Winter of the Gods

by Jordanna Max Brodsky

  Flint looked completely flummoxed for the first time. It occurred to Selene that he’d had very little interaction with mortal women over the centuries.

  “Thank you, ladies,” Theo said with a grin. “Couldn’t have said it better myself.”

  “Now,” Gabriela said, waving the cab away. “How exactly are we getting across the harbor in the middle of winter?”

  “Not we,” Theo said quickly. “You and Ruth are not coming.”

  His friend patted the bulge in her pocket. “I’m an amazing shot, or have you already forgotten that?”

  “Yeah, and so is Selene, trust me, even if she usually prefers a bow. I’ve already put you both in too much danger. This isn’t your fight.”

  “You’re risking your life, Theo,” Ruth said quietly. “That makes it our fight.”

  “Damn straight.” Gabriela crossed her arms over her breasts and glared at him.

  Theo turned helplessly to Selene. “Tell them this is absurd.”

  “They can make their own decisions,” she replied.

  “Please,” Theo begged, stepping closer to his friends. “I can’t bear it. If you take an arrow to the back or a gunshot to the head, that’s it. No ritual can resurrect you. And in the somewhat unlikely event that I survive tonight, I couldn’t bear returning to a world without both of you in it.”

  Gabriela’s face softened. She sighed. “Well, Theo-dorable, you do know how to sweet-talk a girl.”

  Ruth spoke, her voice hardly more than a whisper. “But you and Selene … you’ll need help out there.” She snuck a glance at Flint and Gerry, clearly sure that a man in a wheelchair would be no match for the Mithraist cop and her cohorts.

  “We’ll have Hippo,” Selene interjected calmly.

  Theo scratched the dog behind her ears. “If only we had a whole army of Hippos,” he said with a rueful smile. “I mean, not hippos, because that would be awkward but … you know what I mean.”

  Selene laughed aloud. “Theo, that’s the best idea you’ve had all week.” She hoisted the bag of weapons more firmly on her shoulder. “Let’s go get us some Hippos.”

  Theo’s confusion lasted only a second before a grin spread across his face. “Good plan.” He gave his friends each a quick hug. Gabriela pulled the Glock from her pocket and handed it to him. He slipped it beneath the back of his waistband.

  Selene spared a moment to shake Gabriela’s hand. Theo would’ve wanted her to. “Thank you,” she said, the words awkward on her tongue. Gabriela just scowled at her.

  She turned to Ruth next. “And you. Thank you.” Then, as Ruth took her hand, Selene leaned in close. “If something happens to me … you’ll take care of Theo.”

  It was a command, not a question.

  Paper cutouts of puppies and kittens in overlarge Santa hats peered down coyly from the walls of the animal shelter. Let’s hope the animals inside are slightly more intimidating, Theo thought as he watched Selene pick the lock on the door to the holding room.

  The funk of urine and antiseptic assaulted his nose the moment the door swung open, followed by a rising chorus of whines and yips. Selene walked the aisle, dispassionately appraising each animal. Hippo trotted beside Theo on her leash, tail beating the air, and snuffed each dog as they barked and pawed at the grating. Theo peered into a cage at eye level. A shih tzu puppy, a spherical ball of white and brown fluff. “This one doesn’t look like he could take down a rubber ball, much less an armed man,” he said, sticking his finger through the grate so the puppy could lick it.

  “It’s a she,” Selene said distractedly, without even looking at the animal. Her gaze was far away—Theo’d seen her this way before. He knew she reached into herself for old, untapped powers. The Persuader of Animals, the Lady of Hounds, communing with the dogs around her on a level he couldn’t begin to understand.

  She knelt by a large cage on the floor. A hefty pit bull panted up at her. She stared into the dog’s eyes. Its wagging tail rattled the sides of the cage. Selene shook her head and moved on to the next prisoner: a slim white feist—a squirrel-hunting crossbreed—with perked ears and warm brown eyes. “Leila,” according to the index card taped to her cage. Her pointed head came only to Selene’s knee. Selene opened the grate immediately. Leila and Hippo sniffed each other eagerly as Selene continued her quest.

  Next another pit bull, this one gray and white with a torn ear. A rangy German shepherd with a kink in her tail. A black cockapoo no bigger than a large house cat. A bright snaggletooth protruded from his lower jaw, and he wouldn’t stop jumping in place. His index card read, “Koko.”

  One by one, they joined the army until six dogs ran in frantic circles around the small corridor. Theo rocked back on his heels, trying to restrain Hippo from joining the melee. “You think we should get some leashes?” he shouted above the din.

  Selene just smiled. Then she barked once, sharp and loud. The dogs instantly quieted and turned toward her. The white feist lifted a ladylike front paw, as if offering her services. Koko panted noisily, his small pink tongue flapping in counterpoint. Selene walked from one dog to the next, and each lay down in turn, like supplicants before a queen. She held out a hand for them to smell, then pressed each belly firmly with her booted foot. When she’d finished, she growled deep in her throat without showing her teeth. The dogs sprang to their feet and trotted obediently at her heels as she left the building.

  Theo knelt beside Hippo and unhooked her leash. “Guess you’re past the whole leash thing now,” he said, ruffling the dog’s fur. She panted eagerly, gave his palm a lick, then took off after the rest of the soldiers.

  Ten blocks south, they rejoined Dash’s speedboat at a private marina on the East River, surrounded by towering pleasure yachts. Flint lay propped on the starboard bench, wrapped against the cold in a sailcloth, while Hansen sat on the port side, her bound wrists secured to the boat’s rail.

  The dogs bounded onto the boat at Selene’s curt gesture. Hansen raised a brow at the canine invasion but made no comment. Flint, on the other hand, cracked a rare smile that quickly turned into a glower as the German shepherd insisted on sharing his seat.

  He glanced at his tablet phone. “Liberty Island is about a twelve-minute ride away. It’s eleven o’clock now, and you said the ritual won’t start until Christmas begins. We’re going to just make it.”

  Theo rubbed his hands together, trying to look more optimistic than he felt. “Then let’s get this show on the road. Or the water. Or whatever.”

  Selene stood in the middle of the boat, looking first at Flint’s prone form, then out over the water. “We’ve got another stop first,” she said finally.

  “Selene—” Flint warned. “We don’t have time.”

  “If you join the battle, you’re going to get killed, Flint.” He started to protest. “Think,” she cut in. “You’re going to slow me down—I don’t care how fancy your wheelchair is. And you’re too wounded to help fight. You might get me killed because I’m trying to help you.” That shut him up. “But I know how you could help. How’s your knowledge of nineteenth-century artillery?”

  “I’ve been forging weapons for millennia. What do you think?”

  “Good. Theo, you know how to drive a car. How different can a boat be? Take us to Governors Island.”

  “How different indeed?” Theo replied with a confidence he didn’t feel. He moved to the wheel, found the key Dash had stowed in the cockpit, and started the engine. “See? Piece of cake.” Then he rammed the boat ahead of them with a crunch of fiberglass. “Where are the brakes on this thing?” he muttered as the wooden yacht behind them splintered at a slightly lower pitch. But eventually, they made their way out of the marina and headed down the East River. He kept his eyes glued ahead of him, hoping Governors Island would be hard to miss. At least steering the boat kept him distracted from the upcoming battle. A battle in which his only weapons would be a gun he had no idea how to use and the brains that had gotten him this far.

  The boat pulled int
o the deserted dock at Governors Island just after eleven fifteen. Together, Selene and Theo hauled Flint and his wheelchair ashore and hoisted him to the roof of Castle Williams using an old artillery winch. They rolled him into place beside the fifteen-foot-long Civil War era cannon. A little supernaturally strong elbow grease moved its rotating platform so the barrel pointed straight across the harbor toward Liberty Island.

  On Flint’s orders, Selene had lugged a hundred pounds of gunpowder from inside Fort Jay—where it was used for historical reenactments—across to Castle Williams. Just enough to fire the two cannonballs they’d found on display. Flint had disdained her offer to find him a firing pin as well. The God of Fire never traveled without his own stash of fuses.

  “Try not to actually take down the statue itself,” Theo said as he rolled the second cannonball within Flint’s reach. “Not sure the city would forgive us for that one.”

  “You sure you’re going to be able to handle this?” Selene asked the Smith for the fourth time.

  He gave her a grim frown. “Stop treating me like a mortal. I know my limitations, and I know my strengths. I wouldn’t still be around if I didn’t. I just hope you know yours. Be careful, Huntress.”

  “Great,” Theo cut in before their conversation could get any more intimate. He still didn’t trust the intensity of Flint’s gaze. “Let’s get going. Mithras and midnight wait for no man.”

  They left Flint on the roof and sprinted back toward the dock. Hansen sat on her bench, staring toward Liberty Island as if lost in a dream. The dogs sprawled around her.

  While Selene jumped aboard, Theo untied the mooring rope then reached for the rail before the boat could drift out of his reach. She was staring at him. He recognized the warmth in her gaze, a simmering reminder of what they’d shared on the banks of the Hudson. But he distrusted the way her lips tightened. He knew what she was going to say.

  “Don’t you dare.” He swung aboard and moved toward the cockpit.

  “Theo,” she said, with far more gentleness than he was used to. “You convinced Ruth and Gabriela to stay behind because you couldn’t bear to lose them. Don’t you think I feel the same way?”

  “Except this wasn’t their fight.” He turned back to her. “It is mine. I’m the reason Dash and Philippe are up there in the first place, remember? The Host knew they were coming because I told the Smith to call the captain.”

  “You couldn’t have known—”

  “And I thought we already had this discussion. I love you. So I’m not letting you face an entire cult of divinely armed fanatics with nothing but a sword you don’t know how to use and a pack of shelter dogs.”

  “You don’t have any weapon at all.”

  He patted the back of his pants. “I’ve got a gun.”

  She sighed and held out her hand. “You have to give me that. You don’t know how to aim it. You’ll be safe here, and I’m going to need it.”

  “And who’s going to pilot the boat? Did you suddenly learn how to drive?”

  “Gerry will do it.”

  “You’re going to trust her?”

  “She wants to get to that island as much as I do. And I’m not about to let her throw me overboard.”

  Theo refused to give up. “Fine. You take the gun.” He handed it to her, then reached down into the canvas bag beneath the cockpit and withdrew Orion’s bronze sword. “I’ll take this.”

  Selene laughed. But he barely heard her. A tremor, part electric shock, part icy shiver, ran through his hand and up his arm. He’d expected the bronze weapon to be heavy. Instead, it felt like an extension of his body. He lifted it high, watching the moonlight run down the blade like water. He swung it in a wide arc. It sang.

  “Did you hear that?” he whispered, swinging it again.

  “Hey, watch it!”

  “It’s like the baying of hounds. Or the keening of a woman.” He wasn’t sure he liked it, but he knew he wanted to hear it again.

  The captain’s urgent question snapped him from his reverie. “You have pneuma, don’t you, Professor?”

  “The breath of divinity? The holy spirit? Hardly—”

  “No, Theo,” interrupted Selene, a look of sudden understanding crossing her face. “You do. You’re a Makarites. A Blessed One. As close as a mortal can get to being a hemitheos.”

  Hansen raised her bound hands and laid a careful finger on the conch shell pommel of the sword. “I feel nothing. Syndexioi gain the ability to use these weapons only by a breath from Prometheus. But you … you’re doing this all on your own.”

  He made a few more passes through the air, his muscles moving with a swiftness and strength he hadn’t possessed a moment before. He knew exactly how he would twist a spear upon the haft of his sword and wrench it from its bearer’s grasp. How to swing the blade into an arrow’s path and knock it from the sky. How to slice through empty space and into a man’s flesh in the same easy arc.

  He tossed the sword upward, where it spun end over end, the blade a darker circle, the shining pommel a rim of fire, like a solar eclipse hovering just over their heads. It fell back into his palm, perfectly balanced. He grinned at Selene’s awestruck expression. “Still want me to stay behind?”

  Chapter 42

  THE COLOSSUS

  The first cannonball whistled overhead like a valkyrie’s shriek, then struck the Host’s moored yacht with a thunderous crash. The boat burst into a fireball, incinerating the Perses at the helm and destroying the Mithraists’ only means of escape from Liberty Island.

  They will fight us here. And they will die here, Selene thought as Theo steered them past the burning boat. The dogs around her whimpered as the heat and smoke gusted toward them, but Selene silenced them with a quick snarl.

  They dropped anchor a few yards off the island’s northern shore. To the south, the New Colossus stood atop her stone pedestal with her back to them. Selene only hoped the Host would be as oblivious to their arrival.

  She unfastened Gerry from the boat’s rail, but kept her wrists bound. A strip of life jacket canvas made a serviceable gag. “Sorry, Gerry, but I can’t risk letting you warn them. And if you do anything to try to stop us, I’ll just knock you unconscious—you know that, don’t you? You’ve seen what I can do. So if you want to see your ‘miracle,’ then you’ll do what I say.” The cop nodded stiffly.

  “Good,” Selene said. “Then over the side we go.”

  Theo grimaced at the eddying black water. “You think my magic sword can keep me from freezing to death? Because otherwise this seems like a terrible way to start a battle.”

  In response, Selene picked up Leila, the white feist, and dumped her over the boat’s rail. The small dog paddled vigorously for only a yard before gaining her footing.

  Hippo followed her eagerly, splashing into the water with the grace of a large boulder and bounding ashore with a vigorous shake. Another four dogs followed her lead.

  Only one dog remained. The black cockapoo lifted one hesitant paw and then another, tail tucked and ears flattened. “I’m with you, Koko.” Theo patted the dog’s back. “Shallow icy water is still icy water.”

  Selene hopped over the rail with barely a splash. She held up her arms. “You want me to carry you ashore?”

  “And if I said yes? Don’t answer that,” he said with a sigh. “I know you could.” He hoisted the cockapoo high in his arms. “At least one of us will stay dry,” he muttered as he dropped over the side and waded toward the beach.

  Selene watched as Hansen lowered herself awkwardly down the ladder on the back of the boat, wincing when the cold water struck her knees. She looks old. And tired. She quashed a sudden surge of sympathy. She better keep up.

  Selene headed along the beach at a steady trot, the dogs at her heels, Theo keeping pace beside her, and Gerry not far behind. The air snapped with cold. The full moon lit her way as it crept toward its apex—and midnight.

  She drew even with the statue and crept to the stone seawall that divided the beach from the
rest of the island. Theo, panting slightly, came to stand beside her.

  “I don’t see any guards,” he whispered. “They must’ve run down to the dock when Flint launched that cannonball.”

  “Time to flush out the rest. Send the message.”

  Theo pulled out the cell phone he’d borrowed from Gabriela, switched it to flashlight mode, and turned it toward the dark hulk of Governors Island across the harbor. Moments later, dim thunder echoed across the water, followed by the whistle of another cannonball. This one landed in the middle of the plaza that fronted the statue. Theo threw an arm over Selene’s head to shield her from the flying shards of brick. She restrained herself from telling him he’d be better off sheltering under her. It was, after all, quite sweet.

  They had only a few seconds to wait before two men burst through the door in the statue’s base. The syndexioi wore their black combat gear but no helmets. The larger man bore the attributes of the Corvus—Hermes’ winged cap and caduceus. Without the crow’s mask he’d worn at the planetarium, Selene recognized him as the black cop with the linebacker’s body who’d captured her at Rockefeller Center. The shorter man at his side was the Miles Secundus: He had a Mars tattoo on his right wrist but bore no divine weapon, only a handgun holstered at his hip.

  The Corvus spoke into a headset as he walked cautiously toward the crater in the plaza. “It’s a goddamn cannonball. No, I don’t know where it’s coming from!” He coughed and waved a hand through the cloud of brick dust. “But from the size of this hole, they must be offshore somewhere.” He hopped into the air, his winged cap flapping, and bounced about unsteadily on the currents.

  Selene crouched farther into the shadows behind the seawall and motioned for Theo and Gerry to do the same. The Corvus has only had that cap for a day, she realized, since they stole it back from Dash at the planetarium. It made sense that the cap was harder to master than the other divine items—Dash was, after all, the Trickster. She sent a silent thanks to her little brother for his perversity. The Corvus’s awkwardness would give her an advantage.