Page 196 of A Touch of Chaos

Before she could decide how to tackle the fire, she felt a surge of electricity behind her and whirled, coming face-to-face with Sandros, his eyes aglow. He gave a menacing smile.

“Remember me?”

“How could I forget?” she asked. “You are as ugly as your father.”

His lip curled, eyes sparking with rage. His hand crackled with lightning as he sent a blast barreling towardher. She jumped out of the way, thinking that the impact might cause the doors to burst open, but it only made the fire worse.

Fuck!

Persephone sent spikes of black thorns barreling toward the god. They slammed through him, each one forcing him back step after step, his body jerking violently. Despite this, he managed to blast her with another bolt, and she went flying. Smashing through a marble column, she landed hard on her back.

The demigod followed, launching himself at her, only to be impaled on a thicket of black spires that she had summoned around her. Blood dripped from his body onto hers. She was too frantic to be disgusted, even as she dismissed the spikes and his body fell on top of hers.

She threw him from her, and he fell off the side of the porch.

As she rose to her feet, there was a flare of light in the sky. Persephone looked on both in shock and awe as she followed the path of the sun as it fell from the sky. When it crashed to the ground, there was another flash, and the earth shook the same way it had when New Athens had been severed from the rest of New Greece.

Darkness flooded the world, and the only light was that of Selene’s moon, which bathed everything in silver.

It was then that Persephone understood where Hecate had gone. She had torn Helios from the sky.

Persephone did not have long to think about what that actually meant. For now, she had to save the mortals in the temple.

Regrouping, she scrambled to the door. At first, she did not know what to do, but then she noticed thatthe flames had an energy that felt a lot likelife, and if something had life, it could alsodie. She focused on the feel of the fire. Its wild heat was almost like a pulse. She could feel it in the palm of her hand, and once she had captured its beat, she closed her fingers around it, crushing it, suffocating it until there was no sign of it left.

Without thinking, she touched the handle of the door and instantly felt the burn of hot metal melt her skin. She screamed, her pain feeding her magic, which caused vines to burst from the ground. They tore into the crevices of the door, slowly rotting away the wood until she could kick them open.

But no one ran from the temple, and as the smoke cleared, she saw why. Beyond the threshold, there were only bodies.

Everyone was dead. She was too late.

Something struck her from behind. The blow was hard and instantly made her sick. She staggered but didn’t fall, whirling to find that Sandros had returned, healed but bloody from being skewered by her magic. In his hands, he held a piece of marble, and something inside her snapped.

She screamed, and her magic turned to shadows, peeling off her body and barreling toward the demigod. They raced through him, and he dropped the bloodied piece of marble as he stumbled back until he came to the edge of the steps and fell.

Persephone followed, swiping the marble from the ground. She pounced, slamming it into his head over and over until she noticed thin black shadows wrapping around her wrists and slithering up her arms. She dropped the bloodied rock and rose to her feet, watchingas the tendrils of the demigod’s soul seeped into her skin. She realized what she had just done.

She had taken a life thread that had not been cut.

Her heart hammered in her ears as she frantically scanned the battlefield. Would the Fates take someone as retribution? Or would they give birth to something far worse? She knew the price of taking life—a soul for a soul.

Then her eyes found Hades, and everything around her seemed to slow. He was on his back, motionless.

“No,” she breathed as she stumbled toward him. Then she screamed. “No!”

She fell to her knees beside him and brushed his hair from his face.

“Hades,” she whispered.

His eyes were half-open, and there was blood on his lips. For one strange moment, she felt like she had been here before, that she had seen this before.

Hades lifted his hand, brushing a finger along her cheek.

“I thought…I thought I’d never see you again.” He spoke quietly, more blood spilling from the corners of his mouth.

“We have to get you to the Underworld,” she said, gripping his shoulders, as if by some miracle, she might be able to lift him. “The Golden Fleece—”

“I can’t, Persephone,” he said.

---