Chapter 9
The weekend rush hits Viva Catalina’s hard.
A continuous stream of people flows in. They spread out and fill up tables, booths, the long bar. Saturday afternoons are like this, when State Street Promenade is swarmed by families and tourists. The fleet of bored teens desperate for time with friends and away from their parents.
I haven’t stopped moving since my shift started two hours ago. There’s always something to do. Collect used dishes. Wipe down tables. Drop off plates of food when Max or Kennedy are overrun with orders.
It’s a nice distraction. Never a moment to think. To remember it’s been days since I was last in Aides.
I look forward to seeing you soon, August.
Milos’s words echo through my head on repeat. Before Cary brought me back, he didn’t mention when he’d return. When the celebration was. Maybe it already happened. Maybe Cary lied.
Maybe he never planned to come back for me.
But then I hear the undercurrent of what he said:
I will bring you back. If you want.
I still don’t know what to make of Cary. But I believe him. Honesty ran like a river in his voice. The steadiness of his face. His unflinching lips.
He will come back for me.
I just don’t know when.
Which has me on edge. How much time do I have left before London’s next on Milos’s list? What if he’s sent to Elysium, a place I can’t go? Or worse…the Abyss? My organs knot painfully, remembering the way those shadows swallowed that begging soul right in front of me.
“Watch your six, Curly!”
Kennedy swerves around me with both palms propping up pizza pans.
I spin in a small circle. “Wait, where’s my six again?”
Her laugh lingers as she strolls over to a large family seated at two pushed-together tables.
In the kitchen, dishes clatter. Junie and Tonia assemble pie after pie, joking and playfully shoving each other. It’s impossible to hear their conversation over customer chatter and the music.
More eighties songs. At least I know this one. Fleetwood Mac’s “Everywhere.” I’ve heard it playing in the background of an online ad before. My foot taps along to the sweet harmonies as I restock the napkin dispensers.
Nearby, plastic hits the floor. A splash follows. Tiny cubes of ice slide toward the toe of my sneaker.
“Oh, Hannah, careful!”
Someone’s five-year-old has knocked over an entire cup of soda. No one moves to clean it up. From the front counter, Max gives me a pitiful stare.
I tip my head back, sighing. “I’ll get the mop.”
Shortly after, things slow down. The pizzeria has almost emptied out. Only a smattering of customers here and there, mostly regulars.
“Order seventy-two for Thao!” Max calls over I am the son and heir of nothing in particular.
I slump next to her behind the front counter. Cooling sweat slips down my temple. My feet ache. Max looks just as exhausted. Junie steps out of the kitchen, towel on his shoulder.
“That was nuts.”
“Unbelievable,” I agree. “When’s the last time we were that busy?”
Max twirls her hair into a sloppy bun high on her head. “Not since before the thing with Hal.”
I blink at her. “Since the thing with who?”
“Hal,” she repeats.
“Who’s Hal?”
Max’s eyes widen just as Junie says, “Dude, not cool,” his face twisted.
I look between them, confused.
“August, don’t joke around like that,” Max says bitterly.
“I’m not—” The words stop cold on my tongue. I’ve seen that expression on Max before. And I know exactly what it means.
Who are you?
A familiar, unwelcome rawness scrapes at my chest.
The last time Max looked at me this way was not long after London died. Back then, I barely got out of bed to shower or change my clothes. All I did was sleep and cry and sleep more.
I missed almost three weeks of school. Max came to see me every day. She’d bring my class assignments, then sit with me for hours, talking even though I never had anything to say. The ache was too consuming. She didn’t seem to mind.
Except, one afternoon, she came by begging me to leave my bed for some ice cream and sunshine.
I couldn’t. No, I didn’t want to.
What would ice cream fix? A strawberry sundae wouldn’t bring London back. It was pointless.
Everything was.
That didn’t stop Max. Her stubbornness is as tough as iron.
Finally, I rasped, Go get fucking ice cream by yourself.
It all came without thinking—the impulsive words. My anger. And the impact was instant.
Tears welled in Max’s eyes. She didn’t cry in front of me. Maybe she didn’t at all. But she stared at me like she does now. Like she doesn’t know me.
Like I’m no longer August.
Junie won’t meet my eyes. “Hal was one of us. He sat right there.” He points to the empty stool at the bar, then whispers, “All the time.”
I stare at the red gingham pattern, fading from years of use. I try to picture all the customers who’ve sat there. But I can’t see him.
There’s a hazy, heavy fog clouding my head. Everything else about the pizzeria is crystal clear. But that stool—who sat there—isn’t. I reach for memories of this Hal guy. Nothing appears.
Nausea roils in my stomach. It’s probably just hunger. I skipped breakfast.
“I think—” I swallow. Try again. “I think I’ll take my break now.”
No one stops me.
Tonia hands me two slices of pizza with a weak smile. I nod my appreciation.
It’s not until I sink low in the corner booth that I notice the pizza toppings. Pepperoni and pineapple. My throat constricts.
I nudge the plate aside.
Without meaning to, my brain leaps to Cary. That first time I saw him here in this very booth. A face like marble. Eyes like the darkest corners of the earth. A tightly kept mystery wrapped in a scowl and black clothes.
Tugging out my phone, I search his name on the internet. The top four results are: Cary Elwes and Cary Grant, the actors. Caryophyllaceae, a pink flower Mom would know about. Finally, Cary, a town in North Carolina I never plan to visit.
There’s no mention of the Deathless. Or the ferrier of souls.
“Of course not,” I whisper before switching tactics.
My next search is the underworld. A Wikipedia link pops up. I’ve barely made it through the introduction when a voice groans behind me.
“Oh gods, no. Never trust Wikipedia.”
Someone slides in opposite me.
Henri.
He grins mischievously. “August, you’re one difficult mortal to find.”
“Am I really?”
“No.” He laughs. “But it sounded great, right? Very enigmatic. Like maybe you’re more than you seem.” The last sentence comes with an eyebrow raise. An unreadable glint in his brown eyes.
I bite the corner of my lower lip. “I guess?”
Henri relaxes his arms across the back of the booth. His green blazer looks velvet, expensive. The cream-colored shirt underneath is barely buttoned, exposing hints of his pale russet chest. His glinting charm.
Snakes and wings.
His smile grows. “Well? Go ahead.”
“Go ahead and what?”
He rolls his eyes. Not out of annoyance. More like he finds me entertaining. “Go ahead,” he repeats, “and ask me what you want to know.”
“Oh.” I scratch my chin. “Um…”
He flicks his wrist, gesturing to my phone. “I swear. Mortals will believe whatever the internet tells you.” He tsks. “Did you know anyone can edit those entries? All you need is a username and an imagination.”
I chuckle. “I mean, some of it is true. There are citations. Sometimes bibliographies and further reading.”
“Yes, yes, yes.” Another eye roll. “All collected from scholars who trust whatever some privileged, dead white man with a story and an audience said.”
Well, he certainly has a point about that.
Henri leans forward. “Tell me: Is every story told about you true?”
Immediately, my thoughts slingshot to high school. Troy Ackerman. His square face, freckled white skin, shaggy blond hair. Those shrewd blue eyes always pointed menacingly at me. The ugly words behind his flat smile.
“No,” I say with a bite.
“Exactly! So what would you like to know?”
I blurt the first thing that comes to mind: “Tell me more about the Deathless.”
“So vague.” He points violently toward the article still open on my phone screen. At the top is an art piece of ancient deities and monsters. Something Max would love. “We’re nothing like that.”
“Okay. Then what?”
“The basics? We’re immortal, powerful, gorgeous”—he pauses to wink—“and we all have a role in mortals’ journey to the next realm. Trust me, it’s very boring. And there are so many of us.”
I sit taller. “There are?”
“Yes,” Henri says, sighing.
“Are you born a Deathless?”
“No. We are chosen.” He pushes a lock of raven black hair behind his ear. “But some are born from other Deathless. The rest…come from elsewhere.”
“Where?”
The questions keep bubbling up my throat. Fortunately, Henri doesn’t appear as annoyed as Cary does after each one.
“Elsewhere,” he says again, this time with a quiet chuckle.
“Which Deathless?”
“Did you have someone specific in mind?”
My cheeks catch fire. I consider lying. It’s the only way to keep my plan a secret.
“Tell me, August”—Henri’s mouth quirks high—“which Deathless do you really want to know more about?”
His question is a challenge dressed in his charismatic grin, a flare of dimples.
Milos’s name weighs heavy on my tongue. Aminta’s isn’t far behind, even though I know she’s not a Deathless.
Instead, I say, “Cary.”
A genuine smile unfurls on Henri’s lips. Glee sets like jewels in his eyes. He rubs his chin, pretending to think. “Oh, our sweet, sullen ferrier.”
A beat passes. Overhead, the music shifts to something I don’t recognize.
“He is…complex.”
“In what ways?” I inquire, a little too eager. I clear my throat, attempting to look more nonchalant.
Henri’s gaze lowers back to my phone. “You won’t find any truth about him on there. Out of all of us, he’s the one your kind gets wrong the most.”
“How so?” I ask.
There’s another moment of silence. Henri’s mouth twists, considering. “Okay, he certainly has that all-black, super-cryptic, not-very-talkative vibe going for him. The grim reaper energy is strong in that one.”
The beginnings of a laugh scratch at my throat.