The Wicked Within (22 page)

There were six in all. Athena finally managed to obliterate one of Dora’s creatures. It burst into bits of fiery light, then condensed into one tiny spark to re-form, but she caught it in her hand and smashed it against the wall. The horrors left us alone; they did not approach the altar at all. Hurrying, I ran around the table and reached up to touch my father’s bloody boots. I wrapped my hands around the arrow’s shaft. “Do it,” he insisted. “Hurry.”

I couldn’t pull the arrow back through his feet, so I snapped the shaft, then grabbed his feet and shoved them upward to his hiss of pain. It was over quickly. His feet free, I climbed up the statue of St. Paul, which flanked the column my father was bound to. I reached for the tie around his wrist. Kieran followed my lead and was climbing the statue of St. Peter on the other side to get to the other wrist.

Just as I reached the knot, Kieran’s warning came. “Ari . . . ”

I was yanked backward, landing with a thud on the carpet below.
Goddamn it!
Dora dragged me up. Athena screamed her frustration. Menai notched an arrow and sent it at Dora, but the
witch swatted it away, the horrors blocking the gods from reaching her.

“You will resurrect that child,” she said with a sneer. “I want Athena to suffer, to hold her child in her arms and watch him die, like I did at the bottom of that damn mountain. I want her to feel the loss of a thousand years, and then know what it’s like to see him die in front of her eyes. It’s called revenge, gorgon. An eye for an eye. Do you not want the same for those you have loved and lost?”

I opened my mouth, but no answer came out.

A lion’s roar shook the cathedral. In the doorway, Horus appeared with his black lioness. His eerie eyes were furious, and they zeroed in on Dora. It didn’t take much to figure out that the reason he’d been delayed was because of her. “Think you to hold a
god
?” he shouted at Dora. As he marched down the aisle, his linen clothes transformed into Egyptian war garb. The sight made my mouth drop open.

Dora shoved me away and hurried to face him. Artemis moved back into the shadows, but Horus saw her and threw out a hand. She hit the wall and was pinned there, unable to move. He never took his eyes off Dora. “Think you
that
powerful, witch?”

“I waylaid you, didn’t I?” Dora answered, her confidence unbelievable.

Athena smashed the last of Dora’s horrors and jumped from
the balcony, landing behind Horus, putting him between Dora and herself. The shit was about to hit the fan, and I needed to get my father off that high altar.

“What do you think, brother?” Athena said to Apollo as I inched around the table and back toward my father. “Shall we take them together, or shall I make my peace with Dora once and for all while you visit with the Egyptian?”

Apollo and Horus stared at each other, neither seeming impressed by the other. “Horus and I have a few scores to settle. Have at it, sister,” Apollo said, never taking his eyes off his target.

Horus’s eyebrow lifted. “It’s your funeral.”

And then the shit hit the fan. Pews and prayer books went flying. I scrambled up the statue and sliced through the ties with Athena’s blade. As Kieran climbed the other statue and used her sword to cut my father’s other binding, I went to his feet and held him as best I could. He dropped like a stone, landing half on top of me. We ducked behind the altar table.

“As soon as we have a clear path, we run for the side door,” I said.

Athena shot a bolt of lightning at Dora. It ricocheted off her breastplate and slammed into one of the columns supporting the balcony above. The entire left gallery groaned and sagged.

Horus sent Apollo flying into the pews, his body blasting through them like a plow eating up dirt. Pews were shoved so far
forward that they blocked the side door. “Do you know another way out of here?” I asked Kieran.

“Around the corner, I think. There might be a door that leads behind the altar and into the garden.”

Horus focused his attention on Athena, grabbing her from behind and flinging her backward. She crashed through one of the columns on the second floor. Wasting no time, Horus jumped up after her.

“Okay, now’s our chance,” I said. “Ready?”

We went to go, but Horus and Athena fell to the floor, barring our path. He got up first.

“Horus, no,” Artemis begged from her imprisonment on the wall. That he was able to keep her there and hold his own in a fight spoke to his power. Frustration radiated from him. He growled, hauled back, and punched Athena so hard she tumbled back over the pews, heels over head. Artemis screamed and cursed at him.

An arrow struck him in the shoulder. Horus swung around. Menai stood near the exit. He seemed incredulous that she’d shot him, like her doing so meant something significant, a kind of betrayal of sorts. “Leave her alone!” Artemis shouted, fear in her voice.

“Like I would hurt my child,” Horus growled at her as he yanked the arrow from his shoulder.
Holy shit.
Horus was
Menai’s father. Now it made sense. The child he was coming for wasn’t the baby, but Menai. And apparently, he held Athena and Artemis accountable for some wrongdoing. Horus reached down and grabbed Athena by the throat as she struggled to her feet. Blood poured from her nose.

Horus’s lion leaped over the broken pews and lunged at Menai. Menai shot another arrow. In midair, the lioness transformed into a cat, the arrow missing, and then it was back to the lioness, slamming into Menai. Artemis screamed, struggling against Horus’s hold even as the god fought against Athena, while Dora and more of her horrors dealt with Apollo.

Horus commanded the lioness, and instead of ripping out Menai’s throat, the large beast lay on Menai’s chest, pinning her to the floor. Menai’s curses and struggles didn’t seem to bother the lioness.

“Go, go, go,” I whispered, and we crouched down, hurrying away from the altar.

Dora disappeared, then reappeared in front of us. Athena shot another bolt, and it hit the statue of Jesus perched on the peak of the high altar. It cracked, chunks smashing into the ground next to the altar, and way too close to the Hands. Dora dragged me to the altar, sending Kieran airborne with a wave of her hand.

But Kieran stopped, hovering in the air for a second before slowly being set down. Sebastian, his face and clothes covered in
blood, stood in the doorway. He looked like some ancient god of death, his gray eyes burning like molten silver. I knew Zaria must’ve died a gruesome death.

On her feet, Kieran ran to my father, as Sebastian strode down the aisle, ignoring the fighting around him, his gaze locked on mine. But a horror jumped in his path as Dora shoved me at the table.

Athena screamed her fury. She ran for Dora, tackling her to the ground and knocking the table hard as Apollo slammed into it after a punch from Horus. The Hands were hit and went flying high into the air.

Athena was pinned beneath Dora, but her sharp gaze found me immediately. “Do it! Do it now!”

“Yes! Do it!” Dora sneered, throwing Athena off, grabbing my father with an invisible hand. In a blink he was flat on his back on the altar table with a dagger raised at his heart. “Do it!”

The Hands crested in the air and began to fall. In those two seconds, a hundred thoughts went through my mind. I had to be touching the statue. I couldn’t do it from this distance. My father was going to die.

And then Mel’s incorporeal form solidified, holding a soul over her palm. My heart gave a grief-stricken thud at the sight of my mother’s soul. My father saw it, his face breaking in despair, the struggle going out of him.

“Eleni,” I heard him say, the barest of whispers.

My gaze flew back to the Hands. No time. I staggered up and ran, the pounding of my heart the only thing I could hear as my power tore through me, ripping me open. My eyes burned. In my peripheral vision, I saw some shield their eyes. But that was just a blink in time as the gorgon surged up and out of me with a force that snapped my head back and made my body arch.

I screamed through the burn of energy searing through my veins, lashing cruel and complete, finally set free. Through a cloudy haze, I slid beneath the basket, colliding with Athena as she did the same.

The basket landed in my arms.

Sebastian was suddenly beside me, his hand on my arm, concern in his eyes. Mine were dry and hot. I blinked them hard, trying to erase the blurriness. And then I felt the basket change from stone to reeds.

T
HE HANDS HOLDING THE BASKET
—Zeus’s hands—began to change as well. I shook the basket and they fell off, landing with a sickening slap on the tile.

Quiet filled the church. The only sounds were heaving breaths, the occasional falling of plaster and debris, and the chaos from outside.

Until Dora’s laughter flowed through the nave, carrying the sick tone of cruelty and delight. Athena crawled over, her eyes big with hope. She tugged the basket to her and looked inside. The child was still stone. Misery twisted her features. “No! It didn’t work!” She lifted her head, her green eyes darkening as she found me. She was laid bare, all of it there, the torment, the grief, the raw defeat. And then the rage came. “You
idiot
! It didn’t work!”

She came at me, hitting me hard and sending us tumbling down the two sanctuary steps and into the aisle. She straddled me, hands around my neck and squeezing. Sebastian lunged, but Apollo tackled him in a bear hug. I grabbed Athena’s wrists, lungs straining, pressure building in my face, and through all the pain and fear, I couldn’t miss her devastation, her thousand-year-old sorrow coming through her madness. My heart was hammering, and it burned with . . . sympathy . . . because I knew the outcome. I knew as my power uncoiled and snaked through my body, aware, this time not leaping up for a quick strike, but building, slithering down my arms and into my hands and fingertips.

Our eyes met. Her squeezing stilled. She knew too. And it didn’t feel good, to know I was going to kill her, to see the realization, the desolation and acceptance, the weariness in her eyes.

The blast that flowed out of me was hot and all-consuming. She let go and pushed off, stumbling to her feet and walking a few steps away as I sat up. Everyone had gone still. Stopping in the aisle, Athena glanced over at Artemis, who’d been released by Horus and was openly crying, and then at her brother, his arms still around Sebastian, his eyes glassy too.

She loved them. They loved her.

As messed up as Athena had become, they’d stood by her.
Then she turned slightly and looked toward the basket sitting on the sanctuary steps as her body began to harden.

A tiny cry echoed in the church.

A baby’s cry.

Frantic horror filled Athena’s eyes and my heart.
Oh God. If she’d just waited, just let my power work through a thousand years of stone!
And now she was dying as her baby lived. Spurred by an intention I didn’t fully understand, I crawled on my hands and knees to the basket. A beautiful baby boy gazed up at me with round green eyes, his chubby arms moving up and down.

Carefully I lifted him from the basket and took him to his mother. Marble had eaten its way up her shoulders. The love in her eyes made my throat ache as she stared at her child. Her living child, with pudgy cheeks, perfect lips, bright-green eyes, and a fuzz of soft black hair on his head. “Turn me back,” she begged in a broken, choked voice, tears filling her eyes and spilling over. “Please, turn me back.”

I found myself reaching out to touch her, to save her. Yet my power didn’t leap to life. It was muted, depleted. It needed a little time. And time was against us. But still I tried.

I expected hate or anger when she realized it was over, but Athena simply returned her attention to her son, the child she loved above all else. He gazed up at her and made a cute baby sound, and then he smiled.

“Archer, my son . . . ,” she whispered, marble closing over her lips, her cheeks, freezing the tears on her face, then claiming the color of her eyes.

And she was gone. Athena was gone.

For a moment no one moved or spoke. Then Dora snorted. “Not exactly how I pictured it happening, but satisfying nonetheless. Nice touch, letting her see what she’d be missing. I believe I’ve grown a new respect for you, gorgon.”

I hiked the baby higher on my hip. “I didn’t do it to hurt her; I did it to . . . ” How could I explain? I hated Athena, what she’d done to my family and so many others, but in her moment of pure suffering and heartbreak, I could not bask in her pain. I’m not sure what that made me, but I couldn’t help but think of my mother. What she would have given to see me one last time. The baby cooed and gurgled, its chubby arms and legs jerking, delighting in moving. And I knew I’d done the right thing.

Dora still had the knife poised over my father’s chest. “You’d better step away from my father, witch,” I said, deadly calm, before turning to Mel. “Take my mother back.” Mel nodded in a daze, shocked Athena was gone. As she disappeared, I held on to the image of my mother’s beautiful, bright soul, committing it to memory.

Apollo released Sebastian and shot out his hand. His bow, which had dropped amid the damaged pews, flew into his hand.
Artemis and Menai raised their bows, arrows pointed at Dora. Horus joined them, a blade appearing in his hand and lengthening into a wicked curve. His action garnered him a surprised look from Apollo and Menai, but not from Artemis. She just dipped her head in thanks.

“I’m starting to believe no one likes me,” Dora said flatly.

“No one ever did,” Artemis shot back.

“Except my maker. And you all just hated that, didn’t you? That I was Athena’s favorite? I loved her above all others!
Me!
And what does she do but betray my trust, betray me by offering my child in place of hers.”

“You’re mad,” Apollo said coldly. “You could not have stood against Athena, nor can you stand against us.”

Dora rolled her eyes. “Think I would come here, set all this in motion if I wasn’t protected, if I didn’t think I could win? You seem to forget the Aegis your dear sister dropped into the waves when she set her hurricanes upon this city.”