There was no way that would end well for us. Or, technically, there was one way. But I didn’t want to bet my life on Dr. Berti’s diplomatic skills.
And I didn’t want to know how the Hercules would dispose of Tony and me. Which meant I needed to get a move on, of my own initiative.
Chapter Fourteen
THE PROBLEM WASN’T going to be getting out of Tivoli. Xanthe was pretty relaxed around us. The Hercules generally ignored us. Slipping away wouldn’t be difficult. No, the real issue was getting to Rome without being recaptured or killed by a legimal. The biggest danger came from strixes, which attacked people too often for comfort. But any of our local legimals could be dangerous under the right circumstances. Without a vehicle, the journey back to Rome was risky.
The House of Hercules employed flying horses for mobility. The impression I’d gotten from being in Tivoli and from texting my lab group was that any member of the House who hadn’t learned to ride one yet had to walk. So no vehicles whatsoever. But we had to go.
After thinking about it overnight, I sent a text to Hayley in the morning. “Any ideas how we could get to Rome from here?”
Hayley replied almost instantly. “Luca is going to text you.”
Right, because the guy with the hero complex was the most reasonable of the bunch. A few moments later, a text came in from an unknown number. Luca, presumably.
“We’re coming to get you.” Yeah, definitely Luca. No one else was that out of touch with reality.
“Don’t. It’s too dangerous.” How had he managed to survive this long, if he was this eager to run out into danger? Not even Carter would have come up with something like this on his own, and he thought danger was fun.
My phone vibrated again, his reply popping up on my screen. “Shut up.” I stared at the words out of sheer disbelief. What, now he was getting pissed that I told him not to do something suicidal? The guy got rude when he was under pressure.
Another text came in, from Carter this time. “Cool! Hear that? We’re going to rescue you!” Oh, no.
Then one from Hayley. “We should be outside the city in an hour. Text when you guys get away.” They had to be kidding. Was I the only person in this group with a working sense of self-preservation?
No, I realized, I wasn’t. There was one more. But unfortunately, he was stuck here with me.
I decided to reply to Hayley, the most reasonable of the remaining bunch. Not that the competition for that title was fierce, or anything. “Don’t go. Tell the guys it’s a bad idea.”
“How else are you going to get out of there?” she sent back.
No, I did not need this shit. Where was the sensible Hayley who refused to take a job that would put her outside of the safety zone? I didn’t want the compassionate Hayley right now.
“The three of you cannot go up against the House of Hercules,” I told her.
“We won’t. We’re just the ride.” Oh, because it was that easy.
“What makes you think we can even get out?”
“Please. It’s you. You’ll find a way out. We won’t have to do anything but drive you back to Rome. By the time they know anything is wrong, we’ll be long gone.” That was a vote of confidence I could have done without. Did she really think I could plan this?
Damn it. There was only one argument left for me to make. “They have riders on pegasi patrolling the area. What if they see you?”
“They won’t,” Hayley responded, “because Jessie’s with us.” Right. The power of timing. Why didn’t she just say that in the first place? “We don’t have a lot of time. Someone’s leaked the news of your abduction. The whole city knows, and it won’t be long before the House of Hercules finds out they’re busted. We all need to hurry.”
And that was bad, bad, bad. If the House of Hercules found out that they were already exposed, there would be no reason for them to keep hostages anymore. The damage would be done. The other legends would find out about this. They didn’t seem to care what we humans thought anyway, and our society was the only one with a reason to care if we were safely returned or not.
The House of Hercules was pretty isolated, so we had some time. But we needed to get out. Fast.
I really hoped Luca, Hayley, and Carter wouldn’t do anything reckless—well, more reckless. Just the thought of the three of them together on this was worrisome. Which meant I had to hurry up and come up with something so they wouldn’t get the chance to do it themselves. Okay, had to think. Had to find Tony, too. Well, that was a place to start.
I searched for my fellow captive, confident he was still somewhere in the Villa d’Este. The guy who stayed in the car every time we went outside of the safety zone wouldn’t have left the building without me. I found him back in the courtyard, talking to Alcides. And suddenly the plan that I needed to come up with started taking shape in my head.
Trying to reign in my urgency, I came up to them. “Hi,” I started, making sure to smile, for the kid. “So, I was thinking. How far of a walk is it to Hadrian’s Villa, anyway?”
Alcides jerked his chin up, a glint of eagerness entering his eyes. “It’s about an hour.” Perfect.
Tony looked at me speculatively, but kept quiet. An attentiveness slipped into his posture. I guess he’d figured out I was up to something.
“I don’t mind the walk,” I said, keeping my tone casual. “And it’s supposed to be an important archeological site, right? When else would we have the chance to see it? You’re not busy, are you?”
The boy seemed surprised, but pleasantly so. “No, I’m not busy. I’d love to show you the place. Would you like to go now?” Better and better.
Tony finally cracked a bit of smile. “I’m good with now,” he said, managing to keep his voice level and not desperate, which was pretty impressive for him.
“Cool!” Alcides said, and ushered us out of the Villa d’Este. The more I thought about it, the better this plan looked. Alcides didn’t know we were prisoners, and the last time he’d shown us around, Xanthe had made it seem like she was just tagging along. He’d have no idea he wasn’t supposed to take us out on his own.
Even better, he might have been young, and kept out of the loop by the adults, but his build was comparable to a grown man’s. The patrols in the sky wouldn’t be able to make out his face, just his general figure. I didn’t know what the House of Hercules was feeding their children—muscle milk?—but it was working to our advantage. If we were really, really lucky, the patrols would assume it was okay for him to be escorting us, and not stop us.
We might just make it out of this. Everything might just be okay.
Only half-listening to Alcides’ running commentary, I surveyed the sky, trying to be discreet. It didn’t look like the patrols were following us, or giving us any special attention. Back when Tony and I were alone, they’d been more blatant than this. So, that was promising.
Alcides sped up to point out something of interest, leaving me and Tony behind for the moment. “When we get there,” I told my teammate, taking advantage of the opportunity, “ask to use a bathroom. Then go meet our team.”
He nodded, a mix of hope and apprehension in his eyes. Catching up with Alcides, Tony engaged him with something close to his usual gusto. The time passed, the distance between us and the Hercules’ stronghold grew. I noticed fewer and fewer patrols flying past. Every single time one kept going instead of stopping us, I felt a little giddy.
Soon these patrols would stop altogether, and it would be only us with Alcides. We were so close to freedom. I could practically taste it.
Until another patrol flew over us, and I held my breath. For a few precious minutes, the horse and rider kept to their course—but then they shifted direction, swooping down towards us. Crushing my hopes in the process.
We’d been so close. We’d gotten past so many patrols without drawing their attention. But it only took one of them, getting close enough to recognize Alcides and realize we were functionally unsupervised, to ruin our entire
plan. We’d either get sent back, or someone would come with us to make sure we didn’t escape.
The force of the pegasus’ landing scattered dirt and pebbles in every direction. The rider towered over us, a fierce grin on his bearded face. “What’s this?” he asked, with a hint of amusement.
Alcides straightened, his demeanor growing a bit more serious. “These are guests of the House. I’m showing them around.”
“Guests?” the other man said. “We have guests?”
He didn’t know who we were? He wasn’t aware there were strangers in the Aventine, that the Hercules was keeping hostages? If he knew even less than Alcides did, then we still stood a real chance. I felt a surge of desperate hope.
“We do,” Alcides said, an edge to his voice I hadn’t heard before. “Xanthe said they were okay.”
The man turned his gaze to us. Despite the smile on his face, something about him came off as hard and impenetrable. “Ah, in that case. You will have to forgive me. Xanthe and the Hercules do not always feel like they need to keep anyone else informed, and it is my duty to ask questions.” I would forgive him if he just let us go.
“Then we’ll be on our way,” Alcides said.
“By all means. In fact, I think I’ll join you.”
He would what? He didn’t know who we were, or that we were supposed to be under guard. So why would he abandon his post to join us? Was guard duty in the House of Hercules more of a suggestion than an assignment? I was confused and dismayed, unsure of what was going on.
But, we weren’t being sent back to Tivoli. Pressing on to Hadrian’s Villa with two oblivious legends was better than returning to the House of Hercules’ home base. I had to hold onto that.
“Dad,” Alcides said, in a tone I’d used myself whenever I thought my parents were embarrassing me. This sentry was Alcides’ father? My understanding of the dynamic shifted, the man’s willingness to join us suddenly less strange.
“What?” The sentry’s eyes widened with mock innocence. “In that direction, you must be going to the Villa Adriana. And you know how I love history.”
“Go back to your patrol,” Alcides said, through gritted teeth.
Only then did I realize that, while I’d been thinking of Alcides as a kid, he might very well have been thinking of us as peers. He would have been, what, about a decade younger than me? And strangers usually pegged me as younger than I was, somewhere in my early twenties.
“The area is fine,” Alcides’ father said. “This is more interesting.”
And so we ended up continuing the walk with the sentry, riding his pegasus like a terrestrial horse alongside us. Because that wasn’t awkward at all. Alcides was obviously disgruntled, and took pains to ignore his father.
I wasn’t happy that we had two pairs of eyes on us instead of just one. But this was still doable. Two oblivious legends, one obscenely large ruined villa. There had to be an opportunity for escape there.
Upon reaching a small, dilapidated parking lot, one end closed off by a railing, Alcides directed us towards an open gate. A series of tall trees obscured my view of anything past that, other than a road winding into the woody area. Once we stepped up to that road, Tony asked if there was a bathroom.
“Not a maintained one, not anymore,” Alcides’ father replied. “You will have to go the common way.”
“The common way?” Tony repeated.
“Find a bush,” the man shrugged.
Even better for us. They’d expect Tony to be out of sight. Smart of him, picking a place with so many trees to disappear into. He wouldn’t be visible from above, and it would be hard terrain for a horse. So when Tony stalked off, I didn’t expect to see him back.
Meanwhile, these people needed distracting. The more focused they were on something else, the more time Tony had to find the rest of the team. I wasn’t exactly the most talented conversationalist, so I had to pick a topic that would do the work for me. Something that mattered to them. Something where they’d pick up all the slack for me.
“So,” I said, turning to the sentry. “You’re Alcides’ father?”
The man beamed, and Alcides’ eyes widened in horror. Mission accomplished.
“I am. Raised a talented boy, though he could stand to be more aggressive and less nice.”
“Dad, stop it.”
“He inherited a good set of powers. The strength, most importantly. Though my favorite is the ability to enter a state of rage—”
“Please don’t tell her that.”
“—but can you tell by the way he acts? Look at you. Something about your work is good enough for the House of Hercules to invite you to our territory. You must take pride in your abilities.”
“I do,” I said, with an encouraging nod.
“Is it too much for a father to ask that his son takes pride in his power?” the man asked. “But no, he doesn’t want to appear threatening, so he suppresses the berserker in him. He tries to seem innocuous by using his strength for silly things like juggling. He should be letting it loose, showing the world his capabilities. Letting people see the power and ferociousness, the violence—”
“Dad.”
And so I witnessed an intergenerational conflict in the House of Hercules. Tony might have even decided to risk himself by staying, if he thought he could hear this.
A couple of things they were saying might have concerned me—this mysterious berserker power, or the disturbing fondness the sentry displayed towards aggression and violence—if I hadn’t been too busy suppressing my elation at how effortlessly Tony had gotten away. How easy it’d been to distract them from him. We’d as good as done it. We’d gotten out.
It was a quarter of an hour before Alcides finally turned to me, his cheeks reddened from either frustration or embarrassment. “Please don’t take anything he says seriously. He’s a pre-Boom relic, who doesn’t know anything about the world today.”
“The ingratitude of children,” his father grumbled. Then he shifted his eyes towards me, and something in them made me shiver. “Your friend, he is taking a rather long piss.”
Crude, but to the point.
“Maybe he got lost,” I said. Knowing Tony, that possibly wasn’t even a lie.
“Oh, what a shame,” the man responded, seemingly more entertained than worried. “Alcides, we lost a guest.”
“You think he’s lost?” The youth frowned, the gleam in his eye reminding me a bit of Luca. “But he doesn’t know the area at all. And he’s human. Anything could happen to him.”
As the sole representative of us poor, helpless humans in present company, I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. “Then maybe we should find him? It’ll be faster if we split up.”
Alcides nodded, taking a step to leave—when his father interrupted. “Wait, wait. We have already lost one guest. Are we really going to send another off on her own?”
Damn it.
Alcides stopped. “You’re right. I couldn’t possibly risk letting Jordan get lost, too.”
Okay, seriously? What was with the drama? “It really isn’t that big of a deal.”
“There is no need to worry,” the sentry said, ignoring me. “I’ll stay with our guest.”
Thwarted. Oh, well. I had all day to try again. Eventually, I’d need to go to the bathroom, too.
WE SPLIT UP AND SEARCHED the area, but we couldn’t find Tony. Good.
“Where could he have gone?” the sentry wondered. “It’s not as if he could have gotten very far around here.”
It was strange to have a conversation with the man while he was mounted on a pegasus. For one, he was framed by wings, which made for a weird visual. For another, it hurt my neck to look up at him.
“If he got lost,” I pointed out. “Who knows how long he’s been walking in the wrong direction?”
“What a silly thing to do. He knows how far he walked from us.”
“Maybe he got turned around,” I suggested.
The sentry shook his head. “Where would it even m
ake sense for him to go? It’s not like he can leave the area. Good thing we only really need one of you, eh?”
I stilled, alarmed. He knew?
He couldn’t know. He was too relaxed, too—but I realized we were in the middle of nowhere, and he had a flying horse to scout with. Why shouldn’t he be relaxed? He had no idea my teammates were fools and geniuses, all in one.
One look at my expression, and the sentry burst out laughing. “Did you really think you weren’t being watched?”
Yeah, I kinda did. It was an outlandish, desperate hope. I’d been banking on luck and the House’s general incompetence. But for a little while there, I had really believed. That I was practically free, that all it would take was one good opportunity, and this nightmare would be over.
It wasn’t going to be over, was it? I wouldn’t be getting away while he was guarding me. He was a member of the House of Hercules, and to make the situation worse, he had a pegasus. But at least Tony was gone. I hoped he’d reached the others.
And as for me...
Hopeless or not, I had to give it a shot. I thought about going back to Tivoli. To the blood on the walls, the calculating coldness of the Hercules, the lack of value they placed on our lives—and I wasn’t sure I could do it anymore. I wasn’t sure I could handle going back to that. So I had to try, because I didn’t know what else to do.
But the sentry didn’t need to know that. For his benefit, I forced myself to shrug. “Does it matter? It’s not as if we could go far, anyway. A sentry would find us sooner or later.”
“True.” The man smiled savagely. “And someone will find your friend. The only question is whether they will find him alive.”
I tried to fake concern, because that was what he wanted. He was trying to intimidate me. But that threat didn’t have much of an effect on me. If Tony had been out there without a ride back, that’d be a different story. It was a long way back on foot, through dangerous territory. I wouldn’t want to do it without supplies and backup.
But he wasn’t alone. He had a phone, everyone else had a phone. They could just track each other by GPS.
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