Silence consumed the room. I almost covered my mouth, so no one could hear my sharp intake of breath. I heard the ticking of someone’s watch and was surprised they even wore one. Every tick got louder and louder until I thought my eardrums would burst.
Then Zeus smiled and clapped his hands together, the sound like thunder, rattling the stones of the foundation of the building. “Now, let’s get you settled into your dorms. Also, there’s going to be a big party for you in the great hall later, so you can eat, drink, and be merry.” His smile grew even wider. “Because come tomorrow, your training will start.”
Two other people appeared at the top of the stairs. A man who looked like he just walked off the front page of GQ magazine—short, thick dark hair swept up off his face, chiseled face, cheekbones that could cut glass, a full set of lips made for kissing, and piercing blue eyes framed by dark, square-shaped glasses. He wore a tight turtleneck accentuating all his muscles and simple dark jeans that I imagined hugged a perfect behind. Every girl, even a few guys, swooned at the sight of him. Me included. This had to be Eros.
His female counterpart was equally as attractive—long, dark beach waves, sultry brown eyes, full lips painted red, high cheekbones, regal nose. She wore a simple red dress hugging full breasts and shapely hips. Her long, sculpted legs were perfectly presented in red heels. I suspected she was named Psyche. Every male’s gaze was riveted on her.
Smiling, she gestured with her hand to her left. “If the boys would please follow me, I will direct you to your dorm rooms.”
There was a mad rush up the stairs. I got jostled by the two boys who had been standing behind me.
“Ladies, if you will come with me.” Eros grinned. “I’ll show you to your dorms.”
Another mad rush up the stairs, this time with a bit of pushing and shoving as girls tried to get to the front of the line and closest to Eros. I was happy to follow along in the back of the pack. Although Eros definitely ticked all my attraction boxes, I wasn’t here to fall in love, despite the fact that I couldn’t get mystery guy’s face out of my head.
As we walked through the long, wide corridors of the living quarters of the academy, Eros chatted casually about the party we would be attending later and how much fun it would be.
“There will be all kinds of amazing food there. And Dionysus is an epic DJ. He helped Daft Punk get their start years ago.” He looked left to right suspiciously, then leaned in toward the group. “He used to party with Mozart way back when, but you didn’t hear it from me.”
One of the girls at the front giggled. “Are you going to be there?”
He gave her a disarming smile. “I might be. Maybe you can save me a dance?”
She giggled again, and I thought for sure she was going to pass out. The girl next to her had to put a hand on her arm to brace her from falling.
“So, here we are, ladies. Your dorm rooms. They aren’t assigned, so pick a room as quickly as you can. You don’t want to be the odd one out, or you’ll have to share a room with Medusa. And she’s not very friendly.”
Everyone darted to their left or right and into the rooms on either side. There was some shoving near the rooms closest to the stairs, so I hightailed it down the hallway away from everyone else and dashed into a dark room, hoping maybe I’d luck out and not have a roommate. I immediately toppled over whatever it was sitting in the middle of the floor.
“What the fu—”
“Oh, goodness, I’m so sorry.”
I sat up, squinting into the darkness. A shadowed form moved about on the floor then stood. Light suddenly flooded the room, and I peered up at a petite girl with short red hair.
I scrambled to my feet. “What were you doing on the floor?”
“Talking to him.” She held up a tiny brown mouse by the tail. “I was telling him he needed to find another place to live.”
That was when I noticed the state of the room. Cobwebs covered each corner, both ceiling and floor. Dust coated everything else, including the small desk by the grimy window and the two beds that were stacked up on one another along one wall. And I didn’t even want to identify the tiny pebbles on the floor. Considering this girl was holding up a tiny rodent, I didn’t have to try too hard to figure it out.
She must’ve seen the disgust on my face. “It’ll be nice once we clean it up and fix the beds.” She held out her other hand to me. “I’m Georgina Thrace, by the way.”
“Melany Richmond.” After we shook hands, I took off my backpack and set it down on the floor, glancing around. “I wonder where we’ll find a broom.”
She smiled.
An hour later, we’d cleaned the room and made our respective beds. Georgina proved to be incredibly strong and pretty much did all the heavy lifting when it came to organizing where our beds were going to go. I was surprised, considering she looked more chubby than sturdy.
Once we were done, I felt my stomach growl. I didn’t even know what time it was, as my phone didn’t seem to be working any longer. I didn’t know if it was because it got water damaged or if it was this place. We sure weren’t in Kansas anymore.
“I’m starving. Do you want to go down to this party and get some food?”
Georgina nodded. “I could most definitely eat.”
We left our room and followed some of the other girls who looked like they were making their way to the great hall, wherever that was. Eros left out that detail when he was giving us the quick tour. But as soon as we went down the large stone staircase, we heard the thumping strains of dance music.
We wound our way through empty rooms and hallways toward the sound. The moment we turned the corner of one hallway, there was no mistaking where the party was. The end of the corridor opened up into a cavernous hall made from dark gray stone with a domed ceiling, held up by stone pillars with decorative inlays.
The hall was packed with people. Both new recruits and other students I assumed were second and third year, milled about, talking and laughing. I marveled at it all. I’d never experienced anything like it. Every big party Callie ever had at her house paled in comparison.
My stomach growled again, reminding me of my initial goal. To eat. I looked around for any tables that had food on them but didn’t see any immediately. What I did see were small wooden robots rolling around the room on wheels. They each carried a tray with some kind of food on it. I made a bee-line straight for one that had tiny sandwiches.
In my haste, I nearly knocked it over, as I grabbed four sandwiches and shoved them into my mouth. I looked down at the wooden server. Its beady-eyed gaze was on me; I swore there was judgment in that look, which was impossible as it wasn’t even alive. I made a grab for one more sandwich before it rolled away from me.
I walked through the party, taking in the people bouncing to the music. It wasn’t what I normally liked; I usually went for something a bit more thrashy, a whole lot more metal, but it was decent. My social skills were non-existent, so I kept to the outskirts of the festivity, preferring to watch then do. But my gaze honed in on a pretty black girl being ruthlessly and relentlessly hit on in one of the corners of the room.
Her body language screamed, “Go away!” but the guy wasn’t listening. And he was big, too. Muscular, tall, he loomed over her, leering like a creep, trying to touch her long, dark curls. I didn’t like the situation one bit. I moved closer to gauge what was going on.
“Please, leave me alone. I told you I don’t want to dance.” She tried to step around him, but he got in her way.
“We could go out into the courtyard and make out then, if you don’t want to dance.”
She tried to push past him again, but this time he grabbed her arm. Hell no. Not on my watch.
“She told you to leave her alone.” I moved in to stand beside the girl. “You either don’t understand English or you’re stupid.”
“Mind your own business.” As he scowled down at me, I realized just how big he was.
“Okay, so you speak English fine, so I guess you’re just stupid then.”