Chapter 10 – Andros
ANDROS
Around me, people scream and scream. But it isn’t a constant sound.
That would be far easier to deal with. Instead, it’s like a chorus of suffering that rises and falls like a song meant to tear at your heartstrings.
One man’s fingernails are ripped from his hands every single hour on the dot.
A woman is hit by a car, over and over again.
By the time her body has healed enough for her to stand, the car smashes into her again.
Both of them heal at a magical pace, and so they suffer over and over again all day long.
There’s a man just out of sight. His hands are cuffed, and he’s abused just the way he abused women in life, by a creature that looks exactly like him.
He begs, he pleads, but just as he ignored his victims, his punisher ignores him.
Every day I’m forced to walk the upper levels of Hades’s Underworld.
Every day I hear the screams and the suffering of these people.
I know that none of them are innocent. I heard the story of the woman who hit a man on the road, dragged him home, and then watched him die, trapped beneath her car.
I heard of the molesters, the abusers, the killers, and the rapists.
I heard all their stories, and yet, it’s my own kind of hell to see their punishments.
I will never be able to clear these images from my mind. I will always be broken and wrong inside because of what I’ve seen...and been through...and even done. And yet, I’m to have a child. The one thing I had always wanted.
Gods damn it. Now? Now when I can’t be a good father to any child.
I reach the golden gates to the side of this level of the Underworld.
As I move closer, the screaming and crying fade away.
My feet walk on green grass, and I press a hand to the cold surface.
On the other side, those people who had done good in life are experiencing happiness.
Their greatest dreams and desires are unfolding, and it all feels real to them.
So many times I wonder if I had died, really died and not been betrayed, would I have ended up in Elysium? Or had I done enough bad in my life to spend my eternity being tortured?
I linger at the gate, pressing my hand against the cool golden surface.
When I see no one close by, I let my cheek rest on it and close my eyes.
I try to picture what the world beyond looks like, and the image that forms in my mind takes away the screaming and the scent of blood and brimstone for the briefest moment.
The heaviness that settles in my heart lifts, ever so slightly, and a shudder moves through my body.
“Sad that you’ll never enter Elysium?”
I jerk and every ounce of peace drains from my body. Slowly, I draw back from the gate and open my eyes.
Hades is standing in a dark robe, left open, with nothing underneath. In one hand, he has a glass with a handle made out of bones. Inside is a golden liquid that could only be ambrosia, and the man radiates drunkenness.
He takes a sip from his glass, his gaze running over me. “You know that you shall always be my gargoyle, right? Another part of the collection of things that no one else has.”
“I’m aware,” I say, keeping my face carefully blank.
“Come,” he gestures, “walk with me.”
We walk up the steps leading to the top of the wall, then stop and stare out over the river of souls. “The witch is pregnant.”
It takes everything inside of me not to react.
“When the child is born, before the bond between mother and baby can be severed, we will kill her, and the child shall gain all her powers. Then, I will gain a willing witch, the likes of which no other god has ever had.”
My stomach turns. Everyone says Hades is an asshole, and it takes a special kind of god to not only think up the tortures he creates, but order his people to execute them. But talking about killing a woman after giving birth to her child is a kind of evil that no one should be capable of.
“Just a few more months. No time at all. And those powers will be mine.”
I keep my face blank, but inside I rage. It’s true that I had never been able to free Hecate, but I would think of a new plan. He would not kill the woman I love and take our child. No matter the price I must pay.
“Now, go see to the witch. Make sure she gives me a healthy child, not something broken and ugly like her daughter.”
My heart aches as I turn away from him. Her daughter, Empusa, escaped a short time before I died.
The child was in her teens, from what her mother said, and Hecate had created a distraction, when she realized they couldn’t both escape.
Hecate said that it was the best and worst day of her life.
That Em, as she called her, was finally free, and that filled her with joy, but that she’d lost the bright spot in her life.
I want this child to bring her that same kind of joy.
I had thought, whether my brother came in time or not, that she and the child would be okay for a time.
But it seems that Hades is determined that she is nothing more than an incubator, and my daughter nothing more than a slave to house her magic.
I hate him. I hate him with every fiber of my being.
But even more so, I hate him because now I can’t wait for my brother’s help. We have to escape before the baby comes. Before it is too late.
Someone bumps into me, and I feel something being stuffed into my hand. I catch a glimpse of one of Persephone’s maids beneath a dark hood before she’s gone. Frowning, I look down at my hand. There’s nothing more than herbs. Berries maybe? Why did the woman given me such things?
For a second I consider tossing them off the wall, but then I realize that plants from the surface are rare and beautiful things down here. The least I could do is give them to my Hecate.
I walk down the wall and come to the door to the prison cells.
A skeletal guard unlocks and opens the door at my approach.
Moving down the hall, door after door opens before me until at last I come to Hecate’s cell.
Pulling the keys from my belt, I unlock the door and open it.
Inside I see all the touches that Hades had decided to give her now that she’s carrying something precious to him.
There is a small bed in one corner, with a mattress, sheets, and a blanket.
There is a small fire pit that burns brightly with blue flames, flames that never go out.
She has clothes folded neatly in a chest near her bed, and a rug to warm the stone.
As I stare at her new room, my chest aches. I’m glad she has these small comforts. I just wish it wasn’t because the man running this place planned to murder her and steal our child.
She rises from the bed and smiles, setting the book in her hands down. Hopping off the bed, she shoves her feet into little slippers and runs to me.
Despite all my doubts, I fold her into my arms and breathe in the scent of roses.
“Can you believe it? The doctor actually convinced him I need all this to restore my powers.”
My muscles tense. Should I tell her?
She pulls back from me and smiles, but her smile wavers. “What’s wrong?”
“We need to go,” I say, the words tumbling from my lips.
She frowns. “Go?”
I nod, then step away from her to stare in both directions down the hall. Seeing no one, I close the door and go to her, lifting her in my arms and setting her onto the bed. She gives a little cry of surprise and is back to smiling at me when I sit down next to her on the bed.
“Go,” I say again, softer this time. “We can’t wait any longer for my brother. I’m going to come up with another plan to get out of here.”
She gives me that humoring look, the one that says she doesn’t believe any of this will happen, then looks down at my hands. “What do you have there?”
I’d completely forgotten the plants, which had now been a little crushed in my hand.
I open my hand to show her, and her entire body freezes.
Then, carefully, she picks up the stick with white bark, the leaves, and the little red berry as carefully as someone might pick up something glass and delicate.
“Where did you get these?”
I shrug. “Persephone’s woman slipped them to me.”
“Do you know what this is?” she asks excitedly.
I shake my head.
“It’ll allow me to communicate with someone on the surface. It’s the exact components to the spell!”
For the first time, hope really blossoms inside of me. “Good. We can contact my brother and see how close he is to rescuing us.”
Her expression falters. “I thought I could speak to my daughter.”
My heart hurts to hear her words. “If my brother can get us free, you can talk to her every day.”
“And if he can’t and I waste my one chance to talk to her?” Hecate asks, her expression unreadable.
I reach out and take her free hand, then squeeze. “You know I would never make you do anything I didn’t absolutely have to, but I need you to trust me on this.”
She blinks away tears, and I feel like an asshole. “Okay.”
Going to the fire, she takes a deep breath. “The last time I was pregnant, most of my powers still worked, but they were less reliable, so we’ll have to cross our fingers.”
“Fingers crossed,” I say with a smile, then cross my fingers.
She takes another deep breath, then begins to murmur softly.
At first, I have no idea if she’s really saying words or just mumbling, but her volume increases, and I feel a powerful spell brewing in the room.
She tosses the twig in and a cloud of white smoke drifts up from the fire, but it stays in the air, not moving or dissipating.
She keeps speaking, then throws the leaves in and green rises to blend with the white.
At last, she tosses the berry in and the cloud changes to red.
Then she lowers her arms. “Call for him.”
I stand and move closer to the fire. “Orion, gargoyle brother of mine, speak.” My gaze moves to her, and she gives a nod. “Orion, I’m here,” I say.
“Orion, brother of Andros, answer our call,” Hecate cries, her volume growing.
But nothing happens.
“Is it...the pregnancy? The spell?” I ask in confusion.
She shakes her head, tears in her eyes. “It worked. If you can’t speak to him, then your brother is no longer among the living.”
My stomach drops. “I’m sorry...I’m sorry I wasted your only call.”
She bows her head and tears splatter the floor. “I’m sorry about your brother.”
I want to hold her. I want to bring her comfort, but something inside of me is screaming to get out, and I don’t think I can contain it much longer.
My feet are numb as I move to her door, leave, and lock it behind me.
The sound of her weeping follows me as I race down the hall, in the opposite direction from the entrance.
I never go this way, but I do now, because I need a moment to myself.
The tunnels to the cells break off at random, and I choose one direction after another until I reach a dead end.
Then, and only then, I explode. A scream tears from my lips and I pound the stone over and over again, my human-like flesh tearing and bleeding.
The stone makes my entire hand vibrate, but I don’t care, I just keep punching and punching until I collapse against the stone.
Orion...he is dead. I had been here, promising my love that he was coming for us, and all along he was dead. My brother, the man who was my best friend, and the closest person to me outside of Hecate, is dead.
And I hadn’t even known.
I’m breathing hard as I slide down the wall. Beneath me, blood splatters from my hands onto the stone. I feel so lost, so hopeless.
“What troubles you, gargoyle?”
Every muscle in my body stiffens, and I turn slowly around. Still on the ground, I stare at the two cells in this branch of the prison. But I see no one.
“You long for something. Something I wonder if I could give you.”
Suddenly, a face appears on the other side of the bars, and my stomach twists. I recognize the creature. His skin is like tar, pocked and oozing with an oily substance that rolls down his bumpy, cratered skin. His eyes are two burning pools of lava, and smoke rises from his lips.
I also realize that I’m not in a normal part of the prisons.
These cells are made with black stone woven with orange veins.
Only the most dangerous criminals are kept in this place, bespelled against all escape.
Literally, the only way for any of these prisoners to escape is to be let out with a key.
This is the last place I should’ve let myself melt down.
And then I look back at the prisoner who had spoken to me, and I instantly knew who it is. Hades keeps many innocent people in this dark place. Many people he keeps as tools, not because they are dangerous, but because he wants to use them. Like my Hecate. But this creature? He deserves to be here.
“Ceuthonymus.” The word comes out no louder than a whisper.
There are few things I fear anymore, but Ceuthonymus is among those things.
It was said that he enjoyed melting the flesh from living beings.
That he was the source of fire injuries and painful burns.
He was known as something akin to a serial killer when he was allowed to walk free.
In his wake, whole villages screamed and died slow and painful deaths.
“It is I,” he tells me, steam rolling from his lips. “And I have the ability to see into one's heart.”
I use the wall to rise to my feet and my knees shake. “We are done speaking.”
I’m heading as far and as fast from him as I can when his voice stops me. “I can help you get free.”
I freeze. It’s a trick. It has to be a trick.
“If you know the stories of me, gargoyle, then you know my word means everything. If you wish, if you free me, I will cause such chaos, such destruction, that you and your lover may escape. I promise you this. Neither you, nor her, will be harmed, and I promise that I will provide the necessary distraction.”
I’m breathing hard. “You’re evil and dangerous. If I release you, they might not be able to imprison you again.”
He smiles and more smoke drifts from his lips. “Perhaps. But you must admit, you’ve failed to escape time and time again. If you unlock my cage, I will wait for your signal to escape, and you and your lover will be free. Can you honestly say it wouldn’t be worth any price to save her?”
If I release this evil on the world, I’ll regret it for the rest of my life. But...more than I would regret watching my love die and my child be taken by a monster?
Slowly, I turn back around. “Let’s talk.”