Fifty-Seven
F IFTY - S EVEN
ESTRELLA
My skin felt too tight as we approached the Cocytus the next day. Brann and Caldris had been mostly silent after I finally awoke, but I didn’t have the energy to ask what their conversation had been while I was asleep. For them to practically ignore one another’s existence while we traveled together by foot did not bode well for me at all. I reached up, removing Belladonna from where she’d wound herself around my bicep. The purple snake slithered down to the ground, making her way to Medusa who would look after her while I was gone. She was almost as comfortable with her as she was with me, and it brought me strange comfort to know with absolute certainty that she would be looked after if something happened to me.
That out of all the creatures in the world, at least the little snake would have a place to belong. She’d return to the home she’d had before me, and I wasn’t too proud to admit it was probably a safer one than I could offer her. The river gleamed with a blue that reminded me of sadness, the surface rippling as I stepped into the water. My muscles twitched with the shock of cold, but I forced myself to move deeper into the waters.
This was my final test, the final trial standing between me and the Cradle of Creation. I moved quickly, hoping to get through it sooner rather than later.
It was only the knowledge that the end to these struggles was so close that kept me moving, my irritability and exhaustion threatening to make me give up. I wanted nothing more than to rest for a week, to allow the bone-weary tiredness I felt take control and hide beneath the covers. These trials were not meant to be survived, because anyone who had less to live for than I did would no longer want to win.
I fought back tears as I moved into the water, grateful for the moment without Caldris’s watchful eyes. I knew he felt everything I did, knew the sympathetic, soft stare he leveled me with constantly came from a place of understanding. There was no hiding how deeply that last trial had wounded me, both physically and emotionally. It had weakened all my resolve, sinking deep into me and making me doubt myself in ways I hadn’t thought ever to do again. I’d been so close to death, so close to burning alive in that river and then the battle with the hydra.
If my life was always going to end in flames, if I was always going to be destined to die, then why was I fighting so hard to stay in the world of the living?
The only answer I had was love. It was what motivated me to push through and submerge myself in the Cocytus.
My ears rang as the water poured in, surrounding me and suffocating me. The sound of wailing filled me, an ear-piercing shriek that surrounded me and forced my hands to cover my ears in an attempt to shut it out. My mouth opened on a silent scream that matched the one I heard, my voice joining the cacophony of sound. My lungs burned as the water filled them, setting me aflame from the inside out as darkness pressed in.
I landed on the grass beneath me, sputtering and spitting out the water I’d swallowed. My stomach purged itself, emptying in a wave that felt like it would never end. The water itself tasted of salt, acrid and burning as my eyes watered.
Pushing myself to my feet as soon as I stopped vomiting, I looked around the garden surrounding me. Lush plants and trees were artfully arranged into neat patterns, a circular clearing at the center. It was covered in cobblestone, a natural pool in the middle with water the same blue as the river above my head. The waters rushed over me, carrying spirits and spectral forms down the current. Their mouths were opened into silent screams that I could no longer hear from my place beneath the waters, but the memory of that sound was one that I knew I would carry with me always.
It was the pain of grief, of loss and agony so thorough it knew no end.
The waters in the pool rippled, the branches of a tree hanging over it swaying as it bubbled. I stepped up beside it, staring down into the pool that seemed to have no bottom. A lone figure swam toward the surface, forcing me to back away as the male came closer and closer and then finally emerged from the depths. Water dripped down over his features as he flung his head back, flinging droplets of water at me as he tossed his hair out of his face, running strong fingers through it.
He was nude entirely, his body more on display than I’d ever seen it in my past. In our nights tucked away in the privacy of the woods, we’d never bothered to fully disrobe. It wasn’t safe, not when the risk of discovery came with too many consequences. We’d needed to be ready to flee at a moment’s notice. I averted my gaze quickly, focusing in on his face even though he didn’t seem at all perturbed by his stark nakedness.
“Loris?” I asked, hating the anguished expression on his face. It was one that matched the wails I’d heard in the river, and now that he’d presented himself to me, I could make out his voice in the memory. The deep, mournful cry that I’d never heard in life struck straight into my chest.
“Why?” he asked, his face pinching with the word. It was barely a whisper between us, so sad and heartbroken that I floundered for an answer. The last time I’d seen the man who had once been my lover, I’d killed him.
I’d been the reason he died, the one to send him to the afterlife. I’d never imagined he might come to Tartarus instead of reincarnating, never dared to think of what might have become of him. The guilt was too great to bear when faced with his new reality, plunging into my heart like icy talons gripping my heart.
“Why what?” I asked, shaking off the thoughts that wouldn’t help either of us. The question seemed obvious, but I couldn’t stand to make assumptions about what he may need answers to. Not when I’d already taken so much from him as it was.
“Why did you kill me?” he asked, his face twisting into a sob.
“I didn’t mean to,” I said, the truth strangling my throat. “You were trying to kill me, and the viniculum couldn’t allow that. I wouldn’t have hurt you intentionally. You know that.”
“Do I?” Loris asked, running a hand through his hair that was darkened by the water clinging to it. There was something violent in the motion, an energy that was barely restrained. “Why is that exactly? Was it because you loved me so much you couldn’t bear to live without me?”
The sarcastic tone of the words made me flinch, the harshness seeming completely out of nowhere. Loris and I had been clear from the very beginning of our physical relationship that what we shared was never going to be about love. It was never in the cards for us, and we’d only wanted to taste what was forbidden. “You were my friend,” I said, letting him feel the genuineness of those words. He may not have been the love of my life, but I’d cared for him in my own way.
“Right. Your friend,” he said, sinking his teeth into his bottom lip. “Because you have a filthy fucking Fae mate, and I was just the placeholder.”
“How was I supposed to know that I had a mate or that the Veil would fall? What I felt for you was an entirely different situation that had nothing to do with him,” I argued, wincing as he took a step toward me. I backed away instinctively, not wanting his hands to touch me. I didn’t know what Caldris could feel when I was in the river, if he could hear the thoughts. Our bond was silent for me when I was gone, only the barest of impressions coming down the bond as if the river muffled it.
“That’s not entirely true,” he hissed, his steps continuing as I backed over the flowers behind me. I raised my feet, trying not to trample them as I watched tears track down Loris’s face. “You may not have been aware of his existence before the Veil fell, but that doesn’t mean your heart was ever yours to give. You were never going to be capable of loving me.”
“We agreed when we decided to get physical. We both knew it was only a matter of time before you chose a wife, and I had to marry whoever they decided for me. Love was never going to be mine to give whether it was with my mate or a human husband,” I said, my back striking the trunk of one of the trees at the edge of the grove. The bark dug into the back of my head, my hair tangling on the rough surface as I tried to keep my distance.
“The difference, Estrella,” he argued, his head tilting to the side. I didn’t know if I should expect anger or sorrow, his features flashing between the two emotions so quickly that I couldn’t keep track. They were so entwined together, a horrible mix of emotions that was so strange on Loris’s face. In life, he’d been so carefree. He’d been the gentlest of the Mist Guard, completely different from the rest of the harsh men who had made up that force. “Is that you would have hated your husband for the rest of your life. I would have been the only man you ever chose for yourself. I accepted the fact that they wouldn’t allow me to marry you. I accepted the fact that one day, I would have to watch you bind yourself to another, because I knew we would always have those nights in the woods. I knew I would find a way to continue to meet you and continue our relationship in secret. I knew nothing needed to change, and that I would spend every day for the rest of my life looking at your children and wondering if they were his or mine.”
I fumbled for words, trying to grapple with understanding. None of what he said made any sense with the man I knew, none of it lined up with any of the conversations I remembered us having. We’d planned to go our separate ways once there was a spouse involved, because neither of us wanted to hurt innocents who might have had real love involved. Not when we were just in it for pleasure that could be found in any body. “That was never what I wanted.”
Loris reached out, running his thumb over my cheek. “And what of what I want? Does that not matter to you at all?” he asked, glancing above his head.
Three golden apples hung from a tree branch higher up, too far for him to reach but more enticing than I could ever recall a simple apple looking. His stare came down to mine once again, his eyes burning as he leaned into my space more. With his mouth only a breath from mine, I turned my head away and gave him my cheek. “Stop it,” I hissed.
“We can still have those forbidden nights in the woods, Estrella. That’s my price,” he said, the bitterness and pride in the words making my heart sink into my stomach. That was the one thing I could not do, the one task that I would never complete. I wouldn’t step out on my mate, wouldn’t engage in any activity that would hurt him or bring him shame.
He came before everything else.
“Your price?” I asked, swallowing as the world spun at my feet.
“You cannot reach the apples without my help. You were the greatest betrayal of my life, and now it brings me great joy to know that you will never leave this place without me. You may want to return to your mate, but I will do everything in my power to make sure you never see him again. If I must suffer here, then I’ll at least do it with you at my side,” he said, pressing his hand to the front of my throat. The touch was far more aggressive than anything Loris had ever done before, harsh where he was usually sweet.
“Loris, please. This isn’t you,” I said, shaking my head and trying to squirm away from his grip without causing him any more harm than I had already done.
“You want my help? I want you to go back to your fucking mate and be forced to tell him what you’ve done. I want to fuck you one last time, Estrella. I want to know what a Goddess feels like on the inside, and I want to go into my afterlife with the joy of knowing I have ruined you for him,” he said, angry tears accompanying the words.
“No,” I said, my voice catching with emotion. My throat closed, the pressure around me feeling like a hand on my neck and squeezing. My mouth opened on a scream but didn’t allow any sound to pass, my lungs filling with water I could not see.
“Then I reject you, Estrella Barlowe. You have failed the Trial of the Cocytus,” he said, his voice strengthening as he stepped away. I sank to my knees, clawing at my throat as the water burned through my lungs. It was so cold, so brutal as I sank into the depths of the river once again.
I’d failed , and that was how I died.