Page 15 of Flame and Fury

“There you have it. Ares’s champion, in the flesh. We’ll all be keeping watch to see if you get that comfy bed.”Thaddeus winks, and I try not to vomit.

Rupert is on the other side of the stage now, gesturing wildly for me to stand up. I guess the interview is over.

“Oh, one more thing before you leave.” Lucinda reaches behind her and pulls out an orange envelope. Was she sitting on it? Oh shit. I guess it’s time for another challenge. “May you honor the gods,” she says as she hands it over to me.

The paper is warm. Seriously, was this under her ass? I stomp off stage, waiting until I’m in the wings to rip open the paper. There’s a small shelf in the corner that has a tiny light shining down on some papers. I beeline for the light, yanking the thick paper out of the envelope. I thrust it under the lamp and read the sentence scrawled across the page.

The boar slinks under the frozen lights of the meadow. Capture him and bring him back alive.

Great. Another cryptic clue that I don’t know the meaning of. I lift my head and search the backstage of the theater. Rupert is there, nervously wringing a piece of paper in his hands, but I don’t see any of the other champions.

“Are you kidding me?” I curse under my breath. I was the last one to be interviewed. Preston was first, and that was over an hour ago. Has that bastard had a whole hour advantage over me? That’s bullshit.

“Where’s the exit?” I growl at Rupert, sweeping past him when he points over his shoulder. I follow the direction down a long, narrow hallway and find a door at the end. The wooden walls have been painted black, and it’s nearly impossible to see. There’s nothing distinct about this theater to differentiate it from the one in New York. We could be anywhere.

I spin back around and find Rupert staring at me, still in the same place I left him.

“Where are we?”

Rupert clears his throat before he answers. “Las Vegas.”

I guess that explains the ridiculous winter clothing.

CHAPTER10

WREN

Apparently, Las Vegas used to be a mecca of entertainment and debauchery. Don’t get me wrong it’s still teeming with bad decisions, copious amounts of drugs and alcohol, not to mention seedy entertainment. The major difference between how things used to be and how they are now is the temperature.

About twenty-five years ago, Hera caught Zeus in a compromising position with an entire chorus line of dancers from a musical revue. It wasn’t the first time Zeus was caught in Vegas and Hera was…displeased. Her temper is legendary. I guess no one told her to shove down her anger and count to ten. In retaliation for her husband’s dalliances, and perhaps in a bid to make Vegas less appealing, Hera turned the city into a frigid wasteland.

While the surrounding area is all desert, Vegas is a frozen tundra.

The thing is, people were already established here. Like much of Zeus and Hera‘s territory, those who aren’t part of elite society, or a cleric, don’t have a lot of mobility. It’s not like there are jobs waiting for them somewhere else. Not only that, but people don’t have the money to move out of one shitty town and into the next.

Regardless of Hera’s punishment, Vegas is still a big party town. You just have to suffer the biting cold and numbing temperatures to get around.

The moment I push open the doors and walk outside, my face freezes. It never gets above zero in Las Vegas. It snows almost daily, and the wind whips through the streets like an angry serpent.

Holy shit. A gust of wind sucks the breath right out of me. I turn my head to the side so I can inhale without turning my lungs into ice cubes. Tugging my fuzzy coat around my body, I roll my eyes at the lack of buttons or a zipper. Estella might have a fantastic eye for putting together an outfit, but she is all form over function.

I consider going back inside the theater until I can think through the clue, but the others already have enough of a head start. There’s no time to sit around and twiddle my thumbs. I need to figure out where I’m at in Vegas and where I need to go.

The exit dumps me out on the side of the theater. There’s a narrow alleyway that leads to the front. Keeping my head down, I push through the wind and the biting snow and walk toward the sidewalk. The thin layer of snow on the ground crunches beneath my booted feet. Most of the businesses have someone outside shoveling pathways so pedestrians can get from one point to the next. Bartending at the Hole has never sounded like such a cushy job before.

I’m pretty confident that I’m on the strip. Flashing lights adorn the front of the buildings up and down the street. All I can see through the blizzard is faint blobs of color. Without knowing which direction I need to go, I lean against the side of the theater and think through the latest clue.

What do I know about Vegas? And a Boar? It’s unlikely they want us to find an actual animal and bring it back to the theater, but then who are they talking about?

Part of the clue is obvious. If I hadn’t been mildly panicked and angry when I got my envelope, I would have figured out our location right away.The meadow.I know that’s what Las Vegas means. The media always points out the irony of Hera turning the meadow into the North Pole whenever Las Vegas is discussed. As for the rest of it, I’m clueless.

I know Heracles had to capture a boar for one of his trials, but that’s basically all I can recall. Normally, I’d go to the library, like I did with the first challenge, but I don’t even know if this city has a library. I’ve never been to Las Vegas before, but its notoriety is well known.One fact I know about the town is that it has a massive number of bars. I know a thing or two about the people who work in bars.

It’s interesting because the clerics love to play the morality police but only when it suits their needs. In a place like Las Vegas where the whole point of the city is to drink, be wild, and make bad decisions, how do the clerics decide what’s above board?

I’ve worked at the Hole since I was sixteen. My boss Jerry has connections throughout the city and always knows things no one else does. He needs these partnerships to get beer and liquor for the bar. Having those relationships means he knows the right people and a hell of a lot of gossip about our city. What I need to find is Las Vegas’s version of the Hole.

As far as I can tell, I’m somewhere near the middle of the strip. I’m not going to find the right kind of bar here. What I’m looking for will be on the outskirts. Not on a prime piece of real estate. I don’t have any great instinct telling me where to go. Instead, I pick the direction that has the wind and snow at my back and not pelting my face. I walk for a good twenty minutes before the buildings look less glitzy and grittier.

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