Chapter Thirty-Seven

I recognized the dungeons of the Underworld immediately.

How had I not seen this coming?

Poseidon emerged behind me, still holding onto my arm. Leading the way to the back of the dank prison, Alex stopped above a grate covering. She smiled back at us.

"Well?" Poseidon barked. "Where is it?"

"Down there," Alex pointed to a cell. "It's been here the whole time."

The sea-god thundered to the indicated cell, dragging me along when my left leg could no longer support my weight.

Poseidon flung me to the ground next to the cell. "Retrieve it," he ordered.

"You retrieve it; I don't work for you," I protested.

Torch in hand, Alex landed next to the cell and held the flames over the bars that covered the hole in the floor. The light was not enough to pierce through the darkness; the cell seemed to reach further than the firelight did.

With my dirty, blood-covered hands, I reached out to the bars over the cell. No amount of willpower had been able to stop them from shaking. There was something about fear powerful enough to consume you; there was something even more terrible about anger born of that fear. It was the fear and the helplessness that spurred me on.

Nothing happened. I pulled against the heavy metal and lost. Poseidon's rage filled the room, a tangible beast hovering over us. Alex, whose allegiance I was again unsure of, came to my rescue.

"Try this," she thrust a soaking rag at me—her shirt, torn at the bottom to expose her belly like mine. "The Rive Styx will eat through anything. In the absence of Hades himself, I thought it might be handy."

The water I wrung from the rag dripped onto the metal bars and sizzled. As if heated to a million degrees, the metal dissolved to leave behind only memories of the bars at the mouth of the hole in the ground.

I looked at Alex in amazement but she pointedly looked only in the hole.

Flicking my hand, I dropped a small fireball into the depths.

My fireball burst at the floor of the cell and died, but not before it illuminated a man sitting cross-legged before an urn. "Hey! Watch where you throw those things!" a nasally voice yelled up at me.

The urn in his lap was not unlike those that held cremated loved one's ashes. How oddly fitting that the Nectar be held by a dead man in a dead man's fancy Tupperware. Because when the Olympians finished with him, he would be a dead man.

Poseidon knocked me aside in order to gain a better view of the Nectar's keeper in the blackness of the pit depth. Recognition lit his face at the sound of the prisoner's voice though he did not see the old man.

"Tantalus! He gave the Nectar to you, the thief who thought to make himself immortal when the earth was still young? And we never thought to look here," he spoke under his breath, having the conversation with himself. Poseidon's eternal displeasure faded quickly to be replaced by a look of triumph. "Clever, but not clever enough," he trilled to himself, suddenly giddy with victory as his fingertips.

A pointed glare and a deliberate flick of his wrist encouraged me on with my task. "Bring it to me, Fury."

My leg would prevent me from jumping into the hole to retrieve the urn from the thief; likewise my wings would not be able to carry me out of the narrow cell. I looked at Poseidon to tell him to get the Nectar himself but I didn't have the chance.

Alex dropped down into the cell, folding her wings in close to her body. The cell, while deep, was almost too small for her and the man called Tantalus to share, being only as tall as me in circumference. Scratching sounds screeched up at me as her wings brushed the sides of the cell. Light from the torch illuminated her descent but only so far; I could not see what happened in the darkness beyond the light's reach.

A strained huff sounded and Tantalus was thrown from the cell, clutching the urn with the Nectar within it. It was comical: he popped up out of the cell and sort of rolled himself over the edge and onto solid ground. I got the feeling that we wouldn't be leaving him to finish out his prison sentence. A moment later Alex climbed to the top, using her wings as anchors in the rock wall to propel her escape from the pit.

She immediately set to tying the wide leather strip the cinched her armor together around my leg; the bleeding had slowed but not stopped.

"You have to get out of here, Autumn." She recognized me through the Fury guise. I wanted to squeal with joy that she knew me and not Alecto but her urgent whispers kept me still. "Get the urn to Hades."

Though it was not the time to ask questions, I couldn't stop myself. "How did you get the river water down here without burning yourself? You saw what it did to those bars, why aren't you hurt?"

She kept her voice low, using as few words as possible. "I asked. The Underworld wants us to succeed, the River wanted to be useful."

It was all the explanation I was going to get. I pointed at her side. "You're exposed on the right." She only nodded.

With greedy hands Poseidon reached out to snatch the Nectar from Tantalus across the mouth of the empty cell from us. Tantalus, being human, could not fight off the god's advances—but Alex could. She charged Poseidon, ramming into him with surprising force.

"It's ours, Poseidon," my mouth spoke. While I was preoccupied, Alecto had slipped back into the driver's seat. Damn it. "You no longer deserve it, if you ever did."

From the portal to the prisons Gregory and Jasper made their way to us. As if this had been the plan all along. Once again, I was the last to know anything; I beat at the inside of my head mercilessly but could not break free of Alecto's control.

Poseidon roared. He swung his trident in a wide arc above his head and brought it down on the rocky floor, causing a rumble in the prison. The floor shook, heading straight for Jasper and Gregory; he brought the trident down a second time and the walls trembled. The lamia fell. Bodiless cries erupted from the occupied cells. Somewhere in the prison, the Titans screamed. I watched through Alecto's eyes as Poseidon flinched at the noise.

Alecto launched herself at Poseidon, murderous and hateful. The desire to rip him apart bubbled up in my chest; when it burst, so did she.

Every movement felt natural, practiced; Alecto struck at Poseidon from above, launching off of the floor and diving at him. He dodged to the side, bringing his trident in for a hit at my ribs. Alecto dropped to the floor in order to avoid the weapon—which connected with my shoulder instead of my side. The shoulder was protected with the leather armor; my stomach was not. She stood rolling her shoulders, not to be taken out so easily. With my elbow, Alecto hit him in the throat, catching him off-guard.

She spun my body, relying on her wings to keep her upright when the twinge in my leg got to be too much but not slowing down in her attack. Sure of herself, she moved to kick him in the stomach with my good leg. As he fell back, he caught my ankle, bringing us down with him.

"Nice try, little Fury," Poseidon goaded as he dragged my body towards him with a sardonic smile on his greedy face. "I'll have the Nectar whether you live or die."

"Not likely," Jasper came running at the god, sword in hand, ready to defend his newly reincarnated lover. He swung at Poseidon, who blocked the blade with his trident. Jets of water shot from his hands with amazing force, catching Jasper in the stomach. He fell but was not to be beaten. Jasper pushed off of the ground once the flow of water ceased, his sopping clothes stuck to his skin.

Alex jumped onto Poseidon's back, catching him by the hair, fists full of thick braids. She pulled his head back, arching his spine in an uncomfortable position and stuffing the damp rag in his mouth. Poseidon gagged on the river water, his cheek where the rag touched him began to smoke while he tried to release Alex's hold.

Alecto, not to be outdone or weighed down with injury, brushed her hand against the snake tattoo on my stomach and came away with a braided whip. She cracked it twice in quick succession before aiming it at Poseidon's throat. Jasper threw his sword at Poseidon, aiming for his broad chest.

In the instant that the three attackers thought they might win, Poseidon reminded them that he was a superior god, the second most powerful in all of Olympus.

He shifted and became water, splattering on the floor; Alecto's whip caught nothing but air; Alex fell through the space where Poseidon had once been; Jasper's aim proved true, catching Alex as she occupied the same space the god's chest had occupied. Her armor was untied and loose, allowing the sword to penetrate her collarbone.

Before they had time to process, Poseidon took his physical form again. He lifted Alex from her crumpled position on the rock floor with ease and tossed her away like a ragdoll. She hit a wall with a sick thud before landing on the floor again, unmoving.

In fear of being left out of the fun, Alecto aimed to drop on Poseidon from above, my leg all but useless, but he was too quick: he wrapped an arm around my legs, slick with blood, and spun her away from him. She hit the floor with my shoulder, skidding along the rocky surface on my left side. A trail of blood followed.

Jasper stood soaking wet and weaponless, ready to fight the god with his bare hands if it came to it. Poseidon laughed and sunk all three prongs of his trident into Jasper's body. Alecto looked up in time to see him fall to his knees. The life drained from his eyes as we watched.

His death, unlike his life, had been short. Jasper had connived for all this time to steal the Nectar and keep it hidden, to gain the trust of the new Lord Hades, to bring about the reincarnation of his Fury love.

All that planning; all for nothing.

What happened next is a miracle, if there was such a thing in the realm of the gods. Divine intervention shattered Alecto's hold on my body: her grief grew in bounds as her anger roiled up inside her consciousness; she screamed with raw pain that echoed off the prison walls. Poseidon covered his ears and grimaced at her.

And then she was silent. For the second time, Alecto loosed her control over me and I burst through to dominate my own body. I wrestled with her consciousness, fought with every angry, frustrated part of me. The magic that brought us together in the first place waned and Alecto gave into the heartache.

My hands clenched into fists, exercising command of my muscles again. In exhaustion my body rippled, turning pale again, claws retracting, wings folding themselves into the flesh on my back.

She was gone.

No more Fury; Apollo's arrow clattered to the floor as my wings disappeared. I looked down at my hands, normal, human hands. The blood had not disappeared as the Fury had.

"Hand it over, thieving wretch." Poseidon bore down on Tantalus, his violent words tearing me from my ruminations. "Give me the Nectar!"

Tantalus cowered in Poseidon's shadow, holding the urn to his chest. "They told me to keep it safe," he said quietly. With gnarled hands he stroked the urn, fingers brushing over the etchings. To him this was a treasure.

The god of the sea reached out his hand. "It will be safest with me."

The urn in his hands was precious to Tantalus, who had been in that pit for who knows how long. He wasn't about to give it up. His eyes flickered to me, hopeful.

No, he wasn't looking at me; Gregory hurled himself at us. I had forgotten that he was in the room with us entirely—the last line of defense. He dashed by me inhumanly fast, rushing to Tantalus, who tossed the urn into Gregory's waiting hands. Gregory in turn heaved it over his head in my direction. I raced to catch it, no longer concerned with the blood on my skin or the pain in my leg.

Considering we were fighting for our lives and the fate of the gods, monkey-in-the-middle was not exactly appropriate, but it worked.

The sea god roared; he reached out to stop Tantalus but only succeeded in knocking both him and Gregory into the hole we had just rescued him from.

The Nectar in hand, I limped back towards the portal as quickly as my body would allow. Of all the layers of the Underworld, this was my least favorite. I was more than happy to leave it behind if the portal would let me through, trapping Poseidon in the dungeon.

But then Gregory, Alex—if she lived—and Tantalus would also be trapped with Poseidon.

My left leg hadn't stopped bleeding, which made running difficult. Every step was agony. Every step was necessary. My hands grasped the urn holding the Nectar and I knew I had to make it to the portal.

Ten more feet.

Seven more.

Four.

I cried out. My leg finally collapsed, unable to hold my weight even momentarily. Knees hit the ground and my whole body shuddered.

Wings, Autumn; you have wings, I reminded myself. Footsteps thundered behind me. Now or never. I strained, reaching out for the Fury.

Poseidon bellowed. In fear, my body was paralyzed. I didn't know if I had lost the ability to change or if I was just too afraid to make the transformation. Either way, I had no way to protect myself.

A wave of rushing water flowed towards me, fast and sharp. It struck my injured leg; a scream tore from my lips. I would have sworn Poseidon was slicing of my leg, cutting it clean from my body like a butchered animal.

But pain has always been an excellent motivator. Suddenly my back grew wings again and, even injured, they were enough to propel me to the portal, to battle, to Hector.

Or it was just enough to back me back the way I came.