The cousins turned as one and began to run in the opposite direction. Charlotte was struck with the feeling that she was about to be sucked into the earth. Or worse.
She thought she was still screaming, but the world seemed absolutely silent all of a sudden. She could feel her feet running, but she wasn’t sure she was moving. All seemed strange and still. She knew, somehow, that if she looked behind her, the man-like men would still be standing, still smiling, just as close as they were before. The world was a lonely, terrible, cold place—and utterly silent.
Then, suddenly, a sound burst into the night—a loud motor, a squeal of tires, then a bright light. A car turned the corner and barreled down the street toward them. Charlotte and Zee ran toward it; Charlotte wanted to jump in front of it because getting hit by a car was surely better than what was about to happen to her.
She could hear her voice again and could feel her feet pounding against the pavement. She ran toward the car and heard her cousin doing the same. She didn’t know where the men were, and she didn’t want to look back to find out.
The car squealed to a stop right in front of them, the passenger door flew open, and a voice yelled, “Get in!”
Charlotte gasped. It was Mr. Metos.
CHAPTER 14
Mr. Metos Explains
it All
CHARLOTTE AND ZEE SAT SIDE BY SIDE IN THE passenger seat of Mr. Metos’s battered old sedan. Charlotte felt like her organs had been ripped from her body. Zee didn’t look much better.
“What were you kids doing outside?” Mr. Metos muttered. He didn’t sound like he wanted an answer.
It took Charlotte some time to regain power of thought. She sat huddled next to her cousin, who had his eyes closed and was slowly breathing in and out, as if to reassure himself that he still could.
They drove on in silence, block after block. Charlotte put her brain back in place, then her throat, then her heart and lungs, then her stomach. It took some time to untangle her intestines, which seemed to be intertwined with her kneecaps.
That done, Charlotte could focus on her immediate situation. She had a thousand questions. As in, what on Earth was Mr. Metos doing there, what were they doing in Mr. Metos’s car, and what in the world was going to happen to them now? Charlotte had a strange urge to open the door and run all the way home, grab Bartholomew, hide under the bed, and never ever, ever come out.
But then she would never find out the answers to these thousands of questions, and frankly, she really wanted to know, and besides, she didn’t have any breath left to run.
Mr. Metos did not seem in a particularly chatty mood. He was a lot less frightening than the man-like men, but that really wasn’t saying much.
Charlotte gulped. “Um, where are we going?” she asked quietly.
“To my apartment,” Mr. Metos said brusquely. “We have much to discuss.”
Charlotte’s heart flipped. “I’m supposed to be home for dinner,” she whispered.
Mr. Metos raised his eyebrows and just kept driving. Charlotte huddled closer in to her cousin, who looked nearly catatonic. Eventually they pulled up behind a small white brick apartment building in a neighborhood full of such buildings. The only thing that distinguished this one from the others was a big sign that read, IF YOU LIVED HERE, YOU WOULD BE HOME BY NOW.
Charlotte could not argue with that logic.
Mr. Metos parked right next to the building. Zee awoke from his coma and dutifully began to open the passenger door, but Mr. Metos whispered harshly, “Don’t.” Zee quickly shrank back in his seat, and Charlotte didn’t know whether to be comforted or even more frightened that Zee seemed scared of Mr. Metos too.
Charlotte and Zee watched while Mr. Metos got out of the car, closed the door softly, and began to walk slowly around the parking lot. He stopped a few times, looking around carefully. Finally he walked up to the passenger door, opened it, and hurried them out.
“Quickly, now,” he said, ushering them to the building door. Up a flight of stairs they went, then another, then another, feet echoing noisily in the concrete stairwells. The lights buzzed and flickered overhead. Charlotte was conscious of Mr. Metos behind them, moving them with his gaze.
When they got to Mr. Metos’s apartment, Charlotte immediately thought it looked a great deal like his classroom—small, dark, and bare. There was a little, brownish kitchen to the right, in the sitting room was a tan couch on which rested a bed pillow and a folded-up blanket, and to the left Charlotte could see a room that seemed to be filled entirely with books. And right in front of her, on the counter, sat a small phone. And that reminded her:
“I have to call my mom. She’ll think…” Charlotte gulped a little. “She’ll think something happened to us.”
It wasn’t until she had finished dialing that Charlotte realized she had no idea what to say to her mother, who of course picked up on the first ring. Charlotte was a good liar, but really, how on earth was she supposed to come up with a plausible narrative if her mother picked up on the first ring? “Mom, hi!” she gasped. “Um, we ran into our English teacher walking home from Maddy’s, and he invited us over to dinner….”
There was a pause. “Your father made turkey burgers,” said Mrs. Mielswetzski flatly.
“Um, it’s extra credit,” said Charlotte. As soon as the words came out of her mouth, she winced. It was her worst lie ever.
Mrs. Mielswetzski just sighed heavily. “Oh, well…they’ll keep. Mr. Metos will be driving you home, I hope?”
“I’m sure,” Charlotte grimaced.
“You better let me talk to him.”
Charlotte panicked. “He’s in the bathroom!” she said. “He’s been there awhile! Um, I have to go. We’ll be home in a couple hours.” And she threw the phone back on its hook as if it were burning.
She looked up, blushing. That had not been her best performance. Mr. Metos was looking at her oddly. Zee was still standing in the entrance, staring at the door (which was also odd) and hugging his coat around him. It was awfully cold in there. Charlotte was suddenly conscious again of being a human, one who felt cold, hunger, exhaustion, and tremendous thirst. She stood by the kitchen and bit her lip. Mr. Metos was standing a little awkwardly, looking at both of them as if he’d never seen human children before.
“Um,” Mr. Metos said, “you can sit down over there.” He motioned to the furniture brusquely. Charlotte guessed he didn’t entertain a lot. She nudged Zee, and together they plopped down on the sofa, which was awfully squishy. Charlotte wanted to wrap the folded-up blanket around herself, but she had a feeling that it was what Mr. Metos slept with, and that was just…icky.
Mr. Metos went over to the small kitchen and poured himself a glass of water. Then he moved into the living room and proceeded to drink it. Charlotte gulped.
“Uh, Mr. Metos?” she said in a very, very high voice. “Could I…could I have something to drink?”
Mr. Metos blinked rapidly. “Oh. Yes. Of course.” He stood up and went to the kitchen. “Um. I have vegetable juice or, well…”
“Water would be fine,” said Charlotte.
When Mr. Metos handed her a glass—which she had to share with Zee, who was looking at it longingly—Charlotte noticed that he couldn’t seem to meet her eyes, and he might even have stammered a little. He was nothing like the teacher who stared down kids in class and made Charlotte fear for her neck. He was acting like one of the weird kids in gym class who always got picked last for the team. In this small, dark, underfurnished apartment he didn’t seem like a monster anymore, but like a man. A kind of weird, very pale, socially retarded, vegetable-juice-drinking man.
Or perhaps once you’ve been chased by freakish, eight-foot-tall, skeleton-like goons in tuxedos, your creepy English teacher just isn’t as scary anymore.
But just as Charlotte was finishing these thoughts, Mr. Metos seemed to regain himself. He leaned against the half wall in front of them and looked them over. “All right,” he said. “Let’s just get to the point
. I’m going to tell you something, and this is going to sound very strange, but I must assure you that it is the absolute truth.” He seemed to be regaining his teacherly composure, Charlotte noticed, now that he was instructing again. “Those men who were chasing you, well…they were trying to steal Charlotte’s shadow.”
A moment of silence. Mr. Metos looked probingly at both of them. Charlotte glanced at Zee, who glanced back at Charlotte. “We know,” Charlotte said.
Mr. Metos blinked. “You know ?”
They both nodded.
“I see.” Mr. Metos raised his eyebrows. “What else do you know?”
“Well…” Charlotte bit her lip. “That’s about it.”
Then—slowly, carefully—Mr. Metos told them many things that they did not know. Like that the whole Greek mythology thing was actually true; they weren’t myths at all. The Underworld was real too, all of it. And now there was a guy, a Phil something, and he was trying to stage a coup in the Underworld—with the help of twelve creepy man-like Footmen formed of clay and an entire army of shadows.
Well.
Upon reflection Charlotte decided that she was taking it all rather well. Which shouldn’t have been too much of a surprise; after all, the day had been full of bends to the mind, and other parts of the body too, and Charlotte had really already been as surprised as she possibly could be. There was no more surprise left. Okay, Greek myths real. Underworld real. Coups with shadow army, creepy men made of clay, and Mr. Metos drinks vegetable juice.
Fine.
Charlotte pondered it all for a while, and Zee appeared to be pondering too in an equally unsurprised kind of way, and Mr. Metos watched them both ponder, perhaps surprised at their unsurprisedness—until Charlotte thought of something that did, indeed, surprise her.
“Hey,” she said. “How do you know all this?”
Mr. Metos cleared his throat. “Well…there are those in the Underworld whose only loyalty is to money.”
“Oh.” Charlotte was wise in the ways of the world, and she got his meaning, though she couldn’t help thinking that maybe Mr. Metos should spend a little less of his money bribing people and a little more on furniture. Still, it wasn’t what she meant. “No, I mean…why do you know all this?”
“Ah. Well…I suppose you have a right to know. But this must be kept between us. Do you swear to me that you will keep this information to yourselves?”
They both nodded.
Mr. Metos stood up pedagogically straight and took a deep, loud breath through his nasal passages. “I am a descendant of Prometheus,” he proclaimed. He eyed Charlotte and Zee. “We are sworn to protect humans against the whims of their creators. It is quite a task.”
Now Charlotte was surprised. “You’re a god?”
Mr. Metos cringed. “A Titan, Charlotte. Not a god. I have Titan blood, yes. A little, though I am mortal. More important, I have the charge of Prometheus. The gods created man but do not help him. They’re like parents who abandon their children. Humanity is nothing but a plaything to them, and now, Philonecron is treating people like lab rats. The whole history of man is just like this, the gods…”
But Charlotte had stopped paying attention. She’d been watching Zee, who had been quite quiet during this whole affair—even more so than usual. He didn’t seem to be listening either—he was deep in thought and, once again, happy to let Charlotte do all the talking. Really, he was always deep in thought. He had been since she had met him. There were moments of irrational exuberance at school, but the rest of the time Zee was completely absent from the world around him. He stood in corners of rooms and hid in the shadows as if he weren’t there at all. But where was he?
“Zee,” she hissed. “Did you know this?”
He looked blank. “Sorry?”
“About Mr. Metos?”
Zee shook his head.
“But”—Charlotte scooted closer to him on the couch—“you knew his name. When I first mentioned him. And you were talking to him for so long after class that first day.”
“Just about school things,” Zee said, eyes wide.
Mr. Metos cleared his throat loudly. “If I might interrupt.” He looked pointedly at Charlotte. “I took the opportunity on Zachary’s first day to ask him some questions. It helped me unravel a few mysteries. I knew the Footmen had gone from England to here, but I did not know why. Zachary, I believe your grandmother’s death was the moment when this all started. I believe they were present at her death and took notice of you. Then they began to follow you…tell me, after your grandmother’s death did you ever feel strange? Weak?”
“Yes…” Zee was looking slightly dazed.
“They took your blood,” said Mr. Metos. “They were using it to locate you and follow you.”
“Oh…”
“But,” Charlotte said, “why are you here ? How did you know?”
“I just followed the Footmen,” Mr. Metos answered. “I came when they did.”
“That doesn’t make any sense,” protested Charlotte. “The men didn’t come until Zee was here. You’ve been here all year.”
“They were here long before that, Ms. Mielswetzski.”
“But how? You just said they used Zee’s blood.”
“Charlotte, you must understand that in death, as well as life, blood is everything. The Footmen entered the Upperworld and used the scent of Zachary’s blood to find Zachary and follow him in order to find children. Then, for some reason, the Footmen chose not to follow Zachary anymore. Perhaps they thought they had found all the shadows they were going to find in London, though that seems odd. I do not know. But suddenly they moved here, where the smell of Zachary’s blood would lead them to another child that they could follow. You, Charlotte. Zachary’s blood relative.”
“Oh,” Charlotte said.
“The Footmen have been following you, Charlotte, and taking shadows from the children you lead them to. Though I still don’t know why they moved on from London.”
“It was because of me,” Zee said quietly. “I saw them. And then I was hiding. I didn’t leave the house.”
Mr. Metos nodded slowly. “Well, yes, that would do it. They didn’t have you to lead them to the shadows anymore. So they found Charlotte. But now with you here they don’t need Charlotte anymore….”
He trailed off ominously, and nobody spoke for a few moments, thinking of all the places Mr. Metos might have gone from there.
“Mr. Metos?” Zee broke into the silence, his voice high and hesitant. “Did you, um, know my grandmother? Dalitso Winter?”
“Your grandmother? No. Why?”
“Oh.” He shook his head slightly. “Never mind.” Charlotte raised an eyebrow and looked at him, but Zee had retreated back into his pondering and clearly had no intention of elaborating. Well, whatever it was, she would get it out of him later.
“Well,” Mr. Metos said, “the Footmen are here. They have collected a great number of shadows, and they will keep collecting them until Philonecron is satisfied. Perhaps they already have enough. I do not know. What I do know is that it’s extremely important that you, Zachary, and you, Charlotte, stay safe. I believe they were trying to take Charlotte’s shadow—or Charlotte herself—in order to lure you into the Underworld, Zachary. I believe they need you, Zachary, because of your blood. I believe they need you to utter the spell that will bring the shadows to life. Blood is everything, and they are using your blood to enchant the shadows. They need you for the final step.”
Zee looked up. “I won’t do it.”
Mr. Metos said gently, “Unfortunately, Zachary, Philonecron has your blood, and he knows how to use it. Philonecron has been working with your blood, and I believe he can manipulate your will.”
“What?” Zee asked.
“I believe he can control you. I believe once you get down into the Underworld, Philonecron can make you do exactly what he wants you to do. He knows how to talk to your blood, as it were.”
Zee stared at Mr. Metos, horrified. Charlotte s
huddered. “Mine, too?” she whispered.
“I don’t know. You and Zachary don’t have the same blood, but it is similar. I think he would have some power over you, but it wouldn’t be as overwhelming as it would be for Zachary.”
Zee was shaking his head slowly. Charlotte had a sudden urge to reach out to him, but she didn’t dare.
“Listen to me very carefully,” Mr. Metos continued. “He can make you do what he wants, Zachary. If he can lead you down to the Underworld, he will have all he needs to make his shadow army. And then, for the first time in history, there will be war in the Underworld. And that is a war I do not want to see, because I am not sure Hades can win.”
“Well, why does it matter?” Charlotte piped up suddenly. “So what if he overthrows Hades? It doesn’t sound like he’s so great.”
Mr. Metos’s gaze turned to her. “Well, Charlotte, if the shadows are sent into battle and destroyed, their owners will die. If Philonecron overthrows Hades, he will send your newly dead friends and all the rest of the Dead into a part of the Underworld that really is hell. Hades has no interest in the Dead, but at least he doesn’t want to punish them. Philonecron wants all the Dead to spend eternity in torment. And since we will all one day die…”
Zee sat up. “He can’t. He can’t!”
It was the loudest he’d ever been, and Charlotte stared openly at him. And then she remembered his grandmother, and she gulped and looked at the floor, while Mr. Metos said softly, “I will not let him, Zachary.
“Now,” he continued, “I want you two to stay inside the house. Do whatever you have to do, but they will have a harder time taking you from there. They need one of you, and I’m sure they wouldn’t mind having both of you.”
“But—” Zee exclaimed.
Mr. Metos held up his hand. “I am going to go down to the Underworld and stop Philonecron. I believe I can free the shadows, and then they will naturally go back to their owners. With no shadows, he has no army.”
“How?” Charlotte asked. “How do you get down there? How are you going to free the shadows? How—”