Goddess (Starcrossed)

thinking?”
    “That this is my fight, not yours. Not Lucas’s. Not Hector’s. Mine ,” Helen said, standing up and facing Orion. “I was trying to fight for myself.”
    “You realize that’s not how these things are done, don’t you? We choose champions for a reason—because if you die, we lose. I thought you understood that.”
    “Yes, I do. Helen of Troy had no choice but to sit back and let other people fight for her, and we all know how well that worked out for Troy,” she said pointedly. Orion shut his mouth and turned to the armory.
    “You’re really pissing me off, Helen,” he said, undoing his belt and yanking off his clothes, stripping down so he could get into his armor. Helen moved quickly to help him.
    “I know I am,” she replied, pulling down Orion’s white breastplate. “Because I’m too chicken to do what I really have to do.”
    “And what’s that?” he asked, holding out his arms for Helen to tie his breastplate at the sides. Cassandra appeared at Helen’s elbow, the bracelet Orion made her tinkling prettily. “Kitty, what are you still doing here?” Orion asked her impatiently as if he’d just noticed her presence.
    “I—” she started.
    “Go home to Noel and Kate. This place is too dangerous for you,” he scolded. Cassandra wavered, about to put down the gauntlets she carried, but Helen grabbed her hand and stopped her.
    “Cassandra is here to be close to you so she doesn’t prophesy,” Helen reminded him. She fumbled with the ties on Orion’s armor for a moment and quickly threw up her hands. “And she’s here to dress you. I have no idea how these dratted things are put on.”
    Helen backed off and let Cassandra do what she so obviously wanted to do. Touch Orion. He didn’t even look at her.
    “So, keep going. I’m dying to hear what is it you’re ‘too chicken’ to do,” Orion said with a doubtful look, like he didn’t really believe Helen could be chicken about anything.
    “Make myself immortal,” Helen replied, her voice breaking. “And not mostly immortal—not immortal except for one tiny clause where I can let myself off the hook in a jillion years if I get sick of it all—but really, honestly, till-the-stars-wink-out immortal so I can fight Zeus one-on-one. I don’t want to be immortal.” Helen felt tears sting the backs of her eyes. “I’m terrified of forever.”
    Orion broke away from Cassandra like she wasn’t there and hugged Helen.
    “Okay, yeah. That would terrify me, too,” Orion said, holding her gently so he didn’t crush her against his armor.
    Helen opened her eyes as Orion held her and saw Cassandra staring at them, her blue eyes wide and glassy with hurt. Helen pulled away from Orion and put some distance between them. How could Orion be so insensitive to Cassandra?
    Did he simply not like her? Helen knew that wasn’t true. He was genuinely fond of his “little Kitty”—he just didn’t see her as a woman. Yes, she was a bit young for him at the moment, but there was still something weird about how he couldn’t seem to see inside her the way he could with other people. Like the Fates can’t see through him, she thought. Aeneas was a son of Aphrodite, but he never suspected Cassandra of Troy loved him, either.
    Helen realized that the Fates must hide Cassandra from Orion in much the same way that Nemesis hid Orion from the Fates.
    “Why do you have to become immortal in the first place?” he asked, interrupting Helen’s train of thought and bringing her back to the more pressing situation.
    “To make it my fight. Like it should have been right from the start,” Helen mumbled, rubbing the palms of her hands against her jeans nervously.
    They heard noises outside the tent—the sound of their army returning. Helen heard Scions from the House of Rome saying, “He’s dead! Tantalus is dead! The gods have no champions left!”
    But Helen knew the gods would not be beaten so easily. They would unleash every storm, every earthquake, and every tidal wave at their disposal before they allowed Helen to walk away with a win.
    “Who killed him?” Orion shouted happily, striding to the entrance of the tent.
    “My mother,” Helen answered behind him. She ran and grabbed him by the shoulders before he could join his men in celebration. “Orion. Don’t let Poseidon destroy this island. Fight his earthquakes, and fight the tidal waves. Are you strong enough to take him on like that?”
    “I’ll try,” Orion said,