From the balcony of Atalanta’s suite, Gryphon looked over the stone balustrade out at the sea of depravity. Fountains gurgled bloodred water in the center of the square, and lust-filled moans echoed up to his ears. Naked bodies were draped across the benches surrounding the fountain like blood-starved daemons in need of a fix. Some were grouped in pairs, but most were engaged in hedonistic acts of three and four, in plain sight of anyone who wanted to watch. In invitation to anyone who wanted to join in.
Here in Sin City, anything went. Orgies, gambling, highs never experienced in the living world…if it could be imagined, it was here. The Titans had set up a racket sweeter than anything Vegas had to offer. Pleasure, self-indulgence, no strings—all drugged the inhabitants and kept them from contemplating leaving, as lotus flowers had done to Odysseus and his crew when they’d anchored near an island off the shores of North Africa eons ago. And the only thing the Titans required in exchange for this pleasure-filled escape from the tortures of Tartarus was utter and complete allegiance. Krónos believed he would one day be released from the prison his sons had locked him in. Every soul he stole from Hades down here was one more soldier who would be bound to serve in his army when he was finally free.
“See something you like, doulas?”
His stomach clenched as Atalanta moved up behind him. He hadn’t heard her enter the room, but he should have expected it. She seemed to know where he was at all times.
Her hot breath washed over his nape, sending a shiver down his spine. She was slightly taller than he was, and a thousand times more powerful. As her doulas he was bound to do her will. So far, since being here with her in Sin City that will had consisted of waiting on her hand and foot, running her errands in the acrid streets, dodging danger in Krónos’s city to bring her whatever she asked for. And sometimes—though he hated it—it included serving her guests and allowing them to berate and humiliate him. He wasn’t proud of his station. It was demeaning to be ordered around. Degrading to know your life was held in someone else’s hands. But it was better than the torture he’d endured in Tartarus.
A million times better.
Some deep-buried instinct told him to fight back, but he ignored it. Though when her hand brushed his bare back and she leaned even closer to his ear, his stomach tightened with unease.
“I do so like to look at you, doulas. You are quite a specimen.”
That unease quadrupled. And a worse kind of torture—one she’d yet to unleash but which he worried hovered around the next bend—haunted his every thought.
This is not who you are.
He swallowed hard, worked not to recoil from her touch. Didn’t want to do anything to piss her off. But as he stared out at the black mountains and hazy red sky far off in the distance, he couldn’t quite remember who he was anymore.
Once, before that torture in Tartarus, he was sure he’d been someone. That he’d been part of something. He didn’t know what that was, exactly. Didn’t know who might be missing him right this second. But he was sure of it. Once, he’d made a difference.
“What is it?” Atalanta asked, coming to stand in front of him. He hadn’t noticed she’d stopped stroking his back, that her hands now cupped his face, tipping it up to hers.
She was beautiful. Even he couldn’t deny that. Porcelain skin, large onyx eyes, jet-black hair as silky as the most delicate satin. And her body bested that of any Siren. But her soul was evil. Her eyes as empty as his. And even though he’d vowed to be her doulas for all eternity, he never forgot that. Not even for a moment.
“Nothing,” he managed.
She brushed a finger across his cheek, wiped away a tear he hadn’t known had slipped from his eye. A tear he didn’t even know he could cry. “My doulas is unhappy?”
He thought of the alternative to her humiliation. He couldn’t go back to the torture of Tartarus. An eternity with her, no matter what she made him do, was a billion times better than what he’d been through under Hades’s control.
“No,” he said. “I’m whatever you want me to be.”
“Good boy.” She brushed her hand down his cheek, then stepped past him. “I think I have something that will make you very happy. We’ve a meeting with Krónos in an hour.”
She walked back into the gaudy bedroom with its gold-plated everything and moved behind a screen. Her bloodred robe landed on a side chair. She held her hand out. “Bring me my dress.”
Gryphon crossed to the emerald green gown hanging from a hook on the far wall, removed the hanger, and offered it to her. The gauzy white curtains blew gently in the breeze from the open arched windows. “What do we want with Krónos?”
Fabric rustled as she wriggled into the gown. Stepping out from behind the screen, she turned her back, lifted her long black hair. “Zip me.”
He grasped the zipper at the base of her spine and slowly zipped it up her back until the two halves of the dress came together just beneath her shoulder blades.
“A great many things,” Atalanta said. The emerald green gown was so long, it draped across the floor even when the straps were over her shoulders.
She didn’t elaborate, and he knew not to question. Turning to face him, she leaned close and brushed her index finger over his lips.