“Don’t get discouraged,” Cristos said softly, seeing my face. “It takes a lot of practice. Arsenio and I have spent our whole lives doing this. You did really well for only a few hours.”
“I don’t feel like it,” I laughed, trying to still the shakiness of my hands. “I’m going to be dinner for the first Titan I come across.”
“Don’t forget, they want you alive,” he said, his tone suggesting this was supposed to be relieving to me.
Looking over his shoulder quickly at Arsenio, who had his back turned to us as he made his bed, he grabbed my hand and squeezed it gently.
“You did good, zoi mou,” he whispered reassuringly.
Letting go quickly, he cleared his throat and then asked for the axe back, stowing it in his bag with his sword.
“We’ll try again tomorrow night,” he said, all business. “You’ll be sore in the morning.”
“Do you have first watch or do I,” Arsenio asked, yawning as he turned back to look at us.
“I do,” Cristos laughed. “Get some sleep.”
With another glance towards me, he shouldered his bag once more and headed for the edge of camp, ready to stay up for the first half of the night. Once I was sure he was out of hearing range, I turned to Arsenio, who had laid out a second blanket for me.
“Thank you,” I said warmly.
“You’ll sleep well tonight,” he chuckled. “And you’ll deserve it. You worked hard.”
“Do you really think so?” I asked, still not sure.
“You need work,” he said honestly. “And more than a few weeks to be truly competent. But, I think you’ll do just fine when the occasion arises.”
I laid down on the blanket, watching the flames as he settled into bed himself.
“Arsenio?” I inquired, turning to look at him.
“Yeah?” he asked groggily.
“What does zoi mou mean?”
He smiled wickedly, tucking his arms under his head as he looked up at the sky.
“Wherever did you hear that?” he asked curiously.
“Uh, I overheard Cristos mumbling something,” I said, blushing.
“Ah. It means ‘my life.’”
I tried not to let him hear my sigh of admiration for the name I’d been given, but wasn’t so sure I’d been very successful.
The rest of the week passed in much of the same manner, my skills with the axe increasing every day. We crossed through a couple smaller countries before finally coming into the tip of Italy, Sicily and our goal on the other end of the country. It was decided that we would take a boat down the coast to save time, since Arsenio could use his powers to help push us forward if need be. To be safe, we would stay further out to sea, away from anyone who could get hurt should we be attacked.
Our first day out, I received a shock I hadn’t prepared for.
“You want me to do what?” I asked, the color draining from my face.
“The axe is only half of what you can do to protect yourself,” Cristos said gently. “Now that you have a basic handle on that, you need to learn how to use your powers to protect yourself, too. They’ll be your greatest weapon and defense against those who would harm you.”
“It hurts,” I trembled, panicking. “I don’t want to use them, not ever again. It’s taken all I have just to keep them bottled up this long.”
“He’s right,” Arsenio agreed. “You need to learn how to use them. It will be difficult, but what’s best for you in the long run.”
“You don’t understand,” I said, looking at the two of them as I backed across the deck of our tiny boat. “It feels like I’m dying when I use them.”
“You need to learn to get around it,” Arsenio insisted with conviction. “Your mortal body is fighting against the immortal Titan inside you. Let her loose and eventually the pain will subside as your body learns to deal with her.”
“But what if it doesn’t?” I asked, fear making my voice shake.
“Try it, one time,” Cristos urged me. “The first is always the worst.”
“What would you know about it?” I snapped, hating that he was pushing me into something I really didn’t want to do.
“He may not know, but I do,” Arsenio said gently. “My powers didn’t hurt, but they were a lot to adjust to. You can do it.”
I shook my head, turning away from them as I stared out over the open water, the coast barely visible on the horizon.
The Titan liked this idea, pushing against my walls, eager to get out and be free again. The closest she’d gotten in a while was steaming my skin and I could feel she hungered for more. With a fearful sigh, I squeezed my eyes shut and let the wall down a tiny bit, just enough for the heat to escape. The tingling in my skin started and I knew I’d successfully allowed her to light me on fire once more.
“Don’t burn down the boat,” Arsenio laughed. “That’s good, though.”
Opening my eyes, I turned to face him again, looking at the flames now encasing my body.
“Can you confine it to one spot, like that time with your feet?” Cristos asked curiously, watching me work.
It took a great more amount of effort than I thought it would, but, finally, I managed to extinguish all of my body except for one hand and forearm.
“That’s good,” Arsenio said in excitement. “You’re strong. It takes lots of practice for other gods to be able to do that. Maybe Titans are different?”
He looked at Cristos who shrugged, folding his arms over his chest as he watched us.
“Okay,” Arsenio said, grinning. “Let’s see what you can do.”
A series of focusing exercises came next, all leading up to me being able to hold a ball of fire in my hand and launch it out over the water. This was apparently very impressive, as both men had uttered exclamations and cheered the first time I got it.
Meanwhile, I could feel the Titan growing stronger, testing herself as she pushed against my walls. It was much harder to keep her at bay while I tried to use some of her power, like we were in a massive tug of war and my feet were sliding in the mud as she pulled me closer.
By the end of the day, I felt completely wiped out. The good news was, if I needed to, I could now launch fire balls, set a line of fire across something, light up and extinguish myself within seconds, and heat the metal of my axe to just before its melting point. The tingling in my skin was terrible, to the point of making me want to tear the flesh off, by the time I was finally allowed to quit.
“Those Titans won’t know what hit them,” Arsenio grinned as I sat down on the deck next to the cabin, feeling like I could go to sleep right there.
“What if they won’t trade?” I asked, the thought having been on my mind for days now.
“Then we’ll take the helmet by force,” Cristos said, coming to sit by me.
“The bloody version, right,” I sighed.
He laughed, smiling warmly at me, his fingers brushing over the top of mine quickly.
My stomach tightened, body yearning for him to hold me again. Besides one stolen kiss while he was on watch one night, we hadn’t really touched each other since the night he told me about his fate. That alone was driving me insane. It was much harder to act like nothing had happened. I lived for moments when Arsenio would turn his back to us and soft words would be uttered to me quickly, hands clasping for mere seconds.
“I’m ready for bed,” I announced, carefully getting to my feet. “If that’s okay?”
“Of course,” Arsenio smiled. “You earned it. You need your rest to do it again tomorrow anyway.”
“Ugh,” I groaned.
“I’ll take the watch tonight,” he continued, nodding to Cristos. “You two get some rest. We’ll be in Sicily in a few days. The gods know we’ll need all our strength.”
“Come get me when you’re ready to sleep,” Cristos said, rising and clapping him on the shoulder.
“It’ll be a while yet,” Arsenio replied. “I’ve missed the water and want to spend some time here with it
.”
I smiled, thinking he truly did look in his element out here, the sea all around him, ready to do his bidding.
Yawning, I opened the tiny door to the side of me and walked down the steps into the hull of the boat, seeking out the bed against one of the walls. As soon as I found it and laid down, the door above closed and Cristos’s feet came down the steps, his body materializing as he came closer to me.
“Zoi mou,” he whispered. “May I lie by you?”
In answer, I scooted my body as close to the wall as I could get, leaving plenty of room for him to slide in next to me.
“What about Arsenio?” I asked dreamily.
“Don’t worry about it,” he said, his warmth enclosing around me as he laid on the bed and took me in his arms, banishing the tingling from my overspent powers. “He will be on deck for a while tonight.”
“Of course, the one night I’m too tired to do anything is the one you come to sleep next to me,” I laughed quietly. “Just my luck.”
“I better give you your good night kiss now then,” he chuckled, his breath washing over my face as he held me tightly to him.
“I could stay awake for that,” I whispered sincerely.
His lips brushed against mine, barely enough to even call it a kiss, but I melted under his touch all the same. Thankfully, that wasn’t all he had planned, and soon I found myself pinned under him, his body hovering in plank position above mine. With a painstaking slowness, he lowered down onto his elbows, his head dipping in and lips brushing lightly against mine again.
Arching my back, I wrapped my arms around him, pulling him down on top of me with all the strength I had. He wasn’t done teasing me yet, though, lips moving from my mouth to my throat and down onto my collar bone. A happy sigh breathed out of me as I twisted my fingers into his long hair, pulling on it slightly as he continued to give me goose bumps.
Finally, he seemed to have had enough and attacked my mouth with vigor, pressing himself against me as our feet tangled together.
It was the first time we’d really been like this, alone in a room where we could explore each other without fear of freezing to death. Of course, there was still Arsenio to be wary of, but Cristos seemed more than sure he wouldn’t be coming down for a while.
Sitting up and straddling my thighs, Cristos ran his hands down my arms, sliding his palms onto my waist, pushing my shirt up and out of the way as he caressed the skin there. I all but purred as he bent down and kissed the bare skin, his hands sliding up under the fabric he’d pushed aside earlier. As his hands cupped my breasts, I arched my back, biting my lip to keep from moaning too loud.
He wasn’t the only one who wanted to feel the other. Reaching for him, I grabbed the fabric of his shirt, pulling on it until he helped me remove it, revealing his sculpted—and definitely god like—muscles underneath. Fascinated, I traced every ridge with my fingertips, sitting up to kiss his chest and neck. By the time I’d finished, I could tell he wasn’t going to be able to take much more without going further.
“You’re beautiful, zoi mou,” he said as I laid back down, smiling at him.
“Why do you call me that?” I asked curiously, reveling in the feel of his skin against mine.
“What do you mean?”
“Out of all the things you could call me, why choose that one?” I laughed, brushing the hair from his forehead.
“It’s the only thing I could think of to describe how I feel when I look at you.”
Chapter Twenty One
Cristos
I couldn’t help the grin on my face as I watched Avalon excel at another day of learning how to control the fire within her. It was obvious that this power caused her the least amount of pain, a small comfort to me at least.
The night before had been pure heaven, holding her in my arms and tasting her again. I’d been about to go out of my mind staying away from her, trying to appear as if I was indifferent. She needed to be safe from being used to get to me, as hard as it was. In the end, waiting to be with her was definitely worth it. Still, I couldn’t wait to hold her again tonight. The privacy of the cabin allowed for a more intimate time together, something I desperately wanted and needed to stay away from at the same time.
It would be so easy to sleep with Avalon—like breathing. I knew she would let me, too. But, it didn’t seem like she was quite ready. Even if she was, I didn’t want to risk getting her pregnant, not when we were about to come face to face with a mass of Titans. I didn’t know if she had any type of protection against that, and it didn’t seem right to me, to put her in that position at such at time. Thinking of her someday growing my child in her made me practically glow, though.
Except I would most certainly be cast into Tartarus.
I’d been coming to terms with my fate since I shared it with her, taking her advice to spend the time we had together just being with her. If I was going to Hell, I might as well be happy before I got there.
Pulling myself from grim thoughts, I watched as she started the transformation of her fingers into snakes. This was more painful for her, I could tell from the way her eyes glistened and her lips pressed together, but still not altogether gut wrenching. It hurt me to see her being harmed, but I knew it was for her good, to protect her from the tidal wave of attacks we would surely be facing.
“You’re doing well,” Arsenio coached her, holding onto her shoulder as the last bits of snake appeared, writhing at the ends of her hands.
Her concentration dropped for a moment and the snakes disappeared, her fingers cracking back into place so loudly that even I flinched.
“Sorry,” she panted, holding her hand to her chest. “She pushes so hard against me sometimes. It’s difficult to use just a little bit of the power.”
Curious.
When I’d first started my training, we’d thought I’d inherited Zeus’s powers, since I’d been able to hold a lightning bolt without being harmed. But when we tried to unleash the powers, they just weren’t there. It was like there was a wall, much like Avalon described was holding her Titan back. After several unsuccessful tries, we’d set at seeing if I had other powers and discovered those of Adrastia.
“I’m tired.”
Avalon’s voice broke through my thoughts again and I looked up, noting that some of the color had drained from her face.
“Just a little more,” Arsenio coaxed. “You can do it.”
She nodded, holding her hand out to try again.
With a flurry of movement, she suddenly lit on fire, her fingers instantly transforming as Arsenio jumped back out of the way. With a heart wrenching cry, her back arched and wings started to push through her skin, tearing her apart, blood dripping onto the deck beneath her.
Jumping to my feet, I rushed to her side, her cries screeching out across the water as tears washed her face.
“Avalon,” I said, grabbing her to me and holding her tightly.
She was shaking violently, the wings still sprouting from her back and beating against us as I tried to talk to her.
“Shut her down,” I ordered.
“I can’t,” she whimpered. “Sh-she’s pushing t-too h-hard.”
“Listen to me, zoi mou,” I urged her. “You can do this. I’ll help you.”
Tightening my grip on her, I muttered encouragement in her ear until finally, the wings shuddered and began to fold back into her skin. My heart felt like it might break as she screamed anew, her nails clawing at my back as great sobs of anguish rocked her. When the wings were finally gone, she collapsed against me, her breathing shallow.
“No more,” I said, looking at Arsenio.
He was looking at us, wide eyed, but nodded all the same.
Standing, I gathered her into my arms and carried her into the cabin, lying her on the bed. She cried out again as the fabric brushed over her back and I flinched, my own hands shaking at having seen her in such pain once more.
“I’m sorry,” her hoarse voice croaked out as I tried to arrange her bett
er.
“You don’t need to be sorry,” I reassured her. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”
“I couldn’t hold her back,” she said, defeated. “She won.”
“You’ve been holding her back for a very long time,” I replied gently. “It’s not surprising she broke through again.”
“She’s only ever done that when I needed protecting,” she whispered. “What was different about this time?”
“You’re testing your limits, that’s all,” I said, smiling the best I could. “Rest now. I’ll come check on you in a little while.”
She nodded, closing her eyes and instantly fading into unconsciousness.
With a shuddering sigh, I looked down on her, wanting to hold her and make the pain I knew was still there go away. Somehow, it felt like this was my fault, for wanting her to learn how to control it. Maybe she’d been pushed too much, but at this moment in time I didn’t want her to have to do it ever again.
With heavy feet, I walked back up the stairs and onto the deck of the boat, looking out over the water as a soft breeze brushed the hair from my face.
“Is she okay?” Arsenio asked from behind me.
I turned to see him at the helm, steering the ship with one hand and a water orb in the other.
“Yes,” I nodded.
“I didn’t mean to push her so far,” he confessed. “If I’d known she was that close to breaking—”
“It wasn’t your fault,” I interrupted him. “She’s tired, that’s all. Let her rest now.”
“She’ll be able to use the fire at least when we get to Mount Etna,” he said encouragingly. “If she wants to.”
I remained silent, looking out in front of us, reliving the memory of her cries.
“How long?”
“What?”
I turned to look at him, confused by his question.
“How long have you had feelings for her?” he asked point blank.
“Arsenio,” I sighed.
“You’re not fooling anyone,” he laughed. “Zoi mou? That was a dead giveaway when she asked me what it meant.”
Adrastia (The God Chronicles Book 4) Page 15
