39. Chapter 39
Chapter thirty-nine
Nikias
“ W hat?!” The deity howled, tossing his hand to the side and sending five of his men clattering to the floor.
Nikias winced. “She wasn’t there,” he repeated, swallowing his fear and hoping Thanatos wouldn’t notice the tremor in his voice.
The colossal god stumbled off the throne. “Where is Theron?” he shouted.
“I-I didn’t check, sir. I came straight to you when the girl was missin—”
Thanatos threw the general across the room before he could finish. His back cracked against the wall, and a flash of pain skittered up his spine.
“You’re useless!” Thanatos growled, and Nikias wiped the blood from the gash on the back of his neck. His master looked to the demons who guarded the labyrinth. “Bring me every soldier and meet me at Theron’s chambers at once!” The room quaked with the thunderous roar of the deity’s commands, and every demon did as it was told.
The general hopped to his feet and ran to his master, bowing the whole time. “I am so sorry, Master. I won’t disappoint you again.”
Thanatos snorted. “I highly doubt that. But you may come.”
Nikias kept his head down, but he could hardly contain his excitement, and as soon as Thanatos turned his back, the general smiled and followed close behind.
They walked down the winding labyrinth until they made it to Nikias’s least favorite god’s chambers. One of the demons swung the door open and much of the army flooded in, including Nikias’s master. There was a pause, then a great clattering. Thanatos growled with rage. “Where is he?!” The deity ran out of the room, stumbling every few steps from his giant form, and likely because he wasn’t used to being so mobile.
The giant deity whipped around and bounded toward him. Nikias froze. He clutched his underling’s shoulders with his long, yellowed talons. “Are you certain they didn’t leave for Olympus?”
“I-I don’t know. The ferryman simply said a mortal took him and—”
Thanatos’s eyes went black, and he released his hold on Nikias. The blonde finally let himself breathe a little, but the terror in his master’s face was unsettling enough that it was still hard to exhale. “A mortal ?” Thanatos said in a dry, quiet hiss. This wasn’t usual for him, and Nikias almost preferred his master’s screams.
“Yes, a mortal,” he said again, but the deity was frozen in place.
Thanatos’s chest quickened, and panic widened his eyes. “Nooo!” he roared, and the labyrinth shook. Bits of rock and ceiling fell in crumbles atop their heads. Thanatos fled down the tunnels, and Nikias knew better than to wait for a command. He turned to his soldiers. He didn’t know what to say to them, but his look must have been enough because, almost at once, they all straightened and moved into formation.
The general looked back to Thanatos, who was quickly disappearing from sight. “Move ahead!” Nikias called as he ran to catch up. His soldiers followed in two long, neat rows of about seventy-five.
Seventy-five demons. This was the most men he’d ever commanded.
His mouth curled into a smile.
When Thanatos saw him pull this off, there would be no more Theron of Tartarus. There would be only one option for Hades.
Him.
Corre
As they crept into the tomb-like cavern, Corre couldn’t stop thinking of that strange, powerful force that had twisted her mind, fogging it up and rendering her immobile. What was that?
She looked around the cavern. It was a surprisingly pristine dome made of the same stone as the labyrinth above. It was so smooth and well-structured that it looked hand-crafted. Like the bowl-like nest at the mouth of the river.
Before she got too deep in, a glimmer of something on the walls caught her eye. She couldn’t help following it. She crept closer and closer, and it glinted again. It was magnetic— mesmerizing —but it wasn’t coming from the wall itself. It was a shimmer of some sort of magical substance seepedintothe walls. Like a semi-translucent coating.
It really was beautiful. When she moved, the blackness reflected dark hues of blue, purple, and red. Deep shades she’d never seen in anything other than carefully, expertly crafted paintings.
She leaned in closer.
It was fascinating.
She reached out to touch it.
As soon as her fingertips brushed the surface, that same mind-numbing power forced its way into her head. She let out a cry and fell to the ground.
“Correlia!” Markus ran to her. He skidded to the ground and pulled her onto his lap, deep lines of worry creased along his forehead. But the feeling passed the moment her fingertips left the wall. She adjusted to her knees and rose to her feet.
“I’m okay,” she said, taking his hands, but something at the back of the cave caught her attention. “Markus. Look.” She pointed to a large, curved lump nestled against the back wall. “What is that?”
They walked closer. It wasn’t until they were past a long shadow in front of the shape that they realized what it was.
“It’s a woman,” she said.
Markus took a step forward. “It is . . .” He walked closer, and Corre laced one of her hands in his, holding onto his arm with the other. The closer they got, the clearer it became that this figure was a gloriously beautiful, unusually large goddess. And she was fast asleep.
She had long, thick waves of sapphire hair—a slightly darker tint than her sky-blue skin that sparkled like the clear waters of Olympus. She was curled within her hair, sleeping in the soft bed of loose ringlets. Corre would have thought she was sleeping peacefully in such a comfortable position if it weren’t for her strained expression.
“Who is that?” she asked.
“I don’t know.”
They walked closer, and before she realized what she was doing, Corre found herself reaching out to touch her. She probably shouldn’t have followed such an impulse, but something was pulling her to the goddess.
“What are you doing?” Markus whispered, but she couldn’t help it.
She touched the goddess’s shoulder.
And everything went black.
That same mind-numbing force blasted through her. She jolted back and fell to the ground, hitting her head against the stones below. She heard Markus call her name, but it was muffled and warped. She couldn’t hear past the ringing, and everything sounded like she was underwater.
She couldn’t keep her eyes or mind open. Unlike touching the wall, releasing her fingers from the goddess’s skin didn’t stop the horrific sensation.
A nightmare flashed in her mind, but it wasn’t her own.
Corre was somewhere else entirely.
When she could open her eyes again, she was in a field of grass, the blades moving gently by a subtle breeze. She didn’t recognize this place, despite all the locations her mother had dragged her to for work throughout her adolescence. It was serene. It had to be somewhere on Olympus, but the sky was dark and there were no other signs of life other than the blue goddess and two others—cloaked figures Corre couldn’t make out. Their faces were hidden, but they were facing the goddess.
“Why are you doing this?” the goddess said, and that’s when Corre realized the goddess was crying. She didn’t look scared, but the other giant beings were rigid and staring up at her. They were enormous, but she was over a head taller, her shoulders a little broader.
“You know why,” one of the voices said, and instantly, Corre recognized who it belonged to. She could never forget that raspy voice. That evil, taunting, malicious voice. “You’ve left us with no choice.”
The goddess sobbed, chains appearing on her wrists, sprouting from deep within the earth. The storm clouds twirled faster, thundering and flashing with a bright light before transporting Corre to a new scene.
A dungeon. A small, dingy room. A makeshift prison cell. There was a palpable feeling of dread in the air, and it left her with a sense of melancholy that left her body weak. She trembled violently as anxiety rattled through her, rising by the second.
Her greatest fears flickered across the wall in dark shadows until they changed shape and turned their attention to a young boy in the corner. The feeling of despair was so great that it was difficult to focus on anything going on around her, but in a brief moment of clarity and focus, Corre saw the boy more clearly.
It was Markus.
He was about thirteen or fourteen years old, and he was huddled in the corner, his knees pressed tightly against his face. She only realized who it was by the way he cried and the familiar waves of black hair atop his head. But when he looked up in terror, screaming at the shadows, there was no denying his identity.
Her heart splintered into a thousand broken pieces. This poor boy was in a room of nightmares.
“I’ll help you! Get up! I’ll help you out!” she yelled. She desperately wanted to snatch him from this den of fear, but he couldn’t hear her, and the door was sealed shut.
Wake up , a voice said. A female voice. Wake up.
She looked around but saw no one but young Markus.
There was nothing Corre could do. She was helpless. Useless.
“Why am I seeing this?” she whispered, tears streaming down her face. “Why do I have to see this?”
Then everything went black again.
And she heard that voice one more time. Wake up!
She whipped around but was still shrouded in darkness, until a flash of light blinded her, and she was thrown back into the present. That powerful force that had immobilized her body left her cold and shaking on the floor, then fled like a passing whisper. But it didn’t leave without taking most of her energy along with it.
“Correlia! What happened?” Markus cried. He was bent over her, his hands cradling her face. Her eyes focused. Air. She needed air. She sprang forward and gasped for breath. “Correlia!”
She couldn’t speak. There was no time to think. She worked her way to her feet, keeping her eyes fixed on the sleeping goddess a few feet away.She coughed and croaked, finally finding her voice, and turned to face him. “I think I know what we have to do,” she said. He frowned, baffled, but followed her as she walked to the sleeping goddess. “She’s under a spell. We need to wake her up.”
“The incantation,” Markus said, and Corre nodded.
“How did it start again?” She strained to remember the words, but the ordeal she’d gone through left her with little ability to focus or do much of anything.
“It started with, ‘You raise the dead from slumber, wake from . . .’” Markus said. “But the last word wasn’t right. I remember learning it at some point, but I don’t remember what the last part was.”
“‘You raise the dead from slumber . . . wake from . . .’” Corre’s head throbbed. What did he say?
“Was it—” Markus started, but a terrible roaring cut him off. The whole grotto shook. They turned toward the sound. There was a shadow—a troll-like shape lengthening on the wall. The darkness grew until it revealed a being almost as large as the sleeping goddess.
Right away, Corre knew who it was. There was no denying it; the power radiating from his body as he approached was impossible to ignore.
“Hypnos,” Markus said.
Hypnos.
The terrifying creature was enveloped in shadow as it trudged toward them. Markus whipped around and grabbed her shoulders. “Recite the incantation! Hurry! I’ll fight him off!”
The creature hurriedly bounded over and smacked him, sending him plummeting to the wall. “Markus!” Corre screamed, but the being towered over her, and she got a good look at his face.
She gasped.
He looked like . . .
“Thanatos!” she yelled. He looked exactly like Markus’s master, only his skin wasn’t pale and grayed. It was a dark, mossy green, like the gunk beneath a swampy rock.
“It’s not Thanatos,” Markus said, his voice tight as he staggered forward. The deity turned to face him, and the shock manifested on the young god’s face as well. “But why do you look like him?”
The creature laughed like he had told a joke, but Markus was horrified, mystified. I have to hurry. Corre ran toward the sleeping goddess and tried remembering the incantation. “‘You raise the dead from slumber, wake from—’” The creature wailed and barrelled toward her. She held her hands out to block it, but Markus used his power to knock him over at the last second.
“Keep trying!” Markus shouted, racing to Hypnos and using his powers to get into the deity’s mind. It wailed. “Can’t you handle your own tricks?” Markus snapped, twisting his hand and pushing it out at the giant god.
It grabbed its head and screeched—a dual wail, like two voices came from the being, one deep and one shrill.
Corre searched her mind again. “‘You raise the dead from slumber, wake from . . .’” A lump formed in her throat. She was too weak now, and the word . . . what was that last word? “‘You raise the dead from slumber, wake from—'”
“This curse and collapse asunder!” Markus finished.
Hypnos bellowed and lunged at him, but it was too late.
Light burst from the slumbering goddess—a blinding, sublime, sapphire-infused light. The grotto shook even more violently than before.
“Nooo!” a raspy voice cried, followed by a thundering trail of footsteps. The real Thanatos entered the room in a fury, Nikias and his army rushing in close behind.
The light grew. No one dared to move.
As the grotto’s rumbling settled, the enormous, ethereal goddess rose from her slumbering place and opened her eyes.
“Noooo!” Thanatos roared again, but Hypnos bowed his head and fell to his knees.
“It’s over,” Hypnos said to Markus’s master. When Thanatos didn’t move, Hypnos growled. “Get down,” he said. “And bow to our mother.”