The Immortal Fire

  “And what is that he has?”

  “That, my love,” said Zeus, sounding pleased with himself, “is the sacred fire. See, I finally found it!”

  Charlotte was staring upward, blinking. Zee’s heart was spinning in his chest; he did not want her here, did not want her in danger, and yet—he realized with a stab of guilt—he could not help a feeling of great relief. They were better off together; that much he had learned.

  Hera was staring at the lighter in shock and disbelief.

  “Were they going to use it?” she whispered.

  “I believe so.”

  “This is your fault,” she said in a low, cold voice. “I’ve been telling you and telling you, and you would not listen. Do you see what happens?”

  “I told you to stop nagging!” said Zeus. “I’m in charge!” He turned to Zee and said, “The child was about to tell me where he got it when you so rudely interrupted.”

  This was where he was supposed to stonewall, of course. Zeus could threaten him, do whatever he wanted, but Zee would never give up the name of the goddess who had led them, manipulated them, nearly let Charlotte go to her death, abandoned Zee to his fate….

  Oh, wait…

  Persephone, it was on the tip of his tongue to say. She used them for her own revenge? Well, let Zeus deal with her, and then perhaps she might regret having played with them like pawns. She just left Zee there, saying, what? The Dead need me.

  The Dead need me.

  Zee stopped. Did Persephone, in all her lust for revenge, care for the Dead, too? Did she feel sorry for them, trapped there as she was?

  “No one sent us,” Zee said. “We read about it in a book and then we found it.”

  “You’re lying, mortal,” said Hera with a sneer.

  Charlotte was sitting up now, still blinking rapidly, but looking from Zee to the pair of gods. Their eyes met. There was a huge gash on her face that made him sick to look at.

  “Tell them the truth, Zee,” Charlotte said, her voice weak and pained.

  He stared at her. What was she getting at? Her eyes were trying to communicate something to him, but he could not tell what.

  “It was Cronus,” Charlotte announced.

  “Charlotte,” said Zee quickly, “don’t tell!” He didn’t know what she was doing, but he would play along. That was what they did, they worked together.

  “We have to!” said Charlotte. “He’ll kill us!” She looked back to the gods. “Your daddy’s coming. He wants his universe back. And the mortals are going to help. It’s not like they have any loyalty to you.”

  Zee understood. They were going to bargain, that was it. They would pretend they had the power to speak for all of humanity—and the power to sway them. Charlotte was going to talk the two of them out of this.

  “Ridiculous,” said Zeus. “We defeated the Titans before. We are stronger. Hades has his helmet, I have my lightning bolt.”

  “And the trident?” Charlotte finished pointedly.

  There was a moment of silence, then rage crossed over Zeus’s face. “Where is it?” he spat. “What did you do with it?”

  “We gave it to Cronus,” Charlotte said. “When we went to see him under the Earth. The Titans are metalworkers, aren’t they? He said they’d be able to use it.”

  Hera was looking from the cousins back to Zeus. Zeus was studying them both. “I don’t believe you,” he said slowly. “If Cronus was coming, he would not use mortals. You have no one coming for you. You have no one to help you. You are all alone, and you are nothing.”

  Hera straightened. “Sweetie,” she said, her voice oozing, “these mortals have invaded the Underworld, the Sea, and now Olympus. They have brought the sacred fire that Prometheus stole from us in order to destroy what we have built. Only you are discerning and just enough to come up with the right thing to do.”

  Zeus nodded slowly. “Yes, yes. That is true.”

  “Well,” she said, “I’ll leave you to it, O wise one.” And she turned and floated out of the room.

  Zee and Charlotte exchanged a panicked look. Zeus turned on them.

  “She was being sarcastic,” Charlotte said, her cheeks flushed. “Trust me. The gods all think you’re stupid. They think you can be manipulated. I heard them.” Zee shot her a look. This might not be the time for Charlotte’s temper.

  Zeus straightened. “Mortals,” he said disdainfully, “do you know what separates you from a mangy dog?”

  Charlotte tossed her hair. “Not being mangy?” Zee closed his eyes. He really needed to have a talk with her.

  “This fire,” Zeus said, reaching for the lighter. As Zee watched, the god grabbed the lighter from his hand. When it touched Zeus’s flesh, his eyes went black and a flash of pain crossed his face. But he squeezed his hand around the lighter and did not let go. “This simple fire. If Prometheus had not given it to you, you would be animals, stupid and dirty. Quite an insubstantial thing that keeps you from crawling on the floor, barking and whimpering, isn’t it?” He pressed down the button, and the Flame shot up. “Except dogs were better than you, dogs have fur and sharp teeth and could hunt and survive. Humans had nothing. Humans would have gone extinct in the blink of an eye.”

  “And you didn’t care,” Charlotte said coldly.

  “No. Why should I care?”

  “You’re awful!”

  “Mortal, do you know how many species have gone extinct? I didn’t cry over the dodo bird or the spectacled cormorant, did I? And they could fly!”

  “But—”

  “And what about you? I didn’t see you fighting to save the Western black rhinoceros. And what about the polar bears? Stopped using cars and air-conditioning, have you?” He raised his eyebrows. “You do not understand anything. You are nothing. You could not march up here and seek to take me on. There is a way to the Universe. Now, mortals”—Zeus took a step back and appraised them—“it is time for justice. You two have declared war on the gods with your actions.” As he talked, Zeus strode over to one of the crystal walls and placed his hand on it. The wall disappeared to reveal bright blue sky. Out of the corner of his eye, Zee noticed a small bird floating in above Zeus’s head, but he was too focused on the terrible god to process it.

  “What would you have me do?” Zeus continued. “Another flood? How about a plague this time? Or a great fire sweeping through the Earth?”

  “Huh?” Zee and Charlotte said together.

  “You may choose,” said Zeus with a smirk. “That is what you mortals like, right? Choice? Choose the method of humanity’s destruction.”

  The words took some time to make their way into the cousins’ minds, to take shape, to blossom into meaning. And even then, they hung there for a few moments, inert, as Charlotte and Zee refused to see them for what they were. It could not be. It could not be.

  Zeus took a step toward them, his eyes terrible. “You do not think I would let humanity live, do you? You two know your history, you know what happens when mortals are given the gods’ sacred fire. You must have known this would happen.”

  “No!” Zee didn’t even know which one of them had shrieked it. Charlotte stumbled backward as if she had been hit.

  “I gave you one more chance!” Zeus said.

  “What?” Zee exclaimed.

  “I did!” Zeus insisted. “Hera wanted me to destroy humanity when you disrespected my brother, but I said, no, no, they have one more chance.”

  “You didn’t tell us that!” yelled Zee.

  “Really, it’s only just. And it is your own fault,” Zeus said, clearly enjoying himself. “In fact, I think I will keep you two alive so you can see what you have done. You can wander around the Earth all alone, with no one but the polar bears to keep you company. I’m sure they’ll be grateful for all you’ve done for them.”

  Panic choked Zee, and he could not breathe. Charlotte yelled and ran at Zeus, fists flailing. Zeus smirked before swinging his thunderbolt, hitting her with the flat of the blade. She let out an inhuman cry as
she was flung backward, and she landed in a heap on the floor. She did not move.

  Zeus smirked and went over to retrieve the thunderbolt. “Ah, mortal fortitude.” He turned to Zee, who was staring at his cousin in wide-eyed horror. “She’s alive,” Zeus said. “Don’t worry. There’s only so much pain the human body can take before it shuts down. Now…a plague, I think.” He gestured to the open sky. “I will send my thunderbolt down to Earth and spread plague around the whole planet. I think there should be some suffering, don’t you, after what you have done? It will be a terrible bother, but I think it’s worth it.”

  Zee could not breathe. He closed his eyes, trying to find the ability to make words. This was what the Prometheans had been saying. We’re trying to secure the fate of humanity, Mr. Metos had said. This boy has the fate of the world in his hands, Timon had said. They knew. They knew Zeus would do this. It was Steve, not the Flame, that was humanity’s last hope.

  Would you sacrifice one person for everyone?

  This was not real. This was a nightmare, and soon he would wake up and Mew would be sleeping on his chest and purring gently, and everything would be all right, and he would stroke the cat and feel the gentle peace of knowing that there was a creature next to him that was perfectly happy.

  In the silence of the next few moments, Zee could feel what it would be like, lying perfectly still, with the humming of the cat against his chest. That was peace, that was happiness.

  Before his grandmother died, so many long months ago, she said, I will watch over you. He would see her again. It would be all right.

  And then Zee opened his eyes. Everything was clear. “Why are you punishing the world for what I did?” he said in a low, calm voice.

  “Why not?” said Zeus, as if he legitimately did not understand the question. “You’re a mortal.” He held out one open hand. “Ergo…” He motioned with the other.

  “But just punish me.”

  Zeus blinked. “Punish you?”

  “Yes. Don’t punish everyone else. Kill me.”

  “Zachary Miller, would you give your life to save humankind?” Zeus looked curious, almost amused.

  “Yes, of course!” Of course. It was an easy choice. He could have died senselessly so many times over the past few months; at least now he would die for something.

  “Mortals,” Zeus said under his breath. He looked at Zee carefully, then strode over to where Charlotte lay.

  “Would you give hers?” he asked slowly.

  “W-what?”

  Zeus nudged Charlotte’s body with his foot, and she slid across the floor to the edge of the room, just in front of the open blue sky. One more inch and she would be over the edge.

  “You heard me. Would you give hers?”

  Zee took a step back. “No!”

  “Push her over the edge. That’s all I ask. I pledge right now on the River Styx that for the sacrifice of your cousin, I will not destroy humanity. That is your choice. Choose.”

  What Charlotte knew first was pain. Pain had colonized her entire body, so that she was no longer a creature of flesh, blood, and breath, but only of nerves and synapses.

  And silence. Absolute, eternal, desolate. There was nothing, no one, nothing.

  Then, from somewhere inside, somewhere among the nerves and synapses that were once Charlotte, came a humming noise. A melody. Someone was humming the saddest song Charlotte had ever heard.

  She could feel the melody under her skin, in her veins, settling into her heart for a long stay. Because suddenly she had skin, veins, and a heart again—she had eyes that teared up and lungs that gasped and arms that wrapped themselves around her chest.

  And still there was the song—so tragic, so beautiful, so fragile, so fleeting—and yet it was strong and clear, too, growing stronger every moment, asserting itself against the unyielding, everlasting silence. It would not, could not last, but for these few beautiful moments, it was here, present, for these few moments it had conquered the terrible quiet of everything.

  And the pain, too. The song was everything, stronger than the pain, better than it. She held on to each note like an old friend until the pain was gone.

  And then, quiet again. Charlotte found herself at the edge of a crystal cliff, surrounded by endless blue sky.

  She heard shouting, as if from far away, loud and urgent, so strange to hear shouting in such a beautiful place—

  Zeus was standing over her cousin, his face in a terrible smirk. Zee looked as if he was going to crack apart; the agony in his face made her lose her breath.

  “I can’t do that!” he said, his voice thick with horror.

  “No?” Zeus said. “You will not sacrifice your cousin for all of humanity? You would rather have the whole world die?”

  “I can’t,” Zee whispered, so quietly she could barely hear him.

  “Well, then,” said Zeus, lifting up his thunderbolt.

  A feeling of great warmth and peace came over Charlotte. And then she rolled off the edge of Olympus into the infinite blue.

  CHAPTER 30

  Forced Entry

  ON THE GREAT STAIRCASE UP TO OLYMPUS, ISADORA, the nymph of the Gate, sat feeling rather sorry for herself. After having spent a good couple of millennia not having to do any work at all, she had had to deal with two, count ’em, two mortals in the same day.

  It was a little much.

  Oh, she was tired. She hurt from the strands of her purple hair down to her purple tippy toes. In fact, as she sat she was fading slightly, less purple than blue-violet. And there was nothing she disliked more than being blue-violet. It was better not to try at all.

  It had taken her a long time to be such a brilliant, beautiful hue. You did not turn yourself into the world’s lushest, richest purple just by wishing it so—it took study, concentration, will. Other sky nymphs were content to be some ordinary, common shade of blue, but not Isadora. It took centuries of stealing from rainbows, bit by bit—sure the rainbows didn’t like it, but who in Hades were they? They weren’t sky nymphs, privileged with one of the most important jobs in the whole Universe—manning the doorways to Olympus, testing the mettle of any mortal who dared approach.

  And now she was going to have to start all over again.

  So bad was her mood, so tragic had been her day, that she was barely surprised when the cloud moat in front of her began to pulse. She muttered a few choice curses to herself and then waited.

  A boy burst through, a mortal boy, if you could believe that, dressed in the same ridiculous manner as the others had been, slightly older perhaps, but no less annoying. Isadora heaved her blue (barely) violet self upward and stood waiting.

  “You have business at Olympus?” Her voice was still beautiful at least. If clouds could speak—well, how boring would they be? But still, that is what they would sound like.

  “Um, yes, I guess so,” the boy said. He was looking all around, as if he could not believe where he was.

  If she had eyes, she would roll them. There were procedures, you know, there was a way this worked, and “Um, yes, I guess so,” was decidedly not it. She could feel herself turning red.

  “Could you state your business, please?” Moron.

  “Um,” said the boy, now gaping at her. “I guess I’m…here to meet my father.”

  Well, she’d heard that one a lot before, but not in a number of years.

  “Very well,” said the nymph, raising her hand. She was ready to plunge the mortal into a vision, something to test him, something to stop him, but as she readied the spell to sink him into his own mind, the cloud moat in front of her pulsed again. Once. Twice. Then it exploded.

  She gaped as little quivering pieces of cloud littered the staircase around her.

  “Hey!” she said, as out from the wreckage emerged someone who did not belong on the staircase at all.

  A red-eyed, overdressed half-breed, with skin a sickly shade of white—as if that was attractive.

  “You have business at Olympus?”


  “Yes,” said the half-breed. And then he poised something in his hands, something that was supposed to be missing, something that should not have been found, something he should not be able to use, except there he was, and there it was—

  A burst of light came out of it, toward her, and when it hit her she felt herself begin to dissipate like smoke in the wind, but in the millisecond before she did, she turned the most beautiful shade of purple the world had ever seen.

  CHAPTER 31

  An Unexpected Assist

  ZEE COULD NOT BREATHE. HE COULD NOT THINK. HE was stuck in time. He did not want to go forward, because if time moved, Charlotte would be falling, falling from Olympus, miles down to Earth, and if he could just keep everything perfectly still, she would still be floating in the bright blue sky, alive and well and full of Charlotte-ness.

  Zeus was staring too, his eyes wide and dull. His mouth hung open slightly, and he seemed as unable to move as Zee.

  “That was unexpected,” he said finally.

  And with Zeus’s words, time started again.

  A rush of feeling crashed into Zee, knocking him backward. It did not happen, no, no, it did not happen. The thoughts screamed themselves in his head, so loud as to let nothing else in. It could not happen like that—one moment Charlotte was there, the next she was falling to her death. It was a trick, a lie, a plan. She had a plan—that was Charlotte, his Charlotte, she always had a plan. A winged horse waiting to fly her away—that was it. Beautiful Pegasus with his angel-white wings waiting just under the missing wall, like in a movie. Charlotte knew what was going to happen, knew everything, had prepared. So clever, she was.

  She was still there; Charlotte was still there.

  Zeus continued to look out the window, his brow knit in puzzlement, as if he was thinking very hard and he was not used to the feeling. He shook his head.

  “I thought she hated people…. Hmmph.” Zeus shrugged, then turned on Zee and said cheerfully, “Well, too bad it was all for naught.” And he raised his thunderbolt again.

  No. No. Zee shook himself. He needed to focus now, there was no time, there was no time.