Page 185 of Bonds of Hercules
“Everyone’s talking about your fight in Rome—how you defended the humans. Howpowerfulyou are.”
“Really?” I laughed awkwardly. “They have it wrong.”
Her eyes searched mine. “No, they don’t,” she said softly, her voice full of sincerity.
I held on to her, feeling weak.
“How … have you been?” I whispered.
She shook her head, long hair sparkling. “Better than you … Most creatures think this entire operation is a sham. The Olympians are up to something.”
Someone made a commotion to the side.
Zeus was pointing at us.
I smiled back at her sadly. “I think they’re right.”
“How can I help?” She hugged me tighter, squeezing like she was afraid to let me go.
I couldn’t forget Ceres’s scribbles about Zeus and Vyco. I’dbeen working on a plan. It was a foolish plan, abadplan, the type of plan that you never told anyone about out loud because it wouldn’t work in real life.
Cyclopes screamed in my subconscious, and I steeled myself.
Only cowards are complicit in the face of injustice. You have to at least try to make a difference.
“I need speakers,” I said quickly to Lena. “The fancy solar-powered ones. I need to plug a device into them.”
I gestured with my hands to show her what the plug-in port looked like.
She nodded, her pastel eyes wide with emotion. “Stay safe—I’ve heard that they want to hurt—”
“No talking to the sirens!” Zeus shouted as he pointed at us.
Another siren appeared. Lena was pulled away into the dancing crowd, but her gaze held mine.
“Speakers,” I mouthed silently.
She nodded back.
“Thank you.” I touched my hand to my heart, vision blurring, as tears once again streamed down my face.
A male siren paused with a tray of ambrosia shots. He pushed a glass into my shaking hands and disappeared.
I threw the liquid back.
It did nothing.
I flagged down another server.
The second glass burned—it did a little something.
I stole a drink off someone’s table.
The third glass numbed—everything.
Someone pulled a chair out for me.
I collapsed into it. I blinked—Augustus and Kharon sat beside me at one of the long wooden tables set up in the middle of the room for the Spartans. They both moved closer to me.
