Daughter Of The Moon

Chapter 29

Artemis

"Open up, twin!" I yell, bashing my fist against his solid gold door. I could just break in, I suppose; blow the door to smithereens and really annoy Apollo, but I'm not in the mood. I would rather just shout.

Eventually the door opens, revealing my twin brother, who blinks sleepily at me through a tousled mess of golden curls. "You called?"

"Apparently." I say, an amused smile crooking at the edge of my mouth. "Why so tired, little brother?"

"In case you haven't noticed, it is midnight, Artemis."

Unfazed and uninvited, I lift my chin and walk past Apollo into the hallway and then the wide, well-lit living room of his palace. Once I am comfortably seated in an armchair and have my boots up on a tasteful mahogany stool, I glance at him. He has followed me and is now stretching his long legs out across a chaise longue, completely unsurprised by my behaviour. This is just what we do, or, at least, what we used to do before I stopped visiting him in favour of visiting Jake.

"So, darling sister." He says, flashing me his usual abnormally bright smile. "To what do I owe this pleasure?"

"I want to go hunting with you." I tell him. "Just us; no hunters, no godly business. The way we used to when we were young."

"Am I allowed to ask why?"

I think for a moment, looking up at the ceiling, where a sun-shaped mobile slowly rotates. After one full turn, I answer him. "No."

"Does it have anything to do with a certain prophesy concerning a certain goddess of the moon and her mortal lover?"

I glare at him. "He's not my lover."

Apollo smiles lazily, an impish glint in his eyes. "So you don't love him?"

My cheeks flaming red, I look down at my hands in my lap and twist my fingers together. "Of course I love him." Is my snappish reply. "How else do you think we ended up with a baby in the sky?"

"Well," My twin says, his smile now turning impish too as his pyjamas are suddenly replaced by a doctor's coat and a pair of glasses appear on his face, "when a mommy god and a daddy god love each other very much, they get into bed and-"

"Apollo!"

He pushes his glasses further up the bridge of his nose with his pinkie finger, his blue eyes wide and his face the picture of perfect innocence. "I was only going to say that they hold hands, look up at the stars, and wish for a baby."

"Of course you were." I mutter, getting up out of the armchair and wandering over to a hook next to the doorway, where Apollo's golden longbow and quiver hang. There are hooks like this at the door of every room in the house, just like in my own palace. Even though we gods can just summon things in and out of existence, as true hunters, Apollo and I usually like to see our weapons safe, sound, and in gleaming reality wherever we are. I unhook the bow and quiver and bring them back to him, dropping them on his stomach. They land with an oomph from my twin and a changing of clothes, so when he stands up, rubbing his belly with one hand and clutching his weapons in the other, he is dressed in standard modern hunting gear like I already am.

"So where are we going?" He asks.

I summon my bow into my hands, plucking the string as lovingly as I would a golden harp.

Why am I comparing it to a harp? I think scornfully. Bows are much more useful.

"I was thinking Chattahoochee-Oconee in Georgia." I reply. "There is a particularly bad-tempered manticore out there that I sent my hunters after, but according to Zoe's report they didn't get it, so I thought it might be fun for us to hunt it down. We do so much with just the use of our power nowadays, do we not? I feel like I need to do something; use my skill, not just my immortality."