by Melody Rose
“Tell me about it,” I grunted, finding a second to get a word in.
Violet surprised me by stopping my walking and gathering me in a big hug. Or as big of a hug as her small body could offer. I hugged her back and accepted the sympathy.
“Whatever it is, we’re going to figure it out,” she said into my shirt.
“Thanks, friend,” I said, grateful for her positivity.
Esme ventured over to us and coughed to get my attention. I looked over at the soldier, and Violet released me. She bounced over to Ansel, her black pigtails waving as she walked. I smiled internally at the thought of her giving him the same verbal onslaught that she just gave me. I wondered how long his patience would hold out for Hebe’s daughter.
The daughter of Prometheus walked alongside me, shoulder to shoulder so she could speak quietly. “You’re an idiot, you know,” Esme said as she crossed her arms over her chest.
“I’m starting to realize that,” I agreed, not even finding a good argument against her accusation.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” Esme said as she shook her head. “I’m not worth it.”
“Shut up, okay?” I said, trying to keep my voice playful but hoping she knew there was some seriousness behind my words. “What’s done is done. You’re back in the Military, and I’m…” I stalled, unable to finish my sentence.
“An Olympic Official,” Esme did it for me. “See? You are an idiot.”
“Yeah, well, maybe something good will come of this,” I said with a shrug. “Who knows? Tyche might bless me with some luck, and not much will change.”
“You’re wrong, Shy,” Esme said, and then she clicked her tongue. “Everything’s about to change.”
Little did I know how much she was right. I felt the effects of the sudden change immediately. Because when we reached my dorm and I opened the door, there was nothing inside.
“What the hell?” I balked as I walked into the empty living space.
All of my stuff was gone. My bed, dresser, clothes, weapons, tools, everything. There were still some communal things like the couch and coffee table. All of Janet’s furniture was there, but everything from my toothbrush to my spare pair of boots was absent.
The group wandered into the dorm and looked around blankly. They eventually stared at me as if I had the answer.
“After everything today, I have to go and get robbed too?” I threw my hands up in the air, completely exasperated. “I have to report this to the Officials.”
“You haven’t been robbed,” came a female voice from the doorway.
As one, our heads turned to see Annika leaning against the doorframe. Annika had the build of an Amazon woman, though she was the daughter of Apollo, not his twin Artemis. She looked like her half brother, Ansel, with the same colored hair and green eyes. Though instead of his even tan, the sun kissed her with freckles all across her face. She was the youngest of all of the Olympic Officials in her mid-thirties. Except for me now, I supposed.
“You’re moving,” Annika answered as she waved me back out into the hallway. “Olympic Officials don’t live in the dorms.”
My mouth popped open like a broken latch. “I get an apartment? Like the soldiers?”
“Nope,” Annika said with a small shake of her head. “You get a house. Like the Officials.”
Benji clapped a hand over his mouth to suppress his squeal, but we still heard the high-pitched exclamation. Darren pumped his fist in the air while Violet rushed up to my side and wrapped her arms around me.
“Can we come with you to see it?” Violet begged. When I didn’t answer right away, she looked over at Annika. “We can come with her, right?”
“It’s her house,” Annika said with a shrug. “She can invite whoever she wants.”
“Holy shit,” Benji muttered from behind his hand.
“I guess we’re going to see my house?” I said, my voice turning the statement into a question.
“Hell yeah, we are!” Benji exclaimed, finally releasing his full excitement.
Annika led the way back out of the dorms and across the quad. Students were just filling in from Christmas break, getting ready for the new semester starting tomorrow. We made an odd group: an Olympic Official, four students, one soldier, and the rumored traitor. While we might have gotten Esme reinstated, the word of her return hadn’t been met with the most welcoming responses. We stood by her side the whole time, making us outcasts in our own right. If there wasn’t already enough gossip surrounding all of us, there were bound to be more once the school found out about my new status.
I winced internally and looked back for Ansel, thinking I could really use a word of encouragement from him. But he stayed at the back of the pack with Esme. They continued to whisper to each other, and I watched him put his arm around her, giving her the comforting hug that I so badly wanted.
I swallowed my resentment and focused on the fact that he would probably spend the night with me. We would talk then. There would always be time for the two of us.
Annika led us to the row of condos where the Academy teachers lived. At the end of the walk were the thirteen houses reserved for the Olympic Officials. I never ventured down this far, never needing to. They weren’t mansions, more like quaint cottages with personalities that reflected the gods that blessed them. I could pick out Garth’s, son of Demeter, house with the luscious garden. Min’s was also obvious with a wooden owl, a symbol of Athena, perched over the front door.
We came to the most modern of all of the homes. Whereas the others had more triangular frames, this one was boxy with high windows in the front with the curtains drawn. It was a two-story white marble with a black metal finish. The trim around the windows and door frame matched the color of the roof. Next to the door where the house numbers normally would have been, was Hephaestus’s anvil.
I ran my hand over the symbol, feeling the groves in the marble with my fingertips. Disbelief fell over me again, but it brought comfort to know that this was my father’s house, and generations of his children had lived here. I would be joining the ranks of them, and for the first time since I took a seat in that chair, took up the mantle, I felt pride.
Then there was another thing that brought me comfort. I noticed that the metal lantern above the doorway flashed blue.
Instead of a lightbulb or an ordinary flame, the light within the lantern was a piece of the Eternal Flame. It was awesome to know that I had my own piece hanging right outside of my door whenever I might need it.
I smiled at the sight of the Flame, which danced in response to my presence.
As if all that wasn’t enough to convince me that this was my new home now, my two dogs, Khryseos and Argyreos, stood on the front porch, waiting like the good dogs they were. They were large Dobermans, built by my father originally out of gold and silver. But they were my guard dogs, gifted to me on my first day at the Academy. They were magical beings with their own tricks that I still hadn’t figured out completely. But at their core, they were still loving and happy pups.
I bent down to wrap the pair of them into a hug. They each licked the sides of my face in welcome. But they wouldn’t let me contain them for long. They stood up on all fours and barked, one at a time, indicating that I should open the door.
“Well,” Annika said as she placed the key in the palm of my hand. “Go on in and check out your house.”
I rubbed the key between my fingers, letting the metal sing to me. I felt the history of this home and how many demigods touched this key. Before the key could tell me its whole story, Benji patted me on the shoulder excitedly.
“What are you waiting for? Let’s go in!” he said with a squeeze.
I let them in, and we flooded the house. Everyone explored every corner. Esme, Darren, and Benji wandered around with wide eyes and mouths. Predictably, Violet ventured for the kitchen, being the excellent chef she was, and splayed herself out on the granite countertop.
“I’m never leaving,” she declared. She skip
ped around the kitchen, and explored all of the cabinets, crying out the name of specific pots and pans, most of them being cast iron, which didn’t surprise me.
I hung out in the doorway, admiring the spacious open living area, complete with a kitchen, living room, and dining room. There was a staircase leading to the second floor just off to the right. Everything was hardwood and fully furnished. It was cozy with dark wall colors and metal furniture, excluding the sofa and armchairs. It even had a brick fireplace, looking more like a pizza oven than anything else.
Khryseos and Argyreos pranced right in as if they owned the place. Immediately, they took to sniffing everything. They split off to inspect the whole house before finding the dog door and dashing out into the backyard.
Ansel stayed by my side, seeming to be in as much shock as me. “Damn, Cheyenne, you’re moving up in the world.”
“I didn’t… I never thought it would come with perks like this,” I gaped, unsure of what to say.
“You’re an Olympic Official now, what did you expect?” Ansel said as he put his hands in his pockets.
I turned to look at him with a curious expression. He said that last statement with a weird tone, one I’d never heard him use. It seemed… resentful?
Before I fully had a chance to decipher his words and body language, Benji appeared seemingly out of nowhere and grabbed my hand. He dragged me forward, yanking me along.
“Cheyenne!” he exclaimed like someone who had just won the lottery. “You’ve got to see this.”
“Benji--” I protested, but my friend didn’t let me finish.
“You’re got your own forge.”
“What?” I said, stunned.
My legs moved of their own accord. I lost control of my body as excitement pulsed through my veins. Darren held open the glass sliding door that led out to the backyard. There was a shed-like structure, though it mimicked the design of the house. Violet was waiting at the entrance, and I raced towards her, right through the open barn door.
Inside was a fully equipped forge. I’d worked in numerous smithies in my life by now, even one carved into an Italian cliff side. But this was the ideal size, unlike the Academy’s classroom forge, which could accommodate multiple blacksmiths at once. This one had one forge, one workbench, a single set of tools.
My tools.
I reached out and stroked the anvil, perfectly worn and ready to be used. My eyes wandered across the various metals, each of them singing to me. I saw potential in every single piece, already forming designs in my mind.
Despite the fact that I had been overwhelmed by the constant changes and wrestled with the foolishness of my decision, I couldn’t help myself. This forge might have made it all worth it. If this was one of the perks of being an Olympic Official, I could seriously get used to this.
5
“I think I could get used to this,” Benji said as he lounged out on the couch, resting his feet in Darren’s lap. The son of Asclepius shoved his friend’s legs off, and Benji pouted dramatically.
We spent the evening in my new house. Violet cooked us a delicious dinner of pork chops and mashed potatoes with applesauce we could dip the pork chops in. She made a custom pear sauce for me because I was allergic to apples.
We piled our dishes up in the sink, and we stretched out in the living room with the fire blazing. The January evening quickly turned cold, the dark clouds covering the stars and threatening snow. It was cozy and nice to just relax in this safe environment before classes started again tomorrow.
Annika explained that this was my house, and no one could enter it without my explicit permission. There were magical wards to prevent break-ins and snoops. Not even other Officials had a right to enter my home, just like I couldn’t go into theirs without permission.
It was a level of privacy I couldn’t remember having in my entire life. Even before the Academy, when I lived with my mom, she had a habit of not knocking and just barging into my bedroom. Since then, I’d either lived with roommates or moved back in with my mom. Even when studying abroad in Italy, I shared the villa with Arges and Phae. I never imagined having a whole house to myself.
Hopefully, it wouldn’t be that way for long. I imagined Ansel moving in here after I graduated at the end of this semester, and we could share it together. It was such a big space for one person to occupy all on their own. And we could definitely add elements to make it brighter for him, since I knew he wasn’t a fan of the cave-like interior. He was the son of Apollo, after all. Sky and sun were his friends, whereas I could spend the whole day inside, completely focused on forging and forgetting the outside world.
I curled up like a cat in the chair closest to the fire while Darren, Benji, and Violet took over the couch. Khryseos and Argyreos laid at my feet, sleeping contentedly on either side of me. Esme sat on the floor, leaning back on her hands, her face content for the first time in weeks. Ansel was in the other chair, across from me, resting his chin in his hand. It was so rewarding to see all of them splayed out and comfortable like this. It was a rare moment of peace for all of us.
“I’m going to be knocking on your door every single night,” Benji announced as he tried to stretch his legs out on Violet’s lap this time. Unlike Darren, she let Benji stay and rested her hands on his shins, tucking him in closer to her.
“Not every night,” Darren said with an eye roll. “You just going to abandon Zach like that?”
“He’s got stationed off campus this semester,” Benji said with a frown.
“Oh no, Benji, I’m so sorry,” I said immediately, feeling for his loss. “When did this happen?”
“Over Christmas break,” my friend said with a sigh. “He came over and told me. We’re going to try the long-distance thing, but apparently, he’s out somewhere in the Dakotas where the Symplegades appeared.”
“The what?” Violet asked with pinched eyebrows.
“The Symplegades were two huge rock monsters also known as the Clashing Rocks that cause earthquakes and tidal waves,” I answered automatically, my Oracle powers turning on instantly. “Jason and the Argonauts originally defeated them by using a dove.”
“Thanks, Encyclopedia Brown,” Darren said with a chuckle.
I tipped a fake hat in their direction, taking the jab as a compliment.
“That’s an obscure monster,” Esme said offhandedly.
“No kidding,” Violet commented as she picked at her teeth with her pinky finger.
“That’s been happening a lot lately,” Ansel added. “They are popping up more frequently, and the Military’s having to send out more soldiers. It wouldn’t surprise me if more of them get deployed off campus.”
“Do we think it’s Eris’s doing?” Darren asked, getting to the heart of the matter as he was known to do. He pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose, a tell for whenever he was nervous.
“It has to be,” I concluded. “What could be more chaotic than bringing more monsters to the mortal world? The more she brings, the more spread out the Military is going to be.”
I held the rest of my worries in my head, choosing not to voice them. If Ansel was right about the multitude of monsters, then there was a very good chance that he and Esme would be shipped out. I tried not to think about that and how it made my stomach twist into nauseous knots.
“I hate to say it, Shy, but you’ve got to help the Fates,” Darren said suddenly.
My head turned in his direction so fast that I thought I got whiplash. “Where did that come from?”
“Yeah, party pooper,” Violet said as she reached across the couch to push the healer playfully. “I thought we weren’t going to talk about that tonight.”
“That was before I knew about the monsters and hearing about Zach getting deployed,” Darren defended. He leaned forward, put his elbows on his knees, and looked me directly in the eye. “If you help the Fates, then they tell you where Hephaestus is. You find him, he helps with the Ultimate Weapon, then the war ends. The sooner you do this, the so
oner all of this is over.”
As much as I didn’t want to admit it, I knew he was right. I twisted my fingers over one another, suddenly sweaty.
“And I know the General is going to talk to you tomorrow about your duties as an Olympic Official, but I think, in the end, that’s going to help you more than it will hurt you,” Darren continued arguing his point. “You’re going to have advantages as an Official that you would never have as a student.”
“He has a point,” Esme added her vote of agreement. “Even though I still think you were an idiot for doing that, it might be helpful.”
There was a ruffle of fabric as Ansel shifted in his seat. I eyed him suspiciously, but continued to address Esme and Darren’s concerns.
“Do any of you have any idea how I’m supposed to learn weaving and woodcarving?” I asked. “Because I’m screwed if I can’t find anyone to teach me. It’s not as though I can look up a YouTube video or something out here.”
“I did have one idea,” Benji said as he raised a single finger in the air.
When he didn’t voice it right away, I waved my hand to encourage him to talk. “Care to share with the class?”
“You’re not going to like it,” Benji winced.
“Okay,” I said, drawing out the word into two syllables, emphasizing my hesitation.
“Well, you see, there are the nymphs in the woods on campus that helped you with the dance…” Benji said as he squinted his eyes, preparing for my explosion.
The pieces clicked in my mind, and my mouth dropped into a frown instantly. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“He’s really not that bad,” Benji offered. “You worked with him before, and I took one of his drama classes last semester. He’s eccentric, but he could be your best shot at learning these skills.”
“Drama classes?” Esme asked with a single raised eyebrow. “Are you guys talking about Oliver?”
