Lobster was actual y one of the tamer things served in the dining hal . Caviar, escargot, and veal were among the daily offerings for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, along with tons of other fancy, froufrou foods. Even the regular dishes
-like lasagna, fried chicken, or the fruit salad I was eating
-always featured weird ingredients, strange sauces, and bizarre toppings. But the other kids loved al the exotic foods, since they'd grown up eating the expensive entrees with their obscenely rich parents. The Mythos students scarfed down snails the way kids at my old public high school had inhaled greasy pizzas, crispy fries, and thick cheeseburgers.
The lack of simple, identifiable, normal food was one of the things I hated about the dining hal -and one of the many things I hated about Mythos Academy in general.
"Gwen? Are you even listening to me?" Daphne snapped her fingers in front of my face, causing pink sparks of magic to flutter around us like tiny fireflies.
"I don't have to listen," I said, putting my fork down in the bowl and pushing it, and the mystery fruit, away. "Al you've been talking about for the last two weeks is this weekend getaway al the students are invited to."
"Not just any getaway," Daphne said. "Winter Carnival.
Trust me. It's one of the best events of the year."
"Why?" I groused. "Because everyone gets to go to some fancy ski resort for the weekend, where they can drink, smoke, and have sex with limited interference from the professors?"
Daphne grinned, her black eyes bright with excitement.
"Exactly."
I didn't see how the carnival would be any different from what went on at the academy on a daily basis, but I didn't say anything. The kids might al be at Mythos to supposedly learn how to fight and use their magic to help protect the world, but they liked to party hard while they did it. Given the fact that everyone's parents were filthy, filthy rich, they could easily afford to.
Apparently, back in the day, al the various gods and goddesses had rewarded their warriors with gold, silver, and diamonds the size of my fist. The wealth had trickled down and multiplied through the generations, which is why the Mythos students had the very best of everything, from designer clothes to expensive cars to custom-made jewelry and weapons.
Back at my old high school, a party had been a sixpack of wine coolers that somebody's col ege-age sister had bought on the sly. Here at Mythos, the kids whose parents owned Dionysian wineries sent them cases of the stuff.
"Come on," Daphne wheedled. "I'l need somebody to hold my hair back while I puke my guts out. Some of the parties can get pretty wild."
I raised an eyebrow. "Too wild for a mighty Valkyrie such as yourself to handle?"
Daphne grinned again. I snorted.
Like the other kids at Mythos, Daphne Cruz was the great-great-whatever descendant of an ancient warrior. Oh, she looked like just another rich, spoiled princess, with her smooth, golden hair; perfect amber skin; expensive pink cashmere sweater; and even more expensive matching pink purse. Daphne was definitely a girly-girl, but she also happened to be a Valkyrie as wel , which meant she was incredibly strong. Seriously. Like Hulk strong.
Daphne could have torn apart the table we were sitting at with her bare hands and not even break a nail doing it.
Valkyries also had magic, hence al the sparks flickering around us and in other spots in the dining hal where the girls were sitting. Every time Daphne's French-manicured nails scraped against something or she got particularly emotional, little princess pink sparks would shoot off her fingertips and fil the air. Daphne had once told me that her fingers were like sparklers on the Fourth of July. I didn't mind the cracks and flashes of color, though.
Sitting next to her was like being close to a rainbow. Wel , if rainbows were solid pink. And volatile. Sometimes Daphne's temper flared up almost as much as the sparks did.
Daphne's magic hadn't quickened, or manifested, yet, but once it did, she'd have even more power. Valkyries had al sorts of magical abilities, like being able to heal people, control the weather, and even create il usions.
I shivered. I'd learned that last one the hard way a few weeks ago, when Jasmine Ashton, another one of the rich Valkyrie princesses at Mythos, had summoned up an il usion of a Nemean prowler to try to kil me. If you believed in an il usion, it could hurt you-even kil you-like the real thing. The prowler-a big, black, pantherlike monster-
would have ripped me to shreds if Logan hadn't stabbed it to death, causing the il usion to vanish.
Maybe I had my own twisted kind of power today, because as soon as I thought about Logan, he stepped through the door of the dining hal -with Savannah right beside him. No doubt Logan had come here to grab some breakfast before classes started, just like I had. The Spartan had showered and changed since I'd last seen him in the gym, and his black hair was stil damp. He'd traded in his T-shirt and sweatpants for acid-washed jeans, a blue sweater, and a black leather jacket that outlined his muscled shoulders. He looked total y sexy.
I watched Logan wind his way through the dining hal , past the oil paintings of various mythological feasts that covered the wal s, and the polished suits of armor that stood guard beneath them. He led Savannah to a table not too far away from where Daphne and I were sitting. Like al the others, the table was covered with creamy white linens, dainty china, and a heavy crystal vase ful of fresh poppies, hyacinths, and narcissus flowers.
The table also had the advantage of being right next to the open-air indoor garden that stood in the middle of the dining hal .
Grape vines twisted through the area, winding their way over, around, and sometimes through the thick branches of the olive, orange, and almond trees planted in the black soil there. Marble statues of Demeter, Dionysus, and other gods and goddesses could be seen in various spots in the garden, their heads facing out and their eyes open, as though they were watching the students eat the bounty of the harvests they represented.
Logan and Savannah might as wel have been eating in a romantic restaurant. The ambience was pretty much the same-
especial y given the dreamy way the two of them stared into each other's eyes.
Daphne realized that I wasn't paying attention to her anymore and turned around to see what I was looking at.
Her pretty face softened with knowing sympathy, which made me feel even worse.
"Did I mention that it's not just Mythos students who wil be at the carnival?" Daphne asked. "Lots of kids from the New York academy wil be there too."
I blinked. "There are more academies out there? I thought this was the only school for warriors."