Aphrodite
"I CAN DO THIS." My numb fingers, still glamoured gold, scrambled to keep hold of the sheer cliff face. The Isle of the DAMNED was a shaped like a tall, mutated teardrop—only a jagged curve sloped into the ocean. I'd edged my way around to lower ground. Unfortunately, the cliff still wasn't low enough for me to climb, given the rough shape I was in.
Between waves, I sputtered specifics, locking myself into the promise, forcing the words true. Now there was no choice in the matter. I had to survive.
Poseidon, I thought, drawing my palm against a rock jutting from the face of the island. The sharp edge pierced my spongy palm without resistance. Blood could pass through the weak shield surrounding the island as well as water. Mine was still divine enough to get Poseidon's attention.
I hoped.
Shivers racked my body, hard enough to threaten my tenuous hold on the cliff face. Exposure, I added to my mental list of ways I could die. When the entire frickin' island teleported across gods knew how many time zones, it traded the sun-kissed warm placid water for dark, icy waves.
"She moved the island." I spat out the sentence with as much disgust as I could muster. "That stupid . . ." A litany of curse words followed, but not a single one of them made me feel better. Medea had probably killed herself doing this. And for what?
I squinted against the utter blackness, wishing for a moon, stars, or light of any kind.
Some part of me knew my thrashing could attract creatures living in the water, but that fear had to move aside for the more practical need to keep air in my lungs.
Lightning cracked across the sky, cruelly granting my wish for light in a blinding slash. Of course, Persephone was enraged. The meeting, ostensibly to establish peace with the demigods, had gone horribly wrong when Ares had been outed as an imposter. He'd gotten away, but I'd been dragged along when the island teleported.
So now, not only did the demigods have a weapons cache that could end every god in the Pantheon, they had two hostages. Me and the frickin' Lord of the Underworld.
Maybe my cover isn't blown. They didn't know I was a goddess. Just that Ares was a god.
And I'd been living with him.
And that we'd arrived on the island at the exact same time.
Yeah, they'd be idiots not to at least suspect. And since gods were physically incapable of telling lies, all it would take to confirm their suspicion was a yes or no question.
Assuming I didn't drown first.
Something slick brushed against my legs. What was that? I twisted in the water, limbs jerking in all directions like a tangled marionette, but the waves might as well have been made of midnight. Between the pitch-black night and churned-up bits of relocated island, I couldn't make out my own flesh beneath the waves. I lost my grip on the cliff face and felt a wave of dizziness as my feet kicked into the endless depths.
Probably just a scared fish, I tried to convince myself. My fear of the ocean was mostly instinctive, bred into me by design to keep me from visiting Poseidon's realm. Having his permission to be here should have quelled my fear. But in the dark of the night, with gods knew what swimming around me, fear no longer listened to reason. I was someplace foreign. Other. I didn't belong here.
"Just keep swimming," I told myself through gritted teeth, kicking toward the cliff face.
A wave slammed into me, shoving me beneath the inky blackness. I pushed to the surface, gasping for air, but just as I inhaled, another wave slammed into me. Then another. Then another.
I can't do this, I realized as my outstretched toes brushed against something quivering. But my promises held. No matter how desperately I wanted to give up, to sink beneath the waves and rest, my body wouldn't let me. I kicked to the surface again, and again, and again. Compelled by the promises I'd just made.
"Ooof!" A wave slammed me into a bar of sand, knocking the wind out of me. The granules scraped my body as I slid along an unnatural ocean floor.
I pushed off the silt and surfaced, recoiling at the alien way the sand shifted beneath me. Everything within the shield must have teleported with the island. The shield ended with land along the back and sides of the small island, but the front used to extend enough to include a beach and a swimming area.
Not anymore. The beach had been swallowed by the ocean. This isn't stable. Somewhere inside my exhausted shell of a body, I knew the shifting sand didn't bode well for the island. But I couldn't think about that right now. I crawled forward, losing my balance on the lurching ground beneath me and splashing into the shallow water. After what felt like an eternity, I dragged my tired, battered body onto the thin strip of land made up of rocks, sand, and barrier plants that had once separated the beach from the rest of the island.
Thunder cracked and the clouds opened in a deluge of water. Rain pelted against my back, but I couldn't coordinate my trembling limbs enough to move. For a time, I couldn't hear anything over the crashing waves and my own ragged breathing, but eventually, I picked out distant voices. Lifting my head, I struggled to get my bearings.
A lit building further inland caught my eye. Everyone on the island had gathered at the dining hall to watch the broadcasted truce meeting with the Pantheon. They were probably still there.
It wasn't that far away.
Did I want to approach the demigods, or should I try to hide on the island until Poseidon and the others found me?
Hide where? The island used to be shaped like a teardrop, with the designated swimming area and dock on either side of the pointy end. Now the sandy border between the two had been swallowed by waves. As the island rounded, the coastline grew steeper, culminating in a high cliff at the back of the island. One-bedroom cabins bordered the steep drop-off in a semicircle that had sprung up around the island's hospital: a relic left over from the island's past life of being a medical spa. Auxiliary buildings and a dining hall stood on the west side of the island. A few trails featuring picturesque landscapes and waterfalls ran up the east side of the island, but there wasn't enough plant life to actually hide in. I could walk the entire island in less than an afternoon.
To what end? Even if Poseidon found me, I doubted I could survive another round of teleportation. Teleportation hurt now because of the Steele in my system. I needed time to heal.
So, what? Throw myself on the mercy of the demigods and hope it didn't occur to them to ask yes or no questions? That didn't seem like a great alternative either.
I needed to . . . I needed. . . . My eyelids flagged as my body lost the war against complete and utter exhaustion and crashed straight into a nightmare.
