The Warrior God (The Ares Trials #1) - Eliza Raine Page 0,12

use your power to flash us to food at any point,” he growled. I paused, dropping my hands from my hips.

“Oh. Good. Because you don’t want to see me hangry.”

“What is hangry?”

I rolled my eyes. “Pray you don’t find out,” I muttered. He stared at me a moment through his stupid shiny helmet’s eye slits.

“You are an idiot, and will likely get us killed,” he said eventually.

“I’m not an idiot,” I replied. Which was partially true. I couldn’t argue the bit about getting us killed though. “And anyway, I thought you wanted me dead?”

“That depends,” he said, turning and looking out over the nothingness.

“On what?”

“How irritating you are, and if you are at risk of killing me along with you.”

Well, I was dead then. If I irritated him even half as much as he annoyed me, we were fucked.

There was a slightly pink shimmer in the air between us, and Ares froze, hand on his sword.

“I need to attend to some business before we embark upon this quest. I shall return shortly,” he said, then vanished in a flash of pink.

5

Ares

“Who the hell does that washed up old has-been think he is!” I raged, stamping my foot against the marble of Aphrodite’s throne room floor as I paced. The pink shimmer was her calling card, and I had been relieved to see it. I had expected her to want to see me before I left on my quest. I had wanted her to want to see me.

“Come now, Oceanus is hardly a has-been. And I think he’s quite attractive,” purred Aphrodite from her throne.

“Don’t test me,” I growled, turning to her. She gave me a sultry smile and all my damned resolve seeped from me as her beauty took over my senses. “Aphrodite, stop using your power on me,” I demanded. “I can’t withstand it with none of my own.” Her smile vanished.

“I know, and I’m becoming bored. You’re like a wolf with no fangs.”

Anger, not with her but with myself, leaped through me, but none of my godly power accompanied it. It was just plain, useless fury.

How could I have been so fucking careless? How had I let Zeus take my power?

“I have a way to get my strength back now,” I told her, my voice harsh.

“Yes. A Trident of power. How exciting.” She didn’t sound excited. She sounded completely uninterested. “You know, you could just kill the girl.”

“I would love to kill the girl. She is infuriating. But I would still have to carry out Hades’ bidding and find this damned demon. Why anger the new Lord of the Gods if I would have to perform the same task regardless?”

Aphrodite sighed, and lifted a peach from the bowl of fruit that was always next to her throne.

“I suppose,” she said. “But you never used to care about angering Lords. In fact, you quite enjoyed it.”

“Petty little Lords in my own realm, yes. Not Hades.”

Her smile slid back into place. It was breathtaking. She was breathtaking.

“Well, now those Lords will get a chance to get even with you,” she said. Trepidation rippled through me, and I cursed my loss of power for the millionth time. Trepidation was not something I was familiar, or comfortable with.

But the Goddess of Love was right. When the Lords of War caught up with me, they would likely be stronger than I was. Unless the girl came into her power fast and I could use it all, as I hoped.

My eyes raked over my lover’s smile.

“You take pleasure in my plight?” I snarled at her.

“Yes, Ares, I do. It’s your own stupidity that got you here.”

Her words struck me like a dagger. They were true. But to know she enjoyed my pain...

“Then I will leave you,” I said stiffly.

“No. You will do as you came here to do. You will take pleasure in my body, and I yours, before you set off on this boring quest.”

She still wanted me. The knowledge buoyed me, and I slowly pulled my helmet off. I saw the gleam in her eyes, before she flicked her hand.

“On second thoughts, I’m tired. I’ll see you when you return from Aries. If you return.”

I felt my face burn, and rammed my helmet back onto my head. I could not even flash myself out of her blasted fucking throne room. I had no power.

With another flick of her hand I was back in my desert, dismissed.

6

Bella

“You left me alone in a fucking desert less than five minutes into this damned quest!” I