“Tim broke it off with me. Said you were the reason why, that he can’t stop thinking about you,” she snapped.
“I didn’t and wouldn’t—”
“He said your beauty took his breath away.” Her eyes filled with tears. “He said you looked at him, and he knew you were the one for him. You texted him. I saw the text.”
My jaw dropped. What the hell was he up to? “I never looked at him like that, Beth, and I’ve been far too busy to text anyone. He’s lying to you! You have to believe me that I’m not interested in Theseus—Tim—like that.”
“HE ISN’T THESEUS!” Her scream coincided with Hermes winging through the window. If one could skid to a stop in the air, he did. I glanced at him; his eyes were wide and his mouth hung open.
“Did you call for me?” he managed.
Beth screamed, the sound crawling over my body like tiny daggers, and for just a second I thought she was going to shift. Sandy put a hand on her. “Beth, calm down. This isn’t Alena’s fault. Tim is just one of those assholes who uses one girl to get to another.”
“It is her fault!” she cried as she spun and ran from the room. I stood there, staring at the place she’d been, my heart breaking at the thought of losing my friend. Of losing Beth to a man who would kill her as soon as kiss her.
Sandy shook her head, glanced at me, and shrugged. “I’ll try to talk to her.”
“Thanks,” I said softly. “I didn’t text him; he’s playing a game.”
“I know.” She frowned, turned, and left the room. I blew a big breath out that fluttered my lips.
“Holy snickerdoodles.”
Hermes cleared his throat. “You have a message you want me to take?”
Crap. Of course, that was his job, not educating me on snake oils. “Um. Yes. But first could you take a look at something?”
His eyebrows shot up. “I don’t know much. I’m just a messenger.”
“But you must have learned lots when you take messages. I only need to know if this is fennel.” I pointed at the flask Dahlia held up. He spun around, his wings barely moving.
“It’s a flask,” he stated. I rolled my eyes.
“Dahlia, crack it open for him.”
She spun the lid and held it up for him. He peered in and nodded. “Yup, that’s fennel. Pure and distilled, by the looks of it.”
I frowned. “Any idea why it might burn me?”
“Oh, that’s easy.” He paused. “But why aren’t you asking Ernie?”
“Oh, that’s easy,” I mimicked him. “I don’t trust him not to go running to Hera.”
Hermes blinked several times as if digesting my words. “Yeah, it’s tough being caught between the gods, we all do what we have to in order to survive. You shouldn’t be so hard on him.”
I nodded. “I’m trying, and so is he. Now, can you tell me why this is so awful for me?”
“Prometheus’s Fire,” he said as if that explained it all. I made a motion with my hands for him to continue. He shrugged and floated to stand on the table. “Look, Prometheus hid his fire from the gods, and when he hid it, he put it in there.”
“In the flask?” I wasn’t following.
“No, he put it inside a fennel stalk. So if you know what you’re doing, you can distill fennel down to fine oil that will burn like a son of a Hera. Last person who made it was Hephaestus. Did it up in a crucible in his forge. It’s one of those things that is incredibly effective against monsters. It won’t hurt only you, but those two Stymphalian girls too.”
“What about other supernaturals?”
“Nope, just good old-fashioned Greek monsters,” he said.
Hephaestus. I wracked my brain, coming up with a blank. “Please, what does Hephaestus do again?”
Hermes groaned. “This is why I don’t like answering questions. Can I just take your message, please?”
He had a point. The rest I could find out on my own; I was just being lazy. “Sure. Go to Remo, tell him . . .” What the fricky dicky was I going to tell him?
Dahlia helped out. “Go tell Tad to come back. We need to talk to him.”
Tad, damn, I’d not even thought of my brother. My first instinct had been for someone to get Remo to come see me. For the comfort of his presence, as well as his insight into the situation. Hermes was gone in a shot faster even than usual. No doubt he was worried we were going to pepper him with questions if he stayed a minute longer.
I paced the kitchen, my thoughts rolling. This was a moment where I could use Ernie’s help, and the best way to get the cherub to show up without asking him was to bake something.
I waffled back and forth until finally giving in. I scrubbed my hands and arms clean of the last splatters of vampire blood before I turned the oven on. Next I pulled out a bowl, set it on the counter, and ransacked the kitchen for the ingredients I wanted for a batch of muffins. Flour, sugar, oil, chopped walnuts, pumpkin seeds, and chunks of chocolate, along with the usual suspects to keep the treat from falling. A pinch of salt to set it all off.
“You know, I’m surprised you weren’t five hundred pounds when you were human.” Dahlia leaned in and poked a finger at the batter. I slapped her hand away.
“I didn’t eat everything in sight. I just taste tested, that’s the trick.” I spooned the batter into muffin tins, then made a quick sugar crumble that I put on top of each one. I slid the pan into the hot oven and set the timer.
Within minutes the smell of the muffins filled the air and dispelled the last of the licorice scent.
A flutter of wings turned me around. Ernie beamed down at me. “I thought I smelled muffins. How long?”
I sat down in one of the kitchen chairs and leaned back. “A few minutes. Long enough for you to tell me about Hephaestus.”
Ernie plopped himself on the table, his chubby cheeks puckering. “What has Happy got to do with anything?”
“Happy?” I blinked at him.
Ernie shrugged. “Hephaestus is a mouthful, and I’ve been saying it for a long time. Besides, calling him Happy irritates him. Which is amusing once you get him all worked up. He’s kind of a grumpy bastard.” Ernie winked, and I shook my head, unable to smile back after everything that the night had held for me.
“Tell me about him,” I said. “I really want to know.”
Ernie shrugged again as though he really didn’t care. I didn’t buy his act for a second. “Okay, but he has no part in what Hera is up to.”
“Tell me anyway.”
“Well, he rules the forge, making weapons and dealing with fire. I mean, he rarely comes out of his blacksmith shop, to be honest. He doesn’t deal in the politics like others do. Really.” He sniffed the air. “The muffins are almost ready.”
I ran my tongue along the roof of my mouth, against one fang. I felt like I was missing something, like that one ingredient that would turn a flopped recipe into a bestseller.
“Nothing else about him?”
Ernie shook his head. “He’s married to Aphrodite, but that’s been a rocky marriage from the beginning. I don’t think they’ve had sex for a hundred years or more.”
“Goddess of love?”
“And sex. She’s really my main supervisor.”
Now that was interesting. Ernie slowly took his eyes from the oven and lifted them to mine. “What?”