Page 2 of The Demigod

Anxiety.

This was anxiety.

It was the sweat that was soaking through my clothes.

It was the strangling sensation in my chest and throat.

It was the helplessness that was overtaking me.

“More,” I heard, but the speaker was nowhere to be seen. Just darkness and shadows around me in the lot.

I started to brace myself for more of the panic, but what I felt instead was this crushing, bottomless grief that welled up from some unknown depths and overtook me completely, battling with the anxiety, with the misery that was growing again.

It was all too much, too different, too strong to fight.

And the will to do so was vaporizing with each passing second.

“Ahh!” I screamed, my hands crushing my own skull.

“Take him,” the voice called again.

There were hands then.

Grabbing.

Pulling.

Grunting under my weight when the will to remain on my own feet evaporated.

“Silence him,” the voice said, only then making me aware of my own sounds. The wails of misery. The screams of pain. The pathetic whimpers of panic.

Then, with one hard blow to the back of my head, everything went beautifully, blissfully… black.

CHAPTER TWO

Nox

I wrapped the darkness more fully around me, cloaking me entirely. Shivering at the chill it brought with it, I forced myself out of my hiding space and moved slowly toward some heavy tree cover.

I had to remind myself not to rush, to be mindful of my steps.

One foot falling on a twig and the gig would be up.

They would hear. They would come to investigate. And they would find me.

The powers of a demigod were nothing compared to them.

And I wasn’t even a particularly good demigod, at that. No incredible strength like Heracles and Achilles. No cool wings or scales like Typhon.

I was just a normal girl who could fade into the night and make people really sleepy. And it all came at great personal cost.

So, yeah, I couldn’t be screwing up.

This was too important.

I took slow, careful breaths before stepping behind the tree trunk as wide as a giant’s torso, feeling a little of the panic slip away.

I was safe.

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