Cassandra felt like vomiting. Achilles had come into her home and defiled it. Everywhere she looked there was blood. Splashed across her family’s den. Sinking into the carpet. The people she loved stood afraid inside their own walls. Achilles was forever an invader. A sacker of cities. He snuck in quietly and brought red death with him. Only this time her family hadn’t died.
Ares and his wolves had saved them all.
Cassandra chanced a look at Ares, half-expecting the same old hate to flare into her hands. It didn’t.
“We can stitch Ares up,” Odysseus said. “But Andie and Tom should go to the clinic.”
Athena turned to Cassandra’s mother.
“Maureen,” she asked. “Are you okay?”
Cassandra watched her mom sputter.
“And it feels strange to say this in such a crowd,” Odysseus said, “but I think we’re shorthanded. Cassandra, do you know how to get in touch with Thanatos?”
“Um, no, I—” She didn’t know where he was. And had no phone number to contact him. They should have thought of that, it seemed. But every time she’d needed him, he’d just been there.
“Never mind,” Athena said. “He’s right behind you.”
Cassandra looked over her shoulder and, true enough, Thanatos walked in through the broken doorway.
“The Moirae?” he asked.
“Gone,” Athena replied.
“I’ll take Andie to the hospital,” Odysseus said. “She’s got to go now.”
“What are we going to say?” Andie asked.
“I don’t know. That you fell on something sharp. I’m a great liar. Don’t sweat it.” He took the keys to her Saturn and nodded to Athena before they ducked out the door.
“What is going on here?” Cassandra’s dad asked after they went. “Why do they have to make up a story? And why isn’t anyone calling the police?”
Athena looked at Cassandra. This wasn’t something to cover up. They’d seen too much.
But could she use her god’s tricks and lie it away? Would that be easier? Could we go back to before? The family we were before.
“We’ve got butterfly bandages in the first-aid kit,” Cassandra said. “I’ll go. You start talking. And don’t leave anything out.”
* * *
Cassandra bandaged her father’s cheek together as best she could. Athena might have done a better job, but it felt like she should do it. He was her father.
For the next hour, Athena talked to Cassandra’s parents in a low, reasonable voice about mad, unreasonable things. They scoffed at first, and then their eyes bugged out of their heads. Ares showed his wounds. Athena showed her feathers. At one point, Oblivion rose up on its hind legs and spoke. They told them everything. What they were. Who their children were. When Athena told them about strangling Cassandra to death in the woods, her mother put her fingers to her mouth and wept. Slowly, the gods’ tricks reversed from lies to truth.
“We should go now, to the clinic.” Athena stood. “You can go yourselves, if you think you can handle it.”
“Yes,” her dad said. “We’ll tell them I was working in the garage and my hand slipped.” His eyes were tired, and mostly vacant. They passed over the mess and carnage in his house. He pulled Cassandra’s mom to her feet and clamped his arm around her shoulders.
When they walked past Cassandra it was as if they’d never seen her before.
Her mom stopped.
“But—Henry is still our Henry, isn’t he?”
Athena frowned. “Cassandra is still your Cassandra. Don’t misunderstand.”
“Of course,” her mom said. They walked out and got into the car.
“Will they come back, do you think?” Cassandra asked.
“They just need time,” Athena said. “Like you did with Aidan. They’re your parents.”
“Your father abandoned you,” Cassandra said.
“Yes. But he was a god. So, sort of a shit to begin with.”
Cassandra felt the goddess’ hand on her shoulder. Past them in the den, Thanatos moved through the room righting chairs and collecting bandage wrappers for the trash. So much had been broken. So much to repair. And Cassandra wouldn’t be there for any of it.
“I heard what you said to the Moirae.” She turned out of Athena’s grip and looked at her dead-on. “I was there. I could hear, even though I didn’t care.” She remembered the euphoric, blurry feeling of having them in her mind, of being on the inside of her own face as if inside a mask.