Chapter 82
Zeus’ Lock
LYRA
When I open my eyes, I’m standing in Tartarus…and my arms are empty.
I guess I was dumped in some random room, because it’s pitch-black in here. With a snap of my fingers, the sconce lights the way it’s supposed to, and I get my bearings.
It’s another tiny room. One I’m not sure I’ve seen before. The second I open the door, a scream rips through the bowels of the tunnels.
The sound of it has me bolting out of the room, but the doors in this tunnel have no carvings, which means I have no clue where I am and no way to orient.
So I go right, running in what I hope is the direction the sound is coming from.
They can’t be too far away, since I’m able to hear them through the thick rock.
Another scream racks through the corridors, and I pull up short.
The sound is getting softer. So I flip around and go back the way I came, passing not only the room I was in but several other doors.
As I run past one, something hits it from the inside so hard I swear the stone cracks, and I put on a spurt of extra speed, getting past it, then checking over my shoulder as I run.
Nothing bursts out to follow me.
Three different times, I come to a point where I have to choose a direction, but I only have to double back once when the screaming again gets softer the farther I go. I’m so busy running that I almost shoot past the source. But the movement of bodies beyond an open door catches my attention.
Shocked, I screech to a halt between the door posts and try to make sense of the chaos of the room. My mind takes way too long to catch up and sort out the jumble of limbs and people and words and screaming. And then my gaze finally lands on Boone.
He’s the one screaming.
My heart slams around the cavity of my chest, and not from running. I’ve never heard Boone make sounds like that.
No one notices as I shove my way into the room, trying to get a better look. I’m almost sorry I did when I see the problem. Both of Boone’s legs have been snapped at the femur, the bones sticking out like jagged broken blades, the lower parts of his legs limp, and all of him just…wrong.
I clap a hand over my mouth as I gag, breathing through my mouth instead of my nose, trying not to smell the golden blood of the gods.
It’s everywhere. Cronos is on the ground at Boone’s head, gripping him by the shoulders.
Hyperion and Koios are on either side of him at his grotesquely twisted legs.
I know what they’re doing—trying to reset the bones before Boone’s god healing can get too far.
I’ve seen a real-life example of why they have to move fast—Hephaestus.
The god of forges and invention’s feet are backward because he healed too fast after being thrown down to the Overworld from Olympus as a baby.
“Ready?” Cronos asks.
“Do it!” Boone yells.
Cronos looks at Hyperion and Koios. “On three.” Then he mouths the word “two.” They both nod their understanding.
“One,” he counts. “Two—” All three Titans pull. Hard.
A new sound pours out of Boone, high-pitched but garbled, as if his throat can’t decide if he should scream or groan or vomit.
I go to clap my hands over my ears but stop halfway when I see Persephone take Boone’s hand and, with her other palm, sprinkle something over his eyes, some kind of dust. The terrible sounds cut off abruptly as Boone passes out, his head flopping back loosely on his neck even as the Titans continue to strain his body.
The room goes much quieter, filled only with the sounds of our breathing and the muttered instructions passed between Cronos, Hyperion, and Koios as they work as fast as they can, against immortality.
Every so often, Persephone murmurs softly in Boone’s ear.
I can’t make out the words but imagine they’re something along the lines of how they’ll take care of him.
Finally, twin cracks of sound explode in the room.
I’m not the only one who flinches, but at least Boone’s legs don’t look so…
wrong. Koios leans over first one leg and the other, literally digging into the open wounds with his fingers to check that the bones are aligned. He looks up at Cronos and nods.
Iapetus stands over Boone’s head, first passing a hand over his eyes and whispering more words I can’t hear. Then he moves to the damaged flesh, and the fire of molten lava drips from his fingertips over the wounds, cauterizing them.
They’re not done. As Iapetus works, the others are shoving the meat of Boone’s flesh back together, trying to line up everything as well as they can before they take strips of cloth to bind him.
I didn’t even see Rhea pulling apart sheets in the corner.
Glamoured sheets. The Titans start tying him up tightly.
When they’re finally finished, everybody in the room just kind of goes still and quiet, all of us taking a collective breath after that awfulness.
I realize my hands are still hovering somewhere between my mouth and my ears, so I drop them limp to my sides. “What happened? Did the Pandemonium attack again?”
Iapetus jumps. “Holy shit, Lyra.”
The entire room kind of freezes before they swing to face me with varying expressions that aren’t entirely penetrating my shock after what I just witnessed. Even Tethys and Mnemosyne, who are behind me, seem surprised that I’m here.
“When the fuck did you come from?” Iapetus asks as he swipes his hands down his shirt, gold blending with the yellows in the pattern and yet still leaving streaks across the other patches of color.
Before I can answer, Persephone’s on her feet, pushing the others away to get to me. “I’ll tell you what happened. Boone decided to open Zeus’ Lock on his own.”
What? My gaze shoots past her to Boone, whose chest is moving rhythmically, but he’s still out cold. “Why didn’t he wait for me?”
“Because you…” She flings her arms out wide, coming close to hitting me. “Decided to stay gone for a week. We didn’t know how long it would take you.”
A week? It was one night at most. How has it been a week down here? “That’s not fair.”
It’s not like I had a choice of when time would bring me back.
“Fair?” She shoves a pointed finger in my chest. “You want to talk about fair? He almost died because he was alone.”
Because it’s coming from her—from sunshine on a stick who keeps insisting I’m a beloved friend—I flinch. Hard. “I told him not to go without me…”
The Titans had already started preparing us for that Lock.
A test of wonder and curiosity, apparently—another loose connection.
Zeus’ Lock is about throwing us in the middle of the power of nature by outrunning four elements—a volcanic eruption, a tornado, a tsunami, and an earthquake.
But there is a trick to each—as there always is with Zeus—a safe place to hide if you look hard enough.
Ones that tend to move around and change.
I look at Boone’s broken body. He did that alone.
Persephone’s not finished. “He had to drag himself through the rest of it like this.” She points an accusing finger at his still body.
You’d think after so many shocks in a row, I’d get used to it. Inured. Inoculated. Something along those lines. But nope. My ears start ringing, low and disorienting. When it finally goes away, Persephone is still glaring at me. What happened to the sweet spring goddess?
“I didn’t mean for him to—”
“He did anyway.” She pokes me again. Anger on her is almost scarier than anger on Athena. “Where were you? With Hades?”
“Persephone…” Rhea murmurs. “She didn’t know.”
“Didn’t know?” Persephone scoffs. “She wouldn’t stop messing with things. She never believed she could get us out, and now a good man is broken.”
Her voice cracks on that last word, and she whirls away from me only to spin back around and shove me in the chest, pushing me back toward the door. “Get out.”
Another shove. And I don’t know if it’s the shock or guilt, but I let her. I let her push me again, right out the door into the tunnel.
“Unless Boone asks for you, you are barred from entering this room,” she snaps. “Even then, I’m not sure I’ll say yes.”
Despite being made of stone, the door clangs when she slams it in my face, and I’m left completely and utterly alone in the hallway.
I know this.
I’ve been here before. The outsider—ignored or ostracized by those who I need to work with to survive.
In the time I’ve been here, I’ve learned that this is not in Persephone’s nature, so hopefully she’ll cool off soon. Although yelling and blaming are also not in her nature. Maybe that’s why there’s an ache growing tentacles inside my chest.
She’s right about one thing. I should have been here.
Boone has been working on our escape while I’ve been mucking about with trying to be the puppet master of broken time. Not that time really gave me the choice to come back here sooner.
But would I have if I could?
Boone will always be one of my most important and cherished friends. He shouldn’t have had to go through that alone.
“Damn,” I mutter.
I lean back against the rock of the wall opposite the door and slide down until I’m sitting with my hands draped across my propped-up knees, and I prepare to wait.
For as long as it takes.