by Angie Fox
And a great war cry went up from the armies.
chapter twenty-four
“Get the babies out of here!” I ordered. I didn’t care if they were immortal. Hadn’t I just seen that even high gods could die?
Rodger handed the baby back to Cavillace, but she wasn’t listening to me at all. She’d spotted the other new mommy. “She has so much hair!” the goddess said, admiring Emma’s full nest of asps. She held out the child of peace to meet the child of the damned. “Baby!”
Cavillace smiled. “See how she wriggles so vigorously.”
Medusa nodded. “Yes, well, she does take after her mother.”
The babies reached for each other. That was all it took for the child of the damned. Emma squealed in delight.
The sky crackled as portals fired up. Bundles of color spun on all sides of the armies and even in the lines. Soldiers shrank back from the whipping energy and light. The portals whirled harder, expanding outward until dozens upon dozens of them hovered just above the desert floor. Each of them could easily fit an entire squad at a time, plus dragons, centaurs, and any other kind of war beast.
They were beautiful.
They churned, hot and red. And I swore I could hear the gods, the heavens, and both armies let out a collective gasp.
I couldn’t believe it myself. The portal in the minefield had been weak, solitary. These were enough to move an army.
A million eyes turned to me.
But I hadn’t done it.
“Medusa?” I said, still trying to wrap my mind around it.
The gorgon shrugged. “So she likes other babies.”
Right. Sure. I let it go. Because right then, I knew how I needed to take my stand.
I’d be willing to bet my life that every soul on this battlefield would rather drop weapons and leave. I knew I wanted to go home.
It took me a second to find my voice, but when I did, I turned to Leta. “Can you get a message out?”
“Yes,” she rumbled. “Are you ready for the battle to begin?”
Her and battles. “No.” Tears filled my eyes and I felt my throat clog. I needed my bronze weapon for something else. “Tell them they can go home.”
The dragon was speechless. Another miracle. “I don’t understand,” she stammered.
“I’m done here,” I told her. The armies had raged. I’d faced the gods. And now? “I’m going home.” If the gods wanted to smite me, they’d have to follow me to New Orleans. “Anyone who wants to stay and fight can have at it. The rest can go back to their families. The portals will take them where they want to go.”
Leta’s eyes swam with tears.
I placed a hand on her shoulder. “Tell them they are free.”
These warring soldiers were good people who had been trapped for too long. My friends too. The gods were willing to see each and every one of us die to prove a worthless point in a senseless war.
But not anymore. We deserved to go home. All of us.
She nodded and began to broadcast. I turned to Rodger, who threw his arms around me. “I can go home! I can see Mary Ann. She won’t even know I’m coming!” His eyes darted from portal to portal. “Are you sure this is going to work?”
“They can take you anywhere you want to go,” I told him.
But he was already talking to himself. “I can put the kids to bed tonight. Gabe’s been reading this Smile story about braces. He has to get braces.” Rodger snarfed, half crying, half laughing. “I’m going to have to pay for braces.”
Soldiers on both sides of the Great Divide left their battle lines and began walking across the divide. A half dozen at first, then more. They greeted old friends, or simply offered a hand to people just like them, who happened to have been drafted onto the other side.
A few of the minor gods began yelling out orders to cease. Some went as far as to grapple with soldiers crossing the lines, but there were too many of them and it was too late.
The portals whooshed as soldiers began going home.
I hugged Rodger.
He patted me on the shoulder. “You’ll make it out to California, right?”
“Sure,” I told him, hugging him one more time, squeezing him tight. “Get out of here.”
He winked and headed for the nearest portal. He gave one final wave before he stepped through.
“Halt!” Mars bellowed. “By the power of Zeus, I command you to take up arms!” A smattering of a cheer went up somewhere, but that could have been from the entire company of centaurs who charged through a portal at once. “Who is with me?” Mars bellowed, holding his sword in the air.
No one.
Mars lowered his weapon, staring right at me.
A bolt of lightning shot from the night sky and Zeus himself descended. Even the troops at the portals hesitated and craned their necks to see the king of all the gods. Word was, he hadn’t even picked a side. He just liked the fighting.
“Why are you dismantling the armies?” he boomed.
Mars snarled while Menhit’s mouth opened and closed like a caught fish.
“They will not fight anymore,” she finally said.
Zeus sighed. “Then you will fight,” he told her.
The Chinese god behind her frowned. “It is no fun to be stabbed or shot. We could die.”
“They will not obey,” Mars ground out. “And if we smite them all, then there will be no one to fight.”
I turned to Leta. “Are you broadcasting this?”
“Loud and clear,” she said.
That’s when it hit me. The gods needed us—the humans, the shifters, and the demigods who fought for them. Only we’d been subjugated for so long, we forgot we held the power.
There was no epic battle if we refused to fight it.
“We can smite her,” Mars said, pointing at me.
I froze.
“And make her a hero? A legend?” Zeus bellowed. “No. The healer will live a piddling, mortal life and die in obscurity.”
That sounded great to me.
“This war is over,” Zeus declared. “We have fought well.”
Leta gasped and there was a great rattling as the collars began dropping off the dragons.
One by one, they shifted back into their human forms. The joy, the relief was palpable as they were brought back, whole and unharmed.
The gods watched Zeus, clearly unsure of what would happen next. Hell, I didn’t know either.
The Chinese god crossed his arms over his chest. “Clearly, we have planned this all along.”
“Yes,” the feathered goddess said, gathering steam. “This was obviously a test to see if the people would stand behind us and our chosen healer.” She pointed a finger at me and I wasn’t about to argue. She threw her hands up in the air. “The people passed! The healer can live!”
I couldn’t believe it. I looked to Galen, relief flooding me. These gods were insane, but I didn’t care. I might actually get out of here.
A cheer went up from the gods. It was echoed by the troops, but for an entirely different reason. They were cheering as they formed lines to the portals and left the gods and their war behind.
Jeffe clapped a bottle of nail polish into my hand. “Here. This is yours.”
It was my I’m Not Really a Waitress. I waggled it at him. “You won this fair and square, buddy.”
He shrugged. “Yes. But I cannot fit it anyway.”
It was then that I saw the sphinx had crammed all of his poker winnings onto a hospital gurney.
“I thought I would use these things in the afterlife, but now I can take them home.” He beamed. “That is good because in my country, it is customary to bring presents after a long time away.”
I hugged him and rubbed his back, startling the sphinx. Still, I was pretty sure I’d heard him purr.
Grinning, I let him go and watched him amble toward the nearest portal.
“Look at this.” Galen nudged me. I followed where he pointed and saw Kosta down on one knee in front of Shirley.
Now that was one wedding I wouldn’t miss.
Marius clapped a hand on my shoulder. “I’m going to take care of Thaïs before I leave.”
“You don’t have to do that,” I told him. “It should be my job.”
The vampire’s long mouth turned up in a grin. “You’ve done enough.”
I couldn’t help but smile back. “Thaïs is going to be pissed when he wakes up and there’s no more fighting.”
“Then that will be my reward,” Marius said, before he grew serious. “Thank you, Petra. And you,” he said, shaking Galen’s hand.
“Are you ready?” Galen asked.
“Yes,” I said, dodging the celebrating troops as we made our way to the nearest portal. Soldiers I didn’t know, from both sides, were thanking us and clapping me on the back.
They didn’t understand. I hadn’t done it. They had.
Thunder rolled as Zeus surveyed the rapidly emptying field. They had no armies. They had no support. All they had was delusion.
The god raised his hands to the sky, throwing off thunderbolts. “It is to the benefit of all that the gods declare peace.”
No one was listening. We’d already made it so.
As I neared the portal, I saw Klotho.
She treated me to an approving nod. “I love a well-woven cloth.”
I smiled and gave her a bow.
I turned to Galen and saw the love and the warmth in his eyes. “I love you,” I told him, kissing him, holding him, savoring the feeling of having this man with me. Of knowing I could have a life with him at my side.
As armies collide, the healer shall leave this world forever.
And so the prophecy came to pass. When it was our time, we too stepped through the portal, and into our new life.
chapter twenty-five
A few weeks later …
The benefit of having a large Cajun family is that they had actually kept my house up while I’d been gone. My bungalow in the Garden District stood not much worse for wear on a street lined with palm trees and sprawling sawtooth and live oaks, with Spanish moss flirting with the wind.
They had taken the liberty of painting the shingles outside a bright yellow, and my shutters green.
I didn’t care.
I had Galen sprawled out on my blue couch in the living room, and me right there on top of him.
He was running his tongue along the tip of my ear—much to my squirming delight—when the doorbell rang.
I was perfectly happy to assume it was yet another well-wishing relative welcoming me back from the Peace Corps, or to lecture me for not writing, but Galen was always the type who had to know exactly what was going on.
He craned his neck to look out the front window. “Delivery.”
I let him answer the door while I grabbed a pair of scissors from the cutting block in the kitchen.
My kitchen.
My house.
I stood for a moment and took in the country wallpaper—which now seemed too quaint. In my defense, it had come with the house. I’d never really stopped to notice it before, but now I did. My place, my home was a precious thing and I wasn’t going to take it for granted again.
I’d raided my magnolia tree outside and every room had fresh flowers. There was fruit in a bowl in the kitchen. Real fruit, not the dehydrated kind. My windows were open to the breeze that smelled of spring in New Orleans, not the red dust of limbo or its bubbling tar pits.
“Deep thoughts?” Galen asked, plunking the box down onto the white kitchen island.
“Good ones,” I said, smiling as he moved behind me to wrap his arms around my waist and plant a kiss on the side of my neck.
I scissored through the shipping tape, scooped through endless packing peanuts, and withdrew a purple velvet bag with a note attached.
Used this on Nerthus. Don’t need it anymore.
B.t.w. Congrats on the end of the war!
Eris
“Son of a…”
“When did you meet Eris?” Galen asked, taking the package.
“It’s a long story,” I said, as Galen withdrew a bronze knife. It was as long as my hand, with a compact handle and a triangular blade. I picked it up. It was army issue, and very, very familiar.
“Ha,” I said, “it’s yours now.”
He smiled, inspecting the blade—perfect except for the sliver missing from the tip. “It can’t hurt us anymore.”
“None of it can,” I said, as I watched him find a spot for it on my picture shelf in the hall.
As he did, I glanced over to see commotion on PNN. We’d muted the TV earlier, so we could focus on more pressing matters. But now—
“Galen, come in here.” I turned the volume up.
Newscaster Stone McKay sat at his desk, looking even more tanned than usual. “PNN is first to report that a peace treaty has been signed between the old gods and the new gods.” He smiled, showing overly white, perfectly straight canines. “The gods rejoice at their beneficence!”
And there she was, Eris, the goddess of chaos, smiling into the camera. She held a silver flame in her open palm, her arm bent, like a waitress holds a tray. A white barely there dress clung to her every curve. An array of tiny diamonds on invisible strings flickered over her neck and chest.
“Thanks, Stone.” She brushed at the silky blond curls that cascaded down her back and curled over her shoulders. “The gods are truly brilliant,” she said, as if it were obvious. “They decided—on their own—that our heroes had done enough fighting and dying for glory. The gods then brought the troops home in record time—the same day peace talks began, in fact.”
She smiled into the camera and her skin itself seemed to glow.
There was no mention of the oracles or the struggle or the mass exodus at the end. And I didn’t care.
Galen and I settled in together as PNN moved on to a light celebrity-style piece about the god of fear and the goddess of hope, and the first paid pictures of their darling little baby.
Galen ran his hands up my arms. “Did you see the postcard from Shirley?”
“Yes.” I snarfed. I couldn’t believe she’d talked Kosta into a weekend in Amish country. The salty commander had to be in love.
We’d heard from the others as well. Jeffe had made it back to his brothers and sisters in Egypt. Marius was scouting locations for a vampire pop music club in Las Vegas. And every time I opened my e-mail, I found pictures of Rodger and his kids. It’s like he had to make up for the last half decade of his life. I didn’t blame him one bit.
And in the interest of making up for lost time, I turned around and playfully shoved Galen down onto the couch.
He grinned. “I like a feisty woman.”
“You haven’t seen the half of it,” I said, straddling him, rubbing my body along his like a cat.
I kissed him once, twice, reveling in the feel of him sliding his hands up my back and drawing me down to lie flush against him.
“What?” I asked, when he paused.
“I just can’t believe any of this is real. That I went fishing with your cousins yesterday. That I’m out of the business of killing people.”
It was amazing.
Perfect.
“You’ll do well in private security.”
“Nothing is going to come between us again,” he said.
“Never.” It felt wonderful.
He was my rock, my strength, my reward for going through hell and back again.
The phone rang, and we ignored it. I slid my hands up under his T-shirt, loving the feel of his warm, hard muscles underneath.
“Petra?” Marc’s mom called out from my answering machine on the counter. I really needed to update my technology. “Petra. This is Lacey.” She sounded choked up. Join the club. I’d called her when I’d gotten back into town, but I hadn’t gotten a message like this from her since Marc had gone to war before me, since she and I had both believed he’d died. “I’d like you and Galen to come to dinner,” she said. “We’re all celebrating.
Again. Marc and Leta will be there.”
I could hear the joy in her voice, and the love. Marc was back. And luckily he hadn’t completely shocked his mother because Leta had gotten him to reconnect with her while we were still down in limbo. It was something I’d always tried to do.
I was glad for them. And happy to have my own hero. I gave Galen a saucy grin as I looked down at him.
“I love you,” I told him. I’d never love anybody else.
He gave me a lusty grin. “How about you show me how much?”
I did.
After all, we had hours before we had to be … anywhere.
Also by Angie Fox
Immortally Yours
Immortally Embraced
PRAISE FOR ANGIE FOX
and her bestselling novels
“A new talent just hit the urban fantasy genre, and she has a genuine gift for creating dangerously hilarious drama.”
—RT Book Reviews on The Accidental Demon Slayer
“With its sharp, witty writing and unique characters, Angie Fox’s contemporary paranormal debut is fabulously fun.”
—Chicago Tribune on The Accidental Demon Slayer
“Angie Fox has done it again. In the latest adventure featuring the fabulous demon slayer Lizzie Brown, Fox deftly creates complex characters with a gift for gab, weaving multiple storylines together to create sidesplitting encounters that are both romantic and suspenseful.”
—RT Book Reviews on The Last of the Demon Slayers (4½ stars!)
“The Accidental Demon Slayer is a delightful new paranormal romance that is hilarious, exciting, suspenseful, dangerous, and an adventure ride of action from start to finish. The characters are eccentric, the writing flows great, and the storyline is original. I adored every page of this outstanding debut novel and I hungrily look forward to getting my hands on Angie Fox’s next book.”
—Fresh Fiction
“Ms. Fox details her world with colorful characters that have mysterious pasts, and keeps readers engaged with humorous mishaps, blossoming romance, and spells gone awry. The Accidental Demon Slayer is a fast-moving good time that will quickly gain fans.”
