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We’d onlyjustgotten a reprieve. The sun had only been shining again for a day after nearly a week of darkness. And now the sky was on fire. It was relentless.
“It’s not chasing us,” I gasped, struggling for air and slowing my steps slightly.
“I’m not taking any chances,” Dare replied, sounding just as out of breath as I was. Milos was all but herding us toward Eirene’s house, running circles around us and barking in encouragement. “It has giant bat wings, Grace. It could just be letting us run for entertainment before swooping down and eating us in two seconds flat.”
Logically, I knew that he was right, but there was something about the creature that made me want to reach out and check that it was okay.
Less than a mile from Eirene’s house, Milos skidded to a stop, falling completely silent. After her constant chorus of warning barks, the quiet was eerie.
“What is it, girl?” Dare asked in a low, placating voice, stumbling to a stop. He reached for Milos carefully, running his fingers through her thick fur.
I was no expert in canine body language, but if I had to guess, Milos looked kind of… sad? She tipped her head up to the sky after a moment, letting out a mournful howl that I felt all the way down to my bones.
“Eirene,” I whispered, taking off at a sprint. Suddenly, the fiery sky overhead didn’t seem like the most pressing issue.
The others were catching up, and I took the lead this time, shoving my shoulder against the gate to knock it open and running for the house.
“Grace!” Dare yelled, snagging the back of my coat and hauling me against his body before I could get to the front door. “Stop, stop, you need to stop. Let me go in first, okay?”
He moved fast enough that I didn’t bother arguing with him, silently pushing open the door and stepping into the dimly lit living room. Milos rushed past, heading straight for Eirene.
She was sitting in the armchair, looking as she did the first night when she’d fallen asleep there next to the fire. The tension in her face was relaxed in rest, even if the sadness and exhaustion from the recent loss of all her bonded were still present in her features. Just like last time.
Except this time, she wasn’t breathing.
Milos’ claws clicked on the hard floor as she crossed the room, curling up at Eirene’s feet and letting out a series of soft whines that broke my heart.
“This is your friend?” Vasileios asked quietly, stepping through the door behind us. Dare wrapped his arms around my shoulders, hugging me tightly.
“Yes,” I rasped. “Her name is Eirene. She’s the custodian of the agathos temple. She… she took us in.” I couldn’t bring myself to use past tense. In the back of my mind, I’d suspected this was coming. Suspected that the Fates could not be so cruel as to keep Eirene here in the upperworld for years after all of her bonded had been called to the afterlife. But there was no real preparing for death, was there? Even if she’d been sick, laying in a hospital bed with a clock running down until the final moment,thismoment would have still been agony, filled with what if’s and all the things I wished I could have said.
“Eirene was kind to us,” Dare murmured. “Her bonded are all in the underworld, she’ll see them all again now.”
Yes. Yes, that was a nice thought. Eirene would be happier there than here, alone, in a world that grew more confusing by the day. It was hard forusto say goodbye, but Eirene was leaving the fear and uncertainty and grief she’d experienced in this life behind.
Dare looked over his shoulder through the open door, the worry clear on his face. I could see Ovie and Fox, two of the daimons who’d traveled here with Vasileios, standing guard in the doorway, keeping a watch out for the beast we’d just run from, but there was no sign of it. The fiery orange sky had faded back to blue, and the world was quiet and still again, as if the monster had never appeared. As if, just a few miles away, there wasn’t an enormous hole in the ground that led directly to the deepest, darkest, most treacherous realm in existence.
Was this split second of peace what it felt like to be in the eye of a hurricane?
“We have to give her a proper burial,” I said forcefully, giving Dare’s forearms a light squeeze.
“I know,” Dare sighed, resigned. “And we will. It’s the least we can do. But there’s a literal monster on the loose; I don’t think we should hang around here for any longer than we have to.”
“I’m not leaving.” I knew I sounded stubborn, but I couldn’t help myself. “Dare, I can’t. Aside from the fact that the pit is the only way to Tartarus, we need to be close by in case Riot and Wild come looking for us.”
“Wherever Wild and Riot are, they wouldn’t want you at risk, Grace. Keeping you safe is everyone’s top priority.”
There was a sense ofsomethingsimmeringin my chest, ready to bubble over. Something I was struggling to identify.
Maybe it washelplessness. My entire life, I’d been stuck dancing to someone else’s tune, trying to find ways to cope within the confines that had been set for me as best I could. That feeling was magnified by a thousand now. I’d had all these titles, all these responsibilities, foisted upon me and yet I felt entirely helpless to protect any of the people I cared about.
“Can you give us a minute?” I asked Vasileios with a tight smile, disentangling myself from Dare’s embrace and pulling him toward the kitchen by the hand.
“I’m not trying to upset you, Grace—”
“I know.” I dropped his hand, turning to face him. “But you are coddling me, and you can’t. You’ve all always taken such good care of me, but we don’t have that luxury anymore.”
Dare snorted. “Good luck trying to get us to stop, Grace.”
