by Meg Xuemei X
“Stop pouting, Marigold,” Cameron continued. “It isn’t befitting an initiate to have that sour expression sitting on your face. Man up and be the soldier you were born to be.”
“I’m not a man,” I said. “So I don’t need to man up. And I wasn’t born to be a soldier under your thumb.”
“I can’t tell which gender you belong to,” he said.
The clique snickered, and Demetra giggled in an annoyingly high pitch.
Nat and Yelena threw me a sympathetic look. Everyone knew it was a bad business to get on the bad side of a Dominion, let alone an officer.
“Thanks, man,” I said to Cameron. “Look what you brought me into—a puberty drama, as if I need that shit on top of my other shit piles.”
“You brought yourself into that shit pile,” he said. “I’m only surprised that you refuse to appreciate us for saving you from an unproductive, wasted life.”
Now that irked me, and I became prickly as a hedgehog. “You Dominions forced me to leave my home and my team behind to come here. You took the good life away from me.”
“What kind of good life are we talking about, Marigold?” Marie from the van chimed in curiously, popping up near me.
Some of the clique appeared surprised and unhappy. The Dominion officers probably didn’t associate much with the initiates, even though these two were merely taunting and ridiculing me.
I hadn’t seen Marie since I was sent to the public bath chamber to have my one-minute shower. To my frustration, after I exited the stall I found that someone had taken away all my outfits and left me with only a robe.
I gave the Dominion soldier a glare, “A life of freedom.” I flapped the hem of the robe. “Not this life of wearing a robe without panties. They didn’t even leave a G-String, for gods’ sakes.”
If Marie had been there, I think she’d have the courtesy to find me underwear. I sensed she might actually like me.
Marie howled with laughter, and several escorting soldiers joined in, sending me glances as if they hadn’t seen me before.
The clique screwed up their facial expressions to show they were disgusted by my vulgarity.
“What?” I asked both Cameron and Marie. “No one has ever complained about this inhumane, no underwear treatment?”
“Nope,” Cameron deadpanned. “All, except you, considered it a privilege.”
“Pardon me,” I glared at him incredulously. “What if someone laughed so hard they peed a little?”
Or scared the literal shit out of themselves in the middle of the ritual.
“Stop! Marigold,” Marie wiped a teardrop, then another, from the corner of her eyes. “Just stop.”
In the background, Jack made a sniffing sound. I hoped he didn’t smell a whiff of pee.
“That rogue doesn’t smell like us,” he said, his tone positive. “I don’t think she’s a descendant. She won’t make it.”
“Jack has the magical ability to sense and detect the descendants of gods,” Demetra declared, gloating.
My heart froze as her statement hit me right in the bull’s eye. While the rest of the initiates walked to their glory, this might be a death walk for me.
I scanned the tight security around us and realized I’d have to take a chance with the ritual, if I didn’t want to be put down within seven feet.
“Then why is she even among us?” asked a clique boy with distaste.
“That harpy must want to take a chance,” Demetra explained, as if she knew everything about me, “since this is her only opportunity to rise above her pathetic status. A low class girl like her will do anything to move up the social ladder, though they all gamble and lose.” She made a disgusted sound with her nose. “I wonder how many soldiers she opened her legs for to get here. So sad because no matter how wide her legs spread, it won’t—”
I lunged at her, grabbing a handful of her blonde hair and pulling hard. She screamed as she stumbled back and struggled to break free. Jack charged at me, but Cameron and Marie stepped between us first.
The Dominions pried my fingers off Demetra’s hair, dragged me back, and pinned me in place. The other Dominion soldiers barked orders at the group, urging them to keep walking.
None of them wanted to attract a demigod’s attention.
I wasn’t proud of myself for pulling hair—I was more of a punch-you-in-the-teeth kind of girl. But I was too mad to care about my dignity or anyone else’s. The whole day’s frustration and the fear of what was coming all accumulated and accelerated.
Plus, when I faced bullies, I became an aggressor myself.
I took no shit, and walking toward death’s door wasn’t going to change my attitude either.
“I don’t give a fuck how thick a god’s blood is in your nasty veins,” I warned, not even struggling in Cameron’s and Marie’s grips. “Talk shit like that again, and I’ll beat the crap out of you.”
“You’re dead, you inferior human!” Demetra shrieked. “You don’t have an ounce of any god’s DNA in you. You should never have come here. You won’t come out of that building alive. You’ll suffer an agonizing death before the first rune—”
“What the hell is going on here?” a voice boomed, carrying potent magic.
Axel appeared at the top of the stairs we were about to climb, which led toward a magnificent yet intimidating red building.
Power rolled off him in an icy wind, crushing down everything and everyone in its path.
As one, everyone dropped to their knees, except for me, again.
Even the noises of the wind hushed.
The Dominion soldiers around us quickly straightened their outfits, which were already straight and spotless.
“Are you causing trouble again, Marigold?” Axel asked impatiently.
“Who? Me?” I asked darting my eyes around in innocent confusion.
“What did I say about the consequences of you not behaving?” he pursued.
I bit my lip. He’d let his Dominions punish Jasper and Circe. “This damn robe is uncomfortable,” I said.
His dark amber eyes dipped to my robe before roving across my every inch.
Maybe I shouldn’t have complained about my wardrobe. I suddenly understood what it meant to be caressed without touching.
The demigod could undress me with his mere smoldering gaze, and wearing nothing but a robe didn’t help. If I had on my hunter attire, I’d be in my element and know how to deal with him.
Right now, I’d never felt more vulnerable than under the weight of his blunt, heated, and assessing gaze.
Worse, a swirl of liquid fire licked the flesh between my thighs, and my sex became slick and wet.
My face burned. Goddammit! What had I said about not wearing panties?
Gods help me if my lady bits got any wetter!
I lifted my chin, staring back at the demigod in defiance as I tightened the front of my robe.
An amused, wicked, and possessive smile ghosted his lips before it disappeared as if it had never been there.
“You were out of my sight for only a few hours,” Axel sighed, “and you’re already causing chaos. I’m starting to wonder if it was worth it to bring you here.”
My eyes sparkled in hope, and I stepped toward him without his invitation, though he was still twenty stairs away from me. “You’ll let me go?”
He regarded me darkly, seeming to think about it, and I smiled at him in order to get in his good graces.
“Nope,” he said, his face turning hard. “You will go through the trial, Marigold, even if I have to drag you through it myself.”
A wild wind rolled down from the stairs, shuffling my robe and caressing the valley between my thighs. I parted my lips and widened my eyes at the sensation. Then the naughty wind was gone, as was the infuriating Demigod of War.
Demetra snickered as she rose to her feet. She must believe that Axel was using the ritual as a means to humiliate, punish, and execute me.
She would be the cheerleader for that, wouldn’t she?
>
But she might be right, though.
I refused to let any of them further crush my spirit.
I paused at the base of the stairs and turned to Marie. “May I borrow your boots, Marie?” I asked. At least I could try to improve my current condition as the first step. “You have socks. My bare feet are fragile. It really hurt walking on that long, cobbled path.” I raised my head and peeked at the cobbled stairs leading to the red building where the ritual would be held and lives would be lost.
Maybe I was stalling. I had no courage left. “Man, just look at those stairs. I don’t think my feet, which aren’t made of stones, can take it anymore.”
The clique shot me dirty looks and climbed the stairs with vigor. The other two outsiders followed closely behind them, showing their strength as well.
Nat and Yelena paused beside me.
“C’mon, Marigold,” Yelena offered. “Let’s go. You can lean on Nat and me.”
“Get moving, Marigold,” Cameron said, his voice back to harsh and threatening. “You nearly got my rank stripped with that hair-dragging stunt. No more hassles, or you’ll be very sorry.”
I started to wonder if he had bipolar disorder.
“And the answer to lending you my boots is a big no.” Marie chuckled. “Your feet are the least of your concerns now. You don’t want to keep getting on the bad side of the demigods.”
I sighed in dismay as I climbed the stairs with Yelena and Nat. We were the last row. I could no longer stall.
“Even if the ritual doesn’t kill me,” I murmured to myself, “someone here will murder me eventually.”
“You bet,” Cameron said. “If you don’t keep your mouth shut.”
We reached the top of the stairs. The ritual building’s steel and glass double doors opened in invitation.
I took a deep breath and stepped through the door, the famous phrase echoing chillingly in the back chambers of my head. Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate.
Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.
CHAPTER 6
_____________
The Hall of Olympia was the most majestic place I’d ever seen. Man, even the columns were made of gold. The high ceilings were painted with murals depicting the war of the gods.
Didn’t they say that the winners wrote history?
Twelve Olympian gods’ statues stood close to the four walls, surrounding us. On the rising dais sat one large throne flanked by four smaller ones. All of them were adorned with rare gems, gold, and diamonds.
The biggest throne likely belonged to Ares, the God of War, who was leading Earth’s army against Lucifer and his demon hordes. The rest of the thrones were there for the four demigods.
One could easily tell which throne belonged to which demigod by the symbols carved into each one’s arms and high back.
Six initiates stood to the left side of the door, and the other six had been positioned on the right side with me. High-ranking Dominion officers lined up in two columns from the dais all the way to the door. A few elite students from the seniors, judging from their uniforms, were mixed into the ranks of the Dominion officers.
I bet they had already been selected as future leaders of Dominion of the Gods, which granted them the privilege of watching the show—seeing who lived and who died.
The initiates were as tense as me, but most of the clique looked more excited than anxious. They were the hounds on a blood trail, so confident of their godly heritage, no matter how distant it might be.
Demetra shot me several contemptuous glances, as if dying to tell me how much she looked forward to watching me embarrass myself in front of everyone before my painful death.
I glared back, of course.
Everyone had heard Jack’s diagnosis of me being one hundred percent weak human. No one in this room believed I had enough gods’ blood to survive this barbaric ritual.
Despite that, I tried to put up a brave façade, but the blood had drained from my face as soon as I’d stepped into the hall of death.
I studied the empty thrones.
Where were the demigods? Were they all going to observe the ritual? I’d seen Axel at the top of the stairs before he vanished thirty minutes ago. Where was he now? My thoughts darted from foreboding to how his magical caress had made me wet and how his power had called to me.
“Attention!” a deep male voice boomed, and I nearly jumped out of my skin.
For fuck’s sake. Was it necessary to yell like that when the entire atrium was as quiet as a graveyard?
A tall man wearing a white priest robe stepped into the center of the hall with a flaming dagger. Crimson, gold, and black runes danced on the blade. The crimson ones looked very much like they’d been drawn in blood.
Holy fuck! Was he going to use that dagger on us?
No way. I was not okay with that.
The other initiates also widened their eyes.
If we all protested, they might stop the ritual. I scrutinized the other initiates for even a spark of rebellion. My shoulders sagged, in stark contrast to the others, who all stood tall and proud—even the four other outsiders. I’d be the only one standing up to the priest, and one voice would be easily and quickly smothered.
The priest’s piercing silver eyes sparked with lightning as they swept over us, identifying him as a descendant of Zeus. The god’s blood must be potent in him.
I sniffed. Yep, his power grade was like seven.
He fixed his flashing gaze on me a second longer than the others, and I wondered what I’d done wrong this time.
Uh, I was inhaling and judging his power. I instantly put on a blank mask. No one liked to be sniffed at, which typically implied you had an unpleasant odor or something.
The priest shifted his gaze away from me and glided a hand in the air like a conductor, as if to signal the first violinist to start the first notes. But there was no orchestra but us, the nervous bunch of initiates and the stone-faced, cold-hearted observers.
However, at his wave, an operating table of wood and steel materialized between him and us.
My throat tightened; my breath shortened.
Shit, the priest was going to get everyone to lie on the table one by one and cut them with the blade and see who could survive it.
Could I still run?
Anxiety shot through me, and I felt the urge to pee. Should I raise my hand and ask for permission to go to the bathroom first?
It might be my only chance to escape.
Just when I was about to shoot my hand up, intense wind and light twirled through the hall. Power charged the air, whipping it like living electricity. Water, too, made an appearance as humidity drenched the air, thick and heavy against my skin.
Then three giant figures materialized, each sitting upon a throne. Everyone’s attention was glued to them, and the initiates’ eyes went round with awe.
It wasn’t merely the power rolling off the demigods in spades. They were the most gorgeous beings I’d ever seen. Each of them had the kind of perfect male physique men would die to attain—and women would die for a chance to ride—and I bet the demigods didn’t even need weight training to maintain those hot vessels.
Even I felt a bit overwhelmed. Unlike the drooling initiates around me, though, my mind was too occupied with dread over the ritual to fully appreciate the demigods’ masculine beauty.
When you were worried about your own mortality, lust had to take the backseat.
My gaze found Axel first since I’d had some kind of dealings with him already. His amber eyes focused on me. He even winked at me good-naturedly as a strand of rich, brown hair dropped to his bright forehead.
I wasn’t in the mood to wink back. I’d learned the hard way that getting the attention of a demigod was never a good thing.
I tore my livid gaze from him to regard the regal demigod perched on the throne of lightning. The Demigod of Sky had deep blue eyes and cropped golden hair that made him look more like a military god than the Demigod of War. Maybe Axel didn’
t like people to stereotype him, so he aimed for a casual, playboy style?
The Demigod of Sky had a red cape draped around him, and his silver and black armor highlighted every taut muscle and defined every ridge.
The lightning in his eyes was much more potent than that in the priest’s eyes.
The sky demigod looked too delicious for his own good.
Fine. Next.
My gaze drifted to the giant of a man who’d taken possession of the throne with the symbol of a trident protruding from seafoam on it.
The Demigod of the Sea.
Silver hair flowed down to his broad, armored shoulders. It looked so silky and smooth and shiny that it made me wonder what kind of shampoo he’d been using. He might consider it blasphemy if I asked him about that, though.
The sea demigod looked every bit as sexy as his brethren, but there was something else about him I was wary of, even detested. I could sense his capricious nature and explosive temper, and I’d heard that he was the most vicious among all the demigods.
I categorized him as the super-villain type.
As if sensing my assessment, his cruel, seductive, and violet eyes trained on me. We locked gazes for a heartbeat, and menace flashed through his narrowed eyes. None of the initiates stared at the demigods as boldly as I did.
Why the hell not? They still had some humanity left, right?
And I liked to look freely. It wasn’t just attitude—I was genuinely curious. I liked to think, evaluate, classify, and judge. What could he do to me and what harm could I do to him just by looking?
But the asshole sea demigod seemed to take serious offense anyway. His power assaulted me the next nanosecond. Waves of pressure crushed into me, kicking me in the gut, knocking brutally on my knees. He wanted to humiliate me and make me the only one to kneel before him in front of everyone.
Axel had tried and failed. I wouldn’t surrender to this asshole either.
I lifted my chin. My knees didn’t bend.
I was more prepared than when I’d confronted the Demigod of War, so I didn’t even shudder, though inwardly, I was shaking a little.
A surprised, displeased expression flitted by the sea demigod’s handsome, marble-like face.