Page 16 of The Shadow Gods

“Gods, Paris,” Pollux ground out. “We still have two hours in this van before any of us get a chance to do that.”

“Too bad,” he whispered, and I opened my eyes.

He was smiling, and I was powerless not to smile back. His joy was the sun on my face, and I never wanted it to disappear. I wondered if I could keep it there. If I was enough.

“You're like a storm cloud, Leo. Following people around. Everywhere you go, you just darken the mood.”My father's words popped into my head, but I refused to let them linger. Paris didn't look at me like I was a storm cloud, or a Debbie Downer, or anything disappointing.

That dreamy, hazy look on his face? I'd done that. My words and my kiss.

From the corner of my eye, Pollux reached back and cuffed Paris on the shoulder. He wasn't angry, though, if Pollux's grin was anything to go by.

“I'm not apologizing.” And Paris laughed.

Helaughed.

I happened to look at Hector and froze. Paris's sun had touched him too. His expression was more open and more hopeful than I'd ever seen it. He caught my gaze, but he didn't hide how he felt. He held my stare, smiled back, and shook his head like he couldn't believe what he was seeing.

Paris suddenly reached past me. I didn't realize what he was doing until he held the largest piece of the seal in his hand. “I want to show you.”

I studied him, my gaze jumping from one of his clear blue eyes to the other. “Are you sure? We don't know what we'll see.”

“I'm sure.”

He waited, holding the sharp, but fragile, shard in the palm of his hand. The dark color had a smear of my blood on it. I glanced at Hector, then Orestes, and Pollux, and finally met Achilles's gaze in the rearview mirror.

Anxiety filled my belly, but my desire to do what Paris asked chased it away. Finally, eyes on the man who had kissed me stupid, I touched the tips of my fingers to the seal and disappeared into a memory.

The sun was so warm on my face. Back in the temple, Athena's acolytes chanted. The bright and clean scent of burning herbs drifted from the altar, mixing with the scent of the sea. I breathed in deeply and smiled.

This was good. This was right. My love for Athena would be the center of my life. I'd live and die for her.

There would be no husband or children in my future, but I was okay with that. After all, I'd grown up on these sandstone steps and rested my back against the limestone columns a thousand times. This was home and had been since I'd been chosen as a child to be anarrephoroi,one of four girls who would spend nine months weaving apeplosfor Athena.

The sunny, yellow cloth was even now draped over the marble statue as the most intricate and beautifulpeplosever made.

Everything here, from the chanting to the marble statue of our beautiful goddess, was familiar and beloved.

The wind kicked up, and I breathed in again. The sea was a good distance away, and it was only after the strongest storms I could smell it. But I could now.

The strangeness of it made me frown, and I opened my eyes, scanning the horizon for dark clouds. But there were none.

“Medusa!” I turned when my name was called, and footsteps hurried down the steps. “Come to theErechtheion.”

I stood and nodded excitedly. This week was the Feast of the Bath. For five days, we priestesses had been celebrating our goddess. Today was the culmination of our worship.

We had bathed the marble statue of Athena, cleaned thepeplosand robes adorning her, and now, we would go into theErechtheion,the sanctuary built for Athena and her uncle, Poseidon.

This was the first time I had been asked to complete the rituals, and anticipation bubbled in my belly. The final steps weren't as secret as the other priestesses pretended, but I had never seen them firsthand.

Hand in the other priestess's hand, our sandaled feet slapping against the marble floor, we hurried across the temple to the sanctuary. The light was much dimmer, though lit by thousands of candles.

And it smelled different too. Wrong.

Frowning, I glanced at my sister priestess to see if she was as put off by the smell as I was, but her gaze was unfocused. She dropped my hand as I breathed in, over and over. At first, I smelled the sea and salt, then...rot?

The sanctuary was silent.

I turned to her and found—nothing.

---