by Unknown
chair and held out his hand to take the phone.
She called me, not you, Claire said gently.
She answered her phone, immediately asking Helen several questions
at once. Then Claire was quiet for a moment. She put the call
on speakerphone.
Okay, Len, we can all hear you. What is it? Claire asked, looking
around at the rest of his family but avoiding eye contact with
Lucas.
Im with my mother, Daphne, and my mother only. We are not
being coerced by any other individual, family, or House, Helen
announced to the room as smoothly as if she were playing a recording.
My mother and I are preparing to leave the island together,
and we ask that you allow us to leave it in peace. I am not in any
physical danger. You know all of this is true, because your
Falsefinders can hear it in my voice. Good-bye. I will miss you all.
The line went silent. Lucas stared at the phone as Claire switched
out of speaker mode, put her phone to her ear, and repeated
Helens name a few times.
That wasnt her, Lucas insisted, shaking his head repeatedly.
He felt something was off, like there was a lie lurking somewhere.
Helen wasnt supposed to leave him. Ever. Shed never call me a
Falsefinder like that.
Lucas, it was her, Claire insisted, finally meeting Lucass eyes
and giving him a sad look as she did so. I know she sounded really
weird, but it was Helen. You know that.
Was she lying? Castor asked Lucas.
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No, Lucas answered hoarsely, as though his voice couldnt entirely
commit to something that the rest of him knew was so
wrong. She told no lies.
So Daphne is alive, Pallas breathed, his eyes wide and blank
with shock.
We still dont know if Daphne is Daphne Atreus, Castor said,
blocking his brother from leaving the room.
Enough, Castor. Just stop it, Pallas said, a note of weariness
weighing his voice down. I thought Helen was that Atreus whore
when I first saw her!
And Hector is a dead ringer for Creon, and Lucas looks like one
of Poseidons children from the House of Athens! Castor shouted,
losing his patience. More often than not the way we look has nothing
to do with who parented us. You know that as well as anyone!
Helens mother could be any one of the five different Daphnes who
were killed in the slaughter eighteen years ago.
Youd do anything to keep the peace, wouldnt you? Even let that
woman get away, Pallas said, pushing past Castor and throwing
Hectors restraining hand off his shoulder.
Lucas took an automatic step forward to get his cousins back.
Hector could easily overpower his father if he had to, but Lucas
didnt want them to fight at all. A fight would delay him from finding
Helen, and he had to see her. They werent supposed to be separated,
and Lucas couldnt shake the overwhelming sensation that
something very wrong was happening.
Where are you going, Dad? Hector asked wearily, backing off
from a physical fight.
To find the woman who murdered my brother, Pallas said
through gritted teeth as he strode toward the door.
You will not go, Cassandra said.
Everyone in the room froze at the sound of her voice. There was a
chiming tone to it, as if more than one person was speaking at the
same time. The voices coming out of her were old and young and
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everything in between, all speaking in harmony. Lucas saw Claire
take an instinctive step back toward Jason in terror. Cassandras
mouth was glowing, and her hair was writhing around her head
like snakes.
Lucas, son of the sun, is the only one who can see the face he
seeks, she continued to prophesy. He will find the daughters of
Zeus, they who are beloved by Aphrodite, and give them shelter in
the Royal House of Thebes. Oh! Caution! Betrayal . . . She broke
off uncertainly. The light left her, and she began to shake. She
looked frightened, but not even Lucas wanted to go near her.
Are you okay? Lucas asked her quietly from across the room,
breaking the unnatural silence. She nodded and rubbed her hands
over her shoulders and upper arms, suddenly looking much smaller
than she was.
Youre going to need to take Hector and the twins with you, she
warned. I think theres going to be a fight.
Ill go, too, Castor said, but Cassandra shook her head.
If Daphne sees you or Pallas, shell run, she said with an apologetic
shrug.
So our children are to go face her alone? No. Daphne is too dangerous.
We cant let them anywhere near her, Pallas objected as
his anger gave way to fear. She seduced Ajax and murdered him!
We dont know that! Castor yelled out in frustration.
For a moment it looked like Castor was going to hit his brother,
but Hector insinuated himself in between them. Lucas nearly
screamed with frustration, wondering how Scions had ever survived
this long. They were always at each others throats, and none
of this infighting got him any closer to Helen.
Everyone calm down! Uncle. Father, Hector said, turning from
one to the other, and assuring both of them. We can handle this.
There was a gasping laugh, a bitter sound that caught everyones
attention. When Lucas looked over, Pandora had a hand over her
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mouth and her eyes were filling up with tears. She looked tenderly
at Hector, and spoke to him from behind her hand.
You look just like him, you know, she said with an odd smile.
Like Ajax. Its as if another cycle is starting.
Theres no cycle waiting for me, Aunt Dora. Ill be fine, Hector
said with a cocky smile. Well all be back in a couple of hours with
Helen and Daphne, safe and sound.
Where is she? Lucas asked Cassandra, relieved to finally be doing
something.
Helen and her mother are somewhere close to the ferry, but they
are moving around so I cant see exactly where, she replied.
Lucas felt his cousins fall in behind him as he turned and headed
for the door.
Wait! Im going with you, Claire insisted as she scurried to
catch up with the fast-moving Scions. Lennie needs me.
You really are insane, you know that? Jason said scornfully, but
Lucas could hear admiration behind his false anger. Youre staying
here.
But I can talk to her! Shell listen to me, Claire reasoned, holding
up her hands and pressing against Jasons chest to keep him
from walking past her. She looked at Lucas, begging him to agree
with her, but he couldnt do that.
Youre not going, Five-Two, Hector said, ending the argument.
If theres a fight youd be a target, and I dont want anyone getting
hurt trying to protect you. He glanced at his brother meaningfully.
Dont worry, Ill bring her back, Lucas assured Claire. He followed
his cousins and jumped into the truck. Just please stay
here, and stay safe.
Of course, Claire replied in her most deferential tone. Lucas
didnt need to be a Falsefinder to know she was lying.
He hoped she wouldnt do anything too stupid, but he couldnt
stop to find out what she was scheming. Helen was about to leave
the island. Lucas didnt know if he had a touch of his little sisters
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talent or not, but he just knew that if Helen left him then, he might
lose her forever.
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UNCORRECTED E-PROOFNOT FOR SALE
HarperCollins Publishers
.....................................................................
Chapter Seventeen
Creon stood along the side of the compound, entirely
cloaked in shadows, and waited until his cousins sped off
in their black SUV before he ran after them. He could easily
keep pace with the moving car, and as long as he
stayed inside a cloud of darkness, he could depend on the
dreary weather to keep him perfectly hidden. No other Scion for
hundreds of years had Creons control over light, and on a cloudy
day not even another Son of Apollo could see him.
Creon had followed Hector and Jason back to the compound
from Helens place that morning. Having nothing else to go on, he
decided the best thing to do would be to eavesdrop on his estranged
family. His father had told him about the shape-shifting
qualities of the cestus, and he knew that he had no other choice but
to wait for his quarry to reveal herself. He guessed that eventually
she would make contact with the traitors, and he had been right.
Now all he had to do was follow them and trust that eventually his
cousins would lead him right to her.
Helen looked out the window of the hotel, searching the nearly
empty street below, but she didnt see Lucas anywhere. Shed
hoped to see him one last time before she left, even if he didnt see
her. It was little enough to hope for, but apparently, little was still
too much. Lucas was gone, the storm was ending, and soon she
and her mother would be on the first ferry off island.
Helen, Daphne called from behind her. Youre wearing your
own face. You have to be consistent or well be discovered.
Helen turned around and concentrated on projecting the image
of the cute brunette she and her mother had decided Helen would
become when they ran away.
Much better, Daphne said with a pleased nod. I still cant believe
you never stumbled on to this power by yourself.
Helen didnt have an answer for that. She was too disturbed by
her newfound power and her newfound mother to decide whether
she was being complimented or insulted. She walked over to the
vanity in the bedroom to look at the stranger in the mirror. The
cestus could make her look like any woman in the world, but shed
only had a few hours to practice with it. Her mother had promised
to teach her how to become any age, any race, any gender in the future,
but although shed kept her disguise simple for now, she was
still unrecognizable, as long as she remembered to keep up the
illusion.
You dont have to keep your half of the cestus as the heart necklace,
you know, her mother told her, standing behind Helen and
looking at her in the glass.
Yeah, I know. I figured out how to do that much on my own, at
least, Helen answered in the strangers voice.
Helens necklace was the actual girdle of Aphrodite, the protective
half that made her impervious to weapons. Daphnes half was
the adornments of Aphrodite, and although she couldnt stop a
blade or a bomb with her skin like Helen could, what she could do
was potentially more frightening. Daphne was irresistible to
whomever she decided to charm.
Well, Im glad. Ive always worn my half as the heart, and I always
hoped you did, too, Daphne said shyly. I guess you probably
think Ive got no right to be nostalgic about you. But I am.
Daphne fingered her heart-shaped charm and opened her mouth
to say something else, but she stopped herself and went into the
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other room to sort through her luggage for the tenth time. A part of
Helen wanted to run after her mother and say she had always
hoped her necklace was a tie between them, too. But another part
of her wanted to rip the thing off her neck and throw it in her
mothers borrowed face.
Helen wasnt certain how far Daphnes power of persuasion went
just yet. It came from the cestus, so it might be that Daphne was irresistible
only in a sexual way, but Helen was painfully aware of
how quickly she had agreed to leave her home and the people she
loved. She was following a woman she couldnt remember to a
place she had never seen, and she had made the decision to do so
in less than an hour. Helen thought through everything she had
learned, looking for some clue that she was being controlled, but as
she added up all the evidence, she knew that she didnt need to be
brainwashed to want to run away.
After what Daphne had told her, Helen was so disgusted with
herself she would have run away, regardless.
Are you hungry? Daphne asked. Helen jumped away from the
window at the sound and dropped the curtain guiltily. Without
even realizing it, she had been looking for Lucas again.
No, she replied, unable to look up from the rug.
Well, youre still going to have to eat, and we should try out your
new face before we get on the ferry, Daphne said with a grimace.
Were going out for breakfast before we have to travel over that
blasted ocean.
Helen tried to argueto a point out how silly it would be to test
her ability to hold her new shape with so little practicebut
Daphne only shrugged and said that it would be easier to test it on
land before they ventured out on the water. It seemed that Helens
fear of the ocean was inherited. Daphne loathed it, and remembering
what Hector had told her about how her own dislike of the
ocean came from not being able to control it, Helen assumed that
her mother must be a huge control freak to hate the ocean so
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passionately. After a quick check to make sure that neither of them
were wearing clothes that might get them recognized, Daphne
dragged Helen out onto the street with a promise that it would be
fun.
The storm had mashed the fallen autumn leaves into a kind of
red-brown paste that coated the cobblestone streets and clogged
the overwhelmed gutters. The rain was petering out and the wind
was dying down, but the bottoms of the clouds were still a
smudged-mascara color, and water ran in impromptu rivers down
the sidewalks on their way out to sea. Fallen branches lay here and
there, the bushy ends denuded of leaves, and the trunk ends, newly
ripped from the tree, ended in fresh white splinters that stuck out
in all directions
like dropped boxes of toothpicks. Helen could
smell the tree sap in the air as the few trees that the island had to
offer bled out after losing their battle with the wind. With the disturbing
image of dead wooden soldiers and giant wooden horses in
her mind, the last thing that she wanted to do was eat.
Nothings going to be open, Helen protested, but she knew she
it wasnt true.
I used to live here, too, you know. And if theres one thing I
learned . . . Daphne stomped confidently past the boarded-up
windows of the nervous art dealers and down the block, where a
line was forming outside the Overeasy Café. Its that Whalers love
nothing more than a really good storm, she finished with relish.
It was true. Helens fellow Nantucketers were proud of their ability
to live through whatever Mother Nature threw at them. It was a
macho thing, but also a chance to bond. They shared a good laugh
over the howling wind, ice, snow, or rain while they all looked for
their hysterical cats and retrieved their lawn decorations from each
others living rooms.
The block didnt have electricity, and folks were still sweeping up
glass from the broken windows. In spite of all this, Helen wasnt at
all surprised that the café was seating people. In fact, she knew
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that at that moment her father and Kate were six blocks away at
the News Store, checking out the damage. She also knew that if
people started hanging around out front looking hungry, Jerry and
Kate would open the doors and feed them. With the refrigerators
out, the perishable would have to be eaten or thrown out, anyway,
and Kate would much rather give food to her neighbors than watch
it spoil.
Helen thought for a moment of how she should be there with
them, but then she caught a glimpse of her new reflection in the
one window outside the Overeasy Café that wasnt broken. She
wasnt Helen. She was a cute brunette from the mainland, and she
and her tacky, horse-faced mother were on vacation in Nantucket.
These two tourists owed nothing to anyone.
Helen sat, put her napkin in her lap, and ordered whatever the
café could make on a gas stoveeggs, bacon, and French-pressed
coffee. As she pushed her food around, Matt walked into the diner.
Helens eyes widened when Matt looked right at her and, out of
habit, she pulled in a breath to call out to him, but his eyes skipped