Page 258 of Bonds of Hercules
“We’re sorry we couldn’t be there for you this morning,” Augustus spoke slowly. “They must have drugged us at the symposium. When we woke up, you were fighting already—we tried to leap through the electric dome—guards stopped us.”
That was why they looked so awful, why I’d woken up with aching limbs.
“We’re sorry we failed you,” Kharon said with anguish. “This is all our fault.”
Tears fell faster and I staggered into one of them. They righted me and I pulled away.
With my right eye swollen, I was fully blind.
I spread my arms wide again. “Just fight me!” I pleaded. “Just get it over with.Please.I love you—Ican’tdo this.”
Calloused fingers gently touched my face, restrained by manacles—I startled, not realizing he’d gotten so close.
“Alexis. Why are you acting like— Your left eye seems fine …” Augustus trailed off, air whistling through teeth.
He stilled.
A new sharpness expanded between us.
“No,” Augustus said shakily.
“What is it?” Kharon asked, his voice getting louder as he neared.
Augustus didn’t speak. His thumb burned where it traced against my skin. The pungent scent of ozone stained the air, as if lightning had struck.
“It’son the same side as your …” Augustus’s voice trailed off.
Ear.
Kharon stepped closer so all three of us stood chest to chest. “What are you talking about? What’s going on? Someoneexplain.”
My tears stopped falling—a fragment of vision came back—Augustus was staring down at me like he’d seen a ghost.
“She’s—” Augustus’s breath hitched. “Partially blind.”
“What?” Kharon stepped back, shaking his head, cuffs rattling. “No, that … that can’t …that can’t be. We would have known if—”
“It’s true.”
My voice sounded far away, like it belonged to someone else.
Neither man moved.
The stadium echoed with murmurs of confusion and shouts for violence.
Kharon lunged forward, his face hovering in front of mine, close enough I could see the silver flecks in his eyes.
“WHY?” he screamed, then his voice dropped to a barely there whisper. “Why … didn’t you tell us that your left eye was …blind?”
“Because—” I cleared my throat. “I’m okay.”
They looked at me with horror.
“I survived,” I said, needing them tounderstand.
The crowd started shouting slurs, turning violent as they demanded the action we weren’t giving them.
Kharon pressed his trembling lips to my forehead.
