The Goddess Inheritance

“What new toy?” I said through gritted teeth.

Calliope glided to the side of my bed. “Haven’t I told you? Nicholas generously donated his time and expertise to forge a weapon that will let me kill a god. His timing couldn’t be better.”

My blood ran cold. Nicholas, Ava’s husband, had been kidnapped on the winter solstice during battle. Up until now, no one had said a word to me about him.

“That’s impossible,” I blurted. Nothing but Cronus could kill an immortal.

“Is it?” said Calliope with a wicked smile. “Are you willing to bet your sweet little darling’s life on that?”

My heart dropped. She was going to kill my baby? “Ava?” I said, my tongue heavy in my mouth.

Biting her lip, Ava set her basket down at the foot of the bed. “I’m sorry.”

The room spun around me. This was just another game. Calliope was trying to scare me by using the people I loved most against me, and this time my supposed best friend was playing along.

What if it wasn’t a game, though? Calliope had sworn she would take away the thing I loved the most, and at the time I thought she’d meant Henry and the rest of my family. But she’d meant the baby. She was about to get everything she wanted from me—there was no reason for her to lie. And the way Ava couldn’t so much as look at me...

My throat swelled until I could barely breathe. “Get out.”

Ava blinked. “But someone needs to be with you—”

“I’d rather have Calliope here than you, you traitorous bitch,” I spat. “Get out.”

Her eyes watered, and to my satisfaction, she fled, leaving me alone with Cronus and Calliope. Ava deserved this. She’d known what this would mean, that Calliope had every intention of slaughtering my baby. And if Calliope really had forced Nicholas to forge a weapon—if Ava had distracted the council for the past nine months to give him enough time—

I didn’t care how much danger Nicholas was in. He was Calliope’s son, and no matter how terrible a person she was, I couldn’t imagine her killing her own child. But she was going to kill my baby without a second thought, and Ava had known the entire time.

Even if our positions had been reversed, even if Henry was the one Calliope held hostage, I would have never, ever done this to Ava. I would have never betrayed her and allowed Calliope to kill her child.

“That wasn’t very nice,” said Calliope in a singsong voice, and my stomach churned. She couldn’t kill the baby. I wouldn’t let her.

“I need to pee,” I said, pushing myself up.

Calliope made a vague gesture and busied herself with unpacking the basket. Cronus offered me his hand, but I brushed it off.

“I think I can make it to the bathroom on my own,” I said.

Crossing the room hadn’t been easy since August, and my body strained with each step I took, but I made it. My prison wasn’t exactly plush, although it wasn’t a concrete cell with a thin mattress and grungy toilet either. It was a simple bedroom with a bathroom attached, and it was several stories up, making a window escape impossible. I might’ve been immortal, but I didn’t have a clue whether or not the baby was. And if Calliope really did have a weapon that could kill a god, it didn’t matter anyway.

I’d tried to get away several times when I’d still been mobile enough to have a chance, but between Cronus, Calliope and Ava, someone had always been there to stop me. I’d made it as far as the beach once, but I couldn’t swim and they knew it. The council may have intended this island to be Cronus’s prison, but it was mine now, too.

Closing the door behind me, I eased down onto the edge of the bathtub and cradled my head in my hands. Frustration rose inside me, threatening to spill out in a great sob, but I swallowed it. I needed a moment, and crying would only make Calliope come in after me.

“Henry.” I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to picture him. “Please. Help us.”

At last I sank into my vision. After nearly a year in this hellhole, I’d learned how to control them, but I still struggled to make it far enough to see him. Three golden walls formed around me, and the fourth became a long pane of windows much like the room in Henry’s palace. But instead of black rock, I saw endless blue sky through the glass, and sunlight poured in, illuminating everything.

“You did this.” The sound of Henry’s voice caught my attention, and I turned. He had Walter by the lapels, and his eyes burned with anger and power I’d never seen before.

“It had to be done,” said Walter unsteadily. Even he looked afraid. “We need you, brother, and if this is what it takes to get you to see that—”

Henry threw Walter against the wall so hard that it fractured, leaving a web of cracks behind. “I will see you pay for this if it is the last thing I do,” he growled.

“Enough.” My mother’s voice rang out, and both brothers turned toward her. She looked pale, and she folded her hands in front of her the way she did when she was trying to keep herself under control. “We will rescue Kate. There is still time, and the more we waste—”

“We cannot risk our efforts for the life of one,” said Walter.

“Then I will,” snarled Henry.

Walter shook his head. “It is far too dangerous for you to go alone.”

“He won’t be alone,” said my mother. “And if you value your hold over the council—”

The muscles in my back and belly contracted, and the pain pulled me from my vision. Back in the bathroom, I let out a soft sob. My mother was wrong—we were out of time. The baby was coming no matter how hard I tried to wait. Calliope would kill it, and there was no one here to stop her. Whether or not anyone came, there was no way out of this. Even if Henry and my mother did attack the island, there was no guarantee they would break through Cronus’s defenses, and by then it would be too late anyway.

The baby nudged me from the inside, and I forced myself to pull it together. I had to do this. I couldn’t break down. The baby’s life depended on it.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, gently pressing against the spot where it had kicked me. “I love you, okay? I’m not going to stop fighting until you’re safe, I promise.”

Someone rapped on the door, and I jumped. “Don’t think you’re going to give birth in the bathtub,” said Calliope. “You’re not having that baby until I say you are.”

“Just a minute,” I called, and I stood long enough to turn on the faucet and drown out my whispers in case she was eavesdropping. It wouldn’t do much good, but the illusion of privacy would have to be enough for now.

Easing back down onto the edge of the bathtub, I rubbed my belly. “Your dad’s really great, and you’ll get to see him soon, okay? He’s not going to let Calliope do this to you either, and he’s way more powerful than me. The whole family is. Today is probably going to be scary, and it’ll hurt—well, it’ll hurt me, I won’t let them hurt you—but in the end, it’ll be okay. I promise.”

It wasn’t an empty promise. Even if I had to die in the process, Calliope would not touch my baby. No matter what it took, I would make sure of it.

* * *

Labor progressed so quickly that I barely made it out of the bathroom. Calliope gave me nothing to help, no medication or words of encouragement, and though Cronus remained by my side, he said nothing as my contractions grew closer and closer together. They had to know the others were coming. There was no other reason to force the baby out like this, and I couldn’t imagine Calliope giving up the chance to make me hurt as long as possible, not unless it was dire.

I refused to scream. Even in the final moments of labor, as the baby ripped through my body, I clenched my jaw and pushed through the pain. Since I’d become immortal, the only thing that had hurt me was Cronus, and apparently giving birth was another exception. My body was doing this to itself, and immortality wasn’t going to stop it.

The moment the baby left me, I felt as if my heart had been ripped from my chest and now rested in Calliope’s arms. She straightened, and a lump formed in my throat as I saw the wrinkled, bloody infant she held. “It’s a boy,” she said, and she smiled. “Perfect.”

Somehow, despite the words I’d whispered to him, the hours I’d spent feeling him kick, and the months I’d carried him, he had never felt completely real. But now—

That was my son.

That was my son, and Calliope was going to kill him.

She didn’t need any tools to cut the cord or finish the rest of the messy birth; in the blink of an eye, everything was clean, and the baby was wrapped in a white blanket. As if she’d done it a thousand times before, she cradled him and stood, leaving me alone on the bed.

“Wait,” I said in a choked voice. I was exhausted and drenched in sweat, and despite the pain, I struggled to get up. “You can’t—please, I’ll do anything, just don’t hurt my son.”

His wails, so tiny and helpless, filled the room, and my heart crumbled. Every bone in my body demanded that I stand, that I go to him and save him from the pain that awaited him, but I couldn’t move. The harder I struggled, the more I froze, and the more my body ached.

Calliope looked at me, her eyes bright and full of malice. She was enjoying this. She was reveling in my pain. “That’s not for you to decide, dear Kate.”