“Bring a soul out of its eternal rest and return it to the land of the living.”

Nick wasn’t stupid enough to buy what she was selling. “At what price?”

“An act of loyalty to us. You bring Kyrian’s child Marissa down to Kalosis and we will return your mother to this world.”

Still, he was skeptical. “You can’t do that.”

Satara gave him a smug smile. “Kratos. A demonstration, please.”

Before Nick could move, the Dream-Hunter touched him. His grip seared Nick’s skin, making it burn and crawl as images tore through him. He saw his mother in a garden, surrounded by roses. Her shoulder-length blond hair was glistening in the light while she laughed at a group of children who were playing around her.

A tear slid down his cheek as he saw her kind face again. “Mom,” he whispered.

His mother cocked her head as if she could hear him. “My Nicky,” she breathed. “I miss you.”

“I can take you into the Underworld,” the Dream-Hunter said. “But it won’t be easy.” He released Nick and the image of his mother instantly vanished.

Nick struggled to breathe. “How do I know I can trust you?”

Kratos shrugged. “I have no emotions. I only do as I’m told. Betrayal is for those who have something to gain.”

It was true. The Dream-Hunters had been cursed by Zeus to feel nothing.

Satara smiled at him. “It’s too soon, Nick. I know. You go home now and rest. When you’re ready to have your mother back, bring Marissa to us.”

He nodded before he turned back and did what she said.

Satara narrowed her eyes as Nick vanished from sight. He was being rather willful, but they could still control him. He needed their blood to live, and so long as they had him tied down, there was nothing he could do to escape.

At least nothing that didn’t involve him begging Acheron for help, and that was the last thing Nick would do, thanks to her and her half-truths about Acheron and his powers.

“You know I can’t bring his mother back.” Kratos said.

She scoffed at him. “Of course not. We get Marissa, and both he and his mother can roast in their hell for all I care. But you are another matter. I want you in his dreams, every night, working on him. He has enough anger to feed you well, my Skotos. Play on that anger. Build it higher until he’s willing to do anything to free his mother and kill Acheron.”

She saw the hesitation in Kratos’s eyes.

She curled her lip. “Oh, don’t tell me you’re going to be a wuss, too. I’m sick to death of weak men around me.”

He grabbed her and shoved her against the wall. “I’m not weak, Satara. You’d do well to remember that.”

She tsked at him. “For a god with no emotions, you seem rather testy.”

He released her. “I’m siphoning off you and your hatred. Even in this realm, it’s pungent.”

“Leave my hatred alone. I don’t want it diminished. Remember, Dream-Hunter, I’m a god, too. Fuck with me and I’ll bring down the wrath of Zeus on you.”

He scoffed at her. “You’re only a demigod, and a servant at that.”

“But dear old Grandpa Zeus will take an audience with me and then he’ll take your head. Are you willing to chance that?”

He took a step back and gave her a look that let her know she should be on guard while sleeping in the future.

“Just do your part, Kratos, and I’ll do mine. The Oneroi don’t monitor the dreams of Daimons. You help me keep Nick turned against Acheron and I will give you a playground unimagined by your brethren.”

Kratos swallowed at her promise. Three weeks ago, he’d been one of the Oneroi. A servant of the gods who protected humans and immortals while they slept. Then Satara had summoned him in her dreams and had turned him Skoti. She’d seduced him with her body and made him crave emotions like a drug. Now he couldn’t stand the emptiness of his existence. He only wanted to feel, and he was willing to do anything to keep his newfound emotions.

She was right. His kind didn’t prey on Daimons, and if they were half as enticing as her then he would have a banquet at his fingertips.

And all he had to do was feed the Dark-Hunter’s anger and grief. Simple.

“It’s a deal, Satara. You give me what I need and I’ll give you what you want.”

She smiled. What she wanted was simple. Nick Gautier’s loyalty and the baby Marissa. With those two things, she could bring down both the Greek and the Atlantean pantheons.

Then she would be a god and she would make Apollymi look weak.

And Nick, Acheron, and Kratos would be her eternal slaves, as would all of mankind.

WHERE ANGELS FEAR TO TREAD

1

From humble beginnings come great things.

Zeke Jacobson rolled his eyes as he read the strip of paper he’d just fished out of his broken fortune cookie. “Well, you can’t get more humble than me,” he muttered as the phone rang.

His stomach clenching in dread of the latest complaint, he picked up the receiver and glanced around his pale gray cube walls. This drab soul-sucking hellhole was where he spent an average of fifty hours a week in absolute effing misery. There were times when he swore he could hear his life ticking away with every swipe of the second hand on the Transformers clock his sister had given him years ago.

Optimus Prime stared at him from his perch next to Zeke’s gloomy gray monitor, mocking him with a childhood memory of how he’d thought his life would be once he was a grown-up.

This was definitely not his dream.

He sighed and reached for his vat of Tums. “Good afternoon. Taylor Transportation. Claims Division. Zeke speaking. How may I help you?” The worst part of the job? He sometimes heard those words even in his sleep.

The irate woman on the other end laid into him over the fact he’d rejected her dubious claim that their delivery truck had mowed down her mailbox and kept going. If she’d spoken to the driver the way she was speaking to him, she was lucky the driver hadn’t mowed her down first.

Her voice held that high-pitched nasal quality that went down a man’s spine like a shredder. “You’re a pathetic idiot if you don’t believe your driver did that.”

Zeke didn’t speak as she continued shrieking at him.

And for the glorious honor of being bitched at constantly, and the esteemed title of Claims Investigator, he’d given up five years of his life as he went to college, worked three shitty jobs, created a debt his great-grandkids would curse him over, and got the holy honor of MBA. More Bullshit Allowed. Unlike his more intelligent counterparts, he’d actually studied and had graduated with honors, thinking he’d have a bright future…

Yeah, this was his life and he hated every minute of it.

Well, not every, single minute. But enough that he dreaded what more wondrous developments the future would hold.

Where oh where is that Pink Power Ranger babe who was supposed to kidnap me and make me part of her merry band?

When he’d dreamed of his future, never once had he seen himself sitting in a cube ten hours a day having people yell at him, while he glibly took it for fear of losing his gargantuan thirty-thou-a-year salary.

The highlights of his life? Drinking beer and playing basketball on the weekends with his friends.

Damn, the woman’s right. I am a pathetic idiot.

“Are you even listening to me?” she droned.

“Yes, ma’am. I understand what you’re saying. But there’s no evidence that our driver did that. I have a sworn statement from him that he didn’t hit the mailbox.”

“Fuck you, you stupid bastard!”

“Yes, ma’am. You have a good day, too.”

She slammed the phone down hard enough for it to ring in his ear.

Hanging it up, Zeke groaned before he put his head to his laminated desk and beat it against the cold, granite-looking finish. Maybe I’ll get a concussion…

The phone rang again.

He lifted his head to glare at Optimus Prime. It was only eleven in the morning. Was it too much to ask for one little brain aneurysm?

Just one.

His stomach churning, he picked the phone up and repeated his work litany.

“Am I speaking to Ezekiel Malachi Jacobson?”

Zeke cringed at the name his grandfather, a devout Baptist preacher, had cursed him, the only grandson, with at birth. God, how he hated hearing all that said at once. It was a name that had gotten his ass kicked on many an occasion at school. It had even caused one college roommate to move out of his dorm room before Zeke arrived.

Really, I’m not an escapee from Children of the Corn. I’ve only thought about mutilating me. Not others.

“That would be me.” God, don’t let this be someone I owe money to.

I did pay all my bills this month?

Right?

“My name is Robert West. I’m the attorney for your granduncle Michael Jacobson.”

Zeke scowled at the unfamiliar name. “Who?”

“He was your grandfather’s youngest brother.”

That was weird. He’d thought all of those relatives were long gone.

“I’m sad to say that your granduncle passed away a few weeks ago and named me as the executor of his will. Since he wasn’t married and didn’t have children, he’s left everything to you.”

Am I being punk’d? Like one of those Nigerian lottery e-mails?

“Left it to me? What about my sister?”

“He only named you, son.”

Oooo-kay… Zeke listened as the lawyer gave him more details about this mystery relative he’d never heard of before. Wow, and here he thought his life was insignificant.

Old Uncle What’s-his-face might be the only one to lead a more lonely and pathetic life than Zeke.

Yeah, this was what he needed. Confirmation of how awful his own future death would be.

And as the lawyer continued to talk, he was quite certain Optimus was laughing his Autobot ass off at this new form of hell that was being dumped on him.

2