Hunted (The Iron Druid Chronicles, Book Six)

Artemis—I untucked the head from my arm and held it in both hands.
    Diana’s eyes were closed and her mouth hung open. I lightly slapped one cheek to see if I got a reaction, even reflexive. Nothing. I shut her jaw and it fell back open.
    Being careful to continue speaking Old Irish, I asked over my shoulder, “How is your goddess doing?”
    “She’s fine. I mean, she looks more than a little angry, but she’s alive. Yours?”
    “Well, we may have a problem.” I cast magical sight and saw that the white glow of Diana’s power was gone. So was her entire aura. She appeared to be truly dead. “Hold up your head for me?” I asked. I craned my neck around and saw that Artemis still shone with energy. “Okay, thanks.”
    Diana had none of that anymore, and it dawned on me that my cold iron aura must have slowly snuffed out the magic that was keeping her alive. It hadn’t been quick, like the nearly instant disintegration of faeries when they touched me, but a gradual process that required prolonged contact. The question that worried me was whether she was forever done or if she would beable to begin anew at Olympus, an idea of virtue and ambrosia made flesh. Had I unwittingly turned her mortal, in other words, or was she only
mostly
dead?
    The longer I lingered there the greater chance that a divine observer would figure out what happened—if they didn’t know already. Thinking back to his reaction before he flew away, Mercury might have figured it out. I hoped not. It would be best if the Olympians didn’t know I could do this.
    Tucking her head back under my arm as if nothing had changed, I said, “Let’s go, but you run a bit ahead. I don’t want Artemis to see what happened.”
    Granuaile resumed running but called over her shoulder, “Is she toast?”
    “Tough to say. I think we’ll get some kind of reaction from Olympus soon. If they come for Artemis, bust her head before you let them have it.”
    “Ugh. Seems wrong somehow.”
    “You mean now that she’s helpless? It’s not murder if you can’t kill her. It’s more like redistributing her consciousness. Only other gods can kill them.”
    “Unless you just did it.”
    “Right. Aside from cutting off her head, though, I didn’t really mean to kill her.”
    Granuaile laughed. “You know I’m on your side, but to an objective listener, that sounds like a less than convincing argument.”
    “I know. We’ll have to wait and see.”
    As we crossed into Belgium and wove a sinuous path through farms and villages and around cities, occasionally earning a honk from a driver who spotted us along a rural road, storm clouds gathered overhead, darkening the Belgian morning commute.
    “Hmm. I think Zeus and Jupiter have received our message. We can expect their reply shortly.”
    “What do you think they’ll say?”
    “I don’t think they’ll say anything.”
    “Then how is it a reply?”
    Two thunderbolts lanced down from the clouds above and struck us. Our fulgurite talismans provided protection, but the sentiment was unmistakable.
    “That’s their reply,” I said, and it was nothing more than I expected. But what followed was completely unexpected.
     Oberon said, running behind us, but it wasn’t in time to prevent Hermes and Mercury from swooping in behind us and batting the heads out of our arms with their caduceus … es? Caducei? Who has ever had to deal with more than one caduceus before?
    Neither head popped up helpfully and allowed the messenger gods to scoop them up on the fly. They dropped at our feet, merely dislodged, and tumbled along as we slowed to pick them back up. We couldn’t let Hermes and Mercury escape with the heads intact; for one thing, they’d find out for sure what had happened to Diana. For another, they’d be able to put Artemis back together fairly quickly and then she’d be only an hour or so behind us. I was already carrying Fragarach in my right hand, so it was a simple matter to shuck it out of its scabbard and halve Diana’s head before Mercury could circle around to pick it up. It was not so simple for Granuaile, however, to take care of Artemis. Hermes was a bit quicker on his second pass—or else the head had rolled a bit farther from her feet—and it was all Granuaile could do to fight him off with her staff and prevent him from picking it up. She was probably thirty yards ahead, and if I went to help we’d have Mercury trying to get involved too. I had to keep my