Chapter Six #2
She had never even known her mother, and here was this stranger assuming he knew more than she did.
It cut Helen a little to have to admit to herself that perhaps he did.
For the first time in hours, she was also hyperaware of the fact that she was lying on top of him, and she didn’t want to be anymore.
She tried to put pressure on her forearm but a searing pain informed her that there would be none of that.
After a few feeble attempts to roll off of him she gave up.
She could feel him smiling, and his arms tensing to hold on to her just in case she managed to get away.
“I know your mother wasn’t named Smith because you can fly, Helen, now hold still. You’re hurting me,” he said frankly.
“Sorry,” she said, suddenly realizing that he’d taken the brunt of her weight when they hit the ground. His injuries were probably far worse than hers—and hers were awful.
As she watched the sand turn gray, then pink, then coral with the rising sun, Helen thought that this was the second dawn she had seen in as many days.
Of the two, she much preferred this one.
She was in far more pain, but she was also alive and completely free from anger.
Helen hadn’t realized how heavy the burden of hate had been until she was allowed to put it down.
She heard a voice calling for Lucas, and although she knew they were in danger lying helpless in that pit, she didn’t want to be found. What if the Furies came back with the rest of the family?
“Here!” Lucas called weakly.
“Wait,” Helen pleaded. “What if they still see the Furies when they look at me? I can’t defend myself in this state.”
“No one will hurt you,” he promised, his arms tightening slightly around her.
“Hector . . .” she began.
“. . . would have to get through me first,” he said resolutely.
“Uh, Lucas?” she said leadingly, not wanting to insult him by pointing out the obvious.
“Yeah,” he replied with a chuckle, catching her drift.
“I know I’m not exactly Secret Service material right now, but trust me.
I won’t let any of them harm you—not even big, bad Hector.
He isn’t as terrible as you think, you know.
” He managed to tilt his head to the side enough to meet Helen’s eyes.
“You’re his cousin. You have to think the best of him.”
“I’ll leave it up to you, then. I can’t hide us, but I won’t call out to them if you don’t want me to,” he said, and let his head roll back out of her sight.
They lay there listening to his family call his name over and over, but Lucas kept his word.
He didn’t make a sound, although he did flinch when he heard Cassandra’s exhausted voice.
She sounded desperate and frightened. They all did.
And Helen was to blame. After a few more moments she couldn’t stand it any longer.
“Here!” Helen yelled as hard as she could. “We’re over here!”
“Are you sure?” Lucas asked carefully.
“No.” She chuckled nervously before calling out again, this time with Lucas’s help.
There was a lot of yelling from down the beach, and the sound of feet pounding across the sand. Then Helen felt Lucas try to reposition his head to look at someone standing above them.
“Hi, Dad,” he said apologetically.
Castor muttered some kind of oath that Helen didn’t recognize, but the meaning was clear enough. Then he starting giving orders, and Helen felt someone thud down next to her.
“My gods,” Ariadne whispered to herself.
“Helen? I’m going to try to roll you off, okay?
But first I’m going to have to try to speed up the healing of your bones a bit.
It will feel a little hot, but don’t be afraid, healing is one of my and Jason’s talents.
Jase, come and do her legs,” she called up.
Helen felt another thud, and then she felt the twins slide their hands gently down along her arms and legs.
There was a burning sensation inside Helen’s bones that was nearly unbearable, and it made her wonder if she would be better off without any “healing.” Right before she begged them to stop, the burning mercifully ended.
The twins counted to three and gingerly flipped her onto her back like she was a runny pancake.
Helen tried to be brave, but she couldn’t stop a scream from slipping out.
Every muscle, every inch of skin, every bone in her body was lit up with pain as though someone had filled her bloodstream with flaming-hot shards of glass.
She gritted her teeth and took deep, calming breaths before she felt like she had enough control to open her eyes.
When she did, she saw Ariadne’s luminous hazel eyes, fringed with the same incredibly long lashes as Jason’s, looking down at her with compassion.
She studied Helen’s face carefully, and then gave her a tired smile.
Helen thought Ariadne looked drained, as if what she had done for Helen had cost her.
Her bow-shaped lips were ashy instead of their usual cherry red and her long, chestnut hair stuck to her perspiring cheeks.
“Don’t worry. Your face is already going back to its right shape. You’ll be your usual, exquisite self by nightfall,” she said, smoothing Helen’s hair comfortingly. “Keep still. I’ll be right back.”
Helen glanced around. For the first time she could see where she and Lucas had spent the night.
It took a moment to register that they were in a hole in the ground that was at least five feet deep and three times that wide, and it took even longer to register that the hole had been made by their bodies when they fell.
She felt water seep into her clothes as it leached up from the damp sand, and realized that Lucas must have been lying in a cold puddle all night.
She rolled her head to the side so she could look at him.
There was a faint Helen-shaped dent running down the length of his body, and his chest was nearly caved in from the weight of her head and shoulders.
His face was pinched up in a grimace. He hummed to himself a little as if to try to give his vocal cords something to do other than howl.
His father hovered over him, looking Lucas directly in the eye and talking softly.
She saw Lucas give a tiny nod, bite his lower lip, then take a deep breath and strain.
His chest expanded into a more normal shape, and then Lucas suddenly let his breath out and panted as if he had just lifted a great weight.
A tear trickled out of the corner of his eye and ran into his hair.
His father said something reassuring and then pulled himself smoothly out of the hole and started talking strategy with Hector. After a few moments of getting his breathing right, Lucas rolled his head to the side so he could look back at Helen.
“I think the worst is over,” he said, squeezing her hand. She hadn’t realized that they had joined hands, but it felt right to her. She squeezed back gently and smiled. He looked horrible. Much worse than Helen could have guessed.
“Piece of cake,” she said blithely, trying to distract him. “So what are you doing next Friday night?”
“What have you got in mind?”
“We could try hitting each other with cars,” she suggested cheerfully.
“Did that last weekend with Jase,” he said with mock regret.
“Go to the zoo and throw ourselves to the lions?” she fired back quickly, desperate to keep him focused on her rather than his caved-in chest.
“The Romans sort of wore that one out. Got anything original?”
“I’ll think of something,” she warned him.
“Can’t wait,” he breathed, and then turned his face away as he rode another shivering wave of pain.
“Hey! Little help?” Helen yelled, her voice sliding up to a shriek as she watched Lucas shake. “Lucas isn’t doing so hot!”
“No, he isn’t doing so hot,” Cassandra said in a hoarse, bitter voice from somewhere around Helen’s feet. Helen hadn’t realized that anyone was in the hole with them while she and Lucas held hands and cracked jokes, but she had the feeling that Cassandra didn’t like what she had seen.
“Lower the boards down, it’s time to move them,” Cassandra called up to her father, as if she was the one in charge.
Helen’s eyes widened in shock that any fourteen-year-old would speak like that to her elders, let alone be obeyed, but the boards were quickly lowered down without a word of comment.
Jason and Ariadne eased Helen and Lucas onto the long planks and told them to hold still.
The twins ran their glowing hands an inch above Lucas’s body, and Helen saw him grit his teeth as they sped up his healing.
Just when she thought Lucas was about to start screaming, the twins stopped, looked at each other in silent communication, and then nodded exhaustedly.
They had both lost so much color their cheeks looked gray to Helen, but they also seemed strangely happy, like nothing gave either of them more pleasure than helping someone else.
Helen tried to thank them, but Ariadne told her to save her strength.
Helen and Lucas were kept level as they were raised out of the crater and loaded side by side in the back of the same giant SUV that Helen had had so many uncharitable thoughts about. Now that it was her ambulance, she made a silent promise to never rag on big trucks again.
Castor was behind the wheel and anxious to get moving.
The longer they stayed on the beach, the higher the sun got, and the more opportunity there was for them to be discovered.
Cassandra came with them, but Jason, Ariadne, and Hector stayed behind to fill in the crater and leave the beach looking as normal as possible.
“Can’t we just put a lump of rock in the middle and pretend it was an asteroid?” Helen heard Hector ask, exhausted.
“Do you think that would work?” Jason put in, perking up at the prospect of seeing his bed an hour or so sooner.