Ernie pressed his nose to mine. “Here’s the thing. Theseus worked for Hephaestus for years, learning the craft of blacksmithing. If anyone can give up the goods on your rival, it’s going to be him. Things happen for a reason, Alena. Take this and run with it.”
I let him go, my mind racing with possibilities. “Yaya, what do you think?”
She grabbed my hand and marched us forward. “I think you’re overdressed for the occasion.”
Narcissus’s eyes widened as Yaya dragged me forward. She waved a free hand at him. “Flora, priestess of Zeus, we need to get cleaned up.”
He bowed. “I didn’t realize. You’ve aged since I saw you last, Flora.”
She swatted him on the butt as we hurried past him into the house. “That’s enough out of you, boy.”
We stepped into the mansion, me gripping the cupcakes and Yaya gripping me. Ernie floated at my shoulder. “I think the extra clothes are this way.”
“Wait, extra clothes?”
“Well, with all the orgies he has, there’s always clothing left behind,” Ernie said as though he were telling me about the weather.
“Good grief, you want me to wear something that someone else cast off in the middle of an orgy?” I gripped the cupcake holder hard enough that the plastic creaked. I made myself ease off. “Why can’t I just talk to Hephaestus and ask him my questions?”
“Because you want him so stunned by your beauty he doesn’t realize what secrets he’s giving up,” Yaya said. She pulled me up the double-wide staircase. At the top she turned to the left. As if she knew where she was going.
“Yaya, when were you here last?”
She didn’t turn around. “After the Blue Box Store incident. I came to talk to Zeus, to try and get him to help you with Hera. He gave me the grand tour.”
Ernie snickered. “Is that so? The grandma tour?”
Yaya whipped around and smacked him on the cheek so fast I was shocked.
Ernie squawked and flew up to the ceiling. Yaya pointed a finger at him. “Don’t you imply that I slept with Zeus. Bad enough I was a fool as a young priestess. I’m not that child anymore.”
I kept my mouth shut. Tad had been smacked more than once for mouthing off at Yaya, and I’d seen her handprint on his cheek. She had an arm on her. Ernie stared with big eyes.
“Won’t happen again.” He floated down, but not within reach.
“Here, this room.” She pushed a door on our right open and flicked on a light. The room lit up, revealing a glittering array of different materials and even some jewelry. I put the cupcakes down. “Put this on.” She tossed me something that looked like an oversized thong. The outfit, if that’s what it was, was all strings with the odd patch of material holding it together.
“Yaya, you’re out of your mind if you think I’m going to wear this.” I flung it back at her.
She caught it, turned it around, and held it up. “It’s a bathing suit, Alena. A stringy, flimsy one, but you need a bathing suit for a pool party. And you want Hephaestus blinded. That much is true.”
Reluctantly, I held up the supposed bathing suit. “Ernie, go see who is here.”
He saluted me and sped out of the room. I shut the door, stripped, and slid the bathing suit on. The patches of material covered, barely, my breasts and bottom. The strings of material attaching the three small pieces were hardly what I’d call coverage.
“Yaya, I feel like a streetwalker.” And there it was. I didn’t want to use whatever beauty I had to force people to do what I wanted. I didn’t want my siren abilities to come into play, not with someone I was beginning to think of as a friend.
I stripped the bathing suit off and put my own clothes back on. “I’m doing this my way, Yaya. No matter what happens.”
A soft smile touched her lips. “All right, my girl. All right.”
I paused, a thought hitting me hard. “Wait, Yaya, why did you ask if I was sure this was where Zeus lived when you’ve been here? And why didn’t you tell me?”
Her eyes closed and a shudder rippled through her. “I am his priestess, Alena. Even now. And he forbade me from telling you anything about his whereabouts.”
“Yaya, that’s awful that he can control you like that,” I whispered, wanting nothing more than to cut the ties between her and Zeus.
“It’s been my life for many years, Alena. I will be all right.” She winked at me, and a smile crossed her face. “Go on now, we don’t have a lot of time to get this done. It feels like the timer is about to go off on our oven.”
I knew what she meant. The feeling that I raced some unseen opponent pushed me. I scooped up the cupcakes and hurried back down the way we’d come, Yaya trailing me now. The sound of laughter and splashing drew me through the house. I tried not to freak out, tried not to think about how badly this could go. But what else did I have? Theseus was playing a game that I wasn’t sure I could match. He was slowly taking my friends and pitting them against me in a chess match where I couldn’t see all the pieces. He had Beth and Sandy. It was apparent he was working with Santos, so it stood to reason Theseus was behind the vampire attacks on me. Not to mention the fennel oil that he’d had made specially for me and that was no doubt in his stupid hands even now. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that Beth had given the oil back to him.
I stepped through a pair of French doors and into the backyard. Though “backyard” might have been the wrong descriptor. The pool was Olympic size, if a rather irregular shape, and all around it were lounges with different species in them. I saw satyrs, nymphs, flitting fairies that dodged between hands swatting at them, more than a few deer that were talking, and a pair of werewolves in the nude and getting rather amorous, and then there were some that looked like your average people in bathing suits, though I doubted they were just humans. Another sweep of the area showed me that the majority of the attendants were nude, actually. Or at least topless. I shouldn’t have been surprised.
Flowering trees, bushes, and exotic plants scented the warm air . . . warm? I drew a breath in, filling my lungs. The air was warm enough that I’d have said it was high summer and not the end of January. A fountain of Zeus stood over the pool, the water flowing from his . . . I blushed and looked at Yaya. “Who would want to play in a pool that was being filled from that?”
She laughed and shook her head. “Oh, Alena. You make me smile. Go on now. Hephaestus has seen you.” She gave me a gentle push, and I stumbled going from the stone patio to the lush grass.
A big pair of hands caught me before I could go to my knees. I looked up, and Smithy looked down. The ice in his eyes wasn’t as severe as I’d seen it. Though he didn’t look happy to see me there.
“Alena.”
“Smithy.” I pulled myself up and away from him. “I was hoping to talk to Zeus, but he seems to be missing.”
“Probably at the store.”
I shook my head. “No, he’s taken a leave. Pretty much as soon as he knew I was headed this way.”