I’d been watching the sisters talk, my head turning back and forth as though I were at a tennis match while I kept hoping I could magically come up with a way out of our situation. I hadn’t noticed the gap opening up in the wall of fire behind me. Not until something wrapped around my already sore ankle and squeezed tight.
I whirled around so fast I fell down, and my eyes widened at what I saw. A section of the fire wall, about four or five feet wide, had opened up, and through that section poured a seething mass of greenery, vines and branches and roots heading for Violet and me like a green tidal wave. The vine that had grabbed my ankle was in the vanguard, and two more of the tendrils leading the charge latched on to me as I struggled.
Beside me, Violet gave a cry of dismay as she, too, was suddenly lashed with vines. Being much stronger than I am, she was able to pull free of the first couple of tendrils, but before she could retreat, several more grabbed on, pulling her down.
Violet screamed as the boiling wave of greenery grew thicker, more and more tendrils finding a hold until there were enough of them that she couldn’t generate sufficient momentum to rip free.
I was being grabbed, too, but Niobe obviously didn’t consider me much of a threat—and rightly so—because I was receiving nowhere near as much attention as Violet.
I found a use for my gun, taking several quick shots to sever the vines that held me, but all I succeeded in doing was letting Niobe know that she needed to direct more of the flood of foliage my way. For every vine I severed, three more whipped out to grab me. Eventually, one vine wrapped around my hand and one around the gun, tearing it out of my grip.
Violet, however, was faring even worse. Her body was completely invisible now beneath a blanket of green. All I could see of her was her horrified face as she writhed and squirmed to no avail.
Things were looking mighty bad. And then they got worse.
Standing just behind the gap in the fire wall was the shadowy figure of a man. He was no one I knew, but in the light of the crackling fire, I caught a glimpse of an iridescent glyph on his cheek. At first glance, I couldn’t tell what the glyph was, so he conveniently turned his face to the light so I could better see the stylized hammer and anvil that marked him as a descendant of Hephaestus.
The Liberi smiled at me triumphantly in a display of the typical Olympian sadism, though I supposed technically he wasn’t an Olympian anymore now that he’d joined forces with Niobe. He made a sweeping gesture with his hands, and the fire began creeping up the tangle of vines—making its leisurely way toward where Violet and I were held captive.
We were about to be roasted alive, and I saw no way we could possibly get out of it.
“Sister, please!” Violet shouted, but if there was more to that sentence, she didn’t get it out. She made a choking sound that suggested one of the vines had wrapped around her throat.
As far as I knew, the fire couldn’t permanently kill either one of us, seeing as it was wielded by a Liberi, but it would be an excruciating death, and I sincerely doubted our situation would have much improved when we came back. I’m not ashamed to admit that I cried as I watched the fire’s inexorable approach and struggled in vain to free myself from the tangle of vines.
My vision blurred with tears that evaporated in the heat moments after they left my eyes. I couldn’t tear my gaze away from the fire that continued to crawl closer, burning down the vines that held us like a spark traveling down a fuse. Violet was screaming in terror, and the flames that surrounded us roared. My heartbeat drummed in my ears, and at first all those sounds drowned out another scream.
I blinked in an effort to clear my vision and coughed from a cloud of smoke that wafted my way. The combination of ultrahot dry air and smoke made my eyes burn so fiercely I could barely keep them open, but my survival instinct had refused to give up on me, so I was still in search of a way out. I had to know who else was screaming and why.
I tore my eyes from the trail of fire and squinted against the pain until I could see the gap in the wall, where the Liberi who controlled the fire stood. Or rather, where he had stood. Now he was on his knees, his back arched, his hands clawing uselessly at the air in front of him while he howled in agony. Behind him stood Anderson, whose glowing hand was clapped to the back of his neck.
Death by Anderson Kane’s hand was not quick, and it most certainly was not painless. I suspected that the Liberi suffered more than I would have if the fire had engulfed me, but I could find no pity in my heart for him.
Anderson wasn’t looking at the man he was killing, nor was he looking at me or Violet. Instead, his eyes were fixed on a point above my head. I took a quick glance behind me and confirmed that yes, it was Niobe whose gaze he had caught.
The screams finally died down, and the Liberi’s body disintegrated into nothingness, leaving only a pile of empty clothes. Violet and I were still trapped in the vines, but the fire stopped its relentless march toward us. The flames around us started burning a little lower—and, unfortunately, creating more smoke. My guess was that without the Liberi’s help, the fire was disinclined to use wet living foliage as fuel.
Paying not the slightest attention to Violet or me, Anderson strode through the widening gap in the fire wall, his hand still glowing with the power of death.
“It’s time for this to end, Niobe,” he said.
She spat out a few un-goddesslike curses, then said, “It will end when you are dead, and not before.”
“You have that backward,” he replied calmly, holding up that glowing hand. “Your choices are to give up your vendetta, or die. I don’t much care which you choose.”
This was becoming a disturbingly familiar tactic on Anderson’s part. He seemed to have forgotten that he had said he’d try to reason with her first. Not that I had any reason to believe negotiation would work, but I would have felt better if he’d made a good-faith effort just in case.
Niobe laughed. “You always were a blind fool. My sisters might not all be in perfect agreement with me at present”—she waved her hand toward Violet, who was exhibit A—“but the one sure way you can unite them against you is to kill me. Murdering me after slaughtering my children will hardly endear you to them.”
“I don’t need to endear myself to them,” he scoffed. “I just need them to renew their altars. I’d rather they do it willingly out of the kindness of their hearts and their respect for human life, but you don’t actually think I would hesitate to force them if necessary, do you? Having known me as long as you have? Don’t forget I am the son of Vengeance, my dear, and my mother taught me well.”
I shuddered. I’d been having a hard time reconciling my image of Anderson with the atrocity I knew he’d committed in his past, and I’d been telling myself he had changed so much he bore little resemblance to the spiteful, angry god he’d once been. But here he was threatening to rape Niobe’s sisters, and there was not an ounce of regret or reluctance in his voice.
To my shock, Anderson’s threat made Niobe smile. “I know exactly what you’re capable of. But you were not present when my sisters and I were assigned our penance. You were supposed to be dead.” She spat that last word with such venom I half expected Anderson to reel as if slapped.
“Our altars cannot be renewed by force,” she said triumphantly. “We must tend them willingly, or the rite will fail. Whether you kill me or not, our altars will fail one by one, and you will die the slow and agonizing death you deserve.”
Anderson’s fists were clenched by his sides, and anger poured off him in almost palpable waves. “I only need one sister alive to renew all those altars,” he growled. “Perhaps as I kill them one by one, those who survive will eventually come to see the error of their ways.”
I was still thrashing and squirming, trying to free myself from the vines. The struggle had seemed pointless at first, but the more attention Niobe focused on Anderson, the weaker the vines’ grips became. I now had some bona fide wiggle room, and I could almost stretch my arm enough to touc
h my fingers to the butt of my gun. I was still uncertain what possible use a gun could have in this conflict between gods, but if nothing else it would be nice to have hold of my security blanket. It certainly didn’t look like the “negotiation” was going very well.
Niobe shook her head and clucked her tongue. “You are still under the misguided impression that you have some power in this situation. I regret to inform you that you have none.”
The vines that had been holding Violet melted away. I’d been too engrossed in the confrontation between Anderson and Niobe to pay much attention to Violet, but one look at her face told me Niobe wasn’t as delusional as she sounded. Violet’s eyes were practically throwing sparks, and though it was Niobe who had just tried to burn her to death, it was Anderson she stared daggers at. She struggled free of the last of the vines and rose to her feet.
She was filthy, her clothing torn, her makeup smeared, and yet she had no trouble exuding power, confidence, and fury.
“You lied to me,” she spat at Anderson. “This was your plan all along, to kill Niobe and then threaten me and the rest of my sisters with rape and death.”
She spit at Anderson’s feet and strode over to stand by her sister’s side to present a united front. For the first time, I thought I saw a hint of uncertainty in Anderson’s eyes. I had told him that killing Niobe and otherwise making threats wasn’t the wisest way to resolve the problem, and he hadn’t listened to me. I wished I could derive even a modicum of satisfaction from having been right.
“I think you’re lying,” Anderson said to Niobe. He was trying to sound firm and convinced, but I could hear the shadow of doubt in his voice. “I think you’re just saying all that to save your own life and Violet is playing along to save herself.”
Niobe walked steadily forward, coming to stand within arm’s reach of Anderson before dropping to her knees.
“Go ahead and kill me,” she said softly, looking up at him from her position on the ground. “You stole from me my one and only reason to live. Do you honestly believe threatening me with death frightens me? Put your hand on me. I will die happy knowing that my suffering will finally be over and yours just begun.”
Niobe was no longer putting any effort into controlling the vines, and I was finally able to fight my way free of them. I grabbed my gun and climbed stiffly to my feet. No one even bothered to look at me, and there was no missing that I was completely insignificant to these gods. Even to Anderson.
Niobe was a madwoman, and though I’m no psychologist, I had little doubt she would qualify as psychotic. But as she knelt there at Anderson’s feet declaring how little her own life meant to her, I couldn’t help but pity her for the soul-deep pain she’d been suffering for untold centuries. There was no way my mind could encompass the depth of the grief she carried with her, nor the guilt that must go hand in hand with it, whether she expressed it or not. She had cheated on her husband knowing he was the son of a Fury. It was he who had committed the atrocity, but she was not completely without responsibility in the death of her children, and I couldn’t imagine the torture of that knowledge.
I believed her. Believed that she would happily die, happily sacrifice all her sisters’ lives, if it would end her pain. I also believed she was telling the truth about the altars, that they couldn’t be renewed by force. She wanted Anderson’s death more than anything, and if she weren’t 100 percent certain her own death would eventually lead to his, then she wouldn’t be so willing to die.
I did a mental double take at my own line of thought. My impression of the discussion so far had been that she wanted Anderson’s death more than anything else, and if that was truly the case, then the human race was already well on the road to extinction. So the way to save humanity was to find something Niobe wanted more than Anderson’s death.
“If you could have absolutely anything in the world,” I asked Niobe, making everyone jump because I think they had literally forgotten I was present, “what would you ask for?”
Glowing, inhuman eyes turned to me and I had an instant and almost overwhelming desire to shut up and run away. The wrath of a goddess is never an easy thing to face, and she didn’t have to tell me how unwanted my input was. I hoped Anderson would help me if she decided to take drastic action because I’d had the gall to speak to her.
“Anything at all,” I prompted. The vines popped back to life, grabbing at me.
“I don’t recall giving you permission to speak,” she said with a sneer as the vines threaded their way up my legs, squeezing painfully tight.
“What can it hurt to answer a simple question?” I asked, keeping my voice as calm as possible and trying not to let her see that she was causing me pain. I didn’t even bother to struggle against the vines. “Just tell me what you want more than anything in the world.”
Her eyes glowed more brightly, twin lasers that should have sliced through my flesh. Anderson was looking at me, too, his face a picture of shut-the-hell-up.
“If you can honestly say that there’s nothing you could possibly want more than Anderson’s death,” I persisted, “then I promise I won’t say another word. Can you say that?”
“I want my children back!” she snarled at me. “But since I can’t have that, I’ll settle for revenge. I may not be the child of a Fury, but I have learned my craft from the best.”
I could see the moment Anderson caught on to what I was implying, because his jaw suddenly dropped open and his eyes widened. I nodded at him ever so slightly, urging him to pick up the ball I’d just tossed. He shook his head at me, but it was in amazement, not denial. It seemed there was something Niobe wanted more than Anderson’s death after all.
Anderson turned to Niobe, and there was still a hint of wonder in his eyes. “I can’t give you back the children I took from you,” he said. “But I can give you new children.”
For the first time, Niobe was struck speechless. No ordinary woman—at least no ordinary woman who had any business being a mother—would think of her children as objects that could be replaced. But hadn’t I thought to myself a million times that gods and goddesses do not think like ordinary people? After all, no ordinary human being, not even the most psychotic, would think it a good idea to kill every living man, woman, and child to get revenge on an ex.
Anderson saw the first chink in Niobe’s armor, and he pressed on. “I would happily give you a child for each one you lost.”
“That you murdered, you mean,” she spat, but there was considerably less heat in her voice, and the white glow in her eyes dimmed as she rolled the possibilities around in her mind.
“That I murdered,” Anderson agreed quietly. “I can never make up for the sins of my past, and though I know you won’t believe me, the only person who hates me more than you is me. If I could die without taking several billion innocents with me, I would give myself to you without hesitation and let you do whatever you wanted to me. But I can’t do that. I’ve caused the death of innocents before, and I will never allow that to happen again.”
Her eyes shimmered with what might have been a hint of tears, and while it didn’t exactly make her look human, it made her look less inhuman. The rage that had been wafting from her since I’d first caught sight of her had all but disappeared. Anderson reached out and put his hand lightly on her shoulder—and she let him.
“Let me give you something better to live for than revenge,” he begged. “It’s never as satisfying as you hope and often leaves you feeling worse than when you began. Take it from someone who knows all too well.”
The glow was completely gone from Niobe’s eyes, replaced by a glimmer of something that looked suspiciously like hope. “You must promise me at least seven sons and seven daughters.”
Anderson nodded his agreement. “Of course.”
“I will share you with no other woman until you have fulfilled your obligation.”
“Done.”
But Niobe shook her head. “No. That is too easy. Just because I am willing to consider a
compromise doesn’t mean I don’t want to see you suffer. I will share you with no other person until you have fulfilled your obligation.”
Anderson eyed her suspiciously. “Just what exactly is your definition of sharing?”
“You will see no one. You will speak to no one. You will, in fact, be my prisoner.”
This was a pill Anderson did not swallow as easily, and it was clear he was about to balk.
“If you wish me and my sisters to maintain our altars and to care for those of Rose and Jasmine as well, then you have no choice but to accept my terms.”
Anderson cut a quick glance over to me before returning his attention to Niobe. “Agreed. But I would ask you to give me seven days to get my affairs in order before I withdraw from the world.”
Despite everything I had learned about Anderson, I still felt a distinct pang at the thought of him withdrawing from the world for the years it would take him to father all those children.
Niobe thought about it a moment, and then nodded. “I’ll accept that condition, but no others. I will make the rules, and you will obey.”
Anderson let out a deep, shuddering breath. “Then it sounds like we have an agreement.”
TWENTY-THREE
The battle between Cyrus’s handpicked Olympians and the ones who had deserted to join Niobe raged on while Niobe and Anderson came to their arrangement, and by the time it was all over the good guys—if you can even use that term when referring to Olympians—had won the day.
I left Violet, Niobe, and Anderson to work out any additional details in the agreement and made my way back down the smoldering trail of ash toward Jasmine’s house. The crushing vines had left a circle of swollen, aching bruises around my ankle, but being Liberi has its advantages, and those bruises ached a little less with each step I took. The way back felt considerably shorter—probably because I wasn’t running for my life.