Page 36 of Prometheus' Priestess

“You think I’mbroken.”

“I didn’t say that,” he said, a dark anger beginning to simmer in his tone.

“You didn’t have to.” She pushed his hand away and sat up, swivelling round to the other side of the bed before stalking off to the bathroom door and slamming it shut. When she emerged, she was fully dressed.

His anger had continued to build as she’d been in the bathroom. She was so young, so naive. But it was more than that he admitted to himself, for he was a man who knew his own flaws well. He hated being shut out. He hated having words put in his mouth and he hated when his actions of help were thrown in his face. But when Amara exited, with her shoulders squared and a look of wounded pride on her face, the penny dropped.

Gluttony. Lust.Pride.He had seen the Goddess of Gluttony and her work first-hand on Amara. He had not, however, seen Eros strike with his arrow. That could have happened at any time, Prometheus reasoned to himself. The thought that Amara had only kissed him because she’d been touched by the God of Lust wounded him, but he couldn’t think about that now. Because Hubris at some point, the third god to intervene with his own challenge, with his excessive pride, had infiltrated Amara’s mind.

The goddesses, those two spiteful bitches Athena and Aphrodite, must have teamed up. They had beenusinghim and his own actions against the priestess for her challenges. This was just a war move to them. Except it was clear Amara was losing every single battle to the fear. She had gorged without purging, given into lust but not overcome it, and now she was filled with a pride that would only make her defiant unless she could transmute it into humility. By the look on her face, that wasn’t going to happen.

He was losing the priestess to her humanity.

All his anger redirected itself at once to the goddesses he’d be having words with once he was back in Olympus. The priestess was no longer − had never been − safe with him here on Earth, herealised.

He didn’t know how Aphrodite had done it, but what he felt for Amara was not what he had felt for any other human before. He could admit that in the privacy of his own mind. And right now she’d be far safer away from him.

“I’ll call you a taxi to take youhome.”

CHAPTER XVIII

Prometheus poured liquid metal into a casing and stood back, watching the molten substance hiss and spit as it settled.

He had returned to his cabin in the mountains after he had put Amara in the taxi and been here ever since. The journey from Earth to Olympus had only taken him a day once he was in the old lands of Greece. It had been a glorious start to the summer, with Demeter jubilant at her reunion with her daughter this year, but all Prometheus had seen these past three months was the dull grey of a life with Amara no longer in it.

Waiting for the mould to cool, he turned his attention to a black and gold gilded armour piece and began to stretch out his frustration on the fresh, tightleather.

“Prometheus, myfriend.”

Prometheus turned to see Tyche, swathed in a blue linen tunic and her hair tied in place with flowers, approaching him.

“What are you doing here?” Prometheus muttered gruffly as he turned back to thearmour.

“The question is, what are you?” She gestured to the outside space around them where Prometheus did a lot of his work. Scattered around the courtyard was an array of cast-iron tools and unfinished projects, while sawdust from the woodwork Prometheus had done earlier swirled in the wind, scattering in the nearby garden beds. Anything to keep his mind off the small priestess who was roaming the plains ofCaledonia.

“It would appear that foresight doesn’t stop me from beingfoolish.”

Tyche raised a manicured eyebrow. “Word from those who spend time in my mother’s presence is that you are besotted with a certain priestess. I didn’t realise it was this bad.” Bad enough that Prometheus was back here effectively sulking.

Prometheus scowled. “I didn’t take you for a gossip, Tyche.”

Tyche pinned him with a glare, her arms folded across her chest and the comparison between her and Amara both scowling at him popped unbidden into his mind.

“I come with news of her, should you wish to hear it. But if you insist on being a bad-tempered oaf, I shall take my leave.”

In her troubled hazelnut eyes was knowledge Prometheus wasn’t sure he wished to know. He began to shake his head, his eyes cast back towards his work. But Tyche was not one for giving up so easily.

“You have not involved yourself in the affairs of humans for centuries. There must be a reason you did so for her,” she said quietly. Prometheus turned to look at her and saw kindness he didn’t want to see. It threatened to breakhim.

When Prometheus refused to reply, Tyche continued. “Hubris has made contact with Nemesis. He says your priestess has succumbed quite favourably to his prideful charms. He jests that she will lay in his bed forever. As you can imagine, Nemesis has grown increasingly more enraged.” For those two had always held a sick contempt for one another that bordered on pathological possessiveness. Some mistook it forlove.

“She has gathered Plutus, Aergia, and Phthonos to convoy with her to the human realm to seek retribution,” Tychecontinued.

Plutus, who was Tyche’s son, though she had little to do with him, would try to convince Amara that copious amounts of wealth would strip her of fear. It was a trick he had convinced many mortals of. But Prometheus had told Amara of the fox that could never be caught. Surely she’d be able to see it in the greedy money game Plutus would play with her.Wouldn’tshe?

Aergia would send idleness, distracting Amara with numbing techniques that so easily surrounded the mortals. Indeed, Prometheus had designed the mortal form to succumb to numbness, when necessary, to protect itself. But Aergia had a habit of leaving her victims mindless, with no sense of passion or drive. He had seen the heart of Amara. She had too much passion and fire to fall prey to that, he thought. She wouldn’t let fear send her there.Wouldshe?

Phthonos would encase Amara in envy. Though how the spirit would do that, Prometheus had no clue. Perhaps play on her abandonment wound and her heritage, surrounding her with happy families.A wound which he, Prometheus, had only made worse by leaving.

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