The Immortal Game

by Talia Rothschild

  None of them had been able to sleep in the labyrinth, but Braxtus looked awful. He radiated emotional exhaustion, and his posture was continually hunched.

  “How are you doing?” Kostas finally asked him.

  Braxtus moved to float on his back, eyes closed. He just grunted.

  “Has being underwater gotten any better for you?” Galene asked.

  Braxtus scrubbed his face. “Don’t worry about me. I’m managing.”

  Kostas and Galene exchanged a look, but didn’t push it.

  Demitri and Iyana swam by, picking seaweed for themselves. Braxtus’s aura shuddered with violet humiliation, and Kostas felt the pang of it.

  Iyana’s emotions had finally lightened and Demitri’s anger had soothed, melting back into his common bloom of golden love, tainted yellow-green by the ever-present shade of possessiveness. Demitri’s emotions had never settled right with Kostas. He had a lot of them, many selfish, held in check by his impassive face and feigned nonchalance.

  Kostas looked to Braxtus. He would love her better.

  Braxtus grumbled something about exploring the coral and swam off. This was the first time they could get a safe distance between each other, and Kostas was glad Braxtus was taking the opportunity for solitude.

  “What’s it like,” Galene asked, “feeling everyone’s emotions?”

  He turned his gaze back to her. She was playing with the reeds, absently braiding different strands. “I don’t know what it’s like not to feel everyone’s emotions,” he replied. “But … it can get noisy.”

  Her blue-green eyes blinked slowly, her lashes dark and curling. “Is it ever hard to distinguish others’ feelings from yours?”

  “It has been the last few days.” He smiled. “Back on Olympus I could just retreat to my temple, where I was alone.”

  Galene nodded. Attraction was there again in her aura, along with caution and … did he see fear?

  “I don’t usually need to stop and analyze my own emotions,” he went on. “Most of my life they’ve been very straightforward.”

  “But you’ve felt that need recently?”

  She can read me almost as well as I can read her, he thought in mild panic. He swallowed. When had his heart started racing? “I suppose, in one area.”

  “What area is that?” Her voice was quiet, and her eyes fled back to her fidgeting hands.

  The more he thought how to respond, the more lost he got. To Tartarus with this. “You.”

  Her aura flared and Kostas was hit with relief, excitement, joy, and even more nerves. It suddenly felt like a violation to be reading her like that. He tried his best to block it out, to ignore it, but it had ignited his own emotions. His insides fluttered.

  “It’s not fair—you’ve been able to read all of my emotions,” she said. Her voice wavered, her eyes still down.

  It was getting harder to breathe. “Do you want to know mine?” And with that, he mustered every ounce of courage he had left in his pounding chest and took her hand.

  Her aura bloomed and swirled as she stared at his hand over hers, then she laced her olive fingers through his.

  He couldn’t tell where his emotions ended and hers began. She met his eyes again, trying not to smile, but the longer they looked at each other the wider it got. She ran a thumb over his, sending electricity up his arm.

  “Look,” Braxtus called.

  Kostas’s euphoria faded as Galene’s fingers slipped from his. She turned toward where Braxtus waved. Reluctantly, he followed suit.

  The chill settled back into his bones.

  A dark, looming cave stood at the far end of the coral dome. It was bleak and uninviting, but somehow beckoned at the same time. The four of them swam to Braxtus.

  In front of them, tangled in seaweed, was another marker. Braxtus kicked down to touch it. The next part of the riddle illuminated on the gold and silvery surface.

  Coils of death guard the cavern where the globe of prisoners may be obtained. But a prisoner may remain.

  Kostas felt a united shudder run through the group.

  “Lots of ominous words in this one,” Braxtus commented quietly.

  Kostas repeated the final section of the riddle in his mind, quickly memorizing every word.

  “Let’s just get this over with,” Demitri growled.

  “Wait,” Galene sighed. “We really need a rest. Let’s break here, eat, and tackle the final test tomorrow.”

  After two days without food, no one opposed. They ate and explored until the waters turned dark. Tethering themselves once again to the seafloor with the seaweed, they settled down for a good night’s rest.

  24

  IYANA

  Iyana tightened the seaweed around her waist and curled up. Sleeping underwater was becoming more familiar, but she still didn’t like the way her body shifted and rocked all night long. Hopefully, she was tired enough that she’d sleep through the night this time.

  She closed her eyes, waiting in the darkness for sleep to overtake her. One by one, she heard the others’ breathing deepen. Just as she thought she might sink into oblivion, Demitri’s fingers ran down her arm.

  He wants to talk about today. She bit her tongue.

  “Iyana.” He spoke in a quiet voice.

  Slowly, she uncurled and turned to look at him.

  “Listen.” He scanned her face, a contrite expression in his gaze. “I’m sorry I lost my temper when you wandered off in the labyrinth.”

  Dark stubble had grown on his jaw since they left Olympus, and his blue eyes caught a glint of filtered moonlight. Why do you always have to look so perfect?

  She turned her head, not wanting him to read the emotion on her face. “Well … it’s true, isn’t it? I keep getting us in trouble. I’m making things harder.”

  “You know I only said those things because I care. I just don’t want you to get hurt.”

  “I wish I could just protect myself,” she muttered.

  “But you don’t need to—I’m with you. I promise I’ll take care of you.” He pulled her into his embrace, and she breathed deeply. The familiar scent of oak was still there, but faint, mingled with the brine of the ocean. “I should have been the one to find you and pull you back, not Braxtus.”

  She tensed in his arms.

  “Didn’t I tell you I was concerned about his motives?” When she didn’t answer, he continued. “He didn’t stay with us to help Galene or stop Poinê. He stayed for the same reason he came. For you.”

  She took a breath, wanting to defend Braxtus’s intentions but not sure how.

  “I know you were friends. I get it. But this isn’t healthy. It’s an obsession. It drove him all the way out of Olympus, potentially into exile, and it concerns me.” He drew her up, scanning her face. “I’m worried he’s going to get to you—drive a wedge between us. I’m not sure how to protect you from that.”

  She swallowed the lump in her throat. “Demitri, he won’t.”

  “Can you promise me that?”

  Her heart panged, and she brushed the hair from his eyes. “You’ve done everything for me. I’m here. I’m not leaving you, no matter what Braxtus says or does.”

  “Good,” he breathed. “Then do one thing for me.”

  “What?”

  “Stay away from him.”

  She frowned. “That’s pretty difficult in such a small group.”

  He took her head in his hands. “Just don’t allow him to continue to engage you. Avoid him all you can.” He lowered his head and kissed her. His lips were warm and soft against hers, and after a moment, he pulled back just enough to look in her eyes. “Please.”

  “All right,” she whispered.

  Giving her a gentle smile, he tucked back a strand that had come loose from her braid. “Thank you.” He released her. “We should get some sleep.”

  Iyana lay in the dark waters for a while, long past when Demitri’s breathing grew deep and even, matching the sounds of sleep around her.

  An obsession. The
words grated against her, sounding wrong. She knew Demitri was concerned and understood why. She’d probably be upset, too, if a goddess had left Olympus to follow Demitri. But Braxtus was good and kind …

  To her right, he mumbled something in his sleep, shifting and pulling taut against his seaweed tether.

  She pressed her eyes shut. She’d waited for Braxtus to say something for so long. She’d been there for him, had cared deeply for him. And he’d said nothing. He’d taken her for granted. She figured he’d seen her only as a friend.

  And Demitri really had done everything for her. He had exiled himself for her.

  She twisted in the water to turn her back on Braxtus, determined to get some rest.

  * * *

  DARKNESS PRESSED IN from every side, so deep Iyana couldn’t see the hand she waved in front of her face.

  She sat up, and a ceiling brushed against her head. She reached out. Her fingers touched cold walls on either side of her, but the way forward and backward was open. She was in some sort of tunnel.

  A low creak and a few whispers trailed past. She started, heart beginning to pound. The whispers grew.

  “In the deep shadows, where Apollo’s sun never reaches…”

  “Endless—”

  “Iyana…”

  Iyana’s heart leapt at that last, familiar voice. “Galene? Is that you?”

  “Iyana.” A new voice.

  “Kostas!” she called back. “What’s going on? Where should I go?”

  “Turn around.” Their voices spoke in unison. Iyana obeyed, scrambling onto her hands and knees. “Travel that way.”

  She started crawling down the tunnel, shivering. “How far do I—”

  She crawled right into something stringy, thick, and sticky.

  A shriek escaped her as she backtracked, tearing the web from her face and hands. Immediately, she pictured an enormous spider bearing down on her and backed up even farther.

  “Keep going!” Galene called.

  “Into a giant web?”

  “It’s the way you need to go,” Kostas insisted.

  She shook her head, shuddering.

  Two more familiar voices started murmuring. After a moment she recognized them—Demitri and Braxtus. Their voices blended with a few other haunting cries, but finally Braxtus’s rose above them.

  “There’s a different way out, Iyana. Turn left.”

  “But—” she started, feeling the wall. To her surprise, it cut inward, a passageway opening up. Her fear eased, and she turned down it.

  “That’s it,” Braxtus encouraged. “You’re going the right way.”

  But when her hand next touched the stone, searing hot pain shot through her arm.

  She screamed and jerked back, falling against the side wall. That, too, was scorching. It burned through her tunic, scalding her shoulder. She pushed away, crying out as she crawled on her burned hand to get back to cool stone.

  “What’s going on?” she choked. “Braxtus, it burned me!”

  “It’s okay. You were going in the right direction. Don’t give up.”

  “I can’t go that way! It hurts!”

  “Iyana!” Demitri’s voice rose, clear enough to hear, though not as loud as the others. “Iyana, I can get you out of here. You need to go back the way you came.”

  “Don’t do it, Iyana,” Galene whispered. “Don’t turn around again.”

  “You’re so close,” Braxtus said.

  “No, listen to me.” Demitri’s voice was forceful, but earnest. “Turn around and go back.”

  Confused and desperate, Iyana slowly turned. A sob escaped her lips as she started back the way she came. Her hand and shoulder pulsed in pain, the people she loved all giving conflicting directions, their voices clearer and stronger every minute.

  “Stop it, Iyana!”

  “What are you doing? Don’t you trust us?”

  “Keep coming.”

  Iyana passed where she had started, moving in the opposite direction as she listened to Demitri. The tunnel widened. The darkness remained.

  “You can stand now,” Demitri told her.

  Cautiously, she did so. “Am I almost out?”

  “No!” Braxtus, Galene, and Kostas cried at the same time Demitri said, “Almost!”

  She swallowed, then continued forward, cradling her injured hand to her chest.

  “Iyana,” Demitri said. “Stop!”

  She skidded to a halt, feeling pebbles roll away from her feet. She listened as they seemed to drop off something and land far below her with a clatter.

  “What … what do I do now?” She hated how her voice trembled.

  “You jump for the other side.”

  She froze.

  “Are you crazy? Don’t listen to him, Iyana!” Galene shouted.

  “Why are you listening to him?” Braxtus demanded. But Iyana felt her burned hand throbbing and pushed away their voices.

  “Demitri … I … I can’t see a thing, I don’t know how far to jump—”

  “Iyana, you need to jump.”

  “I’m serious, there’s no way—!”

  “The cliff you’re standing on is going to collapse! You have to trust me, Iyana!”

  She trembled. “I … I do trust you,” she whispered.

  “Then jump!”

  She backed up, then ran and leapt.

  Right as her feet left the ground she heard a crunching, moaning sound as it collapsed beneath her. She arched high into the air, reaching out to grab onto something, anything—

  A hand caught hers. Light pierced the scene, and she stared up into Demitri’s face as he held her whole weight from the edge of a cliff. With one heave, he pulled her up.

  Shaking, she threw her arms around him.

  Iyana gasped, jerking awake.

  Another moment of panic surged at the darkness around her. It was nearly as impenetrable as it had been in her dream, but she blinked and forced herself to relax as she faintly made out her surroundings.

  She put her arms around herself, trembling as her mind raced through her dream. It had been as vivid as her other recent nightmares, but even more detailed.

  “Iyana?” someone whispered. “Are you awake?”

  She looked up as Braxtus swam over. He’d untied himself from the seaweed, and though she could see the outline of his broad frame, his face was swallowed in shadow. She cringed, remembering the pain of the burn, his voice leading her there. She shook her head to clear the lingering effects of the nightmare.

  “Why are you up?” she asked.

  “Nightmares. You?”

  She rubbed her hand. “Dreams for me, too.”

  He hesitated. “Do you want to talk about it?”

  “No … I’d rather just forget it.”

  “All right.” He nodded in understanding, and as her eyes began to adjust, she looked at him closer. He was a wreck—exhaustion pulled at the lines of his face, and his eyes were swollen and bloodshot.

  “Do you want to talk about it?” she asked cautiously.

  He seemed to struggle with himself, then said, “I haven’t been sleeping much.”

  “I’m so sorry. Sleeping underwater is awful—”

  “Not that.” He rubbed his beard. “I mean, that, too. But on top of it I’ve been plagued with these nightmares.” He gave an audible shudder.

  She paused. “What did you dream tonight?”

  “They’re all pretty similar. Usually, it starts good. I’m on land, but when I try to use my fire, it burns me. And I can’t put it out, so I go to water, and then I’m dragged down, and I can’t breathe…” He swallowed. “Sometimes you’re there, but you never hear me when I call out.”

  She felt a sudden urge to reach for him, but resisted. It’s this water. Being separated from our element is getting to the both of us. She looked up at the coral dome above them. There was so much water and rock between them and the sky.

  “Remember when my father took me training?” he asked, voice quiet. “He said I needed t
o face my fears. He took me to the Eastern stream to fight Tereine.”

  I remember.

  Tereine was the most powerful naiad currently living on Mount Olympus. Iyana had worried about this particular training session. She’d gone to watch.

  Braxtus had stood alone in the center of the rushing stream, wearing nothing but his tunic. The naiad had raged from the rapids, sending water crashing over and over the flames he desperately used to shield himself. Iyana felt familiar anger at the memory. Though he’d looked mildly sympathetic, Apollo had just watched. He’d let the naiad bludgeon his son until Braxtus lost his footing and his head went underwater.

  “He hadn’t trained me enough. I’d never been more helpless, or terrified, or humiliated.” Braxtus gestured to his chest. “That feeling—that’s how I feel all the time underwater.”

  “Me too,” Iyana whispered.

  They locked eyes, and an understanding passed between them. His face broke with relief and gratitude, and her barriers crumbled. Reaching out, she drew closer and wrapped her arms around his waist.

  His arms went around her immediately, drawing her against him. He buried his face in her hair, tangled a hand in it.

  Chills ran down her arms—her heart raced. Her breath hitched, and she knew he heard it.

  Oh, Kronos.

  Avoid him all you can. Demitri’s words flooded her mind.

  Demitri had done everything for her. She could give him the one thing he asked for.

  She unwound her arms and disentangled herself, pulling back. Cold water filled Braxtus’s place, but a line of heat kept them connected, coursing between them. There was a brightness in Braxtus’s eyes. She breathed hard.

  After a long silence he said, “Listen, about today…”

  “Thank you for pulling me out.”

  “I just meant, what Demitri said—”

  “He shouldn’t have said that,” Iyana interrupted. “He apologized to me, and I think he’ll apologize to you if I ask—”

  “Iyana…” He moved closer, a pained expression crossing his face.

  She retreated until the seaweed around her waist stopped her. “No, Braxtus, listen. I chose Demitri.”

  He stopped, looking at her as though he could see right to her stupid, traitorous heart. “Why did you? When you clearly still have feelings for me?”