I’m still not sure what you want me to do.”
“Did you see the man with green hair and all the guyliner and nail polish? That’s Poseidon’s Kraken. We aren’t just here to help you start a new society. We need our revenge. I have a beef with both Poseidon and Athena, but I understand Tryphon needs his revenge too. I love that girl with the long, black hair and the legs for days. We all do. We need to be able to protect her. You could help us by taking out Zeus so we can get closure and protect our mate.”
“I’d say you could get better closure by talking to them, but I’m afraid I know Athena and Poseidon all too well. That won’t work. I guess I could also say I know why we can’t imprison them. You’ve apparently all been through a big enough ordeal that I know why we can’t get them to the Underworld too. I just don’t like the idea of killing my family, no matter how awful they are.”
“Zeus will not stop until he gets his hands on Hephaestus’s weapon. When he does, he’ll start killing your family. When Athena, Poseidon, and Ares find out about it, they will not stop until they have it either. I think you know what they will do with it.”
“I wish my handmaidens had contacted me! I would have put a stop to Demeter before he ever made that weapon.”
“They tried. One of them was turned into a monster and left in the Pits to fight. Many of your soldiers didn’t know what Demeter was doing to Persephone, but a good bit of them didn’t question her methods with what she was forcing us to do. One of them shot me over a cliff.”
Artemis just sniffed.
“Yes, but that was battle, and you were her enemy. You can’t get mad at someone for being a soldier.”
Oh, I wasn’t. But River sure was, and she hadn’t forgotten. Plus, I was pretty sure Tryphon ate her anyway, but I didn’t bring that up. Eating handmaidens was generally looked down on when I was on Earth. She probably wouldn’t like it now.
“Oh, I’m not mad. I’m just letting you know what went down in the Underworld and why we are here.”
“I’ll agree to help on one condition.”
Of course, there were conditions. Why couldn’t anything be easy with these people?
“What are your terms?”
“A pardon for my handmaidens that are still alive. I want Hades to release them and send them back to me. Unharmed.”
Well, shit. This entire time, we were operating under the idea Artemis didn’t give a shit about them. Maybe at one point, she didn’t, but it sounded like she really did now. Enough to risk the lives of everyone here just to get them back. I thought even Hephaestus believed she didn’t care about them. I guess we were all wrong.
The problem was, Hades was pissed. And when he got pissed, he was a total bear. Would he calm his anger enough to realize we needed Artemis so the rest of us wouldn’t die? I knew him to be a reasonable man—unless he was pissed.
I held out my hand.
“I’ll do everything I can to make that happen.”
Artemis gave my hand a hard shake, but not hard enough to be an asshole about it.
“Then you have yourself a deal. You know, you’d make a good handmaiden.”
Not a fucking chance. I learned my lesson working for Athena.
Chapter 21
River
I
could admit when I was wrong. I was an asshole about a lot of things, but not that. I’d said a lot of nasty stuff about Artemis. We all did. It still upset me one of her people hurt Pavlina, but it sounded like she really cared about her handmaidens. She didn’t just tell Pavlina that she would help us if we could get them back. She went around and personally apologized to every single person here, including my father, Finn, Charley, and Solron. She was also very kind to me when she spoke to me.
Yeah, we had all been wrong about her. Hephaestus, too, because he had some preconceived notions about the handmaidens as well. Maybe it had been that way ages ago, but it certainly wasn’t now. I was eyeing Artemis and Hephaestus standing in the living room.
“I’m not sure how many other ways I can apologize. I want to make this right and help you, but I also have to think about my people. Most of the women who join me do