Page 66 of Patron of Mercy

Don’t let me leave again.

An image swam up in his mind from all those years ago. Lach—Glaucus—and when had that name been so entirely eclipsed by the new one?—standing on a dock, looking at him with nothing but annoyance. Saying he didn’t want to tie himself to Death.

And now he had latched on so hard that he could pray, and Thanatos heard him, as he had only heard the most devout priests in history.

When pain lanced through his chest, he dropped the note and reached for the prayer, for Lach, with all his power. He could feel the universe give under his grip, almost as though he were ripping a hole through it instead of moving it around himself.

He landed heavily, still on his feet but slightly off balance. When he reached out to steady himself, his hands hit stone.

It was an altar, and Lach was pinned to the thing under an enormous rock. An old man stood, shakily, across the altar from Thanatos, trying to slide a wicked looking knife into Lach’s heart. He’d missed, but not by enough to reassure Thanatos. Lach was pale and unconscious, and the sight of him made Thanatos’s chest constrict.

At Thanatos’s appearance, the old man looked up, wobbling and having to let go of the knife to hold the altar so he didn’t tip over. “Who are you?” Then he shook his head like it had been a silly question, and motioned to a beefy man behind him. “It doesn’t matter. Kill him.”

Thanatos had never been a creature of violence, and for a fraction of a second, he froze with indecision. The man started around the altar toward him, but it was Lach’s pained breath that broke the stupor. Lach was, as yet, alive. Thanatos wasn’t going to allow his hesitation to change that.

He stared at the musclebound man. “If you have an ounce of self-preservation, you’ll stay where you are.” The man hesitated at the certainty in his voice, but the old man flailed an arm at him.

“Now!”

A day before, Thanatos might have considered himself a pacifist.

It turned out that when a certain pirate’s life was on the line, he was not. He made a motion, like shooing someone away, and brushed the man’s spirit out of his body. The body dropped like a stone, and the spirit stood there, staring down at himself in shock.

That seemed to make the old man reconsider his position. He’d been reaching for the knife in Lach’s chest, but instead he took a step back and stumbled into a wheelchair, glaring at Thanatos, teeth bared in something between a grimace and a snarl.

“Father,” Martina and a man called, practically in unison. Thanatos glared at her. He’d known they couldn’t trust her.

They didn’t have time for her, though. He looked back at Lach.

His Lach, only just returned to him after so long apart.

He didn’t know if they could make it work this time, but he couldn’t allow it to end like this. Reaching up, he cradled Lach’s head in one hand. A drop of blood slipped from his lips and trailed down one cheek.

Thanatos understood, suddenly, why one Olympian after another had selfishly chosen to make their lovers immortal. If he let Lach leave him, that was it. There was no reunion in Elysium for them. If Lach left, he couldn’t follow.

And a world forever without Lach was too horrible a thing to contemplate. Not now. Not like this. He could not allow it.

Leaning down, he kissed Lach’s forehead.

“Hermes,” he called, in his most resonant tone. He didn’t call on his Olympian counterpart often—never twice in a handful of days—but the man had always—

“You called, boss?” Hermes paused and looked at the tableau before him. A dozen angry men, the withered old bastard who’d stabbed Lach, and that damned traitor Martina. “Well, this is awkward.”

“Forget them,” Thanatos said, waving a hand in their direction and ignoring it when they all stepped back. All but Martina, hands firmly planted on her father’s shoulders.

He shoved the boulder off Lach’s legs, toward the others, and turned to Hermes. “You have to heal him.”

Hermes stared, horrified for a fraction of a second, before he jumped into action faster than Thanatos could see, muttering to himself about how many times he’d warned Lach that his mouth was going to get him into trouble. He hopped onto the altar, straddling Lach, and first tore his shirt off, then pulled the knife out, keeping pressure on the wound and working quickly to try to minimize the bleeding.

Thanatos didn’t know as much about medicine as Hermes did; he was prone to arriving when it was far too late to help. Still, he stepped up to the side of the altar, prepared to offer his hands, when Hermes waved him away.

“I’ve got this. You handle the Ivy League. What the hell did he do, tell them Nietzsche was overrated?”

“You are not a part of this,” the old man said in their direction, glaring at Thanatos. He was so angry, his words so staccato, that spittle flew from his lips as he spoke. But his body seemed to be failing him, since he was trying to look and sound impressive, but his volume didn’t manage to rise above an average speaking tone. “Leave at once!”

Thanatos stared at him, drawing himself up to his full height and pulling his power around him like a mantle. Perhaps he was no Ares to be feared for his martial prowess, or Hephaestus with his impressive size, but damn them all, he was the god of death. If he couldn’t use his power to frighten a few mortals, what good was it?

All Hermes needed—all Lach needed—from Thanatos, was for him to stand between them and the enemy. He could do that.

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