Total pages in book: 90
Estimated words: 83786 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 419(@200wpm)___ 335(@250wpm)___ 279(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 83786 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 419(@200wpm)___ 335(@250wpm)___ 279(@300wpm)
She eases back to take my shoulders again. My mother is smart, and she takes one look at my face and nods slowly. “Of course.” She releases my shoulders and takes a step back, resuming her Demeter mask. Even out here, she’s wearing a floral wrap dress, committing fully to the bit. Earth mother, beloved by all. There was a time, so far back that I can barely remember it, where she favored jeans and simple shirts. We had a working farm, and my mother isn’t the type to sit back while others do the labor for her. She’s always led by example, and those years were no exception. She had no problem getting her hands dirty.
She still doesn’t, to be honest, but it’s a different kind of dirt that she deals with now.
“I’m listening,” she says when I take too long to speak.
I haven’t been fully honest with anyone in so long that it’s hard to push past the instinctive resistance. It would be so easy to blame Hermes for all of this the way I did with Perseus and take that angle.
It won’t be successful with my mother. She has worked alongside Hermes in the Thirteen for a decade and change. The others tended to see Hermes as she presented herself: the court jester, the petty thief who breaks into people’s houses because it amuses her. My mother never could figure out what was beneath the trickster persona, but she knew there was something. She respects Hermes. I don’t know if she will after this, but Hermes isn’t the one sending me pictures of my family in the sniper’s scope.
Any less direct threat will be too easy to brush off.
I take a deep breath and it shudders around the edges. “Mother, we’re in trouble.”
To her credit, she doesn’t point out the tent we’re standing in or the civilian encampment we can hear through the thin walls of fabric. “This isn’t about the shooting.”
“It is.” I take another ragged breath. “But not only that.” I suddenly want nothing more than to dump this entire problem into her lap. I may be my mother’s daughter, but even at my most ruthless, I can’t measure up. It never really bothered me, not when we go about things in different ways, but failure after failure has left a horrible taste in my mouth.
And the stakes have never been higher.
I meet her hazel eyes, so similar to my own. “The Thirteen are going to fall. I don’t know if Circe will be the one to do it, or if Hermes will, but the writing is on the wall. Maybe it has been for a long time.”
“That’s defeatist thinking.”
“No, that’s reality. Hermes waylaid me on my trip back to the city. All this time, she’s been working to dismantle the Thirteen. She wants to set up a new form of government in Olympus. One that is determined by the people instead of by lineage and politicking and backroom alliances. Circe sure as fuck seems to want the same thing, albeit through a significantly bloodier path.”
My mother’s brows rise with every word I say, until they disappear beneath her fringe of bangs. “You don’t seem nearly as angry about the idea of a new form of government as I would expect.”
“I hate this city. I always have,” I say flatly. “I’ve been the most vocal about my distaste for how things are run. That doesn’t mean I want the Thirteen put to the sword, metaphorically or otherwise. If the outcome is inevitable, then we need to take the path to ensure our family is safe.”
“The legacy families will revolt before they allow even a modicum of power to slip from their grasp. And even if Hermes—or Circe—somehow managed to pull this off, those positions would still be filled with legacy families the same way they are now. They have too much power and money and influence for it to be otherwise.” But even as she speaks, she wanders around the table, her hazel eyes speculative. “What she’s after is a fool’s dream. Look at any other government in the world, and you’ll see they’re just as corrupt as we are. The rich see after themselves and everyone else suffers for it.”
I blink. “Since when have you concerned yourself with governments outside of Olympus?” Up until recently, the barrier ensured that while we have trade alliances, they’re limited. The only people who could bring ships—or people—through the barrier were descendants of the original Poseidon. It’s only been three days since the barrier fell. The rest of the world hasn’t yet realized we’re no longer separate and protected, but when they do, we’re going to have bigger problems than just Circe.
My mother gives me a sharp look. “All knowledge is worth acquiring. There’s a lot of good information out in the world, and it would be absolutely silly to ignore it just because we can’t have active alliances with other countries.”