but stay safe. I'll handle it."

That's lovely of him to say, but my safety is not guaranteed. More than that, I have a skill set that might actually be useful. "I can help, Asterion. You know I can. I wasn't joking about wanting to be involved."

"If your father finds out you have any connection with this, he won't wait around for me to kill you. He'll do it himself."

I press my hand to my chest and try to breathe through my racing heart. He's right, but either I'm content to sit on the sidelines and let him take the risks or I'm an equal partner. If I don't convince him to take my help, people will die .

Zeus was always going to die and you were okay with that .

I ignore the snide little voice inside me. "He's going to try it soon anyway. He's not one to sit around and twiddle his thumbs when his orders aren't being obeyed. It's only because the tower has taken priority that he hasn't sent someone else after me."

"Ariadne…" He curses. "No. Absolutely fucking not. You're staying out of this. You won't be able to live with the guilt if something goes wrong."

I ignore the fact that he's probably right. "Who's working the tech side of things?"

He sighs. "You're not going to let this go."

"I'm not."

"Fine." Another low curse. "It's Mars."

I don't have much interaction with my father's people, but I have spent plenty of time going through their records. Information is power, and maybe Icarus and I are using the same playbook, because I'd had a faint thought of finding secrets to use to blackmail them if things got particularly bad. The difference is that I didn't find much. Just a few gambling debts and mistresses. Nothing my father would care about enough to give me ammunition to use against his people.

Mars doesn't have any dirty secrets. Like a lot of my father's people, they were a street kid that he brought in as a teenager. They're well liked by the others on Aeacus's team, and they do a pretty decent job of hacking and whatnot.

I'm still better. "When are you meeting with them next?"

"A couple hours. They aren't early risers, so it'll be after noon."

Not long. I would have liked a few extra days to ensure I'm not missing anything, but such is life. "Text me when you're about to leave. I'll meet you somewhere and pass you the information I find before then."

"No." He keeps going before I can protest. "I'll come to you. That fiancé of yours already knows that we're working together, so he can give me access. There's no reason for you to risk yourself."

He wants to come here . Again. With permission this time. I look around the ridiculously luxurious room and feel a strange stab of guilt. "I'll talk to him, but I can't guarantee anything."

"You'll figure it out." He hangs up without saying goodbye.

I glare at my phone, my irritation at the way he ends calls almost enough to override the anxiety that swells in response to this new information. Things were always dire, but now the stakes are higher than they've ever been. For once, I'm not even worried about myself.

Hundreds of people go through the doors of Dodona Tower on any given day. Maybe upward of a thousand. Maybe more. Multiply that by every building in the immediate vicinity, and we're talking about catastrophic losses.

I can't let it happen. I refuse to.

I drag in a breath and pull a robe on. Dionysus came home sometime in the early hours of the morning. He tried to be quiet, but I haven't slept well since arriving here—aside from the night he put a sedative in my wine. It's impossible to ignore the danger I'm constantly in. I have no doubt that he doesn't want to hurt me…just like I have no doubt that if Hera decides I'm more trouble than I'm worth, Dionysus is going to step aside and let her people cut me down.

His room is the one part of the penthouse that I haven't investigated, so it feels strange to pad down the hallway and knock lightly on the door. When there's no answer, I sigh and bang on it. "Dionysus! I need to talk to you."

"Come in."

I hesitate, but only for a moment. His room is bathed in shadows, courtesy of the blackout blinds pulled down over all the windows. I suppose it makes sense, seeing as how he's a night owl. Even so, I'm not walking into that darkness. "Can I turn on the light?"

"Hold on." He curses and there's the sound of him fumbling around for a moment before a lamp flicks on.

Dionysus's bed is startlingly normal. I don't know why I'm so surprised. It's a standard king, and though the thread count is no doubt exceedingly high, the comforter and sheets—both gray—are downright mundane.

He rubs a hand over his eyes. "As much as I adore your lovely face, this had better be good."

Just like that, I remember why I sought him out. "It's actually really bad."

"That's what I was afraid of." He motions for me to continue. "What's gone wrong now?"

I know it's not technically my fault, but I can't help feeling guilty as I relay what Asterion told me. I finish in a rush and then swallow hard. "He doesn't want me meeting him out in public right now because it's not safe, so he requests that you allow him up here."

" Requests. " Dionysus snorts. "More like he gave an order and probably threw in a threat of violence for spice."

I flush because he's mostly right. "Well, uh, more or less."

"Okay." He curses again. "Okay, give me thirty minutes to pull myself together. Can you get coffee going?"

I don't know why I expected him to just hand this problem off to someone else. Dionysus might be a bit flighty and irreverent, but he seems to care more than most beneath all the intentionally distracting trappings. I back out the door. "Of course."

"Ariadne."

I stop. "Yes?"

"We'll figure this out, one way or another." He makes a face. "I doubt the solution will be one anyone is particularly happy with, but we'll ensure that building doesn't come down with all those people in it. I promise."

I want to believe him. Truly, I do. Unfortunately, I've seen what my father and his people are capable of. Even with Asterion working against him, there are no guarantees. But arguing with Dionysus won't accomplish anything. Maybe he's even right. Maybe this will all work out and there's some simple solution that I just haven't thought of.

Maybe.

I back out of the room and shut the door softly behind me. Exactly thirty minutes later, a freshly showered Dionysus appears, wearing his dressing robe and slippers. He catches me looking and shrugs. "I'm awake, but there's no reason I can't be comfortable." It takes me a few minutes to doctor his coffee just how he likes it, and then he sits across the kitchen island from me. "Okay, first order of business. If the Minotaur gives his word that he's not going to murder me horribly, he can have access to the penthouse. Today."

I don't miss the limit he puts on it, but I don't hold that against him. If I were him, I wouldn't want Asterion coming and going freely from my personal residence, either. "Thank you."

"You understand that I have to call Hera and the rest of them in. Or at least update them. We might have been willing to stand by and allow that tower to come down, but without the ability to get innocents out, this changes things significantly."

I'm also aware of that. I don't know what that means for Asterion, for Olympus, or for me. It's tempting to ask Dionysus, but I manage to hold the question inside. He's not the one I made a deal with. Hera is.

"Ariadne." Dionysus holds his coffee cup in both hands and peers at me over the rim. He's as serious as I've ever seen him. "I get that this isn't your fault, or your brother's, for that matter. But Hera is…" He sighs. "You have to understand. Your people are a direct threat to ours."

I try for a smile but give up halfway through. "I understand. My deal with Hera won't stand if I can't uphold my part of the bargain. As for our marriage—"

"It stands." He takes a long sip of his coffee and sets it aside. "Your Minotaur is fearsome indeed, but he's only one man. He can't protect you in this city. I can, at least to some extent. But depending on how things go with Hera, it might be wise to send you to the countryside until this is over. One way or another."

I stare. Of all the things I expected him to say, this wasn't even remotely on the list. "But you don't want to marry me."

"Darling, I don't want to marry anyone ." He shrugs. "But if it has to be someone, why not you? We get along well enough, and you're not looking for something from me that I have no interest in providing."

It strikes me that, under different circumstances, I wouldn't mind being married to Dionysus, either. He asks very little of me and is incredibly generous in return. There's definitely a mutual understanding and respect between us. Marriages were built on less.

But I'm in love with someone else. After having experienced a taste of that , entering into a marriage that is, strictly speaking, a business partnership holds no appeal. Even with Dionysus.

"I can't leave him." I say it softly, feeling my way. "I can't leave either of them. If Asterion keeps following my father's orders, he's going to end up dead. And Icarus…" I swallow hard. "My brother needs me." I think he needs more than me, but as much as I am growing to respect Dionysus, that doesn't mean I trust him explicitly. Not with my brother.

Dionysus presses his fingers to his temples. "You're not making this easy, love."

"I know. I'm sorry."

"Fine, fine, you've convinced me. Take your wayward brother and the monster of a man with you to the countryside. I'll spin it as removing a weapon from Minos's quiver. It's a weak argument, but by the time I give it, you'll be gone."

I don't tell him that it's a Band-Aid, and not even a good one at that. If war comes to Olympus—and it's going to—the people who reside in the countryside around the city won't be immune from the conflict. It's still a sweet offer. "Why would you do that? I know that I've helped out Olympus, but I'm still little more than an enemy."

"You are." He picks his mug back up and stares into his coffee as if it may hold the answers he seeks. "But you're also a victim of your own circumstances and birth. And enough people have been hurt in this mess."

Pan. That's who he's talking about. It's on the tip of my tongue to ask how Pan is or if Dionysus has spoken to him since the attack. I don't. It feels cruel to point out that in our own ways, we've both done plenty of harm to those who don't deserve it.

So I just say, "Thank you."