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I eyed Gluttony. “Together.”

With a slow, almost reverent nod, Lust stepped forward and took my hand. Pride followed, his mouth hard but his eyes soft. Envy and Greed moved next, flanking me like shadows. Sloth leaned against the table with a lazy, satisfied grin. And Gluttony—Gluttony raced forward and gathered me tightly in his arms.

Chapter

Thirty-Four

PRIDE

Iwas reeling, and needed fresh air. I went out to the side yard. Diana was still with the children out front.

That...had been a lot.

And just as Sloth was an introvert so was I. I needed space and quiet to settle and calm.

The smell of cypress and smoke invaded my senses, so potent that if I closed my eyes I could half-convince myself I was back in the Underworld. It had a particular scent–not the fragrant smoke of Gluttony’s kitchen, nor the herbal kind Sloth burned while meditating—but something older, sharper, laced with brimstone and ancient soil. It was the type of scent you felt in your teeth.

I whirled around, lacing my fingers through the wooden garden trellis as the air shifted. The others felt it too—emotions flickering through the network like wind through chimes. Lust’s excitement. Envy’s wariness. Gluttony’s sudden stillness. Even Wrath paused wherever she was in the kitchen, her golden thread thrumming with curiosity.

There was a reason I could hear his laughter in my head and so easily imagine the scent.

He was here.

Hades stepped through the garden gates, and the world exhaled.

Tall and broad-shouldered, the god of the Underworld wore no crown and carried no weapon. He needed none. Shadows obeyed him instinctively, pulling along his heels like loyal dogs. His suit was black, tailored, and utterly unremarkable until you tried to remember its details. The eye slid off it. The mind refused to focus. Every inch of him was designed to be forgotten, until he chose to be remembered. He was darkness incarnate from his hair to his clothes, bright blue eyes the only part of him that contained light.

I’d just seen him in the woods when he’d bailed us out of the fight with Apophis, but every time he appeared I was in awe of his power.

Those eyes met mine, filled with recognition and annoyance. I’d take my compliments where I could.

He wasn’t alone.

She moved beside him like twilight—sharp features, unruly brown curls streaked with gray and moonlight. Her presence hummed with restrained power, not unlike Wrath’s, though honed with precision and purpose. Where Wrath’s magick was raw and reactive, this woman felt like a scalpel: efficient and unapologetic. I’d heard the rumors of the witch born of the gods, who’d fucked Zeus back to sleep after her burgeoning powers accidentally awakened him.

Wait, did that have something to do with why everyone was stirring now?

Not that I’d have the guts to ever ask in front of her. Or Hades.

“Aggie,” I murmured, moving toward her quickly. G probably already knew he was here. The others would be upon us in a flash.

The infamous daughter was someone I hadn’t met yet, but was already an enigma in the short-time since she’d awakened: witch-born, death-touched, the woman who had—accidentally, or so the records claimed—awakened Zeus during a previous cycle...and had put him back to sleep with her own hands. She was the only person, mortal or divine, who had ever succeeded in such a feat.

She looked at me now with a smirk that told me she’d do it all again, too.

Fuck, it made me more than a little hard.

“Pride,” she said smoothly. “Still as uptight as I remember.”

“And you’re still tracking mud into sacred spaces, I see,” I replied, eyeing the dried blood and clay crusted along her boots. “Was there a reason you didn’t knock? Diana didn’t mention you’d all...drop by.”

“I didn’t want to be polite,” she said, breezing past me to sit directly in the grass.

Hades followed without comment, his gaze sweeping over the rose bushes and the benches. He gave nothing away. He never did.

“Been trying to nail down your location for the past day. Tricky wards,” Hades drawled, studying the hyacinths.

I raised an eyebrow. Hades unable to find something? Unheard of.