Page 186 of Blood of Olympus

Gigante downed! I whooped to my beloved and felt her grim satisfaction spread beneath my sternum.

One to go, she murmured.

Vel completed an aerial loop, returning to the burning giant. She swooped in front of its face, capturing the creature’s attention while an enomotia approached from the side — approximately thirty men strong.

I lost sight of them after that because the battlefield became a torrent of violence, bloodshed, and cacophony. Minutes passed in a blur. Flashes of colour interspersed with flickers of black, glints of steel, a smattering of feather, fur, and fangs.

Time was weaponised.

Moments passed, measured only by the beating drum of my heart — and even that was maddeningly off-tempo. Sometimes it pounded at the pace of a centaur, sometimes it felt like a year passed between beats.

I knew this was Kronos’ doing, and yet, he remained hidden. Like a puppeteer pulling the strings from behind a curtain. Or a magician playing tricks behind a smoke screen.

Sometimes I’d catch a glimpse of a familiar face — then other times, I doubted what I had seen. I had no way of knowing if these were the gruesome realities of war, or if other things were in play — Hyperion’s trickery, or my worst fears made real by Phobos…

For instance, when Lykos leaped high into the air, over the foot of the fallen gigante, I caught sight of Nike’s black-and-crimson stained wings as she pirouetted through the air laying siege from above. As he landed, I glimpsed the slack-jawed, blank-stared face of Artemis half-buried in the mud, her silver beads dulled by the grime of battle.

And when I pivoted in the saddle to launch a freshly procured spear at another arachnid-beast, I witnessed Dionysus shaping vines into an enormous, magical lasso which was promptly flicked high above our heads to wrap around that of the remaining gigante. Mouth agape, I watched as he ascended the living, breathing mountain and lost sight after he crested its bouldery head.

I leapt from the saddle to swing at a dark shape moving faster than the others, on a straight trajectory to cut beneath Lykos’ legs, but stopped Ceraunos short as my vision focused. A nimble-footed black dog sporting a white-tipped ear cut past, snapping its teeth around the fingers of a turncoat mortal with flying fists. After ruining the man’s chances of ever stroking his own cock again, it darted away, quickly lost in the sea of writhing black. I followed up by putting him out of his misery, content to condemn no man to a fate such as that.

More images rushed by in a swirling tempest of true or untrue?

A dreadlocked sun god darted past, sword swinging. That could be true.

A cloven-hoofed satyr fly-kicked the head of a mortal, leaving two distinct indents in the side of his unconscious face. Also potentially true.

Aphrodite planted atop the downed mountain, loosing arrow after arrow into the eyes of her enemies. Surely untrue for when has Aph ever demonstrated a capacity with any weapon ever? But then again, Artemis bequeathed her infamous silver bow to the goddess of love earlier…

Most questionable of all, however, was when I saw Demeter severed in two from shoulder to opposite hip, ichor painting the ground beneath her in the shape of a macabre sun. What weapon could cleave an Olympian like that? Nothing I’d ever seen, that was for certain.

Concentrate, Lykos growled as a bloodied sword slunk past my defenses and tore a chunk from my side. It took little more than a swift boot to the face and a shield slammed into it for me to sate my vengeance on the stupid mortal fool.

But I was exhausted. My muscles burned, my lungs heaved, and each second weighed heavier than a downy blanket. I could feel it echoed in Nyssa across the bond. Whatever she’d been doing has left her as depleted as me.

We couldn’t last like this indefinitely.

I groaned, swinging Ceraunos in a fatigued arc, successfully separating the head of an amphisbaena from its body while Lykos dealt with its counterpart. To my right, a manic laugh echoed and Erato dashed under the belly of a giant scorpion. She was quickly tailed by the golden-haired Dromarian princess, both holding their own against the creatures — and seemingly relishing it.

Now that’s a terrifying duo.

And just when I thought I was truly weary, Fate dealt me yet another card.

The battlefield brightened to a painful level in a matter of moments, like the sun magnified through a glass lens. A walking pillar of light moved towards us at a leisurely pace, paying no heed to the bloody cost of battle surrounding him. He strode across the field like he hadn’t hurt the only person I’d ever truly believed in.

My grip tightened around Ceraunos’ hilt. The lightning twining around its blade frenzied anew. I no longer heard the clash of steel or the cries of death. I no longer felt the gore-covered ground sucking at my boots, or blood coating my fingers.

All I saw was him — Hyperion. And the debt awaiting him.

He’d cost Nyssa her eyes. He was about to lose far more.

“Have your balls grown back yet, Hype? Or is that swinging dick just for show?”

A dark shape appeared from behind Hyperion’s column, splitting into three. Three figures who were little more than myth; little more than cautionary tales.

Tartarus.

“Ah, I see. You need help. One to hold it and two more to tickle the place your balls used to be.”