"HELP ME carry him."

The two girls are still standing there and clutching at each other. Their faces are torn in these tearstained masks of open-mouthed shock. Ezra is still passed-out and crumbled into a ball on the cobblestone street.

I grab my sword, return it to its sheath, and flatten Ezra out on his back.

The girls just stand there and tremble and watch me.

"Don't just stand there! Help me!"

I could very easily carry him myself. But these are two able-bodied, fit, perfectly capable young women. I've ought to put them to good use. Lessen the burden for myself.

The first one to speak is the one that I mistook for a child. Just as easily I could have mistaken her for a goddess.

Her skin is a rich deep brown, her eyes soft like water lapping at the sand. She's small and lithe and muscled, perfect for an archer. Her hair is a couple shades darker than her skin, and falling down her back in hundreds of tightly-wound braids. The clothing and jewelry she wears—a strange silver hoop in her nose, and similar small studs in her ears—instantly peg her as an outsider.

She gestures vaguely at the space that Apollo had been standing a moment before. "Who... who was that?"

The second she speaks the spell is broken. Her voice is—you know the way fire feels on your skin? Beautiful and warm and so, so human. There's a gap between her two front teeth. Her Greek is choppy and slow.

"Apollo," I say.

"Apollo?" she repeats, then bursts out laughing, slapping her knees for emphasis. "Apollo! Of course! Why the fuck not?!" She pretends to faint against the wall. "YOU STABBED A FRICKIN' GOD. ALSO, THE GODS ARE REAL?!?!?! IS THAT WHAT THIS IS?!?!?!?!?"

"I didn't realize he was a god—"

"OH, AND!" She dramatically throws her arms outwards. "AND! A GOD TRIED TO KILL ME! IS THAT NOT SOMETHING WE'RE GOING TO TALK ABOUT? I FEEL LIKE THAT'S SOMETHING WE SHOULD TALK ABOUT."

"We will talk about it," I promise. "But you need to help me first."

The blue-haired girl grabs a hold of one of Ezra's legs. The one I mistook for a child follows suit.

"On three," I instruct.

We hoist Ezra up. I steer us in the direction of my home, back out onto the uneven cobblestone path.

"Who are you?" prompts the girl I mistook for a child.

"My name is Antigone Katsaros. Daughter of Dionysus."

"Sweeeeeeet," says the blue-haired girl. "Isn't he the god of getting wasted? That must be sick." She tilts her head backwards. "The name's Boivin-Rot. Dahlia Boivin-Rot."

"Boivin-Rot Dahlia Boivin-Rot." I say her name back to her. "That is an incorrect assumption. He is the god of wine, not getting wasted."

"No, no, oh, my God—just Dahlia is fine. I was trying to be like James Bond, you know? But anywhosies. You can still get wasted off of wine."

"Ignore her," the other girl says. "It's 2019 and she still thinks giving yourself alcohol poisoning is cool. I'm Marisol, by the way."

"I've never actually drank any alcohol," Dahlia insists. "Like, ever. It's not good for your body, bro. Except in moderation. And only once your brain has been fully developed. And you know my body is a temple."

"So what did Apollo want with you?" I ask.

"Some bull about a prophecy." Marisol adjusts her grip on Ezra's calf. "Blah, blah, blah. One of you might kill me, so might some other dude that survived the crash, so I've gotta kill ya. Nothing personal, no hard feelings. He wasn't serious, was he? Like, he had to have been hopped up on, like, drugs or something."

"No," I say. "I'm afraid that he was serious."

"So he is still going to kill us?" Dahlia asks.

"Also no."

The girls look at me expectantly, waiting for more information than just that. Sweat drips down the side of Marisol's face. What more could I tell them? Apollo is no longer a threat; instead, the one they should fear is me? No. I need to make them... trust me.

"He's after me instead," I lie. "He thinks... I'm the child in the prophecy."

How much do they know about the prophecy? If they know anything about it at all, it's very clear in what it entails. The long-presumed-dead child of Apollo and the nymph Evadne is destined to either kill their father or die at his hands. I already told them that I'm the daughter of Dionysus. Ezra knows that my mother is a priestess, not a nymph. If they know even the slightest detail about the prophecy, my lie could fall to pieces so, so easily.

Marisol tilts her head. "Then why didn't he kill you?"

I rack my brain for a lie and come up empty. "I... don't know."

"I just want to go home," Dahlia whines miserably, kicking at the ground.

I jump on the chance to change the subject. "Where is your home?"

"Florida." She sounds even more miserable. "I never thought I'd miss that place so much."

"Ezra is from Florida as well. Do you know him?"

"Know him?" She looks him over, wrinkling her nose. "No. But he looks like a right twink. I think he and I could be friends."

"What's a twink?" I ask.

Dahlia shakes her head at me. "Oh, honey."

"Abs like those and she doesn't even know what a twink is?" Marisol says, as if in agreement. "But... her abs aren't important. What's important is getting home. Is there an airport somewhere here, or—?"

"Antigone," Dahlia says, "you've gotta come with us. If there's a god that wants you dead—"

"It'll be safer for her in America," Marisol agrees.

I purse my lips.

I have a month to figure out which of these three people I'm going to kill. I might as well let them return home in the meantime. And if that means leaving home myself, with the very real possibility that I might never come home...

Maybe it would be better than facing my mother. If she knew what I was doing for her, sacrificing one of these poor unsuspecting heretics—I don't think she'd ever forgive me.

"I promised Ezra that tomorrow I'd take him on a boat to the mainland." Another lie through my teeth. "We'll figure out what to do from there."