Page 92 of The Gods Forbid

Sebastian

I’d slept better in the short hours since I’d woken up covered in sweat and nauseating memories than I had in years.

It felt like there was something in the room with me, weighing me down and giving me permission to fully settle into sleep, but when I’d woken up to a dim, but early, sunrise, I was alone. I got up and looked out the window in time to see Persy sneaking off to the studio.

That was my move, going in there in the early hours of the morning. I let her have it this time, though curiosity burned at the back of my throat. It wouldn’t be wrong of me to go into my side of the studio and try to figure out what she was doing behind that wall, but something stopped me.

The desire to be respectful and considerate or whatever.

Besides, there was another, more pressing matter. I’d woken up with an itch in my chest, a unique tightness that only had one explanation. Maybe it was the fact that I’d brought up Delphi last night. Maybe it was Persy’s offer to go get my bow, painstakingly carved from a cypress tree on the eve of my eighteenth birthday, but I had a feeling that I needed to go to Delphi.

I tried to ignore it for most of the morning, silently telling her to fuck right off, but it wouldn’t work. The tightness got so bad it felt like the individual tendons attaching my muscles to my chest were ripping apart.

The only thing that distracted me for a moment was Persy’s arrival back at the house. She looked tired, but it didn’t mean she wasn’t still beautiful enough to make my stomach clench painfully. All it did was make her eyes shine a brighter gray and her cheeks flush a cool pink.

I was supposed to be on a journey of self discovery. That’s what Persy wanted. That’s what the gods expected. It was—what I was told, at least—what the world needed.

The only thing I’d discovered was that Persy had a dimple.

I didn’t even know if that was the right word for it. All I knew was that whenever she spoke, specifically when she was speaking through a smile or trying to push through a laugh, a little indent would appear right under the apple of her left cheek.

It was nothing more than a small shadow, but it may as well have been the darkest, deepest pits of Tartarus for all that it haunted me.

It had become an obsession of sorts, trying to make sure that dimple came out as much as possible. If it was there, it meant she was smiling.

It meant she was happy.

It meant I’d made her that way.

I was speaking before my mind could kick in and remind me to calm the fuck down around her. “I need to go to Delphi. Would you like to come with me?”

“Yes,” she said, that dimple popping out in full force. “That sounds wonderful, actually.”

Wait, no, no that wasn’t supposed to happen. I wasn’t supposed to feel relieved about that answer. Maybe it was because she already knew. She’d seen the moment I’d snapped and taken on this ridiculous fucking conspiracy with her own eyes, saving me from having to tell her.

I’d only made it through half of it with Calpurnia before I had the urge to break something.

But Persy already knew.Even though I’d had a fucking heart attack when I realized she was in that room with me, it was … nice, or something, having her there.

“Wait, that’s perfect!” Persy said, clapping her hands together decidedly. “I’d wanted to figure out something for prophecy, but I didn’t know how it worked with Delphi.”

Apollos were notoriously secretive about it. I didn’t even think Adrian knew, in all his kingly wisdom. “Sounds delightful,” I said, my words falling out without an inch of bite.

Persy’s smile grew, and not for the first time, I’d felt like I’d done something right. “I’m still having trouble figuring out what to do for truth,” she said.

“You expect honesty from me,” I said, even though was so, so much I wasn’t being honest with her about. It wasn’t a lie, so much as an omission. It was better to keep her far, far away from the state of my thoughts about her. Especially now that we were crossing into the final months with me at her mercy. “That’s truth enough.” I took a step closer to her, finding twisted comfort in the way she stiffened, not in fear, but in awareness. “Unless you want to be honest and tell me what’s behind that studio door.”

Persy’s fingers flexed at her side, like that had something to do with it. Okay, so it involved using her hands. “It’s supposed to be about you telling the truth. Not me.”

“Are you saying you’re lying to me?”

Persy’s chin dipped down ever so slightly, the subtlest show of yes before she said, “No.” Oh, that little muse was hiding something from me, wasn’t she?

That did nothing but blow a gust of wind onto the flames of my curiosity. It would have to hold off for now. I had an Oracle to see.

After a moment for Persy to get changed, during which I tried really, really hard to not have any inappropriate thoughts about, I was gathering a portal to Delphi.

The second I stepped through into the sunlit, crisp air, there was a disturbing feeling of peace building in my chest, though I had some of the worst memories of my life take place here. Delphi was warded so that no one but an Apollo could step directly into the Oracle’s quarters.