Alexandra Bracken
PART ONE: CITY OF GODS
PROLOGUE
The Prologue is from Wrath’s perspective and takes place during the awakening—when the gods become mortal at the Agon’s start. After seven years as a god, Wrath’s human body feels clumsy and slow. He pities the original gods for having experienced the transition 212 times over the centuries and feels superior because “this would be his final taste of mortality” (2). Hunters from the House of Kadmos arrive, dragging a struggling Hermes. Hermes tells Wrath he’ll never find what he seeks. With confirmation his prize has not been destroyed, Wrath beheads Hermes and sets forth to claim his eternal glory.
1. Lore engaging in her 15th arena fight in the six months since her friend Gil’s death. The fights have offered her many benefits over the last several weeks, and tonight it distracts her from the knowledge that “the hunt had come back to her city” (12). The hunt, or Agon, occurs once every seven years when Zeus turns the other Olympian gods mortal for seven days. Descendants of ancient Greek heroes hunt them, and if a hunter kills a god, they take that god’s place for seven years until the next Agon. Lore’s street fight opponent tonight is a cocky guy with no fighting experience. He manages to get in a punch and to celebrate his victory, forces a kiss on Lore. His kiss recalls an Odysseide leader sexually harassing Lore years prior. Something inside her explodes, and she goes into a trance, savagely beating the boy. Only when someone lifts her off him does Lore realize she let out “a part of herself she thought she’d killed years ago” (14). Though she doesn’t want to, Lore gets roped into another fight. This time, her opponent is a young man she recognizes as a hunter by his bronze mask.
2. Though she wants to run, Lore stands her ground, telling her opponent she doesn’t fight “cowards who won’t show their faces” (16). The man removes his mask, revealing himself to be Castor Achilleos, a childhood friend Lore thought died seven years ago. Angry that Castor never came for her, even when she desperately needed him, Lore starts the fight. After a blow takes both of them to the floor, Castor uses the opportunity to warn Lore. Someone Castor refers to only as “he” may be looking for her, which leaves Lore terrified because “there was only one he that would matter” (23). Castor leaves, and after a stunned moment, Lore goes after him. She bursts out of the building housing the fight in time to see an SUV speeding away. A red solo cup rolls toward her. The word “Apodidraskinda” is scribed along its side, which is Castor calling her to a game of Hide and Seek. She throws the cup in the trash.
3. After collecting her pay for the night, Lore and her friend/roommate Miles go for food. On the way, Lore thinks about Castor and his warning. The “he” is Aristos Kadmou (now the god Wrath), an old enemy, but as unsettling as he is, Lore feels a “restlessness in her body she couldn’t purge” at the thought of Castor being alive (25). Lore and Miles get takeout from a neighborhood diner and head to their brownstone. They pass a building covered in a dark substance Miles identifies as blood. Once she’s aware of it, Lore sees blood everywhere. She follows the trail to her brownstone, where the goddess Athena sits with a sword wound in her side that gushes “hot, reeking blood” (35). Athena orders Lore to attend to her and then passes out.
4. Miles starts to call the police, but Lore stops him. Police mean Lore’s name would go on file for anyone to find her, and bringing Athena to a hospital would put the goddess at the mercy of the hunters. Reluctantly, Lore brings Athena inside, feeling “helpless for the first time in years” (37). Lore sends Miles to get supplies to clean the mess and examines Athena. The wound was done by a professional, which means at least one group of hunters searches for the goddess. Athena is one of the original Greek gods, having survived 211 Agons. Lore informs the goddess that she’s out of the hunt and won’t be pulled back in. Her entire family was murdered as a result of the Agon, making Lore the last of the House of Perseus. When Miles returns, Lore cleans the blood in front of the brownstone and then leaves a scattered trail of Athena’s scent throughout the city in hopes it will delay the hunters. When she returns to the townhouse, Athena confesses she sought out Lore for protection. Her sister, Artemis, betrayed her, and Athena heard about Lore’s family, which puts Lore in the unique position of being knowledgeable and trained but outside the hunt. Lore asks what exactly Athena knows about her family, and Athena responds, “I know... who killed them” (44).
5. Lore counters that she knows who killed her family—the Kadmides. Though the hunter houses took an oath centuries ago to not kill one another between Agons, the House of Kadmos broke this promise, and their treachery went unpunished because “no other house was powerful enough to challenge them” (46). Athena asks why Lore never avenged her family. Though Lore’s deepest desire is to kill Wrath, she never did because, as a god, he is only vulnerable during the Agon, and Lore does not want to ascend to godhood. Athena offers to kill him if Lore binds her fate to Athena’s for the duration of the Agon. The binding makes their life energy one—if either dies, the other falls. Wanting Wrath dead more than she wants to live, Lore accepts and makes the oath. Right after, she notices a pale-faced Miles, who tells Lore she better “tell me what the hell is going on” (50).
6. Lore gives Miles a watered-down version of the Agon and the gods. The hunt occurs for seven days every seven years, and its location is determined by where the hunter houses move the omphalos stone (point from which life originated in Greek Mythology). Only four families still participate in the Agon—the houses of Kadmos, Theseus, Achilles, and Odysseus—the others, including Lore’s (Perseus), died out over the centuries. Miles asks what happened to Lore’s family, prompting an explanation of the house hierarchy. For centuries, it’s been the rule that only men “should be allowed to claim the power of a god” (54), meaning women have only recently been allowed to hunt and, even then, in small quantities. Fourteen cycles ago, a woman from the House of Perseus ascended to godhood as Poseidon, which enraged the other houses. The Kadmides murdered all but one member of the House of Perseus—Lore’s great-great-grandfather, whom they only left alive to keep the aegis shield (an item of power belonging to the House of Perseus) from disappearing. Athena interrupts Lore’s explanation by announcing she needs food. Lore makes breakfast and tries to convince both Miles and Athena they have to stay hidden for the next seven days. Both argue, Athena especially. One of the reasons she wants Aristos Kadmou/Ares dead is to keep him from finding an addition to Zeus’s original poem about the Agon, a segment that “tells of how the Agon ends and how its victor will claim unfathomable power” (60). Lore agrees Wrath cannot be allowed to find the poem and decides to find Castor, who, as a healer, should be able to help Athena’s recovery. After setting Athena up with a bath, Lore meets Miles in her room. Miles asks why the hunt continues if the hunters know they will be hunted, and Lore explains hunters strive for kleos, the honor of being remembered forever. Miles gets a call from his mom. Lore overhears Miles tell his mom about a place where they played when he was a kid, which makes Lore realize Castor’s message on the solo cup wasn’t a game. It was “instructions on where, exactly, to find him” (64).
7. Lore goes to Thetis House, a property owned by the Achillides. While using the hidden entrance that avoids the security cameras and snipers, she observes a party, complete with guests in ancient Greek attire. Inside the building, she finds an old hunter’s robe and mask. She dawns the robe but can’t bring herself to wear the mask because she “still felt sick at the thought of wearing something other than her family’s own mark” (69). Armed with a screwdriver, she goes into the hall, where an unfamiliar male voice asks what she’s doing there.
8. Lore answers the query by saying she thought she heard something, revealing the House of Achilles mark she drew on her arm with sharpy. That appeases the other hunter, who suggests they rejoin the party. Before they can, a woman and five young girls, all dressed in traditional Greek garb, emerge from a room. The leader of the House of Achilles, Philip Achilleos, enters the hall and inspects the girls, slapping one who looks up at him. Lore’s anger at the world of hunters shoots through her “like a bolt of lightning” (72), but she refrains from interfering, remembering why she’s there. Lore dawns the mask before entering the party, nervous about being recognized. Behind a silk curtain, she finds a Greek temple constructed both of physical structures and holographic projections, likely for a ceremony. She explores the temple and then gets some food to blend in with the party-goers. She sees several people she trained with years ago, but there’s no sign of Castor. Right when she decides the party is a dead-end, the ceremony starts. Philip Achilleos, his wife, and the girls from upstairs—who Lore now recognizes as standing in for the Muses—arrive, the girls carrying symbols of the god Apollo. Apollo was rumored to be killed in the last Agon, and this ceremony means he was evidently killed by an Achillide. Following the girl-Muses, a man descends the stairs “the way the first ray of sunlight breaks through a window at morning” (77). It’s Castor, who is Apollo.
TEN YEARS EARLIER
On a day 10 years ago, Lore’s father tells her the House of Achilles will allow her to train with them. Lore is overjoyed she’ll be able to fight and learn about the “big mysteries she’d only ever heard stories about” from her heritage (79). After breakfast, her father takes her to Thetis House, where he promises a younger Philip Achilleos he’ll deliver information about Tidebringer (the Perseide who ascended as Poseidon several Agons ago) later that night. The Achillides greet Lore with insults and disgust. The instructor pairs her with Castor, who looks sickly and frail. The rest of the students beat them over and over with staffs until both Lore and Castor are bruised and bloody. They manage to stay standing by holding on to one another. When the lesson is over, the instructor sends them to wash up and change into their uniforms. Lore and Castor help clean one another up, and a bond forms between them.
9. Lore doesn’t want to believe Castor is the new Apollo, but with him before her, she can’t deny it. The setup of the ceremony seems odd, and she wonders if Philip plans to kill Castor to claim Apollo’s power for himself. Castor sits on the throne, and Phillip welcomes him back to the House of Achilles, listing the honors planned to celebrate Apollo’s presence and the improvements the House of Achilles has made in the world over the last seven years, particularly in medicine. Philip ends by asking Apollo to “create a disease that we alone can cure” in order for the House of Achilles to leverage power (94). Castor refuses. Evander (Van), a relative of Castor’s, arrives and relays information about the current Agon. The Kadmides took control of the House of Theseus, killing Tidebringer and Hermes. Amidst Van’s speech, the mirrors around the room suddenly turn red, and a voice commands, “Achillides, hear me” (97).
10. Around the room, hunters fall to their knees at the mercy of Wrath’s power (he instills fear with his voice). When Wrath speaks again, he addresses Castor, offering him a choice. He can surrender and save his house, or he can fight and “all will die beneath my blade, beginning with you” (99). Castor refuses to surrender, and Phillip calls Wrath a liar, sighting that Wrath won’t even return the Achillide dead. In response, Wrath changes the mirrors to show the severed heads of the Achillides. He challenges the House of Achilles to come for the corpses, leaving with the threat: “you will join them soon enough” (100).
11. Following Wrath’s declaration, Lore makes her escape, pausing only briefly to consider taking Castor with her. Though it would solve many of her problems, she decides there is no way for her to sneak him out. Even more, he is safest with his house because the Achillides “would die before subjecting themselves to an outsider’s rule” (102). Lore makes her way back to the room where she entered the building, but the door is locked. Frantic, she checks every door in the hallway, finally finding one that’s open. She searches for an escape but finds none. Voices in the hall approach, and she hides behind a decorative screen, peeking out in time to see Castor, Van, and Philip enter.
12. The men discuss Wrath’s breech of their security, coming to no conclusions. Philip demands to know “how an innocent boy of twelve bested one of the strongest of the original gods” (108). Castor doesn’t answer. Van and Philip leave. Castor moves around the room without finding Lore. He finally stops in the center, and a panel in the wall behind him opens, revealing a masked hunter. The hunter fires a gun at Castor, and Lore breaks from hiding, tackling the hunter and knocking him unconscious. She removes the mask to reveal Philip Achilleos. With Philip neutralized, Lore tends to Castor. The gun was a tranquilizer. Lore wakes Castor by digging her palm into his chest, and Castor aims “a writhing mass of heat and light” at her (110).
13. Lore lurches back, and Castor attacks. They brawl, Castor nearly killing her, until Lore manages to remove her own mask and reveal herself. Her face snaps Castor out of his combat trance. Lore asks why Castor stood there and let Philip shoot him, and Castor says he didn’t mean to. After being a god for seven years, his mortal form feels “Like I’m in a body that doesn’t belong to me” (114). Castor sought Lore out in hopes she could protect him. Lore snaps, feeling betrayed that he disappeared. Castor asks why she came if she’s mad at him. Lore lies—not mentioning Athena and instead asking about the alternative version of the origin poem. She decides that if the Agon can be stopped, Castor must be the god to gain the power. Helping him means defying Athena, which leaves Lore torn about her loyalties. As they discuss bits and pieces of the last seven years, Lore suddenly realizes no guards responded to the sounds of battle in Castor’s room. Philip regains consciousness and informs Lore there were no guards because this assassination was planned. Philip is furious that Castor attained godhood and offers Castor one chance for a quick, painless death. Before Philip can attack, someone shoots an arrow through the skylight, killing him. Lore looks up just in time to see a second arrow “flying straight toward the back of Castor‘s neck” (123).
14. Lore blocks the arrow, and Castor shoves her behind him right before Artemis (goddess of the hunt and Apollo’s twin sister) drops through the skylight. She has come to kill Castor for destroying her brother and looks as if Apollo’s death “had shredded the last bit of her sanity” (126). Castor backs Lore toward the door, retrieving Artemis’s arrow from where it stuck in the wall and using it to point to a dagger concealed in his belt. Lore hurls the weapon at Artemis but misses.
15. Artemis attacks, and Castor lets loose a blast of energy, ripping a whole in the wall. Artemis retreats, and Van arrives, drawn by the explosion. Castor explains Lore seeks information on the origin poem. Van doesn’t know anything but suggests checking the Odysseide records. Knowing Castor isn’t safe, Van tells him to run. Castor refuses. He feels a responsibility to the House of Achilles and a desire to prove himself. The Achillides bloodline has always thought him useless, and he’s “not about to prove them right” (132). Finally, Castor agrees to go to keep Lore safe. Van sees them off with a promise to look into the poem and report anything he finds. Lore goes to the hole in the wall to assess escaping the building and finds an army of Kadmides waiting below. Castor picks her up and jumps, landing them safely, if roughly. They make a run for it through an old escape route they used as kids. The path reminds Lore of how life used to be when it was just her and Castor against everyone, “the way it should have been forever” (136).
PART TWO: CARRYING FIRE
16. Castor and Lore take a cab to Martha’s diner as to not leave a trail of Castor’s godly aura along the streets. There, they use the back bathroom to clean up. Lore tries to convince a distraught Castor that he had to run to stay alive, but he still feels as if he abandoned the Achillides. He thought becoming a god would finally change how the house felt about him and is disappointed that it didn’t. Lore tells him he’s always been strong because, even when he fell, “you fought your way back up” (142). Castor doesn’t believe her. Van arrives at the diner, and Lore leads him and Castor to her apartment, filling them in about Athena. When they get there, Athena hurls a spear at Castor, which he catches “just before it lodged in his heart” (148).
17. Van treats Miles like dirt because Miles isn’t of the Agon, and Athena wants Castor dead, forcing Lore to work quickly to prevent bloodshed. Lore tells Athena that Wrath killed both Hermes and Tidebringer. Van adds that only 27 members of the House of Achilles remain alive and outside Kadmide control. Finally, Castor relents, telling Athena he “cannot—and will not—allow you to die” because her life is tied to Lore’s (154). Athena agrees, and Castor heals her. Van’s sources told him the Kadmides plan to move against the Odysseides that night to capture and kill Heartkeeper (the new Aphrodite), which means they need to find any information the Odysseides have about the origin poem before then. No one knows where the Odysseides headquarters in New York is located. After the death of her family, Lore lived with the Odysseides for a while but betrayed them. She had one real friend among the Odysseides, a woman named Iro, but it’s likely Iro would kill Lore on sight. Still, Lore agrees to hunt down the Odysseides’s location. After everyone, including Miles, takes a job for the night, Lore catches a nap, her last conscious thought a memory of Iro smiling at her when she was still “oblivious to the monster in their midst” (160).
18. Lore wakes not feeling rested but gets out of bed anyway. She finds Van in Gil’s old room and confronts him about touching things that aren’t his. Van confesses he’s always been jealous of Lore for being fearless and, even more, for freeing herself from the Agon. He leaves Lore with the warning not to let Miles get dragged into their world. When Lore tells Van he can get out at any time, he responds that he chose to stay and isn’t leaving “before I get the ones who caged me” (164). Downstairs, Lore finds Athena making preparations. She converted curtain rods, mops, and other regular household items into weapons and insists Lore and the others carry them, even though it is “a thousand years past when it was socially acceptable to casually carry one of these around on the street” (165). Lore disguises the weapons as mops and dusters so the group can pretend they are a cleaning crew. Armed and disguised, they leave to find the Odysseides.
19. The Odysseides still keep the house where Lore last lived with them. A bus sits in front of the house with a tent erected between the building and the bus’s door. The Odysseides are either moving something or evacuating. Castor uses his godly power to open the door of the building next to the Odysseides hall, and the group climbs stairs until they have a view of the Odysseide roof. They find an access door guarded by three cloaked figures. Van uses a drone to shoot tranquilizer darts at the guards. While Castor and Athena open the door, Lore and Van bind the guards, finding each with “A tattoo of the Kadmides’ mark” on his arm (171). Van and Lore take the guard’s earpieces and join Castor and Athena at the open trapdoor. It overlooks the main room of the building from behind a glass dome. Below, Kadmides raid the building. The Odysseides are bound, and at the center of it all, Wrath stands with “his hand around Heartkeeper’s throat” (172).
20. Wrath’s voice comes through the earpieces. If Heartkeeper tells him how to open the Odysseides’s impenetrable vault, he will “allow those men who kneel to me to live” (173). Though Heartkeeper is gagged and badly beaten, he refuses. When no one gives Wrath the information he seeks, he orders Heartkeeper’s daughter, Iro, to come forward and for the Odysseides to be killed if she doesn’t reveal herself. One of the Odysseides tells Wrath that Iro is in the vault, and Lore remembers the vault has a second entrance. The group goes to search for it.
21. The second entrance is in an abandoned shoe-repair shop. While Lore and Athena break in, Castor waits on the roof of the Odysseides building and Van boards the bus to gain information and hopefully rescue the prisoners. The four keep in touch via a three-way call. In the shop, Lore and Athena head down into a tunnel, where cell service cuts out, as does the earpiece’s signal. At the other end of the tunnel, they find the door to the vault, and the earpiece comes back on in time for Lore to hear that Van got away with the bus. Athena breaks into the vault, but Iro isn’t inside. She opens the door on the other side and stands, bruised and bloody, facing Wrath. Above, Castor unleashes his power as planned. The glass dome shatters, raining down destruction, and lines of power break off to fry Kadmides, “crackling and writhing across the ground like lightning scoring the land” (180). Lore and Athena charge into the melee, but Wrath is gone. Athena knocks a distraught Iro unconscious. Lore carries the girl back into the vault but stops when she feels “a pressure at the base of her neck” (182). She turns to see Wrath striding toward her, and she goes still, paralyzed by his power. Athena breaks her paralysis by throwing a spear at Wrath. It misses, and Lore seals the vault closed.
SEVEN YEARS EARLIER
On a spring day seven years ago, Lore goes with her father to deliver a package to the Kadmides. At the meeting, they find Aristos Kadmou sitting on a throne, looking to Lore like she imagined “Hades would as he oversaw his kingdom of the dead” (188). Rather than an alliance, Kadmou proposes an offer. He wishes to buy Lore so he can marry her. Lore’s father refuses. He knows Kadmou truly makes the offer to mingle Perseus and Kadmou blood so the Kadmides can wield the aegis shield—an artifact only usable by the Perseids, the bloodline to which it was gifted. Aristos asks Lore what she wants. Lore responds she will be a warrior, and Aristos insults her, saying she is neither brave nor strong enough. In response, Lore attacks one of the Kadmides, her father pulling her back at the last moment. The Kadmides converge on them, but Aristos intervenes, giving Lore’s father money to purchase Lore and demanding a response by the end of the Agon. Lore and her father leave with a final threat from Aristos that there is no other place for Lore in their world, and he “will ensure that, one way or another” (195).
22. Lore and Athena flee back down the tunnel. When they reach the shoe shop, Lore receives a text from Castor that he’s safe. Athena confronts Lore for cutting off their chance to destroy Wrath. Lore argues they wouldn’t have won the fight, which mollifies the goddess. Athena warns Lore not to feed Wrath’s power with her fear, promising “I will not let you fail” (197). With Iro still unconscious, they go to the address Van gave them as a meeting place, which is a laundromat. Miles is there, and Van arrives shortly after. Miles delivers the money and laptop he went to procure, as well as the additional information that Wrath is after the missing Dionysus. Though the operation went well, Lore is concerned about Miles’s excitement and how he looks “like a kid who had just gotten away with breaking the rules for the first time” (200). An exhausted Castor arrives and heals Iro. The group’s next objective is to track down Dionysus and use him as bait to attract Wrath. Van pulls up an old photo of the new Dionysus, and Miles recognizes the photo’s location as an old museum that’s currently closed for renovations. The group decides to search it, and Lore ends the chapter with the sobering thought: “if Wrath doesn’t find us first” (206).
23. Castor escorts Lore to the laundromat’s bathroom to heal a wound she got during the fight. The wound is bad, and it takes Lore a few minutes to recover, even with Castor’s aid. While he heals her, Castor admits he thought being a god would make him strong, but while it took the sickness from his body, he still feels emotionally weak. Lore asks how he killed Apollo, and Castor answers he has “no memory of what happened” and that the security cameras malfunctioned when Apollo came to Thetis House (211). Lore promises to help him figure it out. After a short silence, a crash and a scream come from where they left the others. Iro is awake.
24. Lore bursts into the room to find Iro holding a letter opener to Miles’s throat. Lore attacks, freeing Miles, and manages to calm Iro enough to tell her what’s going on. Iro accuses Castor of cowardly killing Apollo and stealing the power from the leader of the Achillides. Though Castor was bedridden at the time and what Iro proposes is impossible, Iro refuses to relent, promising to “win back the kleos stolen from my lord in death” (216). The words remind Lore of herself years ago and leave her unsettled. The laptop Miles retrieved holds a copy of the Kadmides’s tracking system, which Van downloaded to his phone. The list of people being followed updates, now showing Lore as a target. Van divvies up supplies and leaves to check on the sheltering Achillides, telling the group he’ll meet up with them at the museum to search for Dionysus. After he leaves, Lore tries to break through to Iro. Iro won’t aid them in finding Dionysus, but she offers information about the poem. An ancient letter from the Odysseides archives claims the poem’s “full text is inscribed on the aegis” (221). Wrath attacked the Odysseides because he found records the House of Odysseus had sheltered Lore. Wrath hunts for her because he believes she can read the poem off the Perseus shield.
25. The group splits up to go to the museum—Lore traveling with Athena. On the way, they discuss the aegis and the poem, Athena expressing her displeasure at the House of Perseus allowing it to be stolen. Lore keeps quiet, knowing her greatest trial will come when Athena finds out Wrath “didn’t have the aegis after all” (223). In the middle of the conversation, Lore feels a weapon against her back. It’s a hunter from the House of Theseus, there to capture Lore for Wrath. Lore disables him, and Athena finishes him off.
26. At the museum, Lore and Athena find Castor, Miles, and dead security guards who were likely murdered by Dionysus. Castor stays on lookout duty while Athena, Lore, and Miles search for Dionysus. They find a trail of destruction leading through doors “that had been kicked in by force” and follow the trail until they hear booming crashes (230). A wounded Dionysus rummages through boxes in an abandoned storage room. Before Lore can figure out how to approach him, Miles’s phone rings loudly. Dionysus punches through the wall and grabs Lore by the throat.
27. Lore manages to stab Dionysus and escape his hold. She orders Miles to get Castor and helps Athena break into the storage room. Castor arrives, and the three try to talk Dionysus down from his rage, offering him an alliance if he acts as bait to draw Wrath out. Dionysus refuses, saying he’d rather die and “end this farce of an existence” (236). For a second time, Athena offers an alliance. Again, Dionysus refuses, offering instead answers to two questions of the group’s choosing. Athena agrees. Dionysus taunts Athena, and Lore defends the goddess’s nature, turning the tide to blame Dionysus for the dead bodies in the museum. Confused, Dionysus responds he hasn’t killed since the very beginning of the Agon, and if there are dead bodies “it wasn’t my blade that did them in” (237).
28. The group puzzles over what two questions to ask Dionysus. Before Lore, Castor, or Athena can come up with anything, Miles asks why Dionysus sided with Wrath but Hermes didn’t. Dionysus answers, and Miles goes on to make statements of possibilities, effectively “getting answers by testing assumptions, not by asking questions” as a loophole to Dionysus’s agreement terms (239). They learn Hermes left Dionysus before the Agon to hide something, which Dionysus believes he’s supposed to find. Athena asks the second question—what Lore’s part is in everything. Dionysus will only tell Lore, and the two separate from the group. Wrath wants Lore because he believes she has the aegis, and he’ll “do just about anything to get it back” (241). Dionysus also reveals he searched for Hermes, which allowed him to find Lore as well because Hermes was with Lore. Gil was Hermes.
PART THREE: DEATHLESS
29. The knowledge that Gil was Hermes nearly breaks Lore. All the years she thought she was free of the gods, she lived with one. Hermes protected her because she knew where the aegis was, and Dionysus only figured it out because he could see something was missing in the house, which meant Hermes had “turn[ed] you invisible to all us gods” (246). In the middle of their argument, an arrow strikes Dionysus in the throat. Kadmides attack. Castor disables them, and Athena kills the mortally wounded Dionysus. Outside, Lore sees a hunter drop from the roof and run. She follows, trying and failing to not think about Gil. After a chase through Central Park, the hunter unmasks himself. It’s Belen Kadmou, Wrath’s bastard son.
30. Belen hasn’t changed since the last time Lore saw him—he’s still blindly obedient to Wrath. The two grapple in the park, Lore eventually gaining the upper hand. She goes in for the killing blow but pauses, realizing that killing him “would do nothing but bring Belen glory” (257). Instead, she cuts off his thumbs so he can’t wield a weapon. Castor arrives and chastises Lore for what she’s done, telling her she isn’t a killer. Confused and unsure, Lore kisses Castor, which turns into something wild between them. Castor pulls back, leaving Lore even more confused, and goes after Belen. Lore joins him and they track Belen for several blocks. Castor tries to aim a blast of power at him, but there are too many bystanders. Belen has no such reservations. He unleashes a drone that releases “a wave of pressure and heat that devoured everything in its path” (262).
31. Lore falls as an explosion goes off, bracing for an impact that doesn’t come. She finds herself at the center of fallen debris, but it’s kept away from her by “a circle of intense, crackling light that surrounded her like a protective barrier” (263). Castor struggles to hold the aura, which burns away an enormous slab of concrete that’s right above Lore. Finally, the concrete cracks and falls away, and Castor passes out. Lore drags Castor out of the debris, and they meet up with Athena, who holds debris out of the way so victims of the explosion can get to safety. As they flee the scene, Lore tells Athena about Belen and the fight. Unlike Castor, Athena understands Lore’s choices. Lore thanks Athena for saving people after the explosion, to which Athena responds, “I shall always do what must be done” (267).
32. Lore and Athena bring the unconscious Castor back to Lore’s apartment, where Van waits. Lore tends to herself and Castor while Athena fills Van in on events since they were last together. In the bathroom, Lore doesn’t know how to feel about her reflection. She’s covered in dust and bruises, and she’s never looked “more like a hunter” in her entire life (270). When she finishes cleaning up herself and Castor, she takes a nap. When Lore wakes, Castor’s hand rests on her shoulder. She sits in the silence, thinking about how she’ll never have him like this again. Whether they find the origin poem or not, Castor will go back to being a god at the Agon’s end. She leaves him to sleep and goes downstairs, where she overhears Miles and Van talking. The two have gotten over their animosity. Van shares how he cares for Castor and was always jealous of his relationship with Lore, and Miles confesses he stayed with the team because he can’t leave Lore to face everything alone. The television blares a breaking news siren. Two little girls were trapped inside a bull statue and set on fire to die. The act is Wrath’s retaliation—reminding Lore of how her sisters died. A message is painted on the bull: “bring it back” (277), meaning the aegis. Lore tells the group Wrath believes she has the shield, and Castor suggests they ally with Artemis. Given Artemis wants Castor dead and stabbed Athena, the others are reluctant to agree. The group finally decides to raid the Achillides weapon stores first and then, if nothing else materializes, search for the goddess.
33. The raids go off without a hitch, but the atmosphere in the apartment feels oppressive. To get away from the silence and weight of everything, Lore climbs up to the roof. Athena joins her, and Lore tells the goddess about Gil/Hermes. Lore doesn’t understand why Hermes deceived her. Athena is sure it has to do with the aegis and emphasizes again how important it is that Wrath does not get his hands on the shield. Even though he can’t wield it, Athena believes he will use Lore to wield it for him and will “do whatever he must to compel you” (287). Lore and Athena argue about the evils of the Agon’s world and men. Finally, Athena asks why Lore truly gave up the hunt. Lore reveals how the leader of the Odysseides forced himself on her, which made her realize, as long as she remained in the Agon’s world, she would never be free. She killed him and ran. Rather than judge her, Athena commends her for doing what she needed to do. She tries to convince Lore to rejoin the Agon, but silently, Lore refuses because she doesn’t “want to forget why I had to leave the Agon when it feels so right to me” (293). A bit later, Lore’s phone buzzes over and over. It’s Miles sending text after text that read only “help.”
34. The group mobilizes to find Miles—Castor and Athena keeping a lookout while Van runs tracking programs on his computer. They find him tied up at Morningside Park—left there as bait for Lore. At the park, Lore hears dogs howl and realizes “Wrath isn’t the one who set the trap” (300). Artemis is.
35. The group goes deeper into the park, staying on alert for attack. They find Miles at the center of a rising pond, and Lore spots Artemis at the far side of the water, an arrow knocked to shoot Miles. Van runs toward him “as Artemis let her arrow fly” (303).
36. Castor lets out a blast of power, disintegrating the arrow. Artemis disappears, and Castor and Athena give chase. Van takes Miles to safety, and Lore runs through the park, navigating only by Artemis and Athena’s shouted argument. Athena tries to reason with her sister, but Artemis is beyond logic. She believes there is no way out of the hunt but to “kill the hunters and false gods for what they have done to us” (305). Lore finally finds the gods. Athena continues to reason with Artemis, and a group of hunting dogs attacks Lore. She manages to hold them off but can’t join the fight between the gods and watches Artemis fight Castor. Castor dangles at the edge of a waterfall. Artemis dances around him, avoiding her own traps and natural obstacles while she tries to send him tumbling. She missteps, loses her balance, and falls to the rocks below.
37. With Artemis gone, Athena is the last remaining original Greek god. Lore helps Castor regain purchase on dry land. She hears a whirring sound, and an arrow strikes her shoulder. A second arrow hits Castor, going through his heart and “extinguishing the sparks of power” in his eyes (312). His lifeless body goes over the edge of the cliff.
PART FOUR: DARK RIVERS
SEVEN YEARS EARLIER
Just before the start of the previous Agon, Lore can think of nothing but Aristos Kadmou’s ultimatum and her fear that her father will agree to give her to the Kadmides. Not even training with the Achillides helps clear her mind. During a break, one of the other kids taunts her with her fate, and Castor attacks the boy. They scuffle briefly until the instructor pulls them apart. The bully backs away, but Castor falls, convulsing. The healers see to Castor, but there’s nothing they can do. Lore promises Castor that, if he dies, “I’ll follow you to the Underworld and drag you back” (323). Castor demands she swear not to rescue him from death but falls asleep before he can extract the promise.
38. Numb with shock at Castor’s death, Lore finds a group of Odysseides across the pond. Among them is Iro. The group is armed with “weapons they had taken from the Kadmides, at Lore’s insistence” (325). Fury builds in Lore. She engages Iro in battle, letting loose a lifetime of anger into the fight. Iro finally manages to get a hit in and gain some distance. She uses her weapon to keep Lore at bay, but the spear heats, turning into molten metal. Castor is alive and responsible for Iro’s ruined weapon.
39. Iro runs for her life. Castor reprimands Lore for killing one of Iro’s companions, but before they can get into an argument, Athena demands Castor tell the truth of what he is—how he can be alive after clearly dying. Castor claims he doesn’t know, but Athena doesn’t believe him. She’s sure his supposed memory block is “a convenient lie to cover the truth of how a god might escape the hunt” (330). Lore sides with Athena. Feeling betrayed, Castor leaves them. Lore and Athena leave the park. As they reach the street, Lore hears a sound like thunder. A massive wave of water rolls down the street, swallowing everything in its path and “drowning the city whole” (331).
40. The water rages, seemingly unending and unstoppable. Athena watches it gravely, finally understanding what it means: “The false Poseidon lives, and she is allied with our enemy” (333). When the wave finally subsides, Lore and Athena track a Kadmide hunter to a hotel and settle in to keep watch. While they wait, they discuss the puzzle of the Agon. Between Hermes posing as Gil and Castor’s inability to die, they know they’re missing something, but neither is sure what. Athena confesses that she’s unsure if she can fight and defeat Wrath alone. Lore considers giving Athena the aegis. The goddess knows how to use it, and letting Athena claim the power may not be such a bad thing, especially “if it meant that the Agon would finally end” (338). The hunter finally emerges from the hotel. Lore and Athena follow her to a Kadmide safe house, where she meets up with hunters who come up from a hidden sanctuary underground.
SEVEN YEARS EARLIER
During the previous Agon, Lore’s parents return home before the hunt’s end, even though they said they wouldn’t return until the seven days were over. Aristos Kadmou has ascended as Wrath, and it is no longer safe for Lore’s family in the Agon’s world. Her parents announce they will leave the city and that the Perseides “will hunt no more” (342). Furious at the news, Lore curls up in bed. She refuses to run like a coward and to leave Castor to die. She knows if her parents just had a reminder of who they are, they would change their minds. She decides they need “what was rightfully theirs” (345), the aegis. Lore sneaks out to steal it.
41. Lore and Athena descend into a tunnel, where Lore follows a thudding noise through twists and turns. The sound comes from a hunter who’s bouncing “a small rubber ball” while guarding a door (348). Feeling dumb, Lore disables the guard and, with Athena’s help, opens the door. Inside, they find a bruised and battered Tidebringer.
42. Tidebringer tells Lore and Athena she was captured at the Agon’s start and given a choice—to die or lend her power to Wrath as needed. She agreed to lend her power in hopes she would survive the Agon to take action in the next one. She fills them in on Wrath’s plan to crush any opposing gods through war once he wins the Agon and awakens his full power. Lore argues he can’t win without the poem, and Tidebringer tells her that Wrath’s had the poem for years. He’s spent this Agon putting his plan into motion and is “within days—hours—of winning the hunt” (353). The unconscious guard wakes and makes a run for it. Athena goes after him. As soon as the goddess is gone, Tidebringer warns Lore to get away from Athena. Hermes saw Lore the night she stole and hid the aegis, and he told Athena everything. Before Lore can make a move, Athena returns and kills Tidebringer.
SEVEN YEARS EARLIER
Lore breaks into the Kadmide property where the aegis is kept. The building is a restaurant, and the shield is in a secret room beneath a walk-in freezer, encased in glass. In the process of retrieving the shield, she sets off alarms, but she manages to escape with the aegis and runs for it. At first, she is giddy with the idea the Kadmides will never forget who bested them. As her adrenaline wears off, she realizes her face was probably caught on camera. The Kadmides will know she stole the shield, as well as “who to blame and who to punish” (360). She hides with the shield to figure out what to do next.
43. Horrified, Lore realizes Athena killed her family, not the Kadmides. The goddess knew Lore took the aegis and came to get it back, using the window Lore left open to gain access to the house. When Lore’s family didn’t know where the shield was, Athena kept tabs on Lore for the next seven years, even as Hermes protected Lore and, by extension, the aegis’s location. Lore fights Athena, but she’s no match for the goddess. Athena shatters Lore’s hand and embeds a spear in her thigh. With Lore subdued, Athena reveals Artemis wasn’t crazy—that Athena promised to deliver Castor to Artemis so the other goddess could destroy him. Athena demands Lore bring her to the aegis, threatening to destroy everything and everyone Lore loves. Lore can’t let Athena get the shield, and refuses by declaring, “The choice is mine” (367). She breaks off part of the spear embedded in her leg and stabs herself through the chest.
PART FIVE: MORTAL
44. The bond Lore and Athena made should have killed them both, but Athena lied about the bond, too. She remains alive and well as Lore dies. Athena starts to drag Lore away, intending to find Castor and force him to heal her, but she stops with a new thought. She leaves Lore to die, her parting words that it was a “shame you did not even possess the courage to drive the blade through your heart” (374).
SEVEN YEARS EARLIER
Lore arrives home to find the window she left open is closed. She thinks it means her parents are awake. Knowing she has to face their anger, she goes inside and stops outside their apartment. While she builds up her courage to enter, something wet soaks into her shoe. She looks down, where “dark blood seeped out through the crack below the door and pooled around her feet” (376).
45. Near death, Lore dreams about the night she found her family dead—complete with pools of blood and her sisters’ eyeless corpses. In the dream, a light calls to her. The light resolves into Gil, who encourages Lore to get up and fight. He begs her to follow him away from the Underworld and toward the world of the living. One agonizing step at a time, Lore does, alternatively walking and crawling through a mix of two realities—life and death. When she’s gone far enough, Gil tells her “the eyes of the gods are upon you” and disappears (381).
46. Lore opens her eyes to find Castor there, healing her. Gil guided her to the base of the ladder leading up to the street, and Castor found her through the location share Miles set up on her phone. Castor apologizes for leaving Lore alone with Athena and, in a voice so unlike his own, promises, “I’ll kill her” (383). Lore explains she was the one to nearly take her life, and Castor understands Athena killed Lore’s family. Miles, Van, and the others are safe. Castor takes care of Tidebringer’s body, and then he and Lore head for the new safehouse.
47. At the safehouse, Lore tells Castor the story of how she stole the aegis to keep her family from leaving New York and the Agon. The last few days, she lied about taking it and knowing where it is, promising herself she would only let Castor see the poem if they retrieved it. Athena’s deception and Lore’s desire had been so complete, though, that she almost gave the shield to the goddess because that was “how much I wanted Wrath dead” (391). Castor confesses he wasn’t honest about his memories involving Apollo. At the time, Castor was bedridden and barely alive. He woke to find a wounded Apollo at the foot of his bed and asked the god if he needed help. Everything after that is blank. Castor wishes he had more to tell—that the story was about him being strong. He wants to prove himself to Lore. When she says he doesn’t need to prove himself and asks why he would even think he does, Castor says he was born knowing how to do three things: “how to breathe, how to dream, and how to love you” (393). Lore kisses him, this time intentionally, and they get lost in one another until a thunderclap drags them back to reality. Lore asks Castor to accompany her to one of the Kadmide houses. She hid the aegis there, and “it’s finally time to go pick it up” (395).
48. The Kadmides no longer own the property where Lore hid the aegis. Castor helps Lore break open the sewer grate out back, and Lore goes down, where she finds the aegis exactly where she left it. She brings it up to Castor, and they look at the poem inscribed on its back. Neither knows what the different ending means, but Castor wonders if the Agon “was meant to be more than punishment” (401). They speculate on how Castor seems to be more than just Apollo reborn but make no headway on that puzzle either. Before they head back to the safehouse, Lore punches the aegis and slices her knife across Medusa’s face, letting Athena know she’s alive and has the shield.
49. Back at the safe house, Iro arrives. She apologizes for turning on Lore and promises she’s now firmly on their side. Van arrives, relieved to see Lore, and Lore realizes these people are the family that were waiting for her to notice them “the whole time she‘d been chasing the past” (407). Van also notices Athena is missing, and Lore tells the entire story—about how Gil was Hermes and Athena tricked her. Iro informs the group that Wrath and the rest of the Kadmides are at the Waldorf Astoria. The purpose of Tidebringer’s flood was to force large groups of people to gather in a few specific locations, likely to be sacrificed. Many of the city’s main disaster shelters were ruined in the flood and bigger places, like Grand Central Station, are housing people. With this information, Miles realizes why the Kadmides are at the Waldorf Astoria, and that “we only have until tomorrow to stop them” (411).
50. Miles believes Wrath chose the Waldorf Astoria because of Track Sixty-One—a special subway built for Franklin Delano Roosevelt to travel from the hotel to Grand Central Station so people wouldn’t see he couldn’t walk. Iro and Van will gather the remaining Odysseides and Achillides to slow down Wrath’s forces. Lore will use the aegis as bait to draw Wrath and Athena into battle with one another, figuring the group can then “take care of whoever emerges from it alive” (414). If they’re successful, they just need to keep Castor alive for another day, and then they’ll have until the next Agon to work out what the poem means.
51. Lore dreams of the Underworld, where she sees all the gods, except Apollo. Unsure what it means, she wakes to find Van watching a sleeping Miles with longing. Van and Lore separate from the sleeping group to talk about the past and Lore’s dream. Lore receives a text from Iro, confirming the attack, and the group prepares to pass the time. Miles makes a run for supplies, bringing back armor, noise-cancelling headphones (to block out Wrath’s persuasive powers), and a few other things for Lore and Castor to use, everyone knowing that, in the end, “It may not be enough” (421). The group heads out, not saying their goodbyes until the last minute. Miles kisses Van, surprising everyone, and the group splits: Miles to Grand Central Station; Van to meet up with Iro, and Lore and Castor to confront Wrath. Castor and Lore head down into the subway. They work their way down the track and right into an ambush. Lore holds up the aegis, using its terror to catch the hunters off guard. Castor engages the hunters in battle, both with weapons and his godly power, and Lore makes a run for it through the tunnel “until Castor’s presence no longer burned at her back” (426).
52. Lore runs through the tunnels until she’s beneath the Waldorf Astoria. Sure enough, Wrath is on Track Sixty-One. He’s dressed for battle, the skin of the Nemean lion draped over his shoulders, which means “Wrath’s plan was happening now” (429), not at sunset as Iro’s source said. Lore tries to text her friends, but she has no cell service. Belen is there, trying to reason with Wrath about why “she” chose to help him. Lore thinks the “she” refers to her, but it’s Athena, who watches from the shadows. Athena joins Wrath and Belen, stroking Wrath’s ego by telling him she’s finally found someone worthy of being king of existence. Athena reminds Wrath that “all great ventures must begin with a sacrifice” (431), and Wrath kills Belen. Wrath soaks his hand in Belen’s blood, leaves a bloody handprint on the tank-like vehicle beside him on the train track, and calls Lore out of hiding.
53. Lore emerges from her hiding place. Wrath gave Iro’s people false information in order to force Lore to find him and bring the aegis. Lore ignores Wrath and addresses Athena “in a way she knew would infuriate him” (434). Wrath responds with threats, and Lore switches on her earbuds noise-cancelling feature. She pretends to falter under Wrath’s power, using the shield as cover to retrieve the flashlight Miles brought her and turning it up to its highest setting, momentarily blinding the gods. Lore strikes at Wrath’s exposed elbow, severing his entire forearm. Somehow in the process, she loses one of her earbuds. Lore taunts Athena, telling her to take out Wrath while he’s vulnerable, but Athena moves to his side to stand with him. The final lines of the aegis’s poem mean the Agon has been a test, not a punishment. Zeus wanted the other gods to “prove our loyalty by ending the worst age of man” (437). Lore makes to attack the tank but stops when Wrath tells her it contains sea fire—a Roman chemical used to start a fire that water does not stop. Tidebringer’s flood was meant to make the entire city vulnerable, not just Grand Central Station.
54. Lore argues that Wrath would be killing his own people. He shrugs off the argument, saying his people are the first sacrifices and would need to die eventually anyway. Lore next tries to appeal to Athena that innocent people will die. Athena simply responds that “there are no innocent mortals” (439). Wrath orders Lore to use the aegis and call down Zeus. When she refuses, he uses his power on her. Lore tries to reason with Athena, but Wrath attacks, forcing Lore back. Cornered and out of options, she calls upon the shield’s power, and it answers, filling her with strength. She disables Wrath without killing him and then offers the aegis to Athena to destroy it. In truth, the shield has no real power. It’s the only thing Athena has left of her father’s love, and destroying it is the only way to truly end the Agon. Athena hesitates, giving Wrath a chance to regain his feet. He stabs Lore with a dagger coated in hydra poison. Athena begs him to remember the aegis will disappear with Lore’s death. Wrath replies he has no use for the shield now that “my victory draws near” (445). He betrays Athena, and she turns on him.
55. Athena and Wrath fight. Athena kills him, but not before Wrath releases the sea fire into the city. Athena drags Lore’s broken body from the fire’s path. The goddess’s skin is gray, and her eyes grow dim—Wrath got her with the poison. Athena retrieves one of Wrath’s daggers and puts it in Lore’s hand with the tip at Athena’s heart. Ascending is the last thing Lore wants, but with both her and Athena at death’s door, it’s the only way to protect New York and its people. Together, they drive the blade into Athena’s heart, “the blow striking hard and true” (450).
56. Athena’s mortal form burns to ash, leaving behind a glowing being. The goddess’s essence enters Lore in a storm of lightning and pain, “threatening to tear her mortal body apart” (451). The storm subsides, leaving her with the power and strength of a god. She stops the car carrying the sea fire, smothering its path with dirt—the only thing to stop the flames. She runs back to Track Sixty-One, which is engulfed in flames. Calling upon her new godly strength, Lore beats the floor, intending to send the flames far enough below ground that they have no oxygen to feed on. Castor arrives as Lore works. He rushes for her, yelling for her to stop, even as Lore finally breaks through and the fire starts to fall. Castor reaches her. The fires are out, but Lore’s power threatens to consume her. Castor kisses her, begging her to stay with him. She holds on to him as a tether to the world “with everything she had in her” (455), finally falling unconscious.
57. Lore wakes in her bedroom at the apartment with her new power pulsing inside her and Miles leaning over her, concerned. Lore’s been asleep for a day, and there are “only hours left until the end of the Agon” and the end of her time as a mortal (457). She doesn’t know what’s going to happen to her but knows she’ll somehow find her way back to New York and her friends. Miles and Lore join the others on the roof of the apartment, where they watch the city rebuilding. A heavy awkwardness settles over the group as Lore-as-goddess arrives, which she breaks by talking about anything but her situation. Lore fills the group in on what happened with Wrath and Athena, trying and failing to answer all their questions about the ascension. The night wears on with friendship and laughter. Lore watches it all, “too afraid to look away in case she missed a second of the life she loved” (461).
58. Lore feels a shift in the night at 11:50. She and Castor promised the others they’d wake them up before midnight, but they can’t do it. Lore can’t face another goodbye that isn’t “on her own terms” (462). She and Castor retreat to the far side of the roof to wait, where Castor tells her he remembered what happened the night Apollo visited. Apollo let Castor kill him and then ascended himself. As midnight draws closer, they talk about what they want and how they feel. They wrap each other in an embrace, and Lore sends a prayer to Zeus or any god that is listening to please let them choose their fates. She feels an ancient presence of “immense, rumbling pressure” behind her that takes her godly power away. The presence fades, and she opens her eyes to see Apollo’s power no longer in Castor’s eyes. They are mortal once again, and they kiss as the sun rises over a new day