Chapter Ten.

An hour later, Rhea was looking like a whole new woman in jeans and a pink peasant blouse. Well, the jeans were more like capris, since she was taller than Agnes, and the top was loose enough to show too-sharp collarbones. But overall, she looked good.

Unlike me. I was hot, sweaty, and had discovered a heretofore unknown allergy to whatever the heck old clothes give off. My back was killing me, my knees were sore from crawling around on the carpet, and my nose was running. I decided I needed a break and settled down cross-legged on the floor with Agnes' huge old sewing kit.

She did embroidery. Who knew?

"And they weren't just powerful seers," Rhea was saying, because she'd come out of her shell when she came out of the dress, which was good. But then she'd decided I was woefully ignorant about Pythian lore, which was bad. Because she was trying her best to educate me.

I didn't like to complain. It wasn't like I couldn't use it. But I was tired and my head hurt, and worse, we still hadn't found anything.

I was trying not to look at my watch, but it was getting harder. Rosier could be back anytime, and I had to be there, and I had to have the Tears. But we'd been through almost the entire closet, and so far-nothing. Except for an old lipstick, a couple folded handkerchiefs, and a few spare coins. And I was beginning to believe there wouldn't be anything else, because Agnes was freaking meticulous about her clothes.

This wasn't going to work.

"Lady?"

I looked up to find Rhea's dark gray eyes on me. They looked concerned. I blanked my face, because panic was probably number 847 on the list of things Pythias weren't supposed to do. "Yes?"

"I was saying that the Pythias were more than famous seers. They were also some of the most powerful and knowledgeable women in the ancient world."

I nodded.

"Themistoclea I, for example, was the tutor of Pythagoras, the father of philosophy, who said that he learned much of what he knew from her."

"Really?"

"Yes. And Lady Phemonoe I, the first prophetess at Delphi, is credited with inventing hexameter verse. The sort used in ancient epics," she added when I looked at her blankly.

"Oh."

"And Perialla VI discovered the ley line system-"

"Bet that was a shock."

Rhea nodded, looking glad to see me show some interest, however vague. "She shifted into the middle of one by accident, and was almost roasted before she could get back out! But it led to the exploration of the whole system thereafter. That was in the thirteenth century, and then in the fourteenth . . ."

She kept talking, but it was getting harder to pay attention, because I didn't care about Pythian history right now. I cared about exactly one thing, but a potion used by a single person isn't exactly easy to come by. And my options if this didn't work weren't looking good.

I'd used up the Senate's bottle on their errand, and I doubted they had any more, since their weapons cache was currently a glass slick in the desert. And, according to Rhea, only the Circle's potion masters knew the recipe, so I couldn't just go out and buy some. And Jonas wasn't likely to help me do something so dangerous, which was why I was having to hope for some of Agnes' leftovers.

Only there didn't appear to be any.

They never showed this part on TV, I thought vehemently. Searches were supposed to take a couple of minutes. You walked in, checked a few obvious places, and then whatever you needed jumped into your hand.

Only so far, nothing was jumping.

Except for the needle I'd just stuck halfway through a finger. Damn it!

"They were political powerhouses, too," Rhea was saying. "Consulted by world leaders on occasions of war and strategy, treaties and diplomacy. Pythias told the Greeks how to defeat the Persians, told Philip of Macedon how to defeat the Greeks, and predicted the rise of Alexander-"

I looked up. Finally, a name I knew. "As in, the Great?"

"Yes. One of the few to ever dare lay hands on a Pythia."

"He assaulted her?"

Rhea nodded. "He'd visited another sybil, who had flattered him by telling him he was divine-a son of Zeus, who had supposedly visited his mother Olympias one night-and he wanted the Pythia to confirm it. She chose to say nothing, rather than to enrage him with the truth, but it didn't help. And his army had surrounded the temple complex, and she knew she couldn't fight them all, and she feared for her people. . . ."

"Well? What did she do?" I asked when Rhea trailed off.

Her lips twitched, and, okay, yeah. She'd hooked me. "She told him what he really wanted to hear: that he was unbeatable."

"Oh." I felt irrationally let down.

"She didn't tell him that he would die of poison before he had a chance to enjoy any of his conquests."

I perked up. "Well, he should have been nicer."

Rhea laughed. "Yes. He should have been! Like the Emperor Nero, who was thrown out of the temple by a later Pythia because he'd killed his mother. Go back, matricide! The number seventy-three marks the hour of your downfall!"

"Damn." I'd have liked to have seen that. By all accounts, Nero had been a murderous little snot. "But living to seventy-three doesn't seem so bad."

"That's what Nero thought. Until he was killed a few years later by a general named Galba-who was seventy-three at the time!"

"Sweet."

"Pythias are even said to have commanded the gods. Well, demigods," she amended. "Xenoclea I ordered Hercules to be sold into slavery for a year, to compensate for killing a man while a guest under his roof. His sale price was to go to the children of the slain."

I started to protest that Hercules was only a myth, but considering my life lately, I just went with "Really?"

She grinned. "She even decided who he would be sold to."

"And that's funny because?"

"Because she selected Queen Omphale of Lydia, who was known for having a sense of humor. The queen took away his lion skin and weapons, and dressed him in women's clothes. And made him stand around holding a basket of wool while she and her handmaidens did their spinning!"

"For a year?"

"For a year." Rhea looked satisfied. Probably because this Xeno-whoever couldn't have come up with a better torture for a musclebound he-man.

"Why haven't I heard any of this before?" I asked.

Rhea's smile faded. "I don't know," she said, her brows drawing together. But she threw it off in a minute. "And it was a Pythia, Aristonice IX, who helped to broker the treaty between the Circle and the vampires that still holds today."

"She must have really been something," I said, wondering how she'd managed to balance those two groups, who usually loathed each other. And if the current consul remembered her.

Guess she would, considering she was old as hell.

I sighed.

"No," Rhea said, a little fiercely.

"No?"

"No!" She shook her head, sending a storm of fuzzies into the air. "We have to learn Pythian history growing up, and she's taught because of the treaty. But other than that, there was nothing unusual about her. She didn't go about battling gods, for instance!"

"Well, maybe she didn't have any to battle."

"No." She was tugging little pockets inside out so fast I was afraid she was going to rip something. "None of them did. None of them had to face what you face. They didn't have to elude Circle assassins or battle demigods or face Apollo himself-"

"I had a little help with Apollo."

"-or any of it! Yet they had more support than you've ever been given! The only people to help you are the Senate, and they . . ." She threw up her hands. "They don't know anything!"

"Don't tell them that," I said, thinking of the consul's reaction.

"I would never tell anyone anything you didn't want me to," she said, looking faintly shocked. "But you shouldn't have to live like that. You should have support. You should have help; you should have-" She cut off abruptly.

I was about to ask why when I heard it, too. A sound. A sound like a door opening outside.

Rhea and I looked at each other, and then we scrambled for the closet entrance.

I grabbed her arm, in case I needed to shift us away, but there was a chance it was just someone in to do the housekeeping. Only I didn't think so. Who does housekeeping at ten o'clock at night?

And then I knew it wasn't.

Because a sliver of the living room was visible through the mostly shut bedroom door, and those didn't look like maids.

There were maybe half a dozen, but I couldn't be sure since my inch of visual space didn't give me much to work with. Just the backside of some dark leather trench coats, the kind only war mages and Nazis thought of as a fashion statement. But it was a woman who spoke.

"Did you leave a light on in the bedroom?"

"No." Another woman.

"You're sure?" The voice sharpened.

And shit. Before even waiting for a reply, the coats were coming this way. I had a split second to see the door start to swing open, and then we were landing somewhere darker and a whole lot more cramped.

Rhea gasped, maybe because her stomach had come into contact with the side of Agnes' desk when I shifted us into the office. But she clapped a hand over her mouth the next second, and then I jerked her down, out of line of sight. We hit the ground, staring out across the darkened living room through the legs of a sofa table, at almost the same time that a man's voice called from the bedroom.

"Looks like someone was searching the place."

"We searched the place!" You idiot went unsaid but implied.

"Don't take that tone with me." A big, dark-haired man stuck his head out of the bedroom door. "And I said searching, not searched. Someone was just in here."

"Oh, so you're psychic now?" the woman asked sarcastically. I adjusted my position slightly, until I could see something other than legs. Past a lamp and a Lucite spill of fake flowers, I saw a model-pretty face, long auburn hair, dark slacks, and a light-colored tank under a leather jacket.

Looked like someone else had decided the dress code was bullshit.

Acolyte? I mouthed at Rhea, who nodded grimly.

"I leave that mumbo-jumbo to you," the man replied. "I deal in facts-"

"And what facts are those?" the acolyte asked witheringly.

"That a damned rush of magic just slapped me in the face!"

"Probably the wards," another man piped up. "They've been itching me since we got here."

"It's not the wards. I know wards-"

"You don't know these," the woman cut in. "They're not the pissant things you're used to dealing with. The Circle's top wardsmiths made them-"

"The Circle!" one of the other coats said contemptuously. "They're not as good as they think they are."

"Neither are you."

"Then it's too bad we're the best you got," the dark-haired mage said, coming back into the living room. "And I'm telling you, someone just did a spell."

"And I'm telling you, it was the wards," the smaller man argued. He was Asian, bald, and looked uncomfortable in his skin. "These things don't like us."

The tall acolyte looked like she agreed with the wards. "They won't hurt you as long as you're with us. Now get the safe open."

"Where is it?" the small man asked, taking something out of his coat.

I glanced at Rhea and mouthed, Silence spell? Because I had a few burning questions. But she shook her head. Apparently, it was powerful enough that they might pick up on it, too.

"Do you know the combination?" I whispered.

She shook her head again, looking guilty. "I only saw it opened once, and that was years ago. I'd forgotten it was even there."

So much for the idea of shifting back a couple hours and beating them to it. But I suddenly had a serious need to get in that safe. Luckily, it looked like they were going to be nice enough to open it for me.

Or not, I thought, as the smaller mage went to the sunflower painting and jerked it open, revealing a steel-colored block. That promptly shocked the hell out of him as soon as he touched it. "Shit!" He jerked his arm back, and I swear I thought I saw it steaming.

"Looks like it's warded, too," the bigger mage said.

"Of course it's warded!" the tall acolyte told him. "What did you expect? Get it open!"

"You get it open," the small mage said, still clutching his arm. "It likes you."

"I don't crack safes!"