I looked back at her and frowned, something which she failed to notice since she was also frowning, regarding the stones at her feet thoughtfully. I knew better than to interrupt when she looked like that, so I contented myself with adding some milk to my tea. I used to take it with lemon, but Pritkin had been so horrified at the idea that I’d adopted his version instead. It wasn’t bad.

“I don’t even understand how he was able to contact me,” I said, a minute later, after Gertie shook her head and refilled her own tea cup. “The gods are supposed to be cut off from us.”

“You said Apollo managed it—”

“Because the Pythian power once belonged to him. It gave him a conduit that the other gods didn’t have. Some part of him that still resided in this world.”

“And Ares?”

Her voice had acquired an edge. Maybe because we’d fought the god of war together, if by fight you mean run around in stark terror and try not to wet ourselves. Or maybe that had just been me.

But even so, seeing a skyscraper-sized, blood-red god tearing his way through space-time, coming to murder you and everyone that you love, does tend to stick with a person. I strongly suspected that it was the main reason that Gertie was helping me. Unlike her heir, she frequently bent the rules, but not to this degree.

Only, where the gods were concerned, there didn’t seem to be any rules.

“Ares did talk to me once—sort of,” I admitted.

“How?”

“Kind of the same way that Apollo did. Apollo shaved off some of his power, binding it to the Pythian Court. Ares did the same with certain weapons and pieces of armor, infusing them with part of his energy, and leaving them behind when the gods were kicked off of Earth. So, a part of him remined here, and was able to possess whoever used the weapons or wore the armor.”

“And you wore the armor,” Gertie guessed.

“Not… exactly.” I shivered slightly, recalling the feeling of having my soul ripped and shredded, as merely a tiny part of a god went on the attack.

It had been during a battle that our side was losing, and where I’d made a desperate, last-ditch attempt to turn the tide. The Pythian ability to possess people was meant to allow us to shift in spirit, rather than body. That meant we could travel farther in time, as the load was lighter, and avoid getting a plague while we were there. I’d never used it much, since the whole concept skeeved me out, but I’d made an exception in this case.

And used the gift to possess the other side’s leader.