31

31

To Know Your Enemy

I stare into swirling gunmetal-gray eyes as, on the heels of realization of where we’re sitting and how we’re touching, awkwardness steals through me. It slowly stiffens each individual part of my body, working its way from my center out until I’m hyperaware of every place we touch. Of how I want to move even closer, press into him.

I’m twenty-three years old, and it’s never been more obvious to me than now that I’ve never been held in the arms of a man. Ever. I need to extricate myself from this situation before I do something foolish. Like straddle his lap, lay my head on his shoulder, and ask him to just hold me.

“Lyra?” He wants an answer to his offer.

I’m not processing. The wiring in my brain has short-circuited, and oddly, the only random thing I can think about is… “Are you affected by my curse?”

He hesitates. And I have my answer. He can’t feel anything real or lasting for me. No one can.

“I need you,” he finally says.

I blink, trying not to let that make me feel anything and focus on the truth. “Right. You need me to win, and to do that you need me functioning.”

I once found a small dog near the entrance to the den’s tunnels. Pledges aren’t allowed to have pets, so I carried him to the nearest animal shelter. The look he gave me when I left him there…that’s what Hades reminds me of just for a second. A sort of lost kind of hurt.

It disappears under a mask of boredom in the next blink, so fast I question what I saw as he takes his hand away from my face.

“If it makes you feel better to believe that, go ahead,” he says. “Do you want to take me up on my offer or not?”

To help Isabel.

Oh gods. Here I am thinking of straddling him when I should only be thinking of what happened. I’m so all over the place right now. Out of control.

“Yes.” My next words come out on a harsh, accusatory whisper. “No one deserves to die that way.”

He searches my eyes. “No.”

“These Labors are fucked-up.”

“I know.”

“We’re not disposable,” I tell him, anger burning away the last of my despair. “Mortals. You gods toy with us like you think we are.”

Hades lets loose a sigh almost as heavy as I feel. “The others do because for them, mortals come and go. Blips. If you think about the lifespan of a butterfly from a mortal’s perspective, so short compared to yours…” He shrugs. “You think of it as a beautiful but doomed thing that is here, then gone too fast to get attached.”

“But we don’t delight in crushing that beautiful thing under our bootheel, either.”

Hades doesn’t defend himself or his fellow deities, and I lift my gaze to study his face, what’s behind the look he’s giving me. “You said the others do,” I say slowly.

His brows twitch up. “So?”

“You don’t think of mortals like that?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

That expression, the lost one, returns. “Because they all come to me in the end.” Those nine words are so laden with burden, I don’t know how they don’t crush him.

It hits me for the very first time that the King of the Underworld is exactly that. A king. The ruler of every soul ever to believe in the Greek gods and end up in his realm after they die. A ruler who must punish and reward the lives those souls lived. A ruler who must know the heartbreak of the people left behind in the mortal world when a loved one passes, because he’ll see those souls, too, eventually.

“We’re not butterflies to you,” I whisper. “We’re eternity.”

His eyes flare briefly with something savage, but he doesn’t speak.

My eyebrows draw together as I think through that, shaking my head. “But you forced me into the Crucible like you didn’t give a flying—”

“I believed you were strong enough to survive the Crucible. There are other reasons, but I did think that.” He winces. Hades actually winces. “I didn’t realize you’d have such a soft heart under that tough shell, though. I’m sorry.”

I stare at him.

“What?” he asks.

“You apologized.” Astonishment rolls through me. “I didn’t know gods could do that.”

His mouth crooks to one side, flashing a hint of the dimple there. “Don’t let it go to your head, my star.”

“Right.” The endearment makes a little part of me think maybe he must care a tiny bit to bother, if only in a vague, guilty way.

I’m not sure how to feel about that. It’s easier to think of him as a callous, selfish, even malicious deity who is just playing his games at any expense. Particularly mine.

“You were really mad at me,” I whisper. What pit of the Underworld did that come from?

Hades shakes his head. “I was…” He glances away. “Frustrated. When I’m truly mad, you’ll know it.”

I’d rather not. “You can really make Isabel’s afterlife…nice?”

“Yes.”

My chin wobbles annoyingly. “Thank you for that.”

After only the briefest hesitation, he gives a single nod. Then he gets us both on our feet, setting me a little bit away from him. The discomfort of my sodden clothes finally penetrates, and I shiver, plucking at my shirt.

He glances down over me, and I try not to feel the prickles that follow in the wake of his gaze. Unaware of my struggle, Hades snaps his fingers. And now we’re both in a dry change of clothes, and I might as well have showered, I’m so clean, though my short hair is also dry. I’m wearing jeans, like he is, along with my tactical vest over a tailored white button-down rolled up at the sleeves. Imagine the amount of time that handy trick would save every day.

“I was so looking forward to another soak in the tub,” I grumble more to myself than to him.

Hades shrugs like he didn’t think of that. “You’d have just wallowed and cried in there.”

“No. That’s not me at all.” Although neither is the way I’ve been reacting since I showed up here. Embarrassment warms my cheeks.

Trying to look anywhere but at him, I glance around the room. The same one where he kissed me only yesterday, and suddenly that’s all I can picture. All I can feel. His lips on mine.

Stop thinking about kissing the god of death, Lyra.

“Hey.” His voice is soft again, compelling and yet harsh at the same time. “Don’t do that. Don’t tell yourself you can’t cry.”

I almost laugh. If only he knew what I was really telling myself just then. Thank the gods he doesn’t.

“It’s who I’ve been made to be.” I look away again, running a hand through my hair. “So…what next?”

“First, you are to make yourself at home here.”

I can’t help myself. Cocking a hip, I say, “I guess I’d better kick you out, then. I hate having visitors.”

Not even a snicker. “Are you done?”

I tilt my head. “You said I could be myself.”

Ignoring that, he beckons me to follow, and I do.

We pass through the door into the rest of his Olympus home, which is all blacks and reds with embellishments of gold popping here and there. No photos here, either, I notice, just like his penthouse. Then again, I don’t have any. Pledges aren’t allowed to have pictures or videos of ourselves. No proof that we exist, should we get caught.

He takes me outside into a courtyard at the center of his home, one filled with flowering potted plants, fountains, and the hazy pink light of evening. He doesn’t stop, walking through a gate that leads to a cobbled street overlooking the glory that is the home of the gods.

It’s just as stunning a second time around. Maybe more so, because the skies are turning dark lavender that blends into brilliant orange where the sun is starting to dip, and the colors reflect off the whites of the buildings, which are lighting up from the insides.

I frown. “It was just morning.”

Poseidon’s contest started first thing.

“We’re a long way from there, my star.”

Right. It’s a big world, and sometimes I need to be reminded of that fact.

“I have to go.” Hades points at the gate to the street. “You don’t pass this when I’m not here. Understand?”

“Um…” I do a double take. “What? Where are you going?”

He watches me from under his lashes. “I mean it, Lyra. The next Labor is tomorrow.”

Tomorrow? The fuck it is. And he thinks he’s just going to abandon me here tonight? “If it’s tomorrow, sitting on my ass in your house is not what I need to be doing. I need allies—”

“You’re not going to find any.”

The words hit me right in the sternum.

And even though I try to hide my reaction, he sees anyway, his jaw going tight. But he doesn’t take it back, either. “It’s not safe here on your own.”

Does he think I’m contemplating a leisurely stroll? “The gods can’t touch me.”

He takes a menacing step closer. “You think they won’t push the boundaries of that rule? And what about the champions? They have no such limitations.”

Which is why he should be doing this with me, damn it. “I have to.”

“No.”

I’m seriously considering hurling my axe at his face. “I can’t just cower in here and hope I make it through the next Labor without being eaten alive.”

He slashes a hand through the air. “Don’t be stubborn about this, Lyra.”

Stubborn? That’s what he thinks this is?

Being dumped with the Order so young and carrying the curse I do, I had to grow up in a godsdamned hurry. I take care of myself, and always have, because no one else was going to. Even trying to throw a rock at Zeus’ temple had purpose.

I cross my arms, glaring daggers at him. Instead of my axe, I hurl words. “Now that I’ve been through today, I know for a fact I won’t survive all these Labors without at least one ally. I don’t have time to sit around and wait on you to get back from… Where are you going? You didn’t answer that yet.”

The muscle in his jaw is clenching and unclenching now. “I have an Underworld to run.”

“Delegate,” I snap. “This is important.”

“And souls like Isabel’s aren’t?”

I take a step back, hurt tumbling into my anger in a toxic mashup. “You know that’s not what I meant.”

Blowing out a sharp breath, he spikes a hand through his hair, rumpling it in the sexiest way, and I resent the fuck out of the fact that I notice at all. “Can you put it off?” I ask.

“Not this.”

So much for being eternity to this god. I’m just another butterfly. Can’t he see that going through another Labor alone is a one-way ticket to the Underworld? Or is he such a loner that it’s not glaringly obvious to him? “I can’t, either.”

He eyes me sharply. “You’re not going to let this go, are you?”

“Would you?”

“Fuck,” he mutters. “Fine.” Then he gets right in my face, his eyes glinting like sharpened knives. “You have that damned axe and one pearl in your hands at all times. I’ll try to be fast.”

This close, I can see lighter silver around his irises. “Fine.” I echo his terse tone.

He hesitates, gaze dropping to my lips. Is he checking that his mark is still there to keep me safe if I have to use one of the pearls? The heat that sneaks through me turns to ice in an instant as he suddenly steps back.

…And then he’s gone.

I stare at the empty space where he was just standing, not entirely believing my eyes.

He did it. He really left me.

Meanwhile, I now get to attempt the impossible with my lack of charm, my curse, and my tether to the god of death, whom no one wants to see become King of the Gods. Ever.

Why is this my life?

Knowing that I’m right, that the chance to find allies before tomorrow is too important to miss, I make myself push through the gate and out into the street.

My skin prickles in the cool breeze. Not the good kind. The kind that feels like eyes are following my every move.