But, of course, Helen didn’t know what Orion was talking about. She barely knew anything about Beth Smith-Hamilton, her supposed mother, but she knew even less about Daphne Atreus.
“Anyway, she’s saved a lot of lives, mine included, and now your mother can be with any member of any House. That’s why she’s the leader of the Rogues and Outcasts.”
Helen’s jaw dropped. Her mother was a hero? Her shady, unreliable, deadbeat mom—the one Helen couldn’t even remember—was some kind of Scion savior? If that was true, then something was either not right in the universe, or not right with the way Helen understood it.
“Listen, part of the reason I told you all of this was because I thought it might make it easier for you to forgive Daphne if I did. And please trust me on this one—you have to forgive your mother, Helen. Not for her sake, but for your own.”
“Why are you defending Daphne?” Helen asked him suspiciously. She thought about the influence of the cestus and wondered if Daphne was controlling him. “Did she ask you to say all this stuff to me?”
“No! You’re misunderstanding what I . . . Daphne never asked me to say anything,” he stammered. Helen made a derisive sound that kept him from continuing. She was angry again, but she didn’t exactly know why. Not knowing made her even angrier. She stomped past him and started marching out of the weeds.
Helen broke through the tall grass and started climbing a steep hill that was lousy with the remains of some tumbled-down medieval castle. As she stomped past a stone stairway that broke off in midair, Helen asked herself why she was so angry. She realized that it wasn’t just one thing. Several things were ticking her off simultaneously, and she was now facing them at the same time.
First, Daphne had sent Orion into the Underworld without bothering to mention it. Second, Cassandra was keeping Claire and Matt from helping her when it was her butt that was dragging through the Underworld every night, not Cassandra’s. And Lucas . . . how could he treat her that horribly? Even if he hated her, how could he do that to her? For the first time, Helen felt angry about what he had done, rather than devastated.
As she stomped along, taking her feelings out on the ground, Helen realized that, most of all, she was angry with herself. She had been so paralyzed with sadness that she had stopped making choices. She had allowed herself to drift along like a helpless bit of fluff. That had to end.
When she was out of breath from hiking up the steep incline at a breakneck pace, Helen braced herself against a massive, mossy block of granite that had once been part of the moldering castle’s outer wall. She whirled around to grill Orion, who was struggling to keep up with her.
“Do you even know why you’re here?” she snapped.
“I’m here to help,” he said through panting breaths.
“You told me my mother sent you. Do you know what the cestus is?”
“Son of Aphrodite, by the way,” he said pointing to himself. “The cestus doesn’t work on me. Daphne can only influence hearts. I can control them.”
“Oh, wow. That’s a pretty terrifying power,” Helen mumbled, momentarily sidetracked. “But you still seem awfully willing to do whatever Daphne tells you to do. Does she have something on you?”
“No! I’m not here because of Daphne, you lunatic! I’m here because I think that what you’re trying to do is amazing, and probably the most important thing any Scion has done since the Trojan War! The Furies destroyed my family, and there is nothing I want more than to stop them from doing that to anyone else. You’re the Descender, and this is your task, but you are an embarrassingly bad fighter without your powers. I’m here to pull you out of whatever smelly hole you fall into so that you actually live long enough to do what you’re meant to do!”
Helen closed her mouth with a snap. It was obvious that Orion was being honest. He had no hidden agenda, even if she still suspected that Daphne did. In fact, the deeper Helen looked into his eyes, the more convinced she became that he would do anything to help her stop the Furies.
The Bough of Aeneas was a monster magnet, but she could see that Orion needed to help her in any way that he could or he would go crazy sitting on the sidelines. And Helen knew that she would go crazy with sadness if she had to do this alone. She needed help, and Orion needed to give it—in a way, it was perfect.
“I’m sorry, Orion. What I said was unfair. It’s just that I feel like so many people are trying to tell me what to do right now, but no one is actually telling me anything. . . .” Helen stopped, struggling to find the right words.
“I get it. You’re so crucial that everyone’s afraid of saying the wrong thing to you.” He sat down and rested for a moment on the grass. “But I’m not afraid, Helen. I’ll tell you everything I know, if you want me to.”
An ominous howl echoed through the valley. Orion jumped up and his head snapped around, seeking the source. He reached under his shirt to draw the long knife that was concealed underneath as he took a hold of Helen’s shoulder and began pushing her in front of him as he moved.
“Uphill,” he ordered in a tight voice.
Helen craned her head to look back and caught a glimpse of a distant patch of reeds being mowed down in a swath. The threat was steamrolling its way toward them. Helen had seen enough to know that whatever it was that was making its way through the marshland was gigantic.
Without her Scion strength and speed, she felt like she was barely going faster than a walk. Orion forced her up the steep hill, one hand on his knife and one hand on the small of her back to keep her from losing her footing. The thing in the grass was gaining on them.
“Go!” Orion barked into her ear.
“What do you mean, go? Go where?” she screeched, not understanding. Orion pushed her as hard as he could toward higher ground, and she stumbled forward onto her hands and knees.
She looked back over her shoulder at Orion who stood a few paces away, facing the thing that Helen could hear scrabbling toward them but still couldn’t see. Orion looked back over his shoulder at her, his green eyes so intense they nearly glowed. Helen had seen that look before and she knew what it meant. It meant that he was digging in. She couldn’t run off and let him fight that thing on his own. She slid back downhill to make her stand with him.
“Get out of here!” he screamed.
“And where the hell am I supposed to . . .”
CHAPTER SIX
The sun was just starting to come up. Helen woke in her bed, freezing cold and reaching out to grab on to a boy who had never been in her bedroom.
“No!” she exclaimed in a ragged voice. Her breath puffed out of her mouth like smoke in the subzero room. “Oh, no no no, this can’t be happening!”
Helen scrambled out of bed and staggered to her dresser on numb legs to get her phone. The message light was blinking. She went into her messages and read:
That sucked. I’m going to bed now. Text me later.
She sat down on the edge of her bed. Relieved laughter bubbled out from between her chattering teeth as she shivered in her freezing-cold bedroom. She checked the time; Orion had texted her at 4:22 a.m. It was 6:30-ish now, and Helen wondered if that was late enough. Deciding that it was silly not to try to get in touch with him she sent back:
R U still in 1 piece?
She waited a few minutes but didn’t get a reply. Helen wanted to fly to the mainland and check on Orion at Milton Academy, but the last thing she needed was to get into trouble for skipping. Finally, she had to let it go and start getting ready for school.
Helen stood up, and as she did, she saw that she was still wearing Orion’s jacket. She could already hear him teasing her about that one, even though this time, stealing his jacket hadn’t been her fault. She tilted her face down, slowly brushing her cheek and lower lip across the collar. It smelled like him—fresh and a little wild, but still safe somehow.
Shrugging impatiently out of the sleeves and telling herself not to be so foolish, Helen went into the bathroom to take a shower. She took her phone
with her, in case Orion tried to contact her, and reminded herself to wash her hair. She even took time to condition it.
As she toweled off and brushed her teeth she thought about how she needed to stop being at the mercy of the Underworld. She had been wandering around aimlessly for . . . well, for a lot longer than real-world time reflected. She owed it to Orion to make a better plan.
At school, the first thing Helen did was track down Cassandra.
“We need to meet this evening,” Helen told her.
“Okay,” Cassandra replied calmly. “Did something happen last night?”
“There’s something I need to tell the whole family. And I’m inviting everyone. Claire, Jason, Matt, Ari,” Helen added as she backpedaled down the crowded hallway.
“They’re not ready,” Cassandra called out in protest, but Helen cut her off.
“Then make them ready. I’m done wasting time.” Helen didn’t give Cassandra a chance to argue.
“You up for a little ancient Greek tonight?” Helen asked Matt and Claire in homeroom.
“Yeah!” Matt responded excitedly, like the über-geek he was. “Do we need to bring anything?”
“Claire?” Helen asked with a shrug, understanding that Matt was asking about what was required for them to become ordained. “You’re the one who found the scroll.”
“I wouldn’t know,” she said. “I didn’t read the whole damn thing. I’m not actively suicidal.”
“I’m sure Cassandra will know. We’ll figure it out tonight,” Helen said confidently.
“Why the big switch?” Matt asked. “Last time I checked, you were on the fence about us joining the ‘study group.’”
“And look how great that’s worked out for me,” Helen said. “Let’s face it, Matt, you and Claire have been helping me prepare for tests since we were in kindergarten. Last night I realized that I’ve been trying to take this test on my own, and that’s probably why I keep failing it.”
She would have told Matt about Orion, but she noticed Zach staring at her, and decided to wait until that night to tell everyone together. The bell rang and ended the conversation. Helen left for her first class wondering what Zach had heard, and how much of it he would be able to understand.
Orion didn’t contact Helen again until lunch, and when he did all he sent were little word-bursts like zzz and taco and H2O. Helen could relate. She didn’t know how long she and Orion had spent in the Underworld the night before, but as usual it had left her tired, hungry, and unbelievably thirsty. At least now there was someone in her life who knew what she was really going through down there. She asked him how he managed to make it out of hell with all his body parts still attached, but his reply was “It’ll give me a thumb cramp.” After that, Helen figured he was either planning to tell her in person, or that he wanted to avoid a rehash altogether, so she let it go.
That evening Cassandra agreed to ordain Matt, Claire, Jason, and Ariadne in the arena with Castor, Pallas, Helen, and Lucas as witnesses. She recited a few things in ancient Greek while she burned some resinous logs in a bronze disk thingy that Jason told her was called a brazier. Then Castor took out a cage full of small birds that started tweeting away as soon as they were uncovered.
“Wait, what are those for?” Claire said in a voice that edged dangerously close to a screech.
“Just be glad the ceremony didn’t call for something big, like a horse or a cow,” Jason said as an aside to Claire. He wasn’t kidding.
Cassandra bowed gravely to her father and held out her hands like a platter. Castor took a tiny blade from his belt and laid it on Cassandra’s palms. As he did so, she started glowing bright green, purple, and blue with the icy hues of the incalculably old, tri-part aura of the Oracle. Possessed by the Three Fates, Cassandra turned to Matt and offered the blade to him first.
“Cut off the offering’s head and throw the carcass in the fire, mortal. You have been found worthy,” the three voices chimed with creepy harmonic beauty.
After a moment’s hesitation, Matt reached into the cage and grasped a struggling bird in one hand and took the little knife in the other. In the firelight, Helen could see that Matt’s face was a mask of disgust, and his hands were shaking terribly as he cut.
Thankfully, he didn’t falter, and the sacrifice was over quickly. Ariadne and Jason followed Matt efficiently, like they had done this sort of thing before, which Helen assumed they probably had. Claire was the only one who balked, and Jason had to steady her hands the whole way through it.
When all four had been initiated, the Fates left Cassandra in a rush, and the fire went out as if it had been doused with a bucket of water. Cassandra staggered for a moment, balanced herself on Lucas, and then finally managed to stand up straight.
As they all made their way back into the library, Claire started to cry a little, shaken by what she had done. Helen wanted to run up and comfort her, but Jason pulled Claire close and bent down to whisper something reassuring in her ear. For a moment, Claire hid her face against Jason’s chest and let him guide her as she walked along blindly.
At such a show of tenderness, Helen couldn’t help but look over toward Lucas, who was walking on the other side of the group. He was as far from her as he could get, and he never once glanced up at any of them. Helen looked away. She felt the weight settling on her chest again, but this time the crushing feeling that she was becoming so familiar with was coupled with something else. Frustration. She had to stop falling apart every time she looked at Lucas, and focus. Too much was at stake.
When they all got back into the library, Matt was still a little green around the edges. Helen started talking immediately to divert any well-meant but probably embarrassing questions about whether or not he needed to puke.
She told everyone about Orion, his fights in the Underworld, and his connection with her mother. There were a few questions about how he got into the Underworld, and more than one disbelieving outburst that anyone but her could survive down there. Helen explained that Orion had the Bough of Aeneas, and it allowed him to travel between the worlds.
“And he’s definitely not just a spirit,” Helen said with certainty. “He loaned me his jacket, and it was still on me when I woke up in the morning.”
“That break-in at the Met?” Castor said urgently to his brother as soon as Helen mentioned the Bough.
“Had to have been. All that was stolen was a piece of ancient metalwork. A golden leaf,” Pallas replied. “And it was stolen by an unknown woman who walked right in, smashed her hand through plate glass, and walked out. A woman who didn’t bother to wear a mask, didn’t use anything but her bare hands, and apparently didn’t shed one drop of blood.”
“Let me guess,” Helen said heavily. “My mother, right?”
“But why would Daphne steal the Bough, and then just hand it over to Orion?” Jason asked. “It’s such a powerful object.”
“Orion told me he’s descended from Aeneas, so he’s the only one that can get it to work,” Helen answered.
“Then he’s Heir to the House of Rome,” Castor said in a slightly awed voice.
“He’s actually the Head of that House. How’d you know?” Helen asked.
“You haven’t read the Aeneid yet, have you?” Castor said, without reproof. “Aeneas was Hector’s best general in the Trojan War, and one of the few survivors when Troy fell. He was also the founder of Rome, and the founder of the Scion House of Rome.”
“And he was the son of Aphrodite.” Ariadne grinned suggestively at Helen. “So is this Orion guy as hot as . . . Ouch!”
Jason had kicked his tactless twin under the table. When she looked over at him he shook his head at her to make sure she didn’t keep going. As it was, Helen felt like her face was trying to burst into flames, though she didn’t know exactly why. She hadn’t done anything to be ashamed of.
“You said ‘that’ House a moment ago, almost as if he were connected to more than one,” Lucas said without raising his eyes to meet Helen’s.
“He is,” Helen stammered, looking anywhere but at Lucas. “Orion is Head of the House of Rome, but he’s also Heir to the House of Athens.”
The room erupted into several conversations at once. Apparently, Orion was the first Scion ever to inherit two Houses, which made sense once Helen thought about it since the Furies worked so hard to keep the Houses separate. As Helen picked snippets of conversation out of the turmoil, it became clear that there was a prophecy concerning Orion, and it wasn’t a good one.
“Wait! Hold up,” Helen interrupted as she started to hear people talk about Orion in a way that she didn’t like. “Will somebody please explain this to me?”
“There’s not much to explain,” Cassandra said briskly. “There was a prophecy made before the Trojan War by Cassandra of Troy. She foresaw that there would be a Multiple Heir—we think that means a Scion who inherits more than one House. This Multiple Heir, or the ‘Vessel Where Royal Scion Blood Has Mixed’ to be exact, is one of a trinity of Scions that we think are supposed to replace the three major gods—Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades. The Three Scions are to rule the sky, the oceans, and the land of the dead, if they manage to overthrow the gods and take their places, that is. The existence of the Multiple Heir is a sign that the End Times are coming to a close. The final battle is about to begin.”
“He’s known as the Tyrant,” Lucas said quietly, and all eyes turned to him in the otherwise motionless room. “He’s described as being ‘born to bitterness’ and he’s supposed to be capable of ‘reducing all mortal cities to rubble.’”
“Like a Scion Antichrist?” Claire whispered to Jason, but in such a hushed room, everyone heard her desperate question.
“No, dear, it’s not exactly the same,” Pallas said soothingly as he reached out to Claire and briefly squeezed her hand. “In our understanding, this is when we Scions get the chance to fight for our immortality. It’s not intended to be the end of the world. That said, if the Final Battle goes badly, most mortals won’t survive it. The coming of the Tyrant is one of the signs that it’s all beginning.”
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