From across the clearing a group of them returned, spears in hand but no prize game with them.
“How’s this?” Aidan reemerged holding out the door he had fashioned out of wood.
“Works for me.” Savannah said, “you want to do the honors?”
“Sure, I’ll brave the cannibals.” He tucked the door under his arm and started sauntering out into the clearing, immediately drawing attention to himself.
“Easy for him to be brave,” I muttered loud enough for Savannah to hear me: “he shoots lightning bolts out of his hand; I make daisies grow.”
“But you can do some crazy damage with a rock.” She pointed out jokingly, not realizing that it made me uncomfortable. I could still see the judgment on Aidan’s face. I suddenly felt like I needed to repent for my action, but that was an innate reaction. Who would I repent to now? Aidan? That would make him more smug than usual.
“Are you two coming?” He shouted over his shoulder making Savannah turn and help me to my feet, bracing my weight and guiding me alongside her toward Aidan.
“He better have a bolt ready in case though...” She whispered to me as we passed three ravenous looking men.
“Excuse us, we won’t be long. We need a minute with your hut and we’ll be on our way.” Aidan was majestically holding his hand up like he was commanding a mass of people. The group of indigenous people all stared at him, no clue what he was saying to them. He propped the door up against the tent, trying to secure it enough to make it look like a doorway before turning to look at us.
“Val, you go first.”
“Savannah’s the mortal.” I argued.
“Yes, but you’re injured, I know at the least she can throw a punch.” Savannah stopped in front of the door and let go of me, forcing my weight onto my bad ankle.
“We’ll be right behind you.”
“Promise?”
“As your King and Queen, we promise.” She said solemnly. I nodded, turning to the door and grabbing Aidan’s shady rock handle and pulled the door open, thinking hard about Stonehenge and all the photos I had ever seen of it before crossing through.
Chapter 25
I stepped through the threshold, entering someone’s home. Glancing around at the rudimentary furniture and other makeshift items I knew I hadn’t managed to go anywhere.
“Did it work?” I heard Aidan ask on the other side. Sighing in frustration I grabbed the door to go back out, “no it didn’t.” I went through to my friends except I stepped right through and half stumbled out into the middle of the ancient rock formation, startling a few tourists.
“Whoa.” I said, gathering my bearings as we both stared at each other. I could see they were trying to figure out where I had come from considering I’d most likely had magically appeared into thin air.
“If you see a guy in a red jacket, I wasn’t here.” I lied fluidly I impressed myself while pretending like I was some dumb college kid on a school field trip. I skirted around them and glanced over the masses looking for the other Gods. I wanted Aidan’s plan to have worked, to arrive here to a group of people waiting breathlessly for me, but all I found was tourists.
“Valentina?” Savannah came stumbling through the portal next, followed only milliseconds after by Aidan.
“Hah, it worked.” He said with a grin, pleased that his terrible door had done the job.
“Where’s everyone else?” Savannah seemed to be having the same epiphany as me. If this was it, if we were all that was left of the Gods, we had utterly failed and we had barely even been in power yet.
“Let’s look around before we get disappointed.” Aidan set his hand on Savannah’s lower back and guided her away from the curious tourists while I went in the other direction. I figured I would be hobbling on my ankle but after another steady step I looked down to find it was feeling perfectly fine.
That couldn’t be a coincidence, there had to be other magical beings here. I had to be feeding off their energy to heal or being this close to the mortals was helping.
I moved quicker, with more determination as I searched every face that went by. I wasn’t as worried about the other Gods not being there, as I was about Griffin not being there. What if what had happened on the mountains had led Oliver to go back to Olympus and take his anger at Zeus out on Hades? What if while searching for the key he had been captured?
Face after faceless face passed. I didn’t know these people. They didn’t know me. I was as alone in this crowd as I had been at that first party Jed had taken me to. I felt almost as alone here as I had in the pits of the Underworld. People might’ve surrounded me but they didn’t notice me, they didn’t even give me a second thought. To them, I was one of those dumb college kids on a school trip.
“Val! Over here. They’re over here.” Savannah parted through the crowds, oblivious to the looks people around her gave her. Women envied her and men wanted her, but she didn’t see. Savannah’s self-doubt had always fascinated me. Every time we got ready together she spent most of the time cutting herself down to size, but she couldn’t see what everyone else saw. Charlotte had thought her a threat because of her beauty, not because she was Hera.
I slipped between two different families and made my way over to Savannah, “was Griffin there?”
Her face dropped slightly before she shrugged, “I don’t know, I didn’t notice.” She took my hand and led me away to where the rest of the Gods were standing. Some were faring better than others, the tolls of disbelief weighing harder on some than others. Aidan, for one, was still shirtless and allowing everyone to see his ribs weren’t healing by consequence. But of course, Zeus’ reliance on belief would be more cataclysmic than the rest of us.
Everett moved forward and offered to heal him, his hands glowing green as he pressed them to Aidan’s ribs and sewed him back together. When he was done, Royce came forward and offered Aidan his button up, leaving him in a white t-shirt. As Aidan finished up, he looked around and found everyone was staring at him expectantly. They thought this was his plan, they assumed that he was going to lead them back to Olympus and set everything right.
I took a deep breath as I felt Savannah pull me forward toward Aidan. We stopped beside him and he suddenly directed everyone’s attention to me.
“Alright, Valentina’s got a plan.”
“Thanks for the introduction.” I said drily making Aidan laugh softly.
“Yes! Valentina!” Someone cheered and clapped, every eye of our kind turning to look at Jed, who was smirking and obviously somewhat drunk. He would, of course, find a club amongst all this chaos.
“Thanks, Jed...” I cleared my throat and tugged on the edge of my jacket’s sleeve, gathering my courage. “Alright, the problem is that we can’t go back to Olympus without the key. to bring the key to us we should trick the Titans into coming to us, bringing it with them. We’re going to descend into the Underworld and trap the Titans there.” All at once everyone started talking disapproving of the plan immensely.
“Wait, wait. WAIT.” I held out my hands and they quieted for a moment, “as the Princess of the Underworld I have the ability to let you in and let you go when it’s time to go back to Olympus. I think, if we can all go down there it will trick the Titans into thinking we’re up to something. Then we might be able to get them to come down into the Underworld where I can trap them. We might even be able to lock them in Tartarus again and fix the balance.”
“And what if they don’t come?” Someone asked loudly. “Why wouldn’t they? They sent you all down to Earth with the intention of seeing you all killed slowly either by disbelief or by the various monsters that will come for us. Even now, we’re in danger.” I cast my eyes to the sky for a moment before looking away, “I know the Underworld isn’t exactly ideal but it will be a haven for those of you who want to help with the plan.”
“And I support this plan.” Aidan said clearly, nodding at everyone in a way that left no room for discussion.
“How do we get into the
Underworld then?” Someone asked loudly. I bit my lip; this was the part I was hoping for Griffin. Hades must surely have a better idea than me, knowing more of the lesser known entrances to the Underworld.
It was a lame answer, but it was the only one I had, “I’m still working on that part.”
“Great, while we’re waiting for her next genius idea we all might be killed.”
“We’re not going to be killed.” Aidan said firmly, turning to address me individually. “Do you think that map of yours might be able to show us an entrance?”
I thought about it for a second before nodding, “I don’t see why not. Maybe if I asked to see someone I know is in the Underworld, it would show me how to get to them?”
“It’s worth a shot. We need to move everyone to-“ A massive rumble echoed through the sky, reminiscent of Aidan’s thunder but even he turned to look up at the sky in wonder.
“What’s that?” Someone shouted and Aidan held up a hand, although this didn’t help to keep everyone calm. Another rumble shook the ground and a massive cloud of smoke filled the sky in the distance.
“What the hell!” We all stared in horror as a bleak, dark cloud rose into the sky as if it was enveloping the universe itself.
“It’s London, something has happened to London.” To make matters worse the black shape sunk low in the sky, covering up the sun’s rays and turning everything around us into darkness.
“What is going on?”
“It’s the Titans.” I said looking up at Aidan, “this is their judgment day. They’re going to punish the humans because Zeus favored them.”
“What about us? What’s going to happen?!” “Everyone, we need to calm down. We must get to the Underworld. Without our powers on Earth, there is little we can do right now.”
“But our powers still work!”
“Not for long, and they are not as strong as they would be in Olympus. Valentina start checking that map.”
I struggled to pull it out of my pockets, crouching down to flatten it out, “Erinyes, Erinyes, Erinyes.” I muttered repeatedly, concentrating on the old women, thinking long and hard about getting to them. Slowly a vision of them unfurled itself on the paper, standing as I had found them and watching something in their caldron. One of them smiled crookedly, her old rotten teeth glaring at me. I shuddered, feeling as if they could see me.
“How do I come back?” I whispered desperately to them, another rumble shaking the ground harder as the cloud got closer to us. I closed the image, staring at where the dot had formed. The Antarctic. That did not help. How was that supposed to help?
Groaning in frustration I looked up at Aidan and shook my head, disappointment drew itself on his features before he regained his composure and looked around at his council.
“Alright, we need to find an entrance to the Underworld. We’re in a place of power there must be an entrance somewhere here, even if it’s to Tartarus or Elysium, some entrance that will get us towards Hades’ kingdom. Everyone stay calm and spread out.”
On command, everyone did as they were told, moving through the throngs of tourists to start looking for anything that could be an entrance into our world. I checked each face as they turned to leave, frowning more and more as the crowd thinned and eventually disappeared. I turned to look at Savannah and sighed softly.
“Griffin’s not here.”
“Maybe something happened.”
“I hope not.” I didn’t want to assume the worse, especially when my “worse” was Griffin betraying all of us and lying to me instead of possibly being dead up in Olympus.
“C’mon. Let’s look.”
Savannah walked away, Aidan coming to meet her not long after as I continued to stand in the same spot feeling somewhat hopeless. I knew I couldn’t give up yet but what was I supposed to say when my plan failed?
I quickly looked down at the map and thought about Griffin, if he were alive he would show up. I smoothed the paper out with my hands and pictured him in my head.
When I opened my eyes again, the screen had opened but it was nothing more than an inky black circle. If Griffin were there, I couldn’t tell, I could only hope the black circle didn’t mean he was dead.
Another rumble shook the ground under my feet and I looked up to see the gray cloud was even closer now, closing in on us by the second. My heart was jumping in my chest as I looked around at the other Gods. If they were panicking it wasn’t showing, everyone was focused on finding the entrance to Hades that their impending doom didn’t even register.
They continued to search diligently and I watched the cloud roll in. The rumbling was harder now, shaking the ground like an earthquake was happening. I bent down and grabbed the map, tucking it away as the cloud closed in on us.
I heard someone scream as a loud crack echoed through the ancient rocks and someone else shouted. Chaos descended then. Tourists began running in all directions, throwing their bodies into each other as the weaker mortals ended up on the ground, sprawled out. I felt dizzy watching all the action, my ears ringing with echoes of their screams. The voices were crowding the space, enclosing tightly around me and I realized this was the end. This was what the Titans had wanted all along. They brought us together at our weakest point and now they were going to kill us in this smog.
“Valentina! Over here.” Aidan shouted, pulling me from my nightmare. He was waving frantically through the darkness, barely more than a shadow anymore. I ran to his side, looking down at the destruction the cloud had caused.
“What-“ I didn’t know whether to ask what happened or what that was. Where we had come through from the Amazon, there was a massive hole in the middle of where Stonehenge had once stood. It was all gone, every stone crumbled and fallen through the deep crack the cloud had created as it carried on its path of destruction.
Sensing my impending question Aidan cut me off, “I don’t know but do you think?”
I took a deep breath and nodded. It was worth a try, besides if that cloud was any indication of what was going to happen to Earth, sticking around any longer would be dangerous for us. We also couldn’t help the mortals if we accepted the Titans’ new reign.
“Help me down.” I held out my hand to Aidan and together we lowered my body into the pit. I grabbed onto the rocks, their sharp edges biting my skin as a reminder of my looming mortality. I let my legs slip into the darkness first, glancing upwards at Aidan, who looked nervous.
“I’ll call back to you if it’s the right place. If it isn’t you’re going to need to figure out a way to pull me back out.”
“What you mean you can’t float out?” He smirked at me, but there was no joking in his eyes. “Be careful Val.” I nodded my head and gripped the edge carefully before launching myself down into the pit. I could feel the rocks tearing at my clothes as I slipped down, the darkness swallowing me. But now I was no stranger to it. I welcomed its embrace understanding that the darkness, like Persephone, was as much a part of me as I was it. This was the price of being the Princess of the Underworld.
I landed with a thud and I rose back to my feet. Taking a deep breath, I held out my hand, “light.” Like in my domain the candles appeared, hanging around me to show me the tunnel I had fallen into. I ventured forward, listening for any sign that I was in the right place. The only thing I heard though was the crunch of each step I took, turning and grinding the rocks and pebbles underfoot.
The candles hung in the air behind me, watching me walk away from them and into the dark abyss. I thought idly how I wished Cerberus was here to help me but then I reminded myself I was strong and brave, and I could handle this on my own.
“You made it.” His voice cut through the darkness like a warm knife in butter and I stopped, my heart pounding in my chest. “I was worried you wouldn’t or that something might’ve happened to you.”
“Griffin!” I couldn’t see him, but I could feel him and that was enough as I launched myself forward, throwing my arms around his neck and clinging to him tig
htly. He smelt of booze and cigarettes... and home.
“I thought... I wasn’t... I-“ Words failed me as his arms went around me and he hugged me tightly.
“It’s okay, you’re safe now. They won’t find you here, not yet.”
“I have to get the others then.” He nodded, letting me go carefully before reaching out and taking my hand in his. It was cold, but it was comforting as he held onto me tightly, guiding me back to the hole I had slid through.
“You’re not hurt, right?” He could barely see me in the dim candlelight, but I could see his eyes searching for any indication of pain.
I shook my head, “fine. Better now that we’re back in immortal territory.” He nodded his head and nodded to the hole I’d used as an entrance.
Leaning against the rock with my free hand I tilted my head back to look up into it and shouted, “Welcome to my kingdom, all are gladly received.”
The Story Continues Next with Griffin…
Tyranny of a Prince
Chapter 1
I’ve always known the devil with great intimacy. I just never imagined, I was him. I thought, perhaps, my lot in life was cursed; that I was bound to a fate that saw everything I ever loved turn to misery. It just turns out: I am misery himself. I am pain. I am unhappiness. I am he who has been, and has yet to be, forgotten.
I am Death.
Death is the disease, from which mortals shrink away. It is the plague over which no human has immunity. No amount of begging may save your soul, because from the moment you were born, your soul was mine. You felt my cold fingers reaching for it the moment you left the warm womb. And I have been chasing you ever since.
My death caught up with me on the corner of Adler and Mulberry streets. This was the place the devil found me, in an old haunt of his; curled and cold, in the grasp of the plague I could no longer run from. He embraced me like a brother and took me home; it was time.
That’s how I found myself here: in the bowels of Mount Olympus.
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