Tempt the Stars

was back in a second, but not with food. But with a large potted fern in a bronze bucket, like the ones that framed the check-in desk. I don’t know what ferns had to do with the ambience, but Dante’s didn’t worry about little inconsistencies like that. Or about the fact that even hell wouldn’t have had that carpet.
    “Right. Here,” he repeated, slamming the fern down. And then he was gone again.
    I pushed fronds out of my face, since he’d set the thing directly in front of me, and checked out the party/ convention/random assembly of beautiful people that was happening. I didn’t know if Casanova was trying to attract a more well-heeled group by parading his off-duty employees in Gucci, or if there was something else going on. And, after a minute, I decided I didn’t care.
    I leaned my head back against the stalactite and closed my eyes. The room felt like it was spinning faster this way, but oddly, it made my stomach feel better. Which, of course, just meant that my brain woke up.
    It started crowding me with thoughts of all the things I could have asked tonight, instead of just sitting around chatting with Roger’s ghosts. But I’d been a little high and more than a little freaked-out, and they’d been hard to ignore. And then with Mother—
    Damn. My mother. I swallowed, and then I banged my head a few times against the rock, because it deserved it.
    I don’t know what I’d expected her to do. Welcome me with open arms? Shower me with kisses? Tell me she’d missed me?
    And yes, I realized. Some part of me
had
expected that, or it wouldn’t have hurt so much. Some stupid part, because of course she hadn’t missed me. She’d never had the chance. She hadn’t spent decades wondering, searching, dreaming. . . 
    And she’d given me what I asked for. Well, more or less. And it had been nothing like I’d expected.
    Not the information itself so much—after a week of contemplating breaking into hell, I’d been prepared for almost anything. But the fact that she hadn’t laughed at me, or told me I was crazy, or shot me in the butt . . . She’d just . . . told me.
    She’d given me what I needed to get up to some next-level shit without much of an argument at all. So, either she was seriously overestimating me, or . . . or maybe I actually had a shot at this? Maybe she saw something in me I didn’t? Maybe . . 
    Maybe she thought the best way to get rid of me was to give me what I wanted and let me figure out for myself that it was nuts.
    I didn’t know. I had this weird feeling that I knew less about my parents now than I had before. I sure
understood
less.
    Like my father. I supposed the truth—if I’d even gotten the truth—was better than the rumors I’d heard, but it was no less bizarre. What was an ancient goddess doing with the magical version of a con man? And what had he been doing with the Black Circle?
    He’d needed power, he said. But for what? Because a couple of ghosts couldn’t possibly use that much, even if they were going around playing Iron Man. So what was he using it for?
    It couldn’t have been to help Mother. She’d been weak, yes. She’d needed magic, yes. But not the human variety. That was why the old legends spoke of the gods visiting earth, but living somewhere else—Asgard, Vanaheim, Olympus—whatever you wanted to call it. Because they couldn’t feed off human magic. I didn’t know if it was incompatible with theirs, or wasn’t strong enough or what. But they would get weak if they stayed here very long.
    It was why Mother had ended up losing most of her power after trapping herself here. And why she’d finally gone to the Pythian Court after avoiding it all those centuries. Apollo, god of prophecy, had gifted the oracles of Delphi with some of his own power, back when they’d been good little worshippers, and it was still going strong. I guess the trickle the Pythias used was negligible compared to the amount needed by a hungry god.
    But Mom hadn’t gotten to feast for long. Going to court had allowed her enemies to locate her, and she’d had to expend most of the power she’d gained fighting them off. So she’d ended up sitting in Tony’s guest cottage with Dad, who was avoiding the Black Circle, who presumably wanted to do violent things to him. And waiting . . 
    For what? Until tonight, I’d never really thought about it. I’d just assumed they were in hiding. That’s what you did when bad people were after you. But