They’d attached themselves to her, like a leech, hungry for blood. They made her head and heart ache. They made her want to scream.

I am not a good friend. I am not a good lover. I am not a good goddess.

***

Work was awkward.

Persephone didn’t feel comfortable around Demetri since learning about the bargain he’d made with Apollo. To make matters worse, he had resorted to assigning her menial tasks like making copies, verifying another co-worker’s work, and delegated some research he was supposed to do on a privacy law. He’d sent her the to-do list in an email with an end of day deadline, which meant she couldn’t work on any of the stories she had in her queue.

She rapped on Demetri’s open door.

“Have a moment?” she asked when he looked up from his tablet.

“Not really,” he said. “Another time?”

“It’s about the to-do list.”

Demetri took off his glasses and stared at her. “It’s three things, Persephone. How hard can it be?”

His comment flustered her. “It isn’t,” she snapped. “But I have other stories—”

“Not today,” he cut her off. “Today, you have three things to accomplish by five.”

Persephone set her teeth so hard, she thought her jaw might break.

“Close the door as you leave.”

She slammed it. Probably not the best move, but it was better than filling the guy with holes from the thorns she wanted to throw at him. She took a few breaths, deciding it would be best if she just got through the tasks Demetri had assigned.

When she was finished, she could comb through the information she’d received over the last few weeks trying to decide on her next story.

She had several options available to her and a million lines of inquiry, but the information she gravitated toward always included her mother. The Goddess of Harvest should be renamed the Goddess of Divine Punishment because she was definitely fond of torture and her methods were vicious, often forcing mortals into starvation or cursing them with an unquenchable hunger. Now and then, when she was really pissed off, she would create famine, killing off whole populations.

My mother is the worst, Persephone thought.

By the time lunch rolled around, Persephone was entertaining herself with thoughts of writing about Demeter. She could see the headline in black, bold letters:

Nurturing Goddess of Harvest Deprives Whole Populations of Food.

Then she cringed, imagining the fallout.

It was likely Demeter would take revenge and probably in the most devastating way Persephone could imagine—revealing that she was actually Demeter’s daughter.

With that thought, Persephone left the Acropolis and met Sybil at Mithaecus’ Cafe for lunch.

Her mind was chaotic, going in several directions—dwelling on Lexa’s healing and Hades anger, making it hard for her to focus on anything the oracle was saying, which made her feel guilty because Sybil had news.