by River Ramsey
His eyes narrowed in confusion and he raised his hand, presumably to create another wall of fire, when my vine broke through the earth. By the time Hades noticed it coiling around his ankle, it was too late. I relished the way his eyes widened as the vine shot up from the ground and dangled him a few feet in the air before his flame consumed it.
It stung. I was always connected to the vines I'd created enough to feel pain, but it was so worth it. Hades hit the ground and gave me a murderous look, letting me know the time for playing games was over.
Good with me. If he wasn't holding back, neither would I.
I felt the white hot heat of his flame building behind me and rushed out of its path, always just out of reach of the fire licking at my heels. It singed the hem of my skirt and a sheen of sweat formed on my forehead, but the adrenaline rush had me feeling alive in a way I hadn’t in… forever.
It was a shame the chemistry we had on the battlefield only spilled over into hatred in the real world.
He had me on the run and I knew if it kept up, I’d end up being pushed out of the arena, so it was time to pull out all the stops. It was clear that whatever had happened in the garden was triggered by my emotion, not my gift, and oddly enough, I’d never felt better. I turned to face Hades as his wall of flame danced toward me and raised my hand, sprouting a great oak tree from the earth. Power and adrenaline coursed through my veins, overflowing with ecstasy, and I felt something taking over as his blue flame died down on impact.
“Holy shit,” Daphne cried.
It was the first I’d remembered we weren’t alone, and as green vines whipped around me like Medusa’s serpents, I was hungry for more. “Is that all you’ve got?” I asked in a voice that didn’t quite sound like my own. It was rougher. More seductive than I’d intended, and Hades’ eyes widened almost imperceptibly.
He had been caught off-guard by the move, but he was ready now. Blue flames lapped in his palm and there was steel in his gaze. The lust that flared within me might as easily have been for his flesh as it was for his power, but I was losing track of the difference.
Something was taking over again, and I only realized it had the same aftertaste of the darkness that had claimed me in the garden when it was too late to turn back.
The only difference was that this time, I didn’t want to.
22
Hades
“Something’s wrong,” Daphne called from the sidelines as Kore came at me, sleek green vines shooting out in all directions. “She’s not herself.”
I failed to dodge one of the vines in time and it sliced into my chest. It was then that I realized all the vines were covered in thorns as sharp as any blade.
“No shit,” I muttered, jumping out of the way of another attack.
There was clearly something wrong, not the least of all because her eyes were glowing a vivid green that looked like flames. She didn’t sound like herself, either. I’d sensed the shift in energy the moment she threw that next attack and at first, I thought it was just another level of her power, but now I wasn’t sure.
“Get them out,” I said, turning to Thor.
He looked doubtfully from me to Kore, but there was no time to waste. “Now!” I bellowed.
Barking orders at the teacher was pushing the limits, even for me, but Thor ushered Helle and Daphne out of the room.
Vines had sprouted through the surface of the stone arena, coiling around the stately columns around us. They twisted and writhed as if they had a mind of their own, and several smaller ones were already snaking their way up Kore’s arms and legs.
Fenrir had told me enough about what had happened in the garden to know this wasn’t good. It wasn’t remotely within her control, even if she didn’t seem to realize it yet.
I thought of canceling the simulation, but decided not to. Better to give her something to play off of rather than unleashing whatever the hell this was on the Academy.
“What’s the matter?” Kore asked in a taunting voice that wasn’t her own. At least, not the version of her I was used to. “Afraid of a little competition?”
There was seduction in her every step, her hips swaying gently as her splayed fingers called forth new life from the ground below us. Her vines had already cracked the subfloor of the training room, and all I could do was hope to keep her distracted from the green light shooting through the broken pieces of the grid.
“Just not used to seeing you like this,” I said, refusing to show any sign of apprehension. I wasn’t worried about myself, but if I didn’t do something, the Academy wasn’t going to be standing for much longer.
“Enough talking,” she growled, sending a thick vine shooting at me. I dodged and knew from experience that if I hadn’t, it would’ve gone right through my chest, thanks to that thorn on the tip.
Shit, this is bad.
I raised a wall of hellfire to dissolve the vine, but there were ten more in its place. If I played this like the game of endurance she’d set up, I was going to lose. First time for everything.
Any other opponent and I would have just charred her, but she wasn’t any other opponent and even if I was willing to send Little Shop of Horrors into the Underworld prematurely, that was definitely an expellable offense.
Force wasn’t going to cut it, and just dodging her attacks couldn’t go on forever. Especially since each time she missed me, she took out another chunk of the training room. The coliseum was starting to look like ancient ruins taken over by some verdant hellscape.
She was a lot more powerful than I’d given her credit for. In between the chaos, I stole a moment just to observe her, torn skirt and jacket fluttering in the wind with that ridiculously purple hair. I had to admit, it looked good on her. Complemented the fire in her eyes.
For the first time since we’d met, she looked like a proper Queen of the Underworld, untapped power flaring out of control with the winds of chaos in her hair. She was trying to kill me in earnest, and it was the first time I’d felt anything for her other than spite.
Loki was right. I really was a headcase.
And this was coming to an end.
I usually zoned out whenever Fenrir started talking, since he was all about lecturing me on the ways of old, but what he’d said about the garden stood out, if only because of the possessive rage it inspired. The first time this had happened, albeit on a smaller scale if his story was to be believed, he’d stopped it with a kiss. Easy enough, except that I had to get past all those barbed demon tentacles to do it.
“Fuck me,” I muttered under my breath, shooting up a wall of flame in all directions in hopes of covering my tracks.
I could see her through the flame in her glaring attempts to locate me. By the time she succeeded, I was right on her. With a flying leap, I took her down and pinned her. Her gaze flared like a Fury’s and her long nails dug into my shoulders, biting painfully as she tried to push me off. Meanwhile, her thorny vines crawled up my body and tightened around my chest, intent on crushing me. I had to act fast.
I kissed her hard and while I was expecting the blowback, I wasn’t expecting her to return it. She really wasn’t herself, but the vines around my chest weren’t constricting quite as tightly and I took my chance, pulling away enough to look down at her.
“You’re full of surprises, aren’t you, Hades?” she purred. A smaller vine was snaking its way up her neck and she didn’t even seem to notice. She was losing control fast.
“That makes two of us,” I remarked, forming a bit of Sleep in my palm. I blew the shimmering gray dust into her face and her eyes widened in rage as she threw me off, hard enough to send me clear across the arena.
I landed on the cracked stone and three great vines claimed me, one arching up over my torso and delving into the stone, one around my neck and one around my left leg. I gripped the one at my neck, but my concentrated flame did nothing to ease its grip.
“You tricked me,” she seethed, already on her feet. At first, I feared the Sleep had no effect. Whatever it was runnin
g through her veins, it had her coked up and damn near invulnerable, but when she staggered, I realized she wasn’t entirely beyond its effects. That much Sleep would have knocked Thor out for a week, so the fact that she was still standing was at once impressive and unsettling.
Her vines were receding around the room as she conserved her power, but the ones on me were holding fast. I wouldn’t be conscious for much longer and I felt the darkness closing in as she shifted unsteadily on her feet.
“You spoiled bastard…” It was the last thing she said before she sank to her knees and then collapsed all the way.
So maybe she was herself a little bit.
The vines finally went limp and I gasped sharply, filling my starved lungs with oxygen. I untangled myself and walked through the rubble of what had once been the training room. “Halcyon, end simulation,” I ordered.
The ruins disappeared, leaving behind the fractured pieces of what had once been the grid. Kore was lying on her back, groaning in some half-conscious state, and the only vines left were the ones rooted in the floor. I gathered her into my arms and her eyes fluttered. They were her usual green, not the hellfire of before, and I couldn’t believe I was actually relieved to see them.
“You drugged me,” she accused, her voice slurred.
“And you tried to strangle me. So the little spats between lovers go.”
Her head lolled to one side and I readjusted her in my arms to carry her out of the training room. I realized when I saw the vine wrapped around the door why we’d gone uninterrupted. I burned the enchanted vine away, realizing there was more to it than its physical form. I very much doubted even she knew the full extent of that aspect of her power, let alone whatever it was that had surfaced today.
It looked like the goddess of spring had a bit of duality to her, after all.
As soon as the door released, Thor flung the door open and I saw the throng of people gathered behind him.
“What the hell was that?” he growled, looking down at the sleeping girl in my arms. “What happened to her?”
“If you can tell me, please do,” I said dryly as he took her from my arms.
“Is she alright?” Dionysus asked, pressing through the crowd. The worry in his gaze confirmed my suspicion that he was more than just a concerned bystander, but I’d deal with him later. My body was covered in cuts, most of them relatively shallow, but I needed a shower in the worst way.
“Alright, clear out,” Thor growled. The onlookers gathered around him parted to make a clear path through the hall. “I need to get her to the infirmary.”
I watched as they left and raised a circle of flame around where Dionysus was standing. He started to step over it, but when the flame singed the hem of his pants, he yanked his foot back and turned to face me. His eyes narrowed when he saw me, but he was far too reserved to speak out of turn.
“We need to talk,” I informed him. “In private.”
23
Kore
When I finally opened my eyes, I was back in the infirmary room that was becoming so familiar. My head felt like someone had pieced it back together after a particularly nasty fall off a high wall, and whatever they had in my IV, I could barely move my limbs. This time, at least nothing felt broken.
“She lives.”
I turned toward the unfamiliar voice, finding myself staring at a tall, lean man in a bold white suit. He wasn’t wearing sunglasses and his eyes were a pale blue. A striking shade, yes, but not the same wall-to-wall color of a Stone. He had curly golden hair and an impish look about him. Even though his features were those of a man in his thirties, that gleam in his eyes gave him a boyish air.
“Who are you?”
“Hermes Trismegistus, at your service,” he said, flipping a card up in his palm. I was learning to be wary of men who fancied sleight of hand, but when I took the card and turned it over, the golden wings surrounding the name he’d given and a phone number warned me that he wasn’t at all joking.
“Holy shit,” I breathed, wincing. “Sorry. Whatever they gave me dislodged my filter.”
He chuckled his amusement, sitting down in a chair next to the bed. “I’ve been called many things, but ‘stuffy’ was never one of them.”
“Forgive me if this should be obvious, but my mind’s a little foggy,” I said, looking around. “Why are you here, exactly?”
“You had quite an ordeal in the training room, from what I’ve heard,” he mused. “Fortunately young Hades stepped in.”
“So fortunate,” I mumbled.
“The truth is, I’m here because of you,” said Hermes. “My position within the Council of Gods is as something of an intermediary.”
“I don’t understand,” I said, thinking it had something to do with the fact that my head was still aching. “What does the Council want with me?”
“Oh, we’ve been watching you for quite some time,” he mused. “As a matter of fact, I was the one who suggested that your mother enroll you in the Academy in the first place.”
“You were?” I asked, even more confused now than when I’d first woken up. “Why?”
“Because you require training if you’re going to fulfill your purpose in this world,” he answered, his eyes lit up with mischief and schemes. “And before you ask, no, I can’t tell you what that is just yet, but all in good time. After today’s events, I came to make sure you were alright. The Council has a very vested interest in you.”
“Because of who my father is?” I asked carefully, afraid to tell him anything he didn’t already know. It just seemed unlikely that even Odin knew anything the Council didn’t.
“Because of who you are,” he corrected. “More importantly, because of who you will become.”
“I don’t understand. I freaked and lost control. I could’ve killed someone, or torn down the whole school,” I said, still reeling from everything I’d done. It was like someone had possessed me. I had a vague, foggy recollection of what had happened after the power took over, but it was like someone else was controlling my body. “What exactly seems promising about that?”
Hermes gave me a knowing look I couldn’t begin to understand. “You don’t need to concern yourself with any of that now. All you need to know is that the Council has a vested interest in your success here at this school.”
“Tell that to the Headmaster,” I muttered. “Or the student body, for that matter.”
“Yes, I’ve been aware that you’re the most recent target in the school’s rather… unique pastime,” he said in a far more diplomatic way than the Wild Hunt and its adherents had earned any right to. “I look forward to seeing how you handle yourself.”
“You know, in the human world, the old people at least pretend to care about bullying,” I said dryly.
He chuckled. “This isn’t the human world, Persephone, and you will be put through many harsher trials than that when the time comes. Nothing you can’t handle, I’m sure, and if you should come across such an obstacle,” he trailed off, his eyes drifting to the card in my hand. “Well, you have my card.”
I looked down at the card, turning it over curiously. “What’s the catch?”
Hermes smiled slightly, more in his eyes than with his lips. “Let’s just say that one day, the Council will be calling on you to return the favor.”
“Me?” I scoffed. “Is that a joke?”
“Not in the slightest,” he said, standing up from the chair. “In the meantime, try to make the most of your time here. We’re expecting great things from you.”
Before I could ask what the hell that meant, he disappeared right in front of me. The fact that the curtains billowed was the only hint that he’d simply moved faster than I could process rather than outright teleporting, but who the hell even knew with the old gods?
I swung my legs over the bed, but before I could get up, the door opened. I would’ve preferred to see just about anyone other than Hades--and my distaste for his presence was even more acutely pronounced, now that I owed
him my life.
“You’re awake,” he remarked, slipping his hands into his pockets like a casual bastard as the door slid shut behind him.
“You sound disappointed,” I said, standing. I was steadier on my feet than I’d feared, which was good, considering that I’d already humiliated myself enough for one day.
Assuming it was the same day.
“Were you talking to someone?” he asked, glancing around the room.
“No.” Lying to him was automatic enough, but I was still processing what Hermes had said and he was the last damn person I trusted with that info.
He watched me closely. “You’re lying.”
“You want a lie? I think your hair looks great gelled back like that. There you go.”
He gave me a crooked smirk that affected me more than I wanted it to. Maybe I was still a little off-kilter. “Now, that’s no way to speak to the man who spared your life.”
“Spared it?” I laughed. “Last thing I remember, you were a missed step away from being impaled.”
“I do remember that,” he mused. “I also remember the kiss.”
“You kissed me.”
“And you returned it.”
I glowered at him, but I couldn’t exactly argue. It was the truth. Screw Power Drunk Me. She had no standards. “I wasn’t myself.”
“That you weren’t. You know, if you’re trying to get yourself expelled by proving you’re a liability, it isn’t going to work. I can tell you that from firsthand experience.”
I snorted. “That ship has sailed. Like it or not, I’m sticking around and if you think playing rescue hero back there is going to keep me from turning your ass in as soon as I can connect you to Phrixus’ death, you’re mistaken.”
“Connect me to his death?” he asked with a haughty laugh, as if it was the most hilarious thing he’d ever heard. “Good luck with that.”
“Not even going to bother claiming innocence?”
“That’s the thing about not being guilty. You don’t have to claim anything,” he said, taking a step toward me. “But that is thinking quite highly of yourself, to assume seeing the two of you together is enough to push me to murder.”
