Mortal Gods

  But no matter how her teeth threatened to chatter, she kept her voice calm. Cassandra was still afraid.

  “That’s good,” Athena said. “Good. Don’t worry about direction. I can feel the current now. It’s taking us.”

  Cassandra nodded, and Athena realized she could see her outside of the flashlight beam. The dark wasn’t so complete. The current grew stronger against her fingers, and she detected a hint of warmth, separate from the steady stream of blood pulsing from her palm.

  “Athena? I think it’s working.”

  Light came up slowly, light the likes of which only existed in one place. Orange and rosy red at once, it cast no shadows. The light of the underworld. Athena pulled her hand out of the water: a sad, pale, empty thing that throbbed and ached. She wiped it on her jeans and balled it into a fist.

  “Here.” Cassandra nudged her and handed her a long white sock. “For your hand. And it’s not off my foot; it’s out of my bag.”

  “Thanks.” Athena tied it around her palm. “We’re almost there.” Banks of black rocks and sand appeared on both sides of the broad waterway. She almost told Cassandra not to look up. The expanse over their heads would make her dizzy to the point of vomiting. But it was better not to. If she told Cassandra not to do it, she’d do it for sure.

  “What river are we on?” Cassandra asked. “Acheron, or Styx?”

  Acheron or Styx. The river of pain or the river of hate. Not much to choose from, but no rivers of dancing ponies led into the underworld. Athena leaned over the side and scooped up water. She pushed it into her mouth, swished it around, and spat.

  “Styx.” She spat again.

  “How do you know?”

  “Don’t you know what hate tastes like?” She glanced back. Cassandra’s face darkened. Silly question. She knew better than most people. “I’m sorry,” Athena said. “It’s making my voice harsh.” She spat more. “Don’t drink it. Don’t even smell it.”

  Below them and on all sides, the Styx glittered like a malevolent jewel. Achilles’ mother had dipped him in up to his heel to make him a killer of men, to make him invincible. The lengths of a mother’s love. Athena supposed it had worked. But it was difficult to imagine dunking an infant into so much hateful water.

  Behind her, Cassandra looked from shore to shore with fearful fascination.

  “Where do we go? It all looks the same. Which side is the one we want?”

  “Probably best to ask the dog,” Athena said.

  Cassandra frowned. “Cerberus?”

  “Ding, ding, ding! Ten points for the princess of Troy.”

  “Is this the river of hate, or the river of smartass?”

  “Sorry,” said Athena. “Let’s just hope Hades’ three-headed Fido is still alive and kicking.”

  Athena put her fingers to her lips and whistled. After a few seconds of tense silence, Cerberus howled back. Twice.

  Twice?

  They waited, but no third howl followed. Then the river turned and they saw why, as he bounded down the bank.

  Two of his heads were alive and well. The third was not. It dangled from his black shoulder, a grotesque marionette of bloodstained bone and sinew that rattled as he pawed the sand.

  “Land the boat,” Athena said.

  “Where? Near that?”

  “He’s not a ‘that.’ He’s a dog.” She pointed toward him again, and Cassandra reluctantly maneuvered the boat toward shore.

  “Dog,” Cassandra muttered. “He’s the size of an elk.”

  And a large elk at that. Cerberus was two thousand pounds of muscle and shining black fur, with fangs just a size too large for his mouth.

  “He doesn’t seem dangerous,” said Athena. “His tail’s wagging, for Pete’s sake.”

  “Yeah,” Cassandra said. “But wagging why? Maybe he’s happy to see us because it’s been a long time between meals.”

  The belly of the boat scraped against the rock and sand bed of the river. Athena used the other oar to push them in hard, and wedged the bow in deep. As they landed, Cerberus stayed back, watching with alert black eyes in both heads, tail still wagging softly.

  “Cerberus.” Athena held one hand out and slipped her other, sock-wrapped hand into her pocket, for her knife. Just in case. The dog’s heads bobbed and licked their jaws. If he decided to bite with both sets of teeth, she’d lose most of an arm.

  “Well,” she said, “will you sniff? Or strike?”

  He did neither. The left head darted forward and ducked under her hand. She grinned and let go of the knife to pet the other head.

  “Is it safe for me, too?” Cassandra asked.

  “I should think so.” Athena scratched Cerberus’ ears as Cassandra got out of the boat, careful to keep her feet dry. In seconds she was also stroking and patting the dog’s massive shoulder.

  “He’s sort of … monstrously cute.” Cassandra leaned away from his teeth and looked at the fallen head, lying limp and furless in a string of bones. “That’s either disgusting or the saddest thing I’ve ever seen.”

  Maybe it was both. Athena couldn’t help noticing the meticulous cleanliness of the bones, as if they’d been picked clean of meat, skin, and fur. She looked at the remaining heads suspiciously, but he was a dog. That was what dogs did.

  She turned the left head back and forth. The fur was smooth and the eyes bright, the gums and tongue pink and wet. The middle head looked much the same, except for a little cloudiness in one of the eyes. Even sadder than the thought of two heads eating the remains of the third was the thought of one head, the last head, doing it alone.

  “Is he going to die, too?” Cassandra asked.

  “Not after we take back Olympus,” said Athena. “I’ve always liked Cerberus. And who knows? He’s Hades’ dog, the dog of the lord of the dead. Maybe this is as far as it goes for him.” She scratched his chins thoughtfully. “One dead head.”

  “This is … interesting and everything,” Cassandra said. “But what now? Where is Aidan?”

  Athena patted both heads and tried to look into both sets of eyes.

  “Cerberus. Be a good boy and take us to Mommy and Daddy.”

  24

  CORPSE ROYALTY

  They walked behind the massive black dog through the caverns of the Underworld to the gates of Hades. Cassandra barely blinked, taking in the mass and fire of the place. The starkness of it, the lack of change. She had thought that it would smell like decay or sulfur, that there’d be tiny, dancing demons. But the only smell was the faint metallic scent of the river behind them.

  The underworld. So few living mortals had seen it. She couldn’t believe she wanted to be there.

  She walked closer to Athena, who was as usual solid and steady as stone, and so familiar compared to everything else. She wanted to take Athena’s arm. But of course she didn’t actually do it.

  “Where are the dead?” she asked. “Where’s Aidan?” She tried not to sound so disappointed. But her heart had hoped she’d be able to sense him the moment they arrived. Her foolish heart had hoped he’d be there to meet the boat.

  “They’re everywhere and nowhere,” said Athena. “They barely exist unless someone has need of them. Like dusty books in a boarded-up library. Like stuffing in the walls.”

  Cassandra stopped in her tracks. She didn’t want to see him that way. A shade, no more substantial than a hologram.

  Athena touched her shoulder.

  “I didn’t mean that’s what happened to Aidan,” she said. “He’s my brother. He’s different. To get him out, we first need to speak to Hades. My uncle. This is his turf, and you don’t take anything without permission.”

  “Will he give us permission?”

  “For a price, maybe.”

  “And if he doesn’t?” she asked.

  “I’ll figure something out. We won’t leave here without him, unless…” Athena slowed.

  “Unless what?”

  “I don’t know what a dead god is like, Cassandra. He could be awful. A mon
ster. Or worse. We’re close now,” she said. “But we can still turn back.”

  Cassandra stared at Cerberus’ massive heads and at the dark tunnel before them. A monster. Or worse. If she looked into Aidan’s eyes and didn’t see him, she didn’t know what she’d do.

  “No,” she said. “It’s worth it, whatever the answers. It has to be.”

  Cerberus barked and darted around a corner. Athena put her arm out protectively.

  “Whatever we find, don’t be scared,” Athena said. “He might be fine. Maybe it won’t be just me protecting you here, but both of us.”

  It was a nice thought.

  They turned the corner.

  Cerberus stood with both heads bowed before a young dead woman, her profile gray, her yellow hair dry as straw. A black dress, dusted with her own decay, hung from her bony frame. She turned to greet them, and Cassandra almost yelped.

  One half of her was dead. The other was rotten. Rotten and run through with small rips and tears from flesh that had swollen, burst, and receded again. Her left eye was clear and bloodless. Her right was yellow, milky, and softening. Most of her hair had fallen out on the right side, and most of the scalp skin had gone with it.

  “It’s been a long time, sister-cousin,” the dead woman said. Her black tongue moved across her lips.

  “It has, Persephone,” said Athena.

  Persephone. The goddess of the underworld, who was once so beautiful that all gods wooed her. So beautiful that Hades kidnapped her to be his eternal bride.

  “May I offer you something to eat or drink?” Persephone gestured behind her, to a golden table piled with sweet fruit and roasted meat, golden chalices filled with sparkling liquid. Cassandra hadn’t noticed it before, too distracted by the horror in front of them.

  Or perhaps it just hadn’t been there. The scent of the food and particularly the drink drifted toward their noses, the first real smells since they’d arrived. All at once she was parched and starving. Athena gripped her arm.

  “Not a good idea,” she said out of the corner of her mouth. She nodded politely at Persephone.

  “You may offer, cousin. But we must refuse. We’re here to visit, not to stay.”

  Persephone smiled. Or she mostly smiled. The rotted side of her mouth refused to obey. It stretched and tore instead. Cassandra stifled a heave.

  “Tell me,” Persephone asked, “what news of my brothers and sisters?”

  Athena shrugged. “Dying. Or killing each other. Where is my uncle? Your husband, Hades?”

  “Venice, last I heard,” Persephone said. “But he could be anywhere, in any city rife with decay. Rife with disease and rot. He has forever been a collector, you know, of dead things and pestilence. He keeps massive houses all over the world, stockpiled with powdered poisons and plague victims in jars. All manner of freak and fancy, every abomination and flesh-eating bacteria. Each one is a treasure in petri dishes and formaldehyde. Precious as leaves pressed in a book.”

  “Is he well?” Athena asked. “Is he ailing?”

  “He may be ailing, but he isn’t dead. If he were, you would know. He’d have exploded in a cloud of viruses. A city would lie dead around him. One last tribute.” Persephone touched her hair, and it fell out onto the ground. “Hades doesn’t come here for me anymore, Athena. In case you hadn’t noticed, I’m not the golden flower he once plucked from my mother’s grasp.”

  “The god of death understands decay,” Athena replied. “Your dead half was always his favorite.”

  “We’ll see when I fade further. When I am one half bone and dust.” She toyed with Cerberus’ dead head. Her fingers twisted the bones like the heavy jewels of a necklace. “How is my mother?”

  “Missing you. She mourns your passing.”

  “I’m sorry for that. My last summer above was four years ago. Since then I’ve been too dead to move with the spring.”

  “But you won’t be apart long,” Cassandra blurted, and Persephone’s dead eyes settled on her face. “When Demeter … dies … you’ll see her again. You’ll be together again.”

  Persephone looked from Cassandra to Athena with a mix of amusement and hunger. She stepped away from Cerberus and walked closer. “Why have you come?”

  “We’ve come for—”

  “Aidan! Apollo. Your cousin,” Cassandra blurted again. Athena pursed her lips, but Cassandra couldn’t help it. He was here. So close.

  “My cousin,” Persephone said. Her black tongue rolled in her mouth, dry and granular in the quiet. “Have you paid the fare?”

  “I paid it,” Athena said. “She doesn’t have to pay.”

  Persephone’s head twitched, so much like a zombie that Cassandra was sure she’d charge them any minute, biting.

  “I make the rules here, cousin,” Persephone said. “And a little blood is not too much to ask.”

  “Back off, Persephone.”

  “How much blood?” Cassandra asked. She held her hand out for Athena’s knife. “How much to pay his passage back?”

  “Cassandra, don’t,” Athena said, but Persephone started to laugh.

  “His passage back?” She cackled. “You can’t take him back! He’s dead. This is his home!”

  “Mortals have left here before,” Athena said. “Surely a god is allowed special favors.”

  Persephone licked her lips, her eyes marking the path of Cassandra’s veins.

  “Pay the fare,” she said. “Perhaps there will be special favors.”

  “Give me the knife, Athena.” Cassandra held her hand out, but Athena didn’t move. She only stared deep into Persephone’s eyes.

  “He’s not here,” Athena said.

  “No,” said Cassandra. “He has to be. Where else would he go?”

  “Where dead gods go,” Athena said. “No one knows. Including her.”

  Persephone slid toward them, her rotten eyes so wide they threatened to fall out.

  “No, no,” she hissed. “He is here. He is. Let me taste the girl, and you’ll see. Let me drain the girl, and I’ll bring him.”

  The idea of those teeth on her skin, of that dead girl anywhere near her, was terrifying. But it was for Aidan. She’d do it for Aidan.

  “It’s okay, Athena,” she said.

  “It would be,” the goddess agreed. “If she wasn’t lying.”

  “You don’t know that,” Cassandra said. She tried to tug the knife closer, but it was useless. She pulled on Athena’s arm, and her feet skidded in the dirt. “Just let me have it!”

  “Wait,” Athena said gently. “Persephone. What’s his last name?”

  Persephone’s head twitched to the side.

  “Apollo has no last name. He is Apollo. Sun-lord.”

  “And he uses a last name now. Like you must’ve done, during your time above. So what is it?”

  “He hasn’t said.”

  “Go ask,” said Athena. “We’ll wait.”

  Cassandra let go of Athena as Persephone trembled. She didn’t know. She couldn’t ask. He wasn’t here. Cassandra’s heart fell down hard and took her body with it.

  * * *

  Athena tried to catch Cassandra as she crumpled, but the girl hit the ground.

  “Dammit.” Athena scowled at her cousin. “Where is he? Is he not here? Tell the truth! I’ll pay your stupid fare.” She tore the sock off her hand and used the knife to cut through the clots. Blood ran into the dirt. Cerberus sniffed the air.

  “I don’t want your filth,” Persephone said. “Vile blood, infested with feathers.”

  “Well, it’s what you get. You certainly don’t get Cassandra. You don’t even get my snake.” She reached into Cassandra’s backpack and uncapped the honey. It flowed into her palm and pooled with her blood, sweet and golden with salty and red. She drew back and threw the whole mix into Persephone’s face.

  “Tell the truth!” she shouted.

  Persephone grimaced and growled, but her black tongue stole out and licked the mess from her cheeks in spite of herself.

&nbs
p; “He is not here,” she said after she’d swallowed. “He never was.”

  “If you’re lying, I’ll slice you down the middle. Dead half separate from deader half.” Athena stepped in front of Cassandra where she’d buckled, her hands dangling in the dirt.

  “Why would I lie?” Persephone asked. “And if he were here, do you think I could control him?”

  “Where is he, then? Where are they? Where do they go?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Athena jumped forward and brought the knife against Persephone’s throat. The dead goddess’s gray skin parted like paper but didn’t bleed.

  “Queen of the dead, and you don’t know? You’re lying. Down!” she shouted at Cerberus, who growled. “Why are you here and they aren’t? They have to be here.”

  “I’m here because I’m tied to this place. I have been since Hades took me from the autumn. I’m here because I’m dead, but I’m not finished dying.” Persephone pushed her throat farther onto the blade and showed teeth smeared red with Athena’s blood. Her hands shoved against Athena’s chest and sent her flying backward. Athena stumbled over a stone and landed on her hip in the dirt beside Cassandra.

  She scrambled onto her feet and crouched. Persephone’s hands against her ribs and sternum hadn’t felt like dead hands, or even dying hands. They were elastic, hard, and fast. Cerberus had both sets of hackles raised beside his mistress. And Cassandra had collapsed slack, in no shape to run or fight.

  But Persephone didn’t advance. The black dress hung on her bones like a sack, and she sighed.

  “I wish they were here,” she said. “I felt it when he died his mortal’s death. And I dreamed of Artemis set upon by dogs. Torn to pieces. Her screams echoed off these walls. We smelled her blood soak into this dirt. But she never came.” She looked at Athena. “I’ll wait for you, too, when Hera crushes your bones. But you won’t come, either. I’ll be here, alone with my rotting dog, until this place fades. Or perhaps until Hades coughs his final plague.

  “Get out. Take her back where she came from. Offer her some comfort.”

  Athena’s hands balled into fists.