Mortal Gods
Forgotten Pantheon
Book 1
Alex Manea
Genre: Urban Fantasy
ISBN: 9781311240422
ASIN: B00N0I2Z8O
Number of pages: 183
Word Count: 45,400
Cover Artist: Ovidiu Stanciu
Book Description:
Heather, a young American girl, is visiting her college roommate, who now lives in Rome. While partying in a local nightclub, she's picked up by a man who looks like he was created in the image of a Greek god. Her initial impression is correct.
He’s one of the last surviving members of the Greek pantheon. After hooking up with him, Heather is forced to join the culmination of a two-millennium-long war between that pantheon and a clandestine sect of monks within the Catholic Church, itself led by perhaps the most infamous figure in Christian history.
Heather and Apollo embark on a world-spanning effort to collect what remains of the gods to engage in the final battle with the monks opposing them. But the fate of the battle is changed by the intervention of a mysterious military organization…
Excerpt
Immediately after waking up, the
body’s first reaction is to open its eyes, but this wasn't the case with
Heather, at least not this time. She knew something bad had happened to her and
keeping her eyes closed gave her a fake feeling of safety. When she came back
to her senses, she didn't know if she had been out for ten minutes or ten hours
or even whether she was in the same place. What woke her was a strange voice
whispering close to her. Her last memory was of walking with Apollo to his car.
Then he started acting really strange and pushed her.
Was this his plan all along? Or did something else
happen?
Her dark thoughts were
interrupted by the strange voice. Heather perked her ears. It wasn't Apollo,
she concluded. She couldn’t understand what the voice was saying but she knew
it wasn't English. Her ears finally caught something vaguely familiar.
“In nomine Patris et Filli et Spiritus Sancti, Amen.”
Latin. It's a prayer. Someone is saying a
prayer. Maybe I'm in a church.
The drop of water that hit her
forehead startled her and brought back the memory of Martin, the sexual
predator who’d kidnapped her when she was a child. She’d been rescued before he
could molest her, but he’d woken her just like this, with drops of water to her
forehead. Since then, having water dropped on her forehead was the thing she
hated and feared most in her life. Once
she’d fallen asleep outside and a rain drop had fallen on her. Another time, a
college friend had done it as a joke. Each time, Heather woke up screaming and
crying, with images of Martin flashing through her mind. Heart racing, Heather
quickly opened her eyes, only to see Martin standing over her.
No
it can’t be him. Martin is dead. He was executed a long time ago.
She blinked and when she opened
her eyes the second time, Martin was gone. Instead, a bald man appeared in
front of her. He was chanting the same prayer over and over again. His left
hand was right above her head, holding a small bottle, which looked just like
the ones flight attendants serve. It was tilted slightly and with every “Amen”
spoken, the man let a drop of liquid fall on Heather's forehead. As it hit her
skin, the liquid mixed with the blood from the cut on her forehead, oozing over
her nose and eyes. Heather wanted to move, to get up and run away, but the fear
paralyzed her.
The strange man had no reaction
when she opened her eyes. He remained still and kept staring right at her,
chanting, like he was hypnotized.
“In nomine Patris et Filli et Spiritus Sancti, Amen,” he repeated.
But he stopped before dropping
the liquid on her forehead with the ‘Amen’.Then, she heard a muffled sound and
blood started dripping from the man’s opened mouth right on Heather's face. He collapsed
next to Heather, his head hitting the asphalt near her left ear. In the few
seconds of perfect silence that followed, she couldn't hear him breathe. He was
dead. Heather started screaming. The loud noise filled up the narrow dark
alley. Out of the same darkness, a man’s silhouette appeared in front of her.
Before she could realize who it was, he had his hand pressed tightly against
her mouth.
“Be quiet,” Apollo said as he
looked beyond the dumpster like he was searching for something.
A muzzled sound came from her
mouth.
“Are you okay?”
Heather shook her head.
“Listen to me very carefully,”
he continued while his hand was still pressed against her mouth. “Your life is
in danger. If you want to get out of here alive, you have to do what I say,
when I say it. Do you understand?”
She nodded.
“I'm going to take my hand off
your mouth, but you have to stop screaming.”
She nodded again.
Apollo removed his hand. Heather
didn't make a sound. She looked left, at the dead man lying next to her. Just
as she did, his hand twitched. Heather screamed again. This time, her own hand
covered her mouth.
“Here's what I want you to do,”
Apollo said, his green eyes glinting in the faint light.“When I say 'now', run
to the car, get into the passenger seat and put the key into the ignition. Stay
as low as possible. I'll be right behind you.”
“What if you don't make it?”
“If I don't, neither do you,” he
replied with a calm voice.
He peeked over the dumpster.
“You ready?”
He handed her the car keychain
and she nodded.
“Now!”
Apollo stepped out from behind
the dumpster and started shooting in the direction they came from. Heather got
up and started running straight to the car. She got in and, as instructed,
placed the key into the ignition. She curled up on the seat and waited. The few
seconds she waited seemed like minutes. Heather moved her head between the
front seats to see what was happening behind her. Apollo was moving slowly
toward the car, his back to it, shooting down the alley. When he emptied his
clip, he ran and got into the driver’s seat. He reloaded his gun, dropping the
empty clip on the floor of the car, and placed it in his lap.
“Who was—?”
Before Heather finished her
sentence, a bullet came out of the darkness, shattering the rear window. The
bullet missed Apollo's head by inches and exited the car through the windshield,
cracking it. Heather screamed again, this time without bothering to cover her
mouth.
About the Author:
Alex Manea is a Romanian journalist and writer, author of the Urban Fantasy novel Mortal Gods, the first book of the Forgotten Pantheon series. Alex is a big mythology buff, especially Greek, this being the source of inspiration behind the novel. Alex is currently working on the second novel of the series.
Twitter: https://twitter.com/authormanea
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