I nodded, gathering my thoughts back to the matters at hand rather than the Hades business. I needed to save Izzy now that Dracula was no longer an immediate threat. “Do you have any advice on how to deal with the twins? Or which Olympians I might be able to trust?”
He shook his head. “I have done all that I can. It is vitally important that you tell no one of your visit here, or about your new ring. Right now, it is your only bargaining chip. Well, Dracula as well, of course.”
“Figured as much. Can you show us the door?” I asked. Then another thought hit me. “Will we meet again?”
He grinned mirthlessly. “Everyone has an appointment with me, Sorin. Some day.”
I folded my arms. “You know what I mean.”
He nodded without answering my question. “It has been a pleasure to officially meet you. Remember that the world up there is full of cheats and liars. Us being seen together could cause problems. There are, however, some exquisite mushrooms in upstate New York if the situation warrants it. As long as no one else learns where these mushrooms are, of course.”
“Of course,” I agreed.
Persephone approached, holding out her arms. “If I can’t have a Sorin, I’ll at least hug one,” she said, flicking a playful glare at her husband. I smiled, wrapping her up in a hug. She rested her head on my shoulders and breathed into my ear so softly that I almost missed it. “You really should have taken Aphrodite up on her offer,” she whispered, sounding heartbroken.
Then she squeezed me and extricated herself, turning to Nero and Lucian to give them matching hugs. I managed to keep my face composed after her chilling message. How had she learned about me refusing Aphrodite’s gift when she hadn’t known earlier? And what the hell did she mean?
Hades was studying me thoughtfully. I extended my hand, hoping to distract him by trading grips. “Goodbye, Hades.”
Instead of shaking my hand, he snapped his fingers, and we were suddenly back on the ledge in the middle of Nowhere, New York. I blinked, reeling at the abrupt dismissal.
Nero stared at me, then down at his hand. He let out a breath of relief, clenching his bone fist. “Well, that was abrupt,” he said, scratching at his head with his bone claw. But he was smiling. “You don’t need to feel terrible anymore, Sorin,” he said, brandishing the bone claw. “I got an upgrade.” I stared at the purple, crystalline joints, still troubled by Persephone’s words.
I turned to find Lucian in wolf form again, but now only twice the size of a typical mountain wolf. I bit back my frown so as not to discourage him. “We will figure it out together, brother.”
He shook his ruff, meeting my eyes for a long moment. Then he caught the scent of something and slowly turned to look behind us towards the forested slopes of the parent mountain, a gentle, bubbling growl rolling out from his throat as his hackles began to rise.
Whatever it was, he didn’t look like he anticipated any immediate danger. He continued staring at the woods, his growl fading.
I turned to find Stevie staring at us. He wore a crooked smile as he stared back at us and then off to the edge of the cliff where he had seen us disappear—only seconds ago, by his estimation.
His smile faltered at Lucian’s smaller size and then his growl. “Did it not work?” he asked, looking puzzled. Lucian padded closer, sniffing at the air as if he’d lost whatever scent had caught his attention. Perhaps it had been a bear wandering through the forest?
Nero smiled at Stevie. “It worked. All is good.” He glanced at Lucian, licking his lips. “It will take time to fully correct, but he’s on the mend.”
Stevie smiled in relief. He stroked his beard. “He already feels different from when you left a few seconds ago—which is still hard for me to wrap my head around. How long were you gone?”
I thought about it. “An hour? Maybe more?” Nero gave me a vague shrug.
Stevie shook his head with a grunt. “Well, you only just left, from my perspective.” He turned back to Lucian again. “He no longer feels like a wild beast. Whatever you did worked. I have heard stories of men who spent too long in wolf form. It took them years to return to normal.”
I sighed impatiently. “We do not have years, but he has already resumed his human form once, so perhaps he will heal quicker.”
Stevie grinned excitedly to hear Lucian’s progress. “Everyone will be so excited to see him. Lucian…” he whispered reverently, shaking his head. A phone rang and he jumped in alarm, almost dropping the phone in his hand. It was mine. He held it out with an embarrassed chuckle.
I approached, answering it without looking. “Sorin.”
“He betrayed us!” Nosh growled, breathing heavily as if running. I heard explosions, screaming, and malevolent laughter in the background. I stiffened with alarm.
“What?” I demanded, all thoughts of Lucian scattering from my mind.
“Benjamin!” Nosh rasped, cursing as an even louder explosion almost blew out the speakers. It was followed by a beastly roar that sounded like Nosh’s spirit bear. “Okay,” he wheezed. “I’m back. It’s fucking chaos over here. The bear should distract them long enough for me to get the hell out.”
“How did Benjamin betray us?” I demanded, motioning everyone closer to me by snapping my fingers. How the hell had anything gone wrong? We’d left the city half an hour ago if I was judging time correctly—which was questionable, given all the time changes I’d experienced.
“Benjamin would never betray us,” Stevie argued adamantly.
“Nosh!” I snapped into the phone impatiently, hoping he could hear me through the chaos on his end. “Where are you? We’re on our way back.”
Nero nodded grimly, flexing his new skeleton hand. Lucian was scanning the woods warily, keeping an eye out for the nearby predator he had smelled, not seeming interested in our panic.
“I’m here,” Nosh grumbled, panting as if running. “Benjamin broke us into groups to search for Izzy. He went with Victoria and Natalie and I went with a few others. But it was a trap.”
My blood suddenly ran cold. “What do you mean? The Cauldron knew you were coming?”
“No, Sorin,” Nosh snarled. “Benjamin kidnapped Victoria and Natalie. He’s gone.”
Everything muted and I heard a high-pitched whine in my ears. I blinked, wondering if I’d misheard him. “Kidnapped? That’s…not possible. He must be trying to protect them!”
“Listen to me, Sorin!” Nosh shouted at the top of his lungs. “I saw it with my own eyes! He tossed them into the back of a van and took off. The Sisters of Mercy were driving. Then more Sisters attacked us, covering their escape. It was fucking coordinated.”
I stared into the middle distance, horrified and unable to make my voice work. Persephone’s parting warning taunted me. You really should have taken Aphrodite up on her offer…
I wanted to rush back to the Underworld and demand an explanation, even if I had to drown the Queen of the Underworld in the Soul Spring and scream Hades name. But every second counted.
“I’m five minutes away from the museum, but I’m sticking to alleys,” Nosh said in a quieter tone, still breathing heavily.
“We’ll meet you on the steps. Find out where they’re taking Natalie and Victoria!”
“They’re going to Trinity Church. It was on the side of the van,” Nosh growled, the sounds of fighting fading dramatically. “I think they were upset that you left town rather than meet their High Priestess. Benjamin must have told them, but I can’t fathom why. Did you say something to piss him off?”
“No!” I snapped.
“It doesn’t make any sense,” he muttered, sounding frustrated. “I’ll see you at the museum.” He hung up without waiting for a response.
Stevie was panting furiously, his eyes distant and wild as he suddenly began to pace. “No. Benjamin would never—”
Lucian cut Stevie off with an abrupt snarl, lunging as if intending to rip his arm off. The tip of a gleaming silver arrow erupted out of Stevie’s open mouth, halt
ed by the back of his skull.
If he hadn’t moved, the arrow would have hit me directly in the chest.
He blinked once before falling forward at my feet, coming to a final rest on his side. Lucian grunted, shaking his head with a slightly dazed expression and almost losing his balance. Panic briefly rose in my chest, fearing he’d been hit as well. Then he hunkered low, snarling and spitting as he glared at the distant woods in the direction of the unseen archer. It hadn’t been a bear he’d sensed out there. It had been this assassin. He had tried to warn us, but we hadn’t heeded him.
That arrow had been intended for me.
I called up my cloak of shadow and blood, whipping it out ahead of us just as three more arrows slammed into it with sounds like breaking glass, making me wince. Because the heavy impacts caused me pain despite my shield.
“Silver arrows,” Nero growled, holding an orb of smoke in his palm as he peered over the cloak, searching for the threat.
I nodded grimly. “Artemis!” I shouted, my voice echoing through the mountains.
“I missed you, brother!” a distant, merciless voice laughed harshly from the depths of the forest. “I thought it was time we got reacquainted.”
“Your sense of humor certainly missed the mark!” I shouted.
31
Stevie stared lifelessly at me, the silver tip of the arrow jutting out of his mouth, and blood painting his long beard. Lucian and Nero hunkered low behind my cloak wall, occasionally risking glances out the side or over the top. Which was almost immediately followed by them frantically ducking back down as more silver arrows pelted my cloak. We were pinned down.
And now the alpha werewolf of New York City’s Crescent was dead.
How had she found us? Only a few people knew of this mountain. Stevie, Natalie, and—
An icy chill rolled down my spine. Benjamin. He and Natalie were the only other people who knew about this mountain, according to Stevie. Damn it. Was Benjamin working for Artemis? The Sisters? Both? Maybe Artemis was working with the Sisters of Mercy.
“Come out, coward!” I challenged, risking a quick glance to scan the forested face of the mountain. Two more arrows simultaneously slammed into the ground on either side of my cloak, letting us know that even splitting up and running was not an option—and removing all potential doubt that Artemis was the best archer in the world. The best hunter in the world.
“Benjamin was incredibly helpful,” she called out, sounding much closer. I peered over my cloak, ready to drop in an instant. No arrows came. “Benjamin was not a fan of being second-in-command. I told him I could make an opening in the werewolf hierarchy for him if he told me where you’d run off to. Nailed it.” She had killed Stevie to help Benjamin? I thought she had been aiming for me—she’d implied as much. “He said something about visiting a big wolf, but this canine doesn’t look that big to me,” she said, exiting the woods without the sound of even a crunching twig, smirking at Lucian as he peered out from the side of my cloak.
She looked exactly the same as the first time I had seen her in Greece so long ago. She had long, golden brown hair, but it was tucked back in a bun so as not to get in the way of her aim. Her features were cold and beautiful, and her eyes were cruel and cunning. She wore jeans and a light jacket and clutched an ornate silver bow at her side with one hand—the same intricate weapon I had once tried to steal. The same bow Hades had so adamantly warned me about.
It was nocked with another gleaming arrow, ready to loose if we made a run for it. She walked sideways, grinning. “You may as well stop hiding. There’s no sport in killing men hiding under a blanket,” she said, eyeing my cloak. She kept her distance, though.
“What do you want, Artemis?”
“You bleeding out at my feet, whimpering my name, sweet brother,” she said in a sickly-sweet tone. She even licked her lips. “And Apollo witnessing it all.”
Lucian began slinking away on silent paws as if hoping to outflank her. Three silver arrows suddenly sailed past my face close enough to feel the wind of their passing. They hammered into Stevie’s lifeless form—right in his heart—each arrow splitting the haft of the one preceding it. The skin around the arrows blackened and smoldered. “Movement makes me jumpy,” Artemis warned. “You don’t want me jumpy, brother.”
I gritted my teeth, motioning for Nero and Lucian to remain behind the cloak. “If you have everything under control, why convince Benjamin to aid the Sisters of Mercy?”
She lowered her bow, frowning as she cocked her head. “What?”
She looked genuinely puzzled. “He kidnapped some friends of mine earlier. He’s working for the Sisters of Mercy. And you, apparently.”
She laughed bitterly. “Well. Little Benjamin has more spunk than I realized.” She shrugged dismissively. “No matter. My only concern is your death.”
Nero murmured uneasily behind me. I didn’t know what he said, but I was pretty sure we were on the same page. “You expect me to believe that’s just a coincidence?” I scoffed. “Rather than the much simpler angle—you’re working with the Sisters of Mercy as well.”
She froze, her good humor shattering in an instant, and punctuated by three silver arrows hammering into the ground directly between my feet. They struck so hard that they sunk into the earth, leaving only the fletching visible.
“Work. With mortals. How dare you,” she seethed, quivering with outrage at the suggestion. “Only a coward would draw filthy mortals into their godly disputes. Mortals are merely for sport, created for us to play with, torment, and discard.”
Nero growled angrily but remained hidden.
I studied her, frowning. I…believed her. No one could fake that level of arrogance. She and her brother had severed the thumbs of Hephaestus without help. I couldn’t imagine her accepting the aid of mortals—not even to command them. It would be…degrading to her.
Had Benjamin kidnapped the devils simply to get some leverage against me for Stevie’s assassination? I remembered him looking me in the eyes, promising to save Izzy. I realized I was panting, my fury ignited by his straight-faced lie. He’d known he would betray me even then. He’d shaken my hand. I bit back most of my anger, directing all that was left at Artemis.
“If you wanted a fight, all you had to do was ask.”
She seemed to have overcome her own anger, and a slow smile crept across her cheeks at my words. “Oh, we do not want to fight. We want to ruin you, first, my dear Sorin. We want to drag your name through every mud puddle we can find. We want to hurt you down to your bones. We will take Dracula and tear you apart one memory at a time, because you embarrassed us in front of Hera. Now Zeus knows, so we must make an example of you to reclaim our honor. You should have just had the decency to die,” she snarled, spitting on the ground. “You are not cut out to stand among true Olympians, no matter your bloodline. Just because a King fucks a donkey, doesn’t mean the kingdom can expect a prince—just a braying ass. Hee. Haw.” She was smiling now, sensing my almost blinding rage. I was clenching my fists, wanting nothing more than to rip her tongue out as she so crassly referenced my mother. “The actual fight will be your final release from the mountains of pain we wish to gift to you,” she said with feverish anticipation, licking her lips again.
I very carefully steadied my nerves. “You should probably know from the outset that it’s really not going to work out how you envision. Donkeys don’t care about kings. They only know how to work. Rain, sun, or storms. They get the job done either way.”
Nero laughed maniacally. “Hee-haw, bitch. Hee-fucking-haw!”
I smiled as her face darkened in fury. “You’re about to die. I’ll give your regards to Apollo.”
I held out my hand for Lucian to remain hidden behind the shield. She had already hinted at wanting a wolf to hunt, so I didn’t want to give her any ideas. I was pissing her off plenty, and this was between us. To that effect, I let a long, wickedly barbed blood crystal form in my hand, ready to throw it at Artemis the moment she was
distracted.
Nero was ducked down behind my cloak, staring at my dagger. “She’s blocking my magic,” he whispered softly.
“I am, little magician,” Artemis snapped, clearly hearing him.
I focused on her. “This is between us, Artemis. You said it yourself—only cowards use mortals in this game.”
She pursed her lips. “Fine. I have no intention of killing the magician and wolf. Yet. Much too easy. I will wait until you are already drowning in depression over the corpses of your women before I heap their bodies onto your guilt.”
I stared at her. Hard. “Swear it.”
She curtsied theatrically. “As long as they don’t attack, I won’t kill them,” she said, sneering at where Lucian and Nero ducked behind my cloak. “Much like I don’t bother crushing the ant that just walked over my boot,” she said, pointing at her feet.
I let out a small sigh of relief, masking it from my face. “Why do you want Dracula? The real reason. He’s almost as worthless as the mortals.”
She smiled delightedly. “I think you know, brother. Oh, and in case it wasn’t obvious, you will not give him to these childish witches. Or everyone you have ever loved will die. Horribly. Slowly.” Her threats were remarkably repetitive. “I’ll see you back in the city.” She blew me a kiss and then turned her back on me, making her way back towards the woods. I dropped my cloak and hurled my blood dagger at her spine, immediately shifting into crimson mist since I had seen how fast she could shoot. She couldn’t hit me in this form, and I was hoping she would hold to her word not to hurt Lucian and Nero; I was ready to whip my cloak back out in an instant if that wasn’t the case.
If I didn’t take her down now, I would have to face both her and her brother at the same time.
This was my best shot.
The dagger sailed true, but she instinctively spun out of its path, already unleashing a silver arrow at my mass of mist. And she was grinning, letting me know she had anticipated my attack.
Devil’s Blood: Shade of Devil Book 3 Page 20
