Starcrossed

still in the process of growing back in, and Helen had to laugh at how ridiculous she looked. How Lucas had managed to keep a straight face while he looked at her when she was as gap-toothed as a six-year-old was beyond comprehension. Then she realized he must have seen it so many times that he barely noticed it. Helen thought about what Ariadne had said—that they had grown up “at each other’s throats.” As if summoned by Helen’s thoughts, Ariadne poked her head into the locker room to check in.
    “Do you need a hand healing?” she asked timidly.
    “No, but come on in,” Helen replied. Maybe she would get a chance to ask if Lucas still had a girlfriend somewhere. “How’s Cassandra?”
    “Overly sensitive, but she’ll be okay. You’re the one that got a Hector beat-down, and since I know what that feels like I’m going to ask you honestly—is anything still broken?” Ariadne glided into the locker room.
    “Nothing broken. Well, not anymore,” Helen replied. Everything about Ariadne was so feminine and round and lovely that Helen simply couldn’t imagine anyone hitting her. “Do you guys do this to each other often? The fighting, I mean.” Ariadne was shaking her head before Helen had even finished talking.
    “No. We spar together to stay in shape, but only the boys really fight, and only when they need to get something off their chests. Lucas and Hector do most of the fighting, obviously.”
    “They don’t get along, do they?”
    “Yes and no,” Ariadne began carefully. “Hector is really proud in general, but he’s especially proud of our ancestry and our family. He doesn’t like that we’ve fractured the House of Thebes. Don’t get me wrong—he doesn’t believe all that crap that the Hundred Cousins do, but he hates to see our House divided. And Lucas feels like it’s his responsibility to keep Hector in line because, well, he’s the only one who can.”
    “It must be really difficult being separated from the rest of your family,” Helen sympathized.
    “We don’t have a choice,” Ariadne said with a tight smile.
    “Is it because of the cult?” Helen asked delicately. “Lucas never got a chance to explain . . .”
    “Tantalus and the Hundred Cousins believe that if only one House exists, then they can raise Atlantis,” Ariadne said. “That’s why our family has always lived right on the water. Boston, Nantucket, Cádiz . . . They’re all near the Atlantic Ocean. Scions are drawn to it.”
    “That’s insane!” Helen blurted out before she realized that Ariadne was serious. “I mean, Atlantis is a myth, right?” The thought of a city existing somewhere, deep under the dark, smothering waves made Helen shudder involuntarily. She took a sip of her juice box to cover her violent reaction and waited for Ariadne to continue.
    “Is Mount Olympus a myth? Or heaven? It all depends on what you believe, and most Scions believe that Atlantis is real, but the problem is that we can’t get there until we accomplish a few things first. See, right after the Trojan War ended, there was a great prophecy made by Cassandra of Troy. She said that if only one Scion House remains, then we can raise Atlantis and claim it as our own land forever. The Hundred Cousins interpret that prophecy to mean that if we demigods earn our entrance into Atlantis then we will become immortal, just like the gods of Olympus.”
    “Wow,” Helen murmured. “Why wouldn’t you want that?”
    “Tempting, isn’t it? Except the problem is that if all four Houses unite, or if there is only one unified House left, then we would be breaking the Truce.”
    “What truce?”
    “The Truce that ended the Trojan War.”
    “I thought the Greeks won. Didn’t they kill all the Trojans and burn Troy to the ground?”
    “They certainly did.”
    “Then if the Greeks won, what do you need a Truce for?”
    “Right from the start, there was a third group that fought in the Trojan War.” Ariadne smiled at Helen’s puzzled look. “The gods. They chose sides, either with their half-human children or with heroes who had particularly pleased them. Some of the gods even came down from Olympus to fight in the war. They fought against each other , and they were deeply invested in the outcome. That complicated everything. The Scions on the Greek side ended up having to make a deal with Zeus.”
    Ariadne explained that the Trojan War was the most destructive war the ancients had ever seen. This was the first