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And Hermes.
Hermes bursts out laughing. “Gods, it took you long enough to figure it out. I thought I was going to have to send a carrier pigeon.” There’s a sound in the background, sharp and booming, and she looks over her shoulder. “Oh damn, I have to run. Have fun, darlings.” A second later her square disappears.
Hades sits back with a sigh. “Apparently some of you are in on the secret. Her name is unfamiliar to me.”
Zeus shakes his head, and for the first time, something resembling an actual expression appears on his face. “What you’re saying is impossible. Circe is dead. She died fifteen years ago.”
Ares is so pale, she looks like she might pass out. “Perseus, her body was never recovered. At the time, I thought it was Father covering things up, but…”
“But?” Aphrodite stops short and seems to try to compose themself. “What are you talking about? Who is Circe?”
“You wouldn’t recognize the name because she’s not from one of the legacy families. It happened so fast, everybody was focused on who she became, rather than who she was.” Ares tucks her hair behind her ears with shaking hands. “She was only a couple years older than me at the time, but it was pretty clear right off the bat that Father bit off more than he could chew. He didn’t wait long to make his move.”
Pieces fall into place, one by one. I see my suspicions reflected in the faces of the people in the meeting, in the sudden tension inHades’s shoulders. The last Zeus had a reputation as a wife killer. His first wife, mother to his four children, died from an unfortunate fall down the stairs. An accident, Zeus claimed, and supposedly he wasn’t anywhere in the house when it happened. His third wife died from a rumored overdose. The official story is that she accidentally mixed meds and had an adverse reaction, but whether that was intentional on her part—or her husband’s part—is anyone’s guess.
But the second wife?
A drowning accident during a romantic trip to the coast during their honeymoon.
Hades leans forward and props his elbows on the desk. “Are you saying that Circe, Minos’s benefactor, enemy to Olympus, is the previous Zeus’s second wife?”
“It’s understandable that her real name doesn’t ring any bells.” Zeus smiles, but not like anything is funny. “When you would’ve known her, her name was Hera.”
Things devolve pretty quickly after that. Hades manages to get out the rest of his information, including the fact that apparently when Circe slipped out of Olympus, she took a piece of the barrier with her.She’sthe reason it’s failing. No one has a good solution. Athena offers to send one of her people to take care of the problem quietly, but Zeus tells her that the situation is already beyond that point. Artemis refuses to believe that a Hera could be the source of all these problems. The new Hephaestus promises to take a look at the barrier, certain that xe can find a solution that no one else has managed to before now.
In short, it’s a fucking mess.
Two hours later, when Hades cuts off the call and sits back witha groan, no solutions have been solidified. He rotates his chair so he can look at me. “What do you think?”
“There was always a possibility that the enemy originated from the city. The information Minos had was too specific to come from an outsider. The assassination clause is too cleverly hidden. This mostly confirms what we already knew.” I drag my hand over my face. “If she was married to the last Zeus, even for a short time, she has more than reason enough to hate the city. Everyone stood by and let him do whatever the fuck he wanted for far too long. Can’t blame her for wanting revenge.”
Hades nods slowly. “No, I can’t blame her for wanting revenge, but Icanblame her for all the violence and suffering her plans have caused. If she had only come back and killed him, I would have shaken her hand and been done with it. She’s responsible for a number of deaths and an increasing amount of unrest that means the violence is just beginning.”
“Not to mention the attacks on the greenhouse and the club.” Shehasto be behind it. It’s the only thing that makes sense. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter if she gave the order directly or if Minos did, because she is his benefactor.
“Not to mention the attack on the greenhouse and the club,” Hades agrees. “She softened us up so much, I don’t know if we can manage to bring together enough people for a standing army to defend the city. Ares has her soldiers, but there’s only so many of them, and their experience leans more toward bodyguard work than actual battle.”
We don’t have even that much in the lower city. The last Zeus never would’ve stood for that kind of gathering of power, even ifHades was interested in it, and it hasn’t been a high priority in the year since that Zeus died. We have a couple dozen people on staff, and another couple dozen rotating in periodically as needed. Not enough. Nowhere near enough.
“What do we do?”
He stares at the now-blank screen of his computer for several moments. “We keep doing exactly what we were doing before this. We drive the enemy from the lower city.”
It should be enough, but I can’t help pressing him. “And after that?”
“I…don’t know.”
That scares me more than anything else that’s happened today.
27
EURYDICE
Watching Orpheus paint has always unwound something in me. For a man who is so present in every room he walks into, when he paints it looks like he’s in another world entirely. After today, I would like to be in another world entirely too. I know there are hurried meetings happening behind closed doors concerning the threat against the city. Part of me wishes that I could be listening in.
The rest of me knows better.
I did my part. Now my responsibility is ensuring Hades keeps his word to Ariadne. I don’t expect he’ll go back on it, but even if I don’t understand the full implications of her information, this reveal is about to do the equivalent of kicking a hornets’ nest. He’s going to have so much to worry about, it will be easy to let the promises to Ariadne go unfulfilled. The potential oversight is understandable, and not a reflection on him, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to let him get away with it. Ariadne put herself in great danger to help us, and I want to ensure that we actually help her back.
