Page 142 of Hades

Brock’s hand found mine. Squeezed.

“What the fuck was that?” he whispered.

“That’s what happens every year.” My voice came out flat. Resigned. “She transforms during Harvest Week. Acts like a different person. Then the festival ends and she goes back to her recliner like nothing happened.”

“And you don’t know why?”

“No.” I looked at him. “I’ve tried asking. She won’t tell me. So I’ve learned to just... accept it.”

His jaw tightened. “I don’t like it.”

“Neither do I.” I squeezed his hand back. “But I don’t know what else to do.”

We stood there in the hallway, weighted down by five years of unanswered questions.

And I knew, with absolute certainty, that whatever this was, it mattered to my mother in ways I would never fully understand.

That night, I couldn’t sleep.

I lay in bed next to Brock, my face pressed into his chest. His heartbeat was steady beneath my ear; his arm locked around me, even in sleep. Even unconscious, he held me like I might disappear.

The irony wasn’t lost on me.

I’d spent years being untouchable. Alone. Safe in my isolation because there was nothing to take from me. No leverage. No weakness.

Now I had this. Him. The weight of his body beside mine. The warmth of his skin. The knowledge that if someone wanted to hurt me, they had a roadmap written in his flesh.

My mother knew it. I could see it in her eyes during those moments when her mask slipped. She understood that I was vulnerable now in ways I’d never been before.

I carefully extracted myself from his arms, moving slowly so I wouldn’t wake him. He stirred, his hand reaching for where I’d been, but he didn’t wake. I slipped out of bed and padded downstairs in bare feet, moving quietly through the dark house.

Cerberus lifted his head from his bed in the kitchen.

“Can’t sleep either?” I whispered.

He stood and followed me to the back door. I let us both out onto the porch.

The night air was cool. Crisp. The kind of air that smelled like autumn and change. Like something ending and something else beginning.

I sat on the steps. Cerberus settled beside me, his massive body warm against my leg.

“Something’s coming,” I told him.

He huffed.

“I know. I just wish I knew what.”

The stars were bright. Clear. Indifferent to my fear.

I thought about all the people I’d killed. All the poison I’d administered. All the lives I’d ended. I’d never felt guilty about any of it. They deserved what they got. The universe didn’t punish people like me, because people like me were already living in punishment.

But now, sitting in the dark with my dog and my fear, I wondered if this was karma. If the universe was finally coming to collect. If my mother was the instrument of that collection.

I didn’t believe in karma. Didn’t believe in cosmic justice.

But I believed in consequences.

And I’d been avoiding mine for five years.