Helen stared at the croissant and wished that one of her talents was X-ray vision. She very much wanted to know what was under that flakey crust. If it was spinach, it had to go on the tray at the end of the case. If it was ham and cheese, well then, it had to go in her belly.
“Lennie? You’ve been staring at that pastry for ten minutes,” Kate said in a matter-of-fact way. “Any longer and it’ll get stale before you get it into your mouth.”
Helen straightened up and focused her eyes, trying to laugh like nothing was wrong. The laugh came out so forced and delayed that it sounded almost creepy. Kate gave her an odd look and stared pointedly at the croissant. Helen took the expected bite and regretted it. Spinach. Still, it gave her something to do so she would stay awake, and Helen had to stay awake for the rest of her shift, no matter what she had to put in her mouth.
Her vision had been blurring in and out every few minutes all night, and if she accidentally fell asleep and descended without Orion’s face in her mind she knew she wouldn’t meet up with him in the Underworld like they had planned. But even more important, she couldn’t allow herself to nod off and a microsecond later appear in the News Store, covered in crazy gunk from the Underworld.
The last few days Helen had been scared stiff that she might fall asleep in class or at work, descend, and wake up in front of everyone she knew covered in unexplainable filth. Especially this evening. She was more tired than she had ever been in her life, and Zach was bogarting a table at the back of the News Store, in the Kate’s Cakes section. Where Helen was stationed.
Several times Helen had tried to strike up a conversation, trying to find out what he was doing there all by himself on a Saturday night, but he barely even acknowledged her. He just kept ordering food and coffee, and typing on his laptop in a distracted way, almost as if he were just doodling. Never once did he make eye contact. When she did catch him staring at her, which happened more than Helen liked, he usually had a disgusted look on his face, as if he had just caught her picking her nose or something.
Wiping down the countertop for the thousandth time to keep herself awake, Helen heard the bells on the front door jingle as someone walked in. She wanted to scream. It was so late, so tantalizingly close to closing. The only thing she wanted was for the night to end so she could count her drawer, go home, and flop into bed. She could tell Zach to scram at ten o’clock sharp, but a new customer could take forever. She heard Kate squeal with happy surprise.
“Hector!”
Helen was out front, jumping into Hector’s arms along with Kate, in about half a second.
Hector picked up both of them easily, one girl to an arm. Although it usually took Hector about five minutes to say something that annoyed the bejeezus out of Helen, when he smiled and held out his arms for a hug she forgot how much of a pain in the ass he usually was. Hanging from Hector’s neck was like reaching up and hugging the sun—nothing but nurturing warmth and light.
“I could get used to this!” Hector chuckled, holding them both up in the air and squeezing them until they were breathless.
“But Noel and I just talked a few hours ago! She told me you were still in Europe, studying. What are you doing on Nantucket?” Kate asked when Hector put them down.
“I got homesick,” he said with a shrug. Helen knew he was telling the truth, even if the whole cover story about studying in Europe was a lie. “It’s just a quick visit. I’m not staying long.”
The three of them chatted pleasantly for another few minutes, although Hector kept shooting Helen worried looks. If Hector was concerned for her, then Helen knew she must be a scary sight. Excusing herself, she went into the back to throw some water on her face.
When Helen returned to the Kate’s Cakes section, Zach wasn’t in his seat, but hurrying back to it. He gathered up his things in a rush and bolted out of the café, his eyes glued to the floor. Helen followed him hesitantly to the front, watching him plow past Hector and out the door. Hector raised his eyebrows at the strange behavior.
“We’ll miss him horribly,” Kate said sarcastically. Then she checked the time. “You know what? If I hurry, I can make a drop at the bank before the last pickup. Can you close up alone, Lennie?”
“I’ll help her,” Hector offered, making Kate smile.
“Are you sure? You know I can only pay you in food, right?” Kate warned playfully.
“Deal.”
“You’re the best! Be sure to box up as many leftovers as you want for your family, too,” Kate said as she gathered her things and headed for the door.
“I’ll do that,” Hector called as she jogged out the door. He sounded cheery enough as he shouted good-bye, but his face fell as soon as Kate was gone.
No matter how much he would have loved to do as Kate asked, there was no way Hector could bring his family anything. Helen touched his arm consolingly and then pulled him into a hug when she saw him shake his head.
“I couldn’t stay away. I had to see someone related to me.” He squeezed Helen tight, like he could hug his whole family through her. “I’m glad I can be with you at least, Princess.”
As Helen hugged him back, a black anger started to rise up out of the tenderness she felt, and it had nothing to do with the fact that he was still calling her “Princess” even though she’d asked him a million times not to. How dare the Furies separate Hector from the people he loved? He was more committed to family than anyone Helen had met. Now, more than ever, the Delos family needed Hector’s strength to carry them through, but he was an Outcast. Helen had to find Persephone and beg her to help. She needed to end this.
“So you just stopped by because you needed a hug?” Helen asked sardonically when they pulled apart, trying to lighten the mood.
“No,” he said seriously. “Not that a hug from you isn’t worth it, but there’s something else. Did you hear anything about a break-in at the Getty?”
Helen shook her head, and Hector pulled a piece of paper out of his jacket pocket and showed it to Helen.
“It was obviously a Scion,” Helen said as she read the description of the impossible break-in and the stolen artifacts. “Who did it?”
“We don’t know. Daphne’s asked all the Rogues and Outcasts she knows, but so far no one’s admitted to it.” Hector rubbed his lower lip with his thumb. It was a gesture Helen had seen his father make when he was thinking. “We can’t figure out why these gold coins, and only these coins, were stolen. As far as we know, they have no magic that’s particular to any one of the Four Houses.”
“I’ll ask the family,” Helen said, taking the piece of paper and tucking it into the back pocket of her jeans. Then she covered her mouth as a giant yawn escaped. “Excuse me, Hector. But I can barely keep my eyes open.”
“I came here feeling all sorry for myself, but you know what? Now that I’m here, I’m more worried about you. You look pretty beat-up.”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m a total disaster.” Helen laughed ruefully as she tried to smooth her hair and straighten her clothes. “The Underworld is, well, it’s exactly as bad as you’d think. But at least I’m not alone down there anymore—that’s something.”
“Orion. He’s solid,” Hector said with a serious nod. Helen gave him a surprised look, and he continued, “I’ve never met him in person, of course. The Furies. But Daphne put the two of us in touch right after I had to leave here. We text each other occasionally, and he’s really been there for me. He’s had a rough life, and he knows what I’m going through. I feel like I can talk to him.”
“Orion is really easy to talk to,” Helen agreed thoughtfully. She wondered if Hector knew more about Orion’s childhood than she did. The thought bothered her. She wanted to be the one to listen to Orion’s secrets, and she had no idea what that meant.
“And he’s reliable. He helped me find Daphne when she was lost at sea. He’s a powerful Scion, Helen. But I think he’s an even better friend.”
“Wow. You’re gushing,” Helen said, flustered by all the high praise coming from Hector, of all people. “What’s going on? Have you got a little man-crush on Orion?”
“Whatever.” Hector brushed off Helen’s teasing. “Look, I’m just saying I like him. That’s it.”
“Well, so do I,” Helen said softly, not certain what else Hector wanted her to say.
“And I don’t see a reason why you wouldn’t. In fact, I don’t see a reason why you wouldn’t do more than just like him. And that’s fine,” Hector said. “But he’s Heir to both Athens and Rome, and you are the Heir to the House of Atreus. You know what that means?”
“The two of us together unite three of the four Houses,” Helen said, frowning.
She had secretly hoped it was jealousy that had turned Lucas against Orion, but now that she considered it, she wasn’t so sure. Maybe he didn’t care if Helen was with another guy or not. Maybe all he cared about was keeping the Houses separate.
“Not that the two of you couldn’t get cozy for a while,” Hector said quickly, misinterpreting Helen’s pained look. “But you couldn’t really . . .”
“Really what, exactly?” Helen looked at Hector sharply and crossed her arms. “No, go on. I’m dying to hear what the Scion rule book says I can and can’t do with Orion.”
“You can have fun—you can have a lot of fun if you want. Not for nothing, but I hear that Scions from the House of Rome are particularly good at that. But don’t get too close to him emotionally, Helen,” he said seriously. “No children, no long-term commitment, and for gods’ sake don’t fall in love with him. The Houses must stay separate.”
It was almost too weird to talk about this with Hector, but at the same time it wasn’t. Helen knew he wasn’t judging her or giving her an empty lecture; he only wanted what was best for everyone.
“We’re just friends,” Helen replied with a certainly she didn’t entirely feel. “Neither of us wants anything else.”
Hector studied her for a moment, almost like he pitied her.
“The whole world could be in love with you and you wouldn’t even notice, would you? Like that weird kid, sitting here so he can stare at you for hours on end.”
“You mean Zach?” Helen shook her head. “Maybe two years ago I would have agreed with you, but not anymore. Zach hates me.”
“Then why was he camping out here on a Saturday night?” Hector asked dubiously.
A thought occurred to him and his eyes started scanning around until they finally landed on the counter. His face froze.
“He knows,” Hector whispered.
“That’s impossible. I never told him anything.”
“You always leave your phone out like that?”
Hector gestured to the countertop, and sure enough, Helen’s phone was sitting next to the rag she had been using. She never left her phone laying out at work, especially not since Orion had started texting her.
Helen stormed over and snatched it up, scrolling through the first screen that lit up. It was the entire thread of texts with Orion, including their plan to meet in the Underworld.
Zach must have stolen her phone out of her bag and gone through her messages. Helen stared at the screen, her mind frozen with disbelief. How could Zach betray her like that?
“He was at that track meet, too, wasn’t he?” Hector’s face was grim and his eyes were two shrewd slits. “I saw him on the edge of the forest, following you and Claire. Right before the Hundred ‘mysteriously’ appeared out of the trees.”
“Yeah, he was there,” she mumbled, still dumbstruck. “I trusted him! Not enough to tell him about my powers, but I never thought he’d do anything to hurt me.”
“Well, he knows, and he’s got to be giving information to the Hundred. That’s the only way they could have found me.” Hector looked over the text thread and sighed heavily. “And now the Hundred will know about Orion as well.”
The thought hadn’t occurred to Helen, but now that Hector brought it up, she felt a surge of panic. As a Rogue, Orion had spent his whole life hiding his existence from the House of Thebes, and Helen had unwittingly led them right to him. She started typing a frantic text.
“Make sure you tell him to ditch his phone,” Hector added as he began moving around the News Store, checking for any sign of an impending attack. Helen explained the situation to Orion as quickly as her thumbs would allow.
Orion didn’t seem at all surprised.
Before I ever even got in touch with you I knew they’d find out about me eventually. Don’t panic. I’ve prepared for this.
Helen couldn’t believe he was so calm. She relayed the compromised text thread to him, but he responded that everything that they had texted was indecipherable to others. He pointed out that there was no way for anyone to trace the phone number he was using back to his location and told her several times that he was safe.
They’re fanatics. They’ll kill you, she typed, unable to believe that he wasn’t already packing a bag.
Look, I don’t have 4 last names (that you know of) for nothing. Trust me, K? C u 2nite as planned.
Helen smiled at her phone, relieved that he was still willing to help her. Then she got angry. Orion had barely even flinched when she told him that he had been discovered. Didn’t he know how dangerous the Hundred Cousins were?
“What’s the matter?” Hector asked when he returned from checking the back alley and saw her stormy expression.
“He says he has it all taken care of.”
“Then don’t worry about him. Orion’s been outmaneuvering murder plots since he was old enough to walk. If he says he took the proper precautions, then he did.” Hector spoke with such perfect faith in Orion’s abilities to protect himself that Helen was left speechless. “You just focus on what you need to do,” he said over his shoulder as he glanced up and down the empty street. “I have to get back to Daphne and tell her about this.”
“You’re going out there?” Helen shouted in disbelief, jumping up to stop him. “But they could be hiding! There’s a new Shadowmaster, you know.”
“Think strategically, Helen. If the Hundred didn’t make their move minutes ago when I was unaware and vulnerable, that means they won’t strike tonight. The real question a good general would ask herself is, why aren’t they coming for me when they know I’m right here?” He eyed her thoughtfully.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” she asked, pointing a finger at Hector and narrowing her eyes suspiciously. “What do you know that I don’t?”
Hector smiled and shook his head, like Helen had entirely missed his point.
“I know that there are a lot of people counting on your success. It’s so important, they’re willing to let me go without a fight to make sure your descent tonight isn’t disrupted.” He opened the back alley door and kissed her on the forehead. “Just don’t forget that the people who really love you need you much more than they need your success. Whatever you and Orion are planning for tonight, be careful in the Underworld, Princess.”
“Damn it!” Helen yelled.
“Was something supposed to happen?” Orion asked expectantly.
She had just tried to picture Persephone’s face and teleport herself and Orion into the queen’s presence. They hadn’t moved a millimeter. Helen paced around in a circle, kicking at little twigs until she realized they were actually tiny, yellowed bones.
“Why can’t it just work?” she moaned. “Just once I want to come up with a plan and have it work. Is that too much to ask?”
Orion opened his mouth, about to say something to calm Helen down.
“Of course it isn’t!” Helen interrupted, her rant picking up steam. “But nothing works down here! Not our talents, not even the geography works. That lake over there is tilted on a slope! It should become a river, but oh, no, not down here! That would make too much sense!”
“Okay, okay! You win! It’s ridiculous,” Orion said, chuckling. He put his hands on her upper arms, making her hold still and face him. “Don’t worry. We’ll think of something else.”
“It’s just that everyone’s counting on me. And I really thought we had a plan, you know?” Helen sighed, her anger spent. She let her head fall forward and thud against Orion’s chest. She was so tired. Orion let her lean against him while he stroked her back comfortingly.
“Tell you the truth? I never thought it was going to work,” Orion said cautiously.
“Really?” Helen looked at him, deflated. “Why not?”
“Well, you haven’t seen Persephone’s face, just a picture of it.”
“But that first time I appeared near you I never saw your whole face, either. All I pictured was your voice and your hands and your . . . mouth.” Helen stumbled over that last bit, her eyes dropping down to admire his lips involuntarily.
“Well, those are still real pieces of me—not just pictures,” Orion said quietly, looking away. “Anyway, you don’t even know for sure if that picture you saw of Persephone is accurate.”
“And you were going to mention this . . . when?” Helen said, punching his shoulder to dispel the tension with some humor. “Why didn’t you say something?”
“Because what the hell do I know?” he said, like it was obvious. “Look, until we find what works, I say no ideas should be taken off the table. We’ll figure this out, but only if we don’t get narrow-minded.”
Helen felt her heart grow a little lighter. Orion knew exactly how to handle her sleep-deprived mood swings. Somehow, it was okay for her to be herself with him no matter how cranky she felt.
“Thanks.” She smiled up at him gratefully.
Helen could feel his heart under her hand, beating hard. His breathing sped up, each breath staying high and tight in his lungs. Helen was suddenly very conscious of the fact that he was holding her, and the small of her back tightened with sensitivity under the weight of his hands. An intense moment passed. Helen had the feeling that Orion was waiting for her in some way. She laughed nervously to cover the fact that she was breathing just as fast as he was and eased out of his arms.
“You’re right. We should stay open to all ideas,” she said as she moved a step away.
What the hell am I doing? she thought, clenching her fists until her nails dug into the palms of her hand.
What she was doing was trying not to think too much about what Hector had said about how she could have “a lot of fun” with a Scion from the House of Rome. What did that mean, exactly? It was the House of Aphrodite, after all. . . .
“You wouldn’t happen to have any, would you? Ideas, I mean,” she continued, pushing aside her thoughts about just how much fun she was allowed to have with Orion.
“Actually, I think I might,” he said, switching gears so fast Helen wondered if she had interpreted the situation correctly. Orion was staring intently at the slanted lake, biting his lower lip.
“I’m listening,” she said, just to remind him that she was still there.
Had he been thinking about kissing her, or was she just flattering herself? Helen watched him gently tug his lower lip through his teeth and didn’t know which of those two options she hoped was true.
Why did Orion have to be an Heir? Why couldn’t he be some amazing guy she’d just met, preferably a full mortal so he was completely removed from this Truce nonsense? It would be so much easier if Orion were just a normal guy.
“You know, in all my reading about the Underworld there have only been a few things that get mentioned over and over,” he continued, oblivious to Helen’s swirling thoughts. “It’s like they’re the only things that the historians agree are really down here one hundred percent of the time.”
Helen stated to tick off the list on her fingers, taking an inventory of all the different things that could fit Orion’s description.
“Well, we’re in Erebus right now—this bland nowheres-ville. Then there are the Fields of Asphodel: creepy. And Tartarus: yuck.”
“Only been to Tartarus once—when we first, ah, met,” Orion said, referring to the time he had pulled her out of the quicksand. “And that was enough.”
“It’s where all the Titans are imprisoned, too. Definitely not a pleasant place to spend eternity,” she said grimly. “So, there’s Tartarus, Erebus, the Asphodels, the Elysian Fields—aka heaven. I’m sure I haven’t found them yet. What am I missing? Oh, yeah, there are the five rivers. The rivers!” Helen exclaimed, catching on at the last second. “Everything down here is about the rivers, isn’t it?”
Like something recalled from a fever dream—more emotion than image—Helen had an uneasy feeling about a river, but she wasn’t sure which one. As soon as she tried to turn her mind’s eye directly on it, the memory swam away like a pale fish.
“The Styx, the Acheron, all of them. They sort of define the space down here, don’t they?” Orion mused as he processed this new line of thought. “They could lead us, like paths.”
“And just how did you come up with this little slice of genius?” Helen asked with admiration, her former thought lost as if it had never existed.
“From what you said about your favorite lake over there,” he said with a wry smile. “It should be a river, but it isn’t. That got me thinking that the rivers must be different. The rest of the landscapes down here are always switching around like they’re interchangeable. But the rivers stay put. They’re always here. I mean, even most full mortals know about the River Styx, right? The rivers are in every reliable account of the Underworld I’ve ever read, and most of the books say that at some point or another all the rivers meet.”
“So, we find any river and follow it, and eventually it will meet up with the one we need,” Helen said, staring unblinkingly into Orion’s eyes, as if moving would ruin the new hope she felt. “Persephone’s Garden is next to the Palace of Hades, and the palace is supposed to be near a river. We find that river, and we might find Persephone.”
“Yeah, but that’s a whole different kind of headache. The river around the Palace of Hades is Phlegethon, the River of Eternal Fire. Not pleasant to stroll along its banks, I’m sure.” Orion’s brow furrowed in thought. “And then we still need to convince Persephone to help us get rid of the Furies.”
Orion suddenly broke eye contact and started looking around in a tense way, as if he heard something.
“What?” Helen asked. She glanced over her shoulder but she didn’t see anything.
“Nothing. Come on,” he said uneasily. Orion tugged on Helen’s arm, urging her onward.
“Hey, what’s the rush? Did you see something?” Helen asked as she trotted alongside Orion, but he stayed silent. “Look, just tell me if it’s got fangs, okay?”
“Did you hear about a robbery at the Getty?” he asked out of the blue.
“Ah, yeah,” Helen said, surprised by his sudden change in topic. “Do you think that has something to do with what you just saw?”
“I don’t know what I saw, but regardless, we’ve been standing in one place for too long,” he said, sounding annoyed. “I shouldn’t have let that happen. I can’t believe I . . .”
Helen waited for him to finish his sentence, but he didn’t. Instead he kept frowning, like something was off, as he walked beside her. Helen kept looking around, but she didn’t see or hear any kind of threat.
The tiny bones that littered the ground, the ones Helen had so carelessly kicked earlier, were getting bigger with every few paces. As she and Orion walked a few yards, the skeletons grew from mouse- to cat- to elephant-sized. Soon they were wandering amidst skeletons that were many times larger than any dinosaur’s. Looking up at the massive calcified structures sticking up out of the ground, Helen felt as if they were walking through a forest of bones.
Arching ribs soared overhead like the pillars of a Gothic cathedral. Lumpy joints, covered in branching colonies of dead and dusty lichens, lay like massive boulders in their path. Helen noticed that many different types of anatomies were jumbled up, as if hundreds of beings the size of skyscrapers had died heaped on top of each other. The scale was increased to such an extent that it was as if Helen were looking through a microscope. From her perspective, each pore inside the sequoia-sized bones was so large it appeared as though they were made out of layers of lace. She ran her hand over one of the latticed surfaces and looked over at Orion.
“Do you know what these creatures were?” she whispered. Orion dropped his eyes and swallowed.
“The Ice Giants. I’ve read stories about this but never believed it was real. This is a cursed place, Helen.”
“What happened here?” she whispered, as awed by what she was looking at as she was by Orion’s emotional reaction.
“It’s an entire battlefield brought directly to the Underworld. That can only happen when every last soldier fights to the death. The Ice Giants are extinct now,” he said in a hopeless monotone that was so unlike him. “I’ve had nightmares about another field like this, transported to the Underworld. Except instead of Ice Giants, all the bones belong to Scions.”
His usually smiling mouth was pinched and forbidding, and Helen was reminded of what Hector had said. Orion had lived a rough life. She could sense it in him now, like a sad note in what was otherwise meant to be a joyful song.
She tilted her face under his until she caught his eye. Pulling him closer to her, she shook his arm gently as if to wake him.
“Hey,” she said softly. “You know what always bugged me about history class?”
“What?” Orion was startled out of his morose reverie by Helen’s seemingly random question, just as she intended.
“It’s all about war and battles and who conquered whom.” Helen wrapped both her hands around one of his thick forearms and started to lead him along again. “You know what I think?”
“What?”
His face broke into a smile as he allowed her to lead. Helen was delighted to see the storm clouds that had darkened his face clear so quickly, as if she had the power to banish them at will.
“I think for every battle date they make us memorize in history class, they should make us learn at least two awesome things. Like, how many people get saved every year by firefighters, or the number of people who’ve walked on the moon. You know what’s awful? I don’t even know the answer to that.”
“Neither do I,” Orion said with a quiet smile.
“And we should know that! We’re Americans!”
“Well, officially I’m Canadian.”
“Close enough!” Helen said, waving an enthusiastic hand in the air. “My point is that considering all the amazing things that people are capable of, why do we focus on war? Humans should be better than that.”
“But you’re not human, not really, not wholly human. Pretty little godling,” hissed a slippery, wheedling voice.
Helen heard a ringing scrape, and a bright flash caught her eye as Orion unsheathed one of the many blades he kept strapped under his clothes. He pushed her behind him and dug his fingers into her hip, his large hand pinning her in place in case she tried to do something idiotic, like jump out and start swinging.
“Come and face me,” Orion challenged to their adversary. His voice was calm, icy—almost like he had been waiting for this.
Frustrated with herself for being so helpless without her lightning, Helen resolved to learn how to fight like a mortal as soon as she was back in the real world. If she ever made it back.
A thin, warbling laugh echoed through the forest of bones, and a haunting almost-song wove its way toward them.
“Big baby godling! Bigger than most, like the hunter he was named for! Want to fight me, foolish Sky Hunter? Caution! I invented war. War, little beauties, I invented it. But, no, Sky Hunter won’t heed. He will fight! And he will forever chase her across the night! For how prettyprettypretty she is!”
The singsong voice slid off into peals of childlike laughter that made Helen’s teeth grind together until they squeaked. As Orion circled defensively, Helen caught a glimpse of a long, gangly figure darting this way and that through the Ice Giants’ graveyard. He was scrawny, nearly naked, and painted all over with blue-dye curlicues, like some Stone Age wild man.
“So like my sister, my lover. So like the Face! Oh! The Face that loved, that launched, that spilled so much bloodbloodblood! Again, again! I want to play the Game with the pretty little godlings again!” Giggling, he darted in close, trying to lure Orion away from Helen, but Orion didn’t fall for it.
As the wild man came nearer, Helen got a better look at him. Horrified, she pressed herself tighter against Orion’s back. The wild man had bulging gray eyes and long dreadlocks that looked like they might have been platinum blond or white before they were matted with blue dye and clotted blood. Blood seemed to bubble up out of his skin. It ran from his nose and ears—even from his scalp, as if his rotted brain leaked gore from any handy hole.
In his hand was a raggedy sword, its edges orange with rust. Whirling around as Orion intercepted one of the wild man’s feints, Helen caught a whiff of him. Her stomach heaved at the necrotic stench. He smelled like sour fear-sweat and rotting meat.
“Ares,” Orion whispered to Helen over his shoulder as the god skipped off, giggling hysterically, to hide among the bones. “Don’t be afraid, Helen. He’s a coward.”
“He’s insane!” Helen whispered back frantically. “He’s completely and totally insane!”
“Most of the gods are, though I hear Ares is by far the worst,” Orion said with a comforting smile. “Don’t be afraid. I won’t let him near you.”
“Um, Orion? If he’s a god, can’t he pretty much crush you?” she asked delicately.
“We don’t have our demigod powers here, so why should he have his god powers?” he said with a shrug, like he was tossing an idea out there. “And he’s the one running away from us. That’s usually a pretty good sign.”
Orion had a point, but Helen still didn’t relax. She could hear the mad god humming to himself as he trotted off in the distance. He didn’t sound very afraid of them.
“You there, little godling! Hiding from the others?” Ares suddenly called out, a few hundred yards away. “So inconvenient, when I need all three of you together to start my favorite Game! Soon, soon. For now I will settle. I will watch you play with my uncle’s pet instead. Here he comes, little godling!”
“Who’s he talking to?” Orion whispered over his shoulder to Helen.
“I don’t know, but I don’t think it’s us. Maybe he’s seeing things?” she guessed.
“Maybe not. Earlier, I thought I saw . . .” Orion’s sentence was abruptly interrupted.
A great howl sounded through the bone forest. It was so deep and loud Helen could feel it vibrating inside her chest. A second howl, then a third followed, each one closer than the last. Helen froze out of sheer instinct, like a white rabbit in the snow.
“Cerberus.” Orion’s voice cracked. He recovered from his fear quickly. “Move!”
He grabbed Helen’s arm and dragged her along, snapping her out of her terrified trance. The two of them ran for their lives with Ares’ cackling laughter ringing in their ears.
They vaulted over brittle bones, trying to keep the howling behind them while making sure not to run down a dead end. Luckily, the bones kept getting smaller and smaller as they zigzagged out of the forest.
“Do you know where you’re going?” she panted. Orion twisted his wrist out from under the sleeve of his jacket and looked at the golden cuff.
“It glows when I’m near a gate,” he shouted back at her.
Helen dodged around a particularly sharp-looking pelvis, and then glanced at Orion’s cuff. It wasn’t glowing, not even a little bit. The howling of Hades’ three-headed hellhound was getting closer by the second.
“Helen. You have to wake up,” Orion said grimly.
“I’m not going anywhere.”
“This isn’t up for debate!” he shouted at her with real anger. “Wake up!”
Helen shook her head stubbornly. Orion caught Helen roughly by the arm, forcing her to stop. He shook her shoulders and glared into her eyes.
“Wake. Up.”
“No.” She glared back at him. “We leave together or not at all.”
Another chest-rattling howl split the air. They both turned and saw Cerberus, less than a football field away, bounding through the diminishing cover of the boneyard.
A strange squeak came out of the back of Helen’s throat at the sight of him. She didn’t know what she was expecting—maybe a pit bull or a mastiff with the head of a Doberman thrown in to round out the trio. The sight of any recognizable breed would have been a comfort. But, no. She should have known that none of those familiar, tame dogs existed eons ago when this beast was whelped.
Cerberus was a wolf. A twenty-foot-tall, three-headed wolf with salivating jaws, and he did not have a tame chromosome in his body. As one of the heads snapped at her, its eyes rolled back to show the whites. One head zeroed in on Helen, the other two on Orion. The hackles rose on their shared back, and all three heads dropped into a menacing crouch. One paw padded forward, then another, as a low growl rumbled in all three throats.
“EEEYAYAYA!!”
A piercing cry broke Cerberus’s deadly concentration, followed by a shower of bone bits that pelted the left-most head.
All three heads reacted immediately. Cerberus turned and sprinted off after the mystery yodeler, abandoning Helen and Orion. Helen tried to see who had saved them, but she could only make out a faint shadow among the gnarled stumps of bone.
“Go-go-go!” Orion urged optimistically as he turned Helen around. Taking her hand and holding it hard, he ran toward a stone wall that had appeared in the distance. Helen resisted.
“We have to go back! We can’t leave . . .”
“Don’t waste a perfectly good act of heroism with a bad one of your own!” he hollered as he dragged her along. “You don’t have to out-valor everyone, you know.”
“I’m not trying to . . .” Helen started to argue, but another series of snarling barks from Cerberus changed her mind. The hellhound had apparently finished with the yodeling hero and was on their trail again. It was time to shut up and run.
Helen and Orion bolted pell-mell toward the wall, hands locked as they encouraged each other on. They were both beyond tired. Helen had lost count of how many hours they had been in the Underworld, and how many miles they had traversed in that incalculable amount of time. Her mouth was so dry her gums ached, and her feet felt swollen and bruised inside her boots. Orion wheezed painfully at her side as if every breath were like sandpaper in his lungs.
Looking down at Orion’s hand linked tightly to hers, Helen saw the cuff on his wrist begin to glow. With every stride closer to the wall, the golden haze coming from the cuff grew until it surrounded his body in a nimbus of gilded light. Helen tore her eyes away from Orion’s illuminated shape to watch a glowing crack form between the dark rocks of the wall ahead.
“Don’t be afraid! Just keep going,” he yelled as they ran toward it on a collision course.
She could hear the slap of massive paws gaining on them as the hellhound closed the distance. The ground shook and the air grew hot and wet as Cerberus literally breathed down Helen’s neck.
The rocks did not part. They did not move reassuringly aside to give Helen and Orion a clear opening. Clinging tightly to Orion’s hand, Helen charged ahead without hesitation.
They jumped through the solid wall, soared through a chasm of empty air, and hit what seemed to be another wall. Helen heard a sickening crunch as her temple hit the hard surface. Unable to catch her breath, Helen waited to slide down the wall and hit the ground, but she never did. It took a moment for her to realize that gravity had done a one eighty, and that she was already on the ground. She was lying on an icy floor in a very cold, very dark place.
“Helen?” Orion’s worried voice splintered off in the dark and echoed down many separate passages.
She tried to answer him but all that came out of her mouth was a wheezing sound. When she tried to pick up her head, her stomach heaved weakly. There was nothing in her belly to throw up.
“Oh, no,” she heard Orion breathe as he shuffled toward her in the dark. She heard a snapping, grinding sound, followed by a bright orange flame as he flicked a lighter. She had to shut her eyes or she knew she’d throw up for sure. “Oh, Helen, your head . . .”
“C-cold,” she managed to groan, and she was. It was even colder here than it was in her bedroom, and she couldn’t lift herself away from it. She twitched her fingers and they seemed to work, but for some reason her arms wouldn’t move.
“I know, Helen, I know.” He moved around her frantically, but talked in a soothing whisper, like he was trying to calm a child or an injured animal. “You hit your head pretty bad and we’re still at the portal—neither here nor there. You can’t heal yourself unless I move you, okay?”
“’Kay,” she managed to whine. She was starting to get freaked out that her limbs weren’t responding properly.
She felt Orion wedge his hands under her prone body, felt him brace himself for one brief moment, and then she felt shafts of pain shoot from her temple to her toes.
Orion was murmuring to her as he carried her out of the cold zone and into someplace slightly warmer, but Helen had no idea what he was saying. She was too busy trying not to throw up. The whole world was tilting and reeling, and she was desperate for Orion’s jarring steps to stop. Every time he planted a foot it felt like he was stepping on her head. Finally, he crouched down, cradling her across his lap, and she heard the snap of his lighter again.
She could feel a warm glow from behind her closed eyelids as Orion lit a candle. Helen felt him brush her hair back from her temple and try his best to wrap her up inside his jacket, close to his skin. After a moment she started to feel a bit better.
“Why do I feel so sick?” she asked when her voice had grown stronger.
“Never had a concussion?” he asked in return, sounding almost amused. He squeezed her tighter in a brief hug. “It’s okay. You’re healing fast now that we’re away from the portal. You have your Scion powers back in this part of the cave, so you’ll be all better soon.”
“Good,” she said with complete faith. If Orion said she was going to be okay, Helen knew she would be. After just a few more seconds, she felt nearly back to normal and she relaxed in his arms. But as she did, she felt him stiffen.
“I have to leave you now,” he said in a gentle voice.
“Huh?” Helen said, lifting her eyes to Orion’s. He looked at her sadly.
“We’re back in the living world, Helen. They’re going to come for us.”
As soon as he finished speaking, a pitiful sobbing came from everywhere at once. Orion dropped his head with a pained look and sighed heavily. In a sudden, violent motion, he kicked over the candle next to them, putting it out. He tried to push Helen out of his lap so he could stand and throw her off him in the sudden dark.
Every muscle in Helen’s body went rigid, stopping him from bending forward and standing up. She put a firm hand against Orion’s chest, pushed him back, and threw a leg over him to pin him to the ground. A wave of rage broke over her as she squeezed his hips between her thighs.
“You’re not going anywhere,” she said. Her voice was low and it cracked with hate.
“No, Helen. Don’t,” Orion pleaded, but he knew it was too late.
The Furies had Helen, and they were commanding her to kill Orion.
