Mortal Gods

Athena snorted.

“Flattery’s not necessary,” she said. “I’ll teach you. Come downstairs.”

“Now?” asked Andie.

“Why not?”

“I—” Andie’s mouth closed slowly. “I hadn’t figured on starting so soon. Honestly, I didn’t think you’d say yes.”

“Well, I did. So do you want to learn, or not?”

“Yeah. I do. It feels like I should.”

Athena raised her brow. “No matter what Cassandra and Henry think?”

Andie pushed past her toward the basement.

The basement was floored in sealed concrete, the walls bare aside from a few other swords and knives. It wasn’t much more than a large open space and a partially finished laundry room. A speed bag and a black heavy bag hung in the eastern corner beside a set of free weights and a bench.

Andie whistled. “I don’t know what I expected, but it wasn’t anything so humble.”

“We’ll have to get some mats,” Athena said. “We can’t be slamming you down onto concrete.”

“What is this?” Andie asked. She ran her hand over the black leather surface of the heavy bag. “Don’t tell me you use a punching bag. Or free weights.”

“Please,” said Athena. “I could juggle every one of those weights with my fingertips. This is for Odysseus.”

Andie walked to the speed bag and gave it a gentle push.

“He was some great warrior, wasn’t he?”

“He was.” In her memory, Athena could still hear his scream and see the flash of bronze as he charged into swords and arrows. “One of the best. He still is.”

“Better than Henry used to be? Better than Hector, I mean?”

Athena cocked her head. In a fair fight, Hector would have won. But Odysseus had never been bound by the rules of a fair fight.

“It would depend on the day,” she answered finally. “Why are you doing this?”

“I don’t know.” Andie shrugged. “Because it feels like I should. It feels like who I am.”

They still are what they were. That’s what Demeter had told her. So was this black-haired girl really a warrior? Even without her memories? Athena’d be lying if she said she wasn’t curious to find out.

“Cassandra doesn’t want me to,” Andie went on. “She says she wants to kill Aphrodite, but what she really wants is for all of you to go away. For everything to go back to the way it was. She wants Aidan back. But none of those things are going to happen. Are they?”

“No.”

“That’s why I want to learn.” She rubbed her hands together. “So let’s go. Do you have some wooden swords or something? Maybe a shield?”

Athena walked to the closet and disappeared inside. When she returned she held two long staffs, like walking sticks.

“What’re those?”

Athena tossed one to her. “It’s a b?. You use it like an extension of your arms.”

Andie’s face fell as she turned the staff back and forth. She’d wanted the sword. But she already held it correctly, right palm away and left palm in, so maybe her hands did remember.

Andie sighed. “I feel like the lame Ninja Turtle. Don’t you have any sai?”

“You can do more with this,” Athena said, and quickly used the b? to pop Andie in the chest. Lightly, very lightly, but the girl nearly buckled.

“Ow!” Andie rubbed her sternum.

“There’s an easier way, you know,” Athena said.

“There is?”

“I could just choke you to death.” Andie took a hasty step back, and Athena laughed. “Take it easy. I’m kidding.”

“Well don’t. You’re not very good at it.”

Athena spun the b?. Maybe time wouldn’t pass so slowly after all.

*   *   *

“We’re never going to find her.”

Odysseus stared up into the trees of Taman Negara and felt small. The rain forest canopy stretched up and out and on forever; or at least that was how it seemed. And they were going to plunge into it, headfirst, to try to pick up the months-cold trail of one dying goddess.

Hermes didn’t agree or disagree with Odysseus’ declaration; he was too busy trying to explain to their boat guide that they didn’t have a hotel to get to and didn’t need transport to one. He knew enough of the local language to keep things civil, and he’d gotten them this far, but his vocabulary failed in the face of the guide’s good-natured insistence. He had to resort to a lot of wild hand gestures.