by Abbie Lyons
“Hey there, hot stuff!” I yelled out the window that Raines had broken. Not my best opening line, but if my seduction skills were good enough, that wouldn’t matter.
The kyrios looked up at me but didn’t answer.
“I’m really lonely up here!” I yelled, trying my best to sound sexy, but still loud enough to be heard from that far away. An awkward combo. “I could really use some company. Maybe I could join you down there?”
My plan was simple: if a kyrios could use a transportation spell to come and take Raines, then a kyrios was also capable of transporting to come and get me.
“I have strict orders!” the kyrios yelled up. “You’re to remain in the tower under any and all circumstances!”
“Please! I want to see what you look like under that helmet! Don’t you want to show me how handsome you are?”
He continued to look in my direction silently. That must’ve meant he was considering it. Maybe I just needed to put a cherry on top.
“I’m begging you!” I screamed like a horny damsel in distress.
That did the trick. The kyrios disappeared in a puff of smoke, only to appear by my side almost instantaneously.
“Well, hello there,” he said flirtily. He looked around the room. “Shall I take you away with me, honey?”
That was hands down the funniest thing I’d ever heard one of these dullards say.
I batted my eyelashes. “Where were you thinking?”
He grabbed a hold of my arm and the next thing I knew, I was out of the tower. We reappeared in some anonymous-looking Hades Academy hallway. I had no idea where in the school it was, but it beat the hell out of being stuck in a tiny room.
Now I just had to get rid of this guy. Catching him off guard with some fire or a small strike of electricity was an option, but might also fatally hurt the poor dude. I briefly considered just punching him in the face, but with that iron mask he was wearing, I’d probably just be hurting myself.
The best bet was once again, to keep banking on my seduction powers.
“I know the perfect spot,” he said. “Follow me.”
“But baby,” I said, giving the kyrios’s hand a little squeeze. “Don’t you think I should go change into something a little more comfortable?”
“Ohh,” he moaned. “You’re going to put something sexy on for me, huh?”
I did my best not to cringe. “Of course. You wait right here, okay?”
And just like that, I strolled off down the hallway. I didn’t bother to look back, but I’m sure he remained standing there just staring like a doofus. This seduction stuff was way more practical than I ever could’ve imagined.
Next question: where to go from here? I figured I’d just wander the hallways until I saw something familiar, doing my best to avoid any more kyrioi at the same time.
It wasn’t long before my wandering was interrupted by more shaking, this time even heavier than before. I picked up the pace, knowing full well that the ceiling could collapse. After all, that’s what happened during the ball my first year—back when I first met Raines’s ex, Tavi. My task would’ve been much easier if there were just giant maps on the walls like at shopping malls, with convenient YOU ARE HERE markers. But, of course, things here could never be so simple.
And it would’ve really sucked figuring out such an ingenious way to get out of the tower in the sky only to be crushed by a bunch of rubble back on the ground.
“Nova fucking Donovan!” an unmistakable British accent called out from behind me. “We’ve been looking all over!”
I turned to see Morgan and Teddy running toward me with huge looks of relief on each of their faces.
“How did you even find me?” I managed to ask before their arms were wrapped around my body in a group hug.
“Dumb luck,” Teddy said as they guided me back where they’d come from. “We didn’t know where you were. So we decided to just turn every corner and open every door we could until we found you.”
“As soon as all the Chaos started, we knew you’d need rescuing!” Morgan cheered. “And here we are...your rescuers!”
After a few minutes of navigating the halls, everything was looking a bit more familiar. We were somewhere near my old Latin classroom. “Any idea what started all of this?” I asked.
“Not a clue,” Teddy said. “One moment Morgan and I were eating a depressing lunch in the common room, and the next moment everything just started shaking. I’m just glad you’re safe.”
As we neared the Great Hall, I couldn’t help but notice who was conspicuously missing. “Where’s Karolina?” I asked.
“Good question,” Morgan said. “Our guess is one of the dorm rooms, probably with one of those boys she’s so in love with. The one from band, Matthias, Aleks...really the possibilities are endless. But now that we’ve found you we should make sure everything’s okay with her.”
But upon returning to the common room, it was clear everything definitely wasn’t okay. The place was in complete disarray—couches overturned, students hiding under tables or running in all directions.
And cultists. The Children of Abaddon were here.
Chapter Eighteen
They were looking for me, of course. The cultists didn’t seem at all concerned with any of the other students in the room. They were devil-worshippers, sure, but they weren’t about to waste their time going after any and all Hades Academy students just for the hell of it—pun most definitely not intended. After all, every student here was a potential convert to their cause. They could be the Children of Abaddon of the future.
Looking raggedy as ever, the cultists weren’t leaving a single spot unturned. If I was hiding somewhere in there, they were going to find me.
We ducked back out of the common room before they could spot us.
“So what’s the game plan here?” I asked.
“The game plan,” Morgan began, “is that you are not going in there. They’re looking all over for you. Teddy and I are going in to find Karolina. But you...you go hide somewhere, dear.”
Okay, so aside from the fact that the Chaos—which was probably a result of all this pure evil entering the grounds of Hades Academy—could’ve shaken the tower to the ground, I was beginning to see the logic in shutting me up in some impenetrable little room. Maybe I never should’ve escaped.
Way to go, Nova. Another classic mistake.
“We’ll check to see if she’s in my room with Matthias,” Teddy said. “And also maybe the Infernal Three’s room in case she’s with Aleks.”
“Don’t forget the band boy! And perhaps she’s just hiding out in your room, Nova,” Morgan noted.
Shit. My room.
That was one of the first places the cultists would go to look for me. Karolina wouldn’t be safe if she were in there. And given the fact that the doors to the rooms were locked to all but the people who lived in them, there was a decent chance that if she was trapped in there with cultists and the door was closed, then I’d be the only one able to get in.
Fuck it. I had to go get her. Maybe this would be another one of those mistakes, but my intuition was telling me it’s what I had to do. After all, what if the cultists thought Karolina was me? All they likely knew about me was that I was a girl with pale skin and dark hair...just like Karolina.
“I need to see if she’s there,” I said, storming back into the common room before either of them could stop me.
This required a little bit of stealth. A crouch behind some furniture here, some hiding behind a bookshelf there. What I hadn’t noticed before, though, was that the floor was already littered with the bodies of several dead kyrioi. It was eerie seeing these men—and presumably some women—who patrolled the halls with such authority just lying there lifelessly.
Those poor, poor souls. Dead because of me.
Eventually there was nothing left to hide behind between the couch I was stationed at and the door that led to the dorms. I was just going to have to make a run for it and hope that none of
those cultist bastards saw me.
“Look who’s here,” I heard a gravelly voice saying before I could get moving, and for a moment I was positive I’d been spotted. “Let’s take care of him.”
Him?
I peeked out over the couch to see Lattimore along with a whole battalion of new kyrioi standing right by the entrance.
“On behalf of the Regents, I command you to leave the grounds of Hades Academy,” Lattimore said in a forceful voice that I wasn’t used to hearing from him. “Failure to leave may be punishable by jail time or death.”
“We don’t give a fuck about your empty threats,” one middle-aged cultist with a mullet said, stepping forward. The Children of Abaddon really didn’t seem to care much about personal style or good haircuts.
“Then be prepared for the consequences,” Lattimore said solemnly as the kyrioi rushed forward.
Now was my time. I darted over to the dorm hallway, and ran as quickly as I possibly could to my door. It was closed, but I could clearly hear muffled voices coming from behind it.
Karolina was in there. And she wasn’t alone. I braced myself for what I’d encounter when I turned the knob.
The first thing I saw were two men in shitty, worn-out clothes standing with their backs to the door in front of Karolina’s bed. I couldn’t see her, but I could hear her crying.
I didn’t even stop to think about what I did. Lighting shot from my fingertips, knocking the men to the ground. The whole thing felt very out-of-body. I’d used potentially lethal force without even sparing a thought about whether or not those men deserved to die. But why should I care about them living or dying? The only thing that mattered at the moment was Karolina.
“Nova!” Karolina screamed. “They thought I might be you!”
Score another point for my intuition.
“It’s okay,” I comforted her. “They’re dead now. I think.”
If they weren’t, the bodies there on the floor certainly didn’t look like they’d be getting up anytime soon anyway.
I made sure the door was closed firmly and we holed up there, our fingertips at the ready. If anybody tried to bust the door down, we’d be ready for them.
A few minutes passed. Nobody came to the door.
Again my intuition spoke to me. “The fight is over,” it said. I knew it would be safe to venture back out into the common room. The cultists simply weren’t a match for a whole army of kyrioi.
“Do you want to go back there with me?” I asked a still sobbing Karolina. “Or would you rather stay here?”
“I’ll come with you,” she said, wiping the tears from her eyes.” Didn’t blame her for not wanting to stick around with those two dudes still on the ground.
We took hold of one another’s hand and opened the door, slowly making the trek down the long hall back to the common room.
I wondered what Karolina was more upset about—nearly being captured by the cultists or seeing her roommate more than willing to kill both of them without a single bit of regret or hesitation. I didn’t even know what to think of myself.
The first thing I saw when we opened the door back into the common room was a sea of kyrioi. There were still a few students sitting around in a state of shock, as well as the bodies of cultists and still more kyrioi on the floor. Other cultists were now in handcuffs. The whole scene looked like some sort of tableau or an epic Renaissance painting. There was just so much going on.
But most importantly of all, it appeared the threat was gone. I scanned the room wondering if my mother was there somewhere among the disarray. But I didn’t see her—nor could I feel her presence. There was no way she was here. If she were, she would’ve found a way to get to me.
A few of the other professors had arrived on scene. I spotted Mantel trying to catch her breath and Professor Donner wielding an axe that I had no doubt he forged himself.
The sight of it all was so intense that it took me a moment to realize that the room was totally silent—not a single person was saying a word. Many of them happened to be looking toward the same thing, while others averted their eyes.
I followed their gazes to a spot on the ground where Dean Lattimore lay, looking serene, but undoubtedly lifeless.
The cultists had been taken care of. The students were safe, for now.
But Dean Lattimore was dead.
And it never would’ve happened if not for me.
Chapter Nineteen
I wasn’t sure how the fuck life was supposed to go on, but I guess we didn’t have much of a choice. The semester still had a few weeks left, and the government wasn’t about to shut down their sole school for the rest of the year, even after it was literally invaded—an invasion which I’d been assured several times by several different people would’ve been impossible. Hades Academy wasn’t safe, and even the hundreds of additional kyrioi sent to the campus in the immediate aftermath didn’t make a single student feel any better.
But our safety didn’t mean much to any of us when compared to the loss we’d already suffered. Dean Lattimore, probably the most beloved guy in the whole school, was gone. And if it weren’t for me, he’d still be alive.
As a girl who was always living with some hugely mixed emotions, this might’ve been as screwed up as they’d ever been. I missed Lattimore more than I’d ever missed anybody. Simply put, I didn’t know how I could survive another year at Hades Academy without him. This was the guy who literally plucked me from homelessness and put me on a flying horse-drawn carriage to a much, much better place. The fact that his bringing me here led indirectly to his death made it even worse. How was the world any better with me alive and him dead? Call it survivor’s remorse if you must, but I wasn’t half the person he was.
Now throw in the fact that almost everybody knew that this whole thing had something to do with me, and you had yourself even more complicated feelings brewing. Camilla wasn’t keeping the information she’d gathered quiet—she was blatantly whispering in ears and pointing over at me every chance she got. Using the death of a person who everybody loved to build up social clout? She wasn’t below that, not even a little bit. It sucked enough that I was the person here most at fault for Lattimore’s death, but for everybody else to know that made it even worse. They might not have known the exact details, sure, but they understood that this was about me in some way.
Then there was the anger, which I guess is what people always tell you is one of those stages of grief. And, damn, I was angry. Angry at the people who told me that this place was safe—which ironically enough, included Lattimore himself. Funny how that worked. I was angry at the other students for giving me stares that seemed to imply this was all because of me, even though I knew it was. The anger toward my mother, even though it seemed like she hadn’t actually showed up for this little siege, was off the charts. But the person I was most furious with, obviously, was myself.
I shouldn’t have been at Hades Academy putting all of these people in danger. At the very least, I should’ve never escaped from that damn tower. They could’ve just figured out a way to snatch me up from there and been on their way, with no need for any other victims. If only things were so simple.
And on top of all of that, I still had to keep going to class, as if everything was peachy and normal. We didn’t even get a break. The weekend ended, and we were expected to get right back into our normal routine.
“This is fucked up, right?” I tried to confirm with the others at breakfast in the refectory. Although it wasn’t much of a breakfast given that I still didn’t have even a little bit of an appetite. “Tell me I’m not being crazy here.” Really, the only happiness I could find in my heart right now was thanks to my friends. They’d stand beside me through anything.
“You are not being crazy at all,” Morgan assured me. “I’m disgusted, frankly. I’ve written my parents and they’re absolutely up in arms! They said they’d understand if I needed to come back home.”
“I’m fucking livid,” Teddy added, quite unc
haracteristically. “Completely fucking livid.”
I was beginning to think that maybe the anger we were all feeling was a good thing. Without it, we’d just be depressed. Having something to be so damn mad about was at least a little energizing.
But I couldn’t help feeling weird just sitting at the refectory table with my friends. The most terrible thing to happen since I’d arrived here had occurred just two days ago, and yet here I was. Letting life continue on as normal felt so wrong, but I was doing exactly what I would any other morning.
“It pisses me off,” Karolina added, almost as loud as I’d ever heard hear.
“After all Lattimore sacrificed for this fucking school,” I said with a sigh. “All the time he devoted to teaching and running this place, even when being dean wasn’t what he wanted. At the expense of enjoying his life and...spending time with his wife.”
In my own grief, I’d completely forgotten that Lattimore had been married. I could only imagine how much she was suffering right now. Because of me.
“Hey,” Morgan said, putting her hand on mine, “it’s not your fault, you know.” It was like she could read my mind. “I see that guilty look on your face, and I don’t want any of that bullshit at a time like this, dear. You’re allowed to be plain old sad.”
Being just sad was easier said than done, but I’d try my best. After all, I was still in shock. I hadn’t even had been able to process the surprise of seeing my biological father in necromancy class, let alone the death of the man who I saw as the closest thing I had in my adult life to a father. There just wasn’t time these days for coping with my feelings.
The first class on the docket was Necromancy, and I was dreading it. For one thing, Professor Mantel was one of the people who’d seemed to be sure that the Children of Abaddon didn’t present a real threat. It seemed like just yesterday that she’d told me that it was likely only a matter of time before the Regents took care of them. Admittedly, aiming any ire at somebody who had my back as much as Mantel—who had quite literally possibly saved my life last year—was stupid.