Sucking his breath in, Urian groaned at the sharp hysterical tone. At first, he thought it was his sister’s screeching howl. Surely, no one but Tannis could hit that particularly heinous note.
But as it continued and grew even louder and shriller, he realized it was Xanthia.
And it took on a whole new level as she crashed into his room and found him entwined in furs on the floor with three naked women who were draped over and under him. Not that he liked the floor. Simply, it’d been the only option as the bed wouldn’t accommodate all of them and the bacchanalian orgy they’d been having the night before.
“What is this?”
He would assume it was fairly obvious given that his pillow was an extremely large bosom, and there was really no doubt given where his hand was buried. And he knew from having walked in on his ex-wife’s antics that she was by no means a woman of pristine virtue.
“Keep your tone down,” he snapped, then cursed himself as even his whispered tone cut through his head like a dagger. “What’s wrong with you now?” He yawned and carefully extracted his hand so as not to harm his sleeping companion whose name he couldn’t quite remember.
“It’s Nephele! For spite, she’s run off with that … that … piece of nothing I forbid her to marry!”
Rubbing at his head, he lay back down and snuggled up to the nicely rounded, warm bosom on his right. To his deepest chagrin, he couldn’t recall the name of its owner either. But then to be fair, she hadn’t asked his. “I’m sure she’s at Daphne’s or Idora’s.”
Xanthia moved to squat beside his pallet and dared to tug the covers off him. “You’re not listening to me, Urian!” She rudely shoved something in his face. “She’s left Kalosis!”
He blinked to clear his vision and took the note she was waving in front of his nose. After a couple of seconds, he was able to focus on the words.
And with each one he read, his blood ran cold.
“Damn it, woman! Where were you when she did this?” He rose to his feet.
Xanthia’s nostrils flared. “Certainly not trapped between the thighs of a whore!”
He glared at her. “I wouldn’t tilt at that dragon were I you.” He ground his teeth and reread the letter. “I can’t believe she went to the human realm.”
“That’s what I was trying to tell you.” She gestured at the letter. “You have to do something. Find her!”
Scratching his head, he nodded. “Okay. Go home and watch Geras. I’ll get her back.” At least he was fully sober now.
As fast as he could, he washed, then used his powers to dress.
He went straight to Apollymi’s palace and sought out their goddess in her garden. Her mirror was the only thing he knew that had any chance of locating his daughter. He prayed he could talk the goddess into letting him use it for such a purpose.
But the moment he asked, she didn’t appear pleased.
Sitting on her perch while her two ever-present Charonte watched on, Apollymi arched a withering brow. “You know the answer, Urian. When it comes to such things, the mirror shows what it wants.”
Hence why he had no idea where Xyn was, even though he’d asked it repeatedly. The damn thing would never tell him where she was located. And he had no idea why. Maybe he kept it from working.
Or she did. He wouldn’t put much of anything past Apollymi, especially when she got into one of her moods.
Not wanting to think about that, he went over to the edge and froze as he caught sight of himself in the black water. Normally, Apollites couldn’t cast a reflection. And that had driven Sheba to utter madness as she’d endlessly asked him how she looked. As if such a great beauty could ever have a day where she didn’t look amazing.
Yet never once had she ever believed him when he told her that. Women … he’d never understand that about them.
Personally, Urian had never thought much about it.
Until now. For the first time, given that his kind couldn’t cast reflections, he saw himself and understood why the other Apollites and Daimons treated him the way they did.
I am a freak.
His eyes were even more horrific than they’d led him to believe with their ridicule. While his father’s were the swirling silver of their goddess’s—which, granted, were off-putting—his were an unnatural shade of vibrant blue. They practically glowed. Unlike any color he’d ever seen before on any person.
And while he’d removed the beads and ribbons of Sheba’s tribe, he’d kept his ghostly white hair long.
Though he’d never shared a great passion with his second wife, he had cared for her and he felt that he should honor her memory and their time together.
He owed her that much. For she had changed him. She’d taken a boy and shown him that he could function without his family, and made him a confident man. Independent in a way he wouldn’t have been had she not come into his life and taken him away from Kalosis.
For that he would always be grateful.
But the one thing he couldn’t do was wear Xyn’s armor. Even if it meant his death. That, he’d packed away in a chest and laid a spell upon it to keep it safe from harm. Because it was all he had left of her.
Plus the pain of bearing her love without her here …
That stinging bite was more than he could handle. So he was dressed in the black Spathi armor of the rest of the Apollymians. And yet he looked nothing like them. Not really. He stood out as deadlier and toxic.
Urian Deathbringer.
Sheba would be proud. Releasing a tired breath, he forced his thoughts to the matter at hand. He had a little girl to find. One who thought herself a woman and had no idea how complicated her young life was about to get if he didn’t locate her and drag her home to her mother.
At first the stubborn waters refused to show him anything. They swirled and remained frustratingly blank.
Urian was about to give up and go searching on his own, when they finally began to swirl very slowly. Then they picked up speed.
Suddenly he saw that sassy little blond head he knew so well. She was in a large hall with other Apollites. Relief coursed through him that she was all right.
Until one of the men present grabbed her. She cried out in alarm.
The man in front of them curled his lip and unsheathed his sword. “We might as well kill her. If she’s not his blood daughter, she’s no good to us. And serves no purpose. Besides, why would he care? I heard he divorced her mother, long ago.”
“He still dotes on her. She can bring him to us.” The Apollite tightened his grip on Nephele’s arm and turned his hate-filled glare toward her. “Call for Urian to open the portal.”
She shook her head. “I will not betray my solren.”
He backhanded her so hard that she hit the floor.
With a deep growl, Urian teleported without a second thought. And realized too late that he should have probably looked around at how many men were actually in this hall before he acted.
Then waited for at least one more Apollite to join him on this venture.
Probably more.
Yeah, this was a bad idea, as he was severely outnumbered. Glancing around while trying to act nonchalant, he saw at least one hundred Apollites and Daimons in the hall.
With him.
And Nephele.
Damn, I should have taught her to fight better. Though he’d tried, she’d never been interested in it and had always ended up spending more time arguing with him about going into the ring than actually learning to defend herself. Which had been completely counterproductive, so he’d given up out of frustration.
Note to self—I failed at parenting.
Then again, given the huge number of warriors in the hall, it wouldn’t have mattered with just the two of them.
They were doomed.
Doing his best not to show his true feelings on the subject, Urian cleared his throat and arched a brow at the men surrounding him. There was only one thing to be done.
Bluff and swagger.
He crossed his arms over his chest and glared at the one in front of him. “I suggest you remove your hands from my daughter or lose them.”
Sounded tough enough. He could almost believe it.
The Apollite had the nerve to laugh. That lasted for about three seconds until Urian blasted him with his powers and rendered the hyena a smoldering pile of ash on the floor. Before the others could recover from their shock, Urian grabbed Nephele and summoned a portal. He sent her through it and was about to go after her when the others rushed him.
He closed it instantly to protect his family and Kalosis. Which meant he was on the wrong side of things.
Damn it.
Forcing himself to remain calm, he blinked slowly as he scanned the men. “Now that my daughter’s safe …” He reached up toward his necklace. It was his last line of defense.
Might not work. Might even get him killed faster. Honestly, he couldn’t blame Ruyn if he chose not to answer. Or kill him on arrival. But Urian was really out of options.
He pricked his finger and hoped the blood was enough to summon his brother-in-law while they closed in.
“Kill the bastard of Apollo!”
Urian scoffed at those words. For one thing, he wasn’t a bastard, he was quite legitimate. Second … “Why?” he snarled, unsheathing his sword. “Not like I love him, either.”
Their answer came as a mass attack.
Bloody wonderful. Kill him for a piece-of-crap grandparent he hated. That was just all kinds of wrong.
Summoning his powers, he really regretted not wearing Xyn’s armor right now. He should have gotten over his feelings and remembered that he was a warrior and it was enchanted.
And that he liked having his balls attached to his body.
A light flashed beside him. He turned to attack, intending to kill whatever it was that had decided to join their party. Then he hesitated and pulled back as he saw Ruyn manifesting there.
Thank the gods, he finally had some reinforcement.
It took Ruyn less than a minute to assess the situation.
And Urian’s stupidity that had caused it. With a sardonic grin, he shook his head. “Brother, it appears to me that you seriously picked the wrong day to carpe your diem.”
“Better than allowing my diem to get carped. So are you going to stand there, admiring my posterior, or lend us a hand with it?”
“Rather it should be a certain finger I lend you, mate.” Growling, Ruyn hefted the two axes off his back and angled them at the ready. “It’s a good thing I like you. Anyone else would be my first victim.”
Urian snorted. “Too bad you don’t like a few more. Am thinking some friends with you wouldn’t have been a bad thing.” He used a god-bolt to blast the Apollite closest to him and swung with a sword at the next. Times like this, he wished he had his father’s or Xyn’s ability to transform into a dragon. They could use the firepower right about now.
Sadly, those powers were beyond his scope.
Ruyn scoffed at his words. “Bah, friends. Who needs them? They just drink your beer and ruin a perfectly good rotten mood by trying to cheer it.” He took the heads off three Apollites with one stroke.
Urian was impressed. He had to slaughter his enemies the old-fashioned way. With his hands and magick.
The worst part was that he still didn’t know why this group was after him or what they wanted. What had he done? Normally, he only drove his brothers to homicide. And that was on purpose.
Ducking as he struck an artery and blood sprayed across his face, Urian licked his lips. At least he was getting fed. Ruyn was not so happy about that part of this. Unlike Urian, Ruyn wasn’t an Apollite. He and Sheba had shared a mother, not Apollo’s blood or the curse.
So Ruyn kicked and twisted his way through them. Urian held his own better than he’d have thought, given their number. Until a barrage of arrows flew at them.
Ruyn deflected the ones aimed at him with his axes.
Urian wasn’t so skilled. While he could catch a single one, he couldn’t catch more than that without dropping his sword. Had he been more experienced, he might have been able to use his telekinesis to deflect them or some other trick.
Sadly, he wasn’t his father.
And three of them embedded in his chest.
With a staggering amount of pain that brought back a fierce round of déjà vu, he fell to one knee. Get up, damn it!
He couldn’t. The best he could manage was to pant.
One of them kicked him to his back. Urian rolled toward him as he went to stab him, knocking the bastard off balance and tripping him. That only drove the arrows in deeper and caused more pain to rip through his body. Groaning out loud, he thought for a moment that he might pass out from the agony of it.
Somehow he managed to rise. The man in front of him was a Daimon who had the nerve to laugh at his pain.
Pain he knew wouldn’t last much longer. Any heartbeat and he’d black out.
Turning toward Ruyn, he saw his brother trying to make his way closer to help him.
But there was only one way to make it through this. And he wasn’t about to let some slimy, crappy Daimon get the better of him. Not like this. I won’t die on my knees …
With an evil grin, Urian turned back toward the Daimon. Then he sank his fangs into the bastard’s throat and ripped it open.
The moment he tasted that blood, he understood what his brothers had tried to tell him. The shot of adrenaline to his system was unnerving. It literally felt as if he’d gone to sleep and been jolted back awake by something fierce and frightening.
Only now he was more alive. More alert. In tune with the very universe itself.
Felt more.
Including a whine in his skull that was deafening. For a moment, he thought he might go insane from the intensity of it. Like a high-pitched squeal embedded deep in the center of his brain that only he could hear.
“He’s a Daimon!”
Those words rang and echoed in his ears loud enough to cause him to flinch. More than that, their attackers instantly stood down. They literally stepped away and withdrew.
Why?
Ruyn scowled at him. “Now while I like to think I’m an awe-inspiring beast whose battle skills are such that it causes my enemies to tremble and flee at the very mention of my name, that’s just a story I tell women to get myself laid.” He gestured at the now-behaving group with his bloody axes. “That shit is surreal and just doesn’t happen except in braggart tales and old men’s fantasies. What’d you do, Urian?”
He sputtered. “I don’t know.”
The one who’d first called for Urian’s head spat blood on the floor. “There’s no need to kill him. He’s dead now.”
Ruyn made an impressively foul face. “While his stench might suggest a dead body, he’s always smelled that way. Bastard looks live enough to me.”
The man rolled his eyes. “He’s a Daimon. We’re out to end the line of Apollo. Once the last of his Apollite brood is dead, our curse is lifted.”
Now it was Urian’s turn to frown. What the hades did he mean by that?
“That true?” Ruyn asked him.
“Not that I know of.” Urian glared at the leader. “Where’d you hear that stupidity?”
“From the oracle of Helios. She swore to us that it was the truth. When the last of his Apollite children are dead, then there won’t be a curse left on us.”
Urian curled his lip at that. Since when had the oracle ever once in the history of oracles spoken that plainly? When the sun rises in the east, the sun will have risen in the morning or after the battle a mighty kingdom will fall, nay—shit was all anyone could ever get from an oracle. They spoke in useless riddles that would be true no matter what so that they hedged their bets, and you interpreted them into whichever you wanted it to be the truth.
He’d never understood why anyone would listen to an oracle.
The Apollite on his right jerked his chin at Urian. “Hey? Can’t he take us to the rest of his family so that we can finish them?”
Urian groaned at another stupid epiphany. Especially as all the others realized he was right.
“Shite,” he and Ruyn mumbled under their breaths at the same time.
“I got the asshole on the left,” Ruyn said.
“Better yet, I got a portal.” Urian opened it fast and grabbed him.
Only instead of landing in Kalosis, Urian hit the ground on the precipice of a mountain unlike anything he’d ever seen before. And no sooner did he land on it than the bottom collapsed out from beneath his feet.
Urian felt himself falling fast and furious. What the hades was this?
Convinced he was dead, he didn’t even have time to pray. There was nothing to grab onto.
Until he slammed into the cold, jagged ground so hard it jarred his teeth. Rattled and momentarily dazed, he dangled over what had to be a thousand-foot drop. His heart hammered so hard, he was amazed it didn’t rip out of his chest. He latched onto the only thing that kept him from falling.
One massive trunk of an arm.
“Thank you,” he breathed as he looked up into Ruyn’s eyes.
“Don’t thank me yet. I still might come to my senses and let go. ’Cause the gods know you’re more trouble than you’re worth.”
“You know you’d miss me if I were gone.”
Ruyn scoffed as he struggled to pull him up and over the jagged ledge without losing his grip, or harming either of them. Grunting and panting, he cursed Urian the whole time. “Lose weight, man! Never seen anyone on a liquid diet weigh so damn much! Shite, already! Usually whenever someone gives me this much trouble, I at least get a blow job for my efforts.”
With one last massive grimace, he succeeded in hauling Urian over and rolling with him until they were tucked underneath a small ledge.
Urian let out a bitter laugh. “You can cuddle me all you want, you brute. But you have to buy me dinner and a ring before you think about kissing me, and any other oral activities are strictly off the table until marriage. I’m not a cheap whore you picked up, you know?”
Laughing, Ruyn shoved at him. “You’re all kinds of wrong, Greek. No idea what my sister saw in you.” He shook his head, then frowned and gripped Urian’s chin so that he could examine his face. “Are you all right?”
“You just said I wasn’t.”
“I know what I said. But you’ve gone kind of green.”
Urian snorted irritably. “My head hurts.”
“Well, if I had a head like yours, it’d hurt, too.”
Grimacing at the oversized oaf, Urian groaned again. “In retrospect, I think I would have rather they killed me.”
Ruyn hugged him before he got up and helped Urian to his feet. “Do you believe any of what they said?”
“About ending the curse?”
He nodded.
Urian considered it as he continued to rub his throbbing temples. “I don’t know. It’s the gods. Anything’s possible, especially when it comes to screwing us.”
“Well, if it is … will your father be able to kill his own children to save his people?”
That was an easy answer. “Nay. Never. But I don’t think it would matter.”
“Why not?”
Urian laughed bitterly. “Given the number of women my father and brothers screwed before they turned Daimon? There’s no telling how many children they could have fathered between them. The only two in my family I know haven’t spawned are me and Paris.”
“You sure?”
He nodded even though it felt like his brain was slamming against his skull. “I’m sterile. It’s why Sheba and I never had children.”
“And your brother?”
“Doesn’t sleep with women.”
Ruyn let out a heavy sigh as he cleaned his axes off on his vambraces, then returned them to their sheaths. “So are you going to tell your father about the prophecy?”
“No idea. Not sure he’d even believe it. He doesn’t put a lot of faith in the gods … other than Apollymi.” Urian glanced around the barren, windy precipice where they stood. “Not that it matters right now. We might never get out of here.”
“How do you mean?”
“Not sure where we are and for some reason, my portal isn’t opening. You and I could be here for a while.”
Ruyn let out a long, drawn-out sigh. “Awesome. Trapped here with you. No wine. No beer.” He scanned him with a look. “And you can’t even shapeshift into a woman. Damn, I pissed off the wrong god last night.”
“I would, but there’s really no excuse for this level of incompetence. So I’m going to take a nap. Wake me up if you ever figure out how to open a portal or something else decides to eat you. If I’m bored enough, I might lend another axe.”
Urian snorted at the irritable ass. He didn’t know why he liked him as much as he did. On his brothers, that attitude was intolerable. For some reason, Ruyn made it charming and funny.
Though at the moment, he was more than a little tempted to kick him.
Still, he wondered about Helios’s prophecy. Could there be any truth to it?
Was there a way to ever free them from Apollo’s curse? Or was it simply another lie from the gods? After all, that was what hope really was. The worst of all the curses Zeus had laid at the bottom of Pandora’s box so that when she opened it, she would release into the world that one stupid thing that would make sure humanity carried on and kept going no matter what despair, degradation, and nightmare the gods heaped on them.
So long as they had hope, they suffered.
How he hated that bitch. She was the worst of all plagues ever concocted by the gods and the cruelest joke they’d ever played on any sentient being—hence the real reason it was inside Pandora’s box. But for his own hope that he might find Xyn again, he wouldn’t be here now.
And that was why he hated Elpis more than any other goddess on Olympus. Because she hid her true purpose behind the guise of lies and treachery. She wasn’t there to comfort. She was there to punish and to prolong the torment of man.
No more. Urian was done with her.
Helios glared at the Daimons and Apollites around him. “You were supposed to kill the children of Apollo. Not let them go.”
“He’s a Daimon, my lord. He can’t have children.”
Helios sent a god-bolt through him that splintered him into pieces. Then he glared at the others. “Anyone else want to voice a stupid opinion?”
They quickly backed down.
Feeling the fire ripple up his arms and over his skin, he turned his blazing gaze toward each of them in turn. “When next I give an order, you will do as I say, without question or fail. I want the death of Apollo’s children and grandchildren. Bring me their hearts or I will have yours in their stead!”
He was through with this game, and tired of watching Zeus and the other Olympian upstarts feeding him table scraps.
War had been declared and he intended to win it.