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“Disgraceful, I say,” Vic crowed again.

Carson looked at me. I just shrugged. I’d only had Vic a few months, but I’d quickly learned there was no controlling the mouthy sword. Vic said whatever he liked, whenever he liked, as loudly as he liked. And if you dared to disagree with him, he was more than happy to discuss the matter further—while I pressed his blade up against your throat.

Vic and Daphne glared at each other before the Valkyrie turned to Carson and started talking to the band geek about how cool the bow was. I wandered through the rest of the room, peering at the other artifacts. Vic kept up his running monologue about how swords were the only real weapons, with him, of course, being the best sword ever. I made agreeing noises when appropriate. It was easier than trying to argue with him.

Daphne and Carson continued to look at the bow, and Vic finished his rant and fell silent once more. I was reading about a ball of silver thread that had belonged to Ariadne, who gave it to Theseus to help him find his way through the labyrinth where the Minotaur was kept, when shoes tapped on the floor and someone walked up beside me.

“Gwendolyn Frost,” a snide voice murmured. “Fancy seeing you here. ”

I turned and found myself face-to-face with a forty-something-year-old guy with black hair, cold blue eyes, and skin that was as white as the marble floor. He wore a dark blue suit and a pair of wingtips that had a higher polish than most of the glass cases in the room. I would have thought him handsome if I hadn’t known exactly how uptight and prissy he was—and how very much he hated me.

I sighed. “Nickamedes. What are you doing here?”

“Overseeing the exhibit, of course. Most of the artifacts on display are on loan from the Library of Antiquities. ”

Nickamedes was the head honcho at the Library of Antiquities, which was located on the Mythos Academy campus not too far away in Cypress Mountain, North Carolina. In addition to books, the massive library was famous for its priceless collection of artifacts. Hundreds and hundreds of glass cases filled the library’s seven floors, containing items that had once belonged to everyone from gods and goddesses to their Champions to the Reapers they had battled.

I supposed it made sense that the Crius Coliseum had borrowed some artifacts from the library—that was probably the reason the Mythos students had been assigned to come here in the first place. So they’d be forced to look at and study the items they walked past and ignored on a daily basis at the library.

Nickamedes stared at me, not looking a bit happier to see me than I was to have run into him. His mouth twisted. “I see that you and your friends waited until the last possible second to come and complete your myth-history assignment, along with a great many of your classmates. ”

Morgan McDougall, Samson Sorensen, Savannah Warren. I’d spotted several kids I knew roaming through the coliseum. All seventeen or so, like me, Daphne, and Carson, and all second-year students at Mythos, trying to cram in a visit to the museum before winter classes.