Chapter 5 Follow the Cobblestone Road
MY brEATH CATCHES IN MY throat, and I feel a ping deep in my stomach as I step off the bridge and onto a tree-lined walkway made of centuries-old cobblestones.
I’m nervous—really, really nervous, especially now that I’m officially late—but I’m also more excited than I can ever remember being in my whole life.
My heart is beating superfast, and every cell in my body feels like it’s ping-ponging off the inside of my skin.
I’m here. I’m really here. Even if I don’t know exactly where on campus this forest is…which is a predicament I plan to fix as soon as I possibly can.
As my feet hit the branch-covered path, I glance around for the amphitheater.
While I don’t know a lot about Anaximander’s campus—my parents were big on not ruining the surprise—I do know from their stories of their time here that the first-day assembly always takes place in the huge amphitheater that sits right in the center of campus.
But if it’s as big as they—and the brochure—say, it seems strange that I can’t even see it from where I’m standing.
I take a few more steps forward, turning around to make sure I’m not missing anything.
But nope. There’s no giant round structure anywhere around me. There’s not even a sign to point me in the right direction, which seems odd considering this is the first day of school. What’s even odder, though, is that there’s no Paris waiting to make sure I survived that awful bridge.
He must have already run ahead to the assembly, something a quick glance at my phone tells me I should be doing right now, as I’m already ten minutes late. But if he was going to leave, the least he could have done was text me where I should go.
Except there’s nothing in my messages besides a quick “We love you” from Mom and a “Knock ’em dead” and “Don’t blow out any more fires!” from Dad.
I try to text Paris to ask where he is—and where I’m supposed to go. But my text doesn’t go through, and I realize there’s no service out here in the middle of all these trees.
Fantastic.
I’m late and lost and wearing muddy shoes. This day is going nothing like how I thought it would.
Still, I have to figure something out. The longer I stand here, the later I get.
I take a deep breath, then turn in another slow circle to once again make sure I haven’t missed any clue as to where I’m supposed to go. But all I can see are huge, towering trees in whichever direction I look—which, oddly enough, is pretty much all I saw before I crossed that awful bridge too.
I know the campus was deliberately built so you can’t see more than a few major buildings at a time, but this is ridiculous. Besides, shouldn’t the amphitheater always be one of those buildings you can see?
Apparently not…
The cobblestone path has to lead somewhere, though. Maybe it’s Anaximander’s very own yellow brick road.
Gods and Furies and Fates, oh my.
My version isn’t quite as catchy as the original, but considering I’m currently in the middle of a giant forest, I’m just as happy not to see any bears, thank you very much.
Late and lost and muddy is more than enough.
I definitely have no desire to add panicked and screaming and possibly mauled and bleeding into the mix.
Eyes wide and ears straining, I make my way down the path and through the trees to what I can only hope is civilization. As I do, the air around me starts to spark and sparkle with little multicolored flashes that remind me of what I saw glistening over that barn on the drive here.
So much for just being a reflection.
These sparkles are moving, lighting up the path in front of me and jumping a few more feet ahead with every step I take, almost like they’re trying to guide me to where I need to go.
My heart starts pounding harder as I pick up the pace, my nerves fading as excitement once again takes over. I have to be on the right path. I just have to be. There’s no other explanation for all these sparkles.
It’s that thought that has me speeding up as I follow the lights around a couple more bends. They speed up too, and soon I’m racing down this path as fast as I can considering I’m still pulling Paris’s suitcase along with me.
I run, run, run, certain that I’m going to find the amphitheater around the next curve. Certain that I’m almost there. Certain that—
Ugh.
I careen to a halt in front of a wide, three-pronged fork in the path that seems to spring up out of nowhere. Cobblestones head off to the right, a gravelly trail heads to the left, and straight out in front of me is a grassy, rocky road that leads deeper into the forest.
Instinct has me wanting to go down the right path—surely the cobblestones will lead to the center of the school—but the little sparkles are dancing their way down the path on the left.
If they’re here to guide me, they must know where they’re going, right?
Still, it seems a little risky to trust my fate to a bunch of sparkly things no one else in my family could even see, so I pause for a few seconds, ears straining for the sound of laughter or clapping or even the raised voice of a teacher to justify following the sparkles onto the gravel trail.
But there’s nothing, just the sound of a waterfall coming from somewhere close by and the rumble of thunder in the distance.
Which means if I don’t hurry, I’ll add “soaking wet” to all the other strikes I already have against me.
As if they realize I’m not following, the sparkles rush back toward me. They whirl around me several times before taking off down the left side of the fork again. Apparently, they really, really, really want me to go in that direction.
And still I’m paralyzed with indecision—I can’t afford to make the wrong choice here. Doubling back will take even more time.
Then, just as I’m about to blindly choose a direction, I see a boy walk out of the trees about a hundred yards in front of me.
He’s tall, with shaggy hair, and though his back is to me and I can’t see his face, his lean, rangy build tells me he’s a student, not a teacher.
His height—a few inches taller than Paris even after he had a major growth spurt this summer—makes me think he’s an upperclasser, maybe even a fifth or sixth year.
He’s dressed in all black—black T-shirt, black jeans, black boots. Even his hair is black, and so is the long cord he’s got wrapped around his left wrist.
Definitely a Hades boy, then—they’re the only ones who dress like that.
A strange shiver runs through me at the thought, a subliminal warning that this boy could be dangerous.
I ignore it as I start running down the grassy path after him. It’s a school mandate—more knowledge from Mom and Dad—that all students attend the opening day festivities, no matter what grade they’re in. Which means he must be heading for the amphitheater.
The sparkles wrap around me, try to convince me to go in the other direction. But I ignore them, too, as I run even faster. If I can catch up to this guy, not only will I figure out where I’m going, but maybe, just maybe, I won’t have to walk into the opening session alone.
A Hades boy is better than nothing at all.
He’s not exactly running, but he’s still moving fast enough that it takes me a couple minutes to get close to him.
“Hey!” I shout, once I’m sure I’m within hearing distance.
He doesn’t stop, doesn’t pause, doesn’t give any indication that he’s heard me at all. Which only makes me yell louder.
“Hey, wait! Can I ask you something?” Still nothing, so I pick up my speed even more. “Hello? Can you hear me?”
He finally stops and turns around to stare at me with eyes as dark and green and mysterious as the forest all around us.
They give me a jolt, as does my first glimpse of his face.
He’s younger than I thought—fourteen or fifteen instead of seventeen or eighteen. Plus he’s really good-looking, especially for a Hades boy.
High cheekbones, a ridiculously perfect nose, deep-bronze skin, and a full mouth that’s currently twisted into a smirk that rides right along the border between amused and obnoxious.
“Hard not to when you’re shouting loud enough to wake the entire Underworld,” he answers wryly.
See? Definitely a Hades boy.
“So why didn’t you answer me then?” He opens his mouth for what I can only guess is another snarky comment, so I just keep talking over him. No one has time to wade through his Underworld attitude right now, least of all me. “Never mind, it’s not important. Can I come with you?”
“Come with me?” Now the second brow goes up. “You don’t even know where I’m going.”
“The amphitheater, right? For the first-day assembly.” I start to add more, but I’m distracted by the sparkles that are suddenly back in full force.
Except instead of swirling around me, this time they are literally swarming him.
Dancing around his head, his shoulders, his hips, his feet, like moths around a flame.
Or bugs around one of those electric zappers.
Not that he notices. Then again, with the way he looks, he’s probably used to getting swarmed by a lot more than a few brightly colored sparkles.
Not that I care about how he looks—no, this conversation is all about getting directions and only directions, thank you very much. Under normal circumstances, Athena girls do not mix with Hades boys…or at least, that’s what my dad always says.
“The first-day assembly started fifteen minutes ago,” he answers as a whole set of sparkles dances along his razor-sharp jawline. “And no, that is absolutely not where I’m going.”
My stomach plummets to somewhere in the vicinity of my ankles. “But everyone has to go. It’s the rules.”
“That’s only if the rules apply to you,” he counters, his smirk growing more pronounced even as he points behind me. “See that giant tree over there? The one with the broken limb? If you take the path to the left of it, it’ll lead you straight there.”
I turn to see which tree he’s talking about—we are in the middle of a forest, after all. There are lots of trees. “The one next to the big tree stump? I don’t see any—”
I break off, mid-sentence, as I turn back to face him. Because he’s no longer there.