Chapter 50
Courage
LYRA
I stand on the stone bridge overlooking the dark abyss that is the entrance to each of the Locks of Tartarus.
Of course the gods would test courage with a leap into an abyss.
Although, why that’s a test for Titans and gods, I don’t know.
We’re fairly indestructible. But it seems like one more roadblock to escaping this place.
Persephone is standing beside me, looking down as well.
After the Pandemonium were loosed again, we spent the rest of yesterday and last night in the tiny, empty room we’d hidden in.
I woke up drooling on Cronos’ shoulder. Something he was nice enough not to point out.
When Koios went out to check that all was clear, he never came back.
So we waited more. Waited and discussed Demeter’s Lock.
Finally, this evening, Rhea found us.
Koios had been touched. So had Crius. They didn’t let me see either of them. Something about staying focused on my task.
The Lock I’m about to enter. Right now.
Persephone sighs, gaze trained on the darkness, and slips her hand into mine. I tense at the contact but don’t pull away.
“I wish I could go with you,” she says. “Help you.”
“No.” I shake my head, still awkward with the hand-holding. “I wouldn’t wish this on anyone.”
Her lips tip up slightly. “Even me, you mean.”
“I didn’t say that.”
She gives me a squeeze. “I’m not worried. Like I said, we become friends eventually.”
I slide her a glance. “Every time?”
Her nod is definitive. “Every single time.”
“Even if Boone thinks I shouldn’t?” Now I’m watching her even more closely.
The goddess of spring can’t quite hide the shadows that shade her features. “He is…” She pauses, thinking. “An unknown.”
I think she also whispers, “Always has been,” to herself.
“It seems like most of this time around is unknown,” I say.
She gives another nod, this one slower. “But I also know you. You won’t judge me based on someone else’s opinion. You’ll decide for yourself.” Her sunshine smile isn’t entirely out of the clouds yet, though. “And you’ll decide you like me.”
“Boone told me…about how he saw you on scores in his past, before all this.”
All the sunshine disappears, and she lets go of my hand. It feels colder in here, as if she was warming me up from the inside. To get me ready for what I’m about to do? Or just because it’s Persephone? “He did?” She blinks a little. “What did he say?”
I shake my head. “You’ll need to talk to him about that.”
“I’ve tried.”
“Try harder. He’s not an unreasonable guy.
He just…” I make a face. Because his frustration with Persephone might have everything to do with the fact that she messed up his scores.
And possibly, given how hard he tried to track her down, that he was interested in her because of that.
A thief who could get the drop on him is a rare thing, and she is beautiful.
Persephone sighs. “Right now, you should focus on getting out of the Lock alive.”
She’s right.
I glance toward the massive carved doors at the end of this bridge.
The ones Cronos pulled me through not all that long ago, and yet it feels like forever.
I picture Hades on the other side, trying to figure out how to get in or how to get me out.
Except he’s not standing there still. My guess is that he’s somewhere topside, probably in Olympus, and that he is using every manipulative trick he has to force his brothers and sisters to each unseal their own Locks.
If Rima’s vision from during the Crucible is connected to this at all—and let’s all fucking hope it’s not—then he’s not going to like his siblings’ answers. The only person I could see being on his side is Demeter. She’ll be desperate to get Persephone out, too.
“You can do this.” Persephone pats my back before stepping away to stand with the Titans—all except Koios and Crius, who are still recovering—who are behind me in a line as I stare down into the darkness, working up the guts to hurl myself into the pit.
Cronos comes to stand beside me next. He doesn’t say anything for a moment.
Then he clears his throat and holds out his palm.
Resting there is a small, carved butterfly, I think made of white quartz.
It reminds me so much of Hades’ butterfly, the only tattoo of his that wanted to stay with him when he gave those to me as one of his gifts for the Crucible, that I can’t help but smile at it.
Cronos takes it in both his hands and snaps it in half.
“Hey!” I startle. “What was that for?”
“Hades made this for me and gave it to me on the anniversary of my…father’s death.”
The way he hesitates over those last two words, I can tell he’s uncomfortable with describing that event. I don’t blame him, after seeing exactly how that went down and why.
“My son told me that some things, no matter if they are destined to face imminent doom, are too precious not to be protected.”
“Then why would you break it?”
He takes one half and puts it in my hand, curling my fingers around the broken piece.
I can feel the smoothness of the carving as well as the jagged edge of the break against my skin.
Then he holds up his half. “When you find yourself questioning anything in there, especially what you have to do, hold on to this. It will feel the same no matter what is happening. It will ground you to reality. And when you get out, I’ll put the pieces back together. ”
His face is so familiar—Hades’ face, only older. Except now, even just in these last few days, it’s taken on a different shape for me, different peaks and valleys, different lines, different expressions. What I see in his expression now is also new…and surprising.
“You don’t want me to go through this,” I murmur. The words remain just between him and me.
“No,” he admits.
“Is there something you’re not telling me? About this particular Lock?”
He considers that. “It took a while for you to figure out how to get through this one the first time.”
In other words, I died and set off several resets. In the last few days, it’s become abundantly clear that time has reset a lot more than I realized. “So…my bad attitude in the past has…”
“A self-fulfilling prophecy is no laughing matter,” Cronos says, all gruff.
I don’t have a comeback for that. Because ever since the Crucible, I’ve wondered…
in relation to my own curse. I didn’t have a chance to ask Zeus how he worded that curse before I ended up down here.
He’s not exactly on speaking terms with us at the moment.
But it seems to me that the way I eventually formed friendships with Zai and Meike and the others, as well as the way I was able to fall in love with and be loved by Hades, means that maybe my curse wasn’t entirely what I was led to believe.
I know it was real. That, I don’t doubt. There were too many little things about how my life played out for it not to be real.
But what if I made it worse?
What if knowing about it at all affected my own reactions, perceptions, and expectations, and because of that, I somehow made it worse?
Kind of the same way Chance being an asshole to all the thieves around him basically guaranteed that no matter how good his skills were, he would never make Master Thief.
He only focused on the competition side of our way of life and not the side that required periodic partnerships or even, at the very least, the ability to charm his way out of a bad situation.
I always kind of thought that he made things harder for himself.
Wouldn’t it be ironic if the same had always been true of me and I just didn’t see it?
Again with the goddess of irony.
Oh my gods. What if that ends up being me?
But no. I’m already the goddess of glamouring. So disappointing.
Focus, Lyra.
“Okay. So I need to go into this one believing I can and will get out of the Lock,” I say slowly.
Cronos opens his mouth, closes it, and then, instead of answering, he tucks his piece of butterfly into a pocket. “We’ll be waiting for you on the other side.”
I half turn as he leaves me there to return to Rhea’s side. Persephone gives me another forced, sunny smile. And I realize that all these grim faces aren’t helping. Neither is standing here trying to bolster my courage.
Sometimes courage is simply taking the leap.
So I jump.