tartarus and back ⇩

15. She's not dead.

P E R C Y

We all stood there for a moment, listening to Kai's distant screams slowly disappear. Grover was whimpering, Annabeth had tears streaming down her face and I just stood there, stunned.

"No! I won't believe it. She just went to a deeper part of the Underworld! There's no way that leads to-"

I interrupted Annabeth. "Shh. Do you hear that?"

There was a low sort of whisper coming from the pit, inviting me in. The sound was getting louder, a muttering, evil voice from far, far below us. Coming from the pit.

Grover sat up. "Wh-what's that noise?"

Annabeth heard it too, now. I could see it in her eyes. "Tartarus. The entrance to Tartarus. Kai- she just fell into Tartarus."

I uncapped Anaklusmos.

The bronze sword expanded, gleaming in the darkness, and the evil voice seemed to falter, just for a moment, before resuming its chant.

I could almost make out words now, ancient, ancient words, older even than Greek. As if ...

"Magic," I said.

"We have to get out of here," Annabeth said.

We all stumbled back up the tunnel. My legs wouldn't move fast enough. My backpack weighed me down. The voice got louder and angrier behind us, and we broke into a run.

Not a moment too soon.

A cold blast of wind pulled at our backs, as if the entire pit were inhaling. For a terrifying moment, I lost ground, my feet slipping in the gravel. If we'd been any closer to the edge, we would've fallen in, just like Kai.

We kept struggling forward, and finally reached the top of the tunnel, where the cavern widened out into the Fields of Asphodel. The wind died. A wail of outrage echoed from deep in the tunnel. Something was not happy we'd gotten away.

"What was that?" Grover panted, when we'd collapsed in the relative safety of a black poplar grove. "One of Hades's pets?"

Annabeth and I looked at each other. I could tell she was nursing an idea, probably the same one she'd gotten during the taxi ride to L.A., but she was too scared to share it. That was enough to terrify me.

I capped my sword, put the pen back in my pocket. "Let's keep going. Maybe- maybe Hades can help us with Kai. "

I had only known Kai for about two weeks. In those two weeks, she had welcomed me, taught me, and offered friendship. Now she was falling to her doom, and it was unlikely I would ever see her again. I couldn't even begin to imagine how Annabeth was feeling.

I was almost relieved to turn away from the tunnel and walk towards Hade's palace.

Almost.

The Furies circled the parapets, high in the gloom. The outer walls of the fortress glittered black, and the two-story-tall bronze gates stood wide open.

Up close, I saw that the engravings on the gates were scenes of death. Some were from modern times- an atomic bomb exploding over a city, a trench filled with gas mask-wearing soldiers, a line of African famine victims waiting with empty bowls-but all of them looked as if they'd been etched into the bronze thousands of years ago. I wondered if I was looking at prophecies that had come true.

Inside the courtyard was the strangest garden I'd ever seen. Multi Colored mushrooms, poisonous shrubs, and weird luminous plants grew without sunlight.

Precious jewels made up for the lack of flowers, piles of rubies as big as my fist, clumps of raw diamonds. Standing here and there like frozen party guests were Medusa's garden statues- petrified children, satyrs, and centaurs-all smiling gro-tesquely.