Page 150 of Blood of Olympus

A sharp snap sounded nearby — suspiciously like clicked fingers — and all at once I was plunged into a desert. Endless red dunes lay before me, spread out in each direction as far as I could see. I half expected the rolling amphisbaena to make a second appearance, somehow surviving the fatal wounds Caelus and I had inflicted upon it last year.

A shudder darted down my spine at the thought.

Fucking snakes.

The irony was not lost on me that my shadows’ chosen form was also fucking snakes.

“Where the fuck am I, and how the fuck did I get here?” I murmured. To the voice, I shouted, “What trickery is this?”

To which he replied with nothing more than a rolling, dagger-sharp laugh.

The longer I stood still, contemplating his demise and my own self-rescue, the hotter it became. My black leathers absorbed all the light of Helios’ sun, chafing and cooking me just like it had in Apollo’s trial.

I took a step forward, anticipating the shifting crunch of sand beneath my feet, but instead the soft squelch of rotting leaves greeted me. My vision shifted again and I was standing within a familiar, eerie forest with trees of ivory and bones for limbs.

Demeter’s Bone Orchard.

Dazedly, I glanced around, wondering how I’d managed to shadowstep — albeit unwillingly — using someone else’s shadows. Light filtered in through the rotting leaves high overhead, giving the foggy orchard a haunted feel. I knew if I kept walking along this seldom used track, I’d wind up at the enormous Tree of Threnos, beholder of Demeter’s broken heart.

“Not today, tree. I’ve got all the grief I can handle right now,” I muttered, spinning on my heel and exiting the grove instead.

A few minutes of hiking later and the skeletal trees faded into elms and oaks. The fog dissipated and sunlight shone through the gaps in their vibrant emerald leaves. A few steps later, I emerged in a clearing filled with wildflowers.

A meadow where a hydra once lay, slain, and a tiny dragon almost shared the same fate — for this was a clearing seared permanently behind my eyelids, in a forest I had visited only once but would know instantly.

The Forest of Artemis.

“How the fuck does this keep happening?”

I whirled around, trees blurring as I moved, and spun straight into a hard stone wall. The impact jarred my face, taking the brunt of the blow. My eyes smarted and my nose ached fiercely, likely broken. A trickle of golden blood smearing my forefinger only confirmed the diagnosis.

“I told you: foolish,” the voice whispered from somewhere close by, and I reacted without consciously choosing to.

My fists flew in the general direction of the voice’s origin and I was rewarded with a muffled grunt. Though the man was still invisible, at least his deceit had finally cost him something.

He growled, dodging my next blow, and followed up by a second snap of his fingers.

In an instant, I was transported to a forsaken fortress, still stained with the crimson blood and mutilated bodies of soldiers. It was every bit as horrifying as the first time I’d beheld them, and my gaze lingered on the one whom I’d spoken to. The one I’d granted the peace of oblivion and sent on his way with a bronze obolus.

Snap.

The man was gone. In his place was a dark chamber and three eerily cloaked figures.

Snap.

The room lit up with thousands of brilliantly glowing golden threads, my gaze snagging on the one right in the middle that started as two but merged into one. Thick emotion lodged itself in my throat.

Snap.

A winter tundra greeted me, my feet sinking into inches thick snow and my breath exiting in a visible puff.

Snap.

The ice was replaced by an inferno. One gigantic forge burned steadily to my right and a worktable appeared on my left. I reached out to touch it, immediately thrown into fresh sorrow by the absence of the gargantuan god it belonged to.

Snap.

My hand passed through the now non-existent bench, throwing my balance off-kilter and sent me sprawling in the dirt of the arena. The sand tasted more ashen than earthen and I spat it out as I got to my feet. Unlike in Ares’ trial, this arena was still, silent — empty. The midday sun only illuminated the lack of bodies in seats, and lack of champions to defeat.