“I don’t know.”
Athena jumped forward and brought the knife against Persephone’s throat. The dead goddess’s gray skin parted like paper but didn’t bleed.
“Queen of the dead, and you don’t know? You’re lying. Down!” she shouted at Cerberus, who growled. “Why are you here and they aren’t? They have to be here.”
“I’m here because I’m tied to this place. I have been since Hades took me from the autumn. I’m here because I’m dead, but I’m not finished dying.” Persephone pushed her throat farther onto the blade and showed teeth smeared red with Athena’s blood. Her hands shoved against Athena’s chest and sent her flying backward. Athena stumbled over a stone and landed on her hip in the dirt beside Cassandra.
She scrambled onto her feet and crouched. Persephone’s hands against her ribs and sternum hadn’t felt like dead hands, or even dying hands. They were elastic, hard, and fast. Cerberus had both sets of hackles raised beside his mistress. And Cassandra had collapsed slack, in no shape to run or fight.
But Persephone didn’t advance. The black dress hung on her bones like a sack, and she sighed.
“I wish they were here,” she said. “I felt it when he died his mortal’s death. And I dreamed of Artemis set upon by dogs. Torn to pieces. Her screams echoed off these walls. We smelled her blood soak into this dirt. But she never came.” She looked at Athena. “I’ll wait for you, too, when Hera crushes your bones. But you won’t come, either. I’ll be here, alone with my rotting dog, until this place fades. Or perhaps until Hades coughs his final plague.
“Get out. Take her back where she came from. Offer her some comfort.”
Athena’s hands balled into fists.
“She doesn’t want my comfort.”
* * *
Cassandra let Athena get her up and guide her back through the catacomb caves of the underworld. She let her load her back into the skiff and push off the shore. They’d come so far. Crossed worlds. She’d been so sure she would see him. Only hours ago, she’d been sure they would bring him back.
“Take care,” Athena said. “Don’t fall out.”
Aidan wasn’t there. Not in the boat beside her or in all of the underworld. He was nowhere. Not even a shade of him remained to wander. He had been blotted out with no stain left behind. But that couldn’t be. Aidan was too bright, too bold, too beautiful to disappear. He was too much a part of everything she was.
“I love him,” she said.
“I know,” Athena replied. She paddled slowly, sadly. Mournful paddling.
Cassandra’s hands began to burn.
Before they were through, the gods would take everything. They would spear Henry and Andie onto wooden pikes to buy themselves another ten minutes. They blew up buildings full of people and burned homes to the ground. All to extend lives that had gone on for too long already.
Aidan. She loved him as much as she ever had. As much as she hated his family.
“We’re almost there, Cassandra. The light’s returning.”
Yes. She could see that. Athena said such stupid things. Dying bitch, taking too many others down with her. Hades’ death alone would cost a city. Thousands of innocents dead, choking on phlegm or full of sores.
Once, a long time ago, the gods had murdered her whole family. All of her people.
The Styx disappeared, replaced by the steel blue of the lake. Cold wind slipped down her collar.
“We’re home, Cassandra.”
She was supposed to kill them.
Cassandra turned and stared at Athena. Shadows crawled across her face.
She was supposed to kill them all.
25
ALL THE HOURS THAT REMAIN
On the drive back to Kincade, Athena treated her carefully. A gentle touch here, a soft word there. No pushing. No questions. Stupid goddess, playing at sympathy. But Cassandra took it, so she wouldn’t have to talk. So she wouldn’t have to scream. She didn’t say a word until they passed the Motel 6 where Athena, Hermes, and Odysseus had stayed when they first hit town that fall.
“What day is it?” Cassandra asked.
“Still Thursday, I think.”
“If you don’t know, don’t guess. Just drive me to school.” But Athena was right. Almost no time had passed. They’d gone so far, and it had been nothing. Been nothing, and for nothing.
“What time is it?” she asked. She glanced around the Dodge, but there was no clock display on the radio. She pulled her phone out of her backpack and looked at the dead screen, then tried to power it off and back on again. It did neither. The fucking underworld had fried her phone.