91 pages • 3 hours read
Alexandra BrackenA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Summary
Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Prologue-Part 1, Chapter 3
Part 1, Chapters 4-6
Part 1, Chapter 7-Ten Years Earlier
Part 1, Chapters 9-12
Part 1, Chapters 13-15
Part 2, Chapters 16-18
Part 2, Chapters 19-21
Part 2, Seven Years Earlier-Chapter 24
Part 2, Chapters 25-28
Part 3, Chapters 29-31
Part 3, Chapters 32-34
Part 3, Chapters 35-37
Part 4, Seven Years Earlier-Seven Years Earlier
Part 4, Chapters 41-43
Part 5, Chapters 44-47
Part 5, Chapters 48-52
Part 5, Chapters 53-55
Part 5, Chapters 56-58
Character Analysis
Themes
Symbols & Motifs
Important Quotes
Essay Topics
Tools
Lore goes to Thetis House, a property owned by the Achillides. While using the hidden entrance that avoids the security cameras and snipers, she observes a party, complete with guests in ancient Greek attire. Inside the building, she finds an old hunter’s robe and mask. She dawns the robe but can’t bring herself to wear the mask because she “still felt sick at the thought of wearing something other than her family’s own mark” (69). Armed with a screwdriver, she goes into the hall, where an unfamiliar male voice asks what she’s doing there.
Lore answers the query by saying she thought she heard something, revealing the House of Achilles mark she drew on her arm with sharpy. That appeases the other hunter, who suggests they rejoin the party. Before they can, a woman and five young girls, all dressed in traditional Greek garb, emerge from a room. The leader of the House of Achilles, Philip Achilleos, enters the hall and inspects the girls, slapping one who looks up at him. Lore’s anger at the world of hunters shoots through her “like a bolt of lightning” (72), but she refrains from interfering, remembering why she’s there.
Lore dawns the mask before entering the party, nervous about being recognized. Behind a silk curtain, she finds a Greek temple constructed both of physical structures and holographic projections, likely for a ceremony. She explores the temple and then gets some food to blend in with the party-goers. She sees several people she trained with years ago, but there’s no sign of Castor.
Right when she decides the party is a dead-end, the ceremony starts. Philip Achilleos, his wife, and the girls from upstairs—who Lore now recognizes as standing in for the Muses—arrive, the girls carrying symbols of the god Apollo. Apollo was rumored to be killed in the last Agon, and this ceremony means he was evidently killed by an Achillide. Following the girl-Muses, a man descends the stairs “the way the first ray of sunlight breaks through a window at morning” (77). It’s Castor, who is Apollo.
On a day 10 years ago, Lore’s father tells her the House of Achilles will allow her to train with them. Lore is overjoyed she’ll be able to fight and learn about the “big mysteries she’d only ever heard stories about” from her heritage (79). After breakfast, her father takes her to Thetis House, where he promises a younger Philip Achilleos he’ll deliver information about Tidebringer (the Perseide who ascended as Poseidon several Agons ago) later that night.
The Achillides greet Lore with insults and disgust. The instructor pairs her with Castor, who looks sickly and frail. The rest of the students beat them over and over with staffs until both Lore and Castor are bruised and bloody. They manage to stay standing by holding on to one another. When the lesson is over, the instructor sends them to wash up and change into their uniforms. Lore and Castor help clean one another up, and a bond forms between them.
These chapters reveal a discrepancy in Lore’s character for the first time. Lore wants to believe she’s left the Agon behind, but the events in these chapters show she is still very influenced by the culture of the hunt. Her reluctance to wear a mask other than her family’s shows how deeply engrained the Agon is in her mind. Even after seven years, it feels like she’s betraying her family. Lore’s fighting skills are still sharp, seen by how she is confident in her ability to use a screwdriver as a weapon.
The treatment of the girls in Chapter 8 reveals the anger Lore still carries toward the Agon and, specifically, the men who hold power. Watching the girls forced into fearful submission for the desire of Philip Achilleos fills Lore with indignation at how the choices were never hers to make. Women were meant to be seen, not heard, and most women who were trained to fight became little more than the extension of a man’s weapon. Lore believed she was special, as seen in the flashback chapter where she was able to train. That belief caused her to steal the aegis from the Kadmides, which led to the death of her family.
Castor’s seven-year disappearance is explained in these chapters. He ascended, but for reasons that are never disclosed, he did not achieve full godly power. In the Prologue, Wrath describes how he traveled across the world in both ethereal and physical form over the last seven years. By contrast, Castor couldn’t manifest a physical form, which is why he never went to Lore. This failing in Castor’s power may be attributed to the conditions of his ascension (he didn’t truly become Apollo—only borrowed his immortality). It may also be that Castor’s mortal illness kept him from becoming as powerful as the other gods.
Action & Adventure
View Collection
American Literature
View Collection
Books About Leadership
View Collection
BookTok Books
View Collection
Feminist Reads
View Collection
Memory
View Collection
Mythology
View Collection
New York Times Best Sellers
View Collection
Romance
View Collection
Sexual Harassment & Violence
View Collection
Teams & Gangs
View Collection
The Best of "Best Book" Lists
View Collection