Page 60 of Sticks and Stones and Broken Bones

“Shit. Hades must know you’re here.”

“How?” I doubled over with another scream as the pain raged like fire through my veins.

“Because you shouldn’t be here, no one but me should be here. He probably has some kind of ward or alarm.”

I fell forwards and hands wrapped around my shoulders. “This sucks balls.”

“I’ll find you, Raevyn. I’ll be in your dreams. Or speak to Corvus. He can carry messages to me.”

The giant raven? How did he know about him? “I don’t…” Fuck, it was hard to speak.

“Shush,” he said as he brushed my hair out of my face. “It’ll be over soon.”

Darkness started to claim my vision as the pain intensified. It was like being ripped apart at a molecular level. I still wasn’t sure if this was a dream or not. But you weren’t supposed to feel pain in a dream, were you?

“Please,” I begged. “Tell me your name.”

He sighed deeply, like he was giving into defeat. “Promise me you won’t hate me when you learn what I’ve done.”

“I won’t. I promise.” Another stab of pain knifed through my chest.

The embers flared in his eyes for a moment before disappearing altogether. The thick swirling oil dark and mercurial. If the eyes were the doorway to the soul, then I wondered if his emotions played through the darkness with the varying flashes of fire. The stronger his emotions, the brighter the fire.

“Apollo,” he said softly. “My name is Apollo.”

I traced my thumb over his bottom lip and smiled softly. “Thank you. It’s lovely to meet you Apollo.”

And then, for the second time that day, my world faded to black.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Rook

“What the fuck happened?” Hades said, his voice barely above a whisper.

You knew he was pissed when his eyes were as bright as the fires of Tartarus, but his voice was calm and quiet. It was fucking scary. And we’d fucked up. Not only had I had a momentary lapse in judgement and fed on Raevyn, but she’d also somehow managed to disappear into an impenetrable prison cell. Oh, and he’d found out about the shredded soul of Nissa Crowley.

To say we were in deep shit probably didn’t even begin to cover it.

“We didn’t expect the complications we encountered,” Korbin said, his voice steady.

“This is worse than ‘complications’ Korbin. It’s an unmitigated disaster.” Hades steepled his hands in front of his face. “Explain everything.”

Korbin walked Hades through everything that had happened, including the conversation he’d had with Raevyn’s mother. That was certainly interesting to hear. Could it be possible that she’s not actually dead? She was definitely stabbed through the heart, so something happened… but what?

“She stopped time?” Hades asked perplexed.

“Not stopped, just slowed,” Hawk replied carefully, clearly getting the memo not to piss the God off even more. Who knew Hawk could be so sensible?

Hades straightened his spine with a jerk. “But that’s not possible.”

“It’s not?” I asked. “Why?

“Because there is only one person that I know with that type of power, and he’s been exiled.”

I looked to the others, and they all gave me blank faces in return. I didn’t know of any God or Goddess, alive or dead, who could control time.

Hades walked over to his overly large kingdom viewing window and clenched his hands behind his back. I felt a twinge of something like sympathy for him in that moment. It must be a burden running a kingdom with no one to share it with. I at least had my fellow Revenants to talk to when things got tough but who did he have?

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