Theta (5 page)

Niko went to the screen on the wall nearest
him and tapped through the commands, paused to read, then placed
the tranq gun in its holster at his thigh. He was dressed in his
urban fatigues featuring his appointed rank of a four star general,
armed to the teeth, and smelling lightly of soap.

“
I’ll let Cleon know,” Niko
said. “You have somewhere to be soon.”

I didn’t want to leave, in case Cecelia
suddenly woke up.

The sinking feeling in my stomach, however,
led me to believe that wasn’t going to happen. My worst fears were
all happening at once. Cleon could use my magic, and I was alone to
prevent the apocalypse.

Niko glanced at me, and I stepped back from
the railing. The Oracle catnip of the chamber was calming me,
giving my world a surreal feeling, though nothing was ever going to
scrub the vision in my mind away.

After two months here as a semi-prisoner, I
was accustomed to feeling as if the ground beneath me would
collapse at any time. The new sensations tearing through me were so
much worse than being unsteady, for one reason only.

I was powerful enough to stop anything that
came my way. So … in the future I foresaw, why hadn’t future-me
prevented what I witnessed firsthand in the vision? And how did I
ensure this particular future never happened?

Shouldn’t I, potentially the most powerful
person on the planet, know what to do?

“
Whatever happened, fix
yourself before dinner,” Niko said firmly. “You look like you ran
into a drunk and horny Zeus in a dark alley. If you don’t want
Cleon suspecting anything, fix this shit.” He studied
me.

I didn’t like his too intent gaze. He
suspected something. Niko was an enigma, someone who saw far more
than he let on, and who was smarter than his roughened edges
indicated. If one person here could force me to talk, it would
probably be Niko. Not because I trusted him, but because he spoke
to me in a language I understood: that which Herakles had taught
me. Fighting, survival, physical strength over mental agility.

Maybe that was the real reason I asked Niko
every day if he had reconsidered helping me. There were parts of
him that reminded me of Herakles. Niko suppressed a lot of my
acting out; this much I knew. He dealt with me on his terms, but he
didn’t tell Cleon when I was disobeying the Supreme Magistrate’s
direct orders, or I’d spend more time locked up.

A small part of Niko was looking out for me.
Or perhaps, since he was so selfish, he was hedging his bets and
keeping the door opened in case I did become the person I was
supposed be.

Either way, I enjoyed a level of leniency I
wouldn’t, if someone other than Niko were overseeing every second
of my day. It was this that convinced me to do what he wanted when
I would have preferred to challenge him.

Turning away, I went to the elevator.
Someone had disabled the office furniture I ordered to contain the
guard, and I plucked the green ribbons from the objects to render
them inanimate again. The door to the building had been smashed
through, probably by Niko.

No one challenged me as I left. My escort
was waiting, along with Leandra, whose eyes were large. She
breathed an audible sigh of relief when I joined her. As my
personal servant, she couldn’t speak to me openly in public, but
she fell into step behind me as I hurried back to my chalet.

Only when we were alone in my room did she
break the silence. Far from the obedient, docile type, Leandra
smacked me on the back of my head.

“
What in Hades was that
about?” she demanded, rounding on me.

At my look, she softened. I felt like
crying, and she sensed it.

“
Chocolate makes you feel
better.” She brought me the tray of snacks and sat down on my bed.
“Come on. Talk to me.”

I went. I gazed past her briefly at the
names scrawled in purple marker lining the wall.

I’m going to need more
space, if the vision is true,
I thought and
then shuddered. I nibbled on a chocolate croissant, trying to wrap
my head around how to explain what I’d seen. Leandra waited
patiently.

“
I had my first vision,” I
said finally. “It was of the world ending.”

Leandra stared at me.

“
You all knew what I was
long before anyone told me,” I continued. “What am I supposed to
do? Did the priests tell you guys anything about my powers at
all?”

She didn’t speak for a full two minutes. At
last, she shook her head. “We knew what you were, but we assumed
you would know what that entailed when the time came,” she said.
“What exactly did you see?”

I shared the vision with her in as few words
as possible and then mentioned Cecelia’s coma.

“
Cecelia has been helping
me suppress my abilities, because of Cleon,” I continued,
distraught. “But now, Cecelia’s in a coma, and I have no one to
help me understand what I’m capable of.”

“
You have to learn. You
have to figure it out,” Leandra said urgently. “Damn Cleon. You
have to become as strong as you can, so you can stop this from
happening!”

“
But that’s the opposite of
what Cecelia says. She says my power has to stay contained, or I’ll
wipe out everyone. And this is proof.” I pulled up my sleeve to
reveal the double omega tattoo.

“
I may not know much about
what you’re supposed to do, but I do know you have to fight a
battle. Maybe more than one,” Leandra said. “How can you do that,
if you’re suppressing your power?”

From anyone else on the
compound, I would’ve ignored the advice that ran counter to what
the only other Oracle in existence claimed to be best for me.
Leandra’s rationale was nearly identical to what Herakles would
say. If I weren’t as strong as I could be, how could I
win
? I sometimes wondered
if I shouldn’t at least experiment with my magic, to see what I
could do, and wasn’t there some benefit in foreseeing the future?
Wouldn’t that give me an advantage?

Since arriving to this
compound, I’d been in a state of profound confusion. I knew Cecelia
was angry; her emotion reached me often during our lessons. Was her
judgment clouded, or did she advise me to suppress myself because
she foresaw what happened if I
didn’t
?

With her out of the picture, I had no one
else to help me navigate what I was, aside from Leandra.

“
You’re the strongest since
the first,” Leandra added. “What if Cecelia is trying to help you
but doesn’t really know how, when you’re destined for something
only one other Oracle in ten thousand years has done?”

Leandra made sense. “What about Cleon? He
can manipulate some of my power now,” I said, torn. “What if he’s
the reason the apocalypse happens, because I became stronger and he
uses my power to destroy the world?”

“
Alternately, what if you
being weak is what allows him to act?” she challenged.

I sighed. I was paralyzed by the morality of
wielding the power I possessed.

Leandra appeared pensive, chewing on her
lower lip, before she stood and paced. “We weren’t prepared for
this,” she admitted. “Give me a couple of days to see what I can
learn. I’ll talk to Theodocia, too. I can’t tell you how to handle
your own power, except to say I think you need to be as strong as
possible to withstand what might have to be done to Cleon.”

Her words sent a chill through me. If there
was one name I wanted on my wall, it was Cleon’s, but not if it
meant all of existence ceased as well.

“
Come one. We need to get
you ready for tonight. When you’re at the dinner, I’ll send word to
Theodocia,” Leandra said with a glance at the clock on my
nightstand.

Talking to her helped me feel far less alone
handling the fate of all of humanity. As I showered, I forced
myself to review the vision in my head. Lantos claimed there were
clues or information in the visions I should be able to
interpret.

I was drawing a complete blank, though. I’d
been so upset, so stunned, I saw no details, only a ghostly Adonis,
the flames and nothingness. How often would I have visions? Would I
have a second shot to try to interpret this one, or had I condemned
us all already because I was too overwhelmed to notice hints that
could help me change the future?

Tears rose as hot water washed away the
sweat from my workout. I hated being helpless. Herakles had trained
me to be strong, and Adonis believed in me. Swallowing hard, I
decided I was going to have to make a choice without Cecelia. I
could no longer dwell in the gray area of whether or not I’d enable
Cleon by becoming stronger. I certainly would never be able to stop
the annihilation of everything, if I were weak.

It was terrifying to know, with complete
certainty, at least one of the paths open to me led to the
annihilation of everything, and I had no idea which one this
was.

“
Artemis, if you’re there,
I need some guidance,” I said. I held my breath and listened for
her voice. She had spoken to me on top of the walls, when I
destroyed the five-block radius around her principal temple in
DC.

If she heard me, she didn’t respond.

I finished up my shower. Leandra helped me
into the formal dress Cleon had ordered me to wear this night. I
stood in front of a floor length mirror, staring at myself while
she went through the various jewels belonging to the treasury of
the Oracles of Delphi.

I was pale, and my eyes were haunted. I
didn’t look well at all. Physically, I was tense and my muscles
sore from sparring. Mentally, I was a mess. If I’d had a choice,
I’d have skipped the event tonight.

Leandra draped a pendant with a thumb-sized,
teardrop diamond around my neck. I slid my feet into my favorite
wedges and then strapped a knife to my thigh, beneath the
dress.

Leandra either didn’t notice or didn’t care.
She was normally more concerned about how others would see me than
whether or not I could defend myself. This evening, her features
were taut, and she was quieter than usual.

“
No comment about my fat
feet or wild hair?” I asked. I was worried – but it was my
responsibility, not hers, to spend sleepless nights terrorized by
the thoughts of what I’d done and what I would do. After all, I was
the only person who could prevent the apocalypse.

She lifted her gaze from the two scarves
she’d laid out on the dressers at the center of my two-story,
walk-in closet.

“
I can’t stop thinking
about your vision,” she said.

“
That makes two of
us.”

“
Yes, but I have faith you
can stop it. My concern is detaching that parasite from your
powers.”

I forced a smile and smoothed out the pale
yellow dress. I wanted to be the person she believed in.

One of my mandatory escorts knocked thirty
minutes before I was scheduled to be at the House. I went to the
door of my bedroom reluctantly and joined the single guard sent to
fetch me. Trailing him through the beautiful villa, I couldn’t help
wondering how I was going to sleep tonight. Not only were the names
of those I’d murdered looking down upon me, but the vision of the
world ending was replaying through my head.

As much as I didn’t want to, I kept thinking
about Lantos and how he was likely the only person on the compound
who might be able to help me. He did nothing for free, however, and
I had nothing to offer. He ranked second only to Cleon on my list
of people I despised.

I walked with my escort across the compound
to the House. Guests were already arriving, wearing designer
clothing and adorned with larger diamonds than the one I wore. The
crowd was larger than usual. Cleon hosted ambassadors and
politicians several times a week, and rarely was a Tuesday soiree
attended by more than ten people.

By the line forming to enter the House, this
gathering consisted of a hundred people, if not more. Now that I
knew what his alleged plan was – selling safe zones – I was no
longer surprised this many people wanted to meet him.

The moment I was noticed, the movers and
shakers of the world parted. Most fell quiet, while some whispered.
Everyone looked. Despite the warm summer evening, I shivered, as I
always did when put on display.

I bypassed the security checkpoint and
followed my escort through the bottom floor to the entertaining
wing. The ballroom was bright and filled with a small army of
serving staff circulating through the room with snacks and alcohol.
A full bar was in one corner, and a string quartet playing softly
in another.

How could anyone pretend life was normal?
How did the elite attend swanky parties, knowing the world outside
the walls was in chaos, and they were in the presence of someone
who had destroyed a large part of the city?

I would never fit into this world.

Cleon, however, was in his element. He stood
in the center of the room, on a raised dais, speaking to a man in a
well-tailored suit who was flanked by two assistants. Cleon rarely
introduced me to anyone. I assumed my usual position behind him,
off the dais, a trophy with the power of a goddess obediently
standing behind her master.

It made me despise him more.

The people trickled into
the room slowly. I never understood how they could even
appear
pleased to be here.
Either everyone in the ballroom was bored enough to find a stuffy
event like this enjoyable, or they were damned good actors. Cleon
stayed on his dais, the center of attention. Most people paid
homage by stepping up for a moment to meet him and speak a few
words before descending to the main floor with the rest of
us.