Page 25

And the moment they left my mouth, I knew I had made a mistake. A huge, huge mistake.

Because Atlas went completely beneath my hand.

Every muscle in his body seemed to lock in place as if the Gorgon King himself had turned him into stone. His eyes fixed on me with a sudden intensity that made my stomach immediately drop. The color drained from my face as my own words replayed themselves inside my head, and I realized exactly what I had just done.

Oh shit.

The silence stretched between us, thick and uncomfortable, while Atlas stared at me as though trying to determine whether he had heard me correctly. I could practically see the moment my words replayed themselves inside his head. Each piece fell into place one by one until there was no possibility of misunderstanding what I had just said.

“Theron?” he asked at last.

His voice wasn’t loud, but somehow that made it infinitely worse. There was something dangerous in the calmness of it, something that made every instinct I possessed scream that I should immediately stop talking. Unfortunately, I seemed to have already passed that point. The way he said the name told me everything I needed to know. He knew exactly who I meant.

I swallowed hard.

“Atlas…”

“Theron,” he repeated, his eyes narrowing as he studied my face.

“As in… the Gorgon King?”

I opened my mouth, desperately searching for a response that might somehow salvage the situation, but nothing came. Whatever excuse I might have invented died before it reached my lips, and the silence that followed only confirmed his suspicions. Judging by the look settling across his features, my failure to answer had told him far more than any explanation ever could have.

“Alexandra,” he said slowly, and there was something dangerous in the calmness of his voice now. “The Gorgon King helped you… Do I have that right?”

For a moment, I considered lying.

For an even briefer moment, I considered pretending I had no idea what he was talking about. Unfortunately, neither of those options seemed particularly believable.

“Well, we… we wouldn’t have made it back in time without him,” I admitted, being as careful with my words as I could. Too little, too late, however.

Atlas blinked slowly, as if I was suddenly speaking a language he didn’t understand. Of all the reactions I had been expecting, complete disbelief hadn’t been one of them.

“Without him?” he repeated slowly, and I nodded.

“Yes, he helped us.”

The look on Atlas’s face would have been almost amusing if it weren’t directed at me. Oh, and if he wasn’t also repeating words I said in that super scary way that instantly put me on edge, like I wasn’t just playing with fire, I was throwing gasoline on it!

“Helped you?”

The disbelief vanished, replaced by something that looked suspiciously like horror.

“Alexandra, Theron does not help people.” His top lip pulled back, somewhere between a sneer and a snarl. “He doesn’t guide lost travelers, Alexandra. “The Gorgon King doesn’t simply decide to help others, especially not those connected to me. Not unless he receives something in return, something of great value. Creatures like him do not involve themselves in the affairs of others unless there is something to gain.”

I could already feel this conversation spiraling in a direction I wasn’t going to enjoy.

“Atlas...”

“No.” He shook his head and stepped back, dragging a hand through his hair as he tried to process what I had just told him. “You don’t understand my world.”

His eyes found mine again.

Dark, intense, and demanding answers.

“Now tell me, Alexandra,” he said, his voice rough.

“What price did you pay exactly?”