InsaneJournal

As summer beat down, the temptation to become fully nocturnal came with it, and with fewer vital daytime demands on her attention now that Kaden and Marcie were safely out of the city, Hecate slept through most of the sunlight hours.

Most of them. She had spent last night in the room Kaden had been staying in, giving it a proper cleanse in the final stages of the waning moon, and fallen asleep on the bed once it was done. Late in the afternoon, however, her phone buzzed insistently, a message from reception to say she had a very twitchy looking visitor who wouldn't stop pacing the foyer, and should she ask him to leave?

No, Hecate replied. She'd come down. Twitchy sounded like it could be trouble.

But the elevator doors, as they opened, parted to reveal Much. Twitchy and pacing, yes, but not a threatening kind of trouble. He spotted her immediately and came over, a strong, unsettled kind of energy about him. "Hi, good afternoon, hi, can we talk? I bought you a - I didn't know what to bring you but I remembered you liked these and - here-" he passed her a box of animal crackers, looking awkward about it, and only a little less awkward when she smiled.

"Come upstairs," she said, and he joined her in the elevator, letting out a long breath as the doors closed. Hecate gave him a measuring look as he glanced at her shoulders, bare beneath the thin straps of her sleep-wrinkled dress, then looked away. She recognized the twitchiness; she was quite used to seeing people who were struggling with being pulled in multiple directions.

There was a small fridge in her office, and she went straight to it, pulling out a pitcher of icy mint tea and pouring them both a glass. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing!" Much had grabbed a crystal ball to fiddle with while she poured, and passed it back and forth between his hands. "I mean, yet. Marcie - well, you know where Marcie is, obviously - okay, when she left, she said, keep an eye on stuff, so, I'm keeping an eye on stuff. Apollo, I mean. Ares. That lot. And I know - everything you've done for her, well, she trusts you, which means I can, I reckon, which means, we should work together, you know? Make sure no one gets a whiff of where she is. Or... Anything. I figure, we're on surveillance. Olympian surveillance. I mean, not all of them. Ares and Apollo. Them mainly. Don't wanna turn our backs. I promised, right? I wanna make sure I know what they're up to without, uh-"

Hecate tucked both feet up underneath her, letting him unspool all his tangled words, only stepping in when he tripped over them. "Without them noticing they're being watched?"

"Yeah that," Much looked at the crystal ball in his hand. "Does this work?"

"It won't help you spy on Olympians, if that is what you really mean. It is very good at holding down paperwork when I have the windows open."

"Oh," Much set the ball back down on its papers. His eyes flicked back up to her, traced along the line of her collarbones and the small black and silver charm on a ribbon at her throat, only for a moment before he yanked his gaze away. “You’re not going to Clio’s barbecue, you said? I’m going. Apollo’s going. I’ll keep an eye on him then. Ares isn’t invited. I don’t know how to track Ares. Do you? I mean, can you?”

“I have an eye on Ares,” Hecate inclined her head. “And Apollo.”

“Oh, okay, good. I mean, good. As many eyes as possible is good, right? I just don’t want anything to happen to her. To them. They’ve both been through enough. Fuck,” he raked his hand through his hair, gripping it tight for a moment, eyes wide and staring at something he’d invented inside his own mind.

“Drink your tea,” Hecate suggested, and Much looked at the glass in front of him like he’d never seen a glass before, before grabbing it with both of his hands. If she’d known he was coming, she might have tried to stir some focus into it. Mint had such an active energy and that seemed to be one thing Much didn’t need help with.

He had a number of ideas about different ways to track the gods, most of them involving a degrees of recklessness Hecate tried to calm because she could see exactly where it was heading, and Marcie didn’t need to come home to another death. There was something bigger at play in his motivation, Hecate could see that, but not what it was. The need to protect Marcie was part of it, and genuine. The desire to go up against an opponent (or two) more powerful than himself certainly played a part too. A very real anger at Apollo and the things he’d been allowed to get away with. The inability to sit back and let someone else do all the work. He kept looking at his watch like the big hand was dragging him toward some fate, too.

Maybe there was more, but the inner workings of Much’s mind weren’t one of her concerns.

With the reassurance that yes, she was watching for danger from Ares and Apollo, Much left well before evening, and Hecate twisted her hair into a loose, fat bun, and stepped out onto the street too. Now that she was up, it seemed a good opportunity to get a few more things done.



From across the street, Hecate watched Ariadne step out of her office and rearrange her satchel where it hung heavy across her shoulder. She waved a goodbye to someone staying behind, and started to jog away, but paused as she felt a tingle up the back of her neck, and slowly turned around to scan the street, her eyes falling on Hecate.

It took a moment or two before recognition dawned, and Ariadne’s face lit up as she ran to close the distance and threw her arms around Hecate. “Hex! Hasn’t it been forever!?”

“A few years,” Hecate agreed, as Ariadne pulled back to examine her.

“I haven’t heard much gossip about you, which means neither has Dion, which means there’s either nothing to tell or shedloads,” Ariadne said. “I’m leaning toward shedloads. What’s new, pussycat?”

“I have a favour to ask you,” Hecate said, offering Ariadne the box of animal crackers she’d been snacking on. It piqued Ariadne’s curiosity, and her appetite, and she took a little yellow lion and fell into step beside Hecate. “I read the transcript of the paper you presented last year at the Boston conference for Sports Psychology, very worthwhile,” she said, and Ariadne readjusted a little bit more – somehow, it was easier to slip from her mortal, psychologists world into the world of the gods than back again.

“The trauma and dance one?” Ariadne asked. Gods above and below, so much had happened since she wrote that paper. “I found another incredible study I should have added to that one, but, of course, months after the conference. I can send it to you if you like. That’s not the favour, though?”

“That’s not the favour,” Hecate’s dark eyes searched Ariadne’s, the bright blue of the Aegean in the sun, and behind it, all those dark and twisted corners. “I have a woman in my care who needs help,” she said. “Her exposure to the world of immortals was violent and traumatic, she needs someone to talk who who understands some of the things you understand.”

“Specifically?”

“Tyrannical fathers. A youth locked in captivity. That solid gem of stubbornness that refuses to feel guilty for killing to survive. The complexity wrapped around all of it.”

Ariadne gave her a look. The look said fucking hell, Hecate, you don’t pull your punches.

“She’s mortal,” Hecate continued. “Though her father is not. Thirty years she was raised in his manor, and only a short while ago she fought her way out, with a bullet through her father’s forehead.”

“Yikes,” said Ariadne.

“Yikes,” Hecate agreed. “When he returned to life some weeks later, I managed to find her before he did. Now she’s in hiding, and trying to come to terms with everything she has survived while she prepares to birth a child she does not want. She needs a therapist who isn’t going to call her crazy when she talks about her dead father still hunting her down.”

“Yeah, yeah course she does.” A heavy cloud had passed over Ariadne’s eyes, the solemnity with which she looked at Hecate made Hecate sure she’d made the right choice. “It’ll have to be in secret, though. I’m not officially qualified, if anyone finds out, I’ll lose my license before they even give it to me.”

“Of course it’s in secret,” Hecate said, with a soft, yet wry twist of a smile. That was her whole life, keeping secrets.

“Can I ask who her father is? And where he is now?” It felt like a fair question, even though Ariadne already knew she would do it. Still, she wouldn’t go blindly in.

“Caligula,” said Hecate, her voice grim and firm as dirt packed down over a grave. “And he’s dead, again. He won’t be back for some weeks more.”

Yikes, thought Ariadne again, shaking her head. “I’ll share my calendar with you,” she said, with a definitive nod. “We can figure out a good time to start.”



Night had fallen properly by the time Hecate finished walking across the Brooklyn Bridge, pausing for a long stare down into the river. She felt the great pull of it, down there in the dark, the dangerous swirls, the killer undercurrents. Above, the whole sky had clouded over, and the hot air crackled with another approaching thunderstorm.

She had her eye on Apollo, yes, and Ares too. They were the obvious threats to Kaden’s safety, and to Marcie’s by association (Hecate put little faith in their truce, fearing that the first sign of it snapping would be something irreparable, like a neck) but there was a third threat here, a more unpredictable one, whose silence made Hecate warier with each passing night.

Melpomene looked at her flatly when she opened her door. She was not an easy muse to surprise at the best of times, and Melpomene was clearly not at her best. Her skin was very pale, aside from the shadows that gathered under her eyes, and her thick hair hung in a loose and wild halo around her face and shoulders, making the woman inside the halo look very small indeed. “What do you want?” her usually sharpened voice had a bluntness to it, too.

“Simply to check in on you both,” Hecate said, letting her eyes drop to the baby in Melpomene’s arms. Telos looked back at her, his eyes as bright and alert as his mothers were not. “Have a biscuit,” she offered the box of animal crackers, its supplies dwindling now.

Melpomene’s brow furrowed, but she reached in and pulled out a blue rhino, looking at it for a long moment like it could be an omen, before putting it into her mouth. As she moved, Hecate caught sight of her hands and the look of them rang an alarm; a faint but wide, greenish bruise coloured her palm, and her skin was red and sore looking. “What have you done?” she asked gently, and Melpomene curled her hands protectively around Telos’ back.

“My hands are not made for cleaning,” she said, something of her old sharpness reappearing in her eyes. “Only that.”

“Only that,” Hecate replied, her voice just as a gentle as if she believed her. Pushing seemed unwise. Pushing seemed like the perfect way to get herself forcibly removed. “Why don’t I bring you some balm, to sooth your skin. It will help.”

“Will it,” Melpomene said, tersely. “I can survive sore hands, Hecate.” Telos laughed then, reaching out toward Hecate, and Melpomene visibly softened, pressing her lips lightly against his dark hair. Hecate stepped a little closer, so he could grab at the stropholos hanging around her neck, and smiled as well as he yanked on it, hard.

“He’s so strong,” she said, watching him mouth at her necklace.

“Count yourself lucky those fists aren’t aiming at your face,” Melpomene said, with the faintest of smiles, and rearranged her heavy son in her arms.

“I shall,” Hecate said, lifting her eyes to Melpomene’s face instead. “Is he healthy, then? Is he happy?”

It took Melpomene a long moment to reply. “When he’s not eating, he’s laughing,” she said, a haunted look about her Hecate couldn’t precisely put her finger on. “So yes, and yes.”

“I’ll give him my blessings anyway,” Hecate lifted her hand to stroke his back under the tight cotton singlet he was wearing, the warmth of his little summer body radiating through. “And take another cookie or two, Melpomene. You look like you’re fading away.”

Melpomene exhaled a short puff of air through her nose. “Trust me,” she said dryly. “Nothing in this apartment is fading away.”