Page 70 of A Crown of Hopes and Sorrows

The woman standing before us smirked as she lifted her face.

Her golden, glowing eyes bore into me, and a shiver ran down my spine.

“Well,” she said, her voice silky. “It’s convenient for you to come to me, and alone at that. Saves me the trouble of killing off your guards.”

Searing light took over my vision, and I gasped, falling from Meadow and hitting the ground hard, my shoulder screaming in pain.

28

Apollo

Hyacinth had remained quiet since we left the Palace of the Four Winds, and the silence stretched between us like ice, cold and biting. I felt like I should speak, but I wasn’t sure what to say. And I could barely turn to face Hyacinth with his furrowed brow and pinched lips highlighted by the brightness of the sun's reflection on the snow.

Hyacinth pulled the reins, and the horses stopped, prancing their hooves and chuffing up ivory powder that danced into the breeze. Hyacinth gestured at his guards and Delon and Len, a dark look flashing over his eyes, and they inclined their heads, trotting away from us.

Hyacinth turned towards me. “What the hell was that?”

“You didn’t hear the people talking like I did. If I hadn’t—”

“Oh, I’m certain,” he bit out, “that we’ve given them all a great deal to talk about now.”

I blew out a breath and crossed my arms. In the last couple of hours, I’d had time to think, and I’d perhaps acted too impulsively. But no. Zephyrus was setting up Hyacinth’s kingdom to fall for his cause. He would have allowed the death of his people solely to help him rise on a foolish quest that would result in nothing but loss and destruction. “Zephyrus is an asshole, Cyn. He planned to use you, and we don’t need him.”

“No,” he said through his teeth. “You knew our standing before the gods and leaders present there was important. You understood the plan and agreed to it.” He cracked his fist against the wood, and the chariot trembled with it. “Godsdamnit, Apollo, you understood how much was riding on this.” Tears bit at his eyes. “How could you?”

I frowned. “We can’t trust Zephyrus, anyway. And now everyone else sees that. He’s—”

“He’s the fucking god of the west wind,” Hyacinth yelled. An icy breeze ruffled the fur around his hood. “He’s deeply interconnected with basically every single deity we want on our side, regardless of how they feel about him. Many of which stood in that room and watched that… embarrassment… play out.” He growled, his fingers curling into his palms. “And I don’t need to tell you this. You knew it walking into this situation. You just let your petty jealousy—”

“You know what,” I hissed. “I have been jealous. You’re right. Him marching around like he had some hold on you, like you belonged to him. Yes, it burned me up.”

“A great fucking analogy since you’ve burned all of our plans to the fucking ground.”

I kicked back against the seat. “We’ll go see the other gods again ourselves, and we can—”

“No. No, there’s no ‘we’ in this anymore.”

I snapped up again, the ice of my breath catching in my chest. “What do you mean there’s no ‘we’?”

“You disrespected the hell out of me, Apollo.”

“Because—”

“And I could deal with that.” He cut me off. “If you swore to me you would not do that again, I could process it and forgive you. But you may have just sacrificed my kingdom by acting on a whim.” He pressed his fingers against his chest and wrinkles swept over his forehead. “There has to be at least one person in that room loyal to Zeus. How do you think he might react when he hears about us visiting the wind gods? When he knows we gathered with hundreds of deities and that we’re caught up with Zephyrus who has his own fucking ambitions? So much for all the dedications we made at the temples for Zeus. If he finds this out, you might as well have handed my people over to your father yourself.”

“I have not.” I gasped, reaching for him, but he pulled back. “We can still work this out. Okay, maybe I messed up some, but—”

“You messed up?” he growled. “Apollo, you act like you knocked over a glass of wine. You didn’t mess up; you just let your jealousy wreck this entire plan. Something my family has worked on for decades. The fate of millions of people that we’ve dangled on the complicated strategy of allying with Jupiter to stand against Zeus—a god who could end our country in a heartbeat. This is a plan we have managed to keep fucking quiet up to this point. And you’ve allowed your pettiness to squander that.”

“You know what?” I leaned in closer to him, our knees brushing. “You’re right. I can’t stand to have someone else flirting with you. And I won’t apologize for being petty about it. I’m sorry I screwed things up with Zephyrus and didn’t handle that diplomatically. I’m sure there could have been a better approach. But I don’t think we’ve squandered anything. Zephyrus stood in opposition to your aim, and we can still fix this.”

Hyacinth’s gaze swept out to the icy mountains in the distance, lingering on the blurring blues of the world. His voice dropped to a whisper that tangled with the snow clattering around. “Are you wanting to fix it because of your error, or for my sake?”

“Your sake.”

He shook his head, his lips pinching. “That’s the problem. You’re choosing me over everyone else.”

“Of course I am. I love you.”