The Clown paused. I looked up to see the Prince and two other gods, the Swan and the Veil; they were part of the six major gods.

“She is a traitor, why would you not want her dead?” the Veil was a woman with dark hair. She always wore black and a veil covered her face. Her voice was as expressionless as the veil made her face.

“She will live and die at my pleasure, do you deny me?” Was that irritation in his voice? I had never heard him show any emotion, at least not as The Prince.

The Veil didn’t respond.

For a moment there was nothing but silence. Then the Prince turned away from me and focused on Toni, “The Princess still lives?” He narrowed his eyes at Lightning and Heala, “What is Ethereal’s role in this?”

We didn’t get a chance to wonder what he meant because the Clown yelled, “The traitor should die,” and leapt at me. I jerked back. But the attack never came as The Prince shifted behind him, grabbed the Clown by the shoulder and ripped his head off. I gasped as blood sprayed over my face and chest. The Prince stared at the severed head, “I said no one was to touch her. Was I unclear?

“Ash, bury the head on the highest mountain, the body in the deepest ocean, should take him a few centuries to pull back together.”

I suppose I should have stopped being able to be surprised at this point but my heart still ached as Ash came out of an alley to take the head.

“Or perhaps you love her,” a fog condensed into a form of a woman, taking shape into Ethel. Relief washed over me until Ethel walked behind me, a long knife appearing in her hand. It felt strange for a god to use such a mundane weapon. “Do you not see history repeating? The dissent your concern for her has started?” I couldn’t move as she pulled my head back and slashed my throat.

No, not slashed, her thrust was meant to take my head right off.

I shut my eyes, after a year with the Prince I learned not to scream.

But her blade cut my neck and wouldn’t go further.

I opened my eyes to see Ash dropped the body, putting the head a ways away from it, staring at me as helpless as I felt. Somewhere in the back of my mind I wondered if the gods we “killed” were just waiting to be reunited with their heads too.

The Prince stepped forward, “You would compare this with your tryst with a human?”

“Your judgment is clouded, my Prince,” I gasped as Kitty attacked the Prince from behind.

“No,” I thought the word more than said it.

Toni was running to help Kitty and though Ethel stood back and my neck healed I couldn’t move to help her. Ash headed Toni off, killing her with one blow to the head. Her face, what was left of her humanity, melted beneath his molten touch.

I stared unable to comprehend how it all went so wrong.

What was happening?

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Kitty and the Prince were locked, almost equals in combat. How could she hold against him? And why were the Swan and the Veil doing nothing? He was their leader, wasn’t he?

I stepped forward--to what? Help him? Kill him?

“Stop, you can’t help him now,” Ethel put a hand on my shoulder.

“This was your plan? Why?”

She looked at me, her face pitying, “He loves you, but loving a human is something he himself has denied the possibility of to the gods, forbidden it. By loving you he has broken the pact he had with the rest of the gods, his throne is up for grabs now. You may want to take them and warn the humans to evacuate far, far away. There may be no Florida after this.”

Leave? I looked from one person to the next. People I’ve cared about; people I’ve come to care about. The Prince. If he died would I be better off? Or would I go insane like the Peacock’s Worshippers? Were those gods dead? And even if nothing happened to me, would the rest of them hunt me down after all this was over?

Ethel grabbed me by the throat, “Run, human. Now.”

I turned to find Lightning and Heala awake, staring at the chaos. “We have to go,” I yelled at them, helping them up. They didn’t have to be told twice.

We ran the way we came. “Toni is dead?” Lighting asked.

I nodded, unable to say anything else, not sure I understood enough to explain anyway.

We stopped at a police station long enough to tell them what was happening. The fighting was getting loud enough that we didn’t have much convincing to do. They were used to evacuating for gods by now anyway.

The Commissioner was called, then the Governor. Evacuation plans were put into effect. “Fastest way is to enact a statewide hurricane evacuation.”

All the news channels were alerted. Every channel ran the emergency signal telling people of the gods battling in their midst. They told them to take what they could carry, and follow the hurricane evacuation routes out of the state.

“There will be panic,” cops murmured.

“You’ll help with the evacuation, won’t you?”

We exchanged glances, “We’re on our way to the hospital, we’ll start evacuating there.”

Streets crowded quickly with cars. Traffic slowing to a crawl they couldn’t afford to be in. People left work in a hurry, on cell phones with their loved ones.

The smell of anesthetic, bleach and sickness hit us like a fist when we stepped into the hospital. The place was already in chaos from the Jester’s eardrum blowing fiasco. Now more injured from the current gods’ fighting were pouring in.

Heala stopped in the doorway and wouldn’t budge.

“Come on,” Lightning tugged on her.

“No,” her face clear of any childlike wistfulness, “I can help here, you find them.”

Lightning wouldn’t leave her side so I went on my own. Evacuation plans were starting to take effect here too.

I hadn’t taken full advantage of my Worshipper senses before, being a curse to feel, hear, see and taste more in the Prince’s custody. Now I stopped in a corner, closed my eyes and listened.

Ten minutes of feeling like the voices was a permanent ringing in my ears I found Brad‘s voice, “Lean on me, come on, it’s just a little walk to the ambulance.” I couldn’t go too fast with the unorganized crowds, tourneys and every other imaginable obstacle.

I spotted Shadow’s sandy hair, “Shadow.” He didn’t turn. I could have smacked my forehead, their eardrums burst only a couple of hours ago.

I tapped him on the shoulder. He didn’t jump, turning around, eyes widening. “I’m here to help,” I enunciated, he nodded.

Outside it sounded like bombs were going off. Inside we worked tirelessly to fill ambulances and cars full of sick and injured. Doctors and nurses stayed to the last. A helicopter took several critical patients away.

Several operations were still in progress. Family and nurses paced the halls biting their nails. Heala went into those rooms and suddenly they were done, the patients even awake.

I don’t know how long it took, minutes, hours, days. But after we were done, leaving with the last group, we heard screams, saw smoke and dust from toppling buildings. I looked back at the hospital, empty and abandoned. Those people would have nowhere to turn to now.

Mercy hugged Heala, the first display of affection I’d seen from her.

We jumped into an abandoned car. Lightning jump-starting it by putting his finger by the ignition. That’s a handy power.

We took back roads at first but too many were blocked off or so destroyed we could never make it through. I was glad we didn’t see any of the actual battle, if that was the right word for whatever was happening.

We joined the rest of Florida on the crawling exodus out of state.