Ash
I don’t feel so great.
I don’t know if it’s the blow to my balls or the devil’s weed or the fact that Haley keeps grinding her knuckles into me.
Maybe all three.
But it doesn’t matter how I’m feeling. I have to get up. I know I have to get up and then get Emma out of here. I promised
her parents I would.
Except every time I open my eyes and try to sit up, the world starts spinning. This is probably an aftereffect of the devil’s
weed, but truthfully . . . I haven’t felt that great since I told Frankie the truth about Guy.
The look on her face! She seemed as horrified as if I’d just told her I like to kill puppies in my spare time, or something.
I guess I can understand it might be upsetting for a therapist to hear that the guy she’s sleeping with believes his grandmother
is a literal goddess. But you’d think she’d want to know, especially since she asks so many questions all the time.
So I’ve lost her. That’s how it goes, I guess. Being the grandson of an all-powerful goddess isn’t all it’s cracked up to be . . . especially when other wannabe goddesses kidnap you, and the woman you love doesn’t even care.
I’m not sure that’s what’s making it feel so hard for me to sit up right now. That could be a result of my bruised ribs, and
the fact that I was poisoned by a weed that’s way more invasive than the one Dr. Dick kept talking about, and I’m now lying
on a really hard, really cold slab of rock with my hands tied behind my back.
On the plus side, I’ve found Emma Bridle. Or rather, Emma found me.
I didn’t realize it until after I’d been dropped on this rock. I fought the entire time they were dragging me from that boat.
Or at least, I tried to fight. One of the side effects of devil’s weed is that you can still walk and even talk under its
influence, but you’re basically a puppet of whoever administered it, thanks to the hallucinations.
So I might have been staggering around and spewing nonsense—always a good look. I should probably be grateful Frankie wasn’t
around to see it.
Anyway, after they pushed me onto this rock, I was just lying here, staring up at the stars—I could see a few, despite all
the smoke and fog—and thinking about Frankie and wondering if I’d ever see her again when this little face appeared in my
line of vision.
I recognized her instantly despite the truly terrible haircut someone has given her.
“Emma! Emma,” I cried. “Get out. Get out of here! It isn’t safe!”
But I don’t think she understood me—the tongue is always the last thing to recover from devil’s weed—because she only smiled at me shyly and said, “I’m sorry. But Haley says I’ve got to put this in your mouth.”
“Hey,” I tried to say. “Emma! Run! You’ve got to run!”
But because of the residual effects of the devil’s weed, all that came out was “Eh! Umma! Unnnh! Uh-uh huh-hunn.”
Emma looked sympathetic but still stuffed a sock in my mouth, then tied it in place with a strip of cloth, murmuring, “Don’t
worry. She isn’t really going to hurt you.” There’s a little tremor in her voice when she glances Haley’s way and whispers,
“At least, I don’t think so.”
I’m not going to lie: I’m not feeling very hopeful about this situation.
And it’s all my own fault for underestimating the enemy. Haley is such a young, pretty girl. It’s hard to believe someone
that sweet and innocent-looking could be so skilled . . . and so ruthless.
But she is. If she can hack the system of an international biomedical foundation, she’d have no problem hacking Olympus’s.
That has to be how she found out about my grandmother, her connection to West Harbor . . . and then to me, through the record
of the purchase of my house. That was apparently enough to bring her to West Harbor with her band of worshipful followers,
in the hope she might be able to do exactly what she’s doing: extort power—and cash—from the most powerful woman in the world.
I warned Guy long ago that our systems weren’t secure enough. But have you ever tried telling anything to your grandmother,
especially one who also happens to be CEO of the company you work for and a goddess? Not only do they always think they’re right, but they understand literally nothing about technology, let alone
modern life.
I must have told Guy a million times that far from welcoming the existence of immortals, today’s humans—much like Francesca, earlier tonight—would be horrified by the revelation that gods and goddesses live and work among them .
. . and that the world is governed by both magic and science.
This could only challenge their core monotheist beliefs, and most likely cause widespread fear, panic, and violence.
But there’s something even worse that could happen: a power-hungry little narcissist like Haley could come along and decide
to try to blackmail us.
Even if Haley never manages to get through to Gaia with her ransom demand for me—which is unlikely, because though Gaia really
is my emergency contact, she’s listed as Guy on my phone, and she never picks up—West Harbor is already fucked. Gaia isn’t
exactly all-knowing, but she can tell when one of her kids is in trouble. Think the fires around Center Island are bad now?
Just wait. The whole damn place is going to go up like a cinder—and possibly take the rest of West Harbor with it—when she
finds out what Haley is up to.
That’s why I have to get Emma out of here. I don’t want her, or anyone else, to die tonight.
But how am I going to do anything when I can’t even lift my head? All I really want to do is go back to sleep. It was nice
when I was asleep, because then nothing hurt. I could sleep right here on this altar if people would stop shouting and poking
me. Every time I start to doze off, I hear Haley yapping on about bones. Poke. Bones. Poke.
Here she goes again.
“Ash,” she’s saying. “Ash, wake up.”
Only Haley’s voice sounds different than before. There’s a sort of husky warmth to it I never noticed. She actually sounds a lot like . . .
“Wake up, Ash.”
I open my eyes to the most beautiful sight I’ve ever seen in my life: Francesca Giovanni peering down at me, her dark eyes
worried.
When she sees I’m looking at her, however, those eyes soften with relief.
“Oh, thank God,” she whispers. “Ash, you’ve got to get up.”
“I love you,” I tell her, because my heart is so full. She found me. She found me! That must mean she still likes me a little.
But I’m not sure she understands what I’m trying to tell her—it did come out sounding like Rye Roo You—since she whispers, “Shhh, Ash, not so loud. Come on, we’ve got to go—”
I can’t believe it. Frankie has come to rescue me, and my hands and feet are free. She’s cut through the bow lines the girls
used to tie me up.
She’s amazing. I always knew she was amazing, but . . . she really is amazing.
Then I remember what Haley has in store for me—and how Gaia is going to react—and I panic. Somehow Frankie has climbed up
onto the stone altar without being seen—the girls are kneeling down below, their heads bowed reverently as Haley, her back
to us, drones on. All it would take is for one of them—just one—to raise her head and notice us, and it’s over. This is the
least safe place on earth for Francesca to be right now.
I turn my head to tell her this—she has one arm around my waist, to help me down off the backside of the altar—and find I’m still unable to form intelligible words .
. . and I’m still a little bit uncoordinated.
This is unfortunate since the escape route Frankie has planned for us is up the side of a steep ravine behind Satan’s Seat.
I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to climb down from a sacrificial slab at night while still high on an extremely poisonous
plant belonging to the nightshade family after having been repeatedly kicked and punched by a bunch of witches.
But I can now say with confidence that I have, and it did not go as planned.
I don’t even make it off the altar before I stumble. My lips collide with Frankie’s ear, but she only tightens her grip on
me and whispers, “It’s okay. It’s okay, just hurry—”
But it’s not okay. It’s not okay at all, because one of the girls kneeling in front of the altar finally does lift her head,
and immediately sees Frankie up there on the slab with me.
“Stop her!” the girl shrieks.
“She’s taking our sacrifice!” yells someone else.
Frankie tries. I have to give her that.
Only there’s no escape when one of you has limited upper body strength (her) and the other has just been beaten up, then doused
with a psychoactive plant. As much as Frankie is trying to shove me, I’m not moving fast enough to avoid the sudden stampede
of enraged, white-robed witches that is coming directly at us.
So I can’t really blame Frankie for what she does next. Slipping an arm around my neck, she presses something very firmly
to the side of my throat, then whirls around to shout, “Stop! One more step and he dies.”
The witches stop. Even Haley stops. From where I’m standing on top of the altar, I can see the surprise in their eyes—surprise
coupled with anger.
I guess I’d be angry, too, if someone was threatening to kill the guy I’d gone to all the trouble of kidnapping.
“Really?” Haley sounds amused. She’s standing at the base of the altar, staring up at us. But she doesn’t look angry or scared.
She looks pleased with herself. “You’re going to slit his throat with a pair of pruning shears?”
“Yes, I will, if you don’t back off and let us go,” Frankie says. I can feel her heart slamming hard against my chest. She
may be scared, but neither her voice nor the arm around my waist, holding me upright, is shaking. “I’ll do anything I have
to keep you from using him in your twisted little scheme.”
I’ve always known Frankie is a badass, but I never realized how badass until now.
“You’re never going to get your money now,” I say smugly to Haley. Only what comes out of my mouth is mere gibberish since
my tongue is still numb from the devil’s weed.
Haley isn’t impressed. She doesn’t even acknowledge me. She’s still smiling as she says to Francesca, “You do realize it doesn’t
matter who provides the blood sacrifice, only that the blood sacrifice is made, right? So please, go right ahead and kill
him. You’ll be doing us a favor.”
Wait. What?
I’m going to die here, I realize. Francesca and I are both going to die tonight.
And there’s nothing I can do about it.