“I was coming to Corfu, anyway.” I ignored her again, noticing the way her hands fisted at her sides. “I've traveled a week, and you wait until I was—what?—six, seven hours away to whisk me off the ferry? Is it for dramatic effect?” This next question was going to get me hurt, but I had to ask it and hope her response jarred my ability to protect myself to the surface. “Or were you too weak to bring me here from that far away?” I let my gaze travel from her face to her wings. “Did it take you this long to heal?”
With a screech, she flew at me. Her hands hit me hard in the chest, her entire weight launching me against the altar. There was a crash as the marble top slid sideways, and the seal tumbled to the floor.
She was in my face before I had time to blink. “You're so arrogant. Thinking you know,you know.It was the same arrogance that made me want to punish you the first time. You worshipped me, but you were not humble. Your confidenceoffended me.And so, I gave you a gift. I humbled you.”
She humbled me?
“I was barely out of adolescence. I did everything that was asked of me, and I did it for you. If you were truly above us, above me, you would have seen what I did and known what was in my heart.”
She knelt on the ground. Eyes on mine, she reached for a piece of the seal. It was the one I had found first. Hector and Astyanax.
“Hector was my brother's hero, did you know that? A favorite of Apollo, and my father, Zeus. They protected him for much of the war, but he was like you—proud. Do you know who heard his prayers?” Her eyes narrowed. We were so close, I could see golden flecks like stars in her eyes. Maybe they were stars, and I was looking into the universe. “I did. I heard his prayers to make his son a greater king than he ever could have been. I heard those prayers like I heard yours, and I did the same thing for both of you.”
“Ignored them?” I asked. “Laughed at the mortals who begged for divine intervention?” I wanted to slap her. “I loved you. You say you felt my conceit and arrogance, but did you ever feel that?”
She sat back, shard held loosely between her fingers. The other three pieces were nearby, and she picked up each one, examining the edges. Sweeping away the dirt on the floor, she placed the base down, then fit a second piece in place.
“My grandparents made this world,” she said, examining the vessel. “Every organism, every stone, every plant, everyuniversewas made by a god because we willed it into existence. Why do you think I owe you anything when we have given you everything?”
I had no response, but she didn't need it. She just went on. “I am not a mother. I'm not benevolent. I don't care about you.” She lifted her eyebrows and slowly slid the third piece of the seal into place. “Do you understand?”
“You're a liar,” I replied. “In one breath, you accuse me of being egotistical. You say you needed to teach me a lesson. In the next, you claim you don't care about me or anyone. You're a liar. If you didn't care, you'd have sat on your throne and watched us. None of it would have interested you. Instead, you made us your focus. Your world revolved around us. You don't have to admit it; I know it's true.”
Her glare should have set me on fire.
“Why haven't you killed me yet?” I asked. There had to be a reason. All of this banter had to be leading to something.
“Why haven't you asked about your heroes?” she retorted. Whatever she read on my face made her laugh. The sound was like bells, chiming on Christmas morning. “Aren't you curious?”
“Yes.” Anything else would be a lie. “Where are they?”
“Maybe I left them on the ferry in the middle of the sea.” She smiled, enjoying my worry too much. “Or maybe I had my uncle sink that ship and hold it beneath the water until they died. And then maybe I asked him to hold them under as they revived, over and over. What do you think of that fate? A constant, repetitive, eternal drowning. It would be fitting for them to be trapped beneath the ocean like they trapped us.”
Fear pierced my heart, and though I tried to stop myself, I bent at the waist to blunt the pain.
She crawled so close I could feel her breath. “That upsets you, doesn't it? It would hurt you.”
It would. She knew it would.
The picture was in my head, and I couldn't stop it from replaying.
“If you want them to live, you'll give me what I want,” she whispered.
“What could I possibly have that you want?” I asked. “The shield? I don't have it. I haven't found it, and I don't know where it is.”
“I know where it is.” She sat, pushing back until the seal was next to her. “It's in the same place as the fifth piece of the seal.”
“You knew where it was the whole time?” The scope of the game she played appeared in front of me. There were so many players. So much territory. I was out of my depth, and in that second, I knew it.
She nodded. “Do you realize, I didn't even care about the seal? All I wanted was the shield. I wanted back what I had given you—”
“You never gave me anything!” My voice echoed in the chamber, bouncing off the rock walls.
“Not on purpose.” I hated how calm she stayed while my insides churned, and I hated that she was seeing it written all over my face. “And when I realized what I had done, it hadn't mattered. You were here, in this cave, covered in dirt and blood and grime and no one gave afuckabout you. Not when the Trojan War began, and the gods reveled in the game. I didn't give you a second thought after you died, either. Not when Perseus used your head to kill a monster. Do you know, you were here, in this cave, when the Trojan War ended? Those heroes you love so much? They didn't know you existed.” She sighed. “We had so much fun, and then suddenly, it was over.
“Bringing them back was my father's idea.Pollux was never going to remain dead. My father would never allow it, but the others?” She lifted one golden shoulder. “Maybe. Can I tell you a secret?”
Each revelation drove a knife deeper into my chest. It wasn't just what Athena said about me and how little I mattered. It was how little anything mattered. We were all pieces on a game board, and she wouldn't hesitate to wipe us all off if the game didn't go her way.