Grim’s hand squeezed my arm so hard I thought my muscle might pop out of my flesh.
Osiris’s eyes landed on me again, making me regret speaking out loud. “Anubis knows the rules. You have a rare, fleeting advantage. Don’t make me regret granting it.”
I resisted the urge to salute as Anubis dragged me out of the throne room in haste, probably afraid I would say something else.
We made our way back to Hraf-haf. He grinned. “Glad to see you’ve lived to see another day, miss.”
33
Iwaited until we were back in the antechamber to ask my questions.
“What did he mean, I will do what I do best?”
Grim didn’t answer right away.
“Now. You are telling me everything now. I’m not waiting any longer, so you can kaput with the cryptic bullshit.”
“Hunt. You hunt people, and you hunt sekhors. You even suspected Qwynn where I was blind to her abilities yet again. Osiris wants you to help me discover the conspiracy against him because hunting is what you do best. One of the gods seeks chaos and upheaval. That is no small transgression.”
I crossed my arms, still trying to keep up. “And how are we supposed to do that? Go door-to-door around the world and ask each god if they did it? How many are there? Plus, I don’t travel well. I get sick on airplanes.”
Grim failed to cover his smile.
“What? What’s so funny?”
“You ramble when you are nervous.”
“You straighten your suits when you’re nervous,” I shot back.
His expression emptied. “We do not have to travel the world to see the rest of the gods.”
“And why is that?” I tapped my foot.
Grim sat on the arm of his throne, one foot on the seat, positioning himself in an impossibly alluring pose. “Because they are all here. In Vegas.”
My foot stilled.
He entwined his fingers. “All of the gods reside on the Strip. As I own Sinopolis, they have staked their claim on other such hotels. They are all here.”
All the gods were in one place. In Vegas. Was that where the sayingwhat happens in Vegas, stays in Vegasoriginated? Because otherwise a god might smite your ass.
“What are the rules?” I asked, referring again to our talk with daddy Osiris.
He spoke more slowly. “I think you already know that human blood will no longer sustain you.”
I nodded, not trusting myself to speak.
“That is because you are now bonded to me. You require my blood, and my blood alone, to stay alive.”
Did the floor drop out from under me? I checked. Nope. Must have been my heart falling out of my chest. “Literally, no one else’s blood? Not even another gods?”
Grim shook his head, his expression as serious as only Death himself could manage.
“You not only control what I eat, you can control my will. Like how they used to do in the old days,” I said, hearing the snarl in my voice. “I had enough of that with Crane.”
He was on his feet in the blink of an eye. “I won’t abuse the power, Vivien.”
“It’s enough that you have it in the first place.” He didn’t understand. I had worked so hard to get out of anyone’s control, and to end up like this…I wondered if this wouldn’t be worse than death for me.
