Free Mightiest of Swords (The Inkwell Trilogy Book 1) by Aaron Buchanan Page A

house, I could have been the one to give away its existence for all I knew.
    I put that aside: Apollo was no more a target than Zeus or Hermes or even Marduk or Osiris, for that matter.  Athena as a target would make sense, because removing her would cripple the gods’ abilities to care for themselves, but this was something else.
    “It was a test. A trial run, if you will. Apollo was just to see if the pyramid worked as a weapon against the gods.” I found myself on the edge of my—I believed a Queen Anne—chair.
    “I am so very glad you father named you after me. You are as clever as he boasted,” Athena declared, sounding genuinely pleased.
    “So, if Apollo isn’t the end game, then some other god—or gods—are.” My dad had locked the pyramid away for safe-keeping and I let someone make off with it. I felt guilty and responsible. On one hand, I might have spared Apollo the indignity of what most who lived at Solemn Ages were forced to endure. On the other hand, it was sad and senseless; it did not matter by what one set his or her moral compass: it was murder.
    “Assuredly. This means all my kind are in grievous peril.” Athena paced the room, clearly agitated. “I am not at all be sure if we are the targets, but we must presume that we are based on the evidence we have. I am certain that these are not just arithmancers looking to make a name for themselves.”
    “My love, what you are saying is unthinkable! The magoi have remained on the fringes for nearly 500 years. Why would this man want to kill the foundations of belief for so many in this world?” The man’s voice was gravelly, yet louder than at any point since entering the apartment.
    “Yes, Dio, the arithmancers wish to carry this out,” Athena spoke directly to her male companion. “To what end, I cannot yet say.” Now there was despair in her voice. It had been there the entire time, but her elation at getting to finally meet me face-to-face covered it up. The idea that someone would set out to murder gods was something she understandably found very burdensome. Many of her peers would not be able to understand the danger. And if Athena had been the one murdered, this place—Solemn Ages—would disappear.
    This realization was like a new layer of gravity was suddenly placed upon the earth. It was heavy and the comfortable chair in which I sat was suddenly much less comfortable.
    “So, what do we do?” Joy spoke, breaking the pregnant silence in the room.
    “As you by now recognize, Grey, your father kept the pyramid in the vault for a reason and are now learning why that was the case. We have to find this arithmancer and his apprentice and put an end to them.” The voice was authoritative, and one again, louder than I expected. It was Dio.
    Shred finally chimed in, “I’m not sure what his motivations are, other than the obvious.”
    “Like, is he just trying to go all John Lennon/Imagine?” Joy asked, I assumed rhetorically. “‘And no religion too?’”
    Shred, apparently, could not help himself as he followed up Joy’s quote with his own rendition of Yoo-hoo-ooo-a-ooo , but moving on as if it were just a compulsion. “Could there be something else going on?” Shred asked. I thought I could make out him rubbing his stubble from wherever he sat. Or stood.
    “Grey has mentioned an end game. We cannot yet conceive what that might be.” Athena stood nearer to me, pacing close by. “But we do know the culprit. We know where that he lives in Cambridge, England. He might think he is safe enough to return there.”
    “If I were him, there is no way I go back, but someone should go check it out. Treat it like a crime scene,” I add.
    “Someone should go. I will go.” Dio’s voice sounded like it was coming from the same direction as Athena’s. I imagined his arm around Athena’s shoulders.
    “I’ll do it. I’ll go check out his flat in Cambridge,” Shred volunteered. “Put my ears to the ground. Buy some beer, tickle