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Chapter 10
Poseidon
Elyse was struggling. I’d tried everything I could think of to find Catina, to figure out where X might have taken her.
But I had no idea where else to look. X couldn’t go to Mount Olympus, so he had to be here on Earth. I’d covered all the abandoned islands where cyclops and other creatures used to live.
And I found nothing.
The Underworld didn’t make sense unless Catina was dead, which I wasn’t willing to accept. I didn’t want Elyse to think that way, either. Why would X take the human and kill her? He’d have done it in front of Elyse for maximum torture, so I held on to hope.
But the more time that passed without Catina returning, the more Elyse blamed herself in one way or another, because she hadn’t been able to save her.
On Wednesday morning, Ares arrived at my apartment. He didn’t just appear like the gods usually did. He knocked on my door as if he respected my privacy. I appreciated that. Lately, he’d shown a different side of himself, one very different from the image we all had of him. He tried to be a better god, and I admired his effort.
“Beer? Soda? Milk?” I asked, opening my fridge. The shelves were filled with all sorts of drinks and a half-eaten red velvet cake. I’d tried a piece at a café the other day and fell in love. Of all the human foods I’d tasted, this dessert had to be the closest to ambrosia, so I’d bought the entire cake from the store.
“No, thanks. I want to talk to you about Elyse,” Ares started. “She’s not coping well with her friend’s kidnapping.”
“I know.” I shut the fridge door. “Not sure how else to help her.”
“I’ve done what I can too.” Ares stood in the living room, his hands hanging by his side, his shoulders rigid. “But you need to step it up a notch.”
His face changed when he talked about her. His eyes brightened, his voice filled with excitement.
“You care about her,” I ventured.
He nodded once and folded his arms, defensive, his chin lifting. But I wasn’t going to attack him. I understood he saw something in her that reflected a part of himself. She did that for all of us. Touched part of us, connected with us, made us reflect on who we were.
It was one of the reasons I didn’t mind that she was with Apollo anymore. Elyse was the type of person who made you like yourself again, just because of who you became in her presence. She never asked anything more of me from you than to be myself. And at the heart of it, she wanted love and happiness. As simple as that. I had every intention of making her smile every single day.
“What do you think I should do?” I needed Ares’s advice. We were all in this together, so we might as well team up already.
“I think you ought to take her out, do something with her that’s not what you usually do.” Ares tilted his head to the side but held my gaze. “It’s just a thought. I don’t know how you two are. But I can tell she likes you a lot. So maybe if we all spend more time with her it will help take the edge off her anxiety until we find a way to find X. Apollo found a so-called witch to see if she can find a locator spell for Catina. I might reach out to the Oracle for any insight. You need to help Elyse through this time as well, keep her safe in case X returns.”
“Of course.” His caring suggestion surprised me, and I enjoyed this new Ares more than the old version. “I like that idea. Appreciate the advice.”
He gave me a curt nod of his head and turned to the front door to leave.
“Ares,” I called.
He stopped at the entrance and looked at me over his shoulder.
“I might have been wrong about you.”
“Thanks,” he drawled in a tone that might have been sarcastic.
But I took it at face value. After he left, I called Heracles.
“How do I make Elyse feel special?” I asked, hating how silly I sounded for asking Heracles but also excited to bring joy back to Elyse’s life during such a shitty time. “I want to do something humans understand.”
“You’re asking me about this?” Heracles asked.
“You know her best,” I explained. “And you’ve lived on Earth long enough to be familiar with their customs. I need your help.”
Heracles chuckled. “I never thought I’d hear that from any of my uncles. Take her out on a date. Flowers, dinner, the whole thing. Not just sex, but something that shows you care about her.”
I’d give his suggestion a try. The whole partnering thing was so different for us gods. We all slept around with whomever we were drawn to and thought nothing more of it, butdatingseemed so much more different for humans. Maybe because they lived for such a short time. They had something to lose, so they loved hard and deep. Needing that soul-felt connection to bring out their powerful emotions.
