Chapter 73
The Umpteenth Time
LYRA
“Lyra, I don’t know if I can take much more of this.”
“You and me both,” I mutter too softly for Hades to catch.
I’m back in the Underworld, with him in the water garden. Again.
I’ve heard those words so many times, I’ve lost count. A hundred, maybe. After all, it’s only resetting a few hours of my time, personally.
By now, my heart is so heavy I can hardly breathe, hardly move.
In a hundred times revisiting him here, that part always stays the same, and yet I’ve never saved Isabel. Not once.
Timing truly is everything.
I’ve tried giving him specific instructions on how to fix it.
He’s even tried interfering directly. Any time he interferes results in a reset.
We’ve tried having Boone come with me, but the fissure of time never picks him up, or at least it never takes him to the same place.
Any instances I’ve interfered—yes, I tried going up there myself—it resets.
My more subtle attempts might change how she dies, but she dies in Fingal’s Cave every single time.
Fifty attempts in, the Titans gave me only another fifty tries.
Seventy-five in, I knew the truth deep down—that sometimes it’s just a person’s time to go—but I wasn’t ready to quit.
But it’s over now.
My choice. Cronos didn’t have to convince me. I’ve realized that with where time now resets to, it’s not going to let me fix anything before this.
At least that’s what Cronos said after I shared that conclusion.
When I asked him why he didn’t tell me that sooner, he said that some truths have to be felt so deeply to sink in as truth that the only way to learn them is through our own experience.
He was right about that.
But that also means I can’t save the others, either. Meike, Neve, Dex, Dae’s grandmother…
Their deaths are part of the larger tapestry that makes up this story of life. At least in this timeline we’re now stuck with.
“Lyra?”
Hades is still behind me.
There’s a huge difference between acknowledging a harsh reality and going through with it.
“Lyra?” He puts a hand on my shoulder.
I take a deep breath and face him. “I know I’m in the middle of Poseidon’s Lock. You should go back to her. She’s going to need you when it’s…over.”
He takes in the set to my features. I can only imagine how I look. How I feel is…empty. Numb. No…not numb. Guilty.
“You’re sure?” he asks slowly. “You don’t look well.”
“Something bad is about to happen for her. You’ll find out soon enough.” My only consolation is that I know where Isabel is in Elysium. She’s told me herself that she’s happy there, waiting for her partner, Estephany, and other members of their family to join her.
Hades makes a noise in the back of his throat. “I can help—”
“No. Not this time. I promise. I’ve tried.” Gods, I sound so…cold. Heartless.
“Lyra—”
I hold my hand out to him. “Take me to your rooms. I’ll wait for you there.”
Maybe he sees that I’m beyond arguing with. A small spark of grateful warmth that he doesn’t push me further settles in my chest as he takes my hand, and we’re instantly standing in his rooms.
Like every other time, he sets Cerberus to guard me.
Only this time, Hades is reluctant to leave.
“Go,” I tell him when he hesitates.
I’m not sure how long I stand here staring at the fancy rug, the patterns swirling around my feet until they distort. It’s a while. Honestly, I’m waiting for time to take me away again.
After so many resets, that feels like my new normal.
I sit down on the edge of the bed, not really taking in my surroundings. I’ve been here before. Hells, this is my room, too, now, minus a few photographs I’ve added to all our homes.
And I wait.
I wait for time or Hades. Whichever returns for me first.
Not that I sit still while I do. I move from the bed to the closet to the bathroom, pacing across the floor, splashing my face with cold water. I forgot what water feels like—the kind that doesn’t shock the shit out of me, at least—just in the short time I’ve been stuck in the bowels of the hells.
Looking out the wide windows over the “sunny” version of our Underworld home, I try to pause and soak up the beauty here. What if I never come back?
The mountains that the castle is built into are shrouded in deep purples and phosphorescent blues, leading to clouds hanging around their peaks in the distance, which are cast in brilliant oranges and yellows.
The mountainous “sky” overhead is so high, all I can see are the deep blues broken by bright-blue specks that could be stars but aren’t.
They’re not bugs, either, but crystals. The yellows and oranges of the clouds make the distant mountains look like they are on fire, but a fire of such beauty I would gladly burn in it.
The Labor didn’t take this long, did it? I had already started it when he came down here for me.
I sink to the bed with wobbly knees that won’t support me any longer. Isabel dies today. Holding my hand. In agony.
And I’m sitting here wishing for it to go faster. To get it over with.
The lock clicks in the door loud enough that I jump as Hades steps inside. There’s no sign of Cerberus in the hallway. My god of death is…grim.
“Isabel died?” I ask.
He gives a jerking nod. I can’t look him in the eyes as I also nod.
Hades doesn’t come inside. He leans against the doorjamb, arms crossed, one foot casually over the other. But there’s nothing casual about the vibe coming off him. His eyes glint. “So you are the future of her?”
Who cares if I reset now? “Yes.”
“Then why in the name of Tartarus would you do this to yourself?” He’s still posed so casually, but I swear a stiff breeze would shatter him, he’s holding himself so fiercely tight.
“It’s what has to happen,” I tell him. Sounding cryptic as fuck, I’m well aware.
“Has to happen,” he murmurs. “Why?”
“I can’t tell you.”
His lips flatten. Damn, he can look so ominous, even just leaning in a doorway. “You could have warned me.”
I’ve warned him so many times. About so many parts. “If I had, would you have entered the Crucible? Would you have picked me?”
“I almost damn well didn’t this time, Lyra. I debated it after I found you at Zeus’ temple, tried to come up with any other way. But you told me to do it, to trust you, and…” He looks away, jaw working.
Is this why I’m here now? To make sure he follows through? “You have to trust me, Hades. This is the only way.”
“The only way?” His gaze snaps back to me. “Like when I destroyed Olympus? Was that the only way, too?”
During the Anaxian Wars. “You’re blaming me for that?”
My head is spinning. Maybe I suck at this time-twisting bullshit. I couldn’t even save Isabel. Maybe I’m making it worse. Except…
“I am Lyra’s future.” I point up toward the Overworld, where past me is probably in Dionysus’ bar by now.
“I am proof that things go the way they should for her. I will win the Crucible, even if at times it looks as though I won’t.
Even when it hurts. You will be King of the Gods and get Pandora’s Box. This is what has to happen.”
Hopefully, a future version of Cronos is sending this version of me back to his son over and over…and that future Cronos is out of Tartarus. He must be. It’s the last shred of hope that I hold on to.
The tension doesn’t leave Hades. Even without moving, without changing the set of his features, his growing anger can be felt across the room all the same. “How long do I wait for you?” he asks. “Until you stop disappearing on me?”
I can’t answer that, either.
When I say nothing, he looks away.
“Do you wish you’d never met me?” The entirely unfair question comes out as small as I feel.
“Damn you, Lyra.” He spins away, hand running through his hair, leaving it standing in spikes. “I just left you up there, and you’re devastated. And blaming me.”
“I know.”
He shoots a glare at me over his shoulder. “I’m committed now, but all I care about is you surviving. Forget winning.”
I’m stepping toward him, hand up like I can stop him, before I know what I’m doing. “Don’t do that. She has to win. I have to—”
But he’s gone again. Door locked behind him, as if that could stop me.
I close my eyes, dropping my hand to my side. I could just teleport out of here. Go topside. Try to warn Meike. Or Zai. Any of them.
But I’ve tried that, too. So many times.
So I stay where I am. And wait.