Serpent's Storm

by Amber Benson

  I still hadn’t been able to forgive Thalia for what she’d done, so I hadn’t visited her while she was there. But Clio and our mother had taken pity on the scamp and had gone to see her. After their visit, Clio had given me a pretty thorough description of the cell—one that made me glad Thalia was the sister locked up there, not me.

  Suddenly, I felt a low rumbling, like stone grinding against stone, vibrating underneath the soles of my feet. I assumed something was happening on the floor below me, but when the vibration didn’t dissipate and, instead, seemed to grow in pitch, I realized I was actually feeling the reverberation of the door in the far right wall as it slid open. From my vantage point, I could see a well-lit office hallway—beige Formica floors, peach walls, and the nastiest brown-spotted acoustic ceiling tile I’d ever seen—just beyond the lip of the doorway. When I saw who was coming down the hallway, I took an involuntary step back, trying to blend into the wall I’d just backed myself against.

  The Jackal Brothers, who should’ve been in a holding cell of their own after the body-stealing episode they’d attempted on yours truly only a few weeks earlier, strode down the Formica-tiled hallway as if they owned the place. They wore traditional Egyptian loincloths of white and blue linen, their deeply tanned bodies toned and supple. Their jackal heads betrayed no discernible emotion as, between them, they half carried, half dragged a limp human body toward me. I held my breath as they stopped in the doorway, doing a visual scan of the cell. Their cold, dark eyes slid right over my cowering form as if I weren’t even there—which made me think that this was some kind of bizarre dream I’d haplessly wandered my way into.

  Satisfied that the cell was empty, they threw the body inside, where it crumpled at my feet, the side of its face pressing into the stone floor. Then, with a rumbling screech, the large stone door clapped shut, blocking my view of their retreating backs. I stayed where I was against the far wall, waiting for some kind of movement from the body, but it just lay there, lifeless. I started thinking maybe this was a dead body I was dealing with, but then one of the feet spasmed and I knew it was a living being.

  “Hello?” I whispered, stepping closer to the prone body, but I got no response. I took another step, this time getting within kicking distance, and I reached out a bare toe, poking the man’s T-shirt-covered shoulder.

  Nothing.

  I poked harder, but my touch still didn’t register.

  I was prepared, a few minutes later, when the stone doorway began to rumble again, grinding its way open. I ran back to my corner, trying to blend in with the stone—I wasn’t 100 percent sure of my invisibility, so I thought it better to be safe than sorry.

  A woman stood silhouetted in the hall light, tapping her heel on the Formica as she waited for the door to open. I squinted, hoping to make out more of the woman’s features, but she still had her back to the light. It wasn’t until she stepped into the cell that I had to stifle a cry . . . standing before me in a prim Louis Vuitton minisuit was my older sister, Thalia.

  I didn’t realize I was holding my breath until I felt the bump and grind of my heart, racing for air. I didn’t want to hyperventilate, so I took small, measured breaths until the shock wore off.

  Thalia.

  This was my sister, the one who hated me so much she’d tried to steal my birthright (which I hadn’t even wanted in the first place) and kidnap our dad, sending our family into a tailspin. She was supposed to be in the towers of Purgatory doing penance for her crimes, but instead she was out, wearing a goddamn Louis Vuitton minisuit and looking smugger than a cat who’d eaten a cage of canaries. She looked amazing—smoky makeup, bloodred lipstick, and her hair wrapped in a severe chignon that pulled the skin of her face so taut you could bounce a penny off it. The black minisuit she wore was open at the neck, showing off the pale white skin of her cleavage, and her Jimmy Choo stilettos (she was partial to the brand) click-clacked like someone had spilled a box of tacks on the smooth stone floor.

  The door closed behind her and she made her way across the room, stopping when she reached the prostrate man so she could stare at his unconscious form. I expected her to kneel down beside the body and try to rouse it, but she surprised me by turning back around and walking over to the far wall. There, she leaned her hips against the stone and waited.

  I wanted to speak to her, to ask her why she hated me so much, but I was scared of what she might say . . . of what I knew she would say. Her reply no doubt would be full of nastiness and vitriol—and after what I’d just gone through with Jarvis, I didn’t think I could handle unbridled hate being loosed in my direction. Besides, it seemed as though I could kick and scream as loud as I wanted and Thalia wouldn’t notice, so there wasn’t any point in trying to connect with her now.

  “Wake up.”

  Thalia was talking to the body, a brittle thread of anger running through her otherwise calm voice. If it were possible, she’d become an even colder creature than when I’d last seen her, all the humanity burned out of her by hate. A chill radiated from her very core, invading the cell with its frozen majesty, making me shiver involuntarily. It was an emotional response rather than a visceral one, because my body felt no colder than it had before. I’d heard of psychic vampires, people who dined upon the strong emotions of others, but I’d never met one before. Yet it wasn’t hard for me to make the leap, to believe that this was what my sister had become. It was as if she weren’t even a person anymore, just a cipher for her anger and hatred, subsisting on what energy she could scavenge from those around her.

  Somehow this transformation was more frightening than if she had become a real, physical monster. At least it was a change I could see and touch. That was something I could handle. This alien coldness was a different thing entirely and much harder for me to wrap my head around.

  “I said,” she cooed, “wake up!” The “wake up” part was spoken with a lot of hostility and it definitely did the trick. The man began to stir, his body lengthening as he rolled onto his side and then immediately contracting again as he clutched his head in pain.

  “Ah . . .” he cried. “Make it stop. Please.”

  Oh, Jesus, I knew the voice and I knew the man. My stomach roiled with nausea, but I just kept telling myself this was some surreal dream—but is it really a dream or is it something else, a voice whispered in the back of my head.

  This new development was not palatable. Never in a million years would I have guessed the man I’d watched the Jackal Brothers manhandle into the cell, whom I had poked with my toe and taken for dead, who was now being tortured by my criminally insane older sister, would end up being someone I knew.

  Yet there it was, the proof sitting right there before my disbelieving eyes.

  Daniel is in Purgatory.

  I didn’t know how he had gotten there or who was responsible—other than Thalia—but I wanted to run over and beat the shit out of my sister for toying with my man. It didn’t matter that he and I were fighting or that we might not even make it as a couple. Daniel belonged to me. He was mine, and all I could do was stand there and watch, helpless.

  “Yes, I can make it stop,” Thalia said, her tone mild. “But you have to ask the right question, Daniel. Not can I stop it, but will I stop it?”

  Daniel continued to hold his head in his hands, pressing against the flesh of his scalp with his fingers.

  “Please, I beg of you . . . Will you make it stop?”

  I could tell by the evil grin she tried to suppress with a studied frown that Thalia was pleased with his response.

  “Because you asked nicely.” She waved her hand and Daniel convulsed on the floor.

  “Now isn’t that better,” she purred, finally stalking over to where he lay, dazed. She waved her hand and—like magic, because that’s exactly what it was—a chair appeared beside her. She sat down and crossed her legs, the tiny skirt riding up her thigh in a very deliberate fashion. It was so gross to watch my sister parading herself over Daniel, flaunting her skin and limbs as a
lure.

  “What do you want?” Daniel asked, sitting up now that the pain had seemingly evaporated. He was wearing a torn white V-neck T-shirt I recognized and a pair of ratty burgundy cords I hadn’t been able to get him to part with when he moved in, no matter what bribe I offered him.

  “I think you have an idea of what I’m after,” Thalia said, playing with the thin gold watch on her wrist. I’d never seen it before and I wondered who’d given it to her. Now that she was a widow—months ago Daniel and I had made short work of her demon husband, Vritra—I didn’t doubt there were a number of suitors willing to drop a fortune on baubles in hopes of winning her heart, whether she was in prison or not.

  “Why don’t you just cut the bullshit,” Daniel said, his face scarlet with anger, “and tell me what you want from me?”

  Thalia laughed, peals of staccato burbling that made me want to retch. I watched Daniel, to see how he was taking it all, and he looked perplexed.

  “You’re so precious,” my sister cooed again. “I couldn’t imagine what Calliope saw in you until right now.”

  Yuck, I thought.

  “But that is neither here nor there,” she continued. “I want what you want, Daniel. I want to rule the Afterlife.”

  Daniel snorted in derision.

  “That’s not what I want—”

  Thalia didn’t let him finish, interrupting him midsentence.

  “You want the Devil out of Hell, and the only way to do that is to put him in Heaven, where he rightly belongs.”

  Daniel stood up and began to pace. He was like a caged lion, all muscle and swagger. I wanted to go to him, wrap my arms around his waist and kiss his sweet lips. I wanted his ice blue eyes holding mine, reassuring me that everything was going to be okay . . . but that might never happen again. Mostly because I’d done everything in my power to push him away during the course of our relationship, since I’d been scared of what he really meant to me. I was an idiot and now I was gonna pay for my stupidity.

  “Explain,” Daniel said, stopping in the middle of the room to stare at my sister.

  She nodded, sensing that he might just be amenable to her plans after all.

  “The Devil wants to challenge God for the rule of Heaven. To do that, he needs help. My help—which he will receive so long as he holds up his end of the bargain we’ve struck. What that bargain entails, of course, is none of your business. Suffice it to say, none of this will be possible until we are assured that there will be no opposition from Death, Inc. This is where you come in,” she purred. “I need your help and I am prepared to offer you the presidency of Death, Inc.—once the Devil has assumed his new position, of course—in order to get it.”

  Thalia paused, waiting for Daniel to weigh in—which, to my utter shock, he did.

  “But I have no interest in running Death, Inc. My allegiance is to the minions of Hell.”

  Thalia nodded.

  “Yes, I assumed as much. I’ll make a deal with you, then. One, I assure you, you will have a hard time turning down.”

  She paused for effect and the whole show was so calculatedly pretentious that I really wanted to gag myself with a spoon.

  “I will give you Hell. You can do with it whatever you want,” she continued finally, “with no one looking over your shoulder or challenging your wishes. You just have to do one teensy thing for me first.”

  “And what’s that?” Daniel asked.

  Thalia shrugged.

  “Now that my father is gone—”

  I didn’t like where my sister was going with this one bit, and Daniel, thankfully, had the decency to look uncomfortable with this train of thought, too.

  “Right now, Death is ineffectively split between you and Calliope, so neither of you wields ultimate control,” Thalia continued. “Things will remain this way until you challenge my sister, best her, and assume total control of the job by drinking from the Cup of Jamshid. Until this is accomplished, she will remain a threat to everything I hold dear.”

  I froze, unable to breathe as I waited for Daniel to tell my sister where she could go shove it.

  “And all I have to do is fight Callie and drink from the Cup of Jamshid?”

  Thalia nodded, but didn’t push the issue, letting Daniel come to his own conclusions. He appeared to be mulling the idea over in his mind, weighing all sides of the proposition.

  “And she won’t be hurt. She’ll be allowed to continue with her life, no strings attached? A real human being like she’s always wanted?”

  My sister grinned mischievously—and Daniel, the trusting nimwit, didn’t have my invisible vantage point, so he couldn’t see Thalia crossing her fingers behind her back, making any promises she agreed to effectively null and void.

  “Of course, Daniel,” Thalia said, looking indignant. “She’s my sister. I wouldn’t harm a hair on her pretty little head.”

  “I still don’t know—” he started to say, but Thalia closed the gap between them, resting her hand on his muscular chest—which only made me want to tear her eyes out with my fingernails.

  “Why don’t you ask me what your alternative is, Daniel, darling?” she murmured, her lips inches away from his. I could see Daniel struggling against the urge to kiss her—and Thalia smiled, knowing she had him in the palm of her hand.

  “What is my alternative?” He gulped.

  She reached down and grabbed his crotch, her bloodred nails like sharpened talons digging into his most delicate man bits.

  “I’ll tear your balls off with my bare hands and make you eat them while I watch,” she said matter-of-factly. “Not much of an alternative, is it?”

  Daniel shook his head and she released her hold on his balls, stepping back to admire her handiwork. She’d definitely put the fear of ball-less-ness in my usually fearless fellow.

  “Okay, then.” Daniel nodded, swallowing hard. “I guess I have no other choice.”

  I wasn’t sure I’d heard him. I shook my head and willed him to repeat what he’d just said, but in the negative.

  “You’ll do it?” Thalia breathed, clapping her hands together in happiness.

  “I’ll do what you want,” Daniel said, wary now. “So long as Callie goes free.”

  Like an ax to my heart . . . his words split me in two, severed my soul from my body, sent me spinning into space like an errant satellite. I’d been betrayed, and by the person I’d expected it from the least. I was on fire with heartache and it was the most miserable feeling I’d ever endured. I couldn’t even begin to process the rest of what Thalia had said about my dad, about Daniel and me splitting Death . . . I couldn’t focus, I felt myself sliding back into the wall, letting the smooth stone envelop my body, steal me away from the horrible betrayal I’d witnessed.

  I closed my eyes, the scene repeating itself on the backs of my eyelids, etched in my memory for all eternity—and then a cool, soothing blackness fell upon me and I ceased to think anymore. I let my brain shut down, and as I let my soul fall away . . .

  I opened my eyes.

  I was lying in marsh grass, the itchy plant sheaths poking into the back of my neck and shoulders. At first, it was pleasant just to lie there, looking up at the sky as it graduated from the blue of day to the orange of sunset. My brain was free of any conscious thought; all I could do was marvel at the beauty blossoming above me. Then, like a knife slitting apart my reality, the memory of Daniel’s betrayal bloomed inside me and I almost cried out because the physical pain of my heart breaking was so terrible.

  “Are you all right?” Hyacinth said. I turned my head to find the giant woman sitting on the grass beside me. Concern was rife on her face and I guessed I’d been pretty vocal while I was dreaming. I reached out and took Hyacinth’s hand, squeezing it as hard as I could to blot out the hurt.

  “Daniel . . . He . . . It’s over,” I cried, the tears leaking from eyes, unbidden. “And my dad, too. Something terrible—”

  I couldn’t get the words out. They got stuck in my throat and I couldn�
��t breathe. I sat up, putting my head in between my knees so I wouldn’t pass out. Hyacinth didn’t question me; she just put her hand on my back and rubbed the tension away as best she could.

  “What am I gonna do?” I whispered, my voice cracking as I fought down my grief. “I don’t know what I’m gonna do.”

  “That’s why your father asked me to be your guardian,” Hyacinth said. “To look after you and protect you if something . . . like this should ever happen.”

  I lifted my head to look at her.

  “He thought something bad was going to happen?”

  She nodded.

  “He hoped not, but he made arrangements just in case.”

  That made me feel a little less worried, but it wasn’t enough to rest any real hopes on.

  “Daniel is going to challenge me,” I whispered. “And I don’t think I can win. I don’t think I want to.”

  Hyacinth didn’t seem too unsettled by what I was saying.

  “You love him. Of course you don’t want to hurt him.”

  “Isn’t that just the worst?” I said, smiling wanly. “I’m just like every other girl with a shitty boyfriend: in denial.”

  Hyacinth patted my back.

  “When the time comes, you’ll do the right thing, Callie.”

  I hoped she was right. I didn’t know how I felt anymore. I just wanted to see my mom and dad and my little sister. I wanted to help them if I could before Thalia did anything else to destroy our family.

  “I just want to go home, ya know?” I sighed, some of the pain receding a little when I realized what I wanted. “Right or wrong, I just want to find out what’s happened to the rest of my family.”

  Hyacinth was smart enough to remain silent, knowing that nothing she could say would make things any better for me—because she understood something I did not: My life had changed irreparably . . . whether I liked it or not.

  eleven

  We stayed on the shore, the clear blue sky stretching out into the horizon above us while I watched the water foam around the edges of the marsh. The sea looked as lonely as I felt, empty of any life on the surface, but a tumultuous mess of activity below the cresting waves. My brain couldn’t stop rehashing everything I’d seen, all the crappy bits compressed into one big ball of awfulness. I saw Jarvis propped up against the toilet, his head hanging forward, lifeless. I saw Daniel pacing his purgatorial cell, choosing power over love. I saw my mom and dad, just a still frame of the last time we were together: my mom sitting on the living room couch, my dad sitting in an armchair reading a book. The image faded to black and I felt terror at what that might mean. I chose not to think of my little sister. If anything had happened to Clio . . . I couldn’t bear to think about it.