Page 31 of Bonds of Hercules
I turned, arm still wrapped around Charlie.
Helen looked up at me, shy and uncertain. “Would you two mind … sleeping in my room with me?” she whispered as she twisted her hands. “Just for safety.”
This was not the sixteen-year-old girl who’d talked a mile a minute.
Heart breaking for what she’d been through, what we’d survived, I nodded.
When we got up to her bedroom, we all turned.
“What?” Drex asked sheepishly. “I’m not sleeping in a room with any of those psychopaths. I’m also not sleeping alone in this place—it’s probably haunted.” He paused. “Is that okay?”
Thus commenced my first official sleepover.
Moonlight filtered through ancient stained glass windows, a wire fence between us and the shimmering Lake Como.
The landscape was silvery and cold.
Inside was a different story.
Pink silk sheets were draped across a four-poster bed covered in crystal-encrusted chiffon. Wigs, dresses, and pearls were strewn across the floor. Makeup was also scattered over every surface.
Amongst the frills, a life-sized poster covered the wall—Erebus wore his signature mask and held a smoking gun.
“Kill or be killed” was written across the top in gothic letters, dripping blood.
I like Helen’s style.
A dangerous-looking servant pushed inside a rolling table covered in a dozen silver plates.
He pulled off the lids.
Ten minutes later, Charlie and I had finished half of the food. We clutched our stomachs, still eating. In contrast, Helen and Drex picked at their plates, gaping at us with wide eyes.
They didn’t understand.
A lifetime of starvation left claw marks on your soul.
That night, stomach sickly full, thoughts racing, body bruised, I fell into a fitful sleep.
Nightmares devoured.
Gasping, I sat up in bed—the room was quiet—everyone else was still resting.
I need to go back to Crete and check on her.My thoughts were jumbled.
Wiping sweat away with trembling fingers, I sighed.
I was wearing one of Helen’s purple nightgowns, body aching like I’d been hit by a Spartan car. The bruises were fading thanks to the Olympians’ healing paste, but my bones were still brittle and stiff.
Helen snored softly in the bed beside me, wearing a pink sparkly bonnet, and a loaded Spartan gun peeked out from beneath her pillow.
An arsenal of weapons was also mounted on the bow-covered headboard, every gun bedazzled with pink gems.
A loud snore echoed up from the pile of cushions on the floor.
Charlie was sprawled next to Fluffy Jr., whose four long legs were sticking straight in the air. Every few seconds, he paddled his paws like he was swimming.
On the other end of the floor, closer to the door and opposite of the bed to Charlie, Drex was asleep on purple cushions with his golden toucan protector—that he’d ingeniously named Toucey—tucked under his arm.
