Deity

Okay. Two lives, because I seriously doubted I was going to get away with this. Guards waited just outside the dining room. If they didn’t kill me, the Council Lucian sought to betray would. Ironic.

I walked around the table slowly, calming my breathing and blocking my emotions. I had enough strength to shove this knife through his back, severing his spinal cord. It would be easier to go for the throat or eye, but gods, I was grossing myself out just thinking about it.

Just do it. I reached Lucian’s side and drew in a deep breath as I let the knife slide out from my sleeve. Then a freight train slammed me to the ground.

I hit the tiled floor with a hard crack. Seth pi

“What is wrong with you?” Seth asked furiously, giving me a little shake when I didn’t answer fast enough. “Are you insane?”

My heart pounded against my ribs. “I’m not the crazy one here!”

“Really—you’re not the crazy one?” His gaze went to the knife. “Do I need to explain this to you?”

“Deal with her.” Lucian stood and threw down his cloth napkin, voice eerily calm. “Before I do something I regret.”

Seth exhaled harshly. “I’m sorry, Lucian. I’ll fix this.”

So shocked, I couldn’t speak. He was apologizing to Lucian? I was in crazy land and there was no escape.

“She needs to accept this,” Lucian said. “I will not live in fear of being murdered in my own home. Either she complies or I’ll have her locked up.”

Seth’s eyes met mine. “That won’t be necessary.”

I glared at him.

“Good.” Lucian sounded more disgusted than afraid. It was like I had spit on him instead of trying to kill him. “I’m retiring for the evening. Guards!”

In a rush of activity, they followed Lucian out of the room. Some of them were pures. Had he promised them something worth going against the Council and risking death? I knew what he’d offered the halfs.

Seth still held me to the floor. “That was possibly the stupidest thing you’d ever tried to do.”

“Too bad it didn’t work.”

Appearing incredulous, he hauled me to my feet. The moment he let go, I bolted for the door. He caught me before I made it out of the room, clamping his arms around me. “Stop this!”

I threw my head back, narrowly missing his. “Let me go!”

“Don’t make this hard, Alex.”

I struggled in his viselike grip. “He’s using you, Seth. Why can’t you see that?”

His chest rose against my back. “Is it so hard for you to accept that Lucian cares for me—for you?”

“He doesn’t care about us! He just wants to use us.” I kicked my legs out to use the wall, but Seth anticipated this and spun me around. “Damn you! You’re smarter than this!”

Seth sighed and started dragging me toward the hall. “You’re such a little fool sometimes. You will want for nothing, Alex. Nothing! Together we will be able to change our world. Isn’t that what you want?” We had reached the bottom of the steps, and I kicked for the statue of some god I didn’t recognize. “Gods! Knock it off, Alex. For someone who’s so short, you’re freaking heavy. I don’t want to have to carry you up these stairs.”

“Gee. Thanks. Now you’re calling me fat.”

“What?” His arms slackened.

I slammed my elbow into his stomach hard enough that the impact rattled my entire body. Seth doubled over, but didn’t let go. Cursing wildly, he flipped me around and bent at the waist. He clamped his arm down on my waist and hauled me over his shoulder. Before I could kick him where it counts, he caught my legs and held them down.

“Put me down!” I pounded on his back with my fists.

Seth grunted as he started up the stairs. “Seriously, I can’t believe I have to do this.”

I continued my assault on his back to no avail. “Seth!”

“Maybe you deserve a spanking, Alex.” Laughing, he rounded the landing as I jabbed him in the kidneys. “Ouch! That hurt!”

We were making enough noise to rouse every Guard in the house, but no one intervened. I recognized the upside-down hallway and the door Seth pushed open. It was my old bedroom in Lucian’s house.

Seth stormed across plush white carpet that so had not been in my bedroom when I’d stayed in this house. Back then, I’d had bare floors that had been cold in the winter. He dumped me unceremoniously on the bed and then planted his hands on his hips. “Behave.”

I sprang to my feet. Seth caught me around the waist and pushed me back down with little effort on his part. An incredible amount of rage filled me with energy, sweeping through me like a rush of roiling waves. And I let the fury swell and spread like the rising tide.

“You’re being ridiculous, Alex. And you need to calm down. You’re making me wish I had some Valium.”

My hands balled into fists. “He is using you, Seth. He wants to control us so he can overthrow the Council. He wants to be greater than the gods. You know they’ll never allow that! That’s why the Apollyons were created in the first place.”

Seth arched a brow. “Yeah, Alex, I know why the Apollyons were first created. To make sure no pure-blood achieved the power of the gods and blah blah. Let me ask you a question. Do you think any of the gods care if you die fighting a daimon?”

“Obviously they care, because they brought me back.”

He rolled his eyes. “What if you weren’t the Apollyon, Alex? What if you were just a normal half? Would they care at all if you died?”

“No, but—”

“Do you think that’s right? That you’re forced to be either a slave or a warrior?”

“No! It’s not right, but the gods didn’t decree that. The pures did, Seth.”

“I know, but don’t you think the gods could’ve changed that if they wanted to?” He moved closer, lowering his voice. “Change needs to happen, Alex.”

“And you think Lucian is really going to bring that kind of change?” I willed Seth to understand. “That once he takes complete control of the Council, he’ll free the servants? Relieve the halfs from their duty?”

“Yes!” Seth dropped to his knees in front of me. “Lucian will.”

“Then who will fight the daimons?”

“There will be those who volunteer just like the pures who do now. Lucian will do this. All we have to do is support him.”

I shook my head. “Lucian has never cared about the halfs. All he has ever cared about is himself. He wants ultimate power—to enslave the mortals instead of the halfs. He said so himself.”

With a disgusted humph, he stood. “Lucian has no intentions of doing such a thing.”

“He told me in the car!” I grasped his hands, ignoring the way the cord jumped. “Please, Seth. You have to believe me. Lucian will do none of the things he’s promised you.”

He stared at me a moment. “Why would you even care if enslaving mortals was his ultimate plan? I don’t get it. You couldn’t stand living among them when you did. Why would you want to protect the gods when the Order killed you— killed you—to protect them? And you have a problem with a few pures dying along the way? Look at how they’ve treated you. I don’t get it.”

Sometimes I didn’t get it myself. The pures treated us halfs like crap. And the gods, well, they were as much to blame as the pures. They’d allowed this to happen. But this was more wrong. “I

He squeezed my hands. “Casualties of war—it happens.”

I pulled my hands free. My stomach turned over. “How can you be so uncaring?”

“It’s not that I’m uncaring, Alex. It’s called strength.”

“No,” I whispered. “That has nothing to do with strength.”