Page 103 of Hades' Shadow
The vision of my mother in Elysium flits across my mind and I shake my head.
No, I can’t afford to think about her being here. I can’t bring her back with me and I can’t stay here so there’s no point in dwelling on it.
“C’mon, Jayden, almost there,” I whisper.
There’s only a small amount of the magic left on his arms. He just needs to hold on a few minutes longer. He just needs to push himself a little harder.
With a determined scream, Jayden pulls the rest of the magic from his arms and it slithers beneath his skin with a hiss.
“That was kind of creepy.” I grimace as Jayden falls on his back, breathing heavily.
“Try feeling magic slithering underneath your skin,” Jayden says. “That sucked major ass.”
Raven giggles. “No, it sucked magic.”
I glare at her and roll my eyes. “That isn’t funny, Raven.”
“I thought it was hilarious.” She grins.
If she hadn’t just been unconscious and had evil magic sucked out of her, I would smack her right now.
“Jayden, are you okay? We should probably move.” I tap him on the shoulder and he groans.
“Yeah, just a second,” he mumbles.
I sit back on my heels and wait for the two of them to be ready to move. There could be demons anywhere, but I can’t ask Raven and Jayden to move when they are so weak.
“What about you, Raven?’ I ask, eyeing her warily.
Her skin is still pale but my friend’s attitude is securely in place.
“I had the life sucked out of me; what do you think?” Raven says with a scowl.
Jayden shakes his head. “C’mon, smart-ass. You have had longer to recover than I have.”
Jayden sits up and gingerly moves to stand.
Raven gets up too but sticks her tongue out at Jayden.
Good, they are both acting like themselves. I hate not being the one to sacrifice for my friends and watching them suffer.
Heracles holds out a hand and helps me up from the ground.
“You are a daughter of Zeus?” Heracles asks as we follow Theseus.
“Yes, I am the only living child of Zeus,” I answer.
Heracles nods. “You are very brave little half sister.”
“Hades asked me to come help him. It will be bad for the world if the Titans are freed because the underworld is weakening.” I glance up at Heracles.
No one ever said that I was great with taking compliments. Heracles is my half brother, but he accomplished much more in his life than I have and the praise feels misplaced.
“And you are humble.” Heracles chuckles.
“It’s not so much bravery as it is knowing there is something more important than fear.” I kick a pebble away from my shoe.
It’s one of my favorite quotes and I know in my heart that if there is something I can do to stop total destruction, then I will do everything I can to stop it.
