* * *
The wall whispered shut behind us, cutting us off from the club. Unlike in the tunnels underneath the academy, no lights clicked on in the ceiling, leaving us in total, unrelenting blackness.
I hesitated, not wanting to trip or fall over something in the dark, but Gretchen shoved me forward. A few gray sparks streamed out of her fingertips, providing a brief bit of illumination, but they winked out too quickly for me to get a good look at the tunnel.
“Start walking,” she growled again.
She must have had enhanced eyesight like so many of the Mythos kids did, because the dark didn’t seem to bother her. Every time I slowed down or stumbled over my own feet, she impatiently shoved me forward again.
Or maybe that was because she knew exactly where we were going.
Since I couldn’t see anything, I reached out with my other senses, once again listening for footsteps, shouts, or any other noise that would indicate that my friends had discovered the tunnel. But the only sound was the faint scuff of our shoes on the floor, and the darkness quickly swallowed that up as well.
I drew in several deep breaths. The passageway smelled old and musty, like the ones under the academy. It probably connected to the academy tunnels, maybe through the passageway that Zoe and I hadn’t explored. But Gretchen seemed to be leading me away from the academy instead of toward it, so I had no clue where we were going. For all I knew, we could be heading to the center of the earth.
The air was much cooler down here than it had been in the club, and the chill crept through my clothes and sank into my bones. I shivered, and not just from the cold.
I was in serious, serious trouble.
I didn’t know why Gretchen had kidnapped me. Maybe she realized that I was working for the Protectorate. Maybe she was planning to use me as a hostage so she could escape. Or maybe she had something far, far worse in mind. But she certainly hadn’t brought me down here to give me a tour, and I needed to get away from her. Or at least give myself a chance to fight back.
Babs was still strapped to my waist, since Gretchen hadn’t bothered to disarm me, but she didn’t need to take away my weapon. She had moved so that she was standing more beside than behind me now, but she still had her hand clamped down on my shoulder, and she could still shove her dagger into my back before I could even reach for Babs. I had to figure out some way to slip out of her grip and buy myself a few seconds to pull my sword free.
Thinking about Babs made an idea pop into my mind. I didn’t know if it would be enough to distract Gretchen, but it was worth a shot.
“Why are you doing this?” I asked.
For a moment, I thought she wasn’t going to answer me, but then her voice sounded in the darkness. “Doing what?”
“This. All of this. Why did you steal Serket’s Pen from the Idun Estate? What are you planning to do with it? What are you planning to do with me? Why did you become a Reaper? Do you want revenge on the Protectorate for something?”
Question after question spewed out of my lips. Gretchen probably thought I was so scared that I was babbling. That was exactly what I was doing. I was taking a page out of Babs’s book and talking, talking, talking, as loud and as fast as possible. I hoped my chatter would annoy the Valkyrie and get her to make a mistake. Or at least lower her guard long enough for me to turn the tables on her. Besides, I really did want to know why she was doing this and what she had planned for the artifact—and for me.
“A Reaper?” Gretchen asked. “Why do you think I’m a Reaper?”
Thanks to Takeda’s intel, I knew she wasn’t a Reaper, but it had seemed like a good way to get her talking. “Because you stole an artifact. That’s what Reapers do.”
“Oh, please,” she scoffed. “Give me some credit. I’m not a Reaper. I couldn’t care less about the Reapers and the Protectorate and their silly little war.”
I turned my head to the side so I could see her face. “What do you mean?”
Gretchen gripped my shoulder even tighter, causing a shower of gray sparks to flicker in the air and illuminate the disgusted look on her face. “The whole thing is pointless. Completely, utterly pointless. Loki might be gone, but people are always going to do bad things. There are always going to be Reapers, no matter how hard the Protectorate tries to put them all in prison.”
As much as I hated to admit it, she had a point. There would always be some people who hurt others because they wanted what someone else had. Or because they thought they were better than everyone else. Or simply because they liked hurting other people.
“I’m tired of it. The Reapers, the Protectorate, all the fighting.” Gretchen’s face twisted a little more. “But do you know what I’m really sick of?”
“What?”
“Mythos freaking Academy.”
That wasn’t what I had expected her to say. Not at all. “What do you mean?”
She sighed. “I’m tired of working so hard all the time. I’m tired of my crummy job in this crummy club and having to wait on stupid, spoiled rich kids just so I have enough money to buy clothes and food and computer equipment.”
Most of the Mythos kids were rich, like Gretchen had said, but it didn’t sound like she was one of them.
“Do you know how much money the Mythos kids spend at Club D every week? It’s insane. Not to mention how much they blow on clothes and shoes in the shops in Snowline Ridge.” Gretchen let out a bitter laugh. “I went shopping with Kylie last weekend. She spent five hundred dollars on a purse. I could barely come up with five dollars for a coffee.”
“What about your parents?” I asked, turning my head and looking at her again. “Don’t they help you? Give you an allowance or something?”
More gray sparks of magic crackled in the air, highlighting her face again. “My parents are useless,” she said with a sneer. “They got divorced when I was nine, and my dad moved to Ashland and got remarried. He has a new family now, and he’s forgotten all about me. I haven’t gotten so much as a birthday card from him in years.”
Even though she had a dagger to my back, my heart still ached at the obvious hurt in her voice. I thought of that picture tucked into her vanity-table mirror. Gretchen had been standing alone in one side of the ripped photo, with her parents in the other half.
“My dad actually pays my mom child support, but she spends it all on makeup, clothes, and exercise classes. My dad left her for another woman, so my mom is obsessed with trying to land another husband who’s richer, better-looking, and more successful than my dad. I went home for fall break last year and asked my mom for money for a new laptop. She promised she would send it to me the next week.”
I couldn’t stop myself from asking the inevitable question. “What happened?”
Gretchen let out another bitter laugh. “She took the money and went on some stupid singles cruise. She even sent me a lousy postcard from one of the ports.”
Last fall? That was around the time we had first gone to the Idun Estate and when she had checked out the artifact book from the library. “Let me guess. That’s when you decided to steal Serket’s Pen.”
“Absolutely.”
“Why that artifact? Why not take something from the Library of Antiquities on campus?” I asked. “Wouldn’t that have been easier?”
“Of course it would have been easier, but Serket’s Pen is worth more money than anything in the library. It was the most valuable artifact at the Idun Estate.” Gretchen paused. “Well, one of the most valuable. I thought about stealing a necklace, but it’s missing a jewel, so it’s not worth as much. I also thought about taking a keepsake box, but I think it’s in storage. It wasn’t in the library with everything else.”
“So you’re going to do what, exactly? Sell the artifact, take the money, and leave the academy forever?”
“You’d better believe it.”
“Okay, so why come over to me in the club?” I asked. “Why not just leave through this tunnel?”
“Because I saw you in the mansio
n library,” Gretchen said. “I had just climbed out the window when you and your Viking boyfriend came running into the library.”
“So you summoned that basilisk to slow us down and cover your tracks.”
“Of course. I couldn’t let you catch me with the artifact and ruin all my hard work.”
Anger spiked through me at her matter-of-fact tone. Ian and I had almost died, but Gretchen wasn’t sorry that she had summoned that basilisk. Not one little bit. And she certainly wouldn’t have been sorry if the monster had killed us.
“And did you see Kylie come into the library?” I asked in a harsh voice. “Because she’s your best friend, and the basilisk almost killed her too.”
“No, I didn’t see her, but it wouldn’t have mattered if I did,” Gretchen replied in that same matter-of-fact tone. “Kylie is my friend, but I wasn’t going to let her or anyone else get in my way. Nobody is stopping me. Not now, when I’m about to get everything I’ve ever wanted.”
More anger spiked through me. Ian and I were part of the Midgard, so we had known the risks of going into the library, but Kylie hadn’t. I might not like Kylie, but she hadn’t deserved to get attacked by a basilisk just so her supposed friend could steal an artifact.
“But why come over to me in the club?” I asked again. “Why bring me down here?”
“Even after the lights came back on at the estate, I still had access to the security system. I wanted to make sure that no one was suspicious of me, so I watched the footage on my phone when we got back to the academy. I heard you talking with your friends in the mansion library about how desperate you were to find the artifact,” Gretchen said. “I spotted your Viking boyfriend in the club, which means that the rest of your Protectorate friends are lurking around too. But now they’ll be so busy looking for you that I’ll be able to slip away in the confusion.”
“Mateo was right,” I muttered. “You certainly are smart.”
“Smarter than you idiots,” she said in a proud voice. “And I’m about to be a whole lot richer too.”
I shook my head. “I know you’ve had a rough time, but lots of kids have crappy parents. Trust me. I know from personal experience. But stealing artifacts and hurting people aren’t the answers to your problems.”
“Oh, what do you know about it?” Gretchen snapped. “You and your aunt are rich, just like everyone else at the academy.”
I wouldn’t say that Aunt Rachel and I were rich. Not like some of the other kids with their limitless credit cards, flashy jewelry, and expensive cars. But I also never had to wonder if I had enough money to buy a cupcake at lunch or a winter coat or a new mystery book that I’d been looking forward to reading.
Still, as much as I felt sorry for Gretchen, I wasn’t going to let her get away with this. Serket’s Pen was dangerous, and it needed to be kept down in the Bunker with the other artifacts. Not to mention the fact that she had almost killed Ian and me by summoning that basilisk. I wasn’t going to let that slide. Nobody hurt my friends—or whatever Ian really was—and got away with it.
Nobody.
I didn’t know how much longer it would be before we reached our destination, but I’d managed to distract Gretchen while we were talking, and her grip wasn’t quite as tight on my shoulder as it had been before. I needed to make a break for it while I still had a chance—
A light flared in the darkness.
We must have turned a corner in the tunnel or stepped into a different passageway. One second, everything was pitch-black. The next, a golden glow appeared, burning bright and steady.
“Faster,” she snapped. “And quit pretending like you can’t see anything.”
I wanted to snipe back that I really hadn’t been able to see anything, but that probably would have earned me another slice in the back from her dagger, so I kept my mouth shut.
The golden glow grew closer and brighter. I blinked several times, trying to get my eyes to adjust to the light.
“Finally,” Gretchen muttered. “I thought we were never going to get here.”
Before I could ask where here was, she shoved me forward. This time, she let go of my shoulder, and her Valkyrie strength propelled me out of the tunnel and into the center of a much larger open space.
I staggered forward and managed to catch myself before I tumbled to the ground. The second I regained my balance, I yanked Babs out of her scabbard. I whirled around and lifted the sword, expecting Gretchen to attack me. But instead, she was standing close to the tunnel entrance, leaning one shoulder against the wall.
What was going on? Why had she brought me here?
My gaze flicked left and right. We were standing in a round room made of stones that had been stacked together. Several plastic lanterns dangled from iron hooks that had been embedded in the walls, although the lights did little to drive back the darkness. It was even colder here than it had been in the tunnel, and my breath frosted in thin clouds in the air.
I kept looking around. Instead of the walls being smooth and whole, spaces had been hollowed out of them, starting just above the floor and going all the way up to the ceiling. What were those for?
Keeping one eye on Gretchen, in case she attacked me after all, I crept a little closer to one of the hollow spaces. Something pale gleamed inside, although I couldn’t quite make out what it was. I stepped to the side, and a ray of lantern light penetrated the darkness, revealing…
A human skull.
There was no mistaking that distinctive shape or the other bones that were arranged around it. A body—a human body—was lying in that hollowed-out space.
I bit back a shriek and lurched away from the wall. My gaze flicked left and right again, but I saw the same thing everywhere I looked.
Bones, bones, and more bones.
They were in all the openings, all resting in peace. At least, until Gretchen and I had come in here and disturbed them. I shivered, but it had nothing to do with the cold air.
I was standing in a crypt.
“Aw, what’s wrong, Rory?” a familiar, mocking voice called out. “Are you scared by a few old bones? Why, I would think that a Spartan like you would be used to seeing dead bodies.”
Footsteps scuffed on the floor. I whirled around, and a twenty-something guy stepped out of the shadows on the opposite side of the crypt. He was tall and strong, with blond hair, blue eyes, and handsome features. He was wearing a black Reaper cloak over a gray shirt, black jeans, and black boots, and a sword with a ruby embedded in the hilt dangled from his belt.
Drake Hunter, Ian’s older brother.
My eyes widened. If Drake was here, then that meant that—
“Maybe Rory is afraid we’re going to leave her down here to rot with everyone else,” another familiar voice called out.
A middle-aged man stepped out of the shadows next to Drake. He was short and thin, with light brown hair, hazel eyes, and a goatee. He too was wearing a cloak over his shirt, jeans, and boots, although his was a bloody Reaper red.
A sword dangled from his belt, along with a couple of small daggers, each one of them with a ruby set into the hilt. The gems, along with the ones on Drake’s sword, burned with an eerie red light, looking more like bloody torches than precious jewels.
Covington, the leader of the Reapers and the man who’d murdered my parents.
I had been wrong before. I wasn’t just in trouble.
I was in danger of never getting out of here alive.
Chapter Eighteen
I stared at Covington, who smiled back at me, looking as smug and confident as ever. In an instant, the crypt disappeared, and I was back in the Cormac Museum the night he had tried to turn me into a Reaper.
Become a Reaper… Become a Reaper… Become a Reaper…
I could hear Covington’s sly voice whispering in my mind over and over again, and I could see that sickening Reaper red fog spreading over everything and clouding my vision just as it had that night at the museum. This odd lethargy spread through my body, threatenin
g to drown me in a sea of cold numbness. Worst of all, I could feel myself wavering. I could feel myself becoming weak and small and tired. I could feel myself starting to give up, starting to give in…
No—no—no!
Those were memories. Awful ones, to be sure, but just memories. Nothing more. I blinked, and the sensations vanished, although not the pain, worry, dread, and fear that they left behind.
Those things never, ever went away.
But Covington hadn’t turned me into a Reaper then, and he wasn’t going to turn me into one now. I wouldn’t let him turn me into a Reaper. Not now, not ever. Making that silent promise to myself helped me push away some of my fear. And the one good thing about my horrible memories was the final emotion they brought along with them.
White-hot rage.
I grabbed hold of that rage, let it scorch through me and burn away the rest of my emotions, until my chest felt like it was full of hot daggers stabbing deeper and deeper into my body with every hard, painful beat of my heart. In that moment, I wanted nothing more than to cross the distance between us, raise Babs high, and run the blade through Covington’s black heart. I even took a step forward to do just that—
“Rory,” a low voice murmured. “No. That’s exactly what he wants.”
It took me a moment to realize that Babs was the one speaking, although I was clutching her so tightly that my hand muffled her voice. I was the only one who heard her soft words, but they were enough to stop me.
As hard as it was, I pushed down my rage and focused on the feel of her hilt in my hand, along with the cool touch of my charm bracelet around my wrist. The sensations comforted me and helped me set aside my emotions and look at the situation as a Spartan.
Babs was right. Covington was standing absolutely still, but Drake was holding something down by his side and shifting back and forth on his feet, as though he were getting ready to strike. The Viking tried to hide the object behind his leg, but I caught a glimpse of a long, slender glass cylinder.
Was that…a syringe?
Spartan Promise Page 17