Heart (34 page)

I couldn’t name them all, but I saw many that
I recognized. Centaurs and nymphs, ogres and more. Some had been
servants to the mountain, others had crawled from seedy places that
I would expect Nix to inhabit.

“Ivy!” Nix roared my name above the clashing
of swords and gruesome sounds of battle. “I will find you!”

I didn’t bother turning around. I needed to
find Ryder first. If I could get to him, we could stand together
and force Nix to fight us both.

I might have a chance with Ryder at my
side.

Nix seemed unstoppable, especially since we
hadn’t been able to do much damage a few minutes ago. But we were
more motivated than ever. And Ryder wanted him dead as badly as I
did.

Where there was a will there was a way.
Right?

Sure.

I jumped up on an overturned column and tried
to find Ryder through the crowd. He stood in the middle of an
attack, with a sword in his hands. I had no idea where it came
from, but he had officially claimed it as his.

He swung his new weapon with all of his
strength. He might not have had precision or skill, but with a
blade that sharp, he didn’t need to be accurate. He just had to hit
something.

And he could hit something.

I caught my breath as I watched him. His hair
was wild and dirty, his face streaked with bruises and blood. His
biceps rippled under the strain of wielding his sword. He looked
like an avenging angel in the middle of the battle for Eden. He
looked like a supernatural creature born to kill… born to seek
revenge.

He looked like a Greek god surrounded by
mortals.

He put the Pantheon to shame, despite their
immortality and mystical beauty.

I had never been more proud of him or proud
to be his.

A whoosh of air blasted around me and I only
had time to brace myself before they appeared.

The Fates.

They stood on the wide column with me with
poise and grace, as if they were meant to stand there, as if this
column had been toppled simply for their feet to rest upon.

“Siren,” Enid smiled demurely, her pale pink
eyes flashing with frenzied excitement.

“Fates,” I clipped back. I didn’t like that
they were here. This seemed pre-planned. They claimed to want Nix
dead, but instinct whispered something different. They didn’t care
so much about Nix as they wanted the entire Pantheon in chaos.

The Oracle of Delphi had said that their true
goal was control. Yet they couldn’t kill a god.

But they could orchestrate it so that the
gods killed each other.

“The day has rather a promising outlook,
don’t you think?” Enid’s grin widened, revealing sharpened teeth
and a black tongue.

I tried not to be sick. Was that her battle
look?

I turned to Isadora, “Have you seen the
outcome to this battle?”

A victorious smile played across her mouth.
“There are too many variables to something like this,” she
explained. “Too many possible outcomes. It’s impossible to predict
exactly how this battle will play out.”

“What happens if Nix wins?” I asked bravely.
I watched him from across the distance. He had been working his way
toward me, killing everything that got in his way. He held a deadly
trident in one hand and used his free hand to choke anything that
dared to get close enough to taste his power.

“You will be his,” she said finally. “The
whole world will be his.”

My mouth went dry. “I thought I would be
yours?”

“In due time,” she said serenely. “We’ll let
him break you in first. We want nothing to do with this rebellious
mind.”

I ground my teeth together. In my spirit I
knew I would never submit to him, but I believed them in this one
thing.

I had no doubt Nix would drag it out of me…
he would reach his bare fist into my soul and pull it out of me if
he had to.

“What happens if Zeus wins?”

“You will still be ours,” Enid laughed. “Or
haven’t you figured that out yet?”

Isadora smiled too. “Zeus will never be able
to kill you, or haven’t you figured that out yet? And your musician
is in love with you. It’s a pity he couldn’t keep his distance.
Should we blame you for that?”

“Or your Siren charm?” Veda snickered behind
her hand.

“The deal we made?” I ignored their extras
and got straight to business. A plan was forming in my head, but I
needed all of the information I could before I jumped in with both
feet.

“It’s still in effect,” Isadora promised. “If
you kill Nix, you are free to go.”

“But you won’t,” Veda added in her little
girl voice. “You can’t.”

Enid leaned in and in a taunting whisper,
added, “You don’t have it in you. You’re not a killer, Siren.”

“I’m not,” I agreed. “But he is.” I pointed
at Ryder as the sword arched over his head in a wild swing before
taking the head of an angry looking minotaur with horns the size of
my thighs and muscles covering every inch of his hairy body. The
creature had been twice the size of Ryder. He had been forced to
take a running leap and launch his human body into the air before
coming down with his beheading.

The Fates hissed with disgust at his display
of power.

“He’s human,” Isadora sighed. “He might take
a few Greeks with him, but he will never reach Nix.”

“Orpheus is too easy to kill,” Veda
explained. “Someone will get to him. It’s only a matter of
time.”

That was the key. Time.

The longer this dragged out, the more chances
someone had to kill Ryder, the more Greeks died, the closer Nix got
to his goal. I needed to end this as quickly as I could.

But looking at the carnage in front of me, I
couldn’t figure out how to do that.

Greeks appeared from thin air. It was like
Zeus had put up the Bat Signal and called everyone to him. Nix’s
army seemed never-ending. They poured from around buildings and
flooded the plaza.

Olympus’s streets became rivers of blood.
Centaur fought centaur, cyclops battled gigantes, god killed god.
There was no end to the mayhem.

Gold bracelets glinted off the flash of
lightning and pulled my attention to the steps of the temple.
Delphi’s dark head bobbed in and out of battling Greeks. Her blue
eyes flashed my way before she spun around to cut off the head of a
nymph that jumped from above to attack her.

The sword was unmistakable. Even from this
distance.

I didn’t know how she’d gotten it or where
she’d found it, but I would never forget the shape of that blade or
the unique curve of the hilt. The god-killer was here.

New hope bloomed inside of me and for the
first time all day I actually believed I could win this.

Della flipped through the air and landed
right in front of Ryder. He was lost in battle, red-eyed and
covered in blood. Just a half-second before he released his sword
to take her head, he recognized who stood before him.

She said something to him that I couldn’t
read from here. I surreptitiously glanced at the Fates surrounding
me, but their eyes were on Nix and Zeus fighting at opposite sides
of the plaza.

They didn’t sense Delphi’s presence; I
thought that was strange. They were supposed to be able to see all
and yet they didn’t notice when their sworn enemy showed up?

Maybe their powers weren’t as omniscient as
they would like us to believe.

“Your best friend just arrived,” I told them.
For the first time since I met them over a year ago, I felt the
power shift between us. I had something to hold over them.

Finally
.

I pointed Delphi out in the crowd just as she
switched swords with Ryder. He held up the new blade with something
like awe. The silver blade glinted in the light of the fire and
promised death.

He spun around suddenly, taking the head of
one of the demi-gods with him. The massive Greek had been sneaking
up on him with fire covering both of his outstretched palms. Ryder
seemed to have sensed the threat and acted on instinct. The corpse
dropped to the ground, the head bouncing away down the stained
limestone path. The fire in his palms died out to nothing.

Ryder’s smile was both boyish and sadistic at
the same time.

He seemed possessed with something more than
himself. He had no reservations throwing himself into this battle
entirely.

He had been awkward and fumbling minutes ago.
Now he was as capable and skilled as anyone here.

The god-killer only enhanced his brutal
talent.

I felt it the second the Fates’ attention
landed on Della. Their thin bodies snapped to attention and I
nearly choked on their aggressive hatred.

“The Oracle,” Enid hissed. “How dare she
taint us with her presence?”

“Let’s catch her,” Isadora snarled. “And
force her to show her face to the world.”

The two older Fates jumped down to the ground
with spry energy. They pulled swords from the folds of their gray
gowns and dragged the tips along the ground in disconcerting
synchronicity. Veda followed after them a few feet, producing
matching swords from her own robes.

She glanced at me over her shoulder and
smiled. “Until later, Siren. Don’t run far.”

I didn’t bother acknowledging her, but her
words pulled at something that had been marinating in my head.

Don’t run far.

But I had run before. I’d run to the one
place I knew I would be safe.

The one place I subconsciously knew I would
be in control.

I didn’t have a weapon. No swords appeared
for me; no weapons materialized out of nowhere. I only had the
power in my blood, the ancient energy that could end this
world.

A gigante approached me with clear intentions
to capture me and drag me back to his master. He swung his
club-like arms at me, but he was too big to be anything but
inaccurate and awkward. I dodged out of the way and circled around
behind him.

Compelled by instinct and the rushing power
inside of me, I pressed my hand to his spine and filled him with
water. He staggered as saltwater submerged his lungs. His huge body
swayed once to the right before he landed heavily on his knees,
choking on gallons of water.

He smelled like rot and mold and I loathed
touching him, but I had couldn’t quell the instinct to use more of
my power. Somehow the energy had taken hold of me and I couldn’t
let go of it. It flared inside of me, driving me farther than I had
ever gone before, farther than I ever wanted to go.

I moved in front of him again and beckoned
him with one finger. He leaned toward me immediately, hypnotized by
the power swelling around me.

I leaned into his ear and with all of the
softness I could manage, I sang into his ear. Unfamiliar directives
assaulted my tongue, demanding that I speak fatal commands. The
power asked for blood. The power wanted me to reveal the depth of
my authority, to prove how deadly I could be… how utterly consuming
I was.

Kill, my blood whispered.

Maim.

Destroy.

Hurt.

Images of drowned sailors flashed in my head
first. Then a world where blood coated the ground and men lay at my
feet.

I saw thousands… hundreds of thousands…
millions of souls at my disposal.

The energy perked up at the images, flexing
its supremacy inside me. I saw a world waiting to be taken. I saw
even Nix on his knees before me.

There was nothing I could not do.

There was no one I could not control.

And those that had the will to oppose me?
Easily disposed of.

I could have all of this. Not even the Fates
could tame me.

The words to end this creature stuck in my
throat. I held his jaw in my hand, the harsh bristle of his beard
scratching against my palm. I felt his pulse beneath my fingertips,
the slow beat of his overly large heart. Water poured from his
mouth and cascaded over my wrist and splashed at my ruined
dress.

I fought the heady feeling with everything
that was still moral and human inside of me. This was what Nix
wanted. This was the power the Fates sought to control. This was
the force that Olympus trembled from.

If I gave into it just once, it would consume
me.

It would own me.

All Nix had to do… or the Fates… or anyone,
was draw it out one time. I would be a slave to the power then. I
would never be able to turn it off. I would become greedy and
bloodthirsty with the need to control and enslave.

I wouldn’t stand a chance.

I barely stood a chance now.

When I sang to the gigante, I used every
ounce of willpower I had left. Instead of singing him to his death
or off a cliff or any other horrid picture that danced gleefully in
my head, I told him to leave.

“Leave,” the hardest word I had ever
uttered.

He stood immediately and pushed his way
through the crowd.

I watched his swaying, drowning body bowl
through the battle and gradually pulled back my power. His lungs
dried and the water left him, but not the command. I didn’t have
the authority to pull that back.

Once the command was uttered, the damage was
done.

Sorrow weighed me down as I realized just how
destructive I was. I had glimpses before, but never had I seen a
clearer picture of how evil I could be.

When I turned my back on his retreating form,
I wasn’t surprised to find Nix waiting for me. Gigantes flanked
him, fighting off anything that tried to get too close to him.

I looked up into his dark eyes and felt my
heart shatter into a thousand pieces. This was what he wanted from
me. This was what he wanted to pull out of me and use.

I would rather die first.

I would do anything to die first.

Nix leaned in so that his lips brushed the
shell of my ear. His hand cupped my jaw and caressed my cheek. The
pose was not all that different from what I had just shared with
the gigante, but this time the tables were reversed. Although the
effect was the same.