The phone clattered from Van’s hand.

“I know,” Castor said to him.

Van and Iro came toward the shield slowly, stunned. Iro pressed a hand to her mouth, crouching in front of it.

“That’s—” Van began.

“Yes,” Lore said.

“Carried into the Trojan War—”

“Yes.”

“Born from Hephaestus’s hammer—”

“Yes.”

“Bearing the Gorgoneion—”

“Do you need to sit back down?” Lore asked him, seriously. Van stretched his hand out toward it, only to pull it back before his fingers could touch Medusa. As if she might bite. But none of them were afraid—Lore wondered then if she had to be holding the shield to use it to instill terror in others, and if she had to will that effect into being.

“This is so cool,” Miles said, dropping onto a knee. He glanced up at Lore. “Can I take a picture with it?”

“What?” Lore said, pulling it back. “No!”

“Was that you, an hour or so ago?” Iro asked. “It sounded like thunder at first, but . . .”

Lore nodded. “I wanted Athena to know that I was alive, and that I had it. I might not know what she’s planning, but at least this will help draw her out.”

“Do we need to draw her out?” Miles asked, pained.

“We do,” Lore confirmed. “If we’re going to end the Agon, she can’t survive it, otherwise there’ll be no place in the world we’ll be safe from her.”

The new god let out a noise of frustration. “We’re missing something, here.”

“Of course we’re missing something,” Van said. “You can’t remember how you became a god, but you seemingly can’t be killed. Why is that?”

Castor had told the others the truth about his ascension, but the story had only brought more questions.

“It might not be connected at all,” Miles pointed out. “Maybe it’s just Apollo’s power healing him fast enough to prevent any injury from killing him.”

“If that’s true then I doubt the original could have died,” Lore said. “And he was shot through the heart.”

Iro looked to Castor. “Sorry.”

Castor’s shoulder lifted in a shrug.

“What if Wrath is taking the lines literally?” Van said. “Instead of building a temple or calling worshippers back to honor Zeus, he’s planning a ceremonial sacrifice of animals or something else in Zeus’s name? Conquest final and fearsome . . . conquest . . . Do we know where he is now?”

“He’s back at the Waldorf Astoria,” Iro said, pressing a hand to her face. “I almost forgot to tell you, and that was the whole point of my coming here. We have eyes posted nearby, and they reported that all the Kadmides returned. I can only assume that he did as well.”

“He was at the Waldorf Astoria?” Lore asked, looking between them. “Did I miss something?”

“Oh, yeah—you actually did,” Miles said. “That’s what the source in the Kadmides told me during that last meeting. The hotel has been closed for remodeling for years now and isn’t set to reopen for a few more months. The Kadmides paid an eye-watering amount to the owners to stop construction work for the week. They’re using the penthouse suites.”

The prestigious hotel undergoing renovations in midtown east seemed like a strange pick to her, aside from it being empty, but Lore let it go. “But he left at one point?”

“All the Kadmides evacuated during the flooding,” Van explained. “Interesting that they came back . . .”

“He would only go back if he had to go back,” Miles said. “Don’t you think? If Van’s right, maybe that’s where they’ve built their altar for the sacrifice.”

Van rubbed at his chin. “Why would he need Tidebringer to cause the flood, then? He could have just taken people off the street— Oh.”

“Oh what?” Lore pressed. “Oh no?”

“They’re not going to attack the Waldorf Astoria,” Van said. He looked to Miles. “It’s empty except for the hunters. But what happened when the floodwaters came in?”

“It broke water mains, disrupted our electricity and all of our transportation systems . . .” Miles stood up. “Oh.”

Van nodded. “It forced people into shelters. That was the whole point of it: to ensure that people—a lot of people—would be gathering in a few places around the city.”

“You think he’s planning a human sacrifice?” Iro asked, aghast. “Knowing it is forbidden?”

“Conquest final and fearsome,” Van repeated again. “It’s a conquest of those who worship rival gods—at least it would be in Wrath’s eyes.”

“But at any point during a weekday there are thousands of people in office buildings, schools, trains, and in subway stations,” Lore said. “Why did he need Tidebringer to cause a flood?”

“To render city services useless, and keep everyone preoccupied with relief efforts,” Miles said. “To move around the city unnoticed because of the flood and its fallout. Everyone they haven’t paid off will be overwhelmed by ensuring the city’s security.”

“Where are the biggest shelters?” Iro asked.

“A lot of the usual designated shelters were also affected,” Miles said. “They’ve been using big structures like Madison Square Garden, Central Park, Grand Central Station. . . .”

He went very pale, then looked at the time on his phone.

“Miles?” Lore queried.

“I know why they picked the Waldorf Astoria,” he said. “And if I’m right, we don’t have until the Agon ends on Sunday at midnight. We only have until tomorrow to stop them.”

“I MEAN . . .” MILES CONTINUED, taking in the faces around him. “I might be wrong. I hope I’m wrong.”

“Let’s operate under the assumption you’re not,” Van said, guiding him back over to a chair.

“They’re evacuating the people in Grand Central and the other temporary relief points starting tomorrow night—Friday night—and taking them to a better-equipped shelter in Queens,” Miles said, sounding more and more disturbed. “But construction aside, it’s definitely not a coincidence he chose that particular hotel.”

“What makes you say that?” Lore asked.

“Have you ever heard of Track Sixty-One?” he said, pulling out his phone and quickly searching. “It’s a so-called ‘secret’ subway track beneath the hotel, built for President Roosevelt—the F. D. one, not the teddy-bear one—so he could move between Grand Central Station and the Waldorf Astoria without the public seeing that he couldn’t walk. I got to take a tour once with my internship boss—but most people have no idea it still exists.”

Miles handed Lore his phone. She scrolled down through the article there as Castor read over her shoulder.

“It looks like FDR would be put in his armored car and they would drive that into an elevator, which led into the Waldorf Astoria’s parking garage,” Castor said. “Whatever the Kadmides brought over from River House could be hidden there, on the track.”