“We need to call the police,” his dad said.
“We need to call Athena,” Ares corrected. “She’ll coordinate … hospitals.” His voice was low and far away. Henry glanced at him, fearful he’d see the god losing consciousness, or holding his own guts in his hands. The idea brought back a flash of Achilles, diving through the window with ropes of intestine looped over his wrist. Henry gagged.
But Ares wasn’t holding his stomach. His gut wound looked like a clean stab, just leaking blood and nearly forgotten. Ares looked down at the floor, where Panic lay limp.
“Damn it.” Henry finished with his dad and wadded some of the rags together to press to the cut on his cheek. “Andie?”
“I’m okay,” she said. “Lux is okay. Your mom is okay.” She had finished with the knots holding his mom’s feet and started on her hands. Her left arm was a sleeve of red, but her hand was steady.
“Where’s Cassandra?” his mom asked. “Is she all right? Did any of you see her upstairs?!”
“I didn’t think she was home,” Andie said. But before anyone could really panic, Athena kicked in the door and ran inside, with Odysseus and Cassandra behind her.
* * *
“Cassandra! Thank god!”
Cassandra blinked hard twice. The sight before her eyes made no sense. Overturned furniture. Her parents wearing bracelets of rags. There was a blood-soaked bandage on her dad’s cheek. And in the center, Ares stood motionless over the body of a red wolf.
“Where were you?” her dad asked, though she thought the answer was a little obvious. Athena was right beside her. She’d been with Athena.
Only that wasn’t quite true. Clotho and Lachesis had been with Athena. Cassandra had last been in her room, where they’d wormed inside her head. But they were gone now. Back at Athena’s house, two creatures that resembled translucent, elongated crustaceans lay ground into the carpet. One had fallen out of Cassandra’s nose. The other from her ear. She’d crushed both beneath her feet and listened to them crunch like hard candies.
Henry lurched from behind their father to kneel over the top of Panic. He pressed a reluctant hand to its chest.
“He’s not dead,” he said, and Ares knelt beside him. “He might be okay, if we get him to a vet.”
“It isn’t a dog,” Ares said. He sounded slow. In shock. Blood had soaked one of his pant legs all the way to the knee.
“Well, can it pretend to be a dog?” Henry asked, and the wolf whispered an answer. “Talking isn’t a good start,” Henry said to it. “I’ll take him. Ares, you have to stay here. The vet will take one look at your gut and send you to the ER.” He heaved the wolf up in his arms and made a face when the creature rose onto two feet to help. Oblivion nosed closer, mostly on all fours.
“Stay.” Henry pointed at it, and it lowered its head.
“What does he mean? What’s wrong with your gut?” Athena asked. “Are you all right?”
“I took a stab. Nothing to write home about.” Ares stood straighter while Athena lifted his shirt. The wound was deep and bad. It pulsed blood and opened like a mouth every time he breathed.
“What were you doing here?” Athena asked.
“He saved us,” Cassandra’s mother answered for him. “Him and his dogs. They jumped through the windows and stopped him. That boy—that boy was going to kill your father.”
“I’m okay, Maureen.” Cassandra’s dad went to her and hugged her tight. “We have to call the police. That kid, whoever he was, can’t have gotten far.”
“Oh, you can bet he’ll be miles away,” Ares said.
“No,” said Cassandra’s mother. “He couldn’t be. I saw you cut through his stomach. He was holding his … his…”
“Yeah, well. He’ll have stuffed all those back in by now. Just a little nick for him. Won’t even leave a scar.”
Cassandra watched her parents. They were surrounded by familiar faces, but each became more foreign and confusing with every passing moment. She knew how they felt. It had been the same for her, when Aidan had suddenly become something different.
“We’re going to have to get you all to hospitals,” Odysseus said. “Andie, come let me look at your arm.”
“Henry should go, too. He was hit on the head. He might have a concussion,” Andie said while Odysseus and Athena studied the deep gash on her shoulder. It looked as though someone had taken a hatchet to her.