“Do the others remember me?” Theo asks hopefully. “Is Haven coming?” There’s an excited gleam in his eye. Theo talks about Haven like there’s no doubt in this world or the next that Haven is a kind and caring friend one would wish a visit from.
“No, or at least I don’t think so,” I say apologetically. “I think I’m the only one who remembers you so far and I haven’t told anyone else. I wasn’t sure what it might mean, or who could be trusted with the secret.”
“You can trust Haven,” Theo says. “He’s a good friend. The best kind. He risked his brother’s wrath just to help me get out before it became too dangerous.”
I frown. “Too dangerous?”
Theo nods. “Before the Choosing Ceremony, Haven and I would come here from time to time for revelries and we met a few guys here who claim to be descendants. They warned us that the trials over the years have become more and more dangerous. That if you don’t lose in the first round, you’re more likely to lose your life in the second and third.”
I think of the escaped Titan and all of the other monsters in Olympus that I’ve yet to encounter. Theo was raised in the house of a dark god and still he forfeited his spot among the elite. Who am I to think I could find a spot amongst them? Me, the orphan maiden? Who can’t even manage to pick a bouquet of flowers?
Theo leans his shoulder into the arched doorway between the entry and the living room. “I always knew that if I was chosen for the house that I’d lose. We all did. You don’t triumph over a Knightfall.”
He looks away and nods at a framed portrait of himself and a girl with dark skin and amber eyes. “And then I met Reyla and losing the trial didn’t seem so bad after all.”
I look around and take in the comforting touches of his home. The cable knit throw on the couch. The pictures on the wall. The plush rugs across the floor. It’s cozy and colorful like Olympus, but somehow it feels…simple, in a good way. Undemanding and trouble-free. “You’re truly happy here?”
“I am,” Theo says, without hesitation. “I miss my family, sure. And life without any magic definitely takes some adjustment, but I’d rather have a mortal life and lifetime with Reyla, than an immortal one without her.”
In that moment, I’m envious of Theo. He has a place where he belongs.
“I’m truly pleased for you, my friend.” I squeeze his arm. “May all the gods bless your union and your path.” I turn and head back toward the door. I’m not sure what I thought I’d get by coming here, but I don’t feel any better. In fact, I feel more confused.
“Wait, Ana.” Theo pulls me in for a light hug. “Thank you for coming to check on me. It’s good to be remembered.”
We say our goodbyes and I head out into the bustling street, back to Olympus. I wander for a few moments, marveling at how happy everyone here seems to be. At how happy Theo obviously is, how well he fits into this world. Like this is where he has always belonged.
We were always told that getting banished to the mortal realm was the ultimate punishment. Many on Olympus would rather spend eternity in the underworld than be sentenced to a lifetime in the mortal one. But this world is nothing like the one in our stories. The people here seem content and happy. They have families and friends and neighbors. They seem to live lives not that different from our own in Olympus City.
All I’ve ever wanted was to belong to someone, to somewhere. I’m jealous that Theo managed to find both here in this place so far from home.
Maybe the mortal realm isn’t as bad as I thought. Maybe I could find a place to belong just as Theo did.
I head back to the God Gate. I have one more place to visit and one more question to ask.
Chapter 28
Though every time I’ve ever returned home to Hestia’s House, I’m overrun by orphans or cats or both, now when I push through the large double doors, I find the place still and quiet. It’s almost as if Hestia knew I was coming and shooed everyone away.
I find the Virgin Goddess in her library in one of the wingback chairs by the open balcony doors. A cool breeze wends in from Lake Nisa. In the distance, a flock of birds flies in front of the sun.
“Anastasha,” Hestia says without turning to me. “Good of you to visit me.”
I cross the library realizing too late that I’m still dressed in clothes more fitting for the mortal realm. I don’t think I’ve ever been in front of Hestia in anything other than a dress.
There’s a matching wingback diagonal from her. I come up alongside it and wait for her to invite me to join her.
You don’t assume an invite from a goddess.
“Sit,” she says.
I sit.
“What brings you here?” She finally looks at me and having her full beauty facing me straight on is both welcomed and consuming. Sometimes it’s hard to breathe around a goddess. It feels like your eyes are full of stardust and your lungs of honey.
But the strike of awe is quickly gone, replaced with my need for answers. Because I don’t know what I want or where I want to be.
And worse yet…I don’t know if I’m capable of winning the second trial. I can’t seem to get control of my powers. I can’t even keep purged memories from burbling back up in my head. If that doesn’t mean I’m broken…
“I remember Theo,” I say, wondering if she’ll even recognize the name. “He’s a descendant that lost our first trial. And every time Hades gifts me a new power, things go awry. I burned a hole through the floor last night.”
She doesn’t react and that only infuriates me more.
“Who am I?” I demand. “Tell me now. Once and for all. I need to know, Mother Goddess. I need to know who I am. I want to know my Fate so I can accept it and move on.”
She turns away from me, back to the balcony doors. The sun fringes her in a hazy golden light.
I think that she won’t answer me, just as she’s denied me my entire life.
But then Hestia reaches over, grabs my hand in hers and squeezes. Her touch is warm like the sun. It should be calming too. As the Virgin Goddess of Hearth and Home, she’s the embodiment of comfort and serenity.
Except there’s a deep frown on her face and regret in her eyes.
“I don’t know, Ana,” she says. “I don’t know who you are.”
A breath stutters out of me. “What?”
She stands up and coaxes me to do the same. “Let me show you something.”
She pulls me from the library, down the hallway and then down into the garden. A high stone wall surrounds it and over the years, vines have grown over the top and hooked themselves into any crack or crevice they could find.
Along the wall, roses bloom all year round in various shades of red and pink. There are great bushes of lavender and plumes of foxglove and fragrant sprigs of thyme. Beneath the watchful eye of the kitchen window, the vegetable garden flourishes. Fringed tops of carrots and creeping stalks of beans and leafy lettuce.
Hestia takes me to her prized cabbage that has a garden plot all its own.
We stop in front of it.
The cabbage is twice as wide as I am and nearly half as tall. In all my years at Hestia’s House, the cabbage has never been harvested or trimmed. It’s been left on its own, but yet it thrives and continues to grow.