"No!" she snapped, turning to look at him. "You can't do that."
A tic started in his jaw.
She moved back, putting the column between them. She took a deep breath as if for strength, then spoke in the voice of a small, frightened child. "Thanatos is loose."
"What!" he roared, lowering his legs to the floor and coming to his feet.
"See! You're yelling."
"Oh, trust me," he said between clenched teeth, "this isn't yelling. I haven't even come close to it yet." Ash pushed himself away from the banister and paced angrily around the long balcony. It took all his strength not to lash out at her. "You promised me you would recall him."
"I tried, but he got away."
"How?"
"I don't know. I wasn't there and now he refuses to heel."
Ash glared at her.
Thanatos was on the loose and the only one who could stop him was under house arrest in Artemis's temple.
Damn her for her tricks and promises. There was no way he could leave here. Unlike the Olympians, once he gave his word, he was bound by it.
It would kill him to break his oath. Literally.
Anger roiled through him. Had she listened to him the first time, they wouldn't be reliving this nightmare. "You swore to me nine hundred years ago when I killed the last one that you wouldn't re-create Thanatos. How many people did that one kill? How many Dark-Hunters? Do you even remember?"
She stiffened and returned his glare. "I told you, we needed someone to corral your people. You won't do it. You won't even control your demon. It was the only reason I made another one. I need someone who can execute them when they misbehave. You, you just make excuses for them. 'You don't understand, Artemis. Waa, waa, waa.' I understand, all right. You prefer to tend to anyone but me so I created someone who listens when I speak." She glared meaningfully at him. "Someone who actually obeys me."
Ash counted to ten three times while he clenched and unclenched his fists. She had a way of making him want to lash out and hurt her that came dangerously close to breaching all of his control.
"Don't get me started on that one, Artie. It seems to me 'obey' isn't a word that belongs in the same sentence as your executioner."
Driven mad by his confinement and thirst for vengeance, the last Thanatos had ripped through England with such force that Ash had had to fabricate stories of a "plague" to keep the humans and Dark-Hunters from learning the truth of what had actually destroyed forty percent of the country's population.
Ash raked his hands over his face at the thought of what Artemis had unleashed onto the world again. He should have known when he asked her to recall it that it was too late for her to do so.
But like a fool, he had counted on her to do as she promised.
He should have known better.
"Damn you, Artemis. Thanatos has the powers to gather Daimons and make them do his bidding. He can call them from hundreds of miles away. Unlike my Hunters, he walks in the daylight and is impossible to kill. The only vulnerability he has is unknown to them."
She scoffed at him. "Well, that's your own fault. You should have told them about him."
"Told them what, Artemis? Behave or the bitch-goddess will unleash her insane killer on you?"
"I am not a bitch!"
He moved to stand before her, pressing her back against the column. "You have no idea what you have created, do you?"
"He's nothing more than a servant. I can recall him."
He looked at her trembling hands and the beads of perspiration on her forehead.
"Then why are you shaking?" he asked. "Tell me how he got loose."
She swallowed. But wisely gave him the information he sought. "Dion did it. He was bragging in the hall about it right before I came to tell you."