Page 138 of The Games Gods Play
Now both men are wearing black suit pants and crisp button-downs, except Boone’s shirt is white. This is the dressiest I’ve seen him. I’m wearing a conservative black pantsuit with loose legs and long sleeves, with a butterfly made of glittering thread over my heart.
I glance from it to Hades, but he’s still closed off. Giving away nothing.
“We have a…party…to attend,” he says.
A what? “You’ve got to be joking.”
Hades just shakes his head, and we follow him out the door and over one house to Zeus’ home—yes, with lightning and clouds adorning everything and a lot of glitz, flash, and over-the-top decor. The god would do well as a designer for Vegas casinos.
In a large ballroom—and yes, Zeus has a freaking ballroom, with a mural of nymphs and cherubs serving him and only him painted on the ceiling—we are led to chairs at one of two long, beautifully decorated banquet tables that face each other. We’re at the very end of ours, near the open doors that lead out onto a terrace. Ares, Neve, and a girl who is apparently her sister are to Hades’ left, then me and Boone to Hades’ right. I’m stuck in the middle, so to speak. Dae, of course, isn’t here. Artemis is seated at a table by herself with no champion and no loved one, conspicuous as hell. And Aphrodite isn’t seated with Jackie and the young man with her. Her brother, I think.
This is a nightmare.
Maybe I didn’t rescue anyone and Hypnos and Morpheus still have me trapped in my sleeping body.
Zeus enters the room with Samuel and his loved one, a woman around his age. Even Boone sits back slightly when the god of thunder appears.
“On Aphrodite’s behalf, I welcome our new guests,” Zeus booms. The god is in his element, hosting people visibly in awe of him. “Aphrodite has taken the result of her Labor hard,” he explains.
“This is the Crucible,” Hera murmurs in a tone that sounds suitably saddened, though it’s paired with an expression that is anything but. “She knew the risks when she set that Labor up. She didn’t have to make the end so dire.”
Beside Hera, Amir’s face turns beet red. He can hardly make himself look at his patron goddess, facing instead to the older woman seated to his other side. One of his nannies, maybe? Given what he said about his family, I don’t think it’s his mother.
I move my gaze back to Hera.
The thing is, as cruel as it sounds, the goddess isn’t wrong. Aphrodite didn’t have to make death at the end be part of the rules. I get that the gods and goddesses love their ticking clocks, and death is certainly an incentive, but there are other ways. As for Hera’s blessing for Amir…now that we all know the consequences, no one is going to risk touching him. That right there is a brilliant move on her part.
The goddess’s timing in pointing that out could have been better, though.
Zeus shoots Hera a chastising look. “I will host in Aphrodite’s place. We would have postponed, but after all, our ‘guests’ are here only three days before the next Labor starts.”
Days only again? Ugh.
I mean, I guess they have a bunch to get through and only a month to do it, but still.
“First, I would like to congratulate Neve for winning today’s challenge, as she was the first to return with her sister.”
He offers her a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes.
“Your prize for winning this Labor—Eros’ bow and arrows—is already in your room.”
“Thank you,” Neve says politely. Though I’m guessing by her expression that the good manners are sticking in her craw hard.
“Now,” Zeus continues, “as we enjoy the sumptuous spread, I would like each champion to introduce their loved one.” He waves as he sits.
Awesome. My personal nightmare is reaching torturous levels—public speaking and trying to explain who Boone is to me. In front of the god I was kissing just this morning.
“Must we?” Hades drawls, leaning back in his chair indolently, expression bored.
Zeus glares first at him, then at me. “Can’t you do something about him, Lyra?”
The fuck you say. That was a calculated remark to get a rise out of one or both of us, and probably Boone, too.
Deliberately, I mimic Hades’ indolent posture and tip my head, looking not at Zeus but at Hades as if I’m studying him. “I don’t know. None of you have been able to do something about him in the several millennia since he was released from Cronos’ insides,” I say.
Hades’ mercurial eyes pin me to the back of my chair with a wild flash of satisfaction so violently fast, the only reason I know I saw it is the way I’m still reeling.
I clear my throat and force a steady gaze to Zeus, who is scowling petulantly. “I don’t know why you think I, a mere mortal, would have better luck.”
