Broken God (10 page)

“What will you call
her?”

I blink at her,
because she has a name. Iris. Artemis knows that. “You’ve always named your
girl Delphi. A long fucking line of them, and they were all the same. Will she
be Delphi?”

A shiver chases
it’s way down my spine and I shake my head.

Because Del is my
Delphi, and Iris
…

“
She’s different,” I
say, hoarsely.

Different and same and her very own name.

Oh gods, I am so
very fucked. I think I see pity in Artemis’ eyes and she steps to the side.
“Get out of here but hurry back. Hermes and I will keep your absence as quiet
as possible but it won’t last, brother.”

I nod and brush a
kiss over her cheek and then I’m out the door and the other gods have all
retreated, to plot and snub each other, to tend ancient, petty arguments that
don’t matter because we are
dying.

I want to stand in
the middle of the main hall and scream for them all to look at the facts and come
together, for once.

They think I’m
insane. I could probably even get away with it.

I don’t. I leave
instead.

Chapter
12.

There's something
wrong.

I know that.

My family is dying.
Being killed by...gods only knows because that wasn't something Del saw fit to
include in her prophecy when my life spiraled so completely out of control.

And yet....

I'm leaving them.

I care.

Of course
,
I care.

But it's a distant
sort of caring. The kind that is more habit than actual concern. I worry for my
family because I have to worry for my family.

Even when I left
Olympus, I cared.

It's
why
I left, because Del saw that we
would die, and that I would be the reason we did.

But for eons, the
only company I've had is my twin and the occasional appearance of my cousin.
And for all of that, I never stopped thinking about them. My family is cruel
and petty and capricious and arrogant in ways that humanity couldn't even
fathom.

But they were
mine
and in my mad, distant way, I loved
them.

Which is why
leaving should give me pause. There are two dead in less than a week, and I'm
leaving again like nothing has happened.

Distantly, I am
aware that something about that is wrong. That my concern should be with
Olympus more than it is with Iris and Del.

I just can't bring
myself to
change
that.

Still. It sits
strange, a lump of unease and awareness that I am doing something strange and
out of character, leaving my family for a girl I barely know.

She is mine, irrevocably.

But still. What do
I know of her? That she plays guitar and sings like a siren, that she’s wild
and free in a way I haven’t seen in too long, and that her brother is dying.

I frown.

That will need to
change. Maybe I’m going about this the wrong way. But I need to know my girl. I
smile and push the bike a little faster, eager suddenly to reach her.

My apartment looks,
surprisingly, the same as I left it.

Del is curled in a
ball on the bed, and she glares at me, her little eyes narrowed in angry
concentration.

Iris is…not on the
bed. I shift and look around the empty room and only relax when I hear the
sound of the shower.

She’s crooning, a
soft noise that reaches down and grabs at me. I lean my head against the door
and she pauses in the middle of her song. Then it resumes, slow and steady and
I smile.

Let it wrap around
me.

I didn’t realize
how tense I was, until she’s singing, and I’m listening to her.

It’s a thousand
miles away from Del and my temple.

It’s a thousand
lifetimes and a million mistakes. But listening to her sing softly, it feels remarkably
like coming home.

I didn’t realize
how much I missed it, until I’m here, listening to her hum, off
-
key and still
lovely and so fucking lost in her own self.

If there was any
doubt about who Iris was, it’s gone.
 

I scoop Del into my
lap and pick up my guitar and settle next to the door, leaning against it and
picking out a quiet accompaniment to go with Iris's soft croon. I can almost
hear the smile in her voice when it climbs, meeting my soft strumming.

I want to drag her
out of the shower, want to drag her to me and kiss the babble from her lips and
smooth the worried wrinkled frown from her brow.

I want to see her
eyes cloudy with Sight and watch them brighten and clear as she smiles at me.

Time. Time. Give
her time and space.

Del always dealt
with my Sight differently. Sometimes by running, sometimes by shutting down
completely, turning into little more than a shell of the girl I was so used to
seeing.

I never really knew
what to expect until it was upon us, but I learned very quickly to let her have
space and time.

She had to come to
accept her Sight without my help.

It wasn't something
I could make easier.

So I sit outside
the bathroom and Del curls up in my lap and sleeps while I play the guitar and
the steam
seeps
under the door and Iris hums softly to herself. I sit there, my hands clenched
on my guitar, the strings silent and my head down, when she sobs.

I sit there and
stroke Del's head and she is the only one who knows that my hands are shaking,
when Iris screams and her voice breaks, babble and senseless words that are
prophecy.

I sit there until
the sun begins to set and I wonder if I will need to stay here all night as
well.

When my head thumps
back, exhausted, on the door. That's when she moves.

The water goes
silent first, and then I hear the soft whisper of her moving, her skin brushing
against the worn towel I had on the sink. The rough stretch of fabric as she
dresses.
 
Wet hair slapping bare skin and
the delicate pad of her bare feet on the wet tile before the door handle
squeaks alarmingly and she pulls it open and peers down at me in all her wet
hair, red
-
eyed
glory.

She looks,
adorably, like a drown rat.

And still lovely.

I smile up at her.

"Hello, Iris
,"
I murmur, and Del
peeks up at her, mewing in curious greeting.

"What,"
she asks, her voice shaky and rough from screaming and crying, "the fuck
did you do to me?"

I blink at her,
because of all the things I expected her to ask, that was the least of them.

"Apollo.
That's your name. I fucked you and now the entire city is lit up like some kind
of psychic Christmas tree and I can see every fucking possible future there
ever was. Do you have any
idea
how
fucking trippy that is? I feel like my head is splitting open and I'm being
yanked into a hundred
-
thousand
pieces."

I shift and she
groans, her eyes clenched closed as the threads that wrap around me twist
tighter and flare in her vision.

I know what she's
seeing. I know that she's almost blinded by the brightness that is my
lifelines.

She's a human girl,
after all, and I am a god. She might be my chosen, but she will never be able
to look at my lifelines without it burning, too bright painful.

"Don't look at
me," I murmur, and she huffs angrily, but obediently directs her gaze away
from me, to the kitten in my lap and she snarls softly.

"Why does the
cat have no threads?"

I glance at Del.
"Does she not?" I ask, startled.

How did I miss
that? Was I really so lost in my own madness that I didn't realize that the cat
had no destiny?

She frowns at me.
"
What
the fuck does it
mean, that she's got no magic light show?"

I ignore her
question. "You asked what I did. I need you to understand that I couldn't
have done this to you without your consent. I never would have. I don't force
my gift where it's not wanted."

Well. There was
that one time, with Cassandra, but that was complicated and I still feel guilty
for it.

That was more about
my aunt than it was Cassandra.

It wasn't a good
time in our collective history, and certainly not in mine.

"
Apollo
!" Iris shouts, and Del's
claws dig into my thigh, jerking me out of my memories and to my current
Oracle, whose standing in front of me still, her hair dripping into her t-shirt,
fury in her eyes.

So strange. Del
always smiled. Loved to make me happy. If there was anything that she lived for
it was my happiness. Iris looks like she'd just as soon slit my throat as make
me
happy
and I'm not completely
convinced she couldn't do it.

I grin and she
growls, low in her throat. "What the fuck did you do?"

"I'm Apollo,
Iris. I never lied to you."
You are
one of the only ones I didn't lie to.
"But this--what's happening to
you. I didn't intend that. I have fought for eons to prevent this very
thing."

Her eyes go
unfocused as she stares at me, and her eyes squint as she stares at me, and her
hands clench and unclench involuntarily at her sides.

"You were mad.
The mad god. They laughed and the Huntress wept and you were so fucking broken,
Apollo, how could you do that
?
How could you--" she shudders,
swaying and I reach for her, taking her by the hand and drawing her down to
hover over me. Her hands are shaking. "How. Why? You were so strong. The
strongest of Olympus. Why would you throw that away? Why would you embrace your
madness?"

She's half present,
and half gone, so lost to visions I could dance naked through the room and it
wouldn’t
truly register.

"It's
beautiful," she whispers, and I hum an agreement, tugging her against me,
tucking her head under my chin and letting her sigh as she relaxes against my
chest. "It's so fucking pretty. I want to play with the threads," she
whispers.

"You
can't," I murmur, tugging her hands down, kissing them and then tucking
them in her lap, between her knees. "Those are lives, sweetheart. You
don't get to play with lives. You only get to observe them."

Iris surfaces, long
enough to frown at me, her pretty face a mask of outrage. "I am not a
watcher, Apollo. And don't think you're getting out of explaining this shit. I
know this is your fault."

I smile reassurance
and she huffs, grumpy, against my lips before she kisses me and shudders, the possibilities
swinging hot and heavy around us. This close, her power so wide open, I can
feel it. I can see the kaleidoscope colors, all purple and greens, scarlets and
gold and the occasional splash of black.

She smiles and hums
as I watch the city, the tiny coffee shop where Lily is working and the
hospital where Heath is sleeping.

"He hates it
here," she whispers into my ear and I know that she knows I'm following
along with her, tagging along as she takes in the shifting beauty of the city.
"I want to take him home," she adds, her voice mournful.

I'm silent.

I don't want to be
the one who tells her that she doesn't have a home now. That she may never have
one again, aside from the one at my side.

She frowns as she
stares at her brother, and I see the madness slide away, the visions slide away
and her frown depends.

“Iris?” I murmur,
and she shakes her head. Her eyes are impossibly wide when she blinks free of
the vision and we tumble into ourselves in my bedroom.

“Apollo,” she
gasps.

Ah.

“He’s fine,
sweetheart.”

“
He’s
dying.”

I shake my head.
“He was. I am not just the god of the sun and prophecy,” I say, gently.

She stares at me,
her eyes impossibly wide and searching.

“I’m the god of
healing, sweetheart. And you wanted him healed.”

She makes a tiny
noise, a little half
-
there
sound, before she kisses me. It would be easy. And while her lips play over
mine and her body settles against me, all sweet
,
warm heat and a tongue that teases with lazy
strokes, dipping into the heat of my mouth and tasting me.

I almost forget.

She's writhing
against me, her hips rolling in these tight little circles and I want to shove
her off of me, pin her down and slam into her. I want to remember what she
tastes like and feels like, when she's wrapped around me and I am sane, and
there is nothing but my own guilt keeping us apart.

I almost forget
that I can't, because there is still too much that she doesn't know, too much
at stake.

I clench my hands
on her hips, dragging her tight against me and rocking up into her, swallowing
down the plaintive little whimpers she's making, because they taste so fucking
good. I groan and lick into her mouth and she whimpers and grinds down against
me.

"Apollo,"
she gasps, her hands tugging at my hair and I laugh, low and throaty and nip at
the line of her jaw. A shudder runs through her as she tips her head back and
groans, this wild, sexy noise that almost has me coming in my pants.

"Want you,
Pollo," she whispers and I shake my head. I feel the hurt curl through her
a heartbeat before she retreats, rocking backwards a fraction and I swear a
little. Drag her back.

"I want to
fuck you, Iris. But you aren't some girl I'm going to fuck and throw away and I
think that we should probably have a conversation at some point. Preferably
before I've got my dick in you."