𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐂𝐘 𝐅𝐑𝐎𝐖𝐍𝐄𝐃.
he missed bob.
he'd gotten used to having the titan on his side, lighting their way with his silver hair and his fearsome war broom.
now their only guide was an emaciated corpse lady with serious self-esteem issues.
as they struggled across the dusty plain, the fog became so thick that percy had to resist the urge to swat it away with his hands. the only reason he was able to follow akhlys's path was because poisonous plants sprang up wherever she walked.
the fog dissipated, and they found themselves on a peninsula that jutted out over a pitch-black void.
"here we are." akhlys turned and leered at them blood from her cheeks dripped on her dress.
her sickly eyes looked moist and swollen but somehow excited.
can misery look excited?
"uh.. great," percy asked. "where is here?"
"the verge of final death," akhlys said. "where night meets the void below tartarus."
annabeth inched forward and peered over the cliff. "i thought there was nothing below
tartarus."
"oh, certainly there is.." akhlys coughed. "even tartarus had to rise from somewhere. this is the edge of the earliest darkness, which was my mother. below lies the realm of chaos, my father. here, you are closer to nothingness than any mortal has ever been. can you not feel it?"
percy knew what she meant.
the void seemed to be pulling at him, leaching the breath from his lungs and the oxygen from his blood.
cherry took percy's hand, hoping he'd warm up.
"we can't stay here," percy said.
"no, indeed!" akhlys said. "don't you feel the death mist? even now, you pass between. look!"
white smoke gathered around percy's feet.
as it coiled up his legs, he realized the smoke wasn't surrounding him. it was coming from him. his whole body was dissolving. he held up his hands and found they were fuzzy and indistinct. he couldn't even tell how many fingers he had. hopefully still
ten.
annabeth looked dead.
cherry touched her face, as if scanning every feature with her hands.
she was still perfect.
percy's blood moved like sap in his veins.
percy studied his arms.
all he saw were blobs of white mist, but he guessed that to them, he looked like a corpse. he took a few steps, though it was difficult. his body felt insubstantial, like he was made of helium and cotton candy.
"i've looked better," he decided. "i can't move very well. but i'm all right."
akhlys clucked. "oh, you're definitely not all right."
percy frowned. "but we'll pass unseen now? we can get to the doors of death?"
"well, perhaps you could," the goddess said, "if you lived that long, which you won't."
akhlys spread her gnarled fingers. more plants bloomed along the edge of the pit. hemlock, nightshade, and oleander spreading toward percy's feet like a deadly carpet.
"the death mist is not simply a disguise, you see. it is a state of being. i could not bring you this gift unless death followed. true death."
"it's a trap," annabeth said.
"i see that now." cherry nodded.
the goddess cackled. "didn't you expect me to betray you?"
"yes," annabeth and percy said together.
"not really." cherry frowned.
"well, then, it was hardly a trap! more of an inevitability. misery is inevitable. pain is-" akhlys began.
"yeah, yeah," percy growled. "let's get to the fighting."
he drew riptide, but the blade was made of smoke.
when he slashed at akhlys, the sword just floated across her like a gentle breeze.
the goddess's ruined mouth split into a grin. "did i forget to mention? you are only mist now, a shadow before death. perhaps if you had time, you could learn to control your new form. but you do not have time. since you cannot touch me, i fear any fight with misery will be quite one-sided."
her fingernails grew into talons.
her jaw unhinged, and her yellow teeth elongated into fangs.
akhlys lunged at percy, and for a split second he thought: well, hey, i'm just smoke. she can 't touch me, right?
the goddess's claws raked across his chest and stung like boiling water.
percy stumbled backward, but he wasn't used to being smoky. his legs moved too slowly.
his arms felt like tissue paper.
in desperation, he threw his backpack at her, thinking maybe it would turn solid when it left his hand, but no such luck. it fell with a soft thud.
akhlys snarled, crouching to spring.
she would have bitten percy's face off if annabeth hadn't charged and screamed, "hey!" right in the goddess's ear.
akhlys flinched, turning toward the sound.
she lashed out at annabeth, but annabeth was better at moving than percy. maybe she wasn't feeling as smoky, or maybe she'd just had more combat training. she'd been at camp half-blood since she was seven. probably she'd had classes percy never got, like how to fight while partially made of smoke.
annabeth dove straight between the goddess's legs and somersaulted to her feet.
akhlys turned and attacked, but annabeth dodged again, like a matador.
percy was so stunned, he lost a few precious seconds. he stared at corpse annabeth, shrouded in mist but moving as fast and confidently as ever. then it occurred to him why she was doing this: to buy them time. which meant percy needed to help.
cherry felt her hands.
at least the first time she was close to dying, she hadn't had enough time to process.
now, she was horrified.
on akhlys's third attack, annabeth wasn't so lucky. she tried to veer aside, but the goddess grabbed annabeth' s wrist and pulled her hard, sending her sprawling.
percy advanced, yelling and waving his sword. he still felt about as solid as a kleenex, but his anger seemed to help him move faster.
"hey, happy!" he yelled.
akhlys spun, dropping annabeth's arm. "happy?" she demanded.
"yeah!" he ducked as she swiped at his head. "you're downright cheerful!"
"arggh!" she lunged again, but she was off balance.
percy sidestepped and backed away, leading the goddess farther from annabeth.
"pleasant!" he called. "delightful!"
the goddess snarled and winced. she stumbled after percy. each compliment seemed to hit her like sand in the face.
"i will kill you slowly!" she growled, her eyes and nose watering, blood dripping from her cheeks. "i will cut you into pieces as a sacrifice to night!"
annabeth struggled to her feet. she started rifling through her pack, no doubt looking for something that might help.
percy wanted to give her more time. she was the brains. better for him to get attacked while she came up with a brilliant plan.
"cuddly!" percy yelled. "fuzzy, warm, and huggable!"
akhlys made a growling, choking noise, like a cat having a seizure.
"a slow death!" she screamed. "a death from a thousand poisons!"
all around her, poisonous plants grew and burst like overfilled balloons. green and white sap trickled out, collecting into pools, and began flowing across the ground toward percy. the sweet-smelling fumes made his head feel wobbly.
cherry cupped the plants in her hands.
they stung. after a couple seconds, they withered away, to be planted somewhere on earth.
"percy!" annabeth's voice sounded far away. "uh, hey, miss wonderful! cheerful! grins! over here!"
but the goddess of misery was now fixated on percy. he tried to retreat again.
unfortunately, the poison ichor was flowing all around him now, making the ground steam and the air burn.
percy found himself stuck on an island of dust not much bigger than a shield. a few yards away, his backpack smoked and dissolved into a puddle of goo.
percy had nowhere to go.
he fell to one knee. he wanted to tell the two girls to run, but he couldn't speak. his throat was as dry as dead leaves.
he wished there were water in tartarus, some nice pool he could jump into to heal himself, or maybe a river he could control.
he'd settle for a bottle of evian.
"you will feed the eternal darkness," akhlys said. "you will die in the arms of night!"
he was dimly aware of annabeth shouting, throwing random pieces of drakon jerky at the goddess.
the white-green poison kept pooling, little streams trickling from the plants as the venomous lake around him got wider and wider.
lake, he thought.
streams.
water.
probably it was just his brain getting fried from poison fumes, but he croaked out a laugh.
poison was liquid. if it moved like water, it must be partially water.
he remembered some science lecture about the human body being mostly water. he remembered extracting water from jason's lungs back in rome. if he could control that, then why not other liquids?
it was a crazy idea. poseidon was the god of the sea, not of every liquid everywhere.
then again, tartarus had its own rules. fire was drinkable. the ground was the body of a dark god. the air was acid, and demigods could be turned into smoky corpses.
so why not try?
he had nothing left to lose.
he glared at the poison flood encroaching from all sides. he concentrated so hard that something inside him cracked, as if a crystal ball had shattered in his stomach.
warmth flowed through him.
the poison tide stopped.
the fumes blew away from him, back toward the goddess. the lake of poison rolled toward her in tiny waves and rivulets.
akhlys shrieked. "what is this?"
"poison," percy said. "that's your specialty, right?"
he stood, his anger growing hotter in his gut. as the flood of venom rolled toward the goddess, the fumes began to make her cough. her eyes watered even more.
oh, good, percy thought. more water.
percy imagined her nose and throat filling with her own tears.
akhlys gagged. "i-"
the tide of venom reached her feet, sizzling like droplets on a hot iron.
she wailed and stumbled back.
"percy!" annabeth called. "stop."
she'd retreated to the edge of the cliff, even though the poison wasn't after her. she sounded terrified. it took percy a moment to realize she was terrified of him.
he didn't want to stop.
he wanted to choke this goddess.
he wanted to watch her drown in her own poison.
he wanted to see just how much misery misery could take.
cherry's face was unreadable. like she was horrified, but wasn't trying to be a hypocrite.
percy turned to the goddess. he willed the poison to recede, creating a small path of retreat along the edge of the cliff.
"leave!" he bellowed.
for an emaciated ghoul, akhlys could run pretty fast when she wanted to. she scrambled along the path, fell on her face, and got up again, wailing as she sped into the dark.
as soon as she was gone, the pools of poison evaporated. the plants withered to dust and blew away.
cherry caught annabeth.
"we have to get away from this cliff," annabeth said. "if akhlys brought us here as some kind of sacrifice.."
percy tried to think.
he was getting used to moving with the death mist around him. he felt more solid, more like himself. but his mind still felt stuffed with cotton.
"she said something about feeding us to the night," he remembered. "what was that about?"
the temperature dropped.
the abyss before them seemed to exhale.
percy grabbed cherry and backed away from the edge as a presence emerged from the void. a form so vast and shadowy, he felt like he understood the concept of dark for the first time.
"i imagine," said the darkness, in a feminine voice as soft as coffin lining, "that she meant night, with a capital n. after all, i am the only one."
annabeth had never been scared of the dark.
but normally the dark wasn't forty feet tall. it didn't have black wings, a whip made out of stars, and a shadowy chariot pulled by vampire horses.
nyx was almost too much to take in. looming over the chasm, she was a churning figure of ash and smoke, as big as the athena parthenos statue, but very much alive.
her dress was void black, mixed with the colors of a space nebula, as if galaxies were being born in her bodice.
her face was hard to see except for the pinpoints of her eyes, which shone like quasars. when her wings beat, waves of darkness rolled over the cliffs, making annabeth feel heavy and sleepy, her eyesight dim.
the goddess's chariot was made of the same material as nico di angelo's sword, stygian iron, and pulled by two massive horses, all black except for their pointed silver fangs. the beasts' legs floated in the abyss, turning from solid to smoke as they moved.
"no, shade," the goddess said. "down, shadow. these little prizes are not for you."
"i like your dress." cherry eyed the fabric.
annabeth couldn't read the expression on percy's ghoulish face very well. apparently he didn't like whatever the horses were saying.
"uh, so you won't let them eat us?" he asked the goddess. "they really want to eat us."
nyx's quasar eyes burned. "of course not. i would not let my horses eat you, any more than i would let akhlys kill you. such fine prizes, i will kill myself!"
annabeth didn't feel particularly witty or courageous, but her instincts told her to take the initiative, or this would be a very short conversation.
"oh, don't kill yourself!" she cried. "we're not that scary."
cherry giggled.
the goddess lowered her whip. "what? no, i didn't mean-"
"well, i'd hope not!" annabeth looked at percy and forced a laugh. "we wouldn't want to scare her, would we?"
"ha, ha," percy said weakly. "no, we wouldn't."
the vampire horses looked confused.
they reared and snorted and knocked their dark heads together. nyx pulled back on the reins.
"do you know who i am?" she demanded.
"well, you're night, i suppose," said annabeth. "i mean, i can tell because you're dark and everything, though the brochure didn't say much about you."
nyx's eyes winked out for a moment. "what brochure?"
annabeth patted her pockets. "we had one, didn't we?"
percy licked his lips. "uh-huh."
he was still watching the horses, his hand tight on his sword hilt, but he was smart enough to follow annabeth' s lead. now she just had to hope she wasn't making things worse, though honestly, she didn't see how things could be worse.
"must've lost it in my bag." cherry frowned, thinking of the beautiful red leather.
"must've, but i guess the brochure didn't say much, because you weren't spotlighted on
the tour. we got to see the river phlegethon, the cocytus, the arai, the poison glade of akhlys, even some random titans and giants, but nyx.. hmm, no, you weren't really featured." annabeth pretended to remember.
"featured? spotlighted?" nyx repeated.
"yeah," percy said, warming up to the idea. "we came down here for the tartarus tour. like, exotic destinations, you know? the underworld is overdone. mount olympus is a tourist trap."
"definitely. that's kinda sad, i'm sorry they didn't mention you." cherry pouted. "probably didn't think you were very important."
"not important!" nyx cracked her whip.
her horses bucked and snapped their silvery fangs.
waves of darkness rolled out of the chasm, turning annabeth's insides to jelly, but she couldn't show her fear.
she pushed down percy's sword arm, forcing him to lower his weapon.
this was a goddess beyond anything they had ever faced. nyx was older than any olympian or titan or giant, older even than gaea. she couldn't be defeated by two demigods, at least not two demigods using force.
annabeth made herself look at the goddess's massive dark face.
"well, how many other demigods have come to see you on the tour?" she asked innocently.
nyx's hand went slack on the reins. "none. not one. this is unacceptable!"
annabeth shrugged. "maybe it's because you haven't really done anything to get in the news. i mean, i can understand tartarus being important! this whole place is named after him. or, if we could meet day-"
"oh, yeah," percy chimed in. "day? she would be impressive. i'd totally want to meet her.
maybe get her autograph."
cherry refrained from asking why he needed another girls autograph.
"yeah, i'd bet you'd like that." cherry commented.
"day!" nyx gripped the rail of her black chariot. the whole vehicle shuddered. "you mean
hemera? she is my daughter! night is much more powerful than day!"
"eh," said annabeth. "i liked the arai, or even akhlys better."
"they are my children as well!" nyc complained.
percy stifled a yawn. "got a lot of children, huh?"
"i am the mother of all terrors!" nyx cried. "the fates themselves! hecate! old age! pain!
sleep! death! and all of the curses! behold how newsworthy i am!"
nyx lashed her whip again. the darkness congealed around her. on either side, an army of shadows appeared.
more dark-winged arai, which annabeth was not thrilled to see.
a withered man who must have been geras, the god of old age.
a younger woman in a black toga, her eyes gleaming and her smile like a serial killer's, no doubt eris, the goddess of strife.
more kept appearing, dozens of demons and minor gods, each one the spawn of night.
annabeth wanted to run.
percy's breathing turned shallow.
"super cool." cherry nodded, as if waiting for a point.
"yeah, not bad," annabeth admitted. "i guess we could get one picture for the scrapbook, but i don't know. you guys are so.. dark. even if i used a flash, i'm not sure it would come out."
"yeah," percy managed. "you guys aren't photogenic."
"you miserable tourists!" nyx hissed. "how dare you not tremble before me! how dare you not whimper and beg for my autograph and a picture for your scrapbook! you want newsworthy? my son hypnos once put zeus to sleep! when zeus pursued him across the earth, bent on vengeance, hypnos hid in my palace for safety, and zeus did not follow. even the king of olympus fears me!"
"uh-huh." annabeth turned to her friends. "well, it's getting late. we should probably get lunch at one of those restaurants the tour guide recommended. then we can find the doors of death."
"aha!" nyx cried in triumph. her brood of shadows stirred and echoed: "aha! aha! you wish to see the doors of death? they lie at the very heart of tartarus. mortals such as you could never reach them, except through the halls of my palace, the mansion of
night!"
she gestured behind her.
floating in the abyss, maybe three hundred feet below, was a doorway of black marble, leading into some sort of large room.
that was the way forward, but it was so far down, an impossible jump. if they missed, they would fall into chaos and be scattered into nothingness, a final death with no do-over.
even if they could make the jump, the goddess of night and her most fearsome children stood in their way.
with a jolt, annabeth realized what needed to happen. like everything she'd ever done, it was a long shot.
in a way, that calmed her down. a crazy idea in the face of death?
she managed a bored sigh. "i suppose we could do one picture, but a group shot won't work. nyx, how about one of you with your favorite child? which one is that?"
the brood rustled.
dozens of horrible glowing eyes turned toward nyx.
the goddess shifted uncomfortably, as if her chariot were heating up under her feet. her shadow horses huffed and pawed at the void.
"my favorite child?" she asked. "all my children are terrifying!"
cherry wanted to smile.
that was kind of sweet.
percy snorted. "seriously? i've met the fates. i've met thanatos. they weren't so scary. you've got to have somebody in this crowd who's worse than that."
"the darkest," annabeth said. "the most like you."
"i am the darkest," hissed eris. "wars and strife! i have caused all manner of death!"
"i am darker still!" snarled geras. "i dim the eyes and addle the brain. every mortal fears old age!"
"yeah, yeah," annabeth said, trying to ignore her chattering teeth. "i'm not seeing enough dark. i mean, you're the children of night! show me dark!"
the horde of arai wailed, flapping their leathery wings and stirring up clouds of blackness.
geras spread his withered hands and dimmed the entire abyss. eris breathed a shadowy spray of buckshot across the void.
"i am the darkest!" hissed one of the demons.
"no, i!"
"no! behold my darkness!"
if a thousand giant octopuses had squirted ink at the same time, at the bottom of the deepest, most sunless ocean trench, it could not have been darker.
cherry squinted.
"wait!" nyx called, suddenly panicked. "i can't see anything."
"yes!" shouted one of her children proudly. "i did that!"
"no, i did!"
"fool, it was me!"
dozens of voices argued in the darkness.
the horses whinnied in alarm.
"stop it!" nyx yelled. "whose foot is that?"
"eris is hitting me!" cried someone. "mother, tell her to stop hitting me!"
"i did not!" yelled eris. "ouch!"
the sounds of scuffling got louder. if possible, the darkness became even deeper. annabeth's eyes dilated so much, they felt like they were being pulled out of their sockets.
"somebody give me light!" nyx screamed. "gah! i can't believe i just said that!"
"it's a trick!" eris yelled. "the demigods are escaping!"
"we've got them!" screamed an arai.
"no, that's my neck!" geras gagged.
cherry took percy and annabeths arms, and then jumped into the darkness, aiming for the doorway far, far below.
after their fall into tartarus, jumping three hundred feet to the mansion of night should have felt quick.
they floated down gently, and eventually hit solid floor.
the trio broke into a run.
above them in the dark, nyx and her children scuffled and yelled, "i've got them! my foot! stop it!"
the squabbling sounds of nyx's children got farther away.
the floor vibrated underfoot.
cherry could smell smoke. there was a flickering of torches.
"don't look," annabeth told the two.
"wasn't planning on it," percy said. "you can feel that, right? we're still in the mansion of night. i do not want to see it."
"this is so scary. this is scarier than those terrible roblox games me and apollo played. i wanna go home."
percy pulled back the girls right before they fell off the edge.
annabeth was trembling, but not just from fear.
"can you tell what's in front of us?" annabeth asked.
"water," he said. "i'm still not looking. i don't think it's safe yet."
"agreed."
"i can sense a river, or maybe it's a moat. it's blocking our path, flowing left to right through a channel cut in the rock. the opposite side is about twenty feet away."
annabeth mentally scolded herself. she'd heard the flowing water, but she had never considered she might be running headlong into it.
"is there a bridge, or.." annabeth questioned.
"i don't think so," percy said. "and there's something wrong with the water. listen."
cherry could hear thousands of voices crying out in agony.
"the river acheron," annabeth guessed. "the fifth river of the underworld."
"i liked the phlegethon better than this," percy muttered.
"it's the river of pain. the ultimate punishment for the souls of the damned. murderers,
especially."
voices whispered to cherry.
they targeted her worst fears.
"this moat must be the border of night's territory. if we get across, we should be okay. we'll have to jump." percy told her, knowing how she felt.
"there!" cried a voice behind them. "kill the ungrateful tourists!"
the children of nyx had found them.
percy grabbed cherry, who was clinging onto annabeth.
he managed to jump, and they made it to solid ground.
"you can open your eyes," percy said, breathing hard. "but you won't like what you see."
annabeth blinked.
after the darkness of nyx, even the dim red glow of tartarus seemed blinding.
"it's a heart." cherry realized. "kinda cute."
"the heart of tartarus," percy murmured.
the center of the valley was covered with a fine black fuzz of peppery dots.
it was an army.
thousands, maybe tens of thousands of monsters, gathered around a central pinpoint of darkness.
"the doors of death." annabeth realized.
"yeah." percy's voice was hoarse.
"where's nyx?" cherry asked.
somehow they'd landed several hundred yards from the banks of acheron, which
flowed through a channel cut into black volcanic hills.
beyond that was nothing but darkness.
no sign of anyone coming after them. apparently even the minions of night didn't like to cross the acheron.
a skittering of a rockslide in the hills to their left made a loud noise. annabeth drew her drakon-bone sword.
percy raised riptide.
a patch of glowing white hair appeared over the ridge, then a familiar grinning face with pure silver eyes.
"bob?" annabeth was so happy she actually jumped. "oh my gods!"
"hi, bob!" cherry gasped.
"friends!" the titan lumbered toward them.
the bristles of his broom had been burned off. his janitor's uniform was slashed with new claw marks, but he looked delighted. on his shoulder, small bob the kitten purred almost as loudly as the pulsing heart of tartarus.
"i found you!" bob gathered them both in a rib-crushing hug. "you look like smoking dead people. that is good!"
"urf," percy said. "how did you get here? through the mansion of night?"
"no, no." bob shook his head adamantly. "that place is too scary. another way, only good for titans and such."
"let me guess," annabeth said. "you went sideways."
bob scratched his chin, evidently at a loss for words. "hmm. no. more.. diagonal"
annabeth laughed, and kissed his immortal nose, which made him blink.
"we stay together now?" he asked.
"yes," annabeth agreed. "time to see if this death mist works."
cherry could only groan as she trudged towards the heart of tartarus.
it seemed that the bad thoughts in her head only got louder and louder. they wouldn't survive this. they wouldn't make it. it was too easy. they'd get hurt.
she wanted to go home.
forever.
about thirty yards from the nearest monsters, bob turned to face percy.
"stay quiet and stay behind me," he advised. "they will not notice you."
"we hope," percy muttered.
on the titan's shoulder, small bob woke up from a nap. he purred seismically and arched his back, turning skeletal then back to calico. at least he didn't seem nervous.
annabeth examined her own zombie hands. "bob, if we're invisible.. how can you see us? i mean, you're technically, you know.."
"yes," bob said. "but we are friends."
"nyx and her children could see us," annabeth said.
bob shrugged. "that was in nyx' s realm. that is different."
"uh, right." annabeth didn't sound reassured, but they were here now.
they didn't have any choice but to try.
percy stared at the swarm of vicious monsters. "well, at least we won't have to worry about bumping into any other friends in this crowd."
bob grinned. "yes, that is good news! now, let's go. death is close."
"the doors of death are close," annabeth corrected. "let's watch the phrasing."
they plunged into the crowd.
percy trembled so badly, he was afraid the death mist would shake right off him. he'd seen large groups of monsters before. he'd fought an army of them during the battle of manhattan.
but this was different.
cherry took percy's hand and stared at the floor.
percy wondered how many of his enemies were in the crowd. he didn't feel very immortal.
he didn't know if he wanted to be immortal.
somewhere in front of them, a deep voice bellowed: "iapetus!"