20. Medusa

I didn’t know how long Dionysus would be gone or how long it would take them to search Hell, but there was one thing I did know from my long life. Time moved differently in other realms, but they especially moved differently in afterlife realms. I learned that a very long time ago.

It was why Hades and Persephone weren’t all that angry about only getting six months together a year. Six months in the Underworld was a lot longer than six months on Earth. Everyone thought spending half the year away from Hades would get Persephone to leave him and they had the upper hand, but Hades played the long game. He wasn’t rash like many of the other gods. When he let Persephone in on the secret, she was all for it.

So, I knew no matter how long it took, it wouldn’t take as long for us here. Hell was a punishment realm, so I was guessing time moved even slower there to make everyone really suffer. I didn’t know if they’d find who they were looking for there, but it made sense.

Gods of the monotheistic religions were a bit of a curiosity to everyone else. They all wanted to know how they managed without help from family. If he’d ended up on this realm, the other gods would have felt it and gone to him. If he had ended up in any other realm, the gods there would have found him and peppered him with questions. And then bragged about meeting him when we visited. Hell just made sense.

They ended not being gone more than a few hours and appeared in the living room just before we were about to eat dinner. Before I could even take in the mysterious new god who I think we were all just a little bit curious about, Lucifer strode straight over to Alecto.

“I’ve just been to the pits of Hell and faced my father for the first time in several millennia. I’ve met you and I don’t want to wait. I’d love to take you on a date when we fix this.”

Alecto got this flirty smile on her face.

“Where were you going to take me?”

“Bigfoot came to me to make a deal. His band is going in a new direction and their last manager kind of fucked them over a big way. I’m going to manage them and promote their new sound. We could just take a break from all this angel nonsense and travel the world with a band.”

Ugh. It had been going so well. Why did Lucifer have to make that particular deal and present to Alecto? Everyone knew Bigfoot as this elusive creature stalking the woods, but he got enough belief to be self actualized into existence. The world actually knew Bigfoot as Rune Riddle, bass player of Meatball Hellscape.

Lucifer had no idea what happened with Alecto and Orion. Any woman would have jumped at what he was offering if that hadn’t gone down.

“Oh, fuck no! Fuck the Fates,” Alecto snapped, stomping out of the room.

Tisiphone and Megaera went scurrying after her. Kat, Jezebel, and Calamity could just sense this was a man done her wrong thing and left, too. I stayed to deal with a very bewildered fallen angel. I explained what set Alecto off, so he knew what he was dealing with.

“Fuck,” Lucifer moaned, mopping his hand down his face. “Alecto is his mate? Even Orion knows he was shit for that. He got cursed with wicked writers’ block after that and he was so mopey, the rest of the band couldn’t tolerate him. It was why they temporarily broke up. The new sound is him trying to calm her down so he can approach her to talk without her melting his brain. Can I tell you that it’s fucking hot she can do that?”

“Just remember when you’re thinking about being a dick again that she can melt yours, too.”

“Noted.”

“Can we focus on the actual issue?” Michael asked.

“Shh. Those of you who can assimilate here always should have been allowed to for what you just witnessed. An archangel just found his mate. That’s a beautiful thing, and it’s something you all should have. We should celebrate when this is over,” the new god said.

Honestly, that made me like him a bit. Lucifer admitted he rebelled, started a civil war, and got countless angels killed. Lucifer didn’t regret a damned thing, but it sounded like his father did. And I knew enough gods to know that most of them didn’t like admitting they were wrong. Most of them didn’t even dwell on it. They forgot about it five minutes later.

Like, I was pretty sure the only reason Poseidon even remembered that he raped me was because I got turned into a killing machine after and got famous. He probably knew his name was associated with the deed, but he didn’t remember anything about the act.

“Seriously?” Michael said.

His eyes were bugging out of his head. I had to remember that Michael spent his entire life dedicated to this god and probably heard the same stories everyone else did, but he’d never actually met him. I don’t think Yahweh was what any of us was expecting.

“Yes. I just sent out a summons for the archangels. The ones that are healing and the ones who were searching for me should be here soon. We’re going to need an open place with no innocents or property nearby. You said they did all this to get my attention. They have it now. They’ve clearly done a lot of research. I don’t enjoy smiting and will try to avoid it, but there is the chance they will attempt to kill me and I’ll have to defend myself. I’d like to keep the collateral damage to a minimum. They’ll be able to sense I’m here so we need to move there soon.”

“We have time,” Michael said. “Yes, a lot of this took a lot of research, but the rest of it is completely unplanned. They came here because their plan with the Coalition is about to go ass up and they want to stop it. It was their best idea to get you to show yourself, but despite all the time that’s passed, I don’t know what they are going to do if they got you.”

“Still, the same society that actualized a symbol to banish a god might have also found a way to kill one. Only a god can kill another god, but we can also be resurrected. I was killed once, and it didn’t stick. We honestly don’t know much about some of the older gods that let themselves fade. They might not have faded, they could have been murdered. Ooh, you know who we need? The angels might not know what they are doing, but I know someone who would. We need Cassandra,” Dionysus said.

Yeah, Cassandra would be our best bet. We had enough gods who were immune to her curse who could carry out the prophecy. I could apologize for not listening about going to Roanoke, even though I had no idea what that even was when she gave me that prophecy and it had been a very long time before I ended up there and got snatched by the Coalition.

“I don’t know who that is.”

Yeah, I guess an angel and a god who didn’t spend much time in this realm wouldn’t. She was pretty famous back in my day.

“My half brother is a drama queen,” Persephone said. “He fell in love with a beautiful witch and tried to woo her by giving her the gift of prophecy because it was part of his magic. She was never all that into him and never would have married him, but some of my family have issues with consent.

“Apollo thought he was different and wouldn’t outright force her to be his bride, but he gifted her prophecy without asking if she wanted it with the expectation that she’d be his. When she still said no, he cursed her so no one would believe her prophesies. Gods are exempt. You asked Mary before you knocked her up, right?”

That was the story, but with anyone our age, it was best to ask what the truth was. Oh, wow. Persephone was tapping her foot and looking at Yahweh expectantly. She took consent seriously after what her father did to her and what her family did to countless people, me included. We had one very embarrassed, blushing god who was about to face Persephone’s wrath if he answered wrong.

“Of course, I did. Isn’t it rude not to?”

“Good answer,” Hades said.

“So, gather the archangels and find Cassandra?” I asked.

“She’s right where I left her. Cassandra has figured out all the loopholes in her curse. She’s super rich from the stock market and if she tells someone the winning lottery numbers, they aren’t going to believe her. If she buys the ticket and drops them off guerilla style, she can help people and organizations that need money.”

Sounded like Cassandra. She’d only ever wanted to help people.

“Uh, y’all? If the angels weren’t pissed before, they are now. It’s not going well for them on the internet right now,” Benji said.

I think we all whipped out our phones because we wanted to see.