by Diana Tyler
Chloe shook her head then looked quickly around for Damian. She knew Apollo was as black-hearted as he was good-looking, not to mention clever. A few more minutes and he’d have her figured out.
“Are you looking for your flying friend?”
“His name is Damian.”
Apollo smiled and gripped her wrist tighter. “Damian, the one who subdues.” As he laughed, his eyes filled with flecks of sickly yellow. “What irony, for today he is the one who will be subdued, as shall you.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
REBELS
Chloe’s hot blood went cold as the whinnying of horses drowned out the music. She turned and saw two white steeds flying toward her, pulling behind them a silver chariot with golden wheels that sliced through the air. The horses slowed to a trot when they saw their master, then abruptly halted in front of him when he raised his palm. They tossed their heads, their snow-white manes waving like silken flags, each movement casting ineffable sweetness into the air.
Apollo leapt into the chariot and took up the reins. “Come,” he said, holding out his hand to Chloe.
“I don’t like horses,” she said, backing away. If she could just back up a little bit more and get herself some space, she could go back in time and start again, or demand that Carya suggest a plan B.
Apollo cracked his whip and the horses lurched toward her. “You’re newly created, little green shoot. How would you know whether you like horses or not?” Before she could answer, he reached down and took hold of her arm, swinging her into the carriage beside him. “Hold on tight.” With a shout, he wheeled the chariot around and snapped the reins.
Chloe felt her stomach rise into her chest as they swooped down over the meadow, the horses’ hooves nearly trampling the flowers as they galloped east, toward an ocean of rolling emerald hills.
As the chariot reached the hills and started climbing, Chloe thought of Acacius, the old custodian from the Religious Council building, who’d been sacrificed under the guise of ritual glorification, or “coronation,” as the council called it. She, along with her entire grade-3 class, had watched what she now knew was a computer-generated simulation play out on the domed ceiling of the sanctuary.
Chloe could see the scene, vivid and sharp in her mind’s eye: green hills dotted with crocuses and yellow daffodils, long-maned horses of every hue kicking up their heels as Acacius, a young man again, came near them. It had all been a sham, a contrivance intended to brainwash the youth into believing that the appointed end of their life in this world was really the beginning of their own sovereign reign in another.
But the hoax did have its roots in something real. From this vantage point, Chloe could see the origins of those deceitful vignettes; origins that made the Fantásmata’s imitation look like a child’s stick-figure drawing. There were horses, yes, but she could also see giraffes and elephants and zebras and bears, even lions walking peacefully beside deer and grazing sheep. It reminded her of Orpheus back in the open field with Eurydice, how every creature had been tamed by his music, completely spellbound.
“Won’t you tell me now who you really are?” Apollo shouted over the wind. “Besides your name, I mean.”
Chloe held her hair away from her mouth to stop it blowing in. “Why don’t you ask Duna? He’s the one who knows all things, isn’t he?”
Apollo’s cheeks reddened as he cracked his whip. “I look forward to finding out whether you’re mortal or not.” He reached into the side of the chariot and produced a gold, forward-curving dagger. He turned it left and right, admiring its sheen as it caught the light.
Why were there knives here in heaven? Chloe didn’t realize she’d spoken aloud until Apollo grinned and slipped the dagger into the sheath on his hip.
“Ah, so you are mortal, then. You must have seen weapons before in the world you come from. Is that right, green shoot?” He turned to her, his eyes like ice as they stared right through her, melting her feigned innocent mask with every second they lingered.
Chloe looked away.
“No more lies if you want to live. Understood?” When she didn’t answer, he rushed toward her and forced her to the chariot’s edge. At the same time, he urged the horses to go faster, climb higher.
She gripped the side of the chariot. “Stop it! What are you doing?” She tried to push against him, but it was no use. The more she struggled, the stronger he became, until she was leaning backward over the side of the carriage, arms dragging in the wind. The slightest swerve from the horses and she would fall to her death.
“The All-Powerful created you for Petros. That’s where you’re from, isn’t it?”
“Yes! Yes!” Chloe shouted.
He yanked her up and made her hands grip the crossbar for balance. She gasped, trying to get a hold of herself. She’d never had a fear of heights before, but she had never before dangled from a chariot thousands of feet in the air.
“Why are you here? How did you get here?” He seemed calmer now, but Chloe knew better than to mistake his calmness for sanity. It only meant his wheels were turning.
“Why would I tell you anything when you’re just going to kill me anyway?”
Apollo grinned, then drummed his fingers along the protruding hilt of his dagger. “I said I would kill you to find out what you are. Now that I know you’re mortal, what need do I have to harm you?”
You tell me, psycho, Chloe wanted to say.
She stood quietly, though her mind was racing, wondering where Damian was and whether he’d been captured, too. Didn’t Carya know this would happen? Didn’t the All-Powerful know they were no match for Cronus, Zeus, Apollo, and all the other power-crazed lunatics who were destined to defect? Why didn’t Duna thwart their conspiracy himself? Surely he didn’t need two teenagers to do it for him.
“Why don’t I ask you some questions now,” Chloe said, trying to distract herself from her own thoughts. “Do you know that you can never defeat Duna? That no matter what you do, he will always win?” She balled her hands into fists and raised her voice above the wind. “That good always conquers evil like you?”
Apollo dropped the reins and grabbed her by the throat with one hand, lifting her up and out of the carriage as black discs eclipsed his irises. “The All-Powerful is only called such because no one has ever dared defy him.”
Feeling her breaths get shorter and shorter, Chloe pulled at his hands and kicked at his shins, desperate to break free. He squeezed tighter.
“I don’t know how or why you’re here, but I promise that after I let you watch us dethrone the All-Powerful I will cut out that brazen tongue of yours.” Then he dropped her.
She curled up at his feet, holding her throat as she sucked in giant gulps of air. “I guess I’ll live to be an old woman, then,” she rasped, “because he’s staying on his throne.”
“Yah!”
Chloe slammed into the back of the carriage as the horses accelerated. She stayed there, praying. After what seemed like hours cramped at Apollo’s feet, the wind died and the chariot came to a smooth stop. The horses snorted as Apollo grabbed her by the heels and pulled her out.
“Let go,” she muttered, as nausea surged in her stomach. She tried to stand up to warn him, but it was too late. Her mouth was full of saliva and the vomit was on its way.
Apollo gagged and immediately released her. He jumped back, spooking the horses.
“I tried to tell you,” she said.
“Disgusting,” he said, although neither his tunic nor his perfect skin had been soiled.
With a flick of his hand, he removed the horses’ harnesses and they trotted off through the dense forest. Chloe could hear the sound of rushing water through the enormous trees that rose like towers all around her.
“Come.” He didn’t touch her again, but simply drew his knife and beckoned her with it. “It’s time you met my friends. They will be so honored to meet Duna’s newest creation.” He gave a wicked laugh, then tramped ahead down the well-worn path.
Looking around the gloomy woods, Chloe half wondered if he hadn’t taken her to Hades. There was no music here, no vibrant emerald tones that had defined the gates and streets and endless expanse of flowers. The air was muggy and thick, as if there’d just been a storm or one was on the way. And the light was gone, choked out by the dark canopy of interconnected foliage of the treetops.
But Hades didn’t exist yet, she reminded herself. According to history, Hades would be made after the rebel spirits polluted the minds of the mortals on Petros. This was a hell they had made for themselves.
There was a time when Damian had cursed what he often thought of as his sixth sense. His psychic connection to his sister had been a scourge for much of his childhood, at least in the childhood he could remember from the old timeline. In his old life, he had tried to ignore it, hoping he’d outgrow it or be able to silence it completely the more he distanced himself from Chloe.
The last time he’d seen the premonitions, they had been too troubling and overwhelming to avoid. They’d led him to Chloe, who was standing with Orpheus at Lake Thyra, inches away from entering a portal to the Underworld. After that he’d been too afraid, too cowardly, to follow her. But he wouldn’t let fear stop him now, no matter what lay ahead.
He saw two white horses standing in a river and drinking as he sailed overhead. He knew Chloe was close. Not only could he sense her, but his mind received visual flashes of the trail she was walking on, of the back of a blond man’s head, and of a dusky hall deep in the heart of a mountain.
“I’m coming, Chloe,” he whispered. He gazed down at the army of trees beneath him that shielded the forest floor. He squinted hard, trying to use his enhanced vision to see beyond the web of leaves and limbs, and he succeeded, but all he saw were tiny black bugs traversing the branches and spotted lizards racing around the trunks.
A little farther south, he saw a mountain, one unlike any of the others he’d encountered so far. The other mountains had been bathed in light, and pointed powerfully into the sky, looking almost like praying hands. This one was strangely unimpressive and lusterless. It was round, and was covered by a ragged fog that wrapped around it like a shroud. When he saw skeins of smoke rising around it, he knew the hall of his visions was inside.
He shot out his arms, propelling himself toward it, faster and faster until his cheeks flapped and filled with air.
“Where are you off to in such a hurry?”
Damian peeked over his shoulder to see Hermes flying beside him, his winged sandals a golden blur as they fluttered to keep up. Damian remembered now that Hermes had been able to see Athena heading to his house; he wasn’t invisible to everyone.
Damian tucked his knees toward his chest, gently decelerating. “Aren’t you supposed to be tending sheep right now?”
“I was headed to my flocks when I caught sight of an unusually lanky and graceless bird careening through the clouds beside me.” Hermes was flying on his back now, his freckled face facing the sky and his fingers interlaced casually behind his head. “The bird was too busy scouring the underbrush for grubs and worms to notice me.”
“So you were always that saucy,” Damian muttered.
Hermes knitted his rust-orange eyebrows and cocked his head sideways. “What did you say?” He tugged on Damian’s ankle. “Speak up.”
Damian kicked Hermes off and started his descent toward the mountain’s base. “You don’t know me, Hermes, but I know you.”
Hermes rammed into Damian’s back, hastening his landing. Damian hit the ground hard but immediately rolled onto his feet. “I’m your friend, Hermes. I’m here to try and convince you of that.”
Hermes laughed, but Damian could see he was more disturbed than amused. “How do you expect me to be convinced that some oafish, yellow-haired bird whom I’ve never seen before is my friend? I’m sorry to tell you this, but I’m quite convinced the opposite is true.” He took a step forward and unsheathed his wand, his dark eyes devoid of the mirth they’d possessed just moments ago. He waved the staff in circles.
Damian thrust out his palm, holding the weapon in place. Hermes latched onto it with his other hand and swung his arms left and right, using all his strength to try and twist the staff free. It wasn’t working, and Damian wasn’t even sweating, but Hermes’ face was as red as a fire truck.
“Convinced yet?” Damian said. Hermes looked close to passing out. “I can do this all day.”
“Not remotely.” Hermes slid off one of his sandals and sent it spinning toward Damian.
Before Damian could react, the sandal struck his hand with surprising force, breaking his hold on Hermes.
“Who are you?” Hermes demanded, pointing the wand at Damian’s head. “Is it you, Nereus, taking the form of an impudent adolescent to try and ruffle my feathers? Duna help you if it—”
“So you can dish out tricks but you obviously can’t take them.” Damian laughed. “But I’m not Nereus, though I hear he’s a pretty nice guy.”
Hermes sniffed the air, and then sneered. “You don’t smell like Nereus. You smell like dirt.”
“Well, that’s because I was made from it.”
Hermes drew up, his expression going suddenly sober. He lowered the wand. “You’re…you’re human, then?” Damian nodded. “What are you doing here?”
“I told you. I’m here to convince you that I’m your friend.” He moved closer to Hermes and glanced around the trees before whispering, “You have to listen to me. The world I come from will be destroyed if you don’t.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
CRONUS
Being in the spirits’ mountain felt all too terrifyingly familiar. The cavern was just a bigger version of the cell Chloe had been thrown into in Hades, where she had been presided over by the delightful Deimos and Phobos, the embodiments of dread and fear. She couldn’t help but feel both of those emotions now as she looked out from the stone pillar she’d been chained to and watched the rebels trickle in through the keyhole-shaped entrance.
Her teeth began to chatter, from both cold and panic, as they drew nearer. She’d already tried half a dozen times to time travel out of the cavern, but Apollo’s proximity to her made it impossible. She needed space for her powers to work, and she wasn’t going to get it any time soon. All she could do was pray. Maybe, just maybe, Damian could get close enough to take her doma with the dýnami and at least save himself.
“Welcome, Father Cronus.” Apollo’s voice rang out like a gong and echoed in circles throughout the cavern.
The light of the entrance was swallowed by a dark image as Cronus floated through it. A golden eagle shrieked as it soared over the spirits and perched on a tripod with feet like lions’ paws. Its beady eyes stared at Chloe. It shrieked again and opened its wings.
“Do you hear that?” Apollo touched Chloe’s shoulder and pointed at the eagle. “The Aetos Dios insists that it be the one to rip out your tongue.”
Chloe ignored Apollo and turned her face to the wall. “I hope it chokes on it.”
Apollo laughed, then bowed as Cronus, his purple robes sweeping the floor behind him, took his place beside Chloe at the fore of the room. Cronus loomed over her. His large hand, festooned with rings, hung even with her shoulder. One swing from it and she knew she’d be knocked out cold.
“You’re not really their father,” Chloe said, drawing on a hazy memory from school. “You want to be, but you aren’t. The All-Powerful is the only one able to create life from nothing.”
Cronus raised his hand as if to strike her, then knelt down and touched a strand of her tangled hair. “A human,” he whispered, the Próta word coarse and clunky as it spilled like turpentine from his lips. His fingers trailed down her arm and brushed the back of her hand. “You don’t feel like clay. And you certainly don’t smell as though you’re endued with the breath of divinity.”
The spirits nearest to them snickered. Even the eagle seemed to cackle.
Cronus drew closer, his cold breath making her shiver. “A fath
er is not he who gives life, but he who nurtures it.” He rose abruptly and swept his hand out toward his audience; every rebel eye was transfixed by the intensity of his presence. “And who here would not agree that I have nurtured you, while the All-Powerful has stunted you?”
The crowd let out an exhilarated shout and shook their shining weapons in the air, spears and swords, javelins and shields, all fresh from the forge. All ready for war. Chloe knew they had no idea that in a few thousand years, all but three of them would be chained in the heart of the new planet they hated. Their entire existence would consist of war and spite and jealousy, and this father they so revered would be vanquished and succeeded by Zeus, yet another ruthless tyrant. To think it had all started here, in this isolated corner of paradise, the very keystone of the hell they were destined for.
When the hall was finally quiet enough, Chloe took a deep breath. She wouldn’t let them kill her without warning them first.
“I’m from the future,” she said, her voice sounding like a frightened child’s as it drifted hesitantly from her throat. “A future that is thousands of years from now.” She swallowed, and licked her lips to moisten them. She could feel the eagle’s eyes boring into her, daring her to look at it. “I know what will happen to you if you revolt against Duna.”
Keeping their reactions hidden, the spirits lifted their eyes to Cronus. His face, too, was inscrutable as silence followed the hollow echoes of her voice.
Then a dark chuckle rumbled from the Titan’s chest. Chloe spotted Apollo leaning, arms folded, against a golden image of Cronus. Even now, she could sense the seditious thoughts churning behind his eyes. How long had Apollo been planning his own rise to power? Had Cronus always been nothing more than a pawn to Apollo, a juggernaut around which the others would rally until he was strong enough to usurp him?