Read Online The Trials of Hercules by Tammie Painter - Free Book Online

but only by twelve years. Does he recognize the girl he rescued in my face? I can’t tell, his eyes give nothing away, but I refuse to look aside even as my chin starts trembling.
    With a clang of metal on metal, he is gone. One of the guards has closed the coffin lid on Herc and the other three are trying to shift the massive stone cover of the vault into place.
    “Wait,” I say, my mind racing for an excuse to delay the inevitable. “The gods, we need to pray to the gods.”
    It is a poor excuse, but the guards don’t know the protocol. They may have been alive when the last blood crimer was sent under, but they wouldn’t have attended the ordeal and can have no idea what proceedings take place. I can drag my prayers as long as I want, but to what avail? The stone will have to be placed and sealed at some point, but I still hold hope that somehow there’s been a mistake and that the gods may intervene. I think of Herc’s deep blue eyes staring at me as I begin an intonation to Hera.
    “What’s going on?” The Solon’s haughty voice grates against my ears. In my focus I hadn’t even heard his gaudy carriage pull up.
    “I was—”
    “Not you, Herene. Them.” He points at the guards who stand with their hands behind their backs waiting for my order to seal the vault. The instant Eury points at them, they squat down, grunting as they shove against the stone cover. “No, no, no, you idiots, don’t close it! Get him out of there.”
    The grunting guards’ faces twist in confusion. Despite the thudding pulse echoing through my ears, my own face feels as if it has been drained of blood.
    Iolalus jumps into the vault and hauls the lid of the coffin open. He climbs back out and offers his hand to pull Herc up.
    “Welcome back, cousin,” he whispers as Eury berates his guards for their stupidity.
    “You,” Eury says pointing to Herc who is backing away from the vault, his face drenched and painted the same cold, grey color of the temple’s columns. “And you, priestess. I’ll need you as well if he agrees. You’ll need to record it in your register.”
    What is going on? The register records all formal agreements—marriages, property sales, wills, work contracts. Any official act of the polis goes into the register and it’s one of the Herenes many duties to keep Portaceae’s register protected and up to date. What agreement can Eury possibly want to make with his cousin who he sentenced only last evening?
    “You stay here,” he says to Iolalus.
    “Agrees to what?” I ask as Eury climbs the stairs to the temple. I jog up after him and Herc, who could just as easily have fled, follows after us taking the steps in six large strides.
    Inside the temple, the columns make shadows over Hera’s statue as the sun continues burning off the morning cloud cover on its ascent. Eury stands in the center of the temple, his back to the statue of Portaceae’s patron goddess.
    “Agrees to what?” I ask again, my voice echoing off the vaulted marble ceiling.
    “A chance at life.” The Solon smirks in a way that sets me on edge. I already know Eury isn’t to be trusted with things I care about.
    “But I’ve been convicted,” Herc says keeping his voice low. “You sentenced me yourself.”
    “Cousin, I know,” Eury says with feigned apology. “I looked into it, though. Herene, maybe you should have done your job before coming here and examined the law. You nearly killed this man.” My nerves bristle. If anything could have saved Herc Dion, I would have done it. How dare this man, this pompous, corrupt excuse for a Solon say I don’t know my job? Before I can respond to his insult, he continues. “There is another way to repay your, shall we say, indiscretion.”
    “Indiscretion? I killed my family. I killed them with my own hands. Their blood is still embedded under my nails. Sergio, Sofia, Cassandra.” Herc raises his hands and thrusts them at his cousin, pushing them closer with each name. By the