We Will Change Our Stars: Seers and Demigods Book 2

by Nicole Thorn

  I regained my feet, and then cried out when pain shot through my leg. It tried to crumble, but I quickly switched my weight over to my other foot, fighting for purchase until I found it.

  Chimera. The creature was a chimera. When we had been younger, my siblings and I had done a ton of research on Greek mythology, trying to find out more about our history. We hadn’t found much on seers, but we’d found a whole host of other things. Like chimera. The only thing missing was the goat’s head on its back.

  Slowly, it turned towards me. Teeth the size of my hands flashed as it roared.

  Yep, definitely gonna die today.

  It charged, and I made my peace with the gods. I sucked in a deep breath, and then swung blindly, trusting that I would hit something with the baton. And I did. The weapon slammed into the chimera’s eye. I didn’t think I had a lot of force behind the move, but the animal screamed bloody murder, shaking its head back and forth, backing away. I swung again, and this time connected with the nose. I heard a small crunch, and another howl of agony.

  The other chimeras didn’t pay attention to me. They rushed the other fighters. I counted at least four more of them, and that seemed like a small army. Johnny started screaming more orders. Screaming at her people to shoot anything, kill them all.

  Zander had vanished. My heart tripped in my chest. What if he had been turned to stone? What if he died? I couldn’t go home to Kizzy and tell her that he died, while she stayed home, and played with Jasper in their studio. I couldn’t let her know that I had been reckless with his life, because she would never forgive me.

  I would never forgive me.

  The chimera growled low in its throat. I looked over to see red tinted black eyes looking right at me. My baton suddenly seemed inadequate. My hand tightened around it all the same. I would probably die today, but I’d be damned before I let it kill me without taking a chunk out of it first.

  The animal charged. There was something about having a several-hundred-pound creature running at you that turned off your thoughts. All the worries floated away, all the little things that one wasn’t even aware of thinking. They all drifted off, and it left me with nothing but the present. Until all my focus narrowed down on the thing coming at me.

  I started backing away, knowing that it wouldn’t do me any good. I didn’t pay enough attention to everything around me. A stone person laid on the ground, one of their arms outstretched, and I tripped right over the thing, landing hard on my ass. The fall saved my life.

  The chimera gathered itself to leap just as I fell. It sailed over me, and landed on the ground. It had been expecting to collide with me, so the landing was sloppy, and it went over on its side. I snatched the knife from the holster, having to wiggle it to really pull it free, and ran forward.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered to the dazed animal. Then I stuck the knife into its eye at the same time that a sword slammed into the neck. Blood spewed everywhere, immediately drenching me and Zander at the same time. Hot, and metallic liquid squirted into my face. I jumped back, but it was far too late.

  I turned to look at Zander, but caught sight of someone else instead. A woman stood on the edge of the forest. She was medium height, but stood out like a sore thumb. Her black hair ran most of the way down her back, and her eyes were such a pale blue they looked almost white. Her skin seemed pale in the winter sun. She wore a black dress that went all the way to the grass, and her face . . . Her expression looked completely cold. She turned those icy eyes on me, and I felt the look down to my core.

  Staring at me, she put two fingers in her mouth, and whistled. The battlefield suddenly changed. The gorgons and the three remaining chimeras retreated. They ran towards the edge of the forest, being cut down as they moved.

  The woman turned her back, and walked away.

  Zander tugged on my hand until I looked at him. “Are you okay?” he asked. “Are you hurt? Your leg!” He knelt, and poked the hurt spot. I almost collapsed with that one move. It looked pretty bad, and it would bruise for sure. I was just a collection of them lately.

  “I’m fine,” I said. Then again when he didn’t seem to hear me. Zander stood up, and his arms came around me. Tightening to the point that they almost hurt. I hugged him back, and breathed in his scent. It was the only form of comfort I needed.

  “What in the fuck happened here?” someone shouted. We looked over at a god. The woman was nearly six feet tall, with tan skin and brown hair pulled back tightly. Her gray eyes practically sparkled with anger. She marched to the center of the camp, and put her hands on her hips. “I leave you alone for three measly years and this is what happens? Can’t a goddess take a vacation?”

  Johnny struggled to her feet. Most of her people were alive, if not well. The others had been turned to stone, or torn to pieces by the chimeras. “Athena,” she breathed. “I’m sorry. We weren’t prepared for gorgons—”

  “No one is prepared for gorgons,” Athena said dismissively. “Just like no one is prepared for a pile of rats that reaches the ceiling. Vermin all of them.” She glanced at us, and started moving our way. I tensed, prepared to get yelled at. Instead, Athena walked passed us, but as she did it, she slapped my ass.

  I squeaked, and then ducked behind Zander. He looked at me, and I whispered. “She touched my butt . . . ”

  Both his eyebrows came up, and he glanced at her. “She couldn’t have,” he said. “I mean. I suppose she could, but she’s Athena.”

  “Who touched my butt.”

  This time his look towards her wasn’t so friendly.

  Athena ignored it, looking down at the chimera I had killed. Or Zander had killed. I didn’t know which of us had the winning blow. She shook her head at it. “Poor thing. Didn’t stand a chance. Trained to be a killer. This is a shame, and she will pay for it if I have any say in the matter.”

  “Who?” Zander asked, being braver than I in front of gods.

  Athena looked over, and smiled. “Aphrodite talks about you all the time, you know,” she said. “Your little seer too.” Again, with that? “That’s why I had to see if the stories were true. Don’t worry, I’m not about to steal her from you.” Then she winked at me. I ducked behind Zander again. “I don’t do things like that.”

  Right. Athena was a maiden. That didn’t mean I wanted her to touch my butt a second time.

  Johnny came jogging over, looking winded from her fight. “Athena. You said you knew who did this.”

  The goddess rolled her eyes. “Yeah, yeah. I know who did this all right. And she will not be allowed a second chance. She shouldn’t have gotten this one to begin with, but everyone keeps talking about how unfair our punishments are, and blah, blah, blah. I miss the days when I could just smite a bunch of people and no one said boo, for fear it would happen to them too. Anyway, what were you saying?”

  Athena moved towards us, and decided that she wanted to lean on Zander. So, she leaned on Zander. We both looked at her, and she grinned at us.

  “Who did this?” Johnny asked. “No one should even know that we’re here. Who would attack us in such a disrespectful manner?”

  “All attacks are disrespectful,” Athena said. “That’s the point of them. You can’t respectfully punch someone in the face, and believe me I’ve tried. It always turns into a big mess.”

  Johnny took in a deep breath, but Athena waved her off before she could say anything, “The culprit, I know. Can’t a girl get some talking in? I haven’t seen you in three years, ya know. Arachne,” she said, much more seriously. “The person who did this was Arachne.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY:

  Weave Me A Way Out of This

  Zander

  Well of course it was Arachne. Why would it be someone else, when it could be the mouthy spider lady? We weren’t that lucky after all. First, we dealt with crazy furies, now the spider lady. Huzzah.

  “Arachne,” Jasmine said, sounding sick. She blinked unevenly and wobbled on her feet. Ah, so she knew the story. Good.

  I s
tabbed my sword into the ground so that I could catch Jasmine before she fell over. I held her with one arm, and let her cling to me, finding her balance. This would probably give her weeks of nightmares, and she would be sneaking into my bed for comfort. I shouldn’t have been happy about that. I should’ve tried to get her to stop coming into my room, but I lost my resolve. I . . . I wanted to keep her.

  Arachne’s story seemed pretty cut and dry. She had been young and cocky, and liked to go around bragging that her weaving skills were the best around. She even claimed she could out-weave the gods. A moronic thing to say, but it had been the first time people decided that they were better than a god at something. Hell, my brother’s wife was only immortal because people used to say that she looked prettier than my mother. Mom got all pissy and decided that there couldn’t be a mortal as stunning as her, so she made Psyche into a god. I didn’t understand how that fixed anything, but whatever. My brother had been happy, and so had Mom.

  Anyway, Arachne had been a cocky kid, and Athena caught wind of all her bragging. Naturally, Athena wanted Arachne to knock it the hell off. Athena disguised herself as an old woman, and met with the girl. She said that if Arachne admitted she wasn’t as good as Athena, then the goddess may forgive the girl for her sin. Arachne decided to make it worse, and rant on and on about how she would totally kick Athena’s ass in a weaving contest. Athena revealed herself, and then the challenge started.

  Of course, Arachne didn’t win that contest. I mean, she had been up against a god. She had no real shot at it, and even if she won, Athena would probably have killed her. Gods had done worse for far less, and Athena punished someone for getting raped in her temple. I had no illusions about who the gods were. Selfish and cowardly and cruel more often than not. My mother loved me, but she had fucked over a lot of people in her long life. Same as Athena, Zeus, Poseidon, and every other person that lived up on Mount Olympus. Honestly, I thought Hades had done the least damage. He kidnapped his niece and made her marry him, trapping her in the underworld, but at least he took care of her. Persephone loved him. If that was the best of them, that really said something.

  But as a punishment for losing and for bragging like crazy, Athena decided to turn Arachne into a spider, along with all her family and those who might’ve come in her line down the road. A bit much if you asked me, but hey, I was a nice guy for the most part. I didn’t want people to suffer just because they were kind of stupid.

  Last I checked, Arachne was still a spider, and I didn’t know how she came out and about in human form. I supposed the right magic could make her human, or at least make her look human. As far as her still being alive, I had to assume that came from whatever Athena did to her.

  “And she’s after your camp because?” I asked.

  “Is it not obvious?” Athena said. “It feels obvious.” She turned to Jasmine. “It’s totally obvious. Revenge,” she sighed. “She doesn’t care about respect when she wants revenge for getting turned into a spider. Which is fair. I would hate being a spider.”

  Jasmine shuddered, and I rubbed her back, holding her to me. I hushed her, and all she did was complain about spiders everywhere. I would have to buy her so much ice cream to make up for this day, and the day before. Any day where a spider lady is after us . . .

  “And she thought destroying your camp would do it?” I asked. “Has she done stuff like this before?”

  “Not like this,” Athena said. “She’s never been good with the planning. Luckily for her, my people were unprepared,” she said flatly, glaring at Johnny, who shifted on her feet and refused to meet Athena’s eyes. “So now some of my people are dead.”

  “Are you going to train more?” Jasmine asked when she stopped mumbling. “You’ve been at this for a while, right?”

  “No,” Athena said, then she shrugged. “Well, you measure time differently. A hundred years isn’t much to me, but it’s longer than your lifetime. And a decade is a blink. So, numbers aren’t all that important. In your standards, no, not long. This went up as a precaution.”

  “For?” I asked.

  The goddess smirked. “Wouldn’t you like to know. That’s classified information, honey, and you don’t need to know it yet.”

  I didn’t like any of that, but of course a god would be teasing us. If I called on my mother, I doubted that she would’ve been of much help. She told us all could have, and everything else she kind of just hinted at. I hated these games that they played. They treated everyone on Earth like toys they played with for entertainment. Even Mom did it with mortals she set up. To her, humans existed for that. She did bad things to pass the time. Demeter wasn’t quite the same, but I knew she’d done things in her past that I wouldn’t like. It was just something that Kizzy and I lived with, knowing our family had done bad things.

  Jasmine looked up at me, communicating perfectly with her eyes. She was on the same page as me. She wanted to know what the hell the gods had gotten up to, and why this place existed. It had to be more than the fact that Athena was the goddess of wisdom and battle strategy.

  “Isn’t a camp like this more Ares’ thing?” I asked Athena. “I mean, the demigods were being trained. Why is it you that runs this place?”

  Athena snorted. “Ares and I agreed that I was better at the training thing.” Sure they did . . . “I can teach them to fight with wisdom and planning. He’s the wrecking ball, but I’m the aim.”

  What good did all this planning and wisdom do when it got her people killed anyway? Stone bodies laid all over the battlefield, and there was no bringing those people back as far as I knew. All the training in the world didn’t save them. The goddess could be cocky and arrogant all she wanted, but she failed her people and this place. Bodies piled up all over this state as of the last few months, and I wanted to know why. Why did everything come here to do damage?

  “Why here?” Jasmine asked, reading my mind. “Why did you set your camp up in Washington of all places? What about Seattle is so appealing to all you god-like people?”

  Johnny’s forehead wrinkled, and she looked thoughtful. “Wait . . . ” She took a step forward. “Is this the only place you have a camp? I thought you had a few.”

  Athena scoffed. “Why would you assume that? Never assume. Do you know what happens when you assume?”

  “Yes,” Johnny said flatly, as if she’d heard it too many times. She looked like she wanted to walk away.

  “Anyway,” Athena went on. “I cannot tell you if I have more or no more camps. I like to keep that close to my chest in case one of you little monsters decides to switch teams, and sell me out. Happens plenty enough.”

  Well maybe if she had been a better person, that would’ve been less of an issue. People switched sides when it fancied them. It was the way of the gods. Backstabbing and betrayals got people killed, but what did the gods care when it didn’t kill one of them? They didn’t.

  Okay, so maybe I was a little pissed at Athena right now. Medusa had been so nice, and this woman did something horrid to her, on top of another horrid thing happening. It made me a little bitter when I thought of my sister. Something similar happened to Kizzy. While she didn’t call out for help to a goddess that would betray her, she had still been punished for something that wasn’t her fault. Demeter didn’t help Kizzy when she could have. Some things just stick in my head, and this was one of them. I didn’t like the goddess before me.

  Jasmine wobbled too much for my taste, so I picked her up and cradled her in my arms without saying anything, or explaining myself. She seemed fine with it, only squeaking in surprise when I picked her up as if she weighed nothing. To me, she didn’t. Jasmine melted against my chest, like her body had been made to mold to mine. I meant to get her off her hurt leg, but now it seemed like I did this more for me than her. Maybe I did, and maybe that was okay. I could take a couple things for me, and this seemed harmless. We got each other off this morning. What was a little bit of holding?

  “What about Arachne?” Jasmine asked f
rom my arms. She wound an arm over my shoulder. “Now that she’s destroyed your camp, is she done with you?”

  The woman laughed. “Oh, she’s never done. Annoying little thing. I have no doubt she wants more from me.”

  Wonderful. “What else can she do? Does she just have the ability to gather up monsters and make them fight for her?”

  Athena shrugged. “It’s all about who you talk to. She’s not without some power of her own. Little tricks and games. She sure does like her spiders.”

  Go figure.

  “What can she do with them?” my lady asked. “She locked a bunch up and they survived without issue.”

  Athena didn’t seem to care much for this conversation, slugging through it. “Well she can do a lot of spidery things. Good for her, I guess. Making the most of what she has.”

  So, she could probably make a spider army, or something like that. Just to send a billion after us. Jasmine would never sleep in her own room again. Should I be upset about that?

  “Well, I should get the misses home,” I said with a grand smile. Best get her back before more spider talk. I wouldn’t want her to throw up all over the place. “We’ll work on the Arachne problem,” I promised.

  Athena arched a brow. “Will you?”

  “Yes,” I stated with a little attitude. “She’s after us too. So, I’m probably going to kill her.”

  “Great!” Athena said with a clap. “Have fun. I’m going to stay here, and have the kids clean up. I guess we’re moving shop.”

  I didn’t care if she had trouble to deal with now, because she deserved it. All of those demigods died because she saw them as her little warriors, and I bet she cared little about them as people. They had probably been young, with their whole lives ahead of them. Now they were dead, and she would replace them with whoever came along next. It seemed unfair to all of them.