“Right,” Adonis said as they walked through the terrible, hopeless part of town. “We’ve gotten word to one of our contacts. The Flowers gang is watching the gate pretty hard. We haven’t been able to get our regular shipments.”
“Why doesn’t Persephone just command the Flowers to give the stuff to you? Why doesn’t she ask Hades to fetch it for her?”
There was a shuffling of feet, and a long glance between Narcissus and Adonis. “Never mind that,” Adonis said as Narcissus rolled his eyes.
She looked from one to the other. “Hades doesn’t know she’s in on this with you, does he?”
“Then he’d have to acknowledge that she screws around on him,” Narcissus said, his face turned away.
Adonis had the grace to look sheepish. “Can you blame her for keeping secrets? You know how they met!”
“And he must know one of those secrets is you, unless you’re too lowly for him to care,” Cressida said. It was twisting an unnecessary knife, but she couldn’t help it. Someone needed to be hurting besides her.
If the comment pained Adonis, though, he didn’t show it. “As I was saying, you’ll meet my contact, and she’ll help you blend in.”
“And your contact isn’t carrying the ambrosia here because…”
“Because the Flowers aren’t letting any of the Field’s lesser denizens out. My contact’s only been able to send messages across by way of chucking the odd one through the gate.”
“Then how am I supposed to get back once I’m through?”
“You’re going to look like a hero!” He grinned. “With the glamor we’re slapping on you, you’ll appear just like someone who’s been resurrected and has returned to the Fields. And the Flowers won’t try to stop a hero from coming and going; they’ll assume that like everyone else, you won’t want to visit Asphodel. After all, who would?”
“That’s where things get a little tricky,” Narcissus said. “When you get ready to leave, you’re going to have to do it quickly; run for the gate before the Flowers realize what you’re up to.”
“So get in, meet my contact, get the ambrosia quick as you can, and get out,” Adonis said. “If you have to talk to anyone but the contact, make yourself sound as impressive as possible. Make up a bunch of stuff that would qualify you for the Fields; say something about how you always knew you were destined for greatness, that sort of thing. Brag. Overstate. The lesser beings have learned to ignore most of the heroes and will wander off, bored.”
“I’d wander off, too, if someone called me and my family lesser beings,” she said.
“Oh, fine. Be as PC as you want out here.” Adonis stabbed a finger around them. “But once you’re in there, everyone is a lesser being unless he knows how to swing a sword or suck a god’s—”
Narcissus cleared his throat. “I think she gets the point.”
Cressida nodded. “Right, who’s the contact?”
They described a dryad, and she expected a name like Mossoak or Honeyflower, but it was something with a lot of vowels that she couldn’t pronounce. They told her not to worry. She wouldn’t need to call the dryad by name. She’d be on the lookout for Cressida. There would be significant eye contact under a clump of trees not far from the gate.
Cressida hefted her backpack and turned to the gate, wondering when Medusa was going to put in an appearance. Maybe she’d decided to cut her losses and wait for the next live person to come floundering into the Underworld. Maybe she’d forgotten Cressida already.
Why in the hell did that thought hurt more than anything? She should have been thinking, good riddance, but the idea of Medusa forgetting her without a second thought felt like a knife in the heart. Well, no one liked being forgotten, but a small, very weak part of her admitted that she was hoping they’d eventually have it out. Maybe there’d be some explanation Cressida could live with, a way they could reconcile, or proof that Adonis and Narcissus were lying despite the oaths they’d taken. Maybe there’d be an epic blowout of a fight where passion would eventually overrule anger, and then…
You just want an excuse to try to get into her pants again!
Cressida called herself a stupid idiot as the fence came closer, and no Medusa appeared. Cressida was a romantic fool after all, just like June had been, just like her parents had been afraid she’d become. She had a vision of her and her aunt back in the living world, reminiscing over a bottle of wine about the time they visited the Underworld and lost their heads over goddesses who ultimately broke their hearts. They’d be sadder but wiser.
A hard lesson to learn, and as the gang distracted the zombies, and Cressida walked through the fence, she wondered if any of it had been worth it. When she got home, she was going to tell Nero to burn his sacred objects and let the Eleusinian Mysteries die like they should have done thousands of years ago. This place deserved to fade away and rot, and one day, after mythology was buried under time, it would wink out of existence, and no one would have their heart broken by it again.
Chapter Thirteen
Hiking through the rivers of the Underworld would have been impossible. There was simply nowhere to put their feet. Medusa supposed she could have bribed any of the myriad sea dwelling beings to ferry her if they would have risked going in the river.
But why would she bother when she had a giant snake?
Medusa rode at the head in front of her mother’s frills. Arachne’s webs bound the others tightly to Aix’s hide like whiny saddlebags. Aix glided effortlessly along the surface, pushing toward the Terrace. The water flowed placidly around them, and Aix cruised without a splash, keeping her face far above the water. This wasn’t the Lethe, not exactly, but the rivers mingled constantly, and Medusa thought it would be just her luck to take a giant wave of forgetfulness full in the face.
The river wouldn’t take them all the way to the palace, but as long as they got inside the Terrace, they could sneak the rest of the way. Hopefully. Medusa didn’t relish the thought of fighting all the way to her target.
A bright glow shone from just ahead. “Slow down, Aix.” The caverns housing the rivers were suffused with the same gray glow as the one that permeated the rest of the Underworld, but this was different: flickering orange torchlight mixed with the steady glow of electric light.
“What’s going on?” Agamemnon whispered, a sound that managed to echo off the rock that hemmed in the river.
“Keep quiet.” Medusa leaned forward along her mother’s head and peered into the gloom. A grid of iron bars stretched across the tunnel, blocking the way forward. Water flowed through the gaps, and a strand of electric lights looped across the top while flaming sconces burned at the sides. “There’s a gate. No guards.”
Aix glided gently forward. Slime trailed through the water, curling around the gate; the bars had probably been there since the Terrace’s invention. A small ledge poked out above the river on the Terrace side, and iron rungs followed the wall above, making a ladder to a manhole in the ceiling.
Medusa cut the others free, and they perched on Aix’s back, staring at the bars.
“What now?” Arachne asked.
“There’s no door,” Pandora said. “Given enough time, I could find a weak spot, but metal is the hardest for me to open.”
People with powers like hers were probably why the builders used metal in the first place. Something about it was harder to magic. Medusa yanked on the bars, but they had a sense of solidness that went beyond touch.
Agamemnon pointed into the shadows. “There. We can squeeze through.”
The rock had eroded away from the wall, leaving a slight gap. Slime coated its pebbled surface. They could wriggle through, but Aix would have to wait there.
“I’ll be back, Mom, Aix.” Medusa climbed onto the slippery bars, then pointed to the manhole. “We’ll come through there.”
Aix bumped the bars gently, and Medusa gave her nose a reassuring pat. “We’ll be back.”
With the help of Arachne’s webs, they eased through the gap,
faces turned away from the water that flowed inches below, slurping past the gate and the slime ready to suck them into possible oblivion. Medusa held her breath as she eased through. If she fell, she had to remember to keep her eyes closed, her mouth closed. The water oozed past slowly. As dangerous as it was, it should have been rushing, snarling whitewater. She didn’t think anything so sinister had ever flowed so placidly.
“Move it,” Arachne said, and Medusa helped the others until they all stood on the Terrace side. After a final pat on her mother’s nose, she climbed.
They sneaked above ground one by one, just inside the Terrace wall. Unlike the hodgepodge that made up the rest of Asphodel, the Terrace resembled a quaint, medieval village, though how they’d agreed on the décor, Medusa had no idea. Probably Hades or Persephone had told them what they’d like, and they’d had to agree. The streets were paved with cobblestones, and the houses were a mix of dark wood and white plaster with the occasional larger building made out of sandy colored brick. In the rest of Asphodel, houses changed as easily as minds, though it took collective consciousness to do it. Here, everything seemed stuck. The shade fog still covered the sky, but the residents of the Terrace couldn’t change that if they wanted to.
Medusa and the others kept to the shadows. Wet and covered in slime, they didn’t fit in with the stylish, modern dress of the Terrace, all suits and well-tailored clothes. They had to be thankful the medieval theme didn’t extend to the clothing. Corsets were just too hard to get in and out of.
They headed upward, making for the huge walls that stretched across the Terrace’s upper level. Medusa contacted her sisters again, who found June still in the garden, though sitting closer to the doors, as if she might soon go inside.
The wall rose far overhead, imposing and seemingly as impenetrable as the walls of ancient Troy. Stheno and Euryale told her that the guards walking the top seemed bored; a few had fallen asleep in various nooks and murder holes. They couldn’t see much action. Who would break into a palace of the gods, after all? Medusa bit her lip and regarded the wall again. Very stupid, desperate people, that was who.
With Arachne’s webs, they were over the wall in a moment, dropping into a world-spanning jungle, a dense collection of plants from every place on earth. Narrow pathways led between huge ferns and giant pink flowers, winding among apple trees warring with palm trees. At a tiny patch of wheat glowing gold amongst the greenery, Medusa thought of Demeter, Persephone’s mother, the source of Persephone’s love of growing things. Trapped in the Underworld, she had to miss the sun and air. Was this fantastic garden a gift from her mother or something Hades had given her to try to make up for the awful place he’d stuck a child of the harvest? Maybe Persephone had given the garden to herself to make eternity in the Underworld a little more bearable. Medusa imagined she’d shed buckets of tears before accepting her role as Dread Persephone and immersing herself in the schemes of the Underworld. Or maybe she still cried for everything she’d lost.
Medusa heard a sigh and held up a hand, signaling the others to stop. When she peeked around the corner, she saw a woman dressed in khaki cargo pants and a blue cotton button-up. Her graying red hair was pinned in a tidy bun, and a handkerchief hung around her neck. Her face was so familiar, it nearly made Medusa sigh. Throw in an enormous backpack and take twenty years off her, and she could have been Cressida.
They could snatch her up in a web and haul her over the wall, but Medusa didn’t want to have to fight her. After knowing Cressida, Medusa didn’t think June would take kindly to being manhandled.
“Stay here,” Medusa whispered to the others. Before they could protest, she stepped into the open and cleared her throat. June started and stood slowly, peering into the shadows just like Cressida might have. Medusa shook off the eerie feeling that they already knew each other, that they had a rapport. The resemblance was so striking, she would have pegged June as Cressida’s mother rather than her aunt.
June stared at her, too, as if trying to figure out who she was. Cressida had mentioned her aunt was a historian and a doctor of myth. Something about Medusa had to be ringing a few bells.
“Have we met?” June asked.
Medusa held out her hand. “My name is Medusa. Perhaps you’ve heard of me?”
When June’s mouth fell open, she looked even more like Cressida, though Medusa hadn’t thought that possible. It made her laugh, and June pulled up short of shaking her hand.
“I’m sorry,” Medusa said, dropping her arm. “You just reminded me so much of your niece.”
“My niece?” Panic infused her voice, taking it up several octaves. “Cressida is here?”
“Looking for you, and I promised to help her find you.”
She looked around. “Is she here?”
Medusa bit her lip, knowing she had to tread carefully and hating herself for it. “I’m afraid she’s fallen in with a bad crowd. They’ve promised to trade you to her in exchange for a dangerous task, but I plan to rescue you and head them off before she gets in any deeper.”
“Rescue me?” June nodded slowly, no doubt thinking fast, but unlike her niece, her expression was unreadable. “I always felt bad for you in your myth, but I’ve learned something since I came here: not everyone is who they seem in their stories. I need a reason to trust you.”
“You’re more cautious than your niece.”
Her stare sharpened. “What happened?”
Medusa told the same lies she’d spun for Cressida, adding that Cressida was in the clutches of Adonis and Narcissus, that Persephone was almost certainly involved, and that they were probably going to trade June for ambrosia.
June nodded as she listened, her thumb caressing her chin. “I’ve been…a guest of the dread goddess for…” She frowned and whispered as if trying to count the days. “I can’t get a handle on the time here.”
“No one can. They’d go mad.”
“And Arachne, Pandora, and Agamemnon are hiding around that corner?”
“And they’re getting impatient,” Arachne called. There were shushing sounds, and Agamemnon poked his head out.
“Apologies, madam,” he said with an oily smile. “We await your pleasure.”
“Well, well,” June said with a look of wonder.
“If you don’t mind,” Medusa said, “what have you and Persephone been doing all this time?”
June sighed loudly and sat. “We’ve laughed; we’ve loved. We met in a shop. She got between me and some thugs and whisked me away to the palace. She said she and Hades don’t see each other anymore. She said she liked the ‘flame of my life.’ The first few days were the most glorious I’ve ever spent, but then…”
“She lost interest?”
June arched an eyebrow. “She’s unstable.”
“How so?”
“She changes moods faster than a chameleon changes colors. She lashes out at people for no reason. She had three different people reduced to shades and then wept about it for hours before laughing her head off and taking a bath in whipped cream. Even the most eccentric people would label her…disturbed. Frankly, I think she’s lost her mind.”
June shook her head and looked to the sky. “I tried to help her, tried to talk to her, but I’m not a regular psychiatrist, let alone someone qualified to diagnose a god. She’s stopped speaking to me.”
Medusa shrugged, not really caring what was wrong with Persephone as long as she didn’t come looking for them. “I know it’s a cliché, but it’s not you. It’s her. Take it from someone who knows, gods can’t be anything but fickle. It’s in the genes. Her whole involvement in the ambrosia trade is probably just to try to alleviate her boredom. Now, your niece awaits.”
June barked a laugh. “She should never have come looking for me, but I suppose I have myself to blame for that.” She smiled fondly. “Cressi always did want to follow in my footsteps, no matter what her parents thought. It used to make me proud.”
Medusa smiled. “It still does. I can tell.”
June’s lips flattened, and she gave Medusa a strange look. “We don’t know each other.”
“I got to know your niece a little, and you seem a lot alike. So, how about it?” Medusa nodded in the direction of the wall. “Want to thwart the plans of a goddess? Get your niece back?”
“And if this has nothing to do with Cressida, and you’re kidnapping me for some plan of your own?”
“If you’re close to Persephone, can’t you call for her, and she’ll come running?”
“Not running,” June said, frowning, “but she’ll come once she finds out I’m missing. She…doesn’t like to lose things she considers hers.” After a shudder, she stood, nodding. “All right, but if we don’t see Cressida soon, or if you’ve hurt her and this is a trick, I will hunt you to the ends of the Underworld.”
The light seemed to coalesce around her as if the very air was listening, making her proclamation into prophecy. Medusa swallowed, shuddering as she realized that she feared this woman. She tried to shake the feeling as they started walking toward the wall. After all, what could a mortal actually do to her?
Well, besides summon a goddess who could stomp the shit out of everyone in their little rescue party. And Medusa had hurt Cressida already and would probably hurt her more before their adventure was done, at least emotionally. Maybe June would only count physical wounds, thinking them harder to heal than emotional scars. But Medusa knew that the only physical pain a person couldn’t come back from was death. Betrayal lived on and on forever.
Medusa shook her head as June and the others introduced themselves. June couldn’t hurt her. She simply wasn’t strong enough. “We’ll see Cressida soon, I promise.”
They shared a slight smile, and Medusa couldn’t shake the feeling of familiarity, but she couldn’t let herself be fooled into thinking this was Cressida. She couldn’t trust this woman, even if Cressida wouldn’t betray anyone.
That thought brought an avalanche of guilt, but with it came an idea. June was mortal. She was older and wilier, and she could wield the harpe. Maybe killing wouldn’t make her squeamish. Maybe she’d even done it before. And if she couldn’t be convinced to help, maybe her help could be bought.
Coils Page 22
