Novalight reeled back with a gasp. Piers’s mouth twisted in disgust. He didn’t even hit him that hard. And if Athena couldn’t take the bastard to another world or let Piers kill him, how would Sophie ever be safe?

Desperation filled him. Piers prided himself on solving problems, but he didn’t know how to solve this. All the book learning and battle experience of his life couldn’t free Sophie from a man protected by the Fates.

Nevertheless, he took a menacing step toward Novalight. “How do you like being faced with someone bigger and scarier?” he ground out. “Think about how Sophie felt when you sent your men after her again and again.”

Novalight hyperventilated, sucking in blood and half choking on it as he backed toward the door.

Glaring at Piers, Athena cocked out a jean-clad hip and flicked her hand toward the scientist. “Now I have to fix that.”

Fury and confusion clashed like cymbals in Piers’s head. Who was this goddess? Not the Athena he…really didn’t know. He stopped in his tracks.

A noise clicked behind Novalight, the door flew open, and Sophie burst into the room.

“No!” Piers shouted.

“Yes!” Athena clapped.

“You!” Novalight grabbed her and dragged her against his chest.

Piers reacted on pure instinct. He freed Sophie from Novalight’s hold with a sharp downward strike, spun her out of the way, and threw the man against the wall so hard the son of a Cyclops shattered the plaster and dropped.

“Ugh. Now I have to fix that.” Athena scowled at him again. “And the bathroom. You’re in Attica now, so you need to get something through your thick, Thalyrian, he-man-warrior head. Destruction and maiming: bad. Piers and Sophie live happily ever after: good.”

“But…” Piers’s heart pounded. He kept an eye on the unconscious Novalight as he reached for Sophie. “Call a god, lose a soul. One of us…” He gripped Sophie tighter, whispering to her, “You shouldn’t have come back.”

“I had to.” She wrapped her arms around him. “I couldn’t just leave you.”

“You should’ve.” Athena wasn’t the only danger here. There was Novalight—not that Sophie had known that.

Athena fluffed her hair. “The Fates say I can’t have Novalight—although I think he’d make a fun tool for Hephaestus or good target practice for Artemis. Lucky for you both: different place, different rules.” Her mouth quirked up. “I’m not technically bound to take a soul from Attica. Thalyria is the only place where that rule is set in stone. People there wanted Olympians to intervene entirely too much. It was getting out of hand and had to be controlled.”

Shock and cautious hope tightened every muscle in Piers’s body. Summoning had definitely been controlled. Those scrolls had been buried. And the information half lost and easily misunderstood.