“What do you mean?” He answered with a question, and I wasn’t sure how I felt about that.
“During combat. You told someone that ‘now’s the time to step in’ or something similar,” I replied, eyeing him carefully. I didn’t want to risk pushing the wrong button with this guy. He was a very old Reaper and a free agent. Nothing stopped him from walking away, if he chose to. I doubted he was still attached enough to any type of moral code. We were doing all this because it was the right thing to do, and the Widow Maker had probably met and reaped many others with similar intentions.
I had a sense that he viewed time and existence much differently from the rest of us, given his absolute immortality.
“Oh, I was talking to Herakles,” the Widow Maker quipped. “He was kind of sluggish. It annoyed me.”
Herakles glowered at him, and I didn’t buy the Widow Maker’s answer, anyway. “Dude, I was busy getting cut down,” the Faulty snapped. “Pardon me if I’m not a badass Reaper like yourself.”
“Not sure how badass he really is.” Raphael chuckled. “Since he barely held his own back there.”
The Widow Maker waved him off. “I told you, I’m no longer bound to Eirexis, and, therefore, my powers are no longer amplified by it. Plus, there were so many of those elemental creeps out there.”
“Then stop railing on me!” Herakles replied. “I did the best I could with what I had.”
“It wasn’t enough,” the Widow Maker said. I had a feeling he was drawing attention in the wrong direction, just so I wouldn’t follow up on my question and further probe for the truth.
“What you did wasn’t enough either, but it was the best you had,” Riza shot back, reducing him to an awkward silence.
“That’s it!” Lumi burst and got up. She glowed white with anger, and I knew there was still enough mojo in her to whip our asses unless we got back in line. “Cut it out. All of you,” she added and looked at the Widow Maker. “If you don’t want to tell us who it was you were talking to back there, that’s fine. My guess is it was another Reaper, but until he or she manifests, we’ll never know. But please don’t disparage others in the crew simply because you cannot be truthful.”
I chuckled softly, pleased to see her eloquence demolish the Widow Maker with just a handful of sharply directed sentences. But she glanced at me next, and I broke into a cold sweat almost instantly, as if getting her attention in these circumstances wasn’t necessarily a good thing. “And you,” she continued. “What is Eirexis telling you? We need to get the hell out of here before the Hermessi catch up with us.”
Lumi was right. We’d been through hell, and we’d just escaped it. Spending another moment here would hurl us back into it. Nethissis prepared another modified travel spell as I took out Eirexis and pointed it in different directions.
“North. We head north,” I said, as Lumi and Nethissis prepared to steer the light bubble that formed around us.
We eventually reached the ocean, while I kept Pyrr and the other Hermessi of the Fire Star in my mind, hoping they continued to keep the others at bay. His was the only help we had, and we needed it, desperately, if we were to reach Zetos.
The spell flew above the water, waves foaming beneath us. Eirexis was basically a stick of white light in my hand, now.
“Okay, we are definitely close,” I said, staring at it. Its temperature rose, the warmth seeping through my skin as I looked at Lumi and Nethissis. “I think we should slow down.”
“It’s got to be underwater,” Herakles mused, glancing around.
We were far from the shore, already, and all there was to see was the vast expanse of dark blue water beneath the clear sky. The storms concentrated somewhere far away from the south, where we’d left the Hermessi fighting. We’d put at least five hundred more miles between us and them, but I knew it was only a matter of time before they’d find us again.
“Thank you for stating the obvious,” Raphael shot back, giving Herakles a cold grin.
Something had changed in the Faulty, though it was barely noticeable. The Widow Maker’s words must’ve gotten to him earlier, because I could almost feel his self-confidence seeping out of him. His gaze was down most of the time, and his brow was permanently furrowed. I’d also seen Riza stealing worried glances at him whenever she could.
I moved toward the Widow Maker and gave him a discreet nudge. He looked down at where I’d touched him first, then at me. “You need to make it right,” I whispered. “Lumi made a point about you railing on him like that.”
The Widow Maker gasped. “Are you serious right now?”
“This team functions on trust and respect. We all have it for each other,” I hissed. “Make. It. Right.”
“If anyone here can’t handle the truth, they don’t belong on this mission,” the Widow Maker replied dryly and quickly diverted attention back to the swamp witches. “Ladies, can we stop?”
“Why?” Lumi asked.
“The glow on Eirexis is fading slightly. We just passed Zetos,” he replied.
Lumi and Nethissis quickly put their arms down, and the spell bubble came to a sudden halt. It nearly knocked me off my feet, but I managed to stay upright. I didn’t even realize I’d caught Eira’s hand in mine until I became aware of her soft touch.
“What now?” Amelia asked. “We put our breathing gear on and go down there?”
“Seems like the sensible thing to do,” Raphael replied, slightly amused as he fitted the breathing device over his mouth.
As soon as we were all ready, Lumi snapped her fingers, and we all fell into the ocean. We shot through like speeding projectiles, piercing through the mass of ice-cold water. One by one, we swam downward, taking advantage of the velocity from our fall. It made about twenty feet easier to navigate, as we made our way toward the bottom.
“Can everyone hear me?” I asked, testing the breathing device’s comms line.
“Loud and clear, toots,” Varga replied.
“Call me ‘toots’ again, and I will tie you to a rock on the bottom,” I said, stifling a laugh.
“Oh, come on, I thought you loved me being sweet on you,” Varga returned, continuing our brief banter. We all needed it, it seemed, as the crew tried hard to breathe through their devices without laughing.
Eva cut in. “Now I’m jealous. Stop it.”
“What’s that?” Riza asked, pointing down.
We all followed her gaze and noticed the peculiar shimmer. It was deep and likely on the bottom of the ocean—which was still quite far away. But it was visible enough to warrant an inspection, especially since Eirexis, now strapped to my thigh again, had regained its full glow.
“It’s got to be Zetos,” I said.
“Where’s the Widow Maker?” Raphael asked, looking around.
