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That was almost certain. Immature jerks don’t like rejection on their best days, but rejecting by throwing them back into a child’s body? That wasn’t going to go over well.
I almost didn’t want to read the rest.
Taking a breath, I resumed where I left off.
“Michail’s revenge was swift, or so it seemed. For he was gone but moments when my surroundings disappeared all around me, and I awoke in a cage—besieged by new memories of a new past.
“He captured me,” I whispered. “Bound me in chains. Claimed such complete control of me in mind and body those thirty years he was trapped in his loop that I was in every way, trapped with him. With me in his grasp, his enemies were banished into their threads, and his rise to power unimpeded.
“And when his years were up, he returned to childhood with more knowledge, more plots, more chains to bind me. Had I had the true power of the goddesses, I’d have cut his thread, but alas, it was another’s destiny to do that.
“She freed me,” I read. “She freed our world from his reign of misery, but the fact remains that all Michail Midas was is because of me.
“Know this, dear reader, and heed it well. The more you change your past, the further your future unravels.”
I closed the book with trembling fingers. “I’m assuming this is why you said I have to keep my power a secret.” My voice was a thin croak.
“You assume correctly. I still exist in the world. My mind, body, and soul are trapped, but all that I represent remains. In much a similar way that lightning streaks across the sky even though the almighty god Zeus is nothing but a collection of parasitic worms feasting on mortal souls.”
I heaved at the image.
“Over these many centuries, every one of your sisters has called out to me for help. A final, desperate plea at the end of a short and miserable life.
“There isn’t a being alive who doesn’t wish they could start at the beginning. Make different choices. Do it right,” she murmured. “That is what you are, Aella Vanda. A beginning. Once this is known, you’ll live out your days in a cage.
“Just like me.”
Fury and fear welled in my chest. “Fuck you. My life is my own. No one will ever put me in a cage again.”
Her laughter faded in my ear.
Shoving up, I threw the book in my pack and went back to the librarian to ask where to find Dolos’s portrait. The sooner I found the prison, the sooner I freed my mom and got us the hell out of this place. As beautiful and amazing as this new world was, they could use their mandatory military service to fuck their butts and shove a lifetime-of-me-hiding-my-power-to-escape-being-used right up there too.
After thoroughly poking and prodding the painting, I left the library for the next Dolos spot. Selene said he had a bust somewhere in the dusty halls of the lower floors. There was nothing much down there except storage, a few training rooms, and the laundry, according to Selene. A good place to hide a prison entrance was somewhere few people had reason to be.
I found Dolos in the middle of a long, dimly lit hallway that branched off into four other corridors. Stopping before him, I studied the statue. Selene said this was the guy, though it was hard to be sure.
The figure was an elderly, long-haired, wrinkled man with a solemn expression. Nothing like the grinning young trickster in the portrait upstairs.
I examined and poked it all over. “Within the eyes,” I repeated to myself. “Maybe it’s speaking of different people because there’s nothing in this guy’s eyes. Would it have been so hard to say within her eyes or his eyes? Narrow it down a bit.”
“Who are you talking to?”
I jumped around. Alex melted out of the shadows, carrying a cedar-scented wave and roguish grin. Gods, he was so handsome. I felt pimply and awkward just being in his presence.
“Where did you come from?”
“It’s not where I’m coming from. It’s where I’m going.” He pointed to the corridor behind me. “The best training rooms are down here. Real weapons. Not practice ones. Plus, the novice ones get so packed,” he said, rubbing the nape of his neck. “Even when I wake up early to get a room to myself, it’s packed with demigoddesses within the hour—all of them asking me to spar and give them tips.”
I got a sudden vision of Alexander shirtless, glistening with sweat, and muscles rippling as he gripped his sword—making long, smooth strokes through the air.
“I bet they are,” I rasped, wetness dampening my middle.
He cocked his head, the cutest look of confusion scrunching his face. “What do you mean?”
“Ugh, don’t tell me you’re one of those guys who is somehow blissfully unaware that you’re smoking fucking hot and cause five-alarm panty fires every time you walk into a room.”
Alex barked a laugh. “Shit. If I was blissfully unaware, I’m not now. Do you always say the first thing that comes into your mind?”
