Starcrossed (37 page)

was able to pick up the basics right away and when Lucas told her

to touch down she thudded into the lawn with a jarring blow, kicking

up two great divots of grass with her heels. She was impressed

with herself and looked up at Lucas for approval, but apparently,

there was still a lot left for her to learn.

“You’ll get better at it,” he said encouragingly as he pounded into

the lawn next to her, skidding two deep trenches with his feet.

“You are such a show-off!” she said, grinning at him.

“Hey, I’ve got to impress you as much as I can, while I can. Soon

you’ll be flying circles around me,” he said. He took her hand and

pulled her tight up against his side as he led her toward the house.

“I doubt that,” Helen said, shaking her head. Lucas was so graceful

in the air. There was no way she’d ever fly the way he did.

“You’re stronger than me,” he said without any envy or judgment,

just as a fact. “When you realize that, you’re going to be able to do

things that I never dreamed of.”

“If I’m so strong, then why do I always need you to come and

save my sorry ass?” she asked sarcastically.

“Because fighting is about much more than strength,” he said

seriously. “Which is good, or Hector would still be able to beat the

crap out of me in a fight.”

“I can still beat the crap out of you in a fight,” Hector shouted

from inside the house. Lucas smirked at Helen and shook his head

as they walked into the kitchen. They didn’t get far.

“Not on my clean floors!” Noel shouted, pointing to Lucas’s and

Helen’s muddy shoes. Then she realized why they were so muddy.

“What did you savages do to my new lawn?” she groaned.

“I had to, Mom. Helen needs to learn.” Lucas dutifully backed out

of the house and took off his shoes, and Helen did the same.

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“Helen, dear. You look hungry. Make sure you eat something before

you leave,” Noel said kindly, before shifting right back into

scolding mode. “About that lawn, you know the rules, Luke.”

“‘Fix what you break,’ yeah, yeah. And you know I always do,” he

said with a mischievous smile as he came into the house and started

chasing his poor, hassled mother out of the kitchen with the

threat of a tickle. She tried to beat him off with a dish towel, but

she didn’t stand a chance.

As Lucas ran upstairs to change his clothes, Helen could see he

was happy. And so was she. She knew she was still in danger and

should be terrified, but watching Lucas bound up the stairs three at

a time, all she could feel was giddy, bubbly happiness. She still had

no idea what the heck was going on between them, but she was

happy.

Apparently, Helen wasn’t the only one. Pandora came into the

kitchen with a yoga glow, humming to herself. She didn’t have on

her bracelets. Instead, it was her anklets and a spangled belly chain

that were jingling away cheerily with every step and sway of her

hips.

“Oh my gods, I love that!” she exclaimed, reaching out and touching

the charm Helen always wore around her neck. “I always say, if

it isn’t plastered with diamonds it isn’t really jewelry.”

“What?” Helen asked, puzzled, looking down. Pandora was chugging

from a bottle she took from the fridge and didn’t hear.

“The workout room is all yours,” she tossed back over her

shoulder at Hector. Helen fingered her heart necklace and

wondered why Pandora had mentioned diamonds. There were no

diamonds on her charm.

“You ready for a beating, Princess?” Hector asked once his aunt

had danced out of the room.

“Do you have to call me that?” Helen huffed, wondering if being a

dick was part of his strategy or if it was just his personality

baseline.

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“Well, now I do,” he smirked, pleased with himself for hitting a

nerve.

“Let’s go before I wreck Noel’s kitchen with your big, stupid

face.”

“That’s the spirit,” he said encouragingly. Helen had to laugh. He

really could be quite charming when he wasn’t trying to kill her.

Hector and Lucas started Helen out on the heavy bag, thinking

that it was the most basic place to begin. She didn’t get it. She tried

to follow through with her hips like they told her, but she kept positioning

herself strangely at the last moment and taking all of the

momentum out of her swing. She just didn’t like to punch things. It

didn’t come naturally to her. Hector couldn’t even watch.

“You’ve got the killer instincts of a houseplant,” he groaned, covering

his face.

“Maybe we should move on to grappling. It’d probably be more

useful for her, anyway, considering all of her attacks have been

close-quarter struggles,” Lucas suggested.

Helen readily agreed. She was a terrible fighter, but not even

Hector could deny that she was trying. The boys gave her a brief

rundown of dojo etiquette, and then she entered the ring with a

bow, as she had been taught. She was expecting Lucas to be her

teacher, but he stood back and let Hector go into the dojo with her

instead.

“I thought this was your specialty,” Helen said uncertainly to

Lucas.

“It is. He’s way better on the ground than I am,” Hector replied

for him with a grin. “Now get down on your hands and knees. You

know, like you’re a dog.”

Despite the fact that Hector was deliberately trying to get Helen’s

back up, she stayed calm and focused on the instructions she was

given. Jujitsu was part physical, which was fun, but the main part

of it, the real challenge, was mental. She felt like she was trying to

solve a puzzle, trying to unwind out of the human pretzel that

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Hector had made out of her. A few times she pissed him off by giggling

and shying away from the sexually suggestive shapes he was

trying to bend her into, but he gutted it out and kept working with

her rather than let Lucas take over the lesson.

“Nah-uh!” Hector said when Lucas tried to enter the ring. “You.

Out.”

“You’re not breaking it down step-by-step for her, Hector!” Lucas

called from outside the cage. He wouldn’t come in the ring and

break the rules of the dojo, but he could still yell from the sidelines.

“She doesn’t know the first thing about pulling guard!”

“Well, tough,” Hector replied as he raised himself up from

between her knees. “There’s no way I’m letting you in here, brother,

so just forget it.” He gestured meaningfully at her prone body

and open legs, and raised his eyebrows. Helen started laughing

hysterically.

“You have nothing to worry about, Hector!” she managed to

choke out. “Trust me!”

That got Lucas blushing. Helen heard a familiar laugh from outside

the ring. “Giggles? Is that you?” She propped herself up and

shoved Hector off of her.

“Yeah, it’s me. I gotta say, Len, I would have thought it would be

harder to get between your legs, but Hector doesn’t seem to be

having any trouble at all,” Claire teased.

“What are you doing here?” Helen said, surprised.

“I tried to stop her, but she just barged in and . . .” Jason began,

his voice fraying with frustration.

“I really wanted to see you do demigod stuff!” Claire said, cutting

him off. “I’ve never gotten to see you do all your tricks on purpose

before.”

“Tricks? We’re not show ponies, Claire!” Jason yelled at her.

Helen looked at Hector and shrugged while Claire and Jason

continued to bicker. “You know what? I think they enjoy fighting,”

she commented.

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“She’s your friend,” Hector said to her.

“He’s your brother,” Helen said back.

Then she heard the door slam. Lucas had left the room. Helen

stood up and called after him, but she couldn’t leave the ring until

Hector, her dojo master for the day, dismissed her. She turned to

him and pleaded with her eyes.

“You may be safe for today, but you’re still in a lot of danger, you

know. I know you don’t like this, but you need to train. And anyway,

it would be better if you just let him start hating you now,

Helen,” he said heavily.

“What are you talking about?” she asked, surprised that Hector

could be so unfeeling.

“Then chase after him if you have to,” he said, looking away.

Helen bowed to him and ran out of the practice ring. “But it will

only get harder,” he warned as she turned to close the door. She

slammed it behind her to make her point . . . though she didn’t exactly

know what that point was.

She ran outside and heard a deep thunking noise coming from

the tennis courts. She started to run and then realized that, duh,

she could fly. Leaping into the air, she looked down to see Lucas in

the tennis-courts-turned-arena, chucking spears at a target. He

saw her and took flight, meeting her in the air.

“Come on,” he said, taking her hand and looking down at a

couple of mortals on the nearly empty beach below them.

“Someone could still see us.”

They flew high, going north to Great Point where they could be

alone. They touched down on the soft sand around the lighthouse

and transitioned into two normal people walking on the chilly

beach, holding hands. Lucas was still silent after a few moments so

Helen decided to go first.

“You know we were all joking around, right? I wasn’t trying to

hurt your feelings. I’m sorry if I did,” Helen told him.

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“You didn’t hurt my feelings,” he said, shaking his head and

clenching his fists. “It’s much simpler than that. Much more basic.

I hate seeing Hector on top of you. I’m jealous, Helen.”

“Then you train me,” she said hopefully, and he stopped walking

and turned away from her with a groan. “Wait, why not?” she

persisted.

“I’m a demigod, not a saint,” he said with a self-deprecating

laugh. “There’s only so much I can take.”

“Exactly. So, what can’t you take? Decide which of the two options

is harder, and do the other. That way, no matter how hard

your choice turns out to be, at least you can find comfort in knowing

you’re avoiding something even worse,” Helen said logically.

Lucas looked at her sidelong and smiled.

“You give good advice, you know that?”

“Maybe, maybe not. I’ve got my own agenda,” she said through a

playful smirk.

“You’re betting I’m going to choose to train you, aren’t you?” he

asked, a laugh bubbling up in his chest.

“Flat out banking on it.”

They walked along for a bit, smiling at their own thoughts. She

could feel him struggling to make his decision, and she let him be.

Then, finally, she felt him give in to something and take a deep

breath.

“The twins will still be teaching you archery and spears, and

Hector will still be in charge of boxing and sword fighting, but I’m

taking over for all the grappling disciplines. Just a warning, this

could still be vetoed by my father and uncle, no matter what I say.”

“Don’t I have any say?” Helen asked, slightly annoyed. “Castor

and Pallas can’t tell me what to do. If I want you to train me, then

why shouldn’t I get what I want?”

“Um . . . maybe leave my family to me,” Lucas said goodnaturedly,

and Helen decided to let the subject drop. “Come on, we

need to go back. I don’t like having you out in the open like this.”

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“Everything is so close,” Helen said as they hovered over the Delos

lawn, still in awe over how fast and simple it was for her to get

from one end of the island to the other. “Don’t you ever get sick of

being stuck over Nantucket?”

“I would if I was stuck,” he said wryly as they touched down in

the backyard, “but I just went to New York the other day.”

“You did! For what?”

“Bagels. There’s this place out in Brooklyn that I love. It only

takes me ten minutes at subsonic to get there.”

Helen stopped dead when she realized what that meant.

“You mean, any day at school, you and I can just fly to Boston

and eat our lunches in Harvard Square and then be back in time

for fifth period?”

“Sure,” he said with a shrug. “I want you to get a few more weeks

of experience before we go off island, but soon you’ll be strong

enough to go everywhere with me.”

“I want to see the statues on Easter Island! And Machu Picchu!

And the Great Wall of China!” Helen exclaimed, practically hysterical

with excitement.

She started bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet as they

walked toward the house. Lucas grabbed her hands.

“We’ll need to wait a bit before we go overseas. You can barely

stay in the air as it is and it’s harder to navigate with no point of

reference, plus oceanic air currents can be a nightmare.”

“But I’ll be with you, and you know all that stuff already!” She

stopped dead and gripping his hand tightly to her chest. “I’m

strong enough now, I swear! Please? I’ve always dreamed of traveling!

Lucas, you have no idea! My whole life I’ve wanted off this

island.”

“I know, and we will—soon! We’ll tape a map to a dartboard and

wherever we hit, we’ll go. Fiji, Finland, Florence, whatever!” he

said indulgently, pulling her against him to stop her from jumping