Before anyone can so much as move, a horrendous sound—one I imagine a grouchy dragon would make when awakened from slumber…actually, four of them—has me clapping my hands over my ears. I’m not the only one, either. The remaining champions do the same.
The Daemones, in a whirlwind of feathers and fury, grab Ares by the arms and fly him away.
“No!” Neve shouts.
The woman’s red-gold hair is styled in pigtailed ringlets. Her green dress with a short, ruffly skirt that flounces every step she takes reminds me of a baby doll as she stalks toward me. “You dumb bitch!”
I scramble back. Only something behind me has her pulling up sharply. Her face loses color so fast, it looks like a vampire sucked her dry, her blue eyes and freckles standing out in stark relief.
“Ares interfered, and that is against the rules,” Hades says from where he still stands across the platform.
He levers away from the wall to walk toward us. And that’s when I see it. The way the champions hurriedly scatter away as he walks among them…and so do the gods and goddesses, though not as blatantly. As if he trails death in his very wake and they shouldn’t get too close.
Is it always like that wherever he goes?
I shakily push to my feet by the time he gets to me.
He’s still staring Neve down when he reaches us and tells her, “It was a mild infraction, and he’ll get a commensurate punishment. It won’t affect you. Get on with finding your token.”
If daggers were glares, the one Ares’ champion shoots me would’ve lodged in my heart. I cross her off my list of potential allies.
Before Hades can lay into me, I grab his arm. I don’t know why. Maybe to give myself something solid to hold on to. His muscles tense under my touch, but that hardly penetrates the panic starting to set in as my own consequences hit me.
“I—I won’t be able to—” I won’t get my gifts now. I’ll be the only champion going into the Crucible without magical aids.
If I thought I was in trouble before…
Hades shakes off my hand, and my heart sinks. He’s done with me already, prepared to abandon me, and I curl over a bit on myself. But he takes me by the shoulders, face close to mine, and meets my eyes directly. “There is never only one way to win any Labor that is part of the Crucible.”
My mind can’t keep up with his words, and I frown. “What?”
He gives my shoulders a slight squeeze. “There’s more than one way. Find it.”
I didn’t even find the first way. Zai did. All I did was pay attention.
I glance around at the champions all wildly searching now. Where do I even start?
He sighs. “Try to remember what I told you about this game at the beginning.”
“That’s enough.” Zeus is the one to growl the words. “You’re getting awfully close to interfering yourself, brother.”
A muscle at the corner of Hades’ lip twitches, but he lets me go and suddenly offers a smile so filled with charm that for a second even I am a little dazzled, like I can’t quite catch my breath. Turns out the god of death has dimples.
“Of course,” he says.
He walks away and leaves me here trying to remember what in Tartarus he said before.
Something about… Oh heavens, what was it about?
Get your shit together, Lyra.
Usually, the voice in my head is my own. But every so often, Felix pops in there, or memories of him when he mentored me.
I pick up and discard another dozen items in rapid succession, and when none zap me away, my shoulders sink. I hug a bright-green bowl against my chest as my eyes dart from item to item. I need a plan. There’s not enough time left to pick through it all—nor is it likely any item remains that will transport me to the end.
I take a deep breath. Panic will get me nowhere. I need to think. What the hells had Hades said exactly? This test is cryptic, but there will be signs.
He meant something by that? Something more than just being an unhelpful ass?
Think, Lyra. What could he have been saying?
I single out the important words. Test. Cryptic. Signs.
My fingers are gripping the bowl so tightly, a rough edge rubs against my palm. I go to set it back down, but something niggles at me. Why would a god ever allow a blemish on one of their artifacts?
I run my fingers along the rough edge again and realize it wasn’t a mistake… There are tiny, raised bumps just along one edge. Crypticode!
I don’t dare glance in Hades’ direction as I run my fingers against the lip of the smooth marble bowl.
Please let me be right.
“What in Olympus’ name is she doing?” I think that’s Athena’s voice. I don’t turn to see.
Closing my eyes, I feel along the system of bumps, which are formed into dots and dashes a lot like Morse code. That little bell keeps going off as more champions find their tokens.
But I stay focused, reading the code on the bowl. Directions.
The rules said if you reach your god or goddess, you win the gifts. And presumably the token was one way to reach them at the finish line, so to speak. But the rules didn’t say you couldn’t find a way to your patron yourself.
