Demigods Academy: Year One (Demigods Academy #1)
Elisa S. Amore & Kiera Legend
Chapter One
MELANY
There were more than one hundred people at Callie’s eighteenth birthday party milling about in the northwest great room, drinking from champagne flutes and eating pickled fig and ricotta canapés passed out by uniformed waiters and waitresses. They were friends from her prestigious private prep school, their parents, and members of her big Greek family. I stood among them, although I didn’t belong to any of those groups. To my face, Callie would definitely call me a friend, sister even, as I’d lived in close proximity to her for the past five years, but I knew behind my back she whispered to her parents, her friends, even the staff who worked in the big house about how I didn’t truly belong.
And the sad thing was she wouldn’t be wrong.
I took a sip of champagne, as I leaned against the white railing of the veranda, and stared out over the grounds of the Demos Estate. It was lit up by solar garden lamps lining the cobblestone pathways and winding around the various stone statues guarding the back entrance to the house, as well as out front near the drive. It was always beautiful here at night. I’d often go for long, secret walks through the garden after midnight, my adopted mother, Sophia, and the rest of the Demos household none the wiser. Well, the gardener, Bishop, knew of my late night outings, as he’d caught me a time or two sprinting through the grass and leaping over the stone benches peppered throughout—my own private obstacle course. But he’d never rat me out. We had an understanding. He wouldn’t snitch on me about my clandestine nighttime adventures, and I wouldn’t tell anyone he smoked weed behind the garden shed with Rachel, who was one of the cooking staff.
“What are you doing out here?” Callie joined me at the railing, the sleeves of her elegant blue gown draping over the white wood. She looked like a queen. Her hair was wrapped in a complicated braid around her head, like the Greek Goddesses wore theirs. She even wore a tiny diamond-encrusted tiara for the occasion.
“You know, the usual. Hiding out. Keeping away from Cousin Leo’s grabby hands.” I made the motion to tweak one of Callie’s boobs.
She laughed and slapped my hand away. “I know, he’s terrible. He grabbed Kate’s ass earlier.”
I took another sip of champagne, feeling aware I wasn’t even close to looking as beautiful and elegant as Callie did. I hadn’t worn a fancy gown, instead opting for a classic black long-sleeved cape jumpsuit. It wasn’t mine; Callie loaned it to me. I could never afford something like that. I also suspected it was chosen for me, so it would cover the tattoos on my arms and legs. Her parents were very traditional and uptight. They only put up with me because I was the daughter of their most trusted housekeeper.
“It’s time to come in now.” Callie turned and gestured to the large room bustling with people in tuxes and gowns beyond the open terrace doors, the din of conversation buzzing annoyingly in my ears. “I’m going to be opening my Shadowbox soon. You want to be there when I do.”
“Sure. I’ll be right in. Give me a minute.”
“You better be. You won’t want to miss seeing me get my invitation to the Gods’ Army.”
I smirked. “You know that’s a million in one shot.”
Her eyes narrowed into slits. “I didn’t waste my life worshipping at the temples for nothing.”
Callie walked back into the party. Her feet didn’t appear like they touched the floor; her gown was so long it dragged on the immaculate, white-tiled floor. She seemed to float she was so graceful. Often people compared her to the Goddess Aphrodite—long, golden blonde hair, perfect, symmetrical facial features, glacial blue eyes, and the nose of an aristocrat. I thought she also possessed some of the Goddess’s character traits as well: vain, sly, and just a little bit diabolical.
Well, maybe not diabolical. People often saved that word to describe me. Not that I blamed them. My midnight blue hair, tattoos, piercings, and snarly attitude were a bit out of place in the upper class neighborhood of Pecunia, where the families were mostly Greek and devout to the Gods. It wasn’t like I didn’t believe in the Gods—I sort of had faith. I just didn’t worship them like everyone else did. They’d done nothing for me in my life. In my opinion, they didn’t deserve my patronage.
Every Thursday, the Demos family went to the Temple of Zeus with their offerings of wine, which they made here on the estate, and lamb sausage, which a butcher in the neighborhood made especially for religious ceremonies, and laid them at the stone feet of the statue of Zeus. Then they spent the day with the other worshippers, drinking and eating. I’d gone once with them years ago, but found the whole practice ridiculous and uncomfortable.
To me, the whole thing was just a story passed down from generation to generation, going on more than a hundred years now. A story we all grew up listening to and reading about in our children’s books about the resurgence of the Gods during the New Dawn. I’d read about the 1906 and 1908 earthquakes that killed hundreds of thousands of people, supposedly caused by the escape of a Titan from their prison, and how the Gods fought him and returned him to Tartarus. Worshipping the Gods ensured no other Titan would escape. And the Shadowboxes delivered to every child turning eighteen was a gift from the Gods in return for that servitude. Ninety-nine percent of the boxes contained a simple birthday message, but there was that one percent that held a special invitation to join the demigods academy to train to be a solider of the Gods.
I thought most of it was just a load of crap. I mean, the Gods’ Army? That couldn’t possibly be true. Where was this army? Who was part of it? No one in more than a hundred years had seen any evidence of it. It was just another way for companies to make a buck. The amount of Blessed Day birthday supplies designed and sold to the devout was ridiculous. Especially since the chances of someone being invited to join the Gods’ Army was miniscule—if it was even real. I’d never known anyone to be chosen. For me, it was just as much a myth as the Gods themselves.
When I joined the others back in the party, the crowd had formed a semi-circle around Callie, while she stood near the baby grand piano at the front of the spacious room. Her parents stood beside her; her mother beamed with pride. Her father appeared stoic. In fact in all the years I’d lived on the estate, I didn’t think I’d ever seen Mr. Demos smile. Or it could’ve been he never smiled at or around me.
I spotted a few of Callie’s friends, who I despised, standing near her at the front. Her best friend, Ashley, looked in thrall with the festivities. On the other hand, Tyler appeared bored to tears. When our gazes locked, he gave me a giant, fake smile then lifted his hand and flipped me the middle finger.
I returned the gesture just as the lights flashed off, and a huge birthday cake was wheeled in on a serving table by two of the cooking staff. Someone in the back started singing Happy Birthday, and then it gained momentum through the crowd as the cake, with its eighteen tall, flickering candles, got closer to the birthday girl.
Callie plastered a fabricated smile on her face, as her guests’ song reached a high-pitched fervor. Then she blew out the candles and everyone clapped. I knew what her wish would be: an invitation to the mystical Gods’ Army. Knowing Callie, she’d probably get it, as she received everything she wanted.