A frustrated groan in her ear woke Megara from her sleep. Her hazy mind oriented itself around the sound. What was bothering Wonder Boy at this hour?
He turned away from her, taking his warmth with him. She'd gotten accustomed to it, and it was her turn to groan as she now felt unbearably cold.
"Why?" She crackled in her crowlike morning voice.
Hercules made a questioning noise over his shoulder. He wasn't too awake, either.
"What did I do?" she whined at him, her voice sounding a little more like herself aside from the whining.
"You didn't… it's… it's me. I woke up like this, and I didn't want to bother you."
A mystery?
"Like what?" Megara sat up, using a hand on his arm to prop herself up.
The full-body shiver that ran through him was her first hint. "I dunno what you call it, but… With us touching this whole time, I…"
There. He'd curled his body away from her, apparently to shield her from the sight of his erection. "I thought I should keep it to myself because you weren't awake, so…"
"That's very thoughtful of you, but I'm awake now."
"That's true…"
"And aren't I better at this than you are?" she trailed her hand down his body.
"Uh… yeah, you definitely are…" Hercules stretched a goofy, lopsided smile across his face.
"So how about in the future, you're not as shy about waking me up to let me handle it?"
"Sure…" he sighed.
"Now that we're both awake, let's go over our strategies for dealing with my father."
"We– uh… wha?"
"It's probably time for you to take Megarion home. After too much longer, it'll become a political issue."
"I-it's not safe for that yet, is it?"
"If you go back and show off the full power of your godhood, I figure my father won't be stupid enough to do anything to contradict you."
Hercules nodded and clenched his teeth to hold in his reactions to her.
"I never heard what else you said to the Olympians," she cooed at him, continuing to toy with him but intensifying her massage.
Hercules looked at her with something approaching panic. He gasped rather than speak, making her speak.
"I'm curious, is all," she said. "It took all day, so a few interesting things must have happened."
He looked about to tell her this wasn't the time, but he forced himself to focus.
"Aphrodite and Dionysus want to make you a minor deity in their retinues, but I didn't want to agree to anything without you there to speak for yourself." His face reddened as he spoke, and he groaned to punctuate the end of his sentence. His eyes rolled shut. He moved in her hand with increasing desperation.
He was like her personal puppet.
"I don't know if I can agree to either of those scenes. I don't want to be responsible for other people's relationships, and I definitely can't party like… Did you say Dionysus? Do you mean Bacchus?"
"Funniest thing happened," Hercules said, though according to his face and how he slowed his movements, he'd found it disturbing. "I was sitting right next to Bacchus, the same god I'd known for years, and suddenly, he morphed into a guy who could've been your brother."
Megara raised a brow. "It seems like no remnant of Hades's power remains."
"You don't mean Hades was responsible for…?" His eyes lost focus, and then they closed.
She eased off him to bring his attention back. "He told me he transformed Dionysus into Bacchus, and then I forgot to say anything about it."
Hercules drew in a deep breath, then opened his eyes. "Half the reason I was up there so long was because none of us could figure out what to do with Hecate. Nobody wants to make the same mistakes we did with Hades."
She took her hand off him. "Did you make a decision?"
Hercules made a pitiful expression disappear in a blink, and then he propped himself up on an elbow as if discussing something intellectual at a symposium. "We don't want to reward her ambitions by making her Queen of the Underworld. We'll be holding elections to pick the next god to put down there because Father picked the last one, and nobody is confident in his ability to choose another one."
"If you're not selecting Hecate, everyone will feel her wrath. She's been quiet for a few days, but I tend to think that means she's plotting something."
"About that…" Hercules trailed a hand down her back. "Yes. The gods– the other gods– have been keeping her under control so she won't bother us. According to them, it was because they wanted to give us time to settle in." He dipped the hand that had been stroking her back lower to cup her backside and drag her closer. "But now I know I'm a god, and they want to get back to their regular duties."
"So wait, what does that mean? Hecate is free to do whatever she wants to us?"
"No…" with a calm, patient face, he started massaging her a little more forcefully. "But it does mean that while I'm here, I have to be more vigilant. Who knows what she's planning?"
"I can guess." She made what she pretended was a thoughtful sound to cover her thrill from his massage. "Since we know her goal is to become Queen of the Underworld, every move she makes will aim toward forcing us to accept her as such. What would convince the gods to grant her the position when they currently oppose her promotion?"
"They'd have to feel as if they had no other option." His eyes darkened, and his massage shifted forward to loop her leg over his hip and press her against him. He said nothing, but the intensity in his eyes told her this was a challenge.
He must have underestimated her ability to pretend she was calm. "A short list of avenues exist that will gain her that result. She could attempt to sabotage and eliminate her competition, or she may decide to extort the gods by some other means. Presumably by dangling something in front of them that they desperately need. But the gods want for nothing."
The game was over. He pulled her into a long kiss and rolled on top of her. "Speaking from experience, it's the people we love that make us vulnerable. It's worked on me once before."
Megara looped her arms around his neck. "With that in mind, she's going to target me. Just because she's smarter than Hades doesn't mean she wouldn't aim in the same direction."
"I won't let her do anything to you." The golden aura that had first surrounded him in the Underworld enveloped them both. "I've fought her before, and I wasn't even fully divine or mature back then."
"Then you'll know she wouldn't go for a head-on fight. She will set seemingly unimportant pieces in place and gradually form them into a trap. Now that your family has admitted to more or less taking their eyes off her, she's going to have more space to do it."
All the lust she'd worked so hard to stoke cleared out of Hercules's eyes. "What? You think…" He started shaking and gave off a wave of heat through his godly aura. "You're right… I know you're right… I can't leave you in that case. Forget anything else. You're the only priority. You're tough, but I'm not listening to any complaints. You're stuck with me."
"Excuse me, have I ever complained when I get you to myself? It's the opposite of a problem."
"Good," he relaxed a little when he found the opportunity to kiss her forehead with a gentle sigh. "But what I'm worried about is that you might resist when I try to protect you."
"It's not just me anymore. Sooner or later, the Ivy sickness will take over, and I'll be bedridden. I can't watch my back so well in that case. Besides, you don't use taking care of me as an excuse to manipulate me."
Hercules's eyes softened to the point some of that softness spilled over in the form of tears. "Oh, Meg… I don't want to be so excited because I know it'll be awful for you…"
"It's fine. This is one of the things I agreed to, remember? So don't feel guilty, just help me feel your excitement, and I'll get through it."
Outside their room, a few cautious footsteps crept across the floorboards.
They waited, but nobody hailed them.
"It's a bit of a drag having guests..."
"I could just send your brother home with Cassandra and Medusa to escort him. That way I'd have you and this house all to myself." An undercurrent of desire returned to both his voice and the light that radiated off of him.
"When are they leaving, by the way? Not that I resent them or anything, but… I sort of liked having the house to ourselves. How do you tell people to leave without ending their friendship?"
"Cass has to get back to Delphi soon. She's staying to see if your brother returns any of the interest she's got in him. Medusa will wander around, but I think she's attracted to all the love in this house now that she's a devotee of Aphrodite."
"I can sympathize. I've got a patron deity, too, and I'll do anything to serve him."
"Wait, who?"
Megara poked his nose. "The only god I'll worship with every part of me. One who's incredibly patient and ought to take a break from saving the world to take his reward."
"Oh… yeah, I think he'd like that."