Page 30 of Wildfire

He sighed, hanging his head and talking to his knees. “We know this isn’t random. But Typhon’s a monster. He’d kill your students, sure, but he wouldn’t only target the strong ones, and he wouldn’t have much interest in their souls. That’s for a titan.”

Theo scowled. “Okay? So there’s a difference?”

Hermes nodded, then raked his hand through his hair and dropped back, sitting so low in the chair that he was practically lying down. He stared up at the ceiling, rather than look at either of them. Theo wasn’t mortal any longer, but he was terribly young. And Wilder—Wilder was in so much danger. Hermes sighed.

“A couple months ago, at the start of spring, you know, when the growing season was kind of delayed?” Hermes tucked his chin down to look at them, just to check that they weren’t surprised by the news.

“Yeah, I read about that. Lysandros’s mother was concerned,” Theo said.

Hermes nodded. “Yeah. Gaia—titan of earth, but generally not a dick—took care of that. Made the crops grow again when Demeter was throwing a tantrum. But there was this, uh, this group? The Fidelis Filii? They were using the opportunity to try and raise Cronus from Tartarus. They meant to sacrifice an immortal to serve as a vessel. We thought it didn’t work because a mortal ended up trying to host him instead, Charles Paget... I never found his body, his soul. I thought he’d been dragged under when the earth cracked, but if Cronus is out now, that must be how. He must have jumped at the chance Paget’s appearance offered, so now he’s trapped in a mortal body, and he’ll need... more. That’s why only mages. That’s why the souls are missing. He’s trying to fuel a human body so it can play a sardine can to a whole ass titan.”

Theo’s mouth was slightly open. Wilder’s brow was heavy. With a grunt, Hermes pushed himself to sit up again. He couldn’t stay still. Everything felt heavier and harder, facing down what he thought was coming.

“He’s recuperating. But if Cronus is consuming souls, it’s not going to end with mages. His favorite feast is gods. He’ll eat the whole world if we sit back and let him,” Hermes said.

What else had they been doing these past millennia but sitting back and letting things happen? The gods had begun to fade out. They weren’t prepared for this fight.

“He’s eating people?” Lysandros asked from the doorway, looking even paler than usual.

Hermes shrugged. “I don’t really know. But it makes sense. Cronus harvests—that’s what your father said. And Typhon is pure fury. This, what’s happening here, is thought out.”

Elbows braced on his knees, he pushed himself onto his feet and reached a hand out to help Wilder up. Lysandros was still staring, Theo gaping, mouth moving like words would come out and they could make a plan. Nothing came. Hermes felt like he was moving through tar, and he just wasn’t up to it. Wilder didn’t look like he was either.

“Once Athena has a chance to talk to Dad, she’ll have a plan. That’s... kind of her thing. And frankly, Typhon’s messing with the wrong goddess first,” Hermes said. He wasn’texactlytrying to shrug off responsibility here, but he knew his strengths, and this wasn’t one of them. They could spend all night up planning, and the next morning, Athena would whisk back in and throw out the whole thing.

He met Wilder’s reserved, deep blue eyes. The man gripped his hand, and Hermes stiffened his arm to brace him to stand. “We’ll come back tomorrow and figure this out.”

Lysandros sucked his cheeks in. “Mom wants us to come back to the palace...”

Hermes was the first to scoff at that. “Sure, good luck getting the guy who threw himself at a lightning bolt to save the school when he was still mortal to abandon it now.” With two fingers at his forehead, he saluted the pair of them and pulled Wilder past Lysandros, who looked utterly flabbergasted that Hermes would try and step away.

“Melisandre needs dinner,” he mumbled to Wilder specifically. Small goals, and elsewhere—that was what he wanted.

Resolutely, like he was marching into battle, Wilder nodded. “Right.”

Hermes started to grin. They might be well and truly fucked, but with one small, reasonable prize ahead, he pushed all his worries aside long enough to tease the professor. “You know, we could get there in a flash if you’d let me carry you.”

Wilder’s regular annoyed scowl returned, and Hermes felt a thrill of victory. Even facing down catastrophe, he could still annoy the fuck out of Wilder Pratt.

“I don’t think so.”

Hermes shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

That Upstart

Carry him, indeed. Wilder hadn’t been carried since before he learned to walk; he sure wasn’t going to start again now.

On the other hand, his knees kept wobbling, and he was glad for it when Hermes put him in the passenger seat of his car and climbed into the driver’s seat himself. He wasn’t a big fan of being driven in his own car, particularly not the way Hermes drove through DC traffic, but he didn’t think he’d have done better just then.

Not that he planned to tell Hermes that.

It felt wrong to wait around for Dean Woods—for Athena—to decide on a plan of attack. Sure, yes, she was the goddess of war or something, but she was still just his boss in his mind. He didn’t associate Dean Woods with fighting. He associated her with bureaucracy, and blunt honesty to the point of rudeness. The latter, at least, he could appreciate.

Back at the house, he fed Melly as she shamelessly demanded petting from Hermes, twining herself around his legs, tail wrapping around and around behind her. She was an aggressive leg-marker, and Wilder had nearly tripped over her more than once.

Somehow, it didn’t surprise him that Hermes didn’t have that issue.

After all, he was a god. An ancient Greek god. Wilder shook his head, trying to shake off the overall feeling of restless discontent, but it was little use.

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