8

LIKE EXCALIBUR

“Achilles will come for Hector. It’s all he’s ever wanted. That, and to be a god. You can bet that the Moirae have promised him both. He’ll come with all their strength at his heel. You won’t be able to protect Hector. The Fates will hold you down, press you to the ground, and turn your head to watch.”

“Great. So what are we supposed to do? Achilles can’t be killed. You kill him once, and he pops right back up to be killed again.”

“Only because it isn’t the right death.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“It means the boy who can put Achilles to rest is the boy standing right next to you. And he is the only one.”

*   *   *

Hermes sat behind the wheel of the rented SUV, driving back toward the road and on to the airport, and home to Kincade. No one had spoken since they got into the car, but the words of Demeter filled the cab. He could hear Andie and Henry replaying it in their heads so clearly he might as well have been telepathic.

*   *   *

“Why Henry? Why does it have to be him?”

“Their destinies are intertwined. All the way to Troy and back again, it is one or the other. There are threads of Achilles inside Hector and threads of Hector inside Achilles. This time will be like the time before. They will face each other. And you have to hurry, if you want to help him.”

“How am I supposed to do that? How can I help him?”

“By making him equal to the task. No mortal man could best Achilles. Not then, and not now. But then, Achilles was only a mortal himself. Find the edge that he once carried, and give it to Hector.”

“The edge that he once carried. You want me to drag Henry to the underworld and dunk him in the river Styx?”

*   *   *

He was lucky Demeter hadn’t had arms then, or she’d have cuffed him in the head. But she said no more. She waited, and breathed, and blinked her elephant-lashed eye patiently.

*   *   *

“The edge he carried. The edge he carried … Like a sword. Like Excalibur. But Achilles didn’t have a magic sword. He had the Styx dip and he had … a shield. A shield forged by the gods. The Shield of Achilles.”

“Very good, Messenger. Now all you have to do is find it.”

*   *   *

Find it. All he had to do was find it, a legendary shield that hadn’t been seen for a few thousand years.

“My god,” he said softly.

“What?” Andie asked. She sat up fast in the passenger seat and scanned the windows as though Demeter or something worse might be flying up after them. Hermes gripped the wheel grimly.

“I might have to do research.”

*   *   *

A day after they returned from their failed trip to the desert, Henry lay on his bed, idly rolling a hockey puck between his fingers. Lux lay on the floor chewing a strip of rawhide. It was the only noise in the house, even though his parents were downstairs.

He, Hermes, and Andie had made it back days before the end of spring break. He wished they’d stayed in the desert longer. Coming back so soon without Cassandra and facing his parents was harder than Henry had imagined. Their faces when he walked through the door showed how much they’d hoped. They’d thought he might be able to bring her home, and he’d thought so, too.

Lux heard the sound of Andie’s Saturn and scrambled up off the floor. Andie knocked once and let herself in, calling out a tremulous “hello” that was met with mostly silence. The house was joyless. Sometimes Henry couldn’t help being pissed off at Cassandra for just how joyless it was.

“Hey.” Andie poked her head through his door. “You finally get the dust out of your hair?”

“It only took three showers.” He sat up on the bed to make room.

“I told my mom what we ‘found’,” she said, and made air quotation marks. “That by the time we got there they were gone. But they left word that they were safe, and would come home soon.” She pulled her black hair out of its ponytail and snapped the binder between her fingers. “My mom went on this tirade about how irresponsible they were. How inconsiderate they were of everyone’s feelings.”

“My parents said the same thing.”

“I couldn’t even disagree. I mean, I do feel like that sometimes, even though I know the truth. Not about Athena, because she’s doing who knows what in the underworld, but then again, she effing left us on that hellhole of a mountain—”