Page 125 of Blood of Olympus

Aros laughed, picking up the green-faced king and tossed him through like a sack of grain. With a salute, he stepped backwards, disappearing into the blackness, with Erato, Diana, and the beasts on his tail.

I stepped through last, crying out at the last second as another, sharper pang pierced the space in my chest where Nyssa’s emotions usually lingered.

Something’s wrong.

Go, Lykos said, voice as faint as a whisper.

Wasting no time at all, I diverted the magic, thinking of my home. My heart. My woman.

CHAPTER 31

Nyssa

The shades were almost upon the only two living figures on the Isle of Judgement when Aph, Evie and I arrived. Though still held aloft, there were somehow more of them than there’d been last time — courtesy of Kronos and his fucked up snakes, I guessed — amassing in a gigantic black cloud above the unaware heads of Hephaestus and Archimedes.

The only thing stopping the shades from descending upon the two gods of craftmanship, and wreaking chaos this realm had never known: my parents.

With arms raised high and hands clasped in the middle — as though, even in this, they would not be parted — Hades and Persephone stood guard over them. And with as much of a reprieve as they could seize, Hephaestus and Archimedes placed the final obsidian keystone into its place atop the archway to Tartarus.

All three gateways were complete.

Wasting no time, for there was little to spare — my parents were almost completely transparent now — I sprinted to the first gateway. Evie ran with me, sword unsheathed and eyes alert for anything, while Aph darted over to the panting, exhausted, and filth-covered men.

I was grateful that none of the living could see the danger of the dead lurking mere inches above their heads.

“Hurry, Nyss,” Charon called as he lent his strength to my parents’. They were spent, and I knew my time was limited. “I don’t know how much longer we can hold them.”

“Not… long,” my father rasped.

“On it,” I said, placing my palm atop the cool stone.

Closing my eyes, I called on that morsel of power stored deep within my core. The tiny ball of light danced joyfully to the surface — all too willing to give parts of itself to the stone, imbuing it with the magic of Life itself. Tingles danced across the skin of my hand and I smiled as I opened my eyes to the purest white light beneath my fingertips, sinking merrily into the arch.

Seconds later, the air within the stones shimmered — like if I reached out to touch it, I’d feel the soft, glossy weight of gossamer between my fingertips. I dared not, knowing the temptation of paradise might be too great to withstand, and the realms would find themselves without a ruler once more.

What would happen to Caelus if I did, though? Would he immediately drop dead and join me in the Elysian Fields? Or would he instead take on my allotted lifespan, alone?

A shiver darted down my spine at the thought. Today was not the day for that particular answer. I could never willingly doom him to an eternity alone. My gaze flicked over to my parents. They weren’t soul bonded, yet still were not able to survive without each other. Our situation was theirs tenfold.

“That’s my girl,” my mother said, ghostly tears rimming her lower lashes. Her eyes — the exact same shade of green as my own — closed as she adjusted her stance and forced more of her strength into holding the billowing, wailing cloud of souls back.

One down, two to go.

As I darted to the middle arch, I risked a glance at my friends. Hephaestus and Archimedes lay sprawled on the ground right where I’d sentenced Zeus — a lifetime ago. Aph crouched between them, offering murmurs of reassurance, clasping Arch’s hand tightly as she leaned down to speak with his father.

Arch met my gaze, with something worryingly like resolve hardening his features, and rose into a seated position. A question seemed to cross the distance between us — unspoken and cautiously asked, but asked nonetheless.

Can you do this? His eyes seemed to say.

And as I slapped my hand down on the dust-covered gateway to the Asphodel Meadows, I dipped my head in a terse nod and called on my mother’s gift once more.

Yes.

Life responded instantaneously, flowing down my arm from its starting point in my chest. It soothed every nerve on the way down, like a fresh burst of rain on a hot summer’s day. Even the air seemed to lighten in its presence.

This time a full minute passed and Life’s light dimmed to a faint, pearly glow. It seeped into every crack in the stone, filled every fissure, until the entire archway shone from within. The light faded into nothingness, and the damage was undone. The air within this gateway flickered into existence as well, and a chorus of moans echoed over the still river water as shades felt the call to go home.

Almost. Just one to go.