Hades Academy: Fourth Semester

by Abbie Lyons

  “Karolina!” I looked urgently to where Matthias, in a black sweater, was casually walking towards the enemy encampment, AKA Camilla and her friends’ table. And there was no mistaking the look on Ruby’s face.

  She was Karolina’s competition.

  Morgan looked absolutely overcome with delight. “Yes! This is perfect. Karo, make your move! Go in for the kill!”

  “Not literally!” Teddy said as Karolina got to her feet. “I don’t want Zelda to get hit with any, y’know, shrapnel,” he added meekly.

  “Don’t worry,” I said as Karolina swished her hips over to where Matthias was ordering another drink at the bar. And indeed, Ruby looked ready to spout steam out her ears. “I’m sure there won’t be any—”

  A glass-shattering, earsplitting explosion rocked the tearoom.

  The ground shifted. Something slammed into my ribs—the table, flung forward by the force of the blast. I coughed, gagged, almost retched out the rest of my tea. The air was hazy, smoky, colors muted to abstraction. Ears ringing, I blinked and blinked and blinked. But I couldn’t see, couldn’t hear. Just dust and a high-pitched nothing.

  Something soft and warm seized my wrist, tugged me forward, scraping my stomach across the wood of the table as I was thrust to my feet.

  “Morgan?” I asked.

  I blinked again. And again.

  It wasn’t Morgan.

  “Hello, Nova. We’ve come to take you home.”

  Sound was rushing back from all sides—screams, splintering, distant tinkles of yet more china and glass fracturing. Metal flooded my mouth—blood, and I could feel it dripping down my chin.

  It was one of them. One of the Children of Abaddon.

  It was a woman this time, though not my mother, but one who had her same fierce and ragged appearance. Her hair was stringy, gingery, her teeth yellow. Her skin oddly red, as though she’d been sunburned. And behind her were more, all in the same dark and shapeless clothes: a taller guy with dreadlocks, a short woman with close-cropped hair and dead gray eyes, a thick-necked bearded man.

  “We’ve come to take you home,” the thin ginger said again. I pulled back as hard as I could.

  “No!” I coughed the word out around the blood and spat onto the boards of the floor. Reality was setting in, sharpening. Where was Morgan? Where were Teddy and Karolina? Were they dead? Hurt? Footsteps were pounding all around us but I couldn’t tell who or where or what—

  “She’s not moving,” growled the bearded guy.

  “She just needs to process,” said the short haired woman, her dull eyes rolling from one corner of the room to the next as people-shaped shadows scattered. “She doesn’t realize her good fortune. But we’ve come to take her to Leda and to Abaddon.” She trained her gaze on me. “Don’t you want to go, Nova? To your mother? To what you’ve been waiting for?”

  “I have not,” I choked out, “been waiting for this.”

  “I don’t like it,” said the dreadlocks guy, rubbing his jaw. “This is taking too long.”

  “You’re coming, Nova,” said the woman with her bony hand around my wrist. “Of course you’re coming.”

  “She needs convincing!”

  No one was coming to help me. I couldn’t blame them—there was no safe way to get back in. I had to think fast, on my feet.

  But the last time I’d been in Westrock, all I’d been able to do was throw a punch—a regular, human, step-the-fuck-off punch.

  So when my defensive instincts took over, that’s what I did.

  My fist had barely begun to fly forward through the air when I felt it: sparks, electricity, quivering and then building through my muscles and in the palm of my closed hand. Blue light feathered around my arm, and by the time I made contact with the cultists woman’s head, it was as though a lightning bolt was striking her.

  Boom.

  Crack.

  Fizz.

  A searing heat tightened around my wrist, and that’s when I realized: the bracelet. My shitty, stupid metallurgy project had saved my ass by supercharging my lightning powers.

  Things were moving strangely, as though there was a strobe light on. Stuttering. Sudden. But the next thing I could see was black smoke billowing, the woman on the floor. Maybe dead.

  Maybe dead.

  “Atalanta!” the bearded guy screamed. The short haired woman launched herself at me. But I fired back with another lightning punch, less impressive than the first but enough to blast her back. The dreadlocks guy didn’t even try.

  And then the energy was too much. I sprinted, flew, absolutely launched myself out of the smoldering Thistle Inn until I was well past the square, past the gates of Westrock, charging up the path back towards Hades. Back towards home. Or what I thought was home.

  What I needed to be home.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Nova!”

  I had barely stepped onto the flagstones of the Hades Academy hallway before Morgan threw her arms around my neck. “I’m so glad you’re okay!”

  My body ached from the run, my muscles still burning. My heart was going a thousand miles a minute. “What happened?” I gasped. “What just...”

  “It was so strange,” Teddy said, his face ghost pale. There was a whole cluster of students standing around in the front hall, murmuring gradually more loudly and looking as confused and scared as I felt. “We were sitting there, as you remember. Karo got up and walked over towards the bar, and then just...boom.”

  Karolina, ashen, took over as Morgan let me go and wrapped her arms around my waist, putting her head on my shoulder.

  “Hey, I’m okay.”

  Except I wasn’t. This was the least okay I’d been maybe all year. My sweater clung to my back, still sticky with sweat.

  “Right,” Morgan said, “so then everything was chaos—well, not the big C kind. Unless...” She flicked a glance at me. I gave my head a little shake.

  “I have no idea.” I swallowed dryly, my throat like sandpaper. “They tried to get me. The Children of Abaddon. There were four of them this time. I don’t know how they found me...” A strange noise escaped my throat, sort of like a sob. “I thought I’d be safe.”

  “You are safe,” Morgan said firmly. “You’re here now, with us. Did you manage to fight them off?”

  “Yeah,” I muttered. “Because of this stupid thing.” I pushed up my sleeve to show my bracelet. “And I thought it was just a piece of crap that I made in a class I didn’t care about.”

  As if on cue, the back of my neck prickled. I looked up and saw Raines, across the room, staring at me. He hadn’t been in Westrock, at least not that I had seen. It looked like he’d run straight from the common room. Just wearing a T-shirt and jeans, breathing a little heavily. And the look in his eyes...

  I stared at the toes of my Docs. That look was everything. I meant too much to him. And after the cultists had showed up, it was clear I was a time bomb.

  “Let’s get you off your feet,” Morgan said briskly. “Back to your room, a nice cuppa, maybe put some more of that booze in it...”

  “Students!” A deep, booming, disembodied voice filled the hall, and the chattering gradually silenced. “Please proceed to the auditorium. Directly. Dean Lattimore will be making an announcement shortly. Any absence will be punishable.”

  The four of us exchanged a panicked look.

  “Already?” Karolina said. “How did they know?”

  “I don’t know,” I said darkly. “But I think I’m glad they do.”

  FIVE MINUTES LATER, we all hustled into the auditorium, which had finally been repaired after the incident with Teddy, Wilder and the whole void of Chaos thing in our first semester. Some of the wooden booths had been restored with lighter panels, so you could tell they were new, but other than that it was still the impressive gigantic room that it had been before. A wave of nostalgia shot through me as I remembered taking my seat here the first time I started a semester at Hades. I’d just met Morgan, was about to meet Teddy...and Wilder. It set ev
erything in motion.

  Or maybe everything had been set in motion before then.

  I was so tired. So tired of trying to figure out what would happen next.

  We squeezed into a four-person booth and shut the little door behind us. I was sandwiched between Morgan and Karolina, and honestly, there was no place I’d rather be. As the room filled up, Camilla and her two lackeys traipsed down the stairs to our right, not giving us any notice—well, except for a flashing cruel glare from Camilla. As if to say this is all your fault. Zelda, as she passed, gave Teddy’s shoulder a quick squeeze, and he put his hand on top of hers. The small gesture moved me, to see such a regular romantic relationship. Maybe we should be less harsh on Teddy, I thought. Because ultimately none of us know what the fuck we’re doing.

  And then the back of my neck prickled again. I could feel Raines watching, wherever he was. I didn’t know if it was my intuition or just...some connection we had. Not a soul bond, but something else.

  “Students, please take your seats.” Dean Lattimore stood on the platform in front of all of the audience. “Please, settle down.”

  It wasn’t doing much. No one could stop talking, except for the four of us, who seemed to have settled into some serious shell shock.

  “Students,” Dean Lattimore tried again, but it was fruitless.

  “Students!” A woman’s voice this time, and I realized that Professor Mantel had gotten to her feet next to Lattimore, her face pink under her silver pixie cut.

  It worked. We all shut up.

  “Thank you, Professor.” Dean Lattimore folded his hands behind his back, his face creased with worry. I felt a sudden rush of gratitude towards Dean Latimore. Unlike Dean Harlowe—or for that matter, “Dean” Frost—Lattimore wore his emotions on his sleeve. It was clear that he cared about us students—and me in particular, I flattered myself. But it was true. I trusted whatever he was about to say.

  “As you know, or are about to find out, there was a severe incident today in Westrock.” He pursed his lips. “Although the source of the explosion and attack is still unknown, the faculty and I have voted unanimously, with the input of the Regents, to suspend classes and enact lockdown security measures effective immediately.

  “So the kyrioi,” murmured Teddy. The kyrioi had been present after the Chaos incidents started to bubble up in our first semester, but their presence had receded almost to the background, save for the occasional glimpse of one in the hallways.

  “Yeah,” I muttered. I wasn’t sure if they’d actually make me feel better or not, but I guess something was better than nothing. A kyrios could probably take down one of those Children of Abaddon cultists with a flick of the wrist.

  My mind flashed back to the teahouse. The ginger-haired woman on the floor. The black smoke...

  I might have killed her. And even if I hadn’t, I didn’t hesitate. I acted remorselessly. And in that way, I was no better than my mother. No better at all.

  A sick twisting took over my stomach, and I had to force myself to tune back in to what Dean Lattimore was saying.

  “Of course, suspending class activity and putting a pause on your studies is far from ideal, and we recognize that. You must all understand that these are what we feel are extraordinary circumstances, and that there was no other option to preserve the safety of the student body. For now, students will be restricted to the dorms, common room, library, and refectory. Traveling through the hallways will require a kyrios escort. Any suspicious activity—any at all—should be reported to a kyrios or a faculty member as soon as possible.”

  He paused, and took off his glasses to rub his eyes.

  “On a personal note...I want you to know that this affects me as much as I believe it affects you. Hades and its students are my everything,” he said. “I’ve given my life to being an educator here, to watching students like you grow and flourish into the demons charged with protecting our world and the balance of the universe. Please know that I will do everything in my power to ensure that the threat is minimized and life can continue as normal.”

  Someone clapped. And then another person. Slowly, tentatively, more and more joined in, until we had built into a full-on ovation. The sound was thunderous, and Dean Lattimore just stood there, looking overwhelmed, as though he might actually cry.

  I clapped hardest of all.

  “Well,” Morgan said, and blew out a breath as we filed out of the auditorium. “I guess that’s to be expected. The kyrioi and everything. Good security measures, all in all.”

  “Yeah,” Teddy said. “And now we just have to kill time sitting in the common room, I guess? That’s a lot of games of demon chess.”

  “You mean a lot of bottles of wine,” Morgan quipped.

  I thought about having nothing else to do but sit around with my friends. Yeah, maybe as Hades Academy’s number-one nerd, I would be bummed about missing classes—well, except for Demon Protocols and Metallurgy, maybe—but still. There were definitely worse things than waiting around with my friends, joking and laughing, doing all the stuff that we did.

  “Maybe we can even bust out the Monopoly board again,” I said.

  Morgan’s face lit up. “Oh yes. I think this time is the one we’re all finally—”

  “Nova Donovan?”

  We’d reached the hallway again. I stopped short. A black-clothed kyrios bloomed in front of us out of literal thin air.

  “Who wants to know?” Morgan answered for me.

  The kyrios didn’t respond.

  “That’s me,” I said. “What do you want?” I added, maybe a little too sassy.

  “You need to come with me.”

  “Come with you where?” I asked, shocked.

  “Security measures,” the kyrios said shortly. “You’re to be isolated.”

  “Isolated?” I said, my voice cracking with disbelief. “What the fuck does that mean?”

  “It’s not optional,” the kyrios said. “I have instructions to restrain you if you resist.”

  Frantically, I looked at my friends, but their faces were blank.

  “Where are you taking her?” Teddy said.

  “I’m not at liberty to disclose.”

  “But—”

  But nothing. I didn’t get a chance to finish my sentence, because before I could resist or run away or do anything at all, a red cloud of sparkles and dust filled my vision, and I evaporated.

  Chapter Sixteen

  When the sparkles and dust finally cleared, I was in a cell.

  Or what looked like a cell. It was a small room, maybe fifteen feet at its widest point, circular and with only two windows that let in weak winter light and revealed a dark sky with just a few snowflakes peppering the view.

  What the fuck?

  A carved, wooden single bed rested against one wall, with a Spartan set of sheets and a blue velvet coverlet. There was also a bookshelf and a small writing desk that extended from the wall with a wooden chair.

  Where the fuck was this? I wasn’t exactly surprised to know that Hades Academy had yet another room I’d never heard of, but usually I got to mysterious new places by walking on my own two feet, not being summoned against my will.

  Heart thumping, I rushed to the window and looked out, hoping to get some sense of grounding.

  But the ground was far away.

  I was in a goddamn tower.

  “This is some Rapunzel shit,” I whispered to myself. I whirled back around, looking for an escape hatch or a door or a ladder...

  There was one. A small one, wooden with an iron handle. I leaped to it, grabbed and pulled, but all it revealed was a bathroom.

  Well, I guess that’s better than nothing, I thought dryly. And slammed the door shut.

  “Where the fuck am I?” I cried out loud. My voice felt raw.

  I spun around and looked at my surroundings closer. There was a slim, leather bound red book on the writing desk. I strode over in two steps and picked it up. When I flipped it open, light fanned out and an image a
ppeared—Dean Lattimore, in perfect miniature, like a hologram, scintillating in a faint green.

  “Nova,” the image said. “I apologize for any abruptness. I didn’t want you to be scared. Trust me that it is not my first choice to do this. But we’re simply not sure how powerful the cultists may be. And given that your mother has demonstrated the power to home in on you...”

  The image shook its head. “You’ll be as safe as we can make you here. You should have every comfort you need, or a reasonable facsimile.” He gave a small, tight smile. “Food will appear when you need it. But other than that, the tower is impenetrable. The entrance is hidden. And there’s really no use escaping—Nova, I know you’re going to try.”

  I lowered my hands from where I had been trying to jimmy the window open. Okay, guilty.

  “You simply have to trust me.” The Dean’s face was open and honest, even if in small shimmering form. “I promise, we will give you answers as soon as we can. You deserve that. You deserve the power of the truth.”

  Unexpected tears pricked at the corners of my eyes.

  “Take care, Nova.” The apparition nodded, and disappeared into the pages of the book, which shut itself neatly.

  I sank onto the bed, arms between my knees. I was a prisoner. Not as punishment, but as...

  No, maybe as punishment. Punishment for not overcoming myself. For being, inherently, a danger.

  The first night I barely slept at all until morning, when, exhausted, I shut my eyes and awoke later when the sun was streaming in full blast. Without a clock, I had no idea what time it was. The bookshelf had reading material—mostly demon poetry, which I’d honestly gotten my fill of the previous semester. There was a set of tarot cards, which I didn’t really know how to read, but found I could use for flicking target practice across the room. I refreshed my shuffling skills too—who knew, maybe after all this was settled, however it settled, I’d have to go back to hustling on the streets. Couldn’t get rusty.