Innovation's Muse (Truth's Harem)

by Allyson Lindt

  He glanced at her and squeezed back.

  Lexi clawed past the chaos, as it fell away, and resurfaced in her own thoughts. She wanted to wipe away the tears on her cheeks, but she didn’t dare let go of the lifeline keeping her attached to reality.

  “What was that?” Cerberus asked.

  She tried not to let the question terrify her. Or rather, the lack of answers. “I don’t know. I’m fine now, though.”

  She spent the next few hours convincing herself of exactly that and not letting go of Actaeon or Cerberus for more than a few seconds at a time. Breathing became easier as people filtered out of the house until only a few remained.

  “You owe me a drink,” Icarus said.

  Actaeon nodded. “Should we say our farewells?” He kissed Lexi on the cheek, then whispered, “Be right back.”

  She fought back the panic when he let go of her, but the oppressive pressure was gone. Evaporated with the mourners. Or it was a panic attack, brought on by seeing a girl in her twenties deal with losing the man who raised her when her ethereal parent wasn’t there.

  Lexi drew in a shaky breath, and watched Actaeon and Icarus hug Esper and exchange a few words with her.

  Cerberus pulled Lexi in, so her back was to his front, and wrapped his arms around her waist. “I won’t apologize if I’m asking this too much.” His breath was warm and comforting on her neck. “Are you all right?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I’m here however you need me to be.”

  She was so grateful for that.

  The four of them left the house, and Lexi felt more of the pressure fade in the outside air.

  They walked a few blocks to a local bar. By the time they arrived, she felt more like herself.

  The brightly-lit pub didn’t resemble those Lexi frequented. The group didn’t even look out of place in their funeral best.

  And when Icarus ordered a round of beers, he didn’t pay in barter. There was no hesitation as he tapped his phone against the machine to use digital currency. He led them to a booth in the back corner of the room, away from everyone else. Not that there were many people in here, at four in the afternoon on a Wednesday.

  Lexi suspected that would change over the next couple of hours.

  She slid into her seat, with Cerberus by her side and Actaeon across the table. Icarus took the spot next to him.

  Lexi needed to feel normal, but everything was off by a degree. Tilted just enough she didn’t fit. “Uncle Ace and Uncle Russ?” She forced the teasing into her voice.

  “Don’t.” Actaeon shook his head, but he didn’t look bothered. He took a long drag off his beer, before setting the bottle down with a sigh. “She’s Prometheus’ daughter.”

  “Well... fuck me. You’re serious?” Disbelief rolled off Cerberus.

  That must be significant. “As in, barely lucid, bleeds energy, tried to kill you in Las Vegas, used to be chained to a rock—”

  “Yes. As in.” Icarus leaned in, forearms on the table. He fiddled with the label on his bottle but didn’t drink. “The long-story-short version is that Prometheus was finally clawing his way back to sanity after The Enlightenment. The one good thing that came of it, was that after thousands of years in chains, he was free. He met someone. Fell in love. They had a baby.”

  Nausea surged in Lexi’s gut, and her head spun. She knew where the story was going. At the very least, she could approximate.

  Actaeon met her gaze and frowned. “Esper was only about six months old when her mother died, and Prometheus... It severed the tentative grasp he had on this world. Icarus knew George, who was looking to adopt, so we made sure she had a good home.”

  “Right.” Lexi didn’t know which hit her harder—the similarities between Esper’s story and her own, or the differences. “And the nicknames?”

  “George didn’t want her to know who we were,” Actaeon said.

  “Your picture is in history books.” She turned to Icarus. “And people write songs about you.”

  Icarus shrugged. “When she was learning to talk, she didn’t know that. By the time she found out, it didn’t matter.”

  That must have been nice. Not the losing-her-real-parents thing, but being placed in an upper-middle class home, with a loving father, by a pair of doting uncles. It sounded more pleasant than living isolated in a middle-of-nowhere town, and then spending several years running, never daring to tell anyone who she was, before being sucked into a bullshit series of twisted threads of fate.

  Lexi swallowed her bitterness. Esper might not have an easy life ahead of her, either. And the girl having a different path wouldn’t change Lexi’s any.

  “Wow.” Cerberus shook his head. “I don’t have any other words for it.”

  “She has an aura, but she’s never shown hints of gifts,” Icarus said. “And now you know the whole story.”

  Lexi finished her beer. The alcohol hit her empty stomach, and while it didn’t give her a buzz, it did take the edge off her tension.

  Cerberus waved the waitress over for another round, and Lexi sent her gratitude in his direction.

  Icarus focused on her. “Enough about something that happened decades ago. I want to know about recent history. Who are you?”

  “You asked me that before, and you know the answer.” Verbal sparring was a familiar realm for Lexi. A pleasant distraction.

  “That’s not what I mean. You can’t keep holding out on me. Did he”—he nodded at Actaeon—“tell you that I like finding answers?”

  “He told me you’re manipulated by knowledge,” Lexi said.

  Actaeon held up his hands. “Not my phrasing. Accurate, but I was more diplomatic about it.”

  Cerberus barked a laugh. “You?”

  People were spilling in for the evening, and chatter filled the air.

  “Anyway.” Icarus never took his attention from Lexi. “First you taunt me with this whole hero-with-a-servant thing and tell me you don’t know—”

  “I don’t.”

  “And then you show up with a second guy on your arm. Where do I submit a resume to be a part of your harem?”

  Lexi didn’t care for the phrasing, or the whisper of heat at seeing more of Icarus. “I don’t have a harem.”

  “We’re fated mates.” Cerberus sounded smug, until Lexi winced mentally. “I know you don’t care for the phrase, but it’s true,” he sent her.

  “It’s okay. Fate or not, I still love you.” She didn’t want to pick a fight with him. Not ever again. Those few hours of arguing hurt too much.

  And somehow they were on their third round of beers. Lexi downed this one as well. The buzz was kicking in, pushing aside her weird freak-out from earlier.

  “Hmm...” Icarus snapped his fingers, and the jukebox a few feet away lit up. Music spilled out. A few people glanced toward them, and a couple moved to dance, but for the most part everyone ignored them.

  “You are a fascination, aren’t you?” Icarus said.

  Lexi shook her head. “Nope. I’m just a girl.”

  Icarus snapped again, and the song changed.

  Lexi didn’t recognize it, but the music had a decent beat, and the opening line was, Take this pink ribbon off my eyes...

  “It’s called I’m Just a Girl, and it’s probably older than your stepdad,” Cerberus told her.

  Icarus stood and extended his hand. “If I can’t apply to be in your boy band, dance with me.”

  “You’re relentless and absurd.” And it was helping her feel better. She nudged Cerberus.

  “You can tell him no,” he said.

  “Are you jealous?”

  Cerberus rolled his eyes and scooted out of her way. “You know how I feel.”

  “I do.” And she wouldn’t have it any other way. She brushed her lips over his, then took Icarus’ hand.

  He spun her into him and settled his palm on her hip. It’d been a long time since she danced for fun. As he led, some jumbled combination of a structured step and club-style grinding, it
occurred to her how much she’d missed it.

  She laughed when he spun her again. As she faced him, he drew their hands up to head level, palms together.

  Her brain stalled at what she saw. A thread, distinct and vibrant, ran from her little finger to his.

  Why hadn’t she noticed that before?

  Because she’d gotten used to the faint cord that always connected her to Actaeon and Cerberus..

  This was different, though. It wasn’t blurred or faded.

  She broke all contact and took several steps back.

  “Did I do something wrong?” Icarus watched her, concern on his face.

  She pressed her palm to her forehead. She didn’t need to be tied to every other fucking person she met. There had to be a mistake. “I just got dizzy.”

  “Are you hear...” Actaeon trailed off when she shot him a look.

  Icarus looked between them. “Is she what?”

  Lexi sank onto the bench next to Cerberus. “No. It’s not voices.”

  “You hear voices?” Great. Now Icarus was back to looking at her like a curiosity.

  “No.” She spat the word out more harshly than she intended. “I mean, I hear Cerberus. Servant’s contract.”

  “And others,” Actaeon said. Lexi glared at him, and he shrugged. “You’re talking to someone who might have answers.”

  “Hmm...” Icarus sat opposite her.

  Her irritation surged, possibly exaggerated by that red string that ran between them, which she couldn’t ignore now that she knew it was there. How did no one else see it, and how dare fate continue to make decisions on her behalf? “I’m not a fucking experiment. Don’t look at me like one.”

  “That’s not what I’m doing.” Icarus sounded contrite.

  She needed to calm the fuck down. “I only heard them the once”—twice if she counted today, which she didn’t, because today was a panic attack—“and it was probably Apollo’s fault. Or Cassandra’s.”

  “Fuck.” Actaeon grimaced.

  Icarus’ attention was no longer on Lexi. “Cassandra? What haven’t you told me?”

  “It’s been less than half a day. There’s a lot I haven’t told you,” Actaeon said.

  Lexi was grateful to no longer be the center of attention, but she didn’t like that vibrant cord that stretched and shrank and passed through objects without pause, running between her and Icarus.

  And she definitely wasn’t looking forward to explaining it to Cerberus and Actaeon.

  There was no way she was telling Icarus.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Icarus knew Cassandra had seen Actaeon come for her in the underworld. Since Actaeon did that decades ago and hadn’t found her, Icarus figured her soul hadn’t survived.

  It was nice to know that wasn’t the case, but the missing-memory thing was strange.

  The other details of their story were far more fascinating. He could almost feel the adoration flowing between Lexi and Cerberus, and wasn’t surprised the promise made as Cerberus died was sincere.

  Icarus still wanted to know why Lexi had done something only a god should be capable of, but he was building a picture in his head.

  Actaeon’s obsession, if it could be called that, was fleeting. Icarus didn’t have to ask or delve deeper. His old friend was a sucker for the tormented soul, whether or not they were a soulmate. Morpheus... Cassandra... At least Icarus had never dealt with that. He didn’t suffer nearly enough to hold Actaeon’s attention for long stretches of time.

  Abrupt and irrational anger surged in Icarus, at the idea that Actaeon might do the same to Lexi—treat her as a gauntlet for suffering, and nothing more.

  He shook the thought aside. “So what you did in my shop—what Hades said you could do... That extends beyond changing your appearance.”

  Lexi stared at him, eyebrows raised. “The entire story—that’s what you took from it?”

  “The rest is standard stuff. Convoluted traps set by the gods, that overlap and cancel each other out. But illusions...”

  She nodded at Cerberus. “He pulls his possessions out of a pocket reality that exists on another plane. I just make imaginary things.”

  “—st heard from my boyfriend. He’s back. I’m s—”

  Icarus blocked out the background conversation. “Illusion isn’t the same as imaginary.”

  “We tried to explain that to her,” Actaeon said.

  “—oncement in about ten min—” The bar was getting crowded, and the snippets of conversation were distracting.

  Lexi held out her hand, and a screwdriver appeared in it.

  Icarus’s pulse sped up, propelled by intrigue. The tool itself wasn’t special. Medium-sized flathead with a black and yellow handle. The Greek letters scratched on the side, which were only half visible, read katektises ton kosmo kai parapano. It meant you’ve conquered the world and more. He knew even without seeing the entire inscription, because he’d put it there. It couldn’t be.

  He reached for it, but his fingers passed through and brushed Lexi’s palm, and the screwdriver vanished.

  Invisible sparks traveled up his hand, and he met her gaze. Did she feel that? Was it an effect of her magic? “Why did you make that?”

  Lexi dropped her chin into her palm, her hand muffling her words. “It’s what popped into my head.”

  “It’s getting late.” Cerberus glanced at his watch. “Or crowded. We should get going.”

  Icarus had so many questions. The most insistent one was, Why did Lexi recreate a screwdriver from my workshop? “Come back to my place. I’ll help with Hades.”

  “How much will it cost?” Actaeon asked.

  Icarus glared at him. “You know me. I’m all about the information. But I’ll warn you now, there’s not a lot of opportunity for martyrdom in the workshop.”

  Actaeon opened his mouth.

  “Turn on GNN,” a woman at the bar shouted.

  A few people groaned, but others chimed in their agreement.

  The bartender switched the TVs over.

  A familiar face splashed across all the screens.

  “Fuck me,” Actaeon murmured.

  Icarus sank back into his seat. This was bad. Beyond bad. When George and Esper talked about seeing Ralph, it was more of a visage in the room kind of thing. More like a ghost. The man on the TV was very real. And looked very much alive.

  Lexi looked between them. “Who’s that?”

  “Steve Jobs,” Cerberus said.

  “The fruit guy?”

  Icarus shot her a glare. “Hush. Listen, and then we’ll explain.”

  “I know a lot of you have questions.” The voice that came from the speakers was distinct and belonged to a man who passed away nearly fifty years ago.

  “Turn it up.”

  “Shut your face.”

  Icarus wanted to smack both of the people arguing. He flicked his fingers, and every speaker in the room turned all the way up, drowning out the chatter.

  “—will come in time.” Steve’s voice grated on Icarus’ eardrums, but it was audible now. “I’ll take a few questions, but first I want everyone to know that yes, it’s really me. Tests will verify that. My time here wasn’t done, and Hades saw that. He’s sent me ba—”

  “Fuck.” Lexi massaged her temples.

  “—st gods don’t answer prayers, but Hades does. He’s done this for me, for my family, and for a world who needs to grow toward the twenty-second century. I’ll take us in that direction.”

  The confidence in the words didn’t surprise Icarus. Some people never changed, and Icarus had mentored Steve and his business partner, Steve, back in the day. “Arrogant bastard,” he muttered.

  “I need air.” Lexi shoved her way through the crowd and out the door, before anyone could stop her.

  Morpheus was right. Hades was building an army of the dead. Not zombies or vampires or anything so cliché. The god was far too sophisticated for that. Icarus grabbed Cerberus before he could bolt after Lexi. “Make sure she’s all r
ight—she’ll appreciate it more coming from you—then we’ll talk. Hades has to be stopped.”

  LEXI PRESSED HER BACK against the brick next to the bar’s picture window, tilted her face to the sky, and tried to fall into the empty space above her. She couldn’t put words to why all of this bothered her so much, beyond, Hades thinks it’s smart.

  “Hey.” Cerberus stopped in front of her and rested his hand on her cheek. Comfort and concern spilled through the bond, helping to calm her.

  She managed a smile. “So he can bring people back from the dead.”

  “Apparently.”

  “You’re surprised.”

  Cerberus pressed his lips to hers, then turned to help her hold up the wall. “I’ve never seen it done, but this is a different world.”

  That wasn’t reassuring. “He’s supposed to be weak. What does this become when he’s back to full power? Or maybe a better question is, What’s the point?”

  “I don’t know, to your first question. The point? Faith. Why worship anyone else, when he defies death?”

  She could think of a lot of reasons, but the question was rhetorical. “What do we do?” There was no doubt she had to do something. She was the catalyst for setting the asshole free.

  “The short version is, we get rid of Hades. Icarus said he’d help.”

  “My dancing was that good, huh?” She meant it to be a joke, but the words fell flat.

  Cerberus kissed her again, then took her hand. “Let’s hope he’s not quite so superficial. If he’s going to hit on my mate, he’d better be doing it for your sexy brain.”

  Mate. She knew Cerberus loved her, but the way he clung to the fated aspect of their relationship soured in her gut. It was a petty thing to let herself get hung up on. “I can’t argue that. Shall we?” She fell into step beside him, and they headed to the repair shop.

  She couldn’t help but glance down at their intertwined fingers, and the ethereal red cord that flickered and blurred but bound them.

  What she saw with Icarus must be different.

  They reached his place, to find him and Actaeon waiting in the main shop. Icarus gestured toward the rear. “Come downstairs. I’ll make coffee.”