Strength (Curse of the Gods #4)(16)

“You should stop,” Siret agreed, watching me with a smile that said you really shouldn’t stop.

“Seduction,” I agreed while pointing at him, my index finger extended and my thumb sticking up: my fingers were arrows and I was shooting Seduction at him.

“It needs to stop,” Aros insisted. “She might look like me, but I do not act like that.”

In fairness, I’d never seen Aros make little arrows with his fingers and try to shoot people with Seduction, but he really should look into it, I decided.

I was high on the power of looking like the Seduction God. We had decided that the best way to disguise me would be to leave one of the guys behind and have me appear as them. Aros had opted to stay behind, and Siret had given me his form. And his ego.

“Okay fine, I’m finished playing,” I lied. “We can go now.”

“She’s lying. You need to keep an eye on her,” Aros warned, as Siret took my arm.

He held me as though he didn’t really know how to touch me, just like when I had been disguised as Sienna.

“I’ll behave,” I promised, as Siret shook his head.

A moment before we disappeared, I made sure to shoot Aros with my Seduction finger-arrow one more time, and I caught his grimace just before the marble cave melted from view. We appeared at the very back of yet another marble platform, with pillars set along each of the square sides to cage us in. The pillars were so high that I had trouble actually seeing where they ended and where the clouds began.

The marble of this platform was shot through with maroon and blue colours, but the platform was otherwise bare of foliage or decoration, barring the display at the other end. It seemed to be a procession of statues, each one almost several stories high, made from the same blue and maroon marbled stone as the platform itself. The statues, I saw, were of eleven faintly-recognisable figures—Staviti in the middle, with a woman on his right, and a man I recognised as Abil on his left. I turned my attention back to the statue of the woman again, realising that it was Pica, looking just as she had when I’d seen her in the walls of the pantera cave that Leden had taken me into. There were eight more figures in total, off to the sides of the statues of Pica and Abil, respectively—three more women and five more men, including Rau, who was on the far left side, facing away from the others.

The Original Gods: all ten of them, with their creator, Staviti.

There was a raised marble dais directly beneath the statue of Staviti, elevating a man over the heads of the gods and goddesses that had gathered on the platform. I assumed that it was Staviti, even though I couldn’t see him very clearly. He was wearing white robes that had the same pattern of marbled blue and maroon that I could see everywhere.

He was so important that he got three colours.

“How will we find the others?” I attempted to ask quietly. I wasn’t used to my new voice yet, so it came out as a growl instead of a whisper.

Siret turned to look at me with raised eyebrows. “Quit growling at me. Can you feel them nearby?”

I closed my eyes, trying to feel for the connection that bound me to the Abcurses. It flickered there, on and off, muddled—possibly because of Siret’s Trickery coating my body, or possibly because of the press of people all around us.

“I think they’re over here somewhere,” I growled again.

Siret sighed. “Okay, lead the way.”

I started to move through the crowd, but I slowed down when I realised that I wasn’t jostling anybody. People were moving out of the way for me. People were … oh shit, they’re staring at me. I glanced down at my hands, but they were still strong, perfect golden man-hands.

Did Siret give me a girl-head?

“Didn’t give you a girl-head,” he muttered from behind me. “You still have Aros’s head, keep walking, Soldier.”

Well then why is everyone—oh. Oh.

“Seduction,” I growled, shooting a nearby goddess with my Finger Arrow of Seduction.

She seemed a little unsteady on her feet, having to lean against the woman next to her for support. I thought that was hilarious, so I took aim and shot my Finger Arrow of Seduction again, at the next woman, adding a wink for good measure. She giggled, swaying on her feet.

“Quit that,” Siret complained, reaching over me to slap down my weapon.

I didn’t get a chance to fight about my right to seduce whoever I wanted to because as soon as I opened my mouth, I caught sight of Rome. I motioned to Siret and started walking faster, making my way over to the others, just as the masses of people around us began to quieten—Staviti must have been making some kind of motion up on the dais.

Rome glanced over and caught my eyes as I neared. He moved past me without pause, and then past Siret next, and then beyond us, searching for someone. Me, presumably. Or Sienna.

“Which one is she?” he asked me, as I pulled up at his side. The others—Adeline, Abil, Coen, and Yael—were quiet, waiting for my response. No other person had joined our huddle, and Rome seemed to notice that, because his eyes grew dark, narrowing. “Where is she?”

“Right here,” I growled out, raising my hand.

“Rocks?” Yael asked, staring at me with slight disgust in his features.

“Seducti—” I began to answer, but Siret cut me off, quickly capturing my finger-arrows before I had a chance to shoot them.