by Aimee Carter
I turned to Ava for support, but she stared intently at the ground, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth. “You, too?” I said, and I slipped my arm from hers. “So what, you both think you’re going to waltz in there and save the day, but if I come with you—”
“If you come, you’ll die no matter what happens to us,” said James. “You know that.”
“I made a deal with Cronus—”
“Do you really think he’ll uphold his end of it?” said Ava.
“James is right. Calliope wants you dead, and as long as she can focus on that, she’ll be distracted. Once you’re gone, she’ll get on with her plan, and then there’s no telling what could happen.”
“You have no experience,” said James. “No abilities you can control. If you go in there, the best thing that could happen is Calliope killing you quickly.”
“I didn’t come all this way to sit tight while you get yourselves slaughtered,” I said, clenching my f ists.
“Then what did you come all this way for?” said Persephone. “For all intents and purposes, you’re useless, and you’re smart enough to know that, so why did you come? The only thing you’ll be good for in there is dying—” She stopped, and her eyes widened a fraction of an inch.
“You’re going to offer Calliope a trade, aren’t you?” James gave me an accusing look, and Ava’s mouth dropped open in disbelief. My cheeks burned, but I refused to look away. “No,” I said with as much conviction as I could muster, but Persephone shook her head anyway.
“You’re an idiot. An absolute idiot. I don’t care what kind of deals you made with Cronus or how badly Calliope wants you dead. All bets are off the moment you go in there.”
“If you’re dead, Henry will fade, too,” said Ava. “You’re the only reason he’s still alive, and he won’t be able to live with the guilt of you dying for him.”
“You have to understand—if Henry fades, we won’t stand a chance against Cronus,” added James. “Even if I did take his place, I’m not one of the six. I don’t have the power to keep Cronus contained while he’s awake, not like Henry does. We can’t risk that.”
My eyes prickled with hot tears. I blinked to keep them from spilling over, but it was useless. I wiped my cheeks and glared at the three of them, anger and frustration boiling inside of me. “So that’s it? I stay out here and wait? What happens if you all die? What am I supposed to do then?”
“That won’t happen,” said Persephone with a sniff.
“There’s only one way to deal with Calliope, and that’s to give her what she wants. Since we can’t hand you over, we’ll have to offer her the next best thing.”
“And what’s that?” I said bitterly. “Convince Henry to love her and make her his queen instead of me?” Persephone huffed. “Hardly. I’m going to open the gate.” And before any of us had the chance to stop her, she winked and disappeared through the wall.
CH A P T ER ELE V EN
INGR ID
Ava fell to her knees beside the bushes, groping along the wall for the crack that had engulfed Persephone. The forest around us melted away, replaced by a meadow full of f lowers, but I was too panicked to investigate.
“She didn’t mean that, did she?” I said as James let out a string of curses I’d never thought I’d hear come out of his mouth.
“She’s crazy,” said Ava. “Sometimes she makes Calliope look sane. We were all glad to be rid of her when she decided to take Adonis and run.”
James hovered over Ava and ran his hands over the spot where Persephone had disappeared. “No, you were glad to be rid of her. Henry practically tried to hang himself.
Here.” His hand slipped through the rock, and Ava fell back on her heels with a sigh of relief.
“Please,” I begged. “Let me come with you. I’ll hide while you do the talking, but I can’t wait out here knowing that every single person that matters to me could be dying in there.”
“And I can’t let you walk through that wall knowing that you’ll never walk out,” said James. “I’m sorry. I know how much it means to you, and we’ll do everything in our power to set them free. But we can’t risk your life, not when it means Henry’s, as well. Please don’t make this any more diff icult for us than it already is.”
I gaped at him; he might as well have slapped me in the face. It had been my idea to come in the f irst place. The three of them wouldn’t even be there if I hadn’t insisted on going. I was the one who’d managed to get Cronus off our backs, yet I was the problem?
“I’m sorry for being so damn diff icult,” I spat. “I’m sorry for not being powerful enough to be anything but a burden, but how would you feel if you’d come all this way to be told you were useless and couldn’t help?”
“Like shit,” he said without batting an eye. “But if our positions were switched, I would understand that it was the right thing to do no matter how hard it was for me to accept.”
Tears stung my eyes, and I blinked rapidly. This wasn’t fair. I had every right to do what I could to help. I didn’t want to die, but living in a world where the council had been wiped out and Cronus ruled—
“We can do it,” said Ava. Her eyes were red. “James and Persephone and I. We can do it as long as we don’t have to worry about you, too. Please, Kate. Henry loves you. Give him something to come home to.”
Every last bit of willpower I had crumbled, and I wiped my cheeks with my dirty sleeves. “Promise me you’ll come back out.”
Neither one of them spoke. James leaned in to me, and for the f irst time in days, I didn’t move away. He pressed his lips to my cheek, and he didn’t have to say it for me to know what it was.
Goodbye.
I watched them disappear into the wall, Ava f irst and James second to make sure I didn’t follow, and once they were gone, I collapsed onto the moss beneath me. A sob escaped from my throat as the weight of helplessness and grief crushed me, leaving me with nothing.
Persephone would open the gate, and the moment it was done, Cronus would kill them all. And there was nothing I could do to stop it.
I didn’t know how long I sat there with my face buried in my hands as sob after sob ripped out of me. My chest ached, and my entire body trembled, but as badly as I wanted to follow them, I couldn’t. No matter what happened, Calliope would still win. She would kill me the instant I walked through the wall, or Persephone would release Cronus, and then Calliope would kill me.
My panic was slowly replaced with an overwhelming need to see what was happening. Desperate, I struggled to focus and push my mind into the cavern beyond the crack, but all I saw was the black rock in front of me.
I tried over and over, again and again, until my sobs turned into growls of frustration. Nothing changed. Why could I do it so easily without meaning to, but when the lives of my family hung in the balance, I couldn’t see so much as Henry’s face?
“Hello?”
I jumped. Half expecting Calliope to have somehow snuck up behind me, I scrambled to my feet, ready to bolt or break her nose, whichever was easier. Instead I came face-to-face with a freckled redhead clutching a bunny.
“Who’re you?” I said, and when she took a step toward me, I moved back.
“Ingrid,” she said. “Who are you?”
I forced myself to relax. The f ield had to come from someone. Most of the others in the Underworld had either avoided us or hadn’t seen us in the f irst place, and when we’d spoken to them, it had been brief, and Ava usually handled it. This was another one of those then, but this time it was only me.
“I’m Kate,” I said. “I’m sorry for intruding. I’m waiting for—”
“For James and Ava,” she said without a hint of surprise.
“I know. I saw you.”
I blinked. “How do you know their names?” Had she been close enough to overhear? I couldn’t remember if I’d used them while we’d argued.
“Because Henry introduced them to me.” She scratched her bunny between the ears and plac
ed it down gently. It hopped off to join a cluster of other animals that seemed to be waiting for Ingrid to come back to them.
“Henry?” I tugged nervously on my sleeves. “How—how do you know Henry?”
“The same way you do,” she said cheerfully. “You’re his wife, right? Kate? You’re the one Calliope was talking about.”
My heart skipped a beat. “Calliope was here? When?”
“Ages ago.” Ingrid shrugged. “Then she went off and left even though she wasn’t supposed to. Henry said.” Henry again. How could she know Henry? Had he passed judgment on her? But that didn’t explain how she knew Calliope or what she was doing here.
Except—
My eyes widened. “You’re one of the girls Calliope killed, aren’t you?”
She beamed, which was exactly the response I hadn’t expected. “You’ve heard of me? That’s amazing. You’re kind of my idol, you know.”
Calliope had killed eleven girls before I’d come to Eden, but the Underworld was so vast that I never thought I’d run into one of them. “I—I am?” I stammered. “Why?” She gave me a look that made it clear I should have known. “Because you won, and you punished her for what she did to me. To us, I mean.” She sighed. “It’s terrible, isn’t it? That she got away with it so many times. I spent forever thinking I was the stupid one for falling for her act.”
“You weren’t stupid,” I said. “You just— She’s a goddess.” She grinned. “So are you now. Tell me all about it. How is it? What can you do? Can you walk on water? Can you f ly? I’ve always wanted to f ly, you know. It’d be incredible, wouldn’t it? And to live forever—I mean, the Underworld is nice and all, but it isn’t the surface.” What did it matter if I was immortal when a Titan wanted to kill me? “So far being a goddess has been anything but incredible.”
“What do you mean?” she said. I hesitated, but Ingrid was dead anyway, and it wasn’t as if she could leave. Besides, she’d probably heard the rocks falling, too. For all I knew, the entire Underworld had. She deserved an explanation.
So I told her. I kept it short and withheld a few details, but by the time I was done, all the blood had drained from her face, and she scooped up another rabbit to cuddle for comfort.
“They went in there and left you here?” she said, and I nodded. “That’s awful. They could already be dead. It’s been ages.”
“Yeah,” I mumbled. I didn’t need the reminder.
“You should go anyway,” she said, perking up at the idea.
“You bested her once, so it’s not like you can’t do it again.
If anyone can, it’s you.”
I bit my lip. “She killed me, too,” I said. “The only reason I’m alive is because my mother traded places with me.”
“So?” Ingrid took a step closer to me, and this time I didn’t move away. “That was when you were mortal. You’re not anymore. You’re a goddess, too, and so what if you can’t control your visions? You won’t need them if you go in there.”
“But if I let her kill me, then there’s no telling what Henry will do,” I said. “If Persephone tells Calliope how to release Cronus, then they’ll need Henry to have a prayer of winning.”
Ingrid sighed. “You don’t get it, do you? You’re one of them now. So what if Calliope’s more powerful? She’s not that special, you know, and she can’t kill you now. Gods can’t kill other gods.”
“But Titans can.”
“You said you made a deal with Cronus. It sounds to me like he’s a lot less likely to kill you than he is the others.
You tried to be nice to him, and you weren’t the one to lock him up.”
I hesitated. She had a point, especially if Calliope continued to order Cronus around. He hadn’t seemed willing to put up with it much longer. More than anything I wanted to say to hell with it and go in after them, but that didn’t solve the problem with Henry. “If something happens to me—”
“It won’t,” she said f irmly. “You bested the Queen of the Gods, and now you’re Queen of the Underworld.”
“I’m not.” I scowled at an unoffending f lower. “Cronus interrupted the ceremony.”
“So? You’re still queen. You don’t need a stupid ceremony to prove it.”
As I stared at the blossoms at my feet, I realized with a start that they were the same ones that Henry had been sending. This was where he’d gotten them—it really had been him after all. He’d wanted me to come here. He wanted my help.
“I can’t risk it like that,” I said, although my resolve was waning. “I can’t risk Henry’s life.”
Ingrid gave me an exasperated look. “Listen to what’s happening. It’s been ages. James and Ava aren’t back yet, and while they might still be trying to sneak around Calliope, chances are they’ve been captured, too. If they don’t come out, what are you going to do? Wait for Calliope to throw their bones through the crack so you know what happened? Or are you going to be our queen and f ight for your realm?”
It wasn’t my realm though. It was Henry’s. “I don’t even deserve to be here,” I all but wailed. “Henry should have let me die. I don’t deserve to be a goddess or his wife or his queen or any of it. I never have. I’m only here because I was the last one left.”
Ingrid tilted her head like a confused puppy. “Of course you deserve to be here. Henry’s not stupid. He would never trust his entire realm to someone he didn’t think could handle it.”
Not if the only other choice was losing it completely, but I didn’t dare say that aloud.
She let out a frustrated huff and pranced around me, as if she were sizing me up. “Don’t you get it? You were chosen because you’re special. So was I.” She tossed her hair over her shoulder. “If it hadn’t been for Calliope, I’d be in your shoes, and you know what? I’d be scared, too. I’d be really, really scared. Being brave doesn’t mean never being afraid, you know. It means going for it anyway because you know it’s the right thing to do.”
“There’s nothing I can do,” I said miserably.
“How do you know until you try?” She stopped in front of me and nodded toward the wall. “You’re the one who has the deal with Cronus, not them. If something’s happened, you could be their only hope. Go help them. Prove to yourself that you deserve this. Show yourself why Henry believes in you.”
“What if I get killed?” I kicked a small stone, and it skit-tered a few feet until it hit the rock wall. “What if I get them all killed?”
“What if you’re the reason they survive?” I could see why Henry had chosen her as a potential queen. She was smart, the kind of smart I wasn’t sure I’d ever be no matter how many years I lived, and her optimism was infectious.
And what if she was right? What if James and Ava—and as much as I didn’t like her, Persephone—were in trouble, and they needed me? If I walked through that wall, there was a good chance my life would no longer be in my control, but had it ever been?
I’d been coasting without any expectations or ambitions for so long that I’d forgotten what it was like to be in charge of my own life. I’d poured so much of myself into helping my mother f ight to stay alive that I’d managed to lose myself in the process. I’d done what she and Henry and everyone else had told me from the beginning. Even the choices I’d made—like choosing not to join Henry in Eden when he’d asked me—had ended in a disaster that forced me in a direction I hadn’t wanted to go. I didn’t mind, not really. I loved Henry, and the council was becoming the family I’d never known. And as long as I survived Calliope’s wrath, immortality was a nice perk, at least until everyone else had died and Henry and I were the only ones left. But I was trying not to think that far ahead.
Still, I’d done it all because I had to. Because someone had made me or manipulated me into it. My mother had spent my whole life grooming me to be the kind of person who could pass the council’s tests; the two friends I’d made in Eden had only approached me because they needed to guide me toward Henry. The council had ruled over my entire l
ife in one way or another. Their expectations made me a burden to Henry. My marriage was because of them.
Even my birth had been their decision.
James was right: nothing in my life had ever really been my choice. But this was, and I was going to do the right thing.
“All right,” I said. “I’ll go. If Calliope kills me, I’m blaming you.”
Ingrid beamed. “That means you have to give me credit when you save their lives.”
“How can you be so damn sure I’ll make it out of there when you don’t even know me?”
She set the bunny down and promptly embraced me. I didn’t have time to move away, but I didn’t think I would have anyway. Her skinny arms were warm around me, and I needed a hug. “Henry believes in you. That’s enough for me.”
“Thanks,” I said awkwardly. “I’ll try.” Once she released me, I ran my hand over the stone, trying to f ind the crack. Just as my f ingertips sank into the rock, Ingrid said in a small voice, “Kate?”
“Yeah?” I said, slowly sliding my whole hand inside. It worked. It really worked. My heart pounded, and my f ingers curled around the cold stone as the meadow around me started to spin. All I had to do was step through, and then—
And then I would either come back or I wouldn’t, but at least I wouldn’t have to live knowing I hadn’t tried.
“Could you come see me sometime?” she said. “When you’re not busy, I mean. Calliope was the only company I had, besides Henry, and he doesn’t come by that often, either.”
Even if she hadn’t asked, I would’ve come. “Of course.
Didn’t you have family?”
She shook her head, and for a split second, her face crumpled. “Henry was my family. I knew him for a long time before…” She cleared her throat and straightened, and this time her smile was forced. “Anyway. Now you have to live, else I’ll die of boredom down here, and you wouldn’t want that on your conscience, would you?”
I laughed weakly. “Thank you for everything. I’ll see you soon.”
And without a second thought, without giving that voice in the back of my mind the chance to talk me out of it or say James and Ava knew what was better for me than I did, I stepped through the wall, and my world went black.