65

65

Aphrodite’s Labor

“This is definitely the most unusual start to a Labor so far.” I say this to Aphrodite, who gives me an enigmatic smile and flutters her ridiculously long eyelashes.

She’s back in va-va-voom mode in a light-pink, figure-hugging strapless jumpsuit that looks, of course, amazing against her warm beige skin and long, black hair, which she’s let hang down in luxurious waves to her backside. “It gets more unusual, I promise,” she says in that husky voice that only makes it harder to put what I was doing with Hades a mere hour ago out of my mind.

What I was feeling with Hades an hour ago.

With Hades.

The god of death.

I’m not going to be cliché and ask myself what the hells I was thinking. I know exactly what I was thinking…that it felt fucking fantastic.

And that’s all well and good, but the real question is…after this is over, assuming I survive, what could we possibly ever be to each other?

There is no future for a mortal and a god.

Besides, what I should be focusing on right now is yet another Labor—and not dying so I can get around to making any plans at all. Although the way this challenge is setting up, who knows how that’s going to go.

Because I am strapped to a narrow bed.

Sure, it’s a comfy single bed with pink silk sheets—this is Aphrodite, after all—and what’s strapping me down are fuzzy hand and ankle cuffs, also pink. The cuffs connect to a scrolling iron headboard and footboard. I would think this was Aphrodite’s way of having her wicked way with me if the other champions weren’t here, all strapped to similar beds, like an odd rainbow made of our uniforms, as we’re lined up by virtue. Black at the end, of course.

“Welcome to your sixth Labor,” Aphrodite purrs. “This time, your survival isn’t the focus. Love is. Today, your task will be finding someone special.”

The one I love most.

A fact that creates an ache in my chest I’m trying very hard to pretend isn’t there.

What will happen when no one is waiting for me? Or—and this might be worse—someone is, and it’s humiliating.

An image of Hades taunts me.

“Two gods will be aiding me today,” Aphrodite says. “Hypnos will put each of you into a deep sleep. Then Morpheus will send you into dreams. In your dream, you must find the mortal you love most in the world.”

Mortal. I almost laugh my relief. No awkward conversation with my patron god in my future.

I focus on Aphrodite. This sounds too easy for the others, who probably already know their someone, at least—so clearly, the twist is coming. If I could, I’d cross my arms and settle in to wait for it.

“They will be trapped in their own dreams in a place particular to them. So to find them, you must figure out who it is and think only of them. Your dream will take you to them. It may not be who you think.”

That’s worse than I thought. I have to think of them?

“When you find them, telling them you love them is what will release you both from the dream. Bring them back to Olympus to end the Labor. If you don’t return with them before sundown tonight, they will die.”

See. There’s always a twist. Always with death on the line.

Aphrodite’s smile turns sly. “If you do wake them successfully, this person will then play in the next Labor with you…as a partner.”

A second twist? Oh goody, and lucky us. I suppose Aphrodite must, if anything, outdo the other gods just to prove she can.

She holds out a hand, and, with a shower of pink sparks, two objects float in the air above her palm—a bow and a quiver of arrows. “The first person to free their loved one wins the prize of Eros’ bow and arrows. These arrows only induce a temporary adoration, lasting a few hours at most. But in those few hours, that creature—man, beast, or…” Did she just glance at me? “…god…will not be able to resist you or say no to any request you make.”

Assuming the winner can aim a bow and arrow and hit a target properly, that should be fun to watch.

Aphrodite looks at each of us in turn, making direct eye contact, and just that much is enough to make me relax a little. As if she has the power to reach into my soul with a single glance and tell me that everything will work out.

“Now…” She waves a theatrical hand. “Dream and go find love.”

Hypnos looks exactly like you’d think—pale skin, long, straight hair of a deep purple that is near black, and beautiful like all the gods except for his creepy-ass eyes that are pure white. He moves silently from bed to bed, pressing a glowing palm to each forehead, and when he does this, the champion’s eyes flutter closed and their body goes lax. As always, I’m last, so I get to watch this many times over, but it’s not until he gets to me that I see his palm is marked with a swirling symbol and that’s what glows bright white.

If Morpheus is present, I don’t see him.

Then it’s my turn. The glow of Hypnos’ hand feels like the rays of the sun when you tip your face up to it in the winter, when it feels good just to keep your eyes closed and lean into the warmth above.

Only when I open my eyes, I’m still lying on the bed.

Um…did it work?

I don’t think it worked.

Aphrodite isn’t here. Hypnos isn’t here. I turn my head to find all the other champions still lying in their beds, eyes closed and sleeping.

A swirl of emotions drops into my gut—disappointment, embarrassment, and a few others I don’t want to put names to.

See. I was right. No one is waiting for me.

I expected this. I knew it was coming. And yet it still feels like someone just speared me through the chest.

I’m broken.

I get to just lie here and wallow in humiliation until the others return.

“Come with me, mortal.” A bronzed man, and I mean all bronze—his skin, his hair, his eyes—with wisps of a sparkling bronze…smoke, I guess?…swirling off of him is standing beside my bed.

I had heard the myth of the sandman was based on Morpheus. Now I see why.

He holds out a palm to me, and despite the fact that I’m still strapped down, I lift a hand to take his anyway. Mine is…translucent. He helps me stand from the bed, and I look down to find my mortal body still strapped there. My soul is leaving it behind to travel wherever Aphrodite and her helpers have me going.

“Each of the champions will get to their loved one in a different way,” he tells me. “For you, my mistress chose something fun.”

Morpheus walks me through a small doorway and down a hall of black-and-white-checkered marble floors and pristine white walls decorated along the top with a simple black molding. At the end of that hallway, double doors lead out onto a balcony, and there, a pegasus waits. The pink one I admired. She nods her head at me a couple of times in what I think is a horsey greeting.

I’m so entranced by the thought of getting to ride a pegasus that I almost forget I need to focus on the challenge.

Think of the person I love most, and the dream will take me to them.

Start with the easier part. Get on the horse, Lyra.

I’ve never ridden a horse before, so let’s just say that I’m the source of great amusement for a lot of immortals watching me struggle to get on right now. And then the pegasus takes off, and I clench my thighs against her waist as I wrap my arms around her soft neck. And squeal.

Riding the pegasus involves a lot of hanging on for dear life as I try not to slide off one side or the other. This has to be harder than riding a regular horse, right? Because she’s surging forward like she’s running, which jostles me forward and back, but her whole body is propelled by her wings, which bounces me up and down.

Thankfully, once she gains altitude—not too high—she levels out, and it’s easier to sit up and hold on with my hands now wrapped in her mane, thighs still gripping tight.

The pegasus tosses her head, eyeing me.

Think of who I love the most.

I know who it’s not. Not my parents. Not Felix. Not… Well, that was a short list. But I remind myself there are all different kinds of love. And three faces immediately flip in my head.

I close my eyes and focus.

One possibility is busy right now, and another is not mortal, which only leaves…

My pegasus surges under me, and I have to open my eyes again to hold on. She flies us up and over a mountain and then spirals down into the clouds that surround the base of Olympus. They remind me of the fog that rolls into the bay in San Francisco, damp and chilly and hard to see through, and I’m used to that. When we emerge from the clouds, that’s exactly where we are. San Francisco. Impossible to miss the soaring columns of the Golden Gate Bridge.

Instead of turning to the city, though, my pegasus flies me away, across the bridge, over the Minos Headlands, past the city of Sausalito, and on to the massive redwoods of Muir Woods.

I’ve never been here.

Maybe I was wrong?

Now with every flap, I’m second-guessing who it could be…or that it’s no one and this is all a terrible joke.

The pegasus drops down between the towering, red-barked trees with their deep-green foliage. She tips this way and that, avoiding their broad trunks and far-reaching branches as she descends.

As we near the ground, the pegasus rears back, flaring her pink wings wide to catch the air and slow herself down. She hits the ground at a run, and I’m thrown forward, grasping around her neck all over again.

After slowing to a trot and then stopping gently—for me, I’m sure—she shakes her body, fluffing out her wings, and I take it as a signal that I should get off. Again, not great with horses, so my getting off is more like falling off, but at least I land on my feet. Then she nods her snout toward more trees. Toward a shadowed part of the forest.

What? Am I supposed to go in that direction?

She nods again, more vigorously, shaking her rose-colored mane, so I shrug and start walking. But after I crest a small hill and the winged horse is out of sight, I realize the problem. How am I going to find my way back to her? This all looks the same. The same the same the same. Guaranteed to get lost in this place. I’m a city girl who navigates by landmarks.

Pushing back my sleeve, I wake my tattoos, breathing a sigh of relief when they spring to life. “Maybe you can help me get around,” I say to the fox. With a touch, he leaps from my arm.

He smiles with sharp teeth visible, then sits for a moment, black ears pricked, and sniffs with his dark little nose. Then he wags his fluffy, black-tipped tail and starts trotting—prancing, really—in the direction the pegasus had indicated. I follow.

I’m glad I asked the fox, because he takes a different route than I would have, right into the heart of the dark trees. Over the rise of another hill, I see it—a tiny log cabin that looks ancient and has seen better days. It sits in a clearing between two of the biggest trees I’ve seen so far, the bases of their trunks almost as wide as the cabin itself.

And it’s guarded by two massive spiders.