The Elysean Trials

THE HOLY BLOODLINES

BOOK ONE
D.N. HOXA
 Contents

Also by D.N. Hoxa

Acknowledgments

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39

More by D.N. Hoxa: The Reign of Dragons Series

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More by D.N. Hoxa: Pixie Pink Series
More by D.N. Hoxa: The Dark Shade Series
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More by D.N. Hoxa: The New Orleans Shade Series
More by D.N. Hoxa: The New York Shade Series
Also by D.N. Hoxa
 This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and
incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance
to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2023 by D.N. Hoxa

This book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any reproduction or
other unauthorized use of the material or artwork herein is prohibited.
Also by D.N. Hoxa

The Reign of Dragons Series (Completed)

King of Air
Guardian of Earth
Warden of Water
Queen of Fire

The Hidden Realm Series (Completed)

Savage Ax
Damsel in Distress
Deadly Match

Pixie Pink Series (Completed)

Werewolves Like Pink Too
Pixies Might Like Claws
Silly Sealed Fates

The New York Shade Series (Completed)

Magic Thief
Stolen Magic
Immoral Magic
Alpha Magic

The New Orleans Shade Series (Completed)

Pain Seeker
Death Spell
Twisted Fate
Battle of Light
The Dark Shade Series (Completed)
Shadow Born
Broken Magic
Dark Shade

Smoke & Ashes Series (Completed)

Firestorm
Ghost City
Witchy Business
Wings of Fire

Winter Wayne Series (Completed)

Bone Witch
Bone Coven
Bone Magic
Bone Spell
Bone Prison
Bone Fairy

Scarlet Jones Series (Completed)

Storm Witch
Storm Power
Storm Legacy
Storm Secrets
Storm Vengeance
Storm Dragon

Victoria Brigham Series (Completed)

Wolf Witch
Wolf Uncovered
Wolf Unleashed
 Wolf’s Rise

The Marked Series (Completed)

Blood and Fire
Deadly Secrets
Death Marked

Starlight Series (Completed)

Assassin
Villain
Sinner
Savior

Morta Fox Series (Completed)

Heartbeat
Reclaimed
Unchanged
 Acknowledgments

Acknowledgment of Sources:

Some of the names and the descriptions of the Greek gods and goddesses,
and their history in this book are loosely based on the information found in
www.theoi.com, and on the D’Aulaires Book of Greek Myths.
 1

When Gaea, Young Earth, became The Mother, she gave birth to the mighty Titans,
and their father, Uranus, the Sky, was proud. They were beautiful and as tall as
mountains, which served them as thrones.
When Gaea gave birth a second time, it was not to Titans but to three Cyclopses,
so ugly their father locked them in the darkest pit of Tartarus so he never had to lay
eyes on them again.

Gaea raged.

—Book of Creation, 6th Edition, 54

by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

DO YOU HAVE WHAT IT TAKES TO BE A GOD?

T like tiny spiders crawling all over my skin every time I

came across them, which, this past month, was literally every ten steps. The
city was full of reminders of the upcoming trials, and their famous slogan
smacked you in the face—big bold letters, bright colors, impossible to miss
if you tried.
“Hey, wait up!” someone called from behind me just as I stepped out
the school gates.
James and Layla, my best friends, rushed toward me with a big crowd
of teenagers at their back, all of them impatient to get the hell out of this
place. Same here—though I wasn’t looking forward to where we were all
headed.
“What part of meet us by the fountain didn’t you understand?” Layla
said, slamming her shoulder to mine like she really meant to knock me over.
She probably did.
“Miles is waiting for me,” I said, lacing my arm with hers so I could
make her walk faster.
“It’s still early,” James said from my other side. “We’re all going to the
same place, anyway. And may I remind you one more time that it’s the day,
ladies and gentlemen.” He raised his hands to the sky as if he were talking
to an audience. “It’s the day for business. A month from now, yours truly
will be so stinking rich I might not even hang out with you anymore, so a
word of advice? Enjoy my company while you still can.”
Impossible not to laugh as Layla rolled her eyes. “I’ve been praying for
the day someone takes you off my hands since third grade. And you’re not
going to be stinking rich, James.” She threw him a pointed look. “We are.”
Neither of them was going to be stinking rich, unfortunately, but I loved
their enthusiasm all the same.
“Yeah right, we—” James started, but Layla cut him off.
“Look at that!” She pulled us to a stop in the middle of the sidewalk to
watch the bus passing by—and the smiling face of the guy that covered the
side of it. “My gods, he’s so hot.” She sounded breathless. It took all I had
not to roll my eyes.
 “He always looks like he’s constipated,” James mumbled, but he didn’t
even blink his eyes until we couldn’t see the bus anymore—or the slogan
written on the back.
“And you always sound like you’re jealous,” Layla said with a wicked
grin.
“I’m not jealous of Arthur O’Brien,” James said, but he was. They all
were. “I’ll be richer than him one day, you just watch."
Layla laughed. “Yeah, right. And we’re not jealous of Avery Johnson.”
“Except I’m not,” I said—I really wasn’t.
But she gave me a pointed look. “Sure, hun. Sure, you’re not,” and she
patted my arm.
Other students rushed past us, almost knocking us over as they
screamed their guts out and cheered at the white truck with the slogan of the
trials spray-painted on the back, the driver honking the horn like a madman.
“Slow down, dickwads!” Layla shouted, then turned to us. “Actually,
we should be rushing, too.” She picked up the speed, dragging James and
me along.
“No, we don’t. The gates don’t open for another two hours,” I reminded
her. Which was why the school had even let us skip classes today, so we all
had plenty of time to make it to the city of Idaea and witness the oh-so-
magical moment of some large-ass gates opening.
Just the thought of it made me sick, especially when the next bus turned
the corner. This one had the picture of Avery Johnson all over the back,
arms crossed in front of her, her smile cold, her small dark eyes sparkling.
Layla, James, and at least another dozen seniors threw their fists in the
air and cheered. I literally got goose bumps from it—not in a good way. It
wasn’t because I knew Avery Johnson or even Arthur O’Brien personally,
or that I hated them specifically. I just hated what they’d become.
“I thought you said Miles was waiting for you,” Layla said after a
minute with a raised brow, before she and James started running with the
crowd, pulling me by the arms.
“I just wanted to—” get away from everyone else, was what I wanted to
say, but I realized I was wasting breath as they dragged me with the same
damn crowd I’d tried to avoid.
It served me, though. I got to Miles, who was sitting by himself on the
porch of the house I lived in, twice as fast.
“Wear something nice,” Layla warned me. “I’ll see you there.” She
kissed my cheek and ran across the street to her house the same second. So
much energy, I swear.
James, who lived next door to her, followed. “See ya there, punk! Get
ready to get riiiich!”
They were both so excited it should have been funny—and Miles was
even worse.
“Dad, Sera’s home. Let’s go!” he called at the top of his lungs even
before I made it to the driveway. He slammed his small fist on the door with
all his strength, too.
“Hold on, kid. I need to drop off my backpack,” I said and rushed
inside.
“Hurry up, okay? I don’t want to miss the gates,” he urged me, just as
impatient as everyone else. Some of our neighbors were already in their
cars, headed downtown. We were going to be stuck in traffic for a while.
“The gates don’t open for another two hours. There’s time,” I said,
running up the stairs anyway.
“It takes almost an hour to get to Idaea,” he reminded me, following me
to my room.
“And we’ll get there in time. Just give me a minute, okay?” I tried to
close the door so I could change my shirt, but he pushed it open. He was a
skinny kid, and he had just turned nine, but he was almost as strong as me
already. I had no chance of pushing that door closed.
 “Two things,” he told me, raising his fingers. “You have to take me to
see the Palace.” He pulled one down. “And you have to stay with me until
the very end, even if Dad wants to leave.”
He grinned, showing me his dimples, and that’s all it took to get me to
smile, too. Out of all the people I’d met in my life, Miles was one of the
very few people I loved. I’d been living with him and his dad for four years
now, and he’d spun me around his little finger since day one. So even
though my automatic response to both those requests was no, I said, “Deal.”
Then pushed him back. “Now let me change.”
I changed my plain black shirt for a clean plain black shirt—you just
can’t go wrong with black. A fist slammed on my door before I’d even
pulled the hem down properly.
God, everybody was in such a damn rush today.
“Hurry up! We leave in one minute.” Gary’s voice came through the
door, making me shiver worse than the slogans all over the city.
“I’ll be right down,” I called, then checked myself in the mirror quickly
to make sure my mascara had stayed in place—by some miracle, it had.
Most of it, anyway.
There was no tricking myself into thinking I would enjoy this day so I
didn’t bother. I just picked up my denim jacket and ran down the stairs,
trying not to think about it at all. So what that I was about to willingly
spend the day among the same people who’d ruined my life? No big deal. I
could pull it off, no problem.
Sweat beads lined my forehead by the time I made it outside. Gary and
Miles were already in his old Subaru about to drive away, same as every
other car around us.
“See you there, babe!” Layla called from the passenger seat of her
mom’s car as they drove away. James was in the back with his mom
because his dad was working. Private businesses and every other office had
closed early today, but Mr. Dormont was a firefighter, and they’d drawn
straws to choose who remained behind and who got to see Idaea today.
Made me wish I was a firefighter, too.
“Just get in already,” Gary barked as I waved at my friends, just as
pissed as every other time he looked at my face.
Biting my tongue, I got in the back with Miles and smiled for his sake.
“Ready, big guy?”
“All set. Look at these.” He put a big notebook on my lap where he’d
collected over a hundred different pictures of every Olympian god and
every famous Elysean in the States, and glued them to the pages. “I’ve got
the biggest collection in my class. I even have Mason Rogers—look.” And
he showed me the picture of a huge guy with a square head and a ridiculous
black bodysuit that looked suspiciously made out of latex, showing every
curve of his body perfectly. Every. Single. Curve. It should have definitely
been R-rated.
“That’s so cool,” I said to Miles instead, swallowing down the bile that
rose up my throat. It wasn’t his fault that the sight of these people made me
nauseous.
“I have a collection of Beatrix Hob, too,” Miles said, flipping through
the pages until he found what he was looking for—Beatrix Hob, a made
Elysean, a gorgeous brunette with waist-length hair and a smile on her face
that said two things painfully clearly—one: I am superior to you; two: you
want to be me.
It took us over an hour and a half to get to the walls of the Elysean city
of Idaea in Boston. During that time, Miles told me everything he knew
about at least five descendants of the Olympian gods, their incredible
magical powers, and their awe-inspiring deeds. I listened, knowing how
much he liked to talk about it. I could shut out James and Layla just fine
any time they talked about Elyseans, but Miles was different. He was just a
kid and he didn’t really have anybody else except his dad. Whoever knew
Gary also knew that that wasn’t saying much. A fucking parasite was more
useful than that man.
When we finally made it close to the walls and got out of the car, it
looked like one of those scenes in apocalypse movies where everyone’s
rushing to get to the airport or to a place that would supposedly be safe
from whatever threat the movie was about. So many cars. So many people,
and all of them had their attention on the gigantic walls of Idaea, trying to
get closer to the gates as fast as they could, pushing and shoving anybody in
their way.
“Stay close,” Gary said, lighting up the cigarette between his lips as he
moved forward. I put Miles behind him and followed.
Gary was a big guy, over six foot three with what Miles called a
watermelon belly that was bigger than an actual watermelon. Nobody was
going to be able to push him to the side if they tried. He’d get us all the way
to the gates safe, at least. But we still had a few miles to go, if not more.
Too many people. Too little space to breathe, and the size of the wall
alone made me a bit claustrophobic. It was possibly two hundred feet tall,
circling Idaea like its purpose was to make it clear to the rest of the world
that Elyseans were not part of us. They were different. They were separate.
And the fact that they opened the gates to their precious city for us once
every four years was a goddamn favor to humanity.
Ugh.
It wasn’t just that they presented themselves that way. It was also that
every human in the world put them up there, too, like they were gods for
real, like the fact that they had magic and supernatural gifts truly made
them more valuable than us. They were descendants of the twelve
Olympians, and they were untouchable. They were angelic. They were
Elyseans who could do no wrong, and we measly humans bowed at their
feet.
 It made me sick to my stomach, but the sight in front of me still took my
breath away.
The brilliant white wall looked like it was keeping the sky up all by
itself, and the two large statues of cyclopses that guarded the western gates
were so detailed, it was hard to imagine that they were cut out of marble
and not real. Their giant bodies were covered in rags that fell like dresses
down to their knees. They each held bats in their hands, the tips of them
pressed to the ground, their hands folded on the butt of the handles. A
single white eye was on their large round faces, and a brilliant green, oval-
shaped emerald was planted in the middle of their foreheads.
The other two gates around the wall were guarded by identical
cyclopses, too. I’d arrived in Boston about a month after the Elysean trials
were completed last time, so I hadn’t been inside, but James and Layla had
told me the stories so many times that I felt like I already knew exactly
what it looked like in there.
Even so, the closer I got, the more I wished I could just turn around and
leave. I didn’t want to be close to these people—actual descendants of the
gods—but I also couldn’t deny that there was a part of me that was curious,
that wanted to see more, to know more, just to prove to myself that these
were mere people. Yes, they called us mortals, but they were mortal, too.
None of them lived forever. Their lifespan was the same as ours. They just
made themselves seem superior by calling us that.
Unfortunately, though, the whole world believed them.
The proof was all around me—so many people, and they weren’t only
coming from Boston, but from all over the country. It was the biggest event
of the last four years, the day the Elyseans opened their city to us, allowed
us inside, fed us and showed us what it was like to live like gods.
Most importantly, they would announce the start of the trials—a series
of deadly games designed for mortals to give us the chance to earn a spot
into the prestigious Elysean Academy of Divine Light and Beauty. And if
the selected ones somehow managed to graduate from it, they would get
god-like powers. They would become Elyseans—just like Avery Johnson
and Arthur O’Brien, and Mason Rogers and Beatrix Hob, and many, many
others before them.
The trials had started some eighty years ago, and each time, at least one
mortal graduated from the Academy, received magical powers, and the title
Elysean.
Which, if you asked me, just proved the absurdity of regarding these
people as gods. If they can pick any human and give them magical powers,
how can they truly be descendants of gods? Gods cannot be created—they
are born.
Except Miss Aldentach didn’t agree with me on this. Her or any of the
sisters who worked in the orphanage where I grew up.
Just the thought of them turned my blood cold, and I had to remind
myself that that part of my life was over. It had been four years since Gary
had taken me in and become my legal guardian. He was a distant cousin of
my dad’s and literally the only family that had ever claimed me. Better him
than all those foster homes I’d gone through as a kid.
Besides, I turned eighteen in just three days. Yeah, it had been a long
thirteen years, but it was almost over. In three days, I would be free for the
first time in my life, and to remember that always raised my spirits as if by
true magic.
“Sera, it’s happening,” Miles shouted when we stopped, still about a
hundred feet from the cyclops gates. Too many people around. Impossible
to get closer.
But at last, the gates were opening.
“Hop on,” I told Miles, and turned around so he could climb on my
back to see better. We barely managed from the people pushing us from all
sides, and the kid might have looked skinny, but he was heavy as all hell.
 When the cyclopses began to move, though, I forgot about everything
else. My God, I had never seen a more terrifying and beautiful thing in my
life. The emeralds on the cyclopses’ foreheads burned bright green. The
marble groaned like a living beast before the cyclopses straightened their
large shoulders, then pulled up their bats from the ground slowly, and each
took a step to the side.
Every single person around me started screaming. The hymn of the gods
started playing somewhere in the distance, and the white gates that had been
at the cyclopses’ back began to move. Even the ground shook as they
opened up a world that many mortals dreamed and prayed and sacrificed to
the gods for day and night.
“Let’s keep moving,” Gary said, and off we went with the screaming
crowd.
“Go, go, go!” Miles called when I put him in front of me again. He
wasn’t in the least bit worried about these people who would stomp you to
death just to get to those damn gates first.
With my hands on his shoulders, I kept my eyes on Gary’s back and we
didn’t stop moving until we reached the gates.

I us almost thirty minutes just to get to the cyclopses and the gates. I
couldn’t even see their faces from down here, but I saw the green crystals
burning in their foreheads just fine. It wasn’t really a surprise—Elyseans
loved riches. They loved their gold. They loved their luxury and they lived
in it. Why wouldn’t they, when they had a whole world at their feet and
nothing and nobody to stand in their way?
A long time ago, gods had walked among us, too, history said. They’d
guided mankind for centuries, and then they’d shared their power with their
descendants. They had retreated back to Olympus to spend the rest of
eternity in their golden palace in the clouds, trusting man, their biggest
creation, to their own. They’d put all the power in the hands of Elyseans,
and to this day, mankind worshiped them just the same as they did gods of
old.
If I were to believe in their gods, I’d probably believe that story, too.
But I—possibly the only human in the country—happened to think that it
takes more than magical powers to make someone a god.
Once we went through the gates, people were no longer trying to break
my ribs or stomp on my feet, and I could even let go of Miles’s hand. My
shirt was sticking to my skin and even my palms were sweaty. It felt like
August, even though it was still mid-May and not that warm out.
But the farther inside Idaea we went, the less important the crowd and
the heat became.
Because the city was a fucking dream.
I’d seen pictures of this place online, but none of them had done it any
justice. Even I—again, possibly the only person in the country who wasn’t
completely infatuated with Elyseans—was breathless as I took in my
surroundings.
Miles gripped my hand and pulled me forward, running through the
crowd. “Stay close!” Gary called after us, but we were already gone. Miles
was laughing his heart out, and I was still having a bit of trouble believing
my eyes.
The buildings were all white—a milky white, inviting, easy on the eyes.
None of them were taller than four stories, but they were carved to
perfection—every corner and every shape engraved on the walls exactly
right. The white statues in front of every building and at every street corner
looked just as real as the cyclopses, except most of these didn’t have fancy
gemstones on their foreheads. The golden decorations—railings on the
delicate balconies, handles on the large doors, the plaques on them
engraved with beautiful cursive letters I didn’t understand, complemented
the buildings and the statues perfectly.
 The cobbled streets were wide, the buildings far apart, perfect yards
with mowed lawns and colorful flowers that seemed too beautiful to even
be real. Big and small golden vases embellished with drawings in black ink
were on the sidewalks inside polished glass cases. Peacocks walked among
us freely, so beautiful they, too, looked painted rather than real. Even the
sky looked bluer from in here somehow, the clouds whiter, puffier, like a
damn drawing.
“It’s Heracles!” Miles shouted, pulling at my hand until my arm
threatened to fall off. He was pointing ahead, at the hundred-foot statue of a
man with a lion’s hide on his shoulders at the end of the street. It was made
of white marble, and the golden plaque engraved with the god’s name was
the only color on it. Even so, it looked alive. The way the face was carved
out, the details of the eyes, the sneer, even the strands of hair blowing to the
side—wow. I kept expecting it to move and look at us as Miles—and at
least a dozen others around us—took pictures of it from every angle.
“Did you know that Perseus was his great-grandfather?” Miles told me.
I smiled. “He was, wasn’t he.” And he was also Perseus’s half-brother.
Zeus fathered them both. But I knew firsthand that to talk about that was
considered sacrilege, and I’d had many a punishment in the past for voicing
my questions about these things that nobody talked about.
Now, I knew to keep my mouth shut about it, especially in front of all
this crowd.
That—and the way Miles radiated joy made it worth it. Who cared what
the gods did, anyway? If it made him happy, I’d take it.
“And he killed a hundred-headed dragon once,” Miles informed me.
“His arrows were poisonous—even the sea was afraid of them. Can you
imagine that?” He beamed, giving me a toothy grin. “Everybody was afraid
of Heracles. I’m going to be just like him when I grow up.” He made a fist
and showed me his nonexistent biceps.
 Impossible not to laugh. “That’s a good dream to have,” I teased,
wrapping my arm around his neck as we pretended to wrestle.
“It’s not a dream—it’s a goal,” he insisted, pushing me off. “You just
wait.”
“Hate to break it to you, kid, but…” I said, putting my hands around my
lips as if I was letting him in on a secret, before I mouthed: you are not a
god.
He rolled his eyes. “You don’t know that. I could very well be Elysean.”
I didn’t blame him for thinking that—it had happened before. In the last
few decades, two Elyseans had somehow ended up being raised by humans
before they were found by their real families and taken back inside the
walls. The stories had given hope to every kid and every adult in the world.
Everyone dreamed of waking up one day and finding out they’re Elysean.
Fuck Cinderella and marrying the prince—the people wanted the power.
The magic. The title.
“Yeah, yeah, I can see Gary being the descendant of a very powerful
and very noble god. Totally,” I joked.
Miles flinched. “Not Dad, mind you. But Mom could have been. We
don’t know that she wasn’t.” And just like always, when he talked about his
mom, his bright green eyes darkened and his smile faltered instantly.
She died when Miles was only two years old, and he didn’t really
remember her. My parents died when I was five, and even I didn’t
remember their faces. But he missed her all the same. He missed the idea of
her. Gary was not exactly a good dad.
I put my arm around his shoulders and pulled him to me. He was like
my baby brother, even if we weren’t that closely related. I’d give up my life
for his in an instant.
“If there’s anybody in the world who was godlike, it was your mom,” I
told him, and I meant it. I’d seen her pictures. She was simply stunning,
with a smile that pulled out your own no matter what mood you were in,
even through a picture. “But right now, we’re in Idaea, and the
announcement will happen in about twenty minutes. We’re gonna need to
run if we wanna make it in time.”
His face brightened up immediately. “We can explore after,” he said
with a nod.
“We will. We’ll stay as long as you want.”
“Even if Dad leaves?” He sounded so hopeful it hurt.
“Even if he leaves. We’ll catch a ride with Layla’s mom, okay?”
It was like I’d served him the whole world on a silver platter.
We kept going, admiring the statues, the peacocks, the vases that held
fragments of stories from the Greek mythos in their drawings. Being here
was like being in a different dimension altogether. There were no Elyseans
around—we probably wouldn’t see them until we reached the center of the
city, where the announcement for the trials would be made. I was glad for
that—we were free to explore on our own, all of us, even though we all
knew we were being watched.
Miles gave me facts about every new marble statue we passed, every
building that was made in honor of a certain god, even the peacocks passing
us by. And the snakes, too. The deeper into the city we went, the more
snakes slithered on the ground, the grass, even upside buildings. They
didn’t attack, didn’t even come close to the people fascinated by them, but
it was still creepy as hell to watch their scales glistening under the sunlight.
I definitely didn’t want to be anywhere near those.
There had been no sign that said Do Not Touch Anything that I’d seen,
but the people never even went close to any of the statues, vases, or even
the buildings that looked deserted. They just marveled at them from a
distance. In the real world, they tended to ignore a no-smoking sign on the
damn table, but in Idaea, they behaved without needing to even be told.
But there were Elyseans in Idaea, and while there were fines to pay in
the mortal world, who knew what kinds of punishments the Elyseans could
give with their magic? The unknown had a way of scaring us more than any
evil we knew. So everyone behaved, myself included.
The deeper inside the city we went, the wider the streets, the larger the
buildings, and the bigger the marble statues. As hard as I tried not to be
impressed—or at least not too impressed—by anything Elysean-made, it
was impossible to help it, especially when I was in front of the most
beautiful piece of art I had ever seen in my life: a statue of the Nine Muses
made out of marble and gold, decorated with small emeralds. Some Muses
had them on their chests, some on their foreheads like the cyclopses, and a
couple on the palms of their hands, too. The crystals reflected light so bright
they mesmerized me, and they seemed to give the Muses an edge—a soul,
like they were really, truly alive and breathing, unlike any of the other
statues we’d seen so far. For once, my hands itched to grab my phone and
snap a picture of this incredible work, but I stopped myself. I would not be
taking pictures of anything in this place.
But I did wonder what it would feel like to touch them.
While Miles told me everything he knew about them, I went closer to
the golden plaque below the thirty-foot statue. Mousai the engraving said,
and below it were the names of all nine Muses. They all wore dresses, and
their faces looked almost identical, though I couldn’t see very well from
down here. But the details on their dresses that looked like they were
moving around their ankles, and the way their feet and toes were carved to
perfection—I couldn’t help myself. As if hypnotized, I reached out a finger
to touch the shiny marble. I could have sworn it was calling my name,
asking me to connect to it, and if I didn’t, something awful was going to
happen.
I couldn’t even hear Miles’s voice anymore or the noise of the crowd
surrounding us. My fingertip brushed against the hem of the dress of one of
the Muses in the middle. The cold of the marble took me off guard, sending
shivers up my arm in an instant. It was so potent it felt like a jolt of
electricity going through me, not simply cold.
“Sera?” Miles called from somewhere behind me.
But before I could respond, something moved by the Muses’s foot. A
snake slithered around the ankle fast, its long tongue tasting the air with a
hiss, the slit pupils on its golden eyes making my very soul tremble.
I jumped back, heart beating so fast it could break my ribcage.
“You’re not supposed to touch that!” Miles said in a terrified whisper,
tugging at my arm, but I couldn’t look away from the snake. The way it
wrapped its green body around the ankle of the Muse, head suspended in
air, unblinking eyes on me as its tongue came out again and again…
My God, it felt like it was looking at the inside of my mind and it could
see all of me.
“Hey, are you okay?” Miles said again, stepping in front of me, making
me look down at him for a second. “You’re pale. Are you gonna be sick?
Please don’t tell me you’re gonna be sick.” He looked terrified, too.
I automatically forced a smile on my face. “No, of course not. It’s just
the heat. I’m fine,” I said breathlessly, hoping he couldn’t see the way my
hands were shaking and couldn’t hear how fast my heart was hammering in
my chest.
But he was just a kid so he didn’t notice anything, only sighed in relief.
“Thank gods. The announcement is about to begin—let’s go!”
He grabbed my hand and pulled me to the side, around the statue of the
Muses and behind it like he couldn’t see the snake at all. But it was still
there, still wrapped around the ankle of the Muse, still watching me like it
fucking knew me, still hissing every few seconds like it wanted to talk to
me. The way it stretched around the statue to follow my every movement
made me feel like it was slithering all over my body instead. I couldn’t tear
my eyes off it until I couldn’t see it anymore.
 Calm down, I said to myself in my head. Just a snake. The gods loved
snakes. They helped most descendants throughout history—that’s why they
were all over this city. They were only animals. Nothing to fear here.
“Ladies and gentlemen!”
The voice came from everywhere all at once, and I jumped in place
again, but at least this time I wasn’t the only one. Everybody stopped
moving for a moment, looking up at the blue sky, holding their breath…
“Welcome to Idaea!”
The hymn of the gods started playing again somewhere close by,
making every hair on my body stand at attention. I’d woken up to that
melody so many times the sound of it put me right back at the orphanage.
I closed my eyes and forced my muscles to relax, reminded my body of
where I was. Not in the orphanage. I was safe here—in Idaea with Miles.
And the announcement for the Elysean Trials had already begun.
 2

Gaea then bore three more monstrous sons, with fifty heads and a hundred arms,
which her husband, Uranus, seized and locked in Tartarus together with their ugly
brothers the Cyclopses.
And so Gaea plotted her revenge on her cruel husband. Out of metal from her
depths as strong as the gods, she forged a scythe and gave it to her firstborns, the
beautiful Titans, to use against their father and free their brothers.
The Titans refused.

—Book of Creation, 92
by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

The screaming and cheering started the next second as everybody realized
whose voice it was: Elliot Embers, the host of this year’s trials.
We were right in front of a large amphitheater that was probably the size
of a football stadium. Red ropes were around it, with several small openings
that let in no more than two people at a time. Just like with everything else
around here, the people were careful to walk slowly, make sure they weren't
touching anything by accident. As we waited in line, I looked around,
hoping to find Layla or James or any other familiar face somewhere close.
All I saw were strangers, but when we went through the red rope and took
in the amphitheater in all its glory, all my other thoughts disappeared.
The thing was huge, oval-shaped, with at least twenty rows of seats
going down. The benches were made of smooth white stone and more than
one third of them were already taken on the other side. The people sitting
on them kept a distance of at least a couple feet from each other, like their
personal space was their most prized asset. Just the way they held
themselves told me it was them—the Elyseans, the ones who called
themselves gods.
People practically poured down the rest of the benches, separated from
the Elyseans by those same red ropes. They moved so fast that the first
three rows closest to the field of grass in the middle were already taken.
“C’mon!” Miles shouted, jumping over the benches to find a seat as
close as we could get, but people were coming from all sides so fast they sat
in front of us in the blink of an eye. We barely managed to find a spot
somewhere over the tenth row.
“Hear, hear!” the host called into the microphone just as the hymn
ended, but the noise wouldn’t let me focus yet. Way too many people
behind me, their knees digging into my back as the ones behind them
pushed and tried to get in the front. The guy sitting on my left was
practically one with me now, and Miles sat on my right, holding my hand
tightly, eyes glossy as he looked at the host, not even noticing the crowd.
Every single seat was already taken, and twice as many people were
standing around the amphitheater, too.
“May I have your attention, please!” the host said, and suddenly, the
crowd exploded into applause.
The man and the woman standing on the square wooden stage in the
middle of the grass field were dressed in silver suits that shone like they
were made entirely out of glitter. They faced us, while behind them sat the
Elyseans, and over them was a large screen that gave us a close-up view of
the hosts. Speakers seemed to be mounted everywhere around us because
when the guy spoke into his microphone again, his voice came from
everywhere at once.
“We’re certainly not used to this kind of crowd in our city, are we?” he
said, smiling so big it looked a bit painful on the screen.
I’d seen pictures of Elliot Embers around the city when they announced
him as the host. He looked to be in his thirties, maybe even early forties,
with golden brown hair sleeked behind his head and big brown eyes. He
had three big golden rings on the fingers of his right hand, a beautiful
sapphire as clear as the sky set in the one in the middle.
“No, we are not,” the woman next to him said, and her smile was a bit
more genuine. They hadn’t put her face on any of the posters, so I had no
idea who she was. No precious gem anywhere on her that I could see on
that screen, but her long blonde hair could have been made out of silk, and
her dark eyes sparkled more than the silver suit she had on. “This is so
exciting! We’re so happy to have all of you here today to share the most
important event in the world with us!”
And the crowd went nuts again. They screamed so much, I couldn’t hear
my own thoughts over it and the applause that went on for a solid minute.
Miles kept clapping his hands, too, so fast and so hard his palms had turned
blood red, but he didn’t even notice.
It wasn’t just him—it was everyone. The hosts went on, mostly the man
doing the talking, his powerful voice booming through the speakers. The
screen changed eventually into a white background, with soft blue letters on
it that said, Do you have what it takes to be a god?
Bile rose up my throat as people cheered louder. I looked at their faces,
their red cheeks and sweaty foreheads and glossy eyes, the way they
cheered and raised their hands to the sky…
God, they worshipped these people. They really thought of them as
gods. Every single mortal here would give up anything to be like them. To
be close to them. To just talk to them—Miles included. All my friends, too.
Even Gary.
Did any of them know what their true faces even were? Did any of these
people know what Elyseans were truly capable of, that they were cold-
blooded murderers?
“Sera, look!” Miles shouted, pulling me from my thoughts, and he
grabbed my hand and jumped to his feet together with everyone else. A set
of double doors somewhere to the side of the amphitheater had opened, and
two pearly white horses walked out, a small golden carriage behind them.
The screen came to life again, showing the faces of the two people
riding in the carriage, waving their hands and smiling at the screaming
audience. Arthur O’Brien and Avery Johnson.
“They’re here! They’re here!” Miles kept on shouting as he jumped up
and down, and the large screen followed the horses walking around the
stage once, while the new Elyseans held themselves like they were fucking
royalty. The smug smiles on their faces, the way they looked at all of us like
they knew for a fact that they were superior, made me want to gag for real.
They had been just like us two years ago.
Had they really forgotten what it was like so fast?
I must have been the only one to think that because the horses stopped
and the hosts helped both of them up on stage, smiling and laughing, patting
their shoulders like they were the bestest of friends.
It didn’t feel right to me.
Four years ago, both Arthur and Avery had been like us, possibly even
sitting somewhere on these benches. They’d been chosen, and then they’d
gone to the Elysean Academy of Divine Light and Beauty, and they’d
graduated from it. Then, they’d eaten a magical fruit called Ambrosia, and
had drunk a juice called Nectar—the food and drink of the gods—and now
they had powers? Just like that?
It felt unnatural, not the way of things.
 Gods drank and ate Nectar and Ambrosia in the stories, and that is why
they had no blood, but they had Ichor in their veins, the very source of their
power. And you were either born with a god’s Ichor in yours, or you
weren’t. You couldn’t just become one because you drank a glass of juice or
ate a damn fruit. It made no sense. If there even was such a thing, you’d
think mortals would have already found it. The way everybody was crazy
about magic and powers, somebody would have found out how to make or
where to find the food of gods a long time ago.
So what was the catch?
“Now, everyone, I know you’re excited. I know—” Elliot Embers
laughed when the crowd cheered even louder. “I know, I know. I am, too,”
he said, but the crowd kept on shouting, and for another good minute, he
kept the microphone down, and talked to his colleague and the new
Elyseans in whispers.
“Alright now!” he then shouted. “Let’s give your vocal cords a break,
my dear mortal friends. We all want to hear what Art and Avery have to say,
don’t we?”
This time, the crowd didn’t cheer. Suddenly, everybody who had been
standing sat down, and so did Miles, pulling me with him.
“Thank you so much, everyone,” Avery said when she took the
microphone in her hands. “And thank you, Elliot,” she added with a curtsy.
He waved her off and smiled like he was suddenly the happiest man in the
world, his cheeks turning pink.
“They’re it,” Miles told me, squeezing my fingers so hard I barely felt
them. “They’re it, Sera. That’s what I’m going to be when I grow up!”
My stomach turned. Miles an Elysean?
I’d rather set something on fire.
“You’re way too good to be like them,” I told him, but he was already
so engrossed in what Avery was saying that I doubted he heard a word I
said.
 “It was hard, I’ll admit. The trials alone were difficult. And the
Academy was not for the faint of heart," she said, and they all laughed.
“But I made it because I was determined. I had a dream, and I was going to
make it come true one way or the other.”
The crowd lost it right away. Avery wiped a nonexistent tear from the
corner of her eye as she watched everyone screaming out her name. Some
people had even brought cards with her and Arthur’s names written on
them, and they waved them up and down for all to see.
Avery Johnson was probably twenty-two or -three years old, but she
somehow looked older than that. Maybe it was the blood-red crystal that
was hanging on the golden necklace she wore. God, did every Elysean own
impossibly big gemstones like that? Even Arthur O’Brien had a green one,
just like I’d seen on the statue of the Muses, sewn to the chest pocket of his
dark green jacket. How desperate were they to show they were rich?
Because we got it. We all got it.
“It has been such a journey,” Arthur said when Avery was done with her
speech and wiping enough invisible tears. “I’ll admit, there were times
when I wanted to quit. There were times when I wanted to leave everything
behind and go home. Being a god is not easy work, ha-ha-ha.”
The crowd ate up his words and screamed until their throats were raw.
You’re not a god, dickwad, I said in my head, but, of course, I kept my
mouth shut.
“After all, Avery and I were not the only mortals at the EA. Another
four were with us, and they did quit. They just weren’t strong enough, not
like us. But we kept on going. And to be fair, our Elysean friends helped a
great deal. Without their guidance and their friendship, without their
kindness and their patience, I would not be here today. So, thank you to all
of you,” Arthur said, turning to where the Elyseans were sitting and bowing
deeply.
 Avery on the other hand was so red in the face she resembled a tomato
—or the ruby around her neck. Steam was coming out her ears, maybe
because she hadn’t thought to say something similar? Because the Elyseans,
at least some of them, were clapping, and they were all smiling, seemingly
pleased with Arthur’s statement.
“Thank you, Arti, Avery,” Elliot said. “You have certainly gained a lot
from the Elysean Academy. Not only were you taught about gods—the true
history—but you were also immersed into a different, higher culture, had
the chance to speak to some of the brightest minds of our time, to be taught
by them, too. You will now be living in an Elysean city of your choosing,
like the Elyseans that you are. That certainly is no small thing.”
The crowd agreed. That’s why everybody jumped to their feet, and
Miles took me with him.
“Now, before we begin with the trials, I would like for the both of you
to show these beautiful mortals the biggest gift of all that you have been so
blessed to receive upon completing your studies at the Academy—your
magic.” And he and the blonde girl, who kept on smiling and nodding her
head, moved to the edge of the stage to leave the middle for Avery and
Arthur.
My heart skipped a long beat when Arthur stepped to the side and
waved at Avery, as if to say ladies first. The girl beamed, smoothing the
flares of her beautiful white dress before she raised her hands. The camera
zoomed out on her a bit, and she looked absolutely flawless with those
white pumps and the pantyhose that shimmered golden, paired with the
ruby on her chest. Her dark brown hair was tied behind her head in a
strange braid, and her eyes sparkled as she turned toward the doors through
which they’d come. They were both open still, though we could only see
darkness on the other side.
“She has been blessed with a gift that even born Elyseans are lucky to
have,” Elliot said. “The gift of fire was granted to her by the gods—straight
from the mighty Apollo. What a blessing,” he whispered. “Dear gods, what
a blessing…”
Fuck. Did it have to be fire?
Avery closed her eyes, inhaling deeply, and I could have sworn the
crystal of her necklace became brighter. Three seconds later, orange flames
sprang to life on the tips of her fingers.
The crowd went completely silent. We all stood still as we watched the
flames dancing on her skin. I forgot to even think as they became longer,
moved faster, then spread away from the tips of her fingers as if pulled by
some invisible strings.
The second they shot forward and sort of dripped down onto the grass,
spreading all the way toward the open doors, the crowd started cheering
again.
My heart squeezed and my breath caught in my throat instantly. A veil
fell before my eyes, isolating me, pulling me into a darkness that was too
absolute to be real. The sound of the outside world faded. It felt like a large
hand was inside my skull, grabbing my brain and squeezing and squeezing
until it no longer even existed.
So hard to breathe. So hard to remember where I was, what those voices
were, where those loud cries were coming from. Everything changed so, so
fast…
Mommy, said a small voice, hushed, breaking.
No, no, no, no—I chanted to myself, trying to move, run, get away from
that fire that was suddenly everywhere by any means necessary. I needed to
get away from it right now!
But I was no longer in control of my thoughts, of my memories, even
though I was trying.
Mommy, said that voice again. Mommy, it hurts…
I screamed.
 In my mind, I screamed with all my strength, twice as loud as any of
these people here today. The panic suffocated me because it knew—I knew
—what going down that hole would do to me. I would not let it happen, not
here and not now. Not ever again.
By some miracle, all that screaming worked, and a second later I heard
my name being called.
“Sera?”
Cold hands on my face.
My eyes popped open as Miles called my name again. It was easy to
hang onto him—familiar, warm and comforting, but that voice was still in
my head, coming from inside my mind. Like a memory, muddy, blurry, so
evil I never wanted to remember it. So vile it left a bad taste in my mouth
even though it had happened a very long time ago.
“Sera, look at me!”
Miles grabbed me by the shoulders and shook me until I had no choice
but to focus on his face. The broken memory of the fire faded, and the
screams of the infatuated people around me took over every inch of space in
my brain immediately.
Avery’s face on the large screen made my stomach twist. I looked at her
hands and to the side of the stage, but there were no more flames anywhere.
The grass hadn’t burned—it looked untouched. Her hands hadn’t turned
black, either—her skin was as smooth and as fair as it should be.
“What’s wrong? Are you hurt?” Miles asked, and I did my best to look
composed as I shook my head.
“I’m fine,” I finally managed to whisper, my throat so dry it hurt.
“Where…where’s the fire?”
“It’s gone. She took it back. It was just magic,” Miles said, his eyes
wide and dark, all the excitement drained from his voice. I’d freaked him
out—again.
 “Hey, I’m fine,” I said, forcing myself to move, put my hands on his
shoulders, calm him down. I tried for a smile, too, but I was only human.
“You sure? Because we can get out. I’ll just call Dad and tell him to
meet us out front, and we’ll—”
My heart squeezed and this time the smile came naturally. He’d give up
an arm to be here today, but one look at my face, and he was willing to
leave right away. It’s why I loved this kid so much—his heart was pure,
which I thought only existed in fiction before I met him.
“C’mon, Miles, look at me. I’m fine! I was just afraid—you know I
don’t like fire. I’m perfectly fine,” I reassured him. And I meant it—fire did
freak me out every time I saw it, but I was in control of my thoughts again.
We didn’t have to leave, at least not yet.
“You sure? Because you look really pale.”
“I’m very sure. No need to worry, okay? I’m fine.” I wrapped my arm
around his and pulled him to turn to the stage again.
What happened next distracted the both of us instantly.
“And now, here to demonstrate for us,” Elliot called. “The magic of
goddess Persephone herself!”
Avery had stepped back and Arthur was standing in the middle of the
stage now. This time, I didn’t even doubt my eyes—the emerald sewn to his
jacket did glow brighter for a moment, before he spread out his hands and
opened his eyes, and the grass in front of the stage moved.
Three thick green stems grew out of the ground within seconds. Crisp
white petals appeared out of thin air and spread to the sides, creating
flowers shaped like stars over each of them. A second later, leaves spread
out underneath, too, unfolding fast.
The crowd applauded one more time. The screen showed the beautiful
flowers from close up, and Arthur bowed deeply to the audience, smiling
like he was on top of the world.
 And he was. There was nothing and nobody out there higher than the
Elyseans. He’d reached the very top indeed, and he would reap the benefits
for the rest of his life.
 3

The Titans trembled with fear of Uranus and refused to do Gaea’s bidding—except the
youngest and the strongest of them all. His name was Cronus, and he unleashed his
wrath upon his father, wielded the weapon of his mother with strength Uranus could
not withstand.
Therefore, he fled, renouncing his powers, never to be seen again.

—Book of Creation, 6th Edition, 102

by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

I hadn’t even calmed down from the sight of Avery’s fire magic all the way
yet before my heart skipped another beat.
“And now—the Iriades!” Elliot said on the mic, and his voice boomed
from the speakers as if by true magic. Miles was on his feet, clapping and
jumping up and down, and everybody else was doing the same. If I had any
hopes of seeing what was happening down there, I would have to get up,
too. As much as I hated all of this, I was too curious to sit still.
Avery and Arthur had left after the demonstration of their magic
powers, as if we hadn’t seen them all over TV already.
The Blessed! The Favored! The Elysean Dream!
 Ugh.
The large screen showed the slogan again in thick bold letters, and the
melody of the hymn barely reached my ears with the slow breeze. It took a
good amount of energy to shut it out, but it was necessary. The doors to the
side of the grass field were open still and two men were pushing something
huge covered in a white cloth toward the stage.
“I know this is the moment you’re all really here for,” Elliot said when
whatever those men were pushing on four tiny wheels was right next to the
stage.
“It’s the moment I’m here for, too,” the woman next to him said, and
they both laughed. So did the crowd.
“Allow us to introduce to you…” Elliot stepped to the side, waving his
hand toward the white cloth as the men who’d brought it grabbed it by the
hems on either side. “The brand new Iriades that will be making the
selection on this blessed year!”
The men pulled the white cloth back. The crowd lost it completely,
screaming so much I literally had to cover my ears with my hands.
But even I couldn’t deny that every inch of my flesh was raised in goose
bumps at the sight of the golden cages that had been under that cloth. The
screen came to life, giving us a close-up view of the blue birds inside those
beautiful cages, watching us curiously.
The people were relentless. They refused to stop screaming, and it took
Elliot a few tries to get them to calm down enough so that he could speak.
“The Iriades—aren’t they a sight to behold?” And he went closer to one
of the golden cages, looking so lovingly at the bird inside you’d think he
was in love with it. “Such wonderful creatures. Made by the mighty
Hephaistos, with Aphrodite’s beauty, Hera’s sharp senses—and Athene
breathed life into them herself!”
My God, the way the people jumped and cried and pulled at their hair
would have been comical if they weren’t threatening to throw me down the
amphitheater every time they jammed their knees onto my back.
“It is they who will decide who is worthy to enter the trials for a chance
to attend the Elysean Academy of Divine Light and Beauty! It is they who
will fly all around this blessed country, and choose fourteen lucky mortals,
and award them with the chance of their lives!” Elliot kept going.
The smell of smoke and fire burning close by made all the hair on my
body stand at attention. The people were already burning food, making
sacrifices to the gods right there in the middle of the fucking crowd. Some
even had Portalts—a literal small portable altar where you could sacrifice
to the gods safely. There was a dedicated place for the figurine of whichever
god you wanted to sacrifice to, a nice deep bowl for the food, and a little
drawer for the matches and sticks, too. As if fire could possibly be safe—
but everyone had one in their homes, even Gary. And it seemed a quarter of
the people here had brought theirs with.
“Please forgive me, for I am just as excited as you are,” Elliot said,
putting a hand to his chest as he pretended to breathe deeply, then even
wipe a tear from his cheek, same as Avery had.
But the screen was showing us the Iriades still.
They were so strange—they didn’t have the body of an ordinary bird.
They were almost completely round, their feathers in all shades of blue,
starting with a morning-sky baby blue at the top of their wings, and ending
in a dark midnight tone at the tips. They moved in their cages constantly so
I couldn’t see their faces properly yet.
“What great gods we have,” Elliot continued, and the woman by his
side nodded and smiled as if he was saying the truest thing she’d ever
heard. “What great descendants they have, too!” he added with a grin, then
looked behind him at his fellow Elyseans sitting on the benches.
The crowd cheered once more, whistling and throwing rose petals that
had no chance of ever reaching all the way over to them. But they still tried.
 “Allow me to remind all of us that it is because of the generosity of my
people that we are here tonight,” Elliot proudly stated. “It’s because of us
that mortals have been allowed to have a taste of greatness, that they’ve
been given the chance to experience what it is like to be a god.” By then,
the sound of the crowd had become normal, but the fact that people were
lighting up more and more fires right there on the benches to sacrifice to the
gods made me incredibly uneasy.
I hated fire. I hated it so much it was making my skin crawl from fifty
feet away.
“But enough talk. We all want to set the Iriades free, don’t we?” The
people cheered. “We want them to fly out into the sky, around the whole
country, and find those among you who are worthy. Find those among you
who were destined for greatness!” He had his shaking fist in the air, too, as
if he were that passionate about this.
I wished I could say that I was cringing or that I wanted to gag at the
idea, at the sight in front of me, at the sound of Elliot’s voice, at the way the
crowd held their breath as he opened the small door of the golden cage
closest to him…I wasn’t.
Instead, I was completely focused.
The bird hopped onto Elliot’s hand immediately, chirping into the
microphone. The screen showed it from close up and I finally saw all of it
—its white beak and its large eyes that were made out of beautiful round
sapphires. It should have freaked me out. A creature who looked so real but
had crystals for eyes, and metal for talons? But this wasn’t a real bird—it
was a robot. Hephaestus had probably not made them himself, but someone
of his bloodline did. And they were absolutely breathtaking.
“These little guys here are going to answer the most important question
of your lives, people…” Elliot whispered into the mic as he analyzed the
bird in his hand, then turned his head to the crowd. “Say it with me?”
The crowd didn’t hesitate. Everyone shouted in unison.
 “DO YOU HAVE WHAT IT TAKES TO BE A GOD?!”
The men opened all the golden cages, and the Iriades flew out. The one
sitting on Elliot’s hand took flight, too. They all rose in the air, flying in a
perfect circle right over the benches where the Elyseans were sitting,
watching them and clapping their hands gracefully.
I held my breath as the fourteen tiny figures hovered in the air…
Then they froze for a single second, before each turned their own way
and they started flying at full speed.
My eyes were on the one that was flying toward us. Its eyes shone, the
gems in them becoming bluer the closer it came. I couldn’t move, couldn’t
think, couldn’t do anything but watch it as it beat those wings that looked so
real, and it felt like it was going to smash its beak right on my face. It was
coming for me and there was nowhere to hide. Nowhere to go from the
people surrounding me, screaming so loudly I couldn’t hear my own
thoughts if I’d had any.
I’d been terrified a lot of times in my life, but this moment definitely
made it to the top ten. The bird flew straight until it was barely three feet
away from my face—then rose up, and in one flashing second, went right
over my head.
I turned together with the crowd to watch it fly away, becoming smaller
and smaller until it merged into the blue of the sky, disappearing from our
view. The people were already at their rituals, calling out god names,
burning food, playing lyres, doing dances and singing songs with lyrics I
didn’t even want to understand.
Miles’s hand was in mine when the people began to leave the
amphitheater. The announcement was over.
“Let’s get away from here before they stomp us to death,” I told Miles,
and for once, he eagerly agreed. I pulled him through the crowd and didn’t
stop walking until we had at least five feet of space around us on all sides.
T was like stepping into another world altogether.
The place was huge, like an open-air shopping mall. The biggest brands of
the world had shops there, but what they sold here wouldn’t be available
anywhere else in the world. God-inspired fashion was a billion-dollar
industry, and the Elyseans sure knew how to take advantage of that. They
only ever allowed mortals to shop these collections once a year online, and
inside Idaea once every four years, when they opened the gates for the trials
for about three weeks.
It was worse than Black Friday. People were already fighting about who
got to what first. It wasn’t just elite clothing brands—they had everything
here, from antique shops to jewelers to home décor, and humans wanted to
get their hands on everything, all at once. Just a few feet away from us, a
woman was offering another twice the amount of money she paid for a
goddess Selene-inspired Prada purse. The woman refused, causing the first
to grab the paper bag from her hands and try to run away with it. They were
both screaming bloody murder at each other yet nobody else even looked
their way.
Across from them, a man was being cornered by another four. They
slowly stalked closer to the poor guy, holding about a dozen black plastic
bags in his hands as he shook his head. The closer to them we went, the
more we heard—apparently, the guy had bought all of Poseidon-inspired
beard oils from the oil shop a few stores down and was planning to sell
them online for twice the price—which was basically James’s Get Rich
Quick scheme. He’d spent the last year analyzing what people mostly
bought online in the black market he somehow had access to, and he’d
worked part time most days at the diner of Layla’s mom to save money so
he could buy whatever was on his list, then sell them later on when Idaea
closed—at astronomical prices, of course.
Was he going to get beaten today, too? Because these four guys here
didn’t look like they were about to let the other go with those beard oils.
Would anybody even stop them?
“This is madness,” I whispered, admiring the beautiful shops all around
us, the statues every few feet, even the animals roaming around us freely. I
tried to imagine how beautiful and pure this place would look without
people arguing and screaming, without a crowd.
“It’s like they’re possessed,” Miles said in wonder.
“You think your dad’s around here somewhere?” Gary was very strict
with money—money from my trust fund that went to him monthly from my
parents’ fortune, and the very reason why he took me in and became my
guardian in the first place. It enabled him to afford to live comfortably
without having to work.
But he did love to indulge himself and Miles every once in a while, and
I had the feeling he’d want to get something from here. After all, I would be
gone in three days. What was left of my parents’ money would be
transferred to me the day I turned eighteen.
“He’ll probably buy some of that liquor he keeps talking about. The
honey wine or whatever it’s called,” Miles said. “Let’s hurry so we don’t
run into him.”
“We should have just gone around this madness,” I mumbled, moving
away from a couple who was running to the other side with at least a dozen
bags in their hands each, like they’d just stolen something and were being
chased by the authorities.
“I wanted to see this, too,” Miles said, looking at me through the corner
of his eye suspiciously. “Why? Do you want to maybe sit down and rest?”
“Miles, I’m fine,” I reassured him for the tenth time. “It was just the
fire. I’m perfectly fine. You know I hate crowds.” And mad people who
would sell their souls for anything Elysean without hesitation. “Besides,
I’m the adult here—I should be worried about you. You’re not allowed to
worry about me.”
 I was still a bit freaked out by that Iriade and the way its crystal eyes
had watched me, but that was over an hour ago. I’d forget all about it—and
everything else in this place—in no time.
“Not an adult yet,” the kid said, grinning mischievously. “We can run to
the Palace, can’t we? Let’s run. Everybody else is doing it.”
Music to my ears. “Race you?”
I gave him a head start and stayed behind him the whole time so I
wouldn’t lose him from sight. I’ll admit, I was having a bit of fun for the
first time since I stepped into this place. Running after Miles, I could
pretend we were out there in the world somewhere, far away from anything
Elysean, and the people around us didn’t even matter so long as they didn’t
get in our way.
“Sera!”
I heard my name being called as I sped past two guys dragging a small
cart behind them fully loaded with paper bags, and I turned just in time to
see Layla’s smiling face waving her hands at me. She and James were in
front of the Hermes Candy Corner—with so many colors and so much
glitter it made me a bit nauseous just to look at it.
I waved at them, too, then pointed ahead. They could see Miles running,
and they knew where we were headed. They’d be there, too, in a minute.
Layla raised her thumbs at me with a grin. Yeah, we’d definitely see them
in a bit.
After about ten minutes of running and trying not to bump into people
—and not let people bump into us—we finally reached the end of the
shopping district. Two large buildings marked the edge of it, both a single
story high, with marble pillars and beautiful birds engraved on the façade.
The one on the left was a fancy sportswear shop, the other a perfumery. The
pink sign on the windows promised you that when you left their store, you
would be a new you—irresistible, irreplaceable, Elysean-like.
 A narrow tunnel between the buildings led to the next street. Plenty of
people on the other side, but not nearly as many as in the shopping district.
They were all looking ahead with their mouths wide open, at the very thing
we were here to see: the Daedalus Palace.
It wasn’t the Academy—we weren’t allowed into the parts of the city
where the Academy was—but it was the place where the Elysean trials
would be held.
The large golden gates revealed a beautiful yard with freshly mowed
grass and flowers that looked like paint on canvas, not part of the real
world. The Palace itself was about fifty feet away, two stories high, wide
and seemingly round, the exterior a pearly white just like most things
around here. It was by no means a skyscraper, but its presence was massive.
The tower on top of it, in the middle of the building, had a perfect grey-
painted triangle for a rooftop that made it look like an arrow pointing at the
sky.
Unfortunately, that was all we could see of the famous Daedalus Palace
through the gates, which would only open to us when the selected
candidates completed the first two trials. But even the air around here
seemed to be different. Lighter somehow. Free. That’s how I knew that I
would be back here just to get inside those gates and see the Palace from
close up. No way could I resist the curiosity to figure out why it felt the way
it did, like it contained a whole world between those walls desperate to be
explored.
I wasn’t the only one in awe of this place. The crowd of people coming
closer to admire it grew by the second.
“Whoa,” Miles whispered, even more impressed than me. “This is the
place, Sera. This is where it happens.”
“It’s just a building,” I muttered, refusing to admit what I felt out loud
even now.
 “It’s not just a building,” he said, going closer to the gates as if he were
hypnotized. “It’s the building. It can become everything and anything.
Some people swear there’s even a portal to Olympus in there.”
Shivers rushed down my back at the idea. I grabbed Miles’s hand in
mine.
“And that’s why you should stop reading those stupid forums. People
have no clue what they’re talking about. There are no portals to Olympus.”
If there were, I’d have known. With the way I was raised and all the
information I’d acquired between the age of twelve and fourteen, when I’d
spent every day at the orphanage with no foster family to want to take me
in, I would have known if there was a way into Olympus because I lived
with the biggest god fanatics to have ever walked the Earth. And if they
hadn’t made their way into Olympus yet, nobody ever would.
“I’m just saying, it’s full of magic. They say Elyseans rearrange a part
of the building for each separate trial with their magic. Arthur himself
confirmed this in a podcast. I heard it.”
“Hey, you freaks!”
James jumped on my back out of nowhere, and Layla jumped on
Miles’s, almost knocking him to the ground.
“Takes one to know one,” I said, elbowing James in the gut until he let
go of me and stepped aside.
“See that?” Layla said to Miles, keeping her arm wrapped around his
shoulders still as she stared at the Palace. “That’s the thing, kid. That’s
where dreams come true—no, no, that’s where dreams are made!”
I burst out laughing and James joined it. Even Miles was trying to stifle
a smile.
“You’re hopeless,” I told her, and she grinned like I’d paid her a
compliment.
“She’s delusional,” James said from my other side. “I had to ride here
with her and both our moms, and let me tell you, my ears are bleeding. I
worship these people as much as the next guy, but those three?” He stepped
in front of me, taking the Palace away from my view for a moment when he
gripped me by the shoulders. “Those three are a tragedy, Sera. They’re so
absurd it’s funny.” He raised a hand toward the sky as if he were reading
invisible words on air. “A tragic comedy.”
“Oh, go sniff a sweaty sock, James,” said Layla. “You loved every
second of my mom’s stories because you’re worse than everybody here
combined.”
“At least I don’t dream about Zeus coming to my bed at night,” James
said under his breath, grinning sneakily. Impossible not to laugh when
Layla’s cheeks flushed bright red, and she suddenly looked enraged.
Oh, my God—James was right?
Then I remembered that Miles was there.
“Shut it, you two. No talking about Zeus in front of Miles.” That god
screwed anything that walked, sometimes even if it didn’t. I don’t care what
Miles read online—he would not hear this from me or my friends.
“See? She’s not completely fucked up in the head, which is more than I
can say about you,” James said to Layla, pointing his finger at me.
“I’m the one who’s fucked up in the head, when you’re the one with
pockets full of god cards you spent three thousand dollars on?!” Layla spit.
I literally gasped—no way to help it. “Are you serious? Three
thousand?” Was he kidding me?
James’s cheeks could be melting off his face any second. “I know what
I’m doing, okay?”
“Really? Because I saw those damn cards—and they’re cards. For a
game, Sera. A stupid game,” Layla told me. I didn’t even have words for
James right now—three thousand dollars. Just…three thousand!
“Hey—those cards sell. I’ve done the homework. I know how it goes
out there. And I’m not the one who spent two hundred bucks on a tiny
bottle of lotion that makes you irresistible to any male that comes near
you,” James countered, and now I had no choice but to turn to Layla, who
was clutching her purse under her arm tightly as if she thought I might grab
it from her.
I couldn’t. I had no words. Two hundred fucking bucks—nope. No
words, so I just shook my head at them both.
Miles turned to me, mouth agape and eyes wide.
“You don’t get why I’m friends with them?” I guessed. “Yeah, me
neither.”
James and Layla didn’t stop going at it until we had enough of the
Palace and decided to retreat from the crowd. Even as we continued to
check out the parts of the city where we were allowed to wander, they
always found something to argue about, but at least they were funny. Miles
was having a great time. I, on the other hand, still couldn’t believe that
they’d spent all that money on those stupid things just because they were
Elysean. I was going to give them a piece of my mind as soon as we went
back to the real world. Not that they’d care, but it would make me feel
better.
Very close to the Palace, we found the first temple, built to honor Zeus
and the twelve gods. The white rooftop stood on twelve columns, and
through them we could see all the statues of the gods sitting inside. Zeus in
the very middle was easily a hundred feet tall, if not more, and the rest of
them were almost as big. The people inside the temple who were sacrificing
the best food they could afford to the gods had filled it up with smoke that
was being sucked into the ceiling, possibly by a good ventilation system
that everyone would eagerly call magic.
I was familiar with most of the stories portrayed in the vases at the
corners of every street, and the more of them I saw, the more uneasy I got.
It wasn’t the stories themselves, just the reminder of how I came to learn
about them. But I tried to keep my focus on the peacocks walking
gracefully around us, avoiding the snakes and the statues with the green and
red and blue gemstones on them as much as I could.
It wasn’t long before we found the feast that the Elyseans had prepared
for us at twilight. They’d set everything up between two smaller temples far
from the Palace, somewhere close to the edge of the city because the wall
surrounding it couldn’t be farther than a few miles by the looks of it.
Long tables were placed in perfect rows on the cobbles. Food of every
kind filled the countless plates. Decorations were over our heads—colored
crystals in the shapes of the gods hanging on thin threads that stretched
from one temple to the other. There was a band playing instruments of gold
—a harp, a lyre and a violin that created the most beautiful, soothing
melody I’d ever heard.
But most importantly, the Elyseans were there to greet us.
They waited for us with drinks in their hands and smiles on their faces.
Even Elliot Embers was among them, and he’d swapped his glittery suit for
a dark blue one that suited him much better.
People were in awe of them. Most cried in their presence, bowed and
curtsied to them, kneeled to them like they really were gods. They weren’t.
This wasn’t the first time that I’d had the misfortune of coming across an
Elysean, and they were most definitely not gods.
But they did look the part. Whatever they did to their clothes, they
looked different from the rest of ours, though the designs and colors were
pretty much the same. Their hair looked different, too, like it was made out
of fabric, their skins glowed, and their eyes seemed to pierce right through
you. Most of the ones around us wore those precious gems about them—
some in their hair, some around their necks or wrists or fingers, even in
their shoes. They must have really loved greens and reds and blues here. All
their crystals were in those colors.
My friends and Miles explored every table, sampling every food,
commenting on every detail. Meanwhile I grabbed a bottle of water, made
sure it was sealed, and stepped back so I could catch my breath and just
enjoy the music in the air. They’d get tired and come back to find me in no
time.
I leaned against one of the columns of the temple closest to me and
observed the scene. It was impossible not to analyze the Elyseans. So damn
glamorous. They looked flawless—like watching the Oscars in real life.
Some people still had tears in their eyes as they admired them, so in awe
they could pass out any second. Some probably really had.
Taking in a deep breath, I forced myself to look away and tried to
remind myself that not all of them were the same as the one I’d met when I
was five. Probably not, just like not all humans were serial killers or
Mandela.
But try as I might, I couldn’t get the bad feeling in my gut to fade away.
It wasn’t just the Elyseans with their fake smiles and their perfectly
manicured hands waving at the mortals who hung onto every word they
said and every breath they took. It was in the air, too. It was in the sky and
all its stars and the half moon. It was the feeling of being watched that was
settling on my shoulders, and it was so heavy nothing could distract me
from it. It was the way all those gemstones reflected colorful light that
seemed to get brighter with every passing minute.
It was this whole damn city that rubbed me the wrong way.
Wrapping my arms around myself, I blew out a long breath. I didn’t
care how beautiful it was here, or how much magic these people had, or
how close to the gods this place was. It didn’t even matter how badly I
wanted to see the inside of the Daedalus Palace—this was definitely the last
time I set foot in Idaea.
And I would continue to stay away from anything Elysean for the rest of
my life.
 4

“The whims of fate change swiftly.”

—Moirai: The Great Fates, 198

by G. T. Vessinger, House Sapphire

We arrived at Gary’s house just before midnight, all of us exhausted. I

couldn’t wait to get to bed and call it a day. Couldn’t wait to put everything
Idaea-related behind me.
“You liked the Palace, at least,” Miles whispered when Gary shut the
door to his room, and we continued to ours, which were at the end of the
corridor across from one another.
“It was okay,” I said, a lazy smile on my face because I knew I’d never
have to see it again.
“I know you hated the rest of it, but thanks for coming, Sera,” he told
me, leaning his head against his door.
“Yeah, no problem, kid. I’m the adult here, remember?” It was my job
to do things for him.
 “Not an adult yet,” he reminded me again. “But you won’t leave, right?
I mean, I know you and Dad don’t exactly get along, but you’re not gonna
leave this place.”
My heart broke into a thousand pieces. “I don’t know yet, Miles,” I said
with a shrug. “Right now, all I know is that I’ll be moving out of this house
Saturday—midnight sharp.” I tried to make it into a joke, but my laughter
sounded bitter.
I’d been looking forward to my eighteenth birthday ever since I could
remember, but I’d never thought someone like Miles would be in my life by
then. I never thought I’d genuinely want to stay close to him forever.
“Hey, maybe I can come live with you in a couple years,” Miles said,
forcing a smile for my sake.
I walked over to him and kissed his cheek. “I’ll be close. So close you’ll
see me every day. I’m never leaving, kid.” I just wouldn’t be in this house
or neighborhood.
“Night, Sera,” he said, flashing me a look so full before he closed the
door that I forgot he was only nine years old. He understood so much more
than I sometimes realized.
“Night, Miles,” I said and sighed when I closed the door.
The room I slept in had never really felt like mine. There was only one
thing I cared about in that tiny space—the calendar on the desk marked with
black ink. I looked at all the Xs of this month as I took my jacket off, then
grabbed the marker, took the lid off with my teeth, and drew another on
today’s square, May fifteenth. Another two of those, and I would be free.
Eighteen. An adult.
I even had a plan I was going to see through. College would have to
wait—I wanted to get a job first, settle down, just breathe for a moment
before I had to decide what I wanted to do with my life. I’d stay here in
Boston for a little bit, close enough to Miles until I learned the ropes of life
on my own.
 And when I did, when the unknown became known and this crippling
fear of the outside world no longer suffocated me, I would finally, truly
begin.

T in my gut refused to go away all morning.

By noon, I was sure that I had the worst case of anxiety since I was
thirteen and convinced that the sky would fall on my head any second, and
the world’s end was just around the corner.
It never did then. It probably wouldn’t today either. But by the time we
walked out of the school building, I realized the reason for my shitty mood
wasn’t my anxiety. It was my friends, my classmates, my teachers—
practically everyone in the whole damn world.
All they could think about was the Elyseans. All they could talk about
was the Elyseans—even our history professor, Mr. Croff, also known as the
Grumpiest Guy in Boston, was cheerful today. Why? Because he got to
speak to an Elysean last night, who told him the gods were proud of his
work as a teacher.
And did Mr. Croff ask said Elysean, how in the fuck would you know
what the gods are proud of? Have you spoken to them personally?
No, of course not. Of course, he didn’t.
I couldn’t even open any social media or forum or anything without the
Elyseans getting shoved down my throat. Even Google had redesigned their
logo with marble statues and laurel crowns for the month. Nobody was
talking about the gods, no—it was all about the Elyseans, what they wore,
what they said, how they moved and smiled and laughed.
And to top it all off? Students and teachers alike had printed out pictures
they took last night, and they—I kid you not—stuck them to walls and
lockers, on desks and toilet stalls, in the cafeteria and the backyard, too.
You simply couldn’t take a single step without looking right at their surreal
faces.
Granted, they did look divine. Perfect. Flawless—ugh. Even more so
when standing next to mortals. You could see beyond a shadow of a doubt
how much better they were than the rest of us, like an upgraded version of a
human being. It made me hate them even more.
Add the fact that everyone was completely mesmerized by them and I
was about ready to throw up.
“He literally couldn’t look away,” Layla was saying to a girl from her
Biology class, whose name I couldn’t remember.
James and I exchanged a look.
“Oh, you’re so lucky! You should look him up on social. Maybe he’ll
want to talk to you,” the girl said, completely in awe.
“Of course not! I’m not going to do his work for him,” Layla said,
throwing her hair back dramatically. James and I didn’t dare look at each
other again. “If he wants this, he’s gonna have to work for it.”
If I’d been in a less shitty mood, I’d have probably laughed my heart out
when the girl walked away, and Layla joined us again by the gates.
“Wow. I mean, I didn’t even know you could be in two places at the
same time. You were with me the whole time yesterday—and you met a
dreamy Elysean who couldn’t look away from you? Just…wow,” James
said under his breath.
I almost laughed.
“Shut it, Dormont. You saw him, too,” she said, cheeks already burning.
“All I saw was an old guy trying to get you to follow him behind the
trees,” James said.
I wasn’t almost laughing anymore.
“Hush—someone will hear you,” Layla spit. “And he wasn’t old! He’s
Elysean, asshole.”
 “Yeah, yeah, whatever,” James said in surrender, knowing he couldn’t
argue with that. He was just as crazy a fanatic as Layla.
“Meanwhile, you were ogling every Elysean with a pair of tits,” Layla
continued when we left the school grounds, speaking a bit louder now. She
and James cared about people spying on our conversations for reasons that
were beyond me.
“Of course, I was—did you see them? They’re fucking hot,” James said
without missing a beat, turning his eyes to the blue sky. The weather was
even warmer today than it had been yesterday. It obviously wasn’t proof
that the gods had blessed the trials, like most people thought. It just meant
that the Elyseans knew which weather forecast channel to trust before
picking the trial dates.
“That, they are,” Layla admitted with a nod.
“One of them had hair so long it reached the back of her knees,” James
said—for the fourth time since lunch break. I refrained from commenting
again.
“Oh, yes, I remember her. She was standing right next to that ginger
guy. Remember—the one with the dark blue jacket? I, for one, never was
into gingers, but Elysean anything just makes it good,” Layla whispered
when a group of students passed us by. I don’t even know why she bothered
—everybody was talking about Elyseans. Adoring Elyseans. Swooning over
how gorgeous and perfect the Elyseans were.
“Hey, it’s this way,” Layla said when I started for the parking lot behind
which was a slight shortcut to Gary’s house. “We’re going to get
milkshakes at Fairytale, remember?”
“No, thanks. I gotta get home,” I said, but she wouldn’t let go of my
arm.
“Don’t be a bitch, Sera. It’s Wednesday. We always get milkshakes on
Wednesday.”
 “Except today,” I said, giving her my best smile. “I’m on my period and
I’ve got cramps like you wouldn’t believe,” I lied. “Just go ahead without
me. I’ll join you next week.” When they stopped talking about Elyseans for
five seconds.
“I didn’t need to hear that, you know,” James muttered. “But either way,
milkshakes are important. I also have good news—I’m well on my way to
make back the money I spent yesterday with the game cards. I’ll tell you all
about it if you come.”
“Pfft, a couple thousand?” Layla waved him off. “That’s nothing. Small
potatoes.”
“So what? Big potatoes have to be small potatoes first before they can
become big potatoes,” he argued. “At least I’m a potato. That’s what
matters.”
Really, really hard not to burst out laughing.
Layla blink at him. “You’re a potato,” she said, like she was just
making sure she heard right.
James flinched, realizing just now what he said, but he held his ground.
“Yep. And you know exactly what I mean.”
I did, too. That didn’t mean I wasn’t going to laugh my heart out at him
later, probably for years to come.
“Whatever,” Layla said, then turned to me. “Wait—weren’t you on your
period last weekend?” And she squinted her eyes at me while she crossed
her arms in front of her.
Busted.
Pulling my lips inside my mouth, I refrained from talking—I was a
really shitty liar.
“Look, we admit that we overdid it with the Elyseans today, but we can
stop,” James said with a sigh.
But he didn’t get it. It wasn’t just yesterday or today or any other day
for that matter—it was the fact that they both knew. I’d told them some of
my story, a tiny bit of it, in a way I’d never ever told anyone before, and
they knew exactly how much it cost me to have to sit there and listen to
them worship those people. It fucking hurt, despite that I’d trained myself
to never take anything personally. It just wasn’t possible when it was my
best friends.
“No, you can’t, James. You can’t,” I reminded him, pissed already that I
had to.
“Why does it bother you so much that we talk about them, anyway?”
Layla said. “I get that you hate them, but not all of them are to blame for
what happened to you, Sera. They’re gods!”
I flinched. “Stop it, Lay.”
“You stop it,” she demanded. “Stop being so stubborn. We had good fun
yesterday. The Elyseans are not the devils you make them be—they’re—”
White noise went off in my mind, blocking out everything else. It was
like I transformed into a completely different person all of a sudden and
controlling myself was impossible—I didn’t want to.
“Stop it,” I hissed, right in the middle of the sidewalk, so mad I was
seeing red. “Just stop. I don’t care who they are or what they look like or
where they come from—they are not gods!” I said, maybe way too loudly,
but at that point I didn’t even care.
Layla looked at me like I’d slapped her. James hardly blinked his wide
eyes.
And I should have stopped there. I should have just turned around and
left right away, but a lid had cracked open, and now all the bad shit I
constantly held back wanted to come out at once.
“You wanna know what they are, Lay? I’ll tell you what they are—
nothing more than power-hungry people with some magic powers and a god
complex. They’re not saints. They’re not good by any means! They are not
gods, people. Stop worshipping them—they are not gods!”
 Every alarm in my head was ringing, my instincts trying to warn me,
and I didn’t listen.
I didn’t listen until it was too late.
I blinked, and not only were James and Layla watching me with their
mouths wide open, shocked out of words, but at least another fifty students
had stopped behind me on the sidewalk. Nobody spoke, but some of them
had their phones in their hands, probably recording me.
Ice-cold shivers rushed down my back. Oh, God. What the hell had I
done? These people were going to label me a fucking terrorist for saying
that out loud.
Shit, shit, shit…
Breathing in deeply, I faced Layla and James again. It didn’t matter that
they heard me or that they recorded me. It didn’t matter at all because I
wouldn’t even be here in two days. I wouldn’t even graduate if that’s what
it took—it didn’t matter.
But before I could turn to the parking lot again, James moved.
His lips opened and closed like a fish out of water, but no sound left
him. Then, he raised his hand, his index finger pointing at my face.
At first, I thought he was going to start shouting at my face—traitor!—
or something like that, but then I noticed the tears in Layla’s eyes. I noticed
neither of them was looking at my face like I thought, and James’s finger
wasn’t pointing at me, but at something close to me. Something behind me.
Were the students who’d been recording me about to jump me from
behind?
I turned to look again.
Blue eyes made out of crystals met mine. They were each as big as my
thumb, taking over more than half of the strange round face covered in blue
feathers, with a snow-white beak extending between them.
I couldn’t remember how to breathe or move or speak.
 An Iriade was hovering in the air soundlessly over my shoulder, looking
right at me.
 5

When Uranus fled, Gaea wed Pontus, the boundless seas, and from their union grew
trees and flowers, beasts and spirits—and the first man. But even so, her son Cronus
did not set his brothers free from Tartarus like he had promised.

And so Gaea raged again.

—Book of Creation, 6th Edition, 130

by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

An Iriade was looking at me.

Its body was about the size of both my fists, with feathers in every
shade of blue, beating its wings so slowly, so silently, it made absolutely no
sense that it would be hovering in the air almost eye level with me.
My stomach twisted into a thousand knots. I took a step back, careful
not to scare the bird, but…
The second I moved, it moved with me, came closer so that barely a
couple inches were between my nose and its beak.
And it never stopped looking at me.
“No.”
 The universe was playing games with me, that was it.
Or maybe I was still in class and I’d fallen asleep, and I was having a
nightmare.
Because this Iriade was here, at Rodrick High, looking right at me—and
the meaning behind that was way too absurd to be real.
So, I took another step back.
The Iriade moved again.
“Oh, my gods…” someone whispered from the crowd of students who
had gathered all around me now.
But I shook my head harder.
“No.” Fuck this. This Iriade wasn’t here for me—it was here for
someone else. Anyone else. Any of the students in our school, any of them.
Them—not me.
“Oh, gods, Sera, it’s you,” Layla said in a shaky whisper, crying.
“You’ve been ch-ch-chosen—it’s looking at you!”
Fuck.
That.
I backed off faster toward the parking lot, eyes on the blue bird so that I
saw it when it moved with me. The crowd of students exploded into
whispers, and some even screamed. I thought I heard James calling my
name, but I couldn’t look away from the bird. It was following me. I was
hardly breathing, shaking so badly I was terrified I might collapse any
second, but the thing would not stop following me.
“Leave me alone!” I shouted at the top of my lungs, so loud my throat
was raw the next second.
The bird didn’t give a shit.
I had no time—or braincells—to think anything through. My instincts
said run, and I ran. I turned and I ran with my heart in my throat like I was
being chased by death itself.
To me, that bird was even worse.
 A mistake, that’s what this was. A stupid, stupid mistake—and as soon
as the Elyseans found out that their bird came to me, they’d send it to
someone else. Clear this whole mess up in no time.
That was it—they’d clear this all up by the end of the day. Until then, all
I had to do was run.
Is it gone? I wondered, eyes ahead, but I wasn’t really seeing anything.
That’s why I kept bumping into people. But before I could even turn to
check, I noticed something moving right next to my temple.
Way, way too close.
The Iriade turned its head to the side, its crystal eyes boring into me,
and its beak opened just a bit to let out the strangest tweet I’d ever heard.
I screamed so hard everybody in the street was alarmed. I almost tripped
all over my feet when I turned abruptly to cross the road, hoping to lose the
bird long enough so I could hide.
But the bird kept on following.
“A mistake, a mistake, a mistake,” I chanted as I went. I just needed to
lose the bird and then the Elyseans would fix this. They’d fix it so that it
wouldn’t come after me again. Just a stupid, stupid mistake.
And I was already getting tired.
Sweat beads lined my forehead and my shirt stuck to my back. I knew
my limits—I couldn’t sprint away from this bird for longer than a couple of
minutes, and I had no doubt that it could keep up with me without trouble.
So, I had to make a new plan.
I forced myself to focus on my surroundings. Funny enough, I’d almost
made it to Fairytale, the diner where we all got milkshakes every
Wednesday. Regret filled me from head to toe as soon as I saw the purple
sign. Maybe I should have just come here with my friends. Maybe if I
hadn’t stopped on that sidewalk, the bird would have missed me.
Or maybe if I’d skipped my last two classes like I’d first intended, I
wouldn’t be running from a stupid bird like it was the grim reaper coming
for my soul right now.
But a couple blocks down from Fairytale, I already knew what I had to
do. I didn’t bother to look for the bird again—it would be right behind me
even though I couldn’t hear it.
Taking off my backpack, I threw it to the sidewalk without a second
thought. I could pick it up later. Then, I took off my denim jacket just as I
reached the alley between a liquor store and an accountant’s office.
I slipped to the side so fast, it was a miracle I didn’t end up with my
face against the asphalt. But I pressed my back to the wall and raised my
jacket, heart almost flying right out of my ribcage as I waited.
The bird flew into the mouth of the alley. I wrapped my jacket around it
as fast as my body allowed.
It was all a blur, and for a second I feared I hadn’t caught it, but another
one of those tweets came from the denim bundle in my hands. That was all
the confirmation I could afford to wait for.
Moving deeper into the alley, I pulled open the disgusting green lid of
the dumpster. It reeked of alcohol and vomit here, but it didn’t even bother
me. I just threw the jacket in and slammed the lid shut with all my strength.
Stepping back, I breathed deeply and tried to get my hands to stop
shaking.
It was over. It was done. The bird was in that dumpster. It couldn’t
follow me anymore. Somebody would find it, and they’d fix this mess.
They’d fix it. I just needed to stay away until they did.
Big warm tears slid down my cheeks as I ran back to the main street,
grabbed my backpack from the sidewalk and started running again.
I didn’t stop until I was far, far away.

A . The town was quiet, barely any soul in sight.

Easy to keep hidden behind trees and cars in the dark. Dogs barked in the
distance, making me jump every few feet like I was afraid of them—I
wasn’t. And I had been out after midnight plenty of times before when I
snuck out to go to parties with Layla and James, so I wasn’t afraid of the
dark, either. I was just checking behind me to see if any blue birds were
following me soundlessly every few seconds.
So far so good.
I’d gone to hide in an abandoned house a few neighborhoods away the
whole day. I always went there when I needed some time to myself. It was
about an hour’s walk, far enough that I wouldn’t be found by accident and
close enough that I could make it back at any time without trouble.
And while I’d hidden there on the balcony of the third floor, half of it
ruined so that the fallen rooftop hid me perfectly from prying eyes, I’d
wondered.
I’d wondered if last night had really gotten to my head more than I
thought.
Because before I fell asleep, I’d let my imagination wander to what it
would be like to actually be one of them, to have magical powers. Maybe
that had somehow fucked me up so much that I’d dreamed an Iriade had
chosen me.
A dream—not real.
Except I remembered the look in its crystal eyes. It was just a machine,
that bird, nothing else, but it still felt like those blue crystals were aware,
windows to an actual soul inside that tiny metal thing covered in feathers.
Maybe that’s why I’d been so freaked out that I’d run and run and even
turned my phone off, had chosen to starve all day rather than go pick
something up at a grocery store.
It would all be worth it, though. Because by now, the Elyseans would
have found their bird in the dumpster near the liquor store, and they’d have
fixed the mistake.
 By tomorrow, nobody would even remember seeing it coming for me,
especially when they announced the candidates.
It was all going to work out just fine.
And when I made it back to Gary’s house, I believed that with my
whole heart.
The lights in the living room were on—that would be Gary. He stayed
up until midnight most nights. Miles was probably in his room, waiting for
me. I’d texted him before I turned my phone off to tell him I was fine, that
I’d be back at the end of the day. Not the first time it had happened, so I
knew he wouldn’t worry too much. Gary would be pissed, probably yell at
me—nothing I couldn’t handle. I’d overreacted, but it was okay. The day
was over now. It was all behind me.
God, I couldn’t wait for tomorrow. I couldn’t wait to finally be free for
real.
Taking in a deep breath, I contemplated going around back so I could
climb up to my room like I did when I snuck out, except I hadn’t left the
window open this morning, and I didn’t want to freak Miles out by going to
his. It was fine, though. Even if Gary had locked the door, he’d be up to
open it.
Luckily, the door opened with ease. Maybe Gary hadn’t noticed I wasn’t
in the house, and if that was the case, I could sneak upstairs without him
even seeing me, then come back to grab something to eat after he went to
bed.
It was a good plan. I was going to stick to it.
But the moment I stepped into the foyer and heard the deafening
silence, I knew something was wrong. Not as wrong as to make me run
back outside, though, which was a shame.
My best guess was that Gary had turned off the TV and was waiting to
yell at me for being gone the whole day. I went for the stairway, knowing
he’d see me through the open door of the living room. If he wanted to stop
me, he would. If not, I’d just keep going until I was in my room. We never
said good mornings or goodnights, anyway.
Praying had never been a strong suit of mine. Even if I’d believed in
everybody else’s gods, I didn’t really believe that they worked that way—or
any other way that wasn’t convenient for them, for that matter. So usually, I
didn’t waste time with it. But tonight, I did ask the universe and fate and
whoever cared to listen that this night ended peacefully for me and with no
more drama.
The universe and fate were cruel bitches, though, because if they heard
my prayers, all they did was laugh at them.
When the light from the living room fell on me, I realized that Gary
hadn’t turned the TV off because he was waiting to yell at me. He’d turned
it off because he wasn’t alone.
On the recliner next to his couch sat none other than Elliot Embers.
My feet glued to the hardwood floor and my whole body froze. Even
my eyes refused to blink as I took in his face, his dark eyes locked on
mine…and the Iriade sitting peacefully on his shoulder.
“Sedorah,” Elliot Embers said, putting down a glass of water he’d been
holding. He smiled at me. “I’ve been waiting for you. Please, come on in.
We have a lot to talk about, you and I.”
His voice was ice-cold, going through my chest like knives. For some
reason, I looked at Gary sitting on the couch, shoulders straight, hair
combed back, barely moving, as if I was hoping he would save me.
What a ridiculous thought. Gary wasn’t going to help me. Nobody could
help me now.
I was already screwed.
 6

“Now Lord of the Universe, cunning Cronus did not free his brothers from Tartarus. It
was the Golden Age of the world, and the other Titans obeyed to him, and the first
man worshipped him.
To keep his power was Cronus’s only purpose, therefore he ate every child his wife
—his sister Titaness Rhea—bore him, knowing that only his offspring would be strong
enough to overthrow him, just as he had done his father.

Until his sixth child, Zeus, was born.”

—Book of Creation, 6th Edition, 204

by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

Every hair on my body stood at attention as I made my way inside the

living room. And when I saw the bulky guy standing in the corner, arm
folded in front of him, black sunglasses hiding his eyes, I froze again.
My God, he was twice the size of Gary. The top of his head almost
touched the fucking ceiling.
“No need to worry about my friend, Sedorah,” Elliot said. “Please,
come in, come in. I’m thrilled to finally meet you.”
 And he stood up, offering me his hand to shake.
He looked flawless, with his deep blue suit that melted on his frame and
his brown hair combed to perfection. He had those golden rings on his
fingers, too. I looked at them like they were snakes—the poisonous kind—
and I swallowed hard, pulling my hands behind my back.
“Don’t be rude, Sera,” Gary said from the couch. “Shake our guest’s
hand. He’s Elysean.” He said it like he was letting me in on a damn secret.
“Oh, please, there’s no need for such formalities. It’s understandable
that Sedorah is feeling a bit overwhelmed.” Elliot blinked at me, his fake
smile going perfectly with his skin and hair that looked like finely made
plastic. No way was he really real. Who had skin like that, and eyes such a
clear brown I could see the bottom of them?
All the Elyseans I’d seen last night in Idaea, unfortunately for me.
Taking a deep breath, I fisted my hands so he wouldn’t see them
shaking.
“Why are you here?” I said, eyes moving from his unnaturally beautiful
face to the bird on his shoulder that looked exactly like the one that’d found
me near the school today. How had he gotten out of that dumpster? Had
Elliot found him?
“Sera,” Gary warned, but Elliot was already pretending he wasn’t there.
“Please sit down,” he said to me and took his seat back on the recliner.
I looked behind me at the guy standing in the corner, perfectly
motionless, like he was trying to impersonate the walls around him.
“I’m good,” I said, holding onto the straps of my backpack. “I’m really
tired, though. I’d like to get to bed soon, so if you could just tell me how I
can help you…” My voice shook, but I pretended I didn’t notice.
The way Elliot smiled at me, you’d think he knew all of my deepest,
darkest, dirtiest secrets by memory.
“I’m here to help you, in fact,” he finally said, patting the bird’s head
with the tip of his finger. “I was just telling your uncle here that this Iriade
chose you to compete in the trials for the Elysean Academy today. He even
found you at your school, didn’t he?” He scratched the bird’s belly, and it
purred a bit, like it was real rather than a machine. “But I’ll admit, we’re all
curious to know why you ran. Why you trapped this pretty boy in the
dumpster and disappeared. I’m sure you have a very good reason.”
And Elliot sat back, as if he’d said all he needed to say, and now it was
my turn.
I avoided looking at Gary because I didn’t need to be intimidated right
now. Screw everything—I was almost eighteen. I didn’t have to be afraid of
anything or anyone anymore.
“I ran because I am not interested in participating in your trials, Mr.
Embers,” I said, my voice dry as a bone, but the words perfectly clear. And
while Gary gasped like I’d admitted to committing the worst crime in the
history of mankind, Elliot’s smile didn’t even falter.
“Surely that must be a joke,” he told me, and I could have sworn the big
guy behind me straightened his shoulders a little bit. Was he going to attack
me? Was he Elysean, too?
“It’s not a joke,” I said, and this time I sounded much more determined.
Though my hands were shaking, my knees were shaking, and everything
inside me insisted that I should run, I still sounded determined, so I kept
going. “I don’t want to be part of the trials or attend your Academy, Mr.
Embers. I would just really like to get to bed right now.” And I took a step
back for emphasis.
To my horror, the big man stepped forward, too. He didn’t reach out for
me, and I couldn’t tell where he was even looking, but he moved just as I
did.
I stepped to the side so that I could see all of them but still be close
enough to the door.
“I don’t think you understand the situation here, Sedorah,” Elliot said,
and his voice was suddenly a bit lower, too. It made a lump the size of a
tennis ball form in my throat. Fuck, I could hardly breathe. “The Iriade is a
gift from the gods. It is here for a reason. It can only make one choice for a
reason.” He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. The little bird
didn’t even flinch at the sudden movement. “It has chosen you, and that
means you will be part of the trials.”
“I won’t,” I said, shaking my head, half my attention on the man to my
side.
Elliot raised his perfect brows. “The mighty Hephaestus has designed
and created these Iriades for us, and we will respect them. All of us, as it is
our du—”
“I don’t care what Hephaestus made,” I said through gritted teeth. “I
don’t care what your duty is. I don’t want to be part of your stupid trials. I
just want to be left alone.” My chin quivered, and if I wasn’t as stubborn as
I was, I’d have been sobbing right now. Not just because I was afraid, but
because I was angry, too. So fucking pissed at whoever had decided what
my life was going to look like. They could rot in Tartarus for the rest of
eternity.
“You ungrateful little brat,” Gary hissed at me. “How dare you speak
like that about the gods in this house?! I raised you myself! I taught you—”
And if I’d had the strength, I would have laughed in his face. In this
house?! He wasn’t even religious. I’d never once heard him talk about any
god or even teach Miles about them. I knew more about Olympus and the
gods and their history than he did—not willingly, but I knew.
And he raised me?
But before he could say anything else, Elliot raised a finger without
even looking at him, and Gary clamped his mouth shut like his button had
been switched off.
“It shocks me to hear you say those words, Sedorah, but I understand
that you are overwhelmed. You are confused. The trials can be very
dangerous. You could very well lose your life in them, as I’m sure you
know, and that will scare anyone, let alone a teenager like yourself,” Elliot
said.
“No, that’s not—”
“Which is why it wouldn’t be fair to leave that decision up to you, don’t
you think, Mr. Baker?” he continued, like I hadn’t even spoken.
“What?” What did he mean—it wouldn’t be fair? What wouldn’t be
fair?
But Elliot turned to Gary, whose cheeks resembled a tomato now. “As I
understand, you are Sedorah’s legal guardian for another two days. Is that
correct?”
“What does that have to do with anything?” I spit, moving closer to
them, but they didn’t look at me. Even the stupid bird ignored me now.
“Yes, that is correct,” Gary said, nodding a million times.
“And what do you think about this incredible opportunity for Sedorah,
Mr. Baker? I mean, to have the chance to become an Elysean…”
“Hey—that’s not his decision to make!” I shouted, but he just kept
going.
“Think about what it would mean for your family,” Elliot told him.
“Stop!”
“In fact, I have quite an offer to make you, good sir, if you are of the
mind to give Sedorah a chance at the best future for her, even if she might
be too young and too naive to understand her options right now.” Elliot
pulled something from the inside pocket of his jacket—something like a
pad made out of shiny black leather. “I think we can all walk away from
this happy, don’t you?”
“Certainly,” Gary said without hesitation as he watched Elliot open his
checkbook and unscrew the lid on his fancy golden pen.
“Hey!” I shouted, shaking so hard I was surprised to still be standing.
And when I slammed both my hands on the coffee table to get them to
listen to me, the bird finally flew off Elliot’s shoulder, and someone
grabbed me from behind.
“Let go of me!” I shouted, but the large hands of the bulky guy could
have been made out of steel. No matter how hard I thrashed, I couldn’t
break free from his grip.
My God, what was happening? Was this even real?
“How does this look?” Elliot said to Gary, handing him a ripped sheet
of his checkbook, and by the way Gary’s eyes opened wide and practically
began to sparkle, I’d say whatever number Elliot wrote on there looked
pretty damn good to him.
“Gary, please,” I said, trying to hold it together, calm down, find another
way out of this. “I’ll walk away right now, and you’ll never have to see me
again. Just please.” I’d never asked him for anything since the day I came
to his house. Not even once.
Please, please, please.
But Gary didn’t even raise his head to look at me.
“Stop it!” I shouted when Elliot offered his hand and Gary shook it
eagerly.
“Thank you for making sure that Sedorah accepts the best chance she
can get at a brighter future. She is lucky to have you as her guardian, even if
she doesn’t know it yet. I mean, she herself isn’t very bright, but since the
gods deigned her worthy of this opportunity, who are we to question it,
right?”
Gary laughed. Elliot joined in, too.
I screamed.
They couldn’t do this. Not tonight. Not so close to my freedom.
They couldn’t fucking take everything from me again!
How could Gary be so cruel? How could he do this to me? Could he not
hear me screaming, see me thrashing, hear me begging? Didn’t he at least
care that I loved his son, that I would give up my life for his in an instant?
 You can’t do this! You can’t do this! You can’t do this!, I kept on
screaming, trying to kick the table, but the guy behind me was a fucking
hulk. He held me back so easily, you’d think I weighed nothing at all.
Just like that, Gary signed whatever documents were in front of him, a
huge smile on his face, eyes sparkling, cheeks flushed. Elliot watched,
showing him all the places that needed his signature, and the bird flew
around him in circles, its crystal eyes on me while I screamed and begged
and told them they couldn’t do this.
The truth was, they could.
The truth was, they already had.
When Elliot met my eyes, I could have sworn I saw raw malice in them.
I no longer had the energy to thrash, not when I hadn’t eaten all day, and my
arms were probably bruised by how tightly his friend was holding me back.
“There,” he said, standing up from the recliner. Gary joined him.
Silent tears streamed from my eyes. Angry tears. There was no more
fear left in me, just pure, raw desperation. Raw rage. “All is done now.
Allow me to officially accept you into the Elysean Trials of 2023. It shall be
your honor to represent your kind before the gods.” He put his hands on my
shoulders as he smiled down at me and said in a whisper, “You are worthy,
Sedorah Sinclair.”
The words brought bile up my throat. I could see it in the expression of
his plastic face that he meant it. There was literally nothing I could do but
follow along. I would be participating in the trials regardless of what I
wanted or how much I begged.
Once again, I couldn’t escape my fate no matter what I did.
With a deep sigh, I lowered my head and forced myself to get my shit
together. It wasn’t over yet. I could still walk away. I would run. I would
keep running to the edges of the world and never look back, no matter how
long it took.
 “It was a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Baker. We will leave right away.
The names of the candidates will be announced after midnight, so there is
no time to waste,” Elliot said, pretending not to notice that Gary was
holding out a hand to shake his again. He stepped back, buttoning his suit
jacket, eyes on me. “Shall we, Sedorah?”
“I need to get some things from my room.”
My voice sounded strange. Distant. Could they tell? My throat was raw
from all that screaming, but it was okay. I would run. As soon as I got to my
room, I’d open the window, and I’d be—
“There will be no need for that. You will be back in three weeks time—
assuming you survive,” Elliot said, then laughed. Gary joined, too. “I’m
only joking. You most probably will survive. But you will be back here
even if you are chosen for the Academy. The school year doesn’t start until
September. You’ll have plenty of time for your things then. Leave your
backpack, too.” And he batted his long lashes at me.
Slowly, I pulled the backpack off me and reached for the side pocket
where my phone was.
“That stays here. Candidates are not allowed phones for the duration of
the trials, I’m afraid.”
A fire must have been lit in the pit of my stomach and it was burning
everything inside me. I didn’t want to give them the satisfaction of seeing
me like this, completely defeated, but it was too much. The ground had
been ripped right from under my feet again, and I was falling so fast, but…
“Sera?”
The scream that had been building up in me died instantly. I blinked the
blur of the tears away and looked to the side at Miles’s face peeking from
the hallway.
Miles.
Oh, God. Miles was in the house. Miles had heard me scream. Miles
had probably seen the whole thing.
 And he looked absolutely terrified.
I put my backpack on the floor. “Hey, there, kid,” I said, my voice dry
and breathless.
“And who might that young man be?” Elliot said, but Miles wouldn’t
even look at him.
“Let her go,” he said to the giant holding me back as he stepped into the
living room.
His dad was by his side instantly, but Miles didn’t back down. In those
pajamas, he looked so much like the little boy I met on my first night here
that my heart broke all over again.
“Miles, this is Mr. Embers. Remember, we saw him yesterday at the
announcement in Idaea?” Gary said, but Miles would only look at me.
“Let her go!” he demanded of the man once more without ever looking
at him.
“Hey, it’s okay, kid. He’s just helping me stand, that’s all. I was about to
collapse,” I forced myself to say.
“Yes, we were only helping your cousin, Miles,” Elliot said, and
suddenly the man behind me let go of my arms and stepped back. My legs
shook. I kept the smile on my wet face still, but I could barely stand. I was
about to collapse for real now.
Especially when Miles pushed his dad away and came to me. “What’s
going on, Sera? Why were you screaming? I heard you upstairs—you were
screaming.”
“Because she was excited,” Elliot said. I gripped Miles’s hands in mine,
unable to speak. “Because she was chosen for the Elysean Trials, Miles.
Imagine that!”
Miles imagined it just fine. His eyes widened, and the next second, the
horror in them disappeared.
I smiled wider. “That’s right, kid. Good ole me,” I told him. “Exciting,
right?”
 Miles wasn’t sure whether to believe me or not. He could see my face
wet with tears, probably more flushed than Gary’s. But that could happen to
an excited person, too.
“Really, Sera? You were chosen?”
“Yes, kid. I was chosen. It’s pretty cool, I’ll admit. Not that I was
expecting it,” I said, and my voice sounded colder by the second.
Miles didn’t buy it. From the way he looked at me, it was obvious that
I’d overdone it. I would never refer to anything Elysean-related as cool
and/or exciting in normal circumstances.
“And you will be allowed to visit your cousin inside the Daedalus
Palace after the second trial, too,” Elliot said. “But I’m afraid we have to go
now. People are waiting for us. We’re already late.”
The man behind me put his large hand on my shoulder. My time was
already up.
My God, I was shaking from head to toe. Was this really happening?
Miles narrowed his brows at the guy touching me, so I grabbed his face
in my hands and turned him to me.
“Listen to me, kid. I’ll be back in no time, okay? It’s just three weeks.
And you can come see me in the Palace in two. I’ll show you around, I
promise. Okay? Just hang on tight. Go find James and Layla tomorrow.
They’ll take you to get milkshakes while I’m gone.”
“It doesn’t feel right,” Miles told me, his eyes moving from Elliot to me
to the guy behind me, sinking his fingers in my shoulder harder every
second to get me to hurry.
I gritted my teeth to keep the pain from showing.
“That’s just because it was so sudden.” I kissed his forehead and hugged
him to me for a moment. I was never really a person who liked to be
touched, but for Miles, I made all the exceptions. “Be good, okay? I’ll be
back before you know it.”
 “Good luck in the trials, Sera. We’ll be rooting for you. I know you’re
going to—” Gary started, and by the way he stepped toward me, I thought
he assumed I would hug him, too.
But I winked at Miles and slipped out the living room door before he
even finished speaking.
It was over. It was done. This was the next hand life dealt to me, and I
would keep playing.
Not only that but I would win, too, until I earned the goddamn freedom
the universe was so intent on keeping from me.
 7

The Titaness Rhea was pregnant with Cronus’s sixth child, Zeus. To save him from his
father, she turned to Gaea, who advised her daughter to hide the child, put baby
clothes on a piece of stone, and let Cronus eat it, thinking it is Zeus.
Cronus did, and the young god Zeus was hidden away in a cave on the island of
Crete.
Cronus was none the wiser.

—Book of Creation, 6th Edition, 251

by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

When I opened the door and the flashing lights went off all at once, my
mind was wiped clean all over again.
The press was here. A large black limo was parked in the driveway. Our
neighbors were on the sidewalk and in Gary’s yard, watching. James and
Layla were there, too, their eyes wide and their mouths open.
I wanted to go to them. I wanted to hug them, too, ask them to take care
of Miles. He didn’t really have any friends, so he tended to lock himself in
his room all day. They needed to make sure he went out with them at least a
couple times a week.
 But the man who put his hand on my shoulder again made it very clear
to me that I wasn’t allowed to move away from Elliot’s side. All I could do
was make eye contact with my friends and hope they knew what to do
while I was gone.
Three weeks, I told myself. It was just three weeks. I would be back in
no time. I would be back, and I would be free. And that was if I didn’t
manage to run away from the Palace first.
So, I kept my chin up when Elliot opened the limo door for me and
forced a smile on my face when I turned to wave at Miles. He was crying,
but he was also smiling. People were calling my name—reporters asking
me how I was feeling, if I was excited for the trials. Could they even see my
face, or did they just assume they were happy tears—because why in the
world would anyone cry out of sadness for being fucking chosen by a robot
shaped like a bird?
As soon as I got into the limo, I breathed easier. The windows were
tinted, and I could hardly see outside, which meant nobody could see me,
either. I could let out more of those tears again just for a moment—they
were so heavy, the weight of them was crushing me under.
But a second later, Elliot got into the backseat, too.
“What a mess,” he said, unbuttoning his jacket as whoever was driving
the limo took us forward.
My eyes were on the window, hoping to see Miles and my friends one
more time.
“You could have made this easier on all of us, you know. I hope we’re
not late because of you.” Elliot’s voice was completely transformed. No
sign of the guy he had been at the announcement yesterday, or in Gary’s
house.
“Why?” I asked, still hoping the window would show me something.
Anything other than those blurry lights. “Why did you bother? Why not just
move on to someone else?”
 “Don’t be silly, Sedorah,” he said with a sharp laugh as he typed on his
phone. “If I could, I would. But the stupid bird chose you, and you have to
be in the trials no matter what you or I prefer.”
Bile rose up my throat again. I analyzed Elliot’s profile, the way every
line of him was carved to perfection, and I wondered what it was like on the
inside, what he hid with that beautiful mask of his. Was he good or bad or
somewhere in between? Was he really, truly a god descendant or just a
mortal with magic powers?
“If you keep looking at me, you’ll fall in love,” he mumbled under his
breath, his eyes never leaving the screen of his phone.
With a flinch, I turned to the window again. “You might be pretty on the
outside, but you’re still a monster where it counts.” Just like all of them
were.
At that, he laughed again. “You’re merely a mortal. What do you know
about true monsters, little one?”
The answer scared me, so I didn’t give him one. I kept my mouth shut
and my eyes on the dark window, but I no longer hoped to see anything.

H ’ to me again until we went through the open gates of

Idaea. These I could see even through the tint of the windows because of
the many lights surrounding them.
I had yet to believe any of this was real. My entire body was still
shaking, and I couldn’t fill my lungs with enough air no matter how deeply
I breathed. The waves of fear crashing onto me every minute were getting
stronger, too. It felt like I had this hand wrapped around my neck, just
waiting to strangle the life out of me any second.
“This isn’t the mortal world, Sedorah,” Elliot eventually said in a
whisper so low I barely heard it. “Your guardian signed you away to us.
Now, we do with you as we please.”
 I couldn’t help but turn to him. “You don’t own me, Elysean,” I said and
made sure he heard the disgust in my voice clearly.
I didn’t care what Gary had signed—as soon as I saw the chance, I
would be out of here. That, or I’d finish their stupid trials, and then leave.
He didn’t fucking own me. Nobody did.
But Elliot must not have liked that because the next second, he was
sitting right next to me on the backseat, and his long fingers were wrapped
tightly around my chin, keeping me in place.
My heart nearly beat right out of my chest. I wanted to push him off, but
I didn’t dare move for fear of what more he would do to me.
“Be careful how you speak around here, Sedorah. Words have a lot of
weight, especially the manner in which you say them,” he said, his big
brown eyes scrolling down my face, analyzing every inch of me. And to my
horror, when they fell on my parted lips, he licked his like a goddamn
animal. “You’re lucky Aphrodite blessed you. If you were smart, you would
use that luck to your advantage.” And he licked my cheek lightning fast.
My stomach twisted and bile rose up my throat. I tried to move away
but his grip was harder than that of the guy who’d held me back at the
house. I wanted to scream, too, but my jaws were locked. A bit of light
slipped through the tinted window so I could see his eyes, the hunger in
them, the way his lips curled to the sides.
“We’re not here to play games, mortal. Talk to me that way again and I
will show you how serious we can be.” It was a fucking threat.
My eyes squeezed shut and a cry left me involuntarily when the psycho
pressed his nose to my cheek and sniffed my skin. My God, this was the
same man that so many people adored. The same man who smiled and cried
at the announcement, the same guy every mortal in the world thought to be
good. Worthy of worship.
But here, in the backseat of this limo, all he did was prove me right.
 When he let go of me, my jaw hurt, and it felt like I had bruises around
my chin. He slid back to the other side just as the limo stopped moving.
I tried to control my breathing. Tried to squeeze my hands between my
thighs to get them to stop shaking. Tried to calm myself down by reminding
myself that I would not stand for this no matter how Elliot threatened me.
But in the end, when the door of the limo opened, black dots were in my
vision. The big guy with the sunglasses held the door open for me and I got
out, feeling like somebody else was navigating my body. Fire burned
everywhere around me, on golden torches hanging on the pillars, and more
orange light came from lamps mounted on the walls, too. My panic had
already reached its peak and my instincts were on high alert, but when the
man put his hand on my shoulder and pushed me forward, I had no choice
but to move.
Elliot was beside me, buttoning up his jacket, an easy smile on his face
again, the one that hid what he truly was so perfectly.
“Shall we?” he said, like the limo ride hadn’t happened at all, and he
waved ahead.
Get it together! I ordered myself, turning my eyes forward, and I finally
saw where I was.
The Daedalus Palace was right in front of me. I stopped walking for a
moment, the shock freezing me in place. My God, it was enormous. It had
looked so normal from outside the gates, but from so close up, I couldn’t
see the sides of the building or the rooftop and the tower over it at all. It
was surrounded by water—the limo had gone over a bridge to get us to the
front doors.
Doors that were wide open, showing us the people inside.
I’d never felt smaller in my life. Sound barely reached me. I could
hardly see anything with clarity. God, I was drawing on thin air…
“Move,” the man behind me growled, shoving me so hard I almost fell
flat on my face.
 Elliot was met by the same woman he’d shared the stage with yesterday.
They whispered something to one another, and then the woman turned to
me.
I could hardly make out her face from all those black dots popping up in
front of me. Keep going, I told myself. Just keep going. I would find my
way out of here in no time.
“Welcome, Sedorah. I’m Angel. Please come with me. We’ve gathered
all the candidates in the Seasons Hall.” She gripped my hand so tightly my
fingers hurt, and when she pulled me forward, I had no chance of stopping
her. “There will be a short introduction—and I mean short. Keep it to your
name, age, and nationality. And then we’ll be taking your picture with your
Iriades. Got it?” She didn’t even look back at me or wait for an answer, just
kept dragging me forward through the hall. The sound of our footsteps dug
into my brain more every second.
Until I thought to actually look at my surroundings.
White marble, glittering gold, deep greens, vibrant blues and bright reds
all around me. The chandelier over my head was bigger than my room and
the tear-shaped crystals in it all seemed to be holding their own light. The
windows were enormous, the ceiling higher than any I’d ever seen before.
Golden chains hung from it, holding the beautiful lanterns midair. Vases at
every corner, paintings, and the doors toward which Angel was storming
with me in tow could be considered as pieces of art on their own. The
polished wood, the golden handles, the intricate faces engraved on the
surface made them look like a damn portal.
But when Angel pushed them open and I saw the other side, I forgot to
breathe all over again.
“Get over there,” Angel told me, shoving me toward a group of people
who looked about my age. My legs took me forward all on their own for a
little bit, until I was able to think again and stop moving.
Wait one second.
 Just breathe.
This room wasn’t all marble and gold and lush colors. This one must
have been taken right out of a dream instead.
Across from the doors were the biggest windows I’d ever seen, with two
statues—a hundred feet tall each—of women with braided hair holding up
the shimmering curtains to the sides. Their dresses were made out of
flowers hanging onto the marble as if they’d sprouted there on purpose.
Their faces were illuminated by the moonlight streaming in so I could see
their peaceful smiles, the way they looked at each other so lovingly, like
they were real people. The windows between them were shaped like a
triangle, and they revealed the silhouette of big trees outside. The two glass
doors twice the size of normal ones on the sides of the statues seemed to
lead right to them.
There were lounges made out of velvet and leather all over the room,
big fluffy cushions, and low round tables in the middle of each. They
looked so comfortable, I genuinely thought about sitting down for a
moment, just until my legs stopped shaking.
But it wasn’t meant to be.
I heard it this time—the Iriade flying in circles over my head. The
crowd of people ahead of me screamed and cheered when more blue birds
came from behind me and flew over their heads, too. They seemed ecstatic
about it, but mine just made me sick to my stomach.
“Gather up, everyone!” a voice boomed in the open space, echoing back
a few times.
Cameras flashed. The girls and boys barely fifteen feet away from me
were getting ready, fixing their hair, most wiping tears of joy…
I shouldn’t be here.
“Sinclair!”
Every cell in my body seemed to burst at the same time. I could barely
see Angel’s face where she stood next to a group of reporters, holding mics
and cameras and smiles so big you’d think they all won the Lotto.
“Get over there, right now!” Angel shouted, pointing at the group again.
They were all staring at me.
Foreign faces. Some were younger, most about my age. Thirteen blue
birds over their heads, and the one flying over me chirped loudly like it
wanted my attention.
I can’t be here.
My instincts took over. All my senses were overwhelmed. I didn’t want
to be here, not for a single second, so I did what I should have done the
moment they brought me to this room—I ran.
I didn’t check to see if the Sunglasses guy or Elliot was somewhere
behind me. I didn’t check for anything, I just moved as fast as my legs
could carry me. My focus was on the glass doors to the right of the marble
statues that held up the shimmery curtains. It was closest to me, and it
would lead me outside—that’s all I needed to know. I could climb fences. I
could run without stopping. I just needed to get outside.
The door was much bigger from close up, the golden handle cold like it
was made out of ice. By some miracle, it opened, and while people called
my name and screamed somewhere behind me, I ran out into the warm
night air, finally free.
I didn’t care where I was going. I didn’t even look properly, just moved
ahead at full speed. All that mattered was that I didn’t stop because this
couldn’t be real. A nightmare. A cruel joke. A mistake—anything but real. I
couldn’t be among Elyseans. I couldn’t wake up and go to bed under the
same roof as them for three whole weeks.
No. It wasn’t going to happen.
“Stop her!” Angel called from somewhere behind me, but I was already
feeling more like myself, and I could see the trees around me, the perfectly
cut hedges to the left that barely reached my middle, shaped into a maze. I
went through them so fast my feet barely touched the cobblestones.
 I would make it. This maze would lead me to the fence wall and then
I’d climb it. I had no clue how I’d do that, but I would because there were
no other options.
Until…
I saw him just as I turned left, following a narrow path between the
hedges. He sat on a stone bench, hands outstretched toward the ground
before his feet, perfectly silent. I had no choice but to stop dead in my
tracks. My body shut down instantly, my eyes struggling to process the
view in front of me.
Darkness was leaking out of his fingers. Shadows so dark they looked
like ink floating in the air in thick tendrils moved toward the ground and
disappeared inside the cobblestones.
Watching someone make fire out of thin air or grow a flower from the
ground within seconds was one thing, but actually playing with shadows
that were darker than the night, that seemed to have a mind of their own as
they twisted and turned, going back and forth from the palm of his hand and
to the ground…
“Somebody stop her!”
The man looked up. My breath caught in my throat.
He pulled his hands into fists and the shadows retreated back inside
him, disappearing like they’d never even existed. He looked at me like I’d
done something illegal by simply existing in this moment, in this place, and
when he slowly stood up, I found I couldn't move a single inch. It wasn’t
just that darkness that had been coming out of his hands—it was the look in
his eyes that were made out of dark, raging storms. It was in the way he
held his shoulders, and the way the air around him seemed to be charged
with energy, even though he didn’t look more than a couple years older than
me.
“Where did you fall from?” he whispered, but his lips barely moved so I
could have easily made it up.
 My God, his face was otherworldly. I’d seen plenty of Elyseans
yesterday, but he was different. His skin was fair, so pale it should have
made him look like a ghost in contrast with his dark hair, but it didn’t. He
just looked like a painting—or a marble statue. Definitely the most
beautiful being I had ever seen in my life.
“Sinclair, stop right this second!”
Angel’s voice rang in my ears. Jolts of electricity charged throughout
my system.
The guy in front of me raised a brow, the storms in his eyes darkening. I
took a step back, letting out a shaky breath.
Please don’t stop me, I thought to myself, unable to say the words out
loud. Even though I knew that he absolutely would, I moved anyway. I
turned to the other side and I ran right through a hedge, ruining it in the
process.
It barely took three seconds for the cold to reach me. I looked back on
instinct to see that the guy hadn’t moved from his place at all. He’d simply
raised a hand, and those tendrils made out of darkness had extended all the
way to me.
A scream tore from my throat when they wrapped around my legs like
ropes. I thought I fell, but I couldn’t be sure. Darkness all around me,
coming from all sides. The sounds of the world were cut off just as abruptly,
too.
I cried and I thrashed, trying to get those shadows off me, more terrified
than I had been in a very long time. But my screams faded eventually, and
my mind began to shut down, slowly at first, then all at once.
Maybe this was it. Maybe this darkness would devour me, body and
soul, and I’d finally be free. Not with the Elyseans, not out there in the
world that had always felt foreign to me, but free for real.
And in those moments, I was perfectly fine with that.
 8

“There are as many truths in the world as there are people. Each has their own and
no two are exactly alike.”

—Metis the Wise, 266

by Elh Pordier, House Ruby

Dark. Cold. Haunting.

That’s what my dreams were like, and that’s what I expected to find
when I finally came to and began to realize that I was, in fact, alive. I hadn’t
died.
That darkness hadn’t sucked the life out of me like I’d imagined.
Instead, I was lying on something soft, breathing a bit faster now that I was
aware of myself, and…there was warmth on my face.
It threw me off for a minute because it made no sense. Hadn’t it just
been dark and cold out there—and inside my head, too? Why did it feel like
the sun was shining on my face now? Why was someone massaging my
face, too—and why did that feel so damn incredible?
 The world behind my closed eyes seemed bright. It took some effort to
get them to open, and when I did, I saw the light like liquid gold streaming
in from my side and illuminating the beautiful white ceiling over me. It was
round, painted with beautiful pale blue flowers, and with golden arrows
going up the sides, the heads meeting each other straight in the middle. I’d
never seen a more beautiful, stranger ceiling before.
I’d never seen sunlight that shimmered this much before, either.
The voices came next. I began to hear the whispers as if they were
coming from far away, but with every new second, I realized that they were
right there, very close to me.
In fact, someone was touching my foot right now.
My body moved on its own accord. I sat up with a jolt, inhaling deeply,
as if I’d just remembered that I needed oxygen to survive. The view before
me swam and whoever had been touching my feet let go.
Hands on my shoulders. “You sleep like the dead, girl,” a woman said.
“Wake up. We have to get you ready.”
Her face came into focus slowly, and she was standing way too close to
me. Her heart-shaped face was gorgeous, her pink lips curved into a frown
as she analyzed me, slowly narrowing her brows as if there was something
wrong with my face.
Then she let go of me. “There. You’re with us now.”
My mouth opened to speak, but I couldn’t find the words. The woman
stood up from the bed I was lying on—and it wasn’t just any bed, but easily
ten times the size of the one in Gary’s house. The peach-colored sheets
were kind of shimmery and so soft they felt like they were melting onto my
skin.
The room was oval-shaped, with two doors to my left and a white tub
on a platform made out of white stone across from me. Half the wall to my
right was made out of glass, the windows showing me the incredibly blue
sky outside, and the rising sun that was falling on my face.
 My face—that was moving even though nobody was touching me. How
strange. I reached out my hand to rub my cheek just to get the twitching to
stop.
Unfortunately for me, it wasn’t just my muscles twitching. Something
was sticking to my face and sucking on my skin.
The scream that came out of me tore from my very soul. I jumped off
the bed, rubbing my face, getting all those things off as fast as I could while
the woman shouted at me to stop.
But I couldn’t stop. How could I stop when there’d been leeches on my
face, sucking the blood from my skin?
My God, they were worse than leeches—purple and round and semi-
transparent, like tiny jellyfish heads without tentacles, and they were
moving, even on the polished wooden floor.
“Get them off me! Just get them off me!” I kept shouting, searching my
face still to make sure no more of them were sticking to me.
“By the gods, girl,” the woman said, cheeks flushed as she kneeled on
the floor with a glass plate filled with water in her hand, and she slowly
started picking up the leeches and putting them in it.
“What are you doing?!” My back was pressed against the windows as I
tried to get as far away from those things as possible. Fuck, those had been
on my face. They’d been sucking and moving and doing who knew what,
and—
“You mortals never cease to surprise me,” the woman spit. “Poor
meredines. They were trying to help you, and this is how you treat them?”
She looked up at me like a hawk, her brown eyes a couple shades darker as
she sneered. “Ungrateful little brat.”
My mouth opened and closed a couple of times, but I still couldn’t
speak until she scooped up the last leech and put it in the water. Then she
straightened up, dusting off her light grey dress as she looked down at me.
 “I am about to say something, and you will not move nor think at all
until I am done. Do you understand?” No, I didn’t understand. I understood
nothing, least of all when she came closer to me like that, so slowly,
cautiously, and… “You have more meredines in your hair. Do not dare—”
Fuck. That.
Those things were in my hair—I could touch them. They were sucking
on my strands, probably feeding off my life force, and I needed them off. I
needed all of them off right now.
The woman kept shouting at me to stop, but I could hardly hear her
voice, and when I couldn’t feel any more of those slimy, gooey things with
my hands, I found a mirror on the other side of the room near the tub to
make sure I could see that I was clean, too.
Except when I stepped in front of the mirror and I saw my face, I froze.
My pores were always a bit visible, which seemed to piss off Layla
more than me. And I got the occasional zit during that time of month, but
my skin looked okay for the most part.
Except today. Today, it looked like I was wearing a filter in real life. My
pores were gone, the dark circles under my deep blue eyes vanished, the
different skin tones around my nostrils evened out, and my lips looked
much more red than usual, too. I had virtually no Cupid’s bow, which made
my lips look kind of strange—like a bee stung me right there and the
swelling never went away, Layla said—and the slight curve of them at the
corners made me look like I was always smiling, which I hated. But right
now, they looked so smooth. Had these people put filler in me or
something? Because my lips were usually pretty dry and wrinkly, not like
this.
It didn’t look like filler, though. Which was confusing because what the
actual fuck?
And my hair, too. Every strand of my light blonde hair that reached the
middle of my back was shiny and silky and smooth as hell. Even the color
looked lighter, like I’d gotten highlights overnight, and my waves that were
normally fuzzy were now soft and spirally and just too damn pretty to be
my hair.
I turned to the woman again, just shaking my head because that was the
best I had.
She’d gotten rid of the plate and was no longer picking up leeches from
the floor. Instead, she was spitting fire at me with her eyes as she held her
hips.
“Sit down. Now.”
She pointed her finger toward the small stool with the white velvet
cushion in front of the vanity table. I wanted to argue—sitting down right
now didn’t seem like a good idea, but you know what did? Running.
Except one look in her eyes and I caved. She was going to probably kill
me if I didn’t do as she said. So, with my head down, I went and sat, feeling
more confused by the second.

“Y G ,” the woman said as she turned on the golden

faucet of the tub to my side. There were fluffy white rugs all around it. “I’m
here to get you ready for today. No mortal has been inside these walls in
four years, so today is a special day,” she told me, grabbing one of the long
neck bottles filled with pink liquid from the dresser by the wall. She poured
almost half the bottle in the tub. Bubbles exploded as if by magic, and some
slowly floated to the ceiling as the smell of roses filled the room.
“I will be here to get you ready on each special day for the next three
weeks, too,” she continued, taking out another bottle, this one shaped like a
heart, with blue liquid inside. She poured three drops into the tub, and the
bubbles grew larger. The water slowly earned a beautiful violet tint, and the
smell of roses turned slightly sweeter.
 Mesmerized, I went closer and reached out to touch the bubbles as they
floated up until they reached the ceiling, then popped without a sound.
“How is this real?” I wondered in a whisper. Everything around me
looked like it belonged in a movie, not the real world. The windows, the
sunlight, the tub in the middle of the room. Those bubbles, even those
bottles of shampoo in the strange shapes, the leeches that had transformed
my skin and hair, and this woman…
“Pay attention, Sedorah,” she demanded, turning the faucet off. “Get in.
We’re late.”
The flesh on my forearms raised in goose bumps. “I can bathe myself.”
She arched a brow. “Get. In.”
I wanted to argue. Better yet—I wanted to start running out of here
already, but what could this woman really do to me? Could she make those
black tendrils of darkness or shadows or ink or whatever they had been
come at me, too, like that guy had done last night?
Just the reminder of his face, of how cold those shadows had been,
made me swallow hard.
I stood up and began to undress. If I had any chance of finding a way
out of here, I’d have to do it when there was nobody around me to see;
otherwise, it wouldn’t work. And I really, desperately needed it to work.
“How did I get here?” I asked, hurrying to take my clothes off while
Grace was busy with something in the drawers and her back was turned to
me. “I ran away. I ran outside and there was this garden and the hedges
and…”
I slipped inside the tub and sat down before Grace could turn around
and see me naked.
“Ah, yes. You put on quite a show last night when you tried to run.” She
chuckled like it was the cutest thing she’d ever heard. “Someone from the
Academy staff stopped you, I’m told. You passed out and were brought here
to your room to rest. I found you in the morning, safe and sound.”
 Safe and sound. I looked up at her, not even surprised at this point. Of
course, she wouldn’t find it alarming that I’d tried to run away and was
knocked out by a guy with scary darkness magic.
Never mind, though. It didn’t matter what she thought or who had
stopped me or how they’d brought me up here. Right now, I just needed to
relax.
Easy to do that when the water was exactly right.
My eyes closed involuntarily. The scent of roses and sweet, sweet
cupcakes calmed me down like the sound of the ocean, which I’d only ever
heard once. The bubbles wrapped around my body like tiny little cushions,
and I lay back in the tub instantly, playing with the water.
I could have sworn that something was trying to take my mind off
things. It was trying to make me forget—one second, the grey eyes of the
stranger from last night were crystal clear in the center of my mind, and the
next, the memory of his face was fading, almost slipping from my fingers
completely.
I opened my eyes again, my limbs heavier by the second. Hands in my
hair. Fingers scratching my skull. A moan escaped my lips and I only
realized it when I heard it, which made my cheeks flush. It was suddenly so
easy to lose myself in the water, the scents, the warm air, that it scared the
hell out of me.
Panic grabbed me by the throat, drowning out every good feeling
instantly. My body jerked and I sat up in the tub—screw what Grace could
see.
And she chuckled that sweet sound again. “Have you ever been exposed
to Philyra’s scents before?”
I turned to look at her. “What?”
“Goddess Philyra. The scent of these shampoos was created by her. It is
meant to loosen tension, ease bad thoughts, and relax the inhaler.”
Oh, my God.
 I gripped the sides of the bathtub tightly to stand up, but—
“Stay,” Grace said as if she could read my mind. “I still need to bathe
you. It’s obviously not affecting you as it should, anyway.”
I turned my head to her once more as she rubbed circles on my back
gently with a cloth. It took me off guard how beautiful she was now that I
could actually focus on her face. Her skin was flawless, and she didn’t seem
to be wearing any makeup—did she put those leeches on her own face, too?
Her hair was shiny, and her eyes were brown, leaning toward green, kind of
swollen like Layla’s. She was elegant, and though no fancy gemstone was
anywhere on her that I could see, she looked Elysean through and through.
“I would imagine a teenager like you wouldn’t even know how to take it
easy,” she continued while she washed my hair. “Today’s world is nuts, I
tell you. No wonder the gods never walk these streets anymore. This is no
life, if you ask me.”
The gods. If the gods really were what these people claimed they were,
this world would be a much better place. If they had really created us, they
wouldn’t have abandoned us like this. No, if there were any gods out there,
they didn’t care about us. They hadn’t in a long time.
I said nothing anyway.
By the time I was out of the tub, she had a clean pair of panties and a
bra that was exactly my size waiting for me. What she called a uniform,
though, made me cringe—milky white, leather pants with a golden zipper, a
white shirt that seemed to be made out of latex, and a white leather vest
over it with golden buttons. Apparently, we all had to wear this outfit for as
long as we stayed here, to get used to it so that we’d feel it like a second
skin by the time the first trial rolled in.
I tried to argue with Grace, but she didn’t budge. She even took my
dirty clothes and put them in the same bag where she’d had that uniform,
and put it by the door, far from my reach. So my choices were to either
leave the room in my underwear or put on the leather uniform.
 The uniform it was.
It was literally made for me, Grace said, though she refused to say by
whom. But the high-waisted leather pants fit me perfectly, and the long-
sleeved shirt didn’t suffocate me like I thought it would. It just hugged
every curve of my body—exactly like a second skin—and the leather vest
over it was very comfortable, too.
I’d been on the verge of tears putting the clothes on, but then I stepped
in front of the mirror and I realized I looked…good. My body was on the
athletic side. My stomach was always flat, but most clothes made me look
pretty square in the middle. These pants, though, hugged me exactly right
and gave me curves I’d never had before. And my boobs weren’t small, but
the shirt made them look even bigger than normal somehow—or maybe it
was the leather vest squeezing them up? I could have sworn even my ass
looked a bit rounder.
All in all, I looked better than most days back home, and it didn’t sit
well with me. This wasn’t a fucking fashion show, was it? What the hell did
we need to wear leather for—regardless of how comfortable it was?
At least Grace let me keep my sneakers instead of putting on the shoes
she brought me—also made out of thin, smooth, white leather. She wasn’t
very happy about it, but…
“No,” I said, eyeing the nail polish in her hand like it was the devil.
After having to wear all that leather, I’d already had enough.
“It’s important that your hands are groomed at all times, Sedorah. A
woman’s beauty is always seen in her hands,” she told me.
I flinched. “Good thing I’m still just a girl then.”
I suspected I’d used up all her patience already, just like she’d used
mine, so she didn’t argue with me. Maybe she just didn’t have the energy
after arguing about the way she’d done my hair—straight, with baby curls
at the tips—and the way she’d done my makeup, too. She’d wanted to put
on eyeshadow and liner and blush. I’d insisted on mascara only. I looked
better like that, anyway.
“I am in no position to order you. I am merely the help,” she told me
with a sigh, shaking the nail polish in front of my face. “But you will come
to regret not accepting my help, young one. I know how things work around
here. You don’t.”
It sounded an awful lot like a warning. Glad I wasn’t planning to stick
around for long.
“I’ll be fine,” I told her with a smile when she went for the door.
“Yes, you will,” she said, eyeing me one more time from my head down
to my toes. Even though I hadn’t let her do everything she’d wanted to me,
she still looked kind of pleased with the sight of me. That had to be a good
sign. “Wait here. Someone will come to pick you up. Good luck, Sedorah.”
She grabbed the paperback with my clothes in it, and before she closed the
door, she added: “Do try not to get into too much trouble.”
I wasn’t about to make promises I didn’t intend to keep, so… “Thank
you, Grace,” was all I said.
The door closed and I was finally all alone, dressed and ready to get the
hell out of here. The windows seemed like the smartest choice. I pulled up a
big one in the middle of the room, and the cold air was like a slap to my
face. The sky was a brilliant blue, no clouds in sight, the sun climbing up
higher by the minute. There were two white temples a hundred feet away
behind which stretched the wall of the Palace. A canal with crystal clear
water stretched like a miniature river all around the building, too, with
arched bridges rising over it every few feet.
The view knocked the breath out of me. It was like the knife I’d
forgotten was buried in my gut was now twisting around slowly, bringing
with it the cold realization of where I was.
I hadn’t forgotten, far from it, but now, without any distractions, and
with the view of the Palace wall right in front of me, I realized there was
nowhere to go. I was high up—way too high to survive a fall, and there was
nothing on the smooth surface of the exterior to help me climb down safely.
Bile rose in my throat. I turned my back to the window immediately,
eyes squeezed shut.
I was in Idaea, inside the Daedalus Palace, that same building that had
fascinated me just two days ago. It had seemed like it was alive then, and
I’d even been half convinced to come back just to see the inside of this
place. But now that I was here, I wanted out. The building was indeed alive
—and about to fucking eat me alive. I was surrounded by Elyseans on all
sides. The same Elyseans who’d ruined my life once and were in the
process of doing it again.
No. I would never allow it. Never.
The next second, I ran to the door and walked out, barely breathing.
Quiet. Too quiet.
The wide hallway was lined with white doors identical to the ones I’d
come out of. Both sides looked the same—marble floors, fire soundlessly
burning on those strange torches, and round lamps mounted on the white
walls, too. No windows that I could see. No people, Elysean or mortal.
Sweat beads lined my forehead. I blew out a long breath and I started
walking left, still completely clueless as to how drastically my life was
going to change in the next three weeks.
 9

Zeus grew fast.

The fairy goat Amaltheia fed him from her horns with Ambrosia and Nectar, the
food and drink of gods. The forest nymphs outside his cave tended to his every need,
until Zeus became a strong new god, stronger than his father. He chose Metis,
daughter of a Titan and the goddess of prudence, as his first wife, for Metis was wise
and he heeded her good advice.
She gave him one: alone, he was not enough to defeat Cronus. First Zeus must
have allies as strong as his child-eating father.

—Book of Creation, 6th Edition, 348

by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

The narrow stairs were almost hidden behind the corner at the end of the
hallway. A man and a woman were coming up, carrying boxes in their
hands. Elysean, except they were wearing grey uniforms just like Grace,
and there were no gemstones on them that I could see.
Either way, I was terrified when they turned my way.
My options were incredibly limited—run, or sit tight and if they asked
me questions, lie.
 Running was going to ring the alarm, and what were the odds that
another one of those people with darkness coming out of their hands was
close by to knock me out?
No, I couldn’t risk waking up in that room again, so sitting tight and
lying it was.
With my back pressed to the wall, I held my breath and listened to their
footsteps as they approached the corner, then turned it. The lie was at the tip
of my tongue—I was told to take the stairs and go find Angel. I sucked at
lying, but I’d make it work this time because I had to.
But the man and the woman barely glanced my way before they
continued ahead. Not a single word to me or each other.
Finally, some good luck.
Letting go of my breath, I rushed to the stairs, hoping not to run into
anyone else until I found a way out of the Palace. It only took me about four
seconds to realize that that was not going to happen anytime soon.
The sounds alone were a good indicator that there was a crowd a floor
below. Worse yet—someone was already descending the stairs, coming my
way quickly, and I had no choice but to keep moving until I was in the same
room they’d brought me in the night before—the Seasons Hall Angel had
called it.
Except now it looked so different.
The statues of the women holding up the shimmery curtains were twice
as beautiful with the sunlight streaming in through the windows. I could
have sworn they were bigger somehow. The tables, the cushions, the
paintings on the walls, the incredibly high ceiling—it all had a different feel
to it, not dark and cold, but warm and inviting now. It wasn’t full by any
means, but it wasn’t empty, either.
Two men were mopping the marble floors on either end, and a woman
was rearranging some cushions around the tables, while a group of four was
standing in front of the statues, talking. Or rather the men were listening to
the only woman among them, who looked properly pissed off about
whatever she was saying.
The three men flinched every few seconds, then cast their eyes toward
the floor, their shoulders hunched. They were dressed in velvets and
expensive looking suits, and all of them wore those gemstones—the woman
had a ruby on the collar of her dress, while two of the men had sapphires—
one on a ring, the other on a golden chain around his thick neck. The third
had the biggest of all—a lush green emerald sewn onto this belt-like thing
he had wrapped around his waist under the jacket of his suit.
They looked flawless, if a bit strange. You could tell by the way that
woman fixing the tables made sure to stay far away from them as she
worked, that they were a big deal. Which surprised me because I’d had the
impression that all Elyseans were equals.
Who were those people? And why the hell couldn’t I look away?
Especially from that woman with the ruby on her dress.
She must have sensed my eyes on her even though we were fifty feet
apart because, suddenly, she turned her head and her eyes locked on mine. I
held my breath. Even my heart skipped a beat, as if my body knew that I
was facing a predator and it was trying to decide whether to start running
already.
Fuck, her face must have been cut out of glass. It was unearthly, more
plastic than Elliot’s, and her big blue eyes were scary enough on their own
without the thick black eyebrows with no arch to bring them to attention.
For a moment, I had the feeling she was going to leap into the air and sink
her claws into my throat, growling like an animal. No idea why she gave me
that impression, but I no longer wondered why those men seemed so
terrified of her. She looked like a lioness, ready to strike at any second.
“There you are.”
I jumped around so fast it was a miracle I didn’t lose my balance.
 Angel’s smile filled my vision, and even though I knew she was one of
them, I was still a bit relieved. A familiar face was better than an unknown
one at this point.
“You were supposed to wait in your room,” she told me, wrapping her
long fingers around my arm and pulling me toward the main doors.
But my eyes went back to the woman with the ruby and the big blue
eyes—and fuck, she was still watching me. Ice-cold shivers danced on my
back. She was no longer speaking, only staring at me from under her lashes,
like she was already planning how she was going to eat me raw.
And then Angel pulled me to the side, and the woman disappeared.
My ears rang. She was saying something to me in a rush, and I couldn’t
understand a single word because all my senses were overwhelmed again,
and I didn’t want to be here, and it felt like I was going to lose my fucking
mind soon, too.
Out. That’s what I needed—to be out of here.
But another set of doors opened, and I was shoved inside without
warning. The sound of laughter and chatter hit me all at once, freezing me
in place.
“Welcome to the Midas Hall,” Angel said from my side. “Your face is
all yellow. If you’re thinking about throwing up, do not do it. You won’t
like what happens next. Just keep it in until this is over, okay?” She stepped
in front of me, that plastic smile of hers making the hair on the back of my
neck stand at attention. “Go find a seat. Madam Carmine will be here any
second. Go!”
And she shoved me forward again.
This hall was only half as big as the last, with a lot more people in it.
The ceiling was just as high, and to my left, four golden-framed windows
that made the entire wall showed the blue sky outside. Fire burned on the
torches, also golden. Across from me, Zeus sat on a large chair, the statue
white and carved to perfection, every toe and every tie of his sandals, up to
the way his eyes looked real enough that I expected them to move. Golden
paintings on the walls with golden frames. Golden pieces of metal blinking
under the lights. So much gold it made me sick.
Two tables, wide and long, were in front of the statue, big enough to fit
twenty people on either side comfortably. Around the first sat the
candidates I’d seen the night before, wearing the same identical milky-
white uniform I had on. At least Grace hadn’t lied about that. I felt a bit
more comfortable in these leathers instantly.
At the second table sat seven others, all of them Elysean. They all
watched me, except for the girl with a sketchbook in her hands, drawing
while she sipped from the straw of a big cup. They couldn’t be more than a
couple of years older than me, if that, but they looked so different. I didn’t
know if it was the expression on their faces or their fancy clothes or the
aura about them, but it was easy to see we were not the same. All seven of
them wore those gemstones, too—red, green, blue, only theirs were smaller
than what I’d seen so far.
The way they kept their eyes on me as I passed by their table made me
wish the floor would open up and swallow me whole. They analyzed every
inch of me like they were trying to memorize me in detail. The guy sitting
at the head of the table, wearing a sapphire around his neck, even winked at
me. I pretended not to be bothered, but on the inside, I was burning.
I sat at the second table, as far away from the other candidates as I could
and forced myself to calm down. So what that I was here? It wasn’t going to
last forever. I would figure a way out soon. I just needed to breathe.
Breathe and keep myself distracted to make sure I didn’t throw up.
The white plates decorated with golden laurels on the table were full of
all kinds of food. The silverware was golden, too. I couldn’t even name half
the foods in front of me, and the mixed scents had me nauseous already. No
way could I eat now. I would definitely throw it all back up.
 I risked a glance at the girl sitting at the edge of the bench on the other
side of the table, the only one by herself. The wild curls of her strawberry
blonde hair hid half her face, but she didn’t seem to mind. Her freckles were
barely noticeable from the flush of her cheeks as she stabbed a croissant
with a fork relentlessly, while she gripped a glass full of orange juice with
the other so tightly her fingers had turned white. At least she’d agreed to the
nail-polish—a pastel green was on her fingernails. Had Grace been to her
room, too? Because she was wearing some white, shimmery eyeshadow, as
well as a bit of pinkish nude lipstick she’d chewed off almost completely.
The others were nervous, too, though not as much as her. Or me. Some
of them were even smiling, and they were all talking to one another.
Human. Mortal. Seven girls, six guys, all my age or close. Yet I felt
completely different from them, too.
Maybe it was a curse. Maybe I was never going to belong anywhere.
Maybe that was my destiny—to wander about and never really fit in.
Had any of them been forced to come here like I had? Had Elliot
Embers himself gone to their houses and tricked their parents or guardians
into signing his contract? Or even paid them, like he did Gary?
God, I couldn’t believe it. I’d literally been sold like a goddamn slave.
“They’re up, everyone,” one of the guys sitting on the other side of the
table said, and they all stood up at the same time, looking somewhere to the
right.
Golden pods with screens on the top that reached my chest lined the
wall across from Zeus’s statue. Behind them was a painting of Artemis I
hadn’t noticed before, aiming her arrow at a buck across a river. It was so
masterfully done, the animal’s fur looked like it was moving.
All the other candidates were rushing toward those pods, and the girl
sitting across from me finally met my eyes.
She raised a brow as if to ask, are you going to check it out, too?
 As much as I didn’t want to be affected by anything in this place,
curiosity got the best of me, so I stood up.
The girl flinched like she wished I’d just stayed put instead. It made me
want to smile—right until I saw those screens.
The first one showed a group picture of all the others in front of the
statues in the Seasons Hall. Candidates, 2023, was written in golden cursive
letters below it. It was taken last night, probably after I ran away and fell
unconscious.
I was relieved. For a moment, I was really relieved.
And then I saw my smiling face on one of the other screens.
Oh, God. Where had they even gotten that picture? I didn’t smile for
pictures. I never even took pictures, much to Layla’s horror. I hated the
camera, and the camera could sense it, so it hated me in return.
I went closer just to make sure it was really me—it was. I was smiling
so brightly because Miles had been sitting next to me. We’d taken that
picture two years ago for his seventh birthday. He was cropped out, though,
my face zoomed in, but it was definitely me and I looked happy.
That wasn’t even the worst part. The text to the side of the picture
knocked the breath out of me.

C 14:

S S , May 18th—and the outline of a bull’s head was drawn

next to it.

S in California and raised all over the country, until she

settled in Boston four years ago and fell in love with the small suburban
neighborhood of Dusty Lawn. A high school senior, she’s a dedicated
student beloved by her teachers, and a bit of a chemistry fanatic, too.
Sedorah loves to go out with friends, drink strawberry milkshakes after
school and get together for group studies with her classmates.
But there’s more.
Our dearest Sedorah has been luckier than most. When tragedy struck
her family at the age of five years old, both her parents passed away, but
her life was saved by a noble Elysean of Apollo’s Bloodline, a brave soul
who cared little about his own life compared to that of a little girl. Today,
that little girl is all grown up and in great health.
Even though she already owes her life to Elyseans, she has been chosen
to be part of the Trials, too. Maybe her first encounter with Elyseans
thirteen years ago was a sign, and she was always meant to be in our midst
like she is today.
To Sedorah we say one thing: stay strong and be brave. An even better
life awaits you.

M . I blinked the tears away, focusing on the

food on my plate that Angel put there for me when she practically dragged
me back to my seat.
“You okay?”
I looked up at the girl sitting across from me. “No.” I was not okay. Not
even close to okay. “You?”
“Not really,” she said without missing a beat. “Was it bad?” She nodded
her head to where the screens were.
I swallowed hard, looking down at the plate again. It wasn’t just bad—it
was a fucking lie, and I couldn’t even say so. I had tried to tell people
before, the truth as I remembered it, or at least what little fragments
remained clear in my mind. Turns out nobody really believes children—
especially a traumatized five-year-old, and especially when she’s actually
accusing an Elysean.
Not that it made a difference. Nobody could change the past, anyway.
“Were you forced to come here?” I asked the girl instead of answering. I
didn’t want the angry tears to spill out just yet. I would let go when I was
alone. Not now.
“Not really forced,” she said, playing with the food on her plate. Her
voice was so soft but powerful at the same time. I wondered what she’d
sound like if she sang. No doubt it would be beautiful. “I just had no idea
what this even was, and my dad said I should do it, and I thought it would
give me three weeks off, so…” She flinched. “I’m starting to think that was
a mistake.”
I squinted my eyes at her. “How did you have no idea what this was?”
The whole world knew about the trials, about the three Elysean cities in the
world opening their doors for mortal candidates every four years.
“I mean, I knew about the trials and everything, I just didn’t even know
it was this year. I live on a farm in Wisconsin,” she said. “Our town is right
at the edge of a mountain, so we’re pretty isolated. Nobody from those parts
has ever been to these trials before. Ever.” Another flinch. “Guess that
should have been a red flag in the first place. What about you?”
The truth was at the tip of my tongue, but I swallowed it down.
“I didn’t want to come but my legal guardian thought I was just being
stupid, and he wasn’t going to let me turn my back on the brightest future I
can possibly have.” My imitation of Elliot’s voice was so awful I laughed.
The girl didn’t. “Wow. I’m so sorry,” she whispered. “I’m Maia, by the
way.”
“Sera. Good to meet you, Maia.” I offered her a smile and she barely
returned it.
 “Good to meet you, too. I probably won’t be here for long—probably
will be taken home after the first trial. Not sure I regret being here yet,
though.” She looked to the side, to the rest of the candidates sitting together
at the other end of the table. “This place is pretty incredible.”
“You don’t know that. Maybe you’ll finish the first trial. Maybe you’ll
finish all of them,” I said, even if the idea made me shiver.
“Not a chance. I know next to nothing about the gods, just a couple
stories my dad used to tell me when we were working. We aren’t exactly
religious. We don’t have any statues or temples or anything like that.”
I, on the other hand, knew plenty about the gods, and I wished with all
my heart that I didn’t.
“Most places don’t,” I told her. “That doesn’t mean you can’t learn.”
“I can run, though. I’m really fast,” she told me, and her cheeks flushed
again, making her freckles disappear. “I’m pretty sure that’s not gonna
help.”
“Maybe it will,” I said, knowing exactly what she was feeling. “We
don’t know what the trials are yet.”
“Really? What about the one four years ago? Or the one before that?”
she asked, hopeful.
“You can only find glimpses online, short footages of what they allow
us to see, never the whole thing. They lock it all up after each trial is over.”
Which was fortunate because Layla and James, or even Miles, wouldn’t
have stopped talking about it.
God, I missed them so much already it hurt.
Maia sighed. “Maybe they’ll tell us.” And she nodded her head to the
other table behind me, to the seven young Elyseans sitting at it.
“Who’re they?” I wondered.
“I heard they’re students from the Academy, but I don’t know for sure,”
Maia whispered.
 The next second, Angel’s voice echoed in the high ceiling. Everyone
stopped talking and sat up straighter.
“Attention, please!”
My stomach twisted as if I was waiting for the roof to fall on my head.
Angel was standing in the middle of the two tables, the statue of Zeus at her
back, and she gripped the binder in her hands tightly as she smiled.
“Madam Carmine will be welcoming you to the Palace now,” she said,
then started clapping her hands, looking at us intently.
The Elyseans from the other table applauded, too, and so the candidates
did the same, including Maia.
The sound of high heels against the marble floor outside the open doors
pierced right through my brain. A heartbeat later, the woman with the big
blue eyes and the blood-red ruby on her dress walked in with her head high,
her long dress floating around her legs like it was underwater. Her dark hair
was tied in a delicate bun behind her head with a golden pin. Her fingernails
were long and sharp, painted a red as deep as the ruby, and they really did
look like claws.
She went between the tables until she reached Zeus’s statue, then
stopped, bowed to it deeply, and turned to us so fast, the fabric of her dress
hissed as if in complaint.
“Welcome, mortals,” she said, folding her hands in front of her as she
looked down at us. Her voice was cold and powerful, dark and light at the
same time, almost as if she were speaking with two different voices. “My
name is Madam Carmine. I am the Headmistress of the Elysean Academy
of Divine Light and Beauty, and I will be in charge of the Daedalus Palace
and the trials for the next three weeks. Please be reminded that this place is
sacred and it shall be regarded as such.” She let that sink in for a second
before she ordered, “You will treat this building and everything inside it
with the utmost respect.”
 The strength of her voice compelled me to want to obey with no
questions asked—fuck. My hand moved to my neck instinctively. I did not
want to be alone with this woman for any reason ever.
Her blue eyes looked ancient, yet her skin was wrinkle free, even
though her hair was a silver grey around the ears. Just the way she held her
shoulders demanded your full submission. She wore no makeup that I could
see, and her beauty was wild. Fierce—like an animal, definitely feline.
“I will be explaining a few things to you in a minute, but first, you will
be required to sign these documents.” She waved her hand to her right, and
Angel immediately started walking toward our table, her binder open.
“These are confidentiality agreements, drafted with the intent to bind you
by law, both mortal and divine, to keep everything you see, hear, and learn
within these walls in the next three weeks to yourselves until the day you
die. You are forbidden from sharing even the smallest details with anyone—
friend or family or lover. You cannot whisper the words to any animal or
write them down in your journal.”
Angel was already by the first candidate sitting at the table. The boy
must have been my age, with dark curly hair and round cheeks, forehead
glistening with sweat as he looked at what Angel offered him—a quill that
seemed to be both made out of gold and a real feather. When he took it in
his shaking hand, Angel suddenly grabbed the hair on the back of his head
and pulled a few strands out without warning. A scream left his lips
involuntarily, which Angel ignored, then let the hair of the boy fall right on
the quill.
“This golden quill was created in the image of our Father, Zeus, and it is
all-knowing. It will bind you to this contract either by hair, if it hasn’t been
altered, or blood,” Madam Carmine said, slowly walking closer to the head
of the table. The boy had already signed the contract, and Angel gave the
same quill to the girl sitting across from him. “Should you be compelled at
any time in the future to break this contract, you will either lose your hair—
violently, I might add—or you will bleed out, and it will not stop until you
do.” She smiled as if to show us her slightly pointed canines.
I had never laid eyes on a more intimidating person in my life.
Everyone held their breath. Nobody dared to question her, even though we
all wanted to.
It wasn’t possible, was it? We weren’t gonna lose our hair or our blood
if we spoke about this place to someone…right?
“From the moment you sign this contract, and to your very last day, no
matter where you go, or what you become, you cannot share anything from
our world to yours,” Madam Carmine continued, as Angel moved to the
second girl in the row—whose hair was cut close to her chin and dyed an
ash blonde.
That’s why she grabbed the girl’s index finger and pierced it with the tip
of the quill. The girl hissed, and when a drop of blood rose on her skin,
Angel dipped the edges of the feather on it, before the girl signed the paper
in front of her. There was no sign of blood on the quill, though, and no sign
of hair from the first two candidates, either. Almost like the quill had
absorbed them.
And Angel kept going.
So did Madam Carmine. She walked between the tables slowly, the high
heels of her leather boots like knives digging into my brain.
“Out of every other person in the country, in most of the world, you
have been chosen to be here today,” she said, her voice lower now. “I
expect each of you to recognize your luck and appreciate it moving
forward. We took great care in preparing this for you, and you will take
great care in abiding by our rules.”
Angel was almost at the middle of the table, piercing the finger of a boy
who’d bleached his cropped hair and had dyed it a pale yellow. Mine wasn’t
colored, but even so, giving my hair to a fucking quill to absorb was not in
the list of things I ever thought I’d have to do.
 I risked a glance at Maia, but she was so enthralled by Madam Carmine
as she walked somewhere behind me, she barely breathed. Her eyes were
wide, her lips parted like she was in awe. That’s why I turned to look and
found those wide blue eyes right on me.
The flesh on my forearms rose in goose bumps.
“Everything we do, we do it with beauty and grace,” she said as she
came closer. Her attention was a spell I couldn’t break free from. “You shall
do the same.” When she stopped right behind me, my neck was killing me
from the awkward angle because I still couldn’t break eye contact.
Madam Carmine reached out for my hand. Her skin was strangely
warm. No idea why I’d expected it to be ice-cold. I thought she was gonna
want me to stand up, but she didn’t. She simply looked at my hand, at my
unpolished nails, for a moment that felt like an eternity to me. Regret filled
me from head to toe. She didn’t move a single muscle on her face, but I
could see the disapproval written all over her anyway.
Just the way she let go of my hand was a goddamn statement:
unacceptable.
I swallowed hard, finally able to turn toward the table, cursing myself
for not listening to Grace. She asked to do my nails three times and I said
no. I’d been so damn stubborn and—wait.
I looked behind me again, stunned at my own thoughts.
What the hell? That was it?
That’s all it took for me to throw everything I stood for out the window,
just because the scary lady with the big blue eyes didn’t approve of my
fucking nails?
Madam Carmine had her back to me as she walked to the head of the
tables again. Closing my eyes, I forced myself to take in a deep breath. She
might seem scary now, but I could handle her. It would be no big deal. I’d
met a woman like her before. I’d been eleven, and I’d wanted to please
Miss Aldentach more than anything in the world, even after I realized how
big a monster she really was. Not Elysean, but something far worse. She
was the one who taught me everything I knew about the gods. She was also
the one who broke me little by little until there was no more fight left in me.
It had taken me the past two years of working on myself, building up
my walls again, trying to stand on my own, but what if all it took was a
little bit? What if I ended up right where I started again? What if all I’d
worked on meant nothing anymore?
Mind your thoughts, I said to myself. The mind wandered, and mine did
so in dark places, but I could always redirect it. I could take it anywhere I
wanted if I had the will.
And I’d been a kid with Miss Aldentach. I wasn’t a kid anymore. Not to
mention I wasn’t planning to stick around to see Madam Carmine again.
When Angel came to me and put a piece of paper on the table, I felt a
lot more like myself again.
“This won’t hurt a bit,” she said as she pulled a few strings of my hair
out.
It did sting a little, but my hair was hers now, and she spun it around the
tip of the quill as I watched. It was incredible to see how the strands
disappeared as soon as they touched what looked like metal but moved like
a true feather. My eyes blinked, my mind still unable to process the image
properly.
“Over here,” Angel said, putting the quill in my hand and showing me a
straight line at the end of the sheet marked: Candidate Sedorah Sinclair.
I didn’t want to sign it. I didn’t want to read those tiny letters, either. I
didn’t want to do any of this, but what other choice did I have? Getting up
right now and running away from here wasn’t going to work, not when
there was that woman in the room with us. I had the feeling she could do far
worse things than those shadows that had knocked me out the night before.
Besides, it didn’t matter if I signed or not—I was never going to talk
about any of this to anyone. If I had it my way, I would never even allow
myself to think about it.
So, I signed my name on the line and got it over with.
There. Done. Now they could get off my back.
“All signed,” Angel informed Madam Carmine, who gave a curt nod.
My throat felt swollen, and I took a sip of water just to calm down my
anxiety. Breathe. I had this. I was biding my time. I wouldn’t be here by the
end of the day.
Everything was going to be just fine.
 10

“One never truly grows up, simply becomes more experienced at being who they are."

—Chronicles of Athene, Book II, 167

by Gustav Allen, House Emerald

“The Elysean Trials are designed to test you on various levels, in ways you
are not expected to understand. They will test your agility, your patience,
your instincts, your mental strength, your ability to cope with danger, and
your magical prowess, among other things. For this, you will participate in
three challenges in the next three weeks. The exact dates will be delivered
to you in a timely manner,” Madam Carmine said. “In the meantime, this
Palace will give you everything you need to prepare. Some of you here
have been less than grateful for the opportunity given to you,” she said, and
her eyes stopped on my face. My cheeks heated up, and I wanted nothing
more than to hide under the table and get the hell out of there fast.
But I was in control of my body now, so I raised my chin and held her
eyes, even if it cost me all my strength.
 “Which is why it is important for you to understand,” she continued, her
eyes moving to the other students again, “that these trials demand your
active participation. You cannot cheat your way out of them. You cannot
remain passive once inside the trial. There is only one way out of each—
completion.” Again, her eyes landed on me. “If you refuse to finish the
trials, you will die inside them.”
My heart beat like a drum in my chest, shaking me to my core. I risked
a glance at the other candidates sitting at the table. All of them looked as
pale as I probably did. If Madam Carmine’s intention had been to scare us
shitless, she’d managed it in under five minutes. I’d be impressed if I
wasn’t so disgusted, but to speak up right now would be impossible. Not
because I didn’t want to, but I knew exactly what happened when you raised
your voice against anything Elysean. I’d paid the price for it many times, so
I bit my tongue and stood as still as every other mortal in the Hall.
Madam Carmine continued.
“There will be cameras with you in the trials, so your every movement
will be monitored. Like I said, you cannot cheat your way out of them—
make sure you do what is asked of you. Make sure you use this Palace to
prepare yourselves. There are no second chances in the trials, no redo
buttons,” she said, then waved her hand left, to the other table where the
Elysean students sat. “Some of the brightest students of the Academy of
Divine Light and Beauty have come here for the duration of the trials to
guide you and offer a helping hand. Use them.”
I looked at the students sitting at the other table, smiling plastic smiles
that hurt my eyes. All of them held their shoulders back and their heads up,
looking at us like they were really hoping to fool us into thinking they
would help us. They were snakes, all of them. The look on their beautiful
faces said as much—except for the Sketchbook Girl. She was still drawing,
moving her pencil furiously, oblivious to what went on around her. I liked
her already.
 “For now,” Madam Carmine said, her voice echoing in the tall ceiling.
“Enjoy your food. Rest. Learn. Most importantly, pray that the good gods
smile upon you.” For the love of God… “We will offer our first sacrifice in
the temples tonight. It will be the perfect opportunity to ensure a smooth
start of the most important journey of your lives.”
And with another look at all of us, she moved toward the doors with
Angel in tow, finally leaving us alone.
Even the air in the hall became lighter when she was gone. The
whispers began, and the Elysean students were talking and laughing out
loud already. A look ahead and I could have sworn Maia was shaking just
as badly as I was. I felt sorry for her—she didn’t belong here. None of us
did. We were barely eighteen, for fuck’s sake. What kind of monsters would
force us into trials that could cost us our lives?
The Elysean kind.
“Hey, it’s okay. It’s not really as bad as she made it sound,” I said to
Maia, though it was. People had died in the trials before, but to me the
tragedy was how nobody made a big deal out of it. Nobody blamed the
trials or—God forbid—the Elyseans. On the contrary—they were still being
praised for offering mortals a chance to be gods. Ugh.
“No, no, I know,” Maia said, rubbing her forearms—probably to chase
the shivers away. “It’s just that woman. She gives me the creeps.”
“Tell me about it,” I muttered, looking down at the scrambled eggs on
my plate that had probably gone cold. Good—I had no appetite anyway.
“She’s beautiful, though. All of them—so beautiful,” Maia said
breathlessly, stealing looks behind me at the other table every few seconds.
“That, they are,” I admitted, watching her trying to hide how her hands
were shaking. It distracted me perfectly from my own fear.
“Olympians were big on beauty,” I said, hoping to distract her, too.
“Ever heard of Aphrodite?”
She nodded her head slowly. “A little?”
 “She practically came out of the sea, put on a nice dress and some
makeup, then went to Olympus. The gods were like, damn, you hot,” I said
in a terrible imitation of a deep manly voice that was supposed to be Zeus,
and she smiled. “Let me sit you on this golden throne right here.” I
pretended to dust off the seat next to me on the bench. “There. You’re a
goddess now.”
Maia put her hands in front of her mouth to keep from laughing out
loud. I was holding back, too, but my shoulders still shook, until—
“You’re going to rot in Haides for all of eternity for making fun of the
gods,” someone suddenly said from behind me, making me jump.
I looked up to find two of the candidates who’d been sitting at the other
end of the table, now looking down at me like they were disgusted.
The look on their faces was too much. My own anxiety and fear and the
absurdity of this whole day was too much as well. I burst out laughing
before I could help it. It was either that or the angry tears making an
appearance, and I’d rather chew my own arm off than cry in front of
everyone here.
The girls were outraged as they continued to the doors, and Maia looked
positively terrified.
“Relax. They’re just girls,” I told her. Mortals, same as us. “And, FYI,
nobody says Haides anymore. Just stick to Tartarus. Sounds cooler.” And I
grabbed a banana from the table just so I wouldn’t have to run on an empty
stomach.
“Okay,” Maia whispered. “Okay, yeah. I say Tartarus, too.”
“Nothing beats hell, though. Something about good ole rot in hell, ya
know? It’s the gold standard if you ask me,” I muttered, now aware of the
other students getting up from the table to leave, already finished with their
food. I kept my voice down so they couldn’t hear me. Nobody here needed
to know how I felt about Elyseans, anyway.
 Just like that, Maia was smiling again. I don’t know why that made me
feel better. Maybe because she distracted me from my own terror?
As much as I didn’t want to leave her—she looked so scared the second
I was on my feet—I had to. I still needed to figure out how I was going to
get out of here, and I couldn’t risk her knowing what I planned to do. I
wouldn’t risk that for anything.
“I’ll see you around?” I said, reluctantly.
She swallowed her food and nodded. “Good luck.”
“You, too.”
We were both going to need a shitload of it.

N .
The Daedalus Palace was a prison, a big fancy prison with marbles and
velvets and gold, even though every single door in it was unlocked. I
walked out the front doors freely, while guards and staff and students
wandered around without paying me any attention. The gates in the distance
and the large walls of the Palace mocked me—no way could I climb them.
No way could I walk out those gates without someone stopping me.
Trapped.
How the hell was I going to get out of this place?
The realization was like a slap to my face—I wasn’t.
I was not going anywhere until at least the second trial ended and they
opened those gates for our families to come visit us.
Until then, I was really, truly stuck here. With Elyseans.
Closing my eyes, I sat on the floor and rested my back against a
column. It was okay. I could finish two trials. I would finish two trials if
that was what it took to get my freedom. What else was there to do? I
pushed the tears back with all my strength and breathed. Minded my
thoughts. Redirected the anxiety that had my skin buzzing like insects lived
on it.
Two trials, that’s all it took. Two trials, and I would run. As soon as
those golden gates opened, I would run. Right now, I’d focus on preparing
the best way I could to make sure I survived long enough to be out there
again. I had what it took, simply because there were no other choices.
Standing up on shaking legs, I looked at my surroundings and tried to
distract myself with the beauty of everything around me. The soft-looking
grass, the canal with the clear water coursing all around the building, the
arched bridges over it. I followed one onto the other side, to the grass and
the trees and the flowers, where the sunlight fell on my face and warmed
me to my bones.
I was okay. Alive, breathing, thinking. As long as I had that, I had
everything.
So off I went to the left of the building to see what I could find, in
which ways this place could help me complete the trials.
The Palace was longer than I’d imagined, with large windows and
beautiful statues, the sound of the water going through the canal calming
me down like a charm. At the corner of it, there was this strange dome
made of what looked like plastic, or maybe even thick, frozen glass. It
seemed to have been left there by accident, though it was huge, maybe a
quarter of the actual Palace. I tried to see the inside, but the two doors were
closed, not a soul in sight nearby, so I kept moving.
When I reached the back, I was in awe.
The courtyard stretched for miles on either side, the hedges and the trees
I’d tried to run to the night before now alive with daylight. Everything
looked so different. Colors vibrated on every petal of every flower, on the
statues, some of them with those emeralds on them, and the low hedges that
made the maze I’d seen last night seemed to be shaped into a large face. I’d
need to get up on the tower in the middle of the building to see all of it, but
I could see what was behind the face maze just fine.
A strange tree stood atop a low hill with the wall of the Palace close
behind. It was broken in half by a man carved out of wood with a trident in
his hands—Poseidon. The tree had grown into two large ones angled to the
sides while fresh water flowed out from where the trident met the trunk,
then fell onto the bed of the canal that stretched all the way around the
building.
I had never seen anything more beautiful in my life, and with the sun at
the tree’s back, dipping it in gold, it looked that much more intense.
The smell of roses and jasmines and all kinds of flowers was in the air.
A few of the other candidates were around me, admiring the views, the
details, but none of them even looked my way.
The glass doors that led into the Seasons Hall were wide open, and I
went inside to continue to explore before I lost my mind over all these
pretty things surrounding me. That’s what they were—just pretty things
meant to distract me from my purpose if I let them, and I sure as hell
wouldn’t.
So much space, so much beauty in the Palace. So many vases and
paintings, peacocks walking the halls, even a couple Elyseans randomly
playing flutes and lyres as they came and went.
It was like walking in a dream and my head was already buzzing, trying
to process everything I heard and saw at the same time, half convinced that
I was in a different world altogether. I’d more readily believe that.
But when I went to check out the left of the building, I found some of
the other candidates at the end of a wide hallway with large windows on
one side that let in so much sunlight it felt like we were out in the courtyard.
With them was the guy—that same guy I’d seen yesterday with the grey
eyes and the shadows slipping out of his hands.
The same guy who’d knocked me out cold.
 I stopped walking for a second.
“Some tips would be very appreciated. After all, we’re here to learn,”
one of the girls was saying, and she sounded about to melt into a pile of goo
on the floor.
Slowly, I went closer, eyes on Shadow Boy to make sure it really was
him who’d attacked me last night.
“There are no tips. You will all have your battles. You will all have to
choose your weapons,” he said, and he sounded a bit irritated. His voice
sent shivers down my back anyway. It was like the sound equivalent of
those shadows that had wrapped around me last night—dark and cold and
dangerous, perfectly smooth.
Definitely him.
“What kind of weapons?” the other girl said, and she sounded even
more breathless than the first.
“Some choose sharp blades,” the guy said to the candidates looking up
at him like he was the goddamn sun. “Some choose arrows. Other choose
the mightiest weapon of all.”
“Which is?” the girl asked without hesitation.
And the guy raised his hand toward the end of the hallway, to the double
doors that were so polished they could have been made out of glass.
Shadows slipped from his palm, not nearly as dark as they had been the
night before, but they were the very same. I recognized them even from a
distance, the way they broke into tendrils, like ribbons floating on air until
they reached the golden handles, then pushed the doors open.
I could hardly breathe as the candidates exploded into applause.
“Books,” the guy said, even more irritated than before. “The library is
right over there.”
The boys said their thanks and the girls batted their lashes at him, and
they finally moved to the open doors of the library, while Shadow Boy
turned to me.
 Him. It was him.
And, unfortunately for me, he looked even better in sunlight than he had
in the dark.
Either way, anger had my heart hammering in my chest. I was so pissed
so suddenly, I couldn’t even dream of controlling myself.
“You,” I spit, raising my finger at his face. This asshole had stopped me
last night even though I hadn’t done anything to him. He didn’t even know
me, and he could have easily minded his own damn business when he saw
me out there, but he decided to interfere anyway.
The moment he saw me, he stopped walking again, so I strode to him,
intending to give him a piece of my mind while the anger still fueled me.
“How dare you attack me behind my back?!” I said when I was still ten
feet away, trying not to notice his strange, colorless eyes, a smoky grey I’d
never seen before. And the way his dark hair was combed behind his head.
And the way his black shirt and black leather pants were the perfect contrast
against his pale skin…
“How dare you—”
The guy smiled.
Something grabbed me by the ankle and pulled me up in the air, and I
was turned upside down faster than I could blink.
The fear paralyzed me long enough to give him time to get closer.
Those damn shadows of his were out his hand again, and they’d wrapped
around my ankles and had pulled me up without my even noticing. Now, I
was hanging on air upside down, my face level with his—and he was
smiling. The asshole was smiling in triumph, no longer bored or irritated.
Even his eyes looked alive.
“Put me down!” I shouted, trying to thrash my limbs, but they were
locked tightly by that magic of his that was so smooth I could hardly feel it.
“Or what?” he said, and his voice had lowered. He came closer and
closer, his eyes analyzing my face as I tried to move but couldn’t.
 People laughed close by. Fuck, I already had an audience.
“Or what, mortal? What are you going to do if I don’t?”
I gritted my teeth to keep from losing it. The anger helped a great deal.
“You can’t keep me like this forever. You can’t watch your back all the
time, either,” I said, and his smile widened.
The way he watched me you’d think I was something to fucking eat. “Is
that a challenge?” he whispered, warm breath blowing against my lips. I
wanted to move away but it was impossible. His shadows had an incredible
grip on me. “I do love a good challenge.”
“You’re a coward,” I said, and the smile fell from his lips instantly—
good. “I had my back turned to you last night and you attacked me.”
His dark brow rose as he brought his hand to my face. His fingers
hovered right over my cheek, but he didn’t touch me. “What do you think
would have happened if I hadn’t stopped you, mortal?”
Wasn’t it obvious? “I would have gotten away.”
But he smiled again, and this time it wasn’t pleasant. “There are far
worse things than me here. The next time you want to run away, maybe I
should let you meet them.”
His magic let go of me all at once, but instead of slamming me against
the floor, it let me down gently.
More laughter. Almost all the candidates and some of the Elysean
students were in the hallway watching me. Laughing at me.
My cheeks burned as I stood up to face him again, so angry I saw red.
Nothing I would have loved more than to slam my fists on his pretty face.
Had it not been for those damn shadows, I wouldn’t have bothered to stop
myself.
“Keep your filthy shadows off me,” I hissed with as much bite as I could
muster.
“But they seem to like putting you off your feet,” the asshole said, and
the others laughed more.
 He turned to them—simply looked at them, and they all clamped their
mouths shut the same second. The Elysean students lowered their heads and
slipped into the library the next heartbeat, and the candidates followed after
them, wide-eyed.
It made me wonder, who the hell was this guy?
When he faced me again, I instinctively took a step back, but I held his
eyes. I had no idea who he was, but I’d be damned if I let him bully me
now.
“You’d do best to watch your back, mortal,” he whispered, giving me
another one of those looks that said he was measuring me up and trying to
figure out how to eat me raw. I couldn’t speak if I tried until he walked
around me and down the hallway, and I couldn’t see those eyes anymore.
“Thanks, dickwad. I can handle myself,” I muttered, half of me hoping
he didn’t hear me.
If he did, he didn’t turn. He didn’t send those shadows after me again,
either. And when he disappeared around the corner, I finally let go of a long
breath.
Fuck! My hands were still shaking. I looked around me, at the library
doors—now closed—at the others to my left, and the beautiful archway that
led to a set of stairs on the library’s side.
I ran to it, hoping for some privacy until I got myself together. I sat on
the floor behind the wall on the other side of the stairway, closed my eyes
and rested my head on my knees. The day hadn’t even begun, and I already
wanted to hide under a blanket for the rest of eternity.
The sound of wheels turning took my attention as I reminded myself
that I had no choice but to be here for now. Walking away from this place
wasn’t possible, so I had to suck it up and deal with whatever these people
were going to throw at me until I was free. No other choice.
Soon, a large cart full of what looked like laundry—sheets and blankets
in whites and pale blues—came through a half-hidden door to the left of the
stairway, and a woman pushed it toward the stairs by herself. She managed
to put the front wheels of the cart onto the first stair just as another two
people came through from the hallway—Elysean students. I held my breath,
my heart skipping a beat. Neither had been there earlier to witness the way
Shadow Boy humiliated me, but I still prayed with my everything that they
didn’t see me.
They didn’t. They just kept going for the stairs, and I thought for sure
they’d help the woman out, but she could have been invisible for all they
cared. Talking in hushed voices, they walked around her and up the stairs
without a single glance her way.
I sighed in relief. Seconds later, the sound of their footsteps faded, so I
stood up.
“Need help with that?” I asked and went to help her carry the cart up.
“Oh, I think I do. These joints aren’t what they used to be anymore,”
she said, her voice small and soft, her brown eyes kind. Definitely Elysean,
and she was wearing a grey dress almost identical to Grace’s. She also had a
white shawl that covered half her rich brown hair streaked with silver. No
gemstone on her that I could see, but even though she didn’t glow the way
some of the other Elyseans did around here, she was absolutely flawless.
Even the wrinkles around her eyes and long, elegant lips looked graceful on
her.
I smiled, too. “No worries. We’ll get this up in no time.” I grabbed the
other end of the cart, expecting it to be heavy. It was incredibly light
instead.
“Thank you, dear,” she said, analyzing me from head to toe, but she
seemed simply curious about me. She was definitely not measuring me up
like Shadow Boy had done earlier. Or Madam Carmine.
“You’re very welcome,” I said, and I meant it. It really was no bother—
the cart was very light.
 “It’s good to meet you, dear. I’m Eeda,” she said, offering me her hand
when we reached the top of the stairs. Wide hallways and doors on either
side, identical to the ones of the room I’d slept in.
“Sera,” I said and shook her hand. “Good to meet you, too. You got
this?” I pointed at the cart.
She smiled so big it kind of surprised me. She looked so friendly, almost
like a mortal. “I got this,” she repeated with a nod.
I made my way down the stairs again. “See you around, Eeda.”
“I’ll see you, Sera,” she said, and I felt her eyes on the back of my neck
until she couldn’t see me anymore.
Maybe not all Elyseans were monsters hiding behind perfect faces.
Maybe people like her and Grace were okay. I mean, I didn’t hate them on
sight, so that had to count for something. My instincts had kept me alive so
far, hadn’t they?
No, they weren’t all bad.
Except for Shadow Boy. He was worse than all of them combined.
When I opened the library doors, my mind was still stuck replaying the
way he’d looked at me, the way he’d spoken to me, the way his shadows
had felt against my skin. Warm. Not cold like last night, but warm this time.
They hadn’t hurt—on the contrary. They hadn’t gripped me tightly, either.
Why? And why hadn’t I asked the laundry woman who he was?
But all my thoughts came to a halt when I took in the massive room in
front of me. Books—so many books!—and I couldn’t even enjoy the sight
of them because of the other candidates, who’d gathered not twenty feet
away, whispering as they watched me, openly laughing at me.
The blood in my veins turned cold. I didn’t care that they were bullying
me. What hurt was that they were like me, kids who’d come from all over
the country for the trials, not Elysean. And they were having the time of
their life making fun of me.
 With a sigh, I stepped outside and closed the door. It didn't matter. I’d
come back later and grab a few books to read. The Palace was vast, I could
explore more until they left.
But the sound of their laughter followed me every step of the way, and it
just made me hate Shadow Boy even more.
 11

Metis, goddess of prudence, was wise, and therefore knew how to trick Cronus. She
made him the only promise he truly cared about— to make him unconquerable, if only
he agreed to eat a magical herb. He did, and the herb made him so sick that he threw
up all five of the children that he’d eaten, together with the stone he’d thought was
Zeus.

And so, Hera, Hestia, Demeter, Hades and Poseidon were at last free to join their
brother, the mighty Zeus, and become his allies in the battle against their child-eating
father.

—Book of Creation, 6th Edition, 379

by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

I thought there was no way this day could get any worse by lunch. I was
dead wrong.
Angel found me and practically forced me back to the Midas Hall to eat.
All the gold in that place was threatening to make me dizzy, but even before
I sat at the table in front of the statue of Zeus, I noticed that everyone was
watching me.
 Not only that, but a couple of the candidates had phones in their hands,
and whatever they saw on those screens must have been hilarious.
I was confused for a moment. Elliot hadn’t let me take mine from
Gary’s house. Where did they get theirs?
That’s when I noticed the Elysean students sitting with them at the head
of the table. The guy with the blue eyes who’d winked at me in the morning
was playing with the golden chain around his neck, completely relaxed,
while the girl wearing an emerald on an even thicker chain over her dark
green shirt tapped her fingers to the tabletop furiously. They were both
smiling at me like they owned my very soul.
The phones must have been theirs, and to my horror, I recognized my
voice coming through the speakers as soon as I sat down.
“You wanna know what they are, Lay? I’ll tell you what they are—
nothing more than power-hungry people with some magic powers and a god
complex. They’re not saints. They’re not good by any means. They are not
gods, people. Stop worshipping them—they are not gods!”
Every inch of my body froze in place as the Elyseans and the candidates
turned to me, laughing and looking at me like I both entertained them and
disgusted them at the same time.
Then they replayed the video again.
And again.
And again…
“Godless,” one of the candidates said to me, the boy with the yellow
hair who was throwing peas at me. Ethan was his name.
“Godless bitch,” said his friend Nick, flipping me off with both hands.
The hair on the back of my neck stood at attention. I looked around,
hoping Angel was already gone—she was. That meant nobody would stop
me from getting the hell out of here, too.
Grabbing a piece of bread from the table, I stood up.
 “Hey, where you going, mortal?” called the Elysean girl sitting with the
other candidates. “Stay a while. Tell us all about what we are. You seem to
know it all—c’mon, sit down.”
Boo!
Godless whore!
You’re going to die in the first trial!
Rot in Tartarus, bitch, they called after me. As much as I wanted to send
them all to hell, give them a piece of my mind and flip them off for good
measure, I forced myself to smile widely at them instead. Nothing was
going to hurt their little egos more than that.
Then I walked out of the Midas Hall with my head up because, yes, I
was godless—and I was damn proud of it.

T every person who refused to worship the Elyseans and the

ground they walked on godless. It was a cool name, now that I thought
about it. I should have made it into my nickname a long time ago.
But no matter how hard I tried to keep myself from thinking, I couldn’t
avoid it all day—they knew. They had all seen that stupid video of when I’d
lost my shit in front of the school with Layla and James. They’d all heard
me talking about Elyseans, saying what I truly felt about them.
Like a fool I thought people would forget. Like a fool I chose to believe
something I knew for a fact wasn’t true—how many times had I been
punished for speaking like that by Miss Aldentach? Thirty? Fifty times?
God, this was wrong. I shouldn’t have been here—this was all so
wrong. I should have been out there tonight, in the free world, out of Gary’s
house for good, on my own for the first time in my life.
Instead, I’d had to lock myself inside a fancy room in a fancy Elysean
palace, to get away from both them and other people like me, ashamed,
terrified of what tomorrow would look like after everything that happened
today. I refused to let myself cry, but my body was so weak. I hadn’t eaten
anything other than that piece of bread for lunch. I hadn’t dared to leave the
room and go exploring again since then, either, knowing I’d be laughed at
and called names every step of the way if I did.
And I would handle that, no problem. I just needed a little time until I
could.
So, I’d taken my time, had hidden in this room, back resting against the
bed corner, knees against my chest. The windows in front of me were open,
the sky a gorgeous deep blue now that the sun had set, brilliant stars
twinkling like they meant to wink at me.
I thought of Miles and of Gary, of Layla and James. I thought of Maia,
too, and if she’d talked to one of the other candidates by now. If she’d
already made friends with them.
Eventually, something moved outside the window, and I didn’t even
have the energy to jump away when the little blue bird landed on the
windowsill.
The Iriade’s sapphire eyes zeroed in on me, and for a moment I forgot it
was a robot. It just felt like it was conscious, like it recognized me, could
tell exactly what I was feeling.
In its white beak was a small, rolled piece of paper, and the bird slowly
spread its wings and landed on the floor, keeping its distance from me.
“What now?” I asked as if I expected it to answer me. It didn’t, just
opened its beak and let the paper fall on the fluffy brown carpet.
Then, as if it could sense my discomfort, it hopped back all the way to
the wall and stayed there.
Reluctantly I reached for the piece of paper and unrolled it.

Candidate Sedorah Sinclair

First trial: May 19th, Noon, at the Daedalus Dome
M 19 . Barely two days away.
I crumpled the piece of paper in my fist and closed my eyes for a
moment. The first trial was two days away, and I had no choice but to get to
the end of it.
The Iriade chirped, its voice that of a bird, but also a bit robotic.
“It’s okay,” I told it because I could have sworn it looked concerned.
That’s how I knew that I was losing my shit. “It’s fine. I got this. You’ll
see.”
Whether it believed me or not, the bird spread its wings and flew right
out the window and into the night, leaving me alone again.
The sound of the crowd somewhere outside came soon after. I got up to
close the window so I could continue to pretend I was all alone in the
world, but the sight of the fires and the people dancing by the temples
didn’t let me look away.
They were sacrificing, just like Madam Carmine said. All the candidates
would be down there, having received the date of the first trial, to sacrifice
food in their temples and pray that the good gods smile upon you—didn’t
Madam Carmine say that, too?
Plenty of Elyseans were with them. Tables outside full of food while
they stood close by and watched, drank, listened to the music of the same
band that had been out there the day they opened Idaea to us.
Even though I was two stories high, there were plenty of fires and
lanterns nearby so I saw everything. I sat on the windowsill and watched, a
tiny part of me wishing I was down there, too, not because I cared about
sacrificing to the gods, but just to feel like I belonged somewhere.
How silly of me. I should have been happy I didn’t belong with these
people. I didn’t pray to their gods. If I did, I’d probably sacrifice to Hades,
who didn’t care about food but wanted the blood, flesh and bones of a black
sheep slaughtered under a shadow. If I were so cruel as to condemn an
animal like that, it would be to him, and I would be sacrificing to pray that
this entire Palace disappeared from the face of the Earth, that Tartarus
swallowed it whole.
As it was, I rested my head against the frame and I watched the people
dancing and talking and enjoying each other’s company while the smoke
from the fires and the burned food rose into the dark sky, almost completely
invisible. They all hung out together—except one silhouette that I could
barely make out at the edge of the second temple, resting against one of the
pillars, arms crossed in front of his chest.
I was far away, but I could see his grey eyes in my mind perfectly. It
was the guy who commanded that darkness, the one who didn’t let me
escape last night, who’d humiliated me in front of everyone this morning.
And I felt those eyes right on me.
Shivers broke all over my skin. He didn’t mingle with the other
Elyseans or the candidates. He just stood there away from the crowd, and it
could have very well been my imagination, but his eyes were locked on
mine as if he could see me, though the building was drenched in darkness
and I only had one small lamp on in the room. His attention was like a
physical touch against my skin, colder than the night’s air.
And when lightning stroke the sky over our heads, that flash of blinding
white light enabled me to see every detail of his face as if he were standing
right in front of me—specifically his eyes, shades of grey and silver
swirling in them like true smoke, or clouds angered with coming storms.
The lightning faded and the people cheered, Elysean and mortal alike. It
was a sign from Zeus, that lightning, a sign that the gods had seen and
accepted the sacrifices made for them tonight.
“I wish…” I whispered into the night, never looking away from the
smoky eyes I could only see in my mind now.
 But then I remembered that wishing doesn’t get you anywhere, so I
didn’t bother to finish it.
I just continued to watch the crowd, how they danced and laughed and
had the night of their lives together, until the small round clock on the
nightstand struck midnight.
“Happy birthday to me,” I said, ignoring the tear that slipped from my
eye. Ignoring the irony that was my life—how many times had I wished
upon the moon and the stars and the sky—even the gods at odd times—for
my eighteenth birthday to arrive faster? For my freedom?
There. I was officially eighteen years old now.
And I was more trapped than ever before.

***

E . Impossible to not let it get to me—the weight of

their eyes was heavy on my shoulders. But I had no other choice than to
leave my room. The first trial was at noon tomorrow, and I had to be
prepared. I had to read. I had to do something other than sit in that fancy
room starving all day long. It was important I didn’t die in these trials. It
was important I tasted my freedom for real for one fucking day of my life
before my end.
So here I was, entering the Midas Hall, focusing on the statue of Zeus,
on all the gold that surrounded me while everyone, Elysean and mortal,
focused on me. They’d all already seen that stupid video. Every single soul
in this place hated my guts now—except maybe Maia.
“Morning,” she said when she sat down across from me at the end of the
table, just like yesterday. Her cheeks were flushed again, and she moved her
eyes from my face down to her plate so fast I was dizzy.
 “Morning. Sleep well?” I said because I wasn’t going to let any of the
other candidates who were watching me like hawks from the other side of
the table intimidate me. Screw them—I said what I said, and I stood by it. If
they didn’t like it, that was a them problem.
“It was okay. The bed’s pretty big. Not used to it,” Maia said in a rush
as she filled her plate, then turned to the others as if she just remembered
they were there. She smiled. Waved at them awkwardly. They waved back.
“I mean, it was fine,” she ended up saying.
“If you wanna go sit closer to them, go ahead, Maia. I don’t mind.”
She’d been there for the sacrifices last night, and maybe she’d made
friends. God knew she’d be better off making friends with them than me.
“I’m fine,” she said, shaking her head. “How about you? You weren’t at
the temples last night—I searched for you.”
“Yeah, I fell asleep early,” I lied.
“It was pretty boring,” she admitted. “But Zeus accepted our sacrifices,
so…” She smiled at me. “I put in a piece of cake for you. Red velvet. Heard
someone say that was Hera’s favorite.”
My stomach twisted and turned so many times it was a miracle I hadn’t
thrown up already.
“Thank you, Maia,” I said, almost breathlessly. Not that it was a big
deal, but I wasn’t used to people doing things for me, no matter if it was
burning perfectly good food and calling it a sacrifice to the gods in my
name. It shouldn’t have overwhelmed me so much, but I even had tears
pricking the back of my eyes because of it. Lame, Sera.
“You’re welcome. Did your Iriade bring you the letter?” she said,
stuffing her mouth full of large purple grapes that tasted better than a
dream.
“It sure did. Tomorrow, noon,” I said with a nod.
“Yeah,” Maia said. “We should eat and get to the library. Some kids
were saying that the first trial is all about knowledge. There won’t be
fighting or anything like that.”
“Isn’t anyone going to guide us? Where’s Angel?” I said, looking
around the hall, hoping to see her familiar face. But other than the seven
students sitting at the table behind me, there were no Elyseans in there with
us.
“Nobody,” Maia said. “We’re on our own.”
“What about them?” I pointed my thumb behind me. “Didn’t Madam
Carmine say that they were here to offer a helping hand?”
I didn’t believe it for a second, of course. They would not be offering
me anything, but maybe they would to Maia.
She flinched. “Yeah, but they’d have to approach you first. I heard one
of the girls last night say that they have to pick you, and you have to swear
allegiance to them before they help you.”
Yeah, fuck no. “Oh,” was all I said.
“Nobody’s approached me yet, but it’s fine. I’ll get through the first trial
somehow. I just need to spend the whole day—and night—reading.” She
smiled, but it was forced.
“Let’s get to the library, then.” If she needed help with anything, I at
least knew more about the gods than she did.
Half the hall was empty when we left. But my stomach was full of
delicious food, and I was focused. I had a purpose—get through the first
two trials, then make my run for it. It would be easy. I’d gone through so
much worse, hadn’t I? Easy.
Maia was a nervous mess, tugging at her fingers, biting her fingernails,
and as much as I wanted to tell her to relax, I didn’t. I knew how
patronizing it could be when people told you to calm down while you were
overwhelmed, so I just distracted her instead.
“Hey, there’s a guy around here with sort of colorless eyes, and he can
literally make shadows with his hands. Any idea who he is?” I said, and I
even felt guilty for asking, like I was afraid that I cared. I didn’t—it was
just so I knew who I was dealing with here.
“Yep. I heard about him. They call him Shade but I don't know his real
name. He’s already graduated from the Academy, but he works there, I
think. I don’t know why he’s here, though. The Elysean kids apparently told
the others to just stay away from him. The girls were bummed cuz he’s
hot.” Then she looked at me. “And scary as hell. I heard about what he did
to you yesterday.”
When we turned the corner to the hallway that ended with the library
doors, my heart skipped a beat and I expected to find him right there again,
talking to the other candidates, his shadows coming for me.
The hallway was empty.
“Yeah, well, he’s Elysean. What did you expect?” I said with a shrug.
“They’re all stuck up assholes with a god complex.”
Maia’s hand was around my wrist instantly, and she looked behind us to
make sure nobody was there. “Hush, Sera!”
I flinched—shit. I needed to mind my mouth. I needed to mind my
temper until I got out of this place.
“Sorry,” I muttered. “It’s fine—nobody heard.”
The way Maia looked at me, you’d think I had committed the most
heinous crime there is. “Let’s just get to the library.” And she began to
hurry.
Great. I pissed her off, too.
But just as we passed the archway left of the library, I saw the laundry
woman again trying to get her cart up the stairs, same as yesterday.
I stopped walking—she looked like she was struggling, and I couldn’t
just let her carry all that load by herself, could I? And it was the perfect
opportunity to give Maia a second to calm down a bit as well, so I said,
“You know what—why don’t you go ahead? I’ll meet you there in a minute,
okay?”
 Maia was almost relieved. Another look behind us to make sure the
other candidates weren’t there, and she nodded.
“Don’t take long,” she whispered and disappeared into the library.
With a sigh, I turned to the archway. “Need help with that?” I asked the
woman—Eeda was her name if I remembered correctly.
“Oh, dear,” she said, a bit startled but she still laughed. “Why, yes, I do.
I really do.”
I went to the other side and grabbed the cart—it was a bit heavier than it
had been yesterday and just as full. “Don’t they have elevators around
here?”
“Not for this,” Eeda said. “I do use the main ones when I make the
rounds at nighttime, though.” Her wide brown eyes sparkled as she took me
in. “How have you been? You look well rested.”
I smiled for her sake—something about the look in her eyes. Something
about her smile that was so genuine. It made me forget that she was
Elysean.
“I slept well last night,” I lied. “Just heading to the library. The first trial
is tomorrow.”
“Thank you, dear,” she said when we reached the second floor. “I heard
about the trial. Did you sacrifice to the gods last night?”
“Nope. Fell asleep early,” I lied again. My cheeks were already flushed
because of it but I hoped she didn’t notice.
“That’s a shame. The gods watch us. They can be persuaded to help a
great deal,” she told me.
And the words were at the tip of my tongue—the gods don’t watch shit.
If they even exist, and if they really weren’t cruel bastards, I wouldn’t be
here talking to you right now. I will not sacrifice perfectly good food for
nothing.
Instead, I nodded. “Hopefully next time I’ll be awake.”
 “Next time it is,” Eeda said with a nod, pulling her white shawl higher
over her head.
“Hey, I was wondering if I could ask you something?” I said before she
turned to leave.
“Sure, dear. Go ahead,” she said without hesitation.
“This guy named Shade knocked me out cold the other night, and then
yesterday he used his magic on me. Sort of like darkness leaking out his
fingers…” I made a motion with my fingers like a damn fool, and she
flinched.
“Ah, yes. Shade. I know Shade,” she said with a nod, and my heart
skipped a beat. “He’s tied to the Void. I heard he can access it as easily as
breathing, but don’t be too sure—I’ve only heard rumors.”
“Oh.” I scratched my cheek. “What the hell’s the Void?”
“He’s not a student, but not exactly a teacher, either,” Eeda continued in
a hushed voice, suddenly looking around as if to make sure nobody could
hear us. It didn’t escape me how she ignored my question. “He and the
others are here under the pretense of helping, but really they’re only here to
be punished. Keep your eyes open, dear. Do not trust any of them.”
On that, at least, we agreed.
“I won’t,” I promised her. “But that guy—”
“I have to get back to work, I’m afraid. Just keep away from them, dear.
You will be all right,” she said, pushing her cart down the hallway with a
sorry smile on her face.
I sighed. “Of course. Thanks, Eeda.”
“Take care, Sera. And good luck!”
I was definitely going to need a shitload of that.
Out in the hallway again, I looked both ways like I was afraid a truck
was going to come run me over before I made it to the library doors.
Nobody was there, and that gave me hope. Maybe the library would be
deserted, too, and only Maia would be in there, reading. So, when I pushed
the door open and stepped inside, I was relaxed.
I shouldn’t have been.
They were all there somehow, mortal and Elysean, or at least most. The
Elyseans were close to the first set of furniture—rich brown leather
recliners with a golden table in the front. Most were standing, but
Sketchbook Girl sat together with a blonde who could blind you with the
perfect angles of her face, and a guy who had his eyes on me as he chewed
gum, grinning like he knew exactly what was coming for me.
Deeper into the room, the other candidates sat at the polished tables to
the right, and Maia was at the very end, sitting alone, waving at me.
Taking in a deep breath, I decided that I wasn’t going to let these kids
intimidate me out of this place—I needed the books. I needed to read, if
only to refresh my memories, and I wasn’t going anywhere. So, while I
made my way to Maia, I just ignored the stares and focused on the library.
Easiest thing in the world to do when it looked like that.
Two steps in and I froze again, shocked at the sight in front of me. I’d
seen it yesterday, too, but I’d been too distracted to notice details other than
a lot of books. The library’s walls were all made out of shelves. The right
side was open, with furniture and tables and statues and vases everywhere,
while on the left, there were more rows of shelves as tall as the impossibly
high ceiling. The wood was carved to perfection, with faces and flowers
and vines that looked real enough to be moving—and with butterflies flying
around them. Butterflies with deep blue, semi-transparent wings that had
words written on them in a beautiful cursive handwriting.
A large solar system made out of wood and gold was in the middle of
the room, the globes seemingly hovering on air ten feet off the floor
together with the sun and more stars that were moving, twinkling like
someone had plucked them from the sky and brought them here to shine.
 I couldn’t stop staring as I spun around, mouth open and eyes wide,
taking in the beauty around me, the smell of wood and paper, the feeling of
being surrounded by books on all sides. The gods sat on clouds in the
painting that took over the ceiling, looking down upon us with smiles on
their faces. And the sound of butterfly wings fluttering was more calming
than any melody I’d ever heard.
“The godless mortal herself…”
Chills washed down my back, and I had no choice but to turn to the
Elyseans. They were all looking at me now—except for Sketchbook Girl.
They were all smiling at me like my soul was in their hands and they could
crush it any time they pleased.
That just pissed me off.
“I do have a god, actually. It just isn’t yours,” I said, and maybe I
shouldn’t have, but what the hell. If it was going to rain, might as well let it
pour.
“You have a death wish, more like,” another said—a guy with ashy
brown, wavy hair falling on his brows that could have been the work of an
artist. He had three small sapphires sewn to the breast pocket of his grey
shirt that complemented the deep brown of his eyes perfectly.
The others chuckled. Maia stuck to her table, for which I was thankful,
but the other candidates were slowly coming closer, smiles on their faces,
happy to witness another humiliation of me.
“I just want to read,” I said and made to move deeper into the library,
maybe even hide behind one of those shelves until they picked something
else to distract themselves with. But most of them were already moving,
coming in front of me to block my way.
I stopped again.
“There are no books for the godless in our library,” the first guy said—
dark hair cut so short it looked like a shadow over his skull, which made his
piercing blue eyes stand out even more. He winked at me again—I had no
idea why those winks freaked me out so much.
“In fact, there’s no place for the godless in our Palace or our trials—or
our city,” said the one with the three small sapphires.
“We’d be showing mercy on your mortal soul if we let you die and let
your body rot in the Dome for the rest of eternity,” the blonde girl said,
standing up slowly. The brooch shaped like a flower with a small sapphire
in the middle that held the shawl around her shoulders was just as beautiful
as her face.
God, she felt so superior to me it was almost funny.
Blue Eyes grinned. “Mercy—I like that. It’s as close as you can be to
Elyseans for the rest of eternity, anyway.”
I flinched—they actually believed that I’d want such a thing. “Thanks,
but I’d rather just jump off a cliff on the other side of the world
somewhere.”
“Your mortal soul—” the blonde girl started, but I was already getting
impatient with them throwing fucking mortality at my face—is that really
the best they had?
“My soul is the same as yours and the same as every other person’s in
the world,” I cut her off.
She wrinkled her nose like my voice disgusted her, but her friends were
laughing at me already, so she took a step closer. “Are you stupid or
something? You and I are not the same,” she spit with so much hatred I felt
it all the way to my bones.
I really should have stopped then. I didn’t.
“Oh, I’m sorry. I missed the part where you aren’t mortal. Somebody
should have told me you live forever.”
The laughter cut off abruptly. Now, they could tear me apart with their
eyes alone.
 “Our souls are immortal, godless,” Blue Eyes said, stalking closer,
watching me like I was a little mouse he intended to catch. Not going to lie,
I was terrified, especially when the blue stone on his necklace seemed to be
pulsating with light from within.
“See, I would agree with you, but then we’d both be wrong. My soul’s
the same as yours,” I said, functioning on pure instinct and stubbornness
now.
“Our souls are divine. Yours is worthless,” the blonde said.
“Oh, really?” I forced a laugh. “Worthless? How do you think the
Underworld survives?” I wasn’t planning to let her answer. “It’s okay not to
know your own history, though. Nothing wrong with not being the sharpest
knife in the drawer. Hey—maybe you should grab a book while you’re
here.” And I waved my finger around.
It was like I’d slapped her across the face.
Letting her arms down to her sides, she came closer than Blue Eyes,
deep into my personal space. It took all I had not to move away, though the
sapphire on her brooch looked about to burst into blue light.
“Are you calling me stupid?” she said slowly, like she was giving me
time to think through my answer.
I put a hand to my chest. “Oh, no, I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings,” I
said, shaking my head. “I honestly thought you knew.”
Someone laughed—the tall guy standing by the recliner still, holding a
stick with a bright green gemstone attached to the end of it, but he masked
it with a cough.
“Damn, Blair,” he muttered, lowering his head to hide his smile.
The girl’s face resembled a tomato, and even the air about her changed,
as if it was charging.
The Elyseans no longer talked to me, but they came closer and closer on
all sides, circling me until I felt like I was suffocating for real.
God, I should have kept my mouth shut. What the hell was I thinking?!
 “You’re going to pay for that, bitch,” Blair hissed, raising her perfectly
manicured hand at me.
In that moment I knew that trial or no trial, these people were going to
attack me. They were going to hurt me, and there was nothing I could do to
stop them.
The realization was like a slap to my face, when…
“Do you like my sketch?”
Everybody stopped moving. Blair, who was about to jump at my neck,
and the guys who’d circled me and were looking at me like I was their prey,
all stopped coming at me and slowly leaned away.
They looked behind them, at the girl with the sketchbook on her lap,
sitting in the recliner still.
For a moment, I thought maybe we’d heard wrong—she didn’t look like
she’d spoken. But then she raised her head, and her ice-cold green eyes
locked on mine.
My heart skipped a beat.
“I said, do you like my sketch?” she repeated and slowly stood up.
She was a couple inches shorter than me, very petite, light brown hair
cut in pin straight bangs that fell just over her brows, accentuating the
strange green of her eyes even more. They were like emeralds on their own,
but she had two actual gemstones on the golden rings on both her middle
fingers.
She turned her sketchbook to me and showed me what she’d been
working on—a hive of wasps, big and small, were drawn to perfection,
black ink on creamy white paper.
“Well, do you?”
Nobody said a single word. The Elyseans all watched her, and so did the
candidates from a few feet away. Maia was still at the table, fingers in her
mouth, probably biting her nails.
 “Yes,” I said, my voice dry as a desert because the way these Elyseans
were reacting to this girl made me very uneasy. “Yes, it looks pretty good.”
The girl smiled. “I have a feeling they’re going to like you, too,” she
said, and then she turned the sketchbook toward herself again and blew on
the paper.
I had never seen anything stranger in my life.
She blew on the paper, and the ink came to life, tearing itself from the
surface and taking shape right there in the air while we watched.
Someone gasped. Others stepped back slowly. I could hardly move as
the wasps, as big as my damn fist, gained shape and color and began to
buzz as if they were really, truly real.
Before the minute was over, more than twenty of them turned to me.
The girl smiled again. “Boo,” she whispered.
The wasps charged for me all at once.
I wish I could say that I faced them bravely. I wish I could say that I
stood my ground and killed all of them with my bare hands, but the truth
was that I ran. A scream of terror was stuck in my throat, but I turned
around and I ran for the doors and down the hallway feeling like every inch
of my body was on fire. The buzzing of the wasps filled my head, and they
were so close I could feel them. When they got to me, they were going to
kill me. They were going to fucking tear me apart.
I never ran faster in my life. When I stumbled into the Seasons Hall,
both Elliot and Angel were there, talking to others, and they simply
watched me make my way to the glass door at the side of the statues. They
could probably see the wasps coming for me, but nobody said a single word
or lifted a finger to help me.
I made it outside into the courtyard and kept on going and going even
after I entered the face maze, barely seeing anything. Barely breathing.
Until my foot caught on a rock and I fell.
 My instincts took over, and I shot to my feet just as fast, turning around
with my hands raised, determined to fight those huge wasps until my dying
breath.
Except there was nothing behind me.
I blinked and the view in front of me swam, my heart slamming against
my ribcage. I was outside, the blue sky over me, the hedges that reached
just above my hips around me, and the wasps hadn’t followed. They
weren’t there.
Relief covered me from head to toe. I sat on the cobbles with my back
to the hedges, hiding my head between my arms. I just needed a second to
catch my breath. I just needed a second to get my shit together.
As my heartbeat slowed down and the buzzing faded from my ears, I
began to hear the music.
It was coming from deeper in the face maze, and I couldn’t tell who was
playing, but a woman was singing in an almost hushed voice, in a language
I couldn’t understand, and my eyes closed again. My whole being became
aware of every note from the flute and harp, and every whisper coming out
of that woman’s mouth, and my very soul rested.
I calmed down completely, but even then, I didn’t move. Even then I
couldn't imagine going back inside that building with those people. With
those wasps.
So, I stayed there, hiding behind the hedges, hating what I’d become,
what my life had turned into so suddenly. Thinking about my parents, of my
very blurry memories of their laughter.
The tears came and fell in silence, and they kept me company until the
music stopped completely.
 12

‘…the King of the Underworld, god of the dead, said,

“Life is about choices, about sacrifices and gains. How do you determine what is
worthy and what isn’t, when you know there is an end to everything?” And that is the
only question that matters.’

—Kingdom of the Dead, Volume II, 66

by Phylis Petra, House Opal

Unprepared. Completely and utterly clueless, and the first trial was
tomorrow.
There was no fooling myself into thinking that I would pull this off—
no, I was going to die. Whatever the trial was, I wasn’t going to survive it—
and wasn’t it funny that I would have to walk into it willingly?
What a fucking joke.
Even so, I didn’t come out of the room until night took over the sky. My
body was weak with hunger by then. The fires were on in the temples
outside, but the hallway outside the room was empty. The stairway, too.
There were people from the staff coming and going, but none of them
stopped me. Maybe they thought I was on my way to the temples to
sacrifice food, too.
And I would—just not to the gods.
Except when I reached the Midas Hall, the doors refused to open. I tried
the handles a few times, and the more they resisted, the more pissed off and
desperate I became.
“Come on!” I hissed at them, as if they could hear me. As if they could
be persuaded to let me through if I shouted at them loud enough.
They didn’t.
Biting back angry tears, I considered going to the temples for a moment,
but I thankfully came to my senses quickly. I didn’t need to eat—I could
survive without food for twenty-four hours just fine. I’d just come back to
the Hall in the morning before the trial. Right now, I had to take advantage
of the fact that everybody was out there and get my hands on some books,
so I made my way to the library again.
The doors opened with ease.
A long sigh escaped me—I pushed them back all the way, and they
revealed to me the library in all its glory. The lamps on the shelves were off,
but light was coming from every globe and every star of the solar system
model hovering in the air in the middle of the room, and it looked even
more magical than it had during the day. The butterflies with the inscribed
blue wings weren’t there, but the way those globes glowed and moved, like
they were buzzing in place, made me feel like I was slowly entering a realm
of dreams.
Except they weren’t the only thing buzzing.
The wasps rose in the air from behind the first row of shelves to the left.
The sound of them, the sight of them—more like shadows in the darkness—
took my breath away instantly.
“Fuck…” I breathed.
They charged for me without a second’s hesitation.
 Instinct took over and I was no longer in charge of my body. Pulling the
doors closed, I began to run down the hallway like fire was coming to
devour me.
I ran until I was in the main hallway again, right by the entrance doors,
and then allowed myself to stop and breathe, to make sure the wasps
weren’t following me.
Of course, they weren’t—they were insects! They couldn’t fucking open
doors! What the hell was wrong with me?
“Get a grip,” I hissed at myself, resting my hands on my knees to catch
my breath. I tired so easily with basically no food in my system the whole
day.
And I realized it was just going to get worse because nobody was going
to help me. If I went to Angel or Madam Carmine or anyone else in this
place, it wasn’t going to make a difference at all.
God, how I missed Miles. And my small, half-empty room. James and
Layla—even Gary. I missed school, too. I missed being free.
Maybe that’s why I went all the way to the entrance doors and tried the
handles, just in case. They didn’t give.
I’d never had my hopes crushed quite so drastically before, but it was
okay. I was still breathing. I could still sleep to gather energy for tomorrow,
even if I couldn’t find food.
So, I turned to go back to the room—and almost slammed onto a wide
chest covered in black fabric.
“Fucking-shitting-goddamn sonovabitch!”
I stepped back, my soul about to leave my body.
And the asshole raised a brow. “How very creative.”
It was him—the Shadow Boy—Shade. He had been right behind me
and I hadn’t heard a single thing. Right there, and I hadn’t even noticed.
“Going somewhere?” he said, and I was still racing to catch my breath,
trying to get my heart to stop slamming against my chest before it broke my
damn ribs.
“Anywhere you’re not,” I spit and walked around him, embarrassed to
have been so startled. This entire place creeped me the fuck out.
“Why aren’t you at the temple, mortal? You weren’t there yesterday,
either,” he said, and he was walking with me. I was going as fast as I could,
but he had no trouble keeping up.
“What are you, stalking me?”
“I am asking you a question. Why?” And the way he said it—demanded
it, like I had no choice but to answer…
I must have truly had a death wish because I stopped walking again and
I faced him, so angry I saw red. So angry I didn’t even care that the smell of
him, like summer rain, filled me from head to toe. And most importantly, I
didn’t care about who he was or what he could do with those damn shadows
of his. This whole day had been too much already, and I just lost it.
“Because I am not stupid enough to burn perfectly good food and call it
a fucking sacrifice to gods who don’t give a shit about my damn existence!”
My voice echoed in the empty hallway, every word crystal clear. Every
inch of my body was shaking.
There. Now I said it. Now he’d have a real reason to kill me and spare
me the misery of having to die in the trial.
The shock reflected in his grey eyes but only for a second. Funny thing
—instead of unleashing his darkness on me to slowly suffocate me while he
watched the light going out in my eyes, he smiled.
He actually smiled and said, “That, they don’t.”
Shocked myself for a moment, I opened my mouth to speak but nothing
came to mind.
“However, nothing will keep you from getting killed if you insist on
telling everyone you cross paths with exactly how you feel about the people
who have your life in their hands,” he continued. “It is not wise to make
enemies out of those you live with, Sedorah Sinclair.”
 The way he said my name broke my skin out in goose bumps—like he’d
been saying it every single day for all of his life.
“Depends on what your goal is,” I forced myself to say. “Shade—is it? I
don’t know what the hell you people tell yourselves around here, but you
are not god-like. You are not superior to me. You are not immortal.”
“What exactly is your goal, then?” he said, stepping a bit closer to me as
if he knew how curious I was to see him from even closer up. To find flaws
in his perfect face that would make him seem a bit more real.
So far it wasn’t working, and my eyes must have been hungry for his
face because I couldn’t stop analyzing him, just like he was doing me.
I swallowed hard. “To keep people like you away from me.”
Again, he smiled, except this time it was laced with a kind of
playfulness that transformed his face completely, made him look younger. It
was all I could do not to reach out and touch those round, bitable cheeks
just to see if he felt real.
“Then you’re going about it all wrong, Snowflake,” he whispered when
he stopped less than a foot away from me, deep into my personal space, and
I couldn’t even find it in me to move back. Just that the sound of his voice
caressed my ears, and I couldn’t look away from his lips that were getting
closer and closer…
I couldn’t stop my mind from going to strange places, either. I wondered
what it would be like to kiss him—those lips looked so soft and juicy. I
wondered what it would be like to feel his body against mine—he just
seemed so strong. The exterior of him was so damn beautiful it was
messing with my mind.
When in the world had I forgotten that he was Elysean and what that
word meant? Because I wanted to kiss him more than I wanted to breathe
right now.
Alarm bells rang in my head. Those strange eyes of his fell on my
parted lips, too, and I could have sworn he could read my desire on my
skin.
“A word of advice? Don’t stand out. Try to keep a low profile,” he said,
and it took all my willpower to step back, to keep my hands by my sides.
What the hell had gotten into me?
“If they’d let me, I would,” I said, closing my eyes for a moment just to
try to gather my thoughts, but when I opened them and found him right
there still, the tips of our noses almost touching, my brain was wiped clean
again.
“They will if you stop talking back,” he said, and his hand was right
next to my cheek, and my stupid body was desperate to feel his touch.
When I found nothing to say for a second, he added: “Exactly like you’re
doing now.”
“Yeah, not gonna happen,” I said, despite my better judgment, and
again, he surprised me when he smiled—like that was exactly what he’d
expected to hear. His hand lowered and I tried not to acknowledge the
disappointment.
“Those kids are some of the worst the Academy has to offer. Do you
have any idea why any of them are even here?” It beat me why he cared,
but I raised my chin, happy to have a half answer, at least.
“They’re being punished.” That’s what Eeda said.
He raised a brow, not exactly surprised, and I could have sworn his eyes
lightened up, turning more silver by the second. I wondered what all the
colors in them were. I wondered if I could count them on my fingers.
Something must have been very wrong with me.
“Trouble is how they live. They’re not afraid of it, which seems to be
your problem, too,” he whispered.
“And what’s yours? Why are you here?” I asked, not even bothering to
pretend I didn’t care at this point. I did—I was desperate to know for
whatever fucked up reason. “I know you’re not a student, so what’s your
excuse? Better yet, why do you care about what they do to me?” Was it
some kind of a scheme? Was he planning something together with the rest
of them and I was too naive to figure it out?
But Shade didn’t answer me at all. Instead, he raised his hand to my
face again like he fucking owned me.
And I wanted to be pissed off. I wanted to send him to hell—who did he
even think he was?!—but then he touched me, and it was like my entire
body was foreign all over again. His hand was warm, soft against my cheek.
My eyes closed before I even realized it, and I was waiting.
God, I was waiting for him to kiss me.
A growl came right out of him, like he was a damn animal. “Look at
me,” he hissed and finally dropped his hand. My eyes snapped open, and I
had no clue what the hell to feel—terrified? Confused? Irritated? No idea,
but I knew for a fact that I shouldn’t have been so damn turned on. And he
made it even worse with those bloodshot eyes stuck to my lips like he
wanted to bite them.
Fuck, we were so close. The smell of him was in my nostrils, stuck in
my brain. The warmth of him was suddenly everything my body craved.
We shouldn’t be this close…
“Focus on the battles you can win. Ignore the rest. Stop pissing people
off,” he told me, his voice darker, heavier somehow.
And he was absolutely right.
I needed to stop talking to Elyseans altogether and focus on the things
that mattered—the trials and getting out of here. I needed to ignore them
and their comments—who cared if they thought their souls were better than
mine? Ignore them all, including this guy who somehow stole my good
senses with his proximity alone.
And that smell. Who even smells like raindrops? How?
I turned around, ready to run to the stairs and disappear, hide under the
damn bed forever, but…
 “And do try not to get wet the next time you see me, Snowflake. I don’t
fuck mortals.”
My entire body froze. I turned around, cheeks on fire, about to deny
everything he thought he knew about me—and why the hell was he calling
me Snowflake?—except the hallway was empty. Shade was gone.
And I was undeniably wet.
“Traitor,” I whispered to my body and made my way up the stairs with
my head down, praying to the universe that I didn’t run into anyone else.
I didn’t.
But when I was close enough to see the door to my room, I also saw that
someone had left me a little gift in front of it, wrapped up in a piece of
paper.
“You’ve got to be shitting me,” I muttered, exhausted already. I
searched the hallway, strained my ears to listen for footsteps, but there was
nobody there.
Had Sketchbook Girl hidden her wasps in there for me? Or had she and
her friends come up with another way to terrorize me?
Goddamn them. Goddamn them to all hells.
It took me a good couple minutes to gather the courage to even get
close. When I made sure that the piece of paper wasn’t moving, I held my
breath and pulled it away to see what hid underneath.
It was a plate with a sandwich full of ham and cheese on it, and two
bananas to the side.
Sitting down on the marble floor, I rested my back against the door and
looked at the food in front of me in awe.
Who in the world had done this? Was it Maia? Was it Grace?
Probably one or the other—who else?
With shaking hands, I grabbed the big sandwich and bit into it—it was
so delicious I almost cried out loud. I ate right there sitting in front of the
door like I was afraid the food might disappear if I moved it, until there was
nothing left.
Eventually, I went into the room, stripped off my clothes and got into
the bed.
Eventually, sleep took me under, but the memory of those grey eyes, the
heat of his skin, the warm breath blowing against my face, refused to fade
away until the very last second.

“Y ’ ,” said Eeda, pushing the cart

toward the stairs, eyes on me while I hid from the world behind the wall.
While I pretended that I wasn’t afraid—that I just wanted to be here, to help
Eeda with her cart, to see a friendly face.
The truth was far uglier than that, though. Simply put, I was a coward.
I’d lingered outside the doors of the Midas Hall and hadn’t gone in for
breakfast—my stomach is full, I thought, I’ll just throw up if I eat.
I’d lingered outside the library doors, too, and hadn’t dared to open
them for fear of the wasps—it won’t matter now, anyway, I thought. Two
hours of reading aren’t going to prepare me for the trial.
So, I’d come to hide here, through the archway and behind the wall so
nobody coming and going could see me.
Because I was a goddamn coward.
“It’s the nerves,” I told Eeda as I went to her. I was glad to see a familiar
—and friendly—face for real. “Just waiting to give you a hand with that.”
“Are you okay, Sera?” she said when I grabbed the cart and helped her
up the stairs—even heavier than the day before, but I was thankful for it. It
was a good distraction.
“I’m fine. Just peachy,” I told her. “How about you? Sleep well?”
 “Like a rock," she said, breathing heavily until we landed on the second
floor with the cart safe and sound. That thing was getting heavier by the
day, and it was always the same blue and white sheets loading it. “So, are
you excited for your first trial as well, or just nervous?”
“Excited, too. Sure,” I lied.
She smiled like she knew I was full of shit. “You’re a kind soul,” she
told me, and I flinched. Kind was not my word of choice. Cowardly on the
other hand…
“May I?” Eeda said, offering me her hands. I immediately put mine over
her palm out of surprise more than anything. She took in a deep breath and
closed her eyes, both hands wrapped around mine. Her skin was so soft and
warm, and I could have sworn her warmth was spreading up my arm, too.
“Just keep your eyes open, dear. And remember to listen to your
instincts,” she whispered, the same thing she told me the day before.
When she looked at me again, she seemed different. Maybe it was just
me, but the colors on her were…lighter somehow, like she was about to
turn fucking transparent.
God, I couldn’t even explain it. I was a damn mess. Must have been the
stress of knowing I was going to die soon.
With one last squeeze of my hand, Eeda let go of me. “I need you back
here to help me with this tomorrow, so try not to die,” she said, laughing.
I joined in—why the hell not? Her warmth had been nice, and I
appreciated the gesture, and the advice. At least if I died today, I’d have that
good memory fresh in my mind before my end.
“I’ll be right here,” I said. Whether she believed me or not, I had no
idea.
But she went on her way and I descended the stairs again, determined to
return to the library to try my luck. Maybe the wasps wouldn’t be there
again. Maybe, if they were, they’d leave me alone today.
 And the moment I stepped out into the hallway, I found Maia coming
along with another one of the candidates, headed for the library. Her smile
fell the same second she saw me. I was going to keep walking, pretend I
hadn’t seen her because I didn’t want to make her uncomfortable, but Maia
raised a hand, then whispered something to her friend.
The girl—Donna from Georgia with the short ash blond hair who was
always playing with the ring on the necklace she wore—continued to the
library, throwing me a dirty look to which I forced the widest grin I could
muster, and Maia slowed down.
“Hey, Sera,” she said, looking behind her at the hallway. “You okay?”
“I’m fine. How are you?” She looked really good. Her nails were done,
her hair was shining, her makeup flawless. Meanwhile I’d snuck out of the
room before Grace had the chance to even see me. At least I was wearing
the leather outfit.
“I’m good. I’m good. Have been reading a lot—there’s a lot of stories
about the gods. So many gods. Donna helped me—her parents are very
religious. They’ve been making her read god stories since she was a girl,”
she said with a strained laugh. Maybe Donna and I had more in common
than I realized, but I didn’t comment. “Anyway, you ready for today?”
“Yes, of course. Born ready,” I lied. “Hey, I found some food outside
my room last night and was wondering if that was you?”
I thought for sure she’d say yes. Instead, she looked surprised as she
shook her head. “No, I didn’t leave you anything. I don't know where your
room is.”
“Oh,” I breathed.
“Did you try the library again?” she asked.
“I was just about to, actually,” I said as a bad feeling settled in my gut.
My full gut thanks to whoever had brought me that food last night.
Fuck, I’d been so sure it was Maia, and now the mystery was already
haunting me.
 Grace. It had to be Grace.
“Okay, then,” Maia said, nodding way too many times. I could have
sworn she was sweating already. “Cool. Let’s get going.”
“Actually, you go ahead. I have something to do real quick, and I’ll be
right there,” I said because I knew she was nervous for having to walk in
there with me.
I understood. I’d have been wary of me, too, if I were her. She needed
the help of the other students more, anyway. The last thing I wanted was her
on my conscience.
“You sure? Because I can wait,” she said, but she was definitely
relieved.
“Yes, I’m sure. Go ahead. I’ll meet you there,” I said and turned around
to leave.
By the time I made it to the end of the hallway, Maia had already
slipped into the library.
And I was most definitely going to die in the first trial.

T of her eyes on me was like a brick wall resting on my

shoulders. I could tell how harshly she was judging every inch of me even
though we were at least fifteen feet apart. Madam Carmine looked flawless
with her dark grey dress that fell all the way to her ankles, her dark hair
smoothed back in thick waves, the big ruby pulsating with light sewn to the
collar of her dress. She analyzed my face, my hair, my leather uniform, my
unpolished nails, my makeup-free face. She was absolutely disgusted by
me, and she didn’t even need words to say it.
We were all standing in front of the Daedalus Dome, the part of the
Palace that had given it its name, which was the dome I’d seen yesterday,
rising about fifty feet over the ground very close to the hill where the
Poseidon tree spilled water to our left. Apparently, all trials would be held
in there, and I couldn’t remember for the life of me if James or Layla had
ever mentioned it before. Frankly, I didn’t really care.
I still couldn’t tell what it was made of, though—maybe plastic or
frozen glass—but it looked smooth and shiny, and nobody could see
anything inside.
Sweat dripped down my forehead. My hands were numb from how
tightly I was fisting them to keep them from shaking. The Iriades were
flying restlessly over our heads, their sapphire eyes reflecting the sunlight
all over the ground every few seconds. I recognized mine, even though they
were all identical. It was just a feeling, something that sort of pulled my
eyes on one of them like a damn magnet. As much as I hated it, I could tell
it apart right away.
It was five minutes to noon, and Angel had brought all fourteen of us to
stand in front of the Dome. The first trial was about to begin.
I looked to my sides through the corners of my eyes, to the boy with the
yellow hair—Ethan, Angel had called him—and the girl to my left with the
long dark curls—Jessica was her name. They were both just as scared as me
as they looked ahead at the Dome, shaking hands fisted so nobody would
see.
Because everybody was there.
About a hundred Elyseans, if not more, were in the courtyard, sitting on
the benches behind the low fences made out of gold that somebody had set
up to separate us from them. There were five different cameras around us,
all operated by Elyseans, and Elliot Embers and Angel were by the doors of
the Dome. To the left, in front of the benches, was a long table behind
which sat the five judges—one of them Madam Carmine, who was still
watching me.
To our other side was a screen so big it made me dizzy to look at it. Big
bold letters filled the middle of it, the slogan of the trials, those damn words
that still made me sick: Do you have what it takes to be a god?
 No—because I was a goddamn human being.
But that wasn’t going to save me from the Dome.
Bile rose in my throat. Every instinct in my body demanded I turn
around and run—my end was waiting for me if I didn’t do something.
Except I knew for a fact that I wouldn’t get farther than a few feet if I tried
to get away. Like Elliot said, they owned me now. Gary had signed those
papers, and the only way out of here was through the stupid trials.
So, I bit my tongue and I reminded myself to mind my thoughts. No
point wondering about what could be waiting for me in there. I tried to see
if Maia was looking my way—she was at the head of the line on my right,
but her eyes were stuck on the screen slightly moving with the slogan, and I
imagined she was trying to keep herself distracted, too.
I searched the crowd again—Madam Carmine wasn’t looking at me
anymore, at least. She was talking to the woman sitting near her at the fancy
cherrywood table of the judges.
The woman wore a green hat and green clothing, her fingers full of
golden rings and emeralds shining under the sunlight. Next to her sat a man
who wore a ruby on his black tie—just the same as the one sewn on Madam
Carmine’s dress. His white suit was impeccable, melting around his
shoulders. The woman next to him wore a tiara with a tear-shaped sapphire
on her head. She was the oldest of the bunch though her hair was dyed a
rich brown. The wrinkles on her face and the look in her pale blue eyes
showed her true age.
But nothing beat the man sitting next to her, wearing a pitch-black suit
with a black shirt and black tie, his black hair sleeked back, and no fancy
gemstone on him that I could see. The way he looked at the Dome, you’d
think he was bored out of his mind and forced to be here, just like me. He
was handsome, his face full of rough edges, his beard starting to get silver
around the corners of his mouth, which made him look even more striking.
He looked like shadows, and it instantly made me wonder about a certain
someone who could make them with his bare hands.
I found him staring right at me the moment I started searching the edges
of the benches where our audience was.
Shade sat at the very edge, half hiding behind the crowd, with at least a
couple feet of space to his side like the man sitting next to him hadn’t dared
to go any closer. Sunlight fell on his pitch-black hair making it shine blue,
and his eyes were just as colorless as I remembered, though his skin looked
less pale in daylight. Those lips much more pink.
A chill rushed down my back. Last night felt like a dream. It couldn’t
have possibly been real, could it? The way he’d looked at me, the way he’d
talked to me, the way I’d been so desperate to kiss him. I’d wanted it with
my whole being—and how dare he assume I was wet for him?
Ugh. Stuck up Elysean prick.
Never mind that I really had been.
And as if he could read all the thoughts in my head again, the corner of
his lips turned up just a bit and he smiled mischievously at me. Asshole.
But that half smile looked damn good on him.
“If I may have your attention, please,” Elliot Embers called, shaking me
to my core, making all the butterflies that had wrongly gathered in my
tummy at the sight of Shade’s face disappear. He had a microphone
strapped to his ear and he smiled as he looked at us. He didn’t wear as much
glitter today, but his silver suit still shimmered in the sunlight, same as
Angel’s backless dress.
“Well, all of you are alive still. That’s something,” Elliot said as he
looked us over, and the crowd laughed. My God, he was a completely
different man from the one in the limo. How incredibly well he hid that side
of him—even the look in his eyes was different. It just made me hate him
more.
 “I’m joking, I’m joking. It’s good to see all of you again. In a minute,
we will be commencing our first trial, but before we do, just a few things
we wanted to go over.” And Elliot turned to the judges and bowed his head
deeply. “It is an honor for all of us to be in your presence, ladies and
gentlemen. Thank you for joining us today.”
I looked at the judges again, nodding their heads politely at Elliot. Who
exactly were they?
I found out in a minute.
“For those of you who don’t know, our judges are the heads of the main
Elysean Houses themselves—Madam Verdelle from House Emerald, Mister
Harkin from House Ruby—” The man with the ruby on his tie nodded,
looking at Elliot like he couldn’t decide whether he liked him or wanted to
murder him on the spot.
“Madam Cyan from House Sapphire,” Elliot continued, waving at the
woman with the tiara on her head, “and Mister Ravenar from House Opal.”
Finally, the man who looked like shadows. He seemed even more bored
than before.
“I’m sure you’ve had the chance to learn more about the importance of
the four Elysean Houses in the couple days since you’ve been at the
Palace,” Elliot said when he turned to us, and to my horror, the other
candidates near me were nodding their heads.
Shit. What the hell? I had no clue about Houses. I mean, I got the
gemstones, and I understood now why most of them wore those colors at all
times, but I had no clue what that even meant.
“The heads of the Houses will be judging your completion of the trials
and they will follow all of you closely in your journey for the next three
weeks. In the end, it is they who will decide your fate, so”—Elliot brought
his hand to the side of his mouth as if he wanted to let us in on a secret—“I
suggest you try to impress them, my dear mortal friends.”
 Lame ass joke but our audience laughed. All of them except Shade, who
sat back and looked passively at everything until his eyes locked on mine
again. Almost like he knew I was watching him.
“You’ve been lucky, I assure you. So, so lucky. These are the brightest
Elysean minds of today, who’ve helped build our cities and our lives with
their own hands, and continue to do it every single day,” Elliot continued, a
hand to his chest as if he were that emotional. God, he was so full of shit.
“So, count it as a blessing to be in their presence, my friends. For it really,
truly is.”
The others nodded, and they were in awe as they looked at the judges.
The ease with which they ignored the bored, downright irritated
expressions on the judges’ faces fascinated me. They could rot in hell for all
I cared. I was not honored to be in their presence, and I most definitely
didn’t count anything Elysean as a blessing.
“And now—the trial,” Elliot said, the loud voice booming from the
speakers making me jump. Angel only stayed there beside him and smiled,
eyes wide and alert, but never uttered a single word. “As you all know, the
trial will take place inside the Daedalus Dome, which has been prepared by
Madam Carmine and her team for all of you today.” The audience
applauded together with him and Angel. Madam Carmine simply nodded,
her expression unreadable. “This one’s easy—the first one always is. For
this trial, you are not allowed anything with you except the clothes on your
body. The Dome will know if you’re trying to sneak anything in, so if any
of you would like to come clean about something while there’s still
time…?” He looked us over for a moment, as if he was hoping we’d come
forward and empty our full pockets.
None of us moved, and Elliot had the audacity to look disappointed
before he continued.
“Very well, then. The first trial is a true test of faith. There are multiple
ways in which you can complete it, but whichever way you choose will
inevitably show us exactly how strong your faith is, what you believe in.
You will show us how much you trust the guidance of our mighty gods.”
Ugh—somebody kill me now. “What you have to do today is very simple,
my dear mortal friends.” The way he smiled at us you’d think he was a
loving father, not a monster wearing a beautiful face and a shimmery suit.
“So, so simple. All you need to pass the first trial is the most precious gift
ever given to mankind—and that’s it!” The audience began to applaud
again.
“That’s it!” Elliot continued. “That’s—wait.” With a hand to his chest,
he turned to the crowd dramatically. “Wait, wait, wait.” He laughed and
Angel joined in, before they both looked at us again. “You will still need to
find your way out, won’t you?”
The audience cheered. Goose bumps rose on my forearms.
The most precious gift to mankind.
Find my way out.
“It’s so unfortunate that neither of us can help you with the trial right
now, but I have faith in all of you, girls and boys. You will make us proud—
you were chosen for a reason, were you not?” Elliot said after a minute,
looking up at the sky, at the Iriades flying in circles over us still, as if they
were waiting to bid us farewell.
“You’ve also had help from the Academy students and from the
incredible staff at the Palace. From Madam Carmine herself.” Again, she
didn’t even bother with a smile. “What a fierce woman she is. You all are
lucky she’s taken you under her wing.”
There it was, that word again—lucky. Lucky, my ass. I hadn’t even seen
Madam Carmine, except that first day at the Midas Hall. She most
definitely hadn’t helped anyone that I knew.
But the more Elliot talked, the more I realized how much I’d managed
to distance myself from everything trial-related. The more I realized just
how badly I’d screwed myself over with my big mouth the past two days.
 The Elysean Houses, which I was apparently supposed to know about,
and which were apparently a very big deal. The judges. The Elysean
students—I was supposed to use them, not run from them. Not turn them
into enemies.
Too late now. Yeah, I had most definitely screwed myself over big time.
“So now I ask you, my mortal friends,” Elliot said, smiling so lovingly
at us it was hard to convince my own self that he was fake. “Do you have
what it takes to be a god?”
Everyone cheered. Everyone clapped. I turned to look at Shade to find
him with his arms crossed in front of his chest, and for some reason that
made me feel a tiny bit better.
But the look in his stormy eyes didn’t change. The message he gave me
from afar was still crystal clear. I was about to go into the first trial severely
unprepared. And there was a very good chance that I would never walk out
of that Dome alive.
 13

Cronus did not fight. Like his father before him, he saw the new gods rising against
him, and he knew his time had come. Like his father before him, he renounced his
powers and fled, never to be seen again on Earth.
Zeus was now Lord of the Universe, but he didn’t want to rule alone; therefore he
shared his power with his brothers and sisters and hoped to live in harmony for all of
eternity.
Alas, the Titans who had been allies of Cronus, and their sons, revolted.

—Book of Creation, 6th Edition, 401

by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

Surreal.
The doors of the Dome opened. Nothing but darkness inside.
People cheered. Cameras everywhere, spinning around us. Elliot said
something to the people watching on screen, and Angel finally spoke, too, I
thought, but I couldn’t be sure. Their voices were suddenly coming from
somewhere far away.
They could have wished us luck as well, but the sound of them was
completely distorted by the time it reached me. I only knew to move
forward when the boy and girl to my sides started walking.
So goddamn strange to be going into that darkness. I could almost hear
it calling my name, and I couldn’t look away for the life of me.
“Erica Germain!”
My eyes blinked as if I just woke up from a deep sleep suddenly. Elliot
was standing on the left of the doors, calling out names of the candidates—
and the girl, Erica, stepped forward and bowed to the judges at Elliot’s side
with a huge smile on her face. She looked absolutely perfect, with half her
long golden brown hair tied up behind her head, her nails a cupcake pink,
the leather of the uniform accentuating her curves perfectly. I didn’t know
anything about her other than her name, and right now that felt like a
tragedy. There was no telling if she’d ever make it out of that place alive.
No telling if I would.
But Erica wasn’t worried in the least. She walked through the doors
with a confidence to be envied, her chin raised and her shoulders straight,
and the darkness swallowed her whole.
“Pablo Alvarez!”
My heart beat steady. My skin was covered in a layer of sweat. My
mind was all but empty as the boy stepped forward. He was the one with
the curly hair and chubby cheeks, and he wore white leathers, too. For the
males, the pants were slightly looser, and the vests longer, covering more of
their chest, but they were the same colors, the same golden buttons, the
same design. Raising a fist to the camera with a forced grin, Pablo
disappeared into the darkness, too, before the minute was over.
“Mark Miller!”
The last boy in line stepped forward, his eyes moving fast to each face
in front of us, both the judges and the audience behind them. He was about
my height but twice as wide. I thought I heard someone say he was great
with numbers, and right now, I was willing to bet anything that he was
counting something in his head to keep himself distracted. Not all of us had
Erica’s confidence. We were doing the best we could not to pass out.
“Look at that—so beautiful when mortals wear the colors of the gods,”
Elliot cooed as Mark bowed to the judges, then rose again—fast, like he
was afraid he might throw up. His face glistened with sweat under the
sunlight. Then he turned and walked into the darkness like a robot.
You’ll make it, Mark, I thought to myself, just because I wasn’t sure if
anybody else was thinking it. Thoughts have power—that’s what Miss
Aldentach always said. I don’t know why I’d always believed that bit, but
not most of the other things she taught me. Probably because everything
else had had something to do with the gods or Elyseans in some way.
Minutes passed, and one by one, Elliot called names and sent candidates
into the Dome.
When there was only Ethan, me, and another girl—Elaine from Ohio—
left in the line, I let go of a shaky breath as if my body already knew.
“Sedorah Sinclair!”
My stomach turned. My body moved forward on its own. A bird
chirped somewhere overhead—possibly the Iriade, but it could have also
been my imagination. If the people cheered, I didn’t hear it. I didn’t turn to
even look at the cameras, or the judges, or Elliot, or even Shade, whose
eyes I could feel on my face even now. I just focused on the darkness and
on putting one foot in front of the other until the sound of the outside world
disappeared completely.
The beating of my heart was the only thing reminding me that I was still
alive. I saw nothing, heard nothing, felt nothing else as I kept going,
terrified of what I might run into, but more terrified to stop moving.
What the hell am I doing here?!
The cold reached me first, settling on my skin, under my clothes, like it
had always belonged there. Not much light, either, but that’s only because it
was nighttime here. The half-moon was in the deep dark sky over me, over
the dead forest ahead, the ground, the trees, all the thin, empty branches half
frozen. The other candidates were already there, looking around, rubbing
their arms, blowing on their hands to try to keep the cold away.
I moved forward, too, eyes wide open and unblinking until I was sure
there was nothing more to see around us but that—the sky, the moon, the
frozen forest.
Behind me, someone stepped through—Ethan. He was a tall guy, over
six foot four and skinny, and his movements seemed so light. He barely
looked at me, eyes wide and perfectly alert, not nearly as terrified as I was
to find myself in this place. He just shot forward as he rubbed his hands,
and I almost asked him to take me with.
Good thing I had the sense to bite my tongue first.
Closing my eyes, I forced myself to take in a deep breath and my lungs
half froze. Steam came out my lips and nostrils with every breath, and then
something moved behind me—Elaine, the last candidate to enter the Dome.
She threw a quick glance my way before she decided I wasn’t worth a
second of her time and rushed forward to the frozen forest, to the others
who were already breaking branches off the trees and trying to light them
up.
The most precious gift ever given to mankind.
Fire. It was fire—Prometheus stole it from Olympus and brought it to
Earth, according to the mythos. According to Miss Aldentach.
And all the other candidates seemed to agree, too. They were all trying
to light a fire, and I needed to do the same.
So goddamn cold. I could hardly feel the tips of my fingers or my feet.
Weren’t all those leathers supposed to keep us warmer than this? My teeth
were chattering, but I forced myself to move, get to the trees, find a branch
and some rocks and make a fire. It was easy—just fire. I could make it, and
then I could get the hell out of here. Survive. It was just fire, never mind
that it was the one thing that scared me worse than Elyseans.
 Just fire, just fire, just fire…
My hands were barely working. Just to reach for the nearest branch on
the first tree of the forest was torture, but I managed. I took a few pieces,
thin twigs with pointy tips that looked dry enough. The ground beneath my
feet was half frozen, too, a thin layer of ice sticking to the dirt here and
there, but there would be thicker pieces of wood if I looked hard enough. It
was the only way I knew to make fire—I’d been to a foster home once, and
the neighbor’s kids, two years my senior, had been obsessed with making
fires in his backyard. He once told me and the other kids in the
neighborhood that all we’d need is the right dry wood and our hands. I’d
never tried, obviously, but I would now. If it meant I was getting out of this
place alive, I’d try to make a stupid fire even if it cost me an arm and a leg.
A scream made me turn my head to see that three of the candidates
deeper into the forest had already made fire, and it burned brightly in the
dark at the tips of the branches in their hands.
Then a fourth came closer with a thick branch of his own, and he lit up
the fire like it was the easiest thing in the world to do—a match.
They had a damn match, and the piece of wood caught fire instantly.
How in the world had they gotten that thing through the doors? Didn’t
Elliot say the Dome would know if we took something with?
The next second, the boy was tackled to the ground by another.
More screams. My heart skipped a long beat—where the hell was Maia?
I couldn’t see her anywhere. But the boys were wrestling not twenty feet
away, and the others refused to help while they grabbed each other by the
throats, one trying to take the match from the other’s hand.
If I’d had any energy to scream, I’d have told them to stop it and just
give everyone the stupid match so we could get the fuck out of here.
Except before the minute was over, the fire died out.
Everyone stopped moving—even the boys who were wrestling.
What the fuck did you do?
 What did you do?!
Give me that match—it’s mine!
They sounded exactly as freaked out as I felt as they tried to light up the
branches again.
But the flames didn’t stick.
Screams of frustration from the three boys and one girl—I couldn’t care
less to see their faces and know which ones they were. Their match wasn’t
working, the fire wasn’t sticking to the wood—and I needed to get moving.
Turning back to the ground, I groaned when I squatted, my knees about
to break in half from the cold. I was shaking so badly, it was a miracle I
managed to grab a thick square piece of broken wood with an almost flat
surface. It would have to do because my options were very limited. I
kneeled on the ground and the cold of it seemed to penetrate through my
skin and flesh, settling right into my bones. So cold.
More screams behind me. I didn’t turn yet, just grabbed the sharpest
twig I had between my palms and began to spin the tip against the square
piece of wood in front of me.
It didn’t work. I knew it wouldn’t—it was too cold, and my arms
couldn’t move fast enough to create the necessary friction for the fire to
spark to life. And I cursed myself in my head a thousand times that I didn’t
learn more ways to make fire, that I didn’t grab a match from somewhere
and put it in my pocket like those kids had, that I couldn’t get my hands to
spin that fucking twig fast enough to give me a spark. Just one single spark.
But there had to be another way.
I refused to sit here and freeze to death—there had to be another way to
get to fire through this forest, and I was going to find it.
Dropping the twigs, I pushed myself up to my feet with all my strength.
God, my limbs felt like they were seconds away from breaking off me. The
cold that coated my skin burned me, and the leathers weren’t helping at all.
Even my sneakers felt like they were full of ice.
 I kept going.
Voices all around me, cries and cheers. Two fires that I could see,
rushing forward as if whoever carried them on their sticks was running. The
deeper into the forest I went, the denser the trees, the sharper their branches.
I felt like Snow White trapped in the woods, except these trees were really
looking to cut me wide open, and the proof was the cuts on my arms that I
hardly felt because of the cold.
So, so cold…
Eventually, I couldn’t see well enough to even make out the fire or the
students running ahead that I’d hoped would guide me to a warmer part of
the woods. I hoped Maia made it. I hoped she was with those kids, that
they’d share the fire, that they’d make it out.
I hoped I made it out, too. Somehow, I still clung to that foolish hope,
even though I could see that it was useless. I still hoped.
Footsteps behind me.
“Move, godless bitch!”
Something hard slammed onto my shoulder and knocked me to the
ground before I could even make out the guy who’d come from behind me.
All I could see was that darkness—he didn’t have fire, either, but he could
move. He could run past me; he wasn’t freezing to death slowly.
And I was already on the ground. The ice-cold ground that could have
been made out of steel.
Get up! my instincts shouted, but my body refused to move. My limbs
were so damn heavy. All I managed to do was roll on my back, look up at
the skinny branches over me, the half-moon in the sky that looked so real.
But it couldn’t be, could it? It was daylight outside—we were in the
Dome. This wasn’t real. It was just a game. Trials to entertain fucking
Elyseans.
And now I was dying, just like I knew I would before I set foot in this
place.
 The Elyseans and their gods must have been mightily entertained to
watch the life freeze in me little by little as I struggled to breathe.
Someone ran not too far away from me. I hoped with all my heart that
they made it out of this place.
And wasn’t it sad? So sad that it was cold that killed me now, when I’d
almost died of fire that first time. The irony wasn’t lost on me.
Then my eyes closed.

M . The nightmares were always more vivid

than the good dreams. Those always slipped from my fingers. Maybe
because the good dreams were only that—dreams.
But the nightmares were rooted deeply into my reality. That’s why I saw
Miss Aldentach’s face so clearly, even though I knew I was dreaming.
I knew I was dying.
And she was there still, even in my last moments. Whichever god’s
cruelty was responsible for it, I would never forgive it.
Not that it mattered, anyway.
She smiled that smile that wasn’t meant to show good emotion. It was
meant to induce fear, to terrify me so much that I wouldn’t catch a break
from it even in my sleep. Four years later, I was still just that little girl I’d
been when she’d educated me. Four years later, I was just that little girl
striving for her approval, blaming myself when she wasn’t happy.
And she still spoke to me.
You were born godless, child. But I will make sure you don’t die one.
I wasn’t there anymore, hadn’t been since Gary had showed up to claim
me. Much to her horror, too, because she still hadn’t converted me as
properly as she’d hoped, she said, because I still asked questions. Meaning
she still hadn’t broken me all the way because I still had doubts about her
ridiculous stories about gods and glory that existed only in fiction.
You were born godless, child, and the gods still showed you mercy when
they brought you to me.
The gods were nothing but cruel bastards for letting you live, was what
I should have said.
But were they, though? Because every other kid at the orphanage with
me had loved Miss Aldentach. She was their whole world. She told them
stories, let them draw their gods, gave them gifts when they behaved. Let
them eat as much as they liked when they learned lessons and didn’t ask
questions.
Not me, though. I never got cake even in the last year when I finally
learned to keep my mouth shut. I never got candy.
But I never really had much of a sweet tooth anyway, so it didn’t even
matter. I got to leave—that was the most important thing. I got to leave,
only to end up in the clutches of the wicked gods and their psycho
descendants all over again.
The Fates, if they existed, were truly evil bitches.
Screams sounded from somewhere far away. At first, I couldn’t tell if
they were my screams from the days I’d been locked up in the punishment
room at the orphanage or if they belonged to someone else. Miss Aldentach
stayed with me, telling me that I was born godless, smiling at me like she
meant to cut me to a million little pieces, but the screams still came
through. I eagerly focused on them, tried to figure out where they were
coming from—anything at all but to have to look at that face. Those
wrinkles and those eyes, so dark they looked black, that silver hair she kept
in a braid, then wrapped it into a bun. That blue dress with white stripes that
made me dizzy to look at.
Anything other than her.
 The screams grew louder and louder the farther away from Miss
Aldentach I got.
My eyes snapped open, and I breathed in, the cold air almost freezing
my lungs completely.
I was still alive.

S D .
I blinked and the half-moon came into view, so pale it had almost
completely faded into the dark sky. No stars in sight, just the branches that
stretched like clawed fingers from the tree, reaching out for one another.
The forest was freezing, and I would be freezing with it soon.
People were shouting not too far away from me. I could hear their
voices but I couldn’t tell what they were saying—just that they were real.
They were here and Miss Aldentach was not.
It was all the encouragement I needed to force myself to move.
I sat up barely, holding onto a tree trunk for support. I looked to the
sides, blinked the blur away until I could make out a group of three lighting
up a match over and over again, but the sticks in their hands refused to hold
the fire. Where were the others? I couldn’t see anybody else.
And what were the odds that those candidates would let me near that
match, just so the small flames could warm me up a bit? Just one tiny bit?
Maybe my sticks would hold that fire, and if they did, I’d give it to them, no
problem. It wouldn’t hurt to try, would it?
I’m dying, I wanted to tell them, but no voice came out of me. That’s
because I knew it would be useless.
My heart felt like it was barely beating, but the rhythm of it was as fast
as ever. As steady.
Which confused me.
Am I dying?
 I was, but…
The heartbeat I felt against my hand wasn’t mine.
The hair on the back of my neck would have stood at attention if it
wasn’t frozen in place. I looked up at the tree I’d held onto for support.
There, on the bark where I’d pressed my hand, beat a heart—fast and
steady, just as it should.
I was confused at first, like even the thoughts in my head had frozen. So
confused that my first guess was that I’d lost my mind—a tree with a
heartbeat. How absurd.
Except it wasn’t. Not if something lived in it.
Someone.
My eyes closed, and I could have sworn Eeda was right in front of me,
the memory of the warmth of her hands almost melting the ice holding me
prisoner here. Her words whispered in my ear, too—keep your eyes open,
she’d said. So, I opened them, and I forced myself to be alert, to focus.
I searched every inch of the tree, trying to reach out my other hand to
touch it, but I could only move so much. And there, near the ground, near
its roots, I could barely make out the shape of a face, the face of a man with
horns coming out of his forehead.
My body let go, and I fell against the tree on my side, cheek pressed to
the ice-cold bark. My skin broke and I felt my blood, cold, sliding down to
my jaw, but I couldn’t even move my hand to wipe it.
Pan, god of the wild. Half man, half goat. A satyr. A god so ugly that
the nymphs ran from him.
I remembered the stories. I remembered the games we played with the
other kids at the orphanage—whoever drew the short straw had to be Pan,
while the rest of us would be nymphs, and it was their job to catch as many
of us as possible. I’d liked those games. It had been the only time when I
hadn’t felt like a complete alien in that place. The books we’d read had had
pictures in them, too, and that was his face, wasn’t it? The big nose and the
horns—it was Pan’s face on the bark of this tree. I could have sworn it was.
I could have sworn a heart beat inside the tree that had already taken my
blood.
The heart of a nymph.
No wonder that fire didn’t stick to those branches they were trying to
light up with matches.
Even the woodchopper shall ask permission from the nymph before
touching her tree, was what Miss Aldentach said.
I hadn’t believed her then. I chose to believe her now. After all, I’d
witnessed a man playing with darkness like it was nothing. My life was
already as absurd as it was going to get.
“P-P-Please,” I thought I said, but my teeth chattered so much I could
barely make out the words. Squeezing my eyes shut, I tried again. “P-P-
Please, may I have your wood for some f-f-fire?”
How silly of me to assume that an actual nymph existed inside this tree.
How absurd to think it would save me—me!—the godless child.
But I was already making my peace with death. I could even see the
light at the end of the tunnel. It burned bright, like a little sun, right in front
of me. It filled me with warmth, too, and it slowly coaxed my eyes to open.
I was still freezing, but I realized that my face was heated up, my
cheeks flushed. And I was so out of it that it took me a couple seconds to
realize it wasn’t the sun shining in front of me at all. It was fire, a big flame
dancing at the tip of a branch no thicker than my forearm, oranges and reds
and yellows merging so beautifully together like they wanted to seduce me.
They did.
I reached out my hand and wrapped it around the branch that had
extended all the way to me from the tree. The moment my fingers wrapped
around it, it snapped. It broke. It gave itself to me.
And the fire burning at the tip of it melted the ice on my skin and bones
within seconds.
 Air slipped down my throat and my lungs no longer threaten to collapse.
I pushed myself to my feet and my knees didn’t shake. I was standing and I
was breathing, and the cold of the woods no longer reached me at all. My
breath still fogged up, but the cold never made it to my skin.
And the flame on the branch kept on burning.
Impossible not to be in awe. I turned to the tree again, pressing my hand
to the trunk. “Thank you,” I whispered, and I meant it with all my heart. I
hoped it knew that it had saved my life. I hoped it knew that I would never
forget it.
Then, I took off running.
 14

The Titans, Gaea’s firstborns, refused to be ruled by the new gods—except Prometheus
and his brother, who could see the future and knew Zeus would win.
But before the new gods could claim victory, they had to go to battle first. Zeus
freed his hundred-armed monstrous brothers from Tartarus, as well as the Cyclopses,
the great smiths, who forged the mightiest weapons of all for him, Hades, and
Poseidon.
Thus, the First War of Gods began.

—Book of Creation, 6th Edition, 429

by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

I ran as fast as I could.

The ground no longer seemed so cold, the trees no longer as dark and as
lifeless. The deeper into the empty forest I went, the livelier they looked,
until I even found a few leaves on a few branches, and I began to sweat
from the heat. The leathers of my uniform were suddenly incredibly thick.
Or maybe it was because the air was no longer freezing around me. I
was almost at the edge of the forest, and I could hear water somewhere
close by, and the ground was soft, the air warm.
 I had no use for the fire anymore, so I threw it to the ground and was
going to put it out with my sneaker, but I didn’t need to. The moment it hit
the dirt, the fire disappeared like it had never been there in the first place.
Time to get the hell out of here.
The water must have been from the canal around the Palace. At least
that seemed like the logical thing, and I was still too stunned by what had
happened, by the fact that I was alive and that nymphs might be real and I
was going to survive the first trial after all that I didn’t stop to think.
I didn’t stop to look around until I was by the last tree line, and I saw
where the sound of the water was coming from—a river, not the canal
around the Palace.
A narrow, shallow-looking river with crystal clear water and yellow
rocks on its bed was coursing not five feet away from the trees, and across
from it, there were more trees—these different, bigger, so green you
couldn’t even make out the branches. Two completely different worlds on
either sides of the river that slithered and went deep into the dark on both
sides where the moonlight didn’t reach.
“What the hell?” I whispered to the night, just as something touched my
foot.
I jumped back so fast and screamed until my throat was raw—a snake
hissed at me, and another three were close to him, too, watching the water
but keeping away, as if they were afraid of the river.
“Get the fuck away from me!” I shouted, searching around me again to
make sure there weren't more of them coming from the other side.
They weren’t big by any means, but they were snakes, and they had
grayish scales and beady eyes and I just wanted them to be as far away from
me as possible.
“Stay away!” I told them, when something moved behind me in the tree
line, and my heart about leaped right out of my chest.
 It was a candidate—Jessica from Alabama, who was so shy she blushed
even more than Maia, and the moment she saw me, she stopped dead in her
tracks. Her dark hair was no longer shiny and smooth, and her uniform was
as dirty as mine, but there was no blood on her that I could see. Her mouth
opened and closed a few times like she wanted to say something, but then
she saw the snakes and fell back a step and looked behind her at the woods
again.
“Hey, have—” you seen Maia, I was going to say, but then someone else
came through the tree line—Nick, the skinny boy from New York City,
whom I’d heard the other girls say had fought in cages all throughout high
school. I was tempted to believe it, judging by the many scars crisscrossing
his handsome face, but those could have been just rumors.
He wasn’t surprised to find Jessica there, but one look at me and he
grinned. Had it been him who’d pushed me back in the frozen forest and
almost killed me?
I didn’t dare ask. I only watched as he jumped inside the river without a
second thought—it was only knee deep—then ran to the other side. Jessica
followed, her eyes on the snakes, and they both disappeared behind the
trees before two minutes were over.
Were they working together? Others had back in the frozen forest with
that match. Was I the only one on my own?
Doesn’t matter, I said to myself. Maia would be fine. Everybody would
be fine—and I needed to get the hell out of here asap. I jumped into the
river right away, too—the snakes seemed to stay away from the water
moving fast on the riverbed like it was in a rush. They remained on dry
land, hissing at me, while I went to the other side. The water was cold, but
not half as cold as the frozen forest had been, and it reached just above my
knees. I crossed it in less than a minute and felt a million times better on the
other side.
 The trees in this forest were so full of life, full of wonderful scents, with
fresh grass on the ground, wildflowers blooming everywhere. I could still
somehow see, even though barely any sliver of moonlight pierced through
the canopy.
Nick and Jessica were long gone, and there were no other candidates
screaming or running or fighting nearby, at least not yet. But they would be
close because the way out of this trial would be through this forest—where
else could I possibly go? I’d found fire—the nymph had given it to me
herself. I was here, same as Nick and Jessica, and I was walking, searching
for the exit doors of the Dome. The finish line should be close. Very, very
close.
Except it wasn’t.
I had no sense of time, but if I were to guess, I walked through the
forest for at least a couple of hours.
Nothing ever changed. The trees were the same, and the grass, and the
flowers—almost like I was going in circles, even though I kept moving
straight ahead.
I stopped and breathed, looking around me, trying to find something to
identify this place, just in case I came around here again. I found a tree with
branches shaped almost like a heart—the strangest tree I’d ever seen. I
memorized it as best as I could before I started walking again.
So tired. My limbs were heavy, my muscles screaming. Sweat dripped
down my hairline, soaking my shirt and sticking it to my back. I unbuttoned
the leather vest, but it didn’t help much. I breathed like I’d been racing—
and it wasn’t long before I saw it again.
The strange tree with the heart-shaped branches was right by my side,
the same way it had been not an hour ago.
I was most definitely walking in circles.
“Goddamn it,” I muttered to myself and sat on the grass to calm my
racing heart.
 It was fine. I wasn’t freezing. I wasn’t dying…at least not yet. But my
stomach had already started growling with hunger, and where in the world
was I going to find the exit to this place? How was it possible that I was
moving in circles, when I kept going straight ahead?
“Hello!” I shouted at the forest, hoping Nick or Jessica or any other
candidate was there with me. Hoping that Maia was close by, and we could
figure this out together.
Nobody answered.
“A little help here would be nice,” I said to the tree I was resting
against, even though I couldn’t feel a heartbeat inside it when I touched it.
No nymphs. No sign of Pan’s ugly face on the bark, either.
I was all alone.
Until the grass moved to my side and I all but passed out.
This time, I was too stunned to even scream as the snake passed by me,
slithering his merry way between the thick grass blades, never even looking
my way. It didn’t hiss, didn’t seem hostile, didn’t attack me—just slithered
by.
And it wasn’t the only one.
More snakes were around that I hadn’t even noticed. They were moving
calmly through the grass. Their scales were dark grey and brown, almost
identical to the soil, so it would have been impossible to make them out
while I walked.
“Excuse me,” I said, just in case they had nymphs inside them, too.
Who else was I going to fucking ask for directions? “Excuse me—you
there! Snake!”
The grey snake that had passed by me stopped and turned its head to
me, its yellow eyes seeing right into my soul. It stood so unnaturally still it
was hard not to start running already, but I resisted.
“Yes, you. Hi. I was just wondering if you could maybe point me in the
right direction to get outside of this place?”
 I was talking to a goddamn snake. Great.
And even it knew how absurd I was being. Maybe it even rolled its eyes
at me before it hissed once, its thin tongue slipping out, then continued to
slither away from me, unbothered.
I could have laughed.
I escaped a freezing forest, begged a tree to give me fire—and it did!—
only to die among pretty flowers and trees and snakes?
What a fucking joke. “Very creative!” I shouted at the sky I couldn’t
even see properly, only a tiny bit of it. It was enough to reveal the stars
twinkling in it now, though. The moon wasn’t alone in this part of the
Dome, it seemed. It had company.
I had company, too—the damn snakes.
Think, think, think, I urged myself, closing my eyes and resting against
the tree again. The gods loved snakes for plenty of reasons I didn’t much
care about—they were snakes. But they were also the only living thing
around me right now. Even after I called out another three times at the top
of my lungs, nobody answered me. Nobody was there except me.
And them.
So, I racked my brain for anything I knew about snakes and the gods—I
knew plenty, it turns out. One in particular, the story of Melampus, some
guy who helped a snake once, came to my mind. I wasn’t exactly sure on
the details anymore, but he helped that snake, and then he somehow grew
wise beyond belief. So wise he became a famous healer and eventually
married a princess and got his own kingdom—or something like that.
I didn’t need to be wise enough to get myself a kingdom, just wise
enough to get the fuck out of this forest alive.
With a sigh—and all out of other options—I stood up from the ground.
“Here goes nothing,” I muttered, already regretting with my whole heart
what I was about to do.
 But what other choice did I have? If there were nymphs in that frozen
forest, who was to say that everything else I knew about the gods wasn’t
true here, too? This snake story was all I had right now. Maybe it was the
easiest way to getting me out of here fast, so I took it. It was going to be in
my nightmares for the rest of eternity, probably, but I would get out of here.
Out. Nothing beat that.
Going back in the forest was easy—I reached the river I’d passed hours
ago within minutes. Which just showed me how stupid I’d been, walking
the same way over and over without even realizing it. The trees were so
similar to one another that I hadn’t noticed a thing.
On the other side of the river, the frozen forest lay unusually still, and
the four snakes I’d encountered when I came through the first time were
still there, too. They were still distressed, hissing at the water, not daring to
get in, possibly because the river was flowing so fast.
And God help me, I was about to carry them to this side of my own free
will.
I was shaking from head to toe when I got back into the river, the water
soaking my pants and sneakers again when they’d just dried. I made it to
the other side in no time, and the snakes watched me, hissed at me, moved
farther away.
“This better work,” I said to myself, before I squatted down and forced
myself to speak to them. “I can, erm…I can get you on the other side if you
want. I can carry you to the pretty forest. You won’t have to touch the water
at all.”
The snakes stopped hissing.
I could have sworn that they gave each other a knowing look, before all
four of them slithered toward me at the same time.
Holy shit, it actually worked.
And holy shit I was about to touch these snakes, carry them on my body
all the way to the other side.
 Don’t throw up, don’t throw up, don’t throw up…
Reaching out my hands toward the ground, I tried to keep them from
shaking but my body didn’t listen. The snakes didn’t mind, though. They
slithered onto my open palms, and I all but passed out.
Gritting my teeth and closing my eyes, I tried not to notice how their
scales felt against my skin—rough and dry and so, so gross—but I was not
going to throw up. The way they wrapped their bodies around my wrists,
then continued up to my arms and shoulders, it was a miracle I wasn’t
running yet. A goddamn miracle that I wasn’t thrashing and trying to get
them off me.
When I stood up, two had their heads on my shoulders, while the other
two had wrapped their bodies around my forearms and their heads rested
over my knuckles.
Keeping my head up, I opened my eyes, determined not to look down at
them for a single second. Then I took in a deep breath to try to stop my
body from shaking. Didn’t work, but it was almost done. Almost over. All I
had to do was cross the small river again and I would be free.
Almost done.
With my eyes to the sky, I went into the water, almost slipping on the
rocks of the riverbed. I don’t know how I made it all the way to the other
side, but I kneeled on the ground and the snakes moved off me eagerly.
Before two minutes were over, I was snake-free, but the imprints of their
bodies all over my arms would remain with me forever.
“Hey, wait!” I said, when I found the four snakes—no longer hissing in
complaint—already on their way toward the tall grass and the trees. I
followed them, went around them and stepped in front of them while
moving backward deeper into the forest.
“Hold on a minute—I helped you! I got you over the river. You have to
tell me how to get out of this place. Can you do that? Just tell me how to get
out, please!”
 The snakes suddenly stopped coming. I stopped walking, too.
“Please, okay? I don’t know who else to ask—there’s nobody here.”
The way their yellow eyes analyzed me made me feel all kinds of weird,
but this was my best chance, so I didn’t let myself think at all.
“Well? Aren’t you going to just point me in the right direction? East?
West—where do I go?” The snakes continued to stare at me, and my
anxiety was already through the roof. “C’mon—just please point me
somewhere. Anywhere. I have to get out of this place. I have to!”
Could they even tell how desperate I was? Did they care?
Before I could ask them that, too, something moved behind me. I turned
to see what it was—too late.
The next second, they were everywhere.
Snakes on my legs, climbing up my body, wrapping themselves around
my thighs and hips and waist, moving farther up to my neck. I screamed, I
jumped, I slammed against trees to try to get them off me—what the hell
were they doing?!—but they didn’t let go. So many of them. There must
have been at least fifty, and eventually they wrapped around my ankles, and
I fell to the ground on my back, unable to move.
Screaming bloody murder, about to be eaten by goddamn snakes.
They were everywhere on me, their bodies like ropes holding me down,
holding my arms against the ground and my legs together, holding my head
down by the neck, too.
I had never been more scared in my life. God, I couldn’t breathe. I
couldn’t move. I couldn’t think.
And then I felt the wetness in my ear.
I must have passed out at some point, possibly when I realized that
those snakes were sticking their tongues in my ears, licking me. When I
came to, the panic was equally intense, though, but I was somehow still
alive.
 Not only that, but the snakes weren’t holding me as tightly anymore,
and they were moving away. They were getting off me.
They weren’t going to eat me, at least not right away. That was all I
needed to know.
I jumped to my feet and started running without really seeing anything.
Adrenaline pumped the blood in my veins and I ran without looking where I
was going, shoulders slamming into trees, falling to the ground and getting
back up again faster than I could even blink. Bile rose in my throat and
there was barely enough air to breathe, but it was okay. I’d keep going like
this for years if it meant I’d never have to feel those snakes on me again or
their tongues in my ear.
But they’d been there already, and now I constantly felt like they were
still moving all over me.
My foot slipped, the other caught in a root of a tree, and I slammed onto
the ground face first, so hard it was impossible to get back up right away.
My ribs felt broken, my lungs desperate for air and I couldn’t breathe until I
pushed myself to lie on my back.
No snakes. There were no snakes on my body. I was safe. They hadn’t
eaten me.
“Breathe,” I told myself, and I did. I just looked up at the few stars I
could see through the thick canopy, and I breathed. Every inch of me was
shaking from the fear and panic, but I was alive. That’s what I had to focus
on—alive.
But then…
“Hold on, I got it.”
Every inch of my body froze.
“There ya go. Good as new.”
Holding my breath, I turned my head to the side slowly to see where the
voice was coming from—something next to my ear, right there on the
ground.
 At first, I saw nothing but dirt and grass.
But then something moved, something tiny. An ant—and it had another
few friends close by, too.
Alarms rang in my head as things clicked into place, and my mind was
flooded with memories once more—of Miss Aldentach and her teachings,
of fucking Melampus and his snakes, the details of his stupid story. How the
snakes he’d saved had licked his ears and cleaned them so thoroughly that
he was able to understand animals speaking to him since.
“Goddamn it, Sera,” I hissed at myself. How had I not remembered that
part of the story? I would have never gone near those damn snakes if I did.
Not ever, not for any reason would I have willingly let them lick my fucking
ears!
“Keep moving. We have a ways to go,” said the first voice—coming
from an ant.
An actual ant that I could barely even make out on the ground.
It was talking and I could understand it.
Tears in my eyes.
“Excuse me,” I whispered breathlessly, and the ants all stopped and
turned to me. The tears slipped down my cheeks and my voice shook, but I
spoke anyway. “Can you please tell me the way out of this forest?”
The ant closest to me stood up straighter and sort of rubbed its chest,
like one would smooth out wrinkles on their shirt.
I cried harder.
“Are you talking to me?” it said, and I could have been seeing things,
but it was pointing at its little chest now, too.
I nodded, something like a cross between a laugh and a cry slipping out
of me. “Yes, sir. Yes, I am.”
“Oh,” said the ant. “Sure, kid. Just follow the bull. It’ll get you out.”
Bull? “What bull?”
But the ant and its friends were already walking away.
 “Hey, wait—what bull?!” I called after them—and yes, I was aware that
I was talking to ants, but this time, at least, they’d talked back. I’d heard
them. They’d talked back.
But they were so tiny that they disappeared behind the thick blades of
grass right away, and I no longer even saw them.
“Just wait a minute,” I whispered to myself, then fell against the ground
once more, exhausted. Sure that I’d already lost my mind. Considering
maybe I had died, that I was food for snakes in their bellies, and this was
just some sort of a weird afterlife illusion or something.
The laughter that burst out of me was more like a scream. Follow the
bull—which bull? There was no bull around here—I would have noticed a
big ass animal in the forest. Hell, I’d been searching for any other living
being, and all I’d found were those damn snakes!
Unless…
The stars kept on shining in the dark sky, winking at me.
Had that ant meant an actual bull or just any bull—like one made of
stars? Like a constellation in the sky—a specific one called Taurus that had
been drawn in my introduction poster right next to my name, because it was
also my Zodiac sign?
I barely breathed as I stood up and climbed a tree all the way to the top,
high enough so that I could see the dark sky without the leaves and the
branches in the way.
And sure enough, the constellation was right there, as clear as the half-
moon shining to its side, the stars shaped like a V with legs, and the two
bigger ones that would be the bull’s horns. They were pointing east.
I jumped off the branches and almost broke my damn ankle in the
process, but I didn’t care.
Follow the bull. Follow the bull. All I have to do is follow the bull.
So, I followed the damn bull and ran east as fast as my body allowed.
 Less than a minute later, the trees began to get fewer and farther
between. I could see the sky just fine, and the constellation. I kept my eyes
on the two stars that led my way, and I just kept going and going and
going…
My body slammed onto something cold and hard, like glass, and I
pushed against it until it gave.
Blinding bright light exploded in front of me. The air changed, and the
sound of people talking and cheering and clapping filled my head.
Out.
I could barely make out the blue sky before my legs gave up on me, and
I hit the ground on my knees. Elliot Ember’s voice came through the
speakers, and though I couldn’t understand a word he said, I recognized
him.
I was out.
I’d made it.
The trial was already over.
 15

“Mistakes are not your friend, but pay close attention for they shall be your greatest
helper."

—Metis the Wise, 398

by Elh Pordier, House Ruby

Every inch of me was shaking still, but I stood with my head up and faced
the judges as they analyzed me. Analyzed us.
Every mortal who’d been in the Dome had found their way out—two
others had been behind me. Nobody had died. Nobody had been stuck.
They’d all made it.
We’d all made it.
And I still couldn’t quite believe that I was alive.
“Marie, please come forth,” said Elliot to one of the girls standing in
line with the rest of us.
She stepped forward, shirt torn and arm bloody, and she was shaking
just as badly as me. Still, she bowed her head to the judges as if they were
damn royalty.
 “You did quite well in there,” Elliot said. “We will have the whole week
to go through the details, but I have to say, what you did with the worms
was quite something. I think it’s safe to say your sacrifice was accepted—
you’re here and you’re standing, one of the first to have made it out.” And
he began to applaud, so the audience joined in.
The audience that had been watching us for…how long had I been in
there exactly? It was still daylight, but the sun was well on the way to
setting, so I couldn’t be sure. I just knew that I was starving. I was weak.
My limbs hurt and my eyes hurt and my everything hurt.
I tried to keep it in, though, especially when I searched the crowd
without really meaning to, and my eyes found his face—Shade, the asshole
that commanded darkness with his bare hands. He didn’t smile. He didn’t
nod. He gave no expression whatsoever, only kept his eyes on me, never
looking away for a second.
“Sedorah, your turn.”
My head whipped to the side, to Elliot smiling at me, waving his hand
for me to step forward. The girl, Marie, was already back in line with the
others.
Holding my breath and gritting my teeth, I took a single step and looked
at the judges, at Madam Carmine who watched me like she really was the
lioness my instincts believed her to be.
“Snakes,” Elliot started. “Melampus—what a story, eh?” And he turned
to the audience once more as they whispered among one another. “I
remember the first time I heard it as a boy—I was so inspired. Not a very
famous story, though, which makes me curious to know where you’ve heard
it as well, our dearest Sedorah.”
His eyes locked on mine. I didn’t move a single inch.
“Well, won’t you tell us? When was the first time you heard the story of
Melampus?”
 When I was eleven and Miss Aldentach forced me to sit there and read
for hours at a time while she waited with me near the desk, with her stick on
her lap for my hands and legs in case I couldn’t answer her questions after.
But if I could, I got to eat dinner before bed. I always learned the stories,
but I rarely got dinner, though, because I had questions to ask. Always those
questions that she hated so much…
I pressed my lips, held Elliot’s eyes, and said nothing.
He smiled uncomfortably—it was a bigger win than completing the
damn trial. “Very well,” he said, and cleared his throat. “Not much of a
talker, Sedorah, but it’s okay. The trial was supposed to show us your faith
in the gods, my dearest friend, and we’d hoped to see more of that. More
trust in our gods, who are the reason you’re here today, right? If you did,
I’m sure you wouldn’t have had to be licked by snakes.” The crowd
applauded for a moment. I bit my tongue until I tasted blood, but at least
Elliot was no longer expecting me to say anything.
“Could have been a bit more entertaining, I’ll admit. There was plenty
of crying and screaming, which we thoroughly enjoyed,” he continued, and
the people laughed. They all laughed, except for Shade. I almost raised my
middle fingers to show them just how much I cared about their opinion.
“And the blood bargain you made with the nymph—such a precious gift
you gave it. Blood is your lifeline, you shouldn’t give it away so freely,
should you? The gods have taught us that time and again.”
I wanted to tell him that I hadn’t given my blood away to the nymph—it
was a damn accident—but I kept my mouth shut anyway. Let them say
whatever they wanted—it wasn’t going to change the fact that I got out of
that Dome.
“All in all, you’re alive, so that should count. In the meantime, try not to
get too close to anyone until you’ve bathed. I hear snake saliva smells
awful,” Elliot continued, with a ha-ha-ha! at the end like he wanted to
convince me that he was joking.
 “I actually like it much better than whatever cologne you’re wearing, so
I’ll keep away from showers for a while, ha-ha-ha,” I said, when I knew
very well that now of all times I should have kept my tongue between my
teeth. But I just couldn’t stop myself.
The audience laughed again, and he did, too, but I knew those eyes. I
knew the way he watched me—he wanted to kill me dead right there on the
spot. If only he dared to step a toe out of line in front of everyone…
I smiled at him. Fuck you, asshole.
“Now, the judges!” Elliot said, turning to the judges who watched me
curiously. “House Ruby, how neat.” The man wearing the white suit—
Mister Harkin—had put a small red gemstone at the edge of the table.
That’s right—we were collecting gemstones now, it seemed. The more
of them the judges gave us, the better off we’d been at the trials.
I waited, heart in my throat, and the old woman, Madam Cyan, finally
reached out and put a small sapphire at the edge of the table, too.
“And Madam Cyan—how very generous of you,” said Elliot, about to
melt into a pile of goo at their feet. “House Ruby and House Sapphire are
on your side for now, Sedorah. Fingers crossed you know how to keep them
there.” And he crossed his fingers at me.
God, the way I’d have loved to see the look on his face if I flipped him
off right now. If I’d only had the energy to handle the aftermath.
The truth was that I didn’t, so I nodded my head and I stepped back into
the line, eyes ahead on the audience. On Shade.
Did he not get tired of watching me? Because he still hadn’t moved an
inch from his place as he looked at me. I almost flipped him off, too, just to
spite him.
It took another half an hour for the judges to give their precious stones
to all the candidates. Most got three or four, and only me and Jessica—
who’d apparently relied completely on someone else to complete the trial—
got two.
 But two was better than nothing. Two meant I’d gone through the first
trial. It didn’t matter that I’d showed them the opposite of what they’d
wanted to see, that I had no faith in their gods and I’d never turn to them for
help ever, not for any reason (I would literally trust a snake first). What
mattered was that I’d survived.
Apparently, we would be keeping those gemstones, too. They would be
sent to our rooms tonight, and we could do with them as we pleased. Elliot
advised us to keep them for now, with that sneaky smile that he had on
whenever he wanted to tell us that he knew secrets we didn’t. It didn’t
matter, though. Those gems would cost a lot in the real world, so I would
definitely keep them until I got out.
When they finally dismissed us and let us go back inside the Palace, I
waited to the side until I saw Maia—cheeks as flushed as always and a big
smile on her face because she’d gotten three stones. Apparently, most of
them had made sacrifices to the gods for both fire and guidance—insects,
which could be counted as food, and other foods they’d had with, for which
they weren’t even questioned. On the contrary—the judges and Elliot and
the audience were so happy with them because they’d turned to the gods for
help, unlike me.
But as long as I was alive and breathing, I couldn’t care less about
making these people happy.
“Hey, Sera,” Maia whispered, gripping my hand tightly when we
stepped into the building. “We’re alive! We made it! Oh, my gods, we made
it!”
“We did. You okay? Did you get hurt?” I asked, looking her over. She
seemed well. Dirty, like the rest of us, but at least there was no blood on
her.
“Not at all. It was easy,” she said. “I’m sorry I didn’t stop to help when
we first went in. I was—”
 “Don’t,” I cut her off. “You’re under no obligation to help anyone but
yourself. I’m glad you focused on the trial.”
She beamed. “We’re going to celebrate tonight. Will you be downstairs
for dinner?”
I nodded. “Couldn’t stay away if I tried.” The way I was desperate for
food would have me down at the Midas Hall before the night had even
fallen.
“Perfect,” Maia said, her eyes sparkling. She really did look so happy.
“See you there!” And she stopped at the first door on the other side of the
building on the second floor.
“See you there, Maia,” I said and continued around the corner to my
room. The others ignored me perfectly, and I, them. Whoever had pushed
me in the frozen forest, at that point I would rather not know at all.
When I finally made it to the room, my body let go. I sat on the floor
right there by the door, rested my back against it, and closed my eyes.
The anger, the fear, the desperation, the panic—it all came back to me
with a vengeance. Tears spilled out of my eyes, and for once, I didn’t try to
push them back. As much as I hated to cry, right now I needed the release.
As much as I hated to admit it, I was happy, too.
I’d been so sure that I was going to die today, but here I was. I wished I
was with Miles, with James and Layla, just to celebrate the incredible fact
that I was still breathing, but it was okay. I could celebrate alone once I got
my shit together.
But I still stayed right there on the floor until the last tear dried on my
cheek.

G to give me a bath barely an hour later. I was going to tell her

that I had it, that I could clean myself the way I had my whole life, but one
look at her face and I caved. She was still pissed that I’d snuck out of the
room this morning without waiting for her, and I didn’t really have the
energy to argue anyway.
So, I let her fill up the tub and pour those pink and purple shampoos in
the water. Their scent really did make me feel like I was out of this world
for a while. I relaxed even more than I had that first day, maybe because I
literally had no strength or will to fight the effect of those scents.
Grace massaged my head and cleaned the cut on my cheek from when
I’d fallen against the nymphs’ tree. Blood bargain, Elliot had called it. But I
hadn’t given my blood to the nymph on purpose, had I?
Doesn’t matter anymore, I reminded myself, and just focused on what
Grace was doing. She cleaned up the cuts on my arms, too—I had more
than I’d realized. They weren’t deep, but they hurt a bit. Nothing I couldn’t
handle.
She’d brought me clothes, too—the exact same white uniform that
smelled like brand new leather. My sneakers were basically ruined from the
Dome, so now I had to wear the leather shoes, too. They were comfortable,
though, light and easy to walk in. I liked them instantly.
Before she left, Grace stopped in front of me and took my hands in hers.
“Congratulations, you ungrateful little brat. You actually passed the first
trial. It was very smart what you did there. I'll admit, I didn’t think you had
it in you.” Her smile was so wide and genuine, it honestly surprised me.
“Thanks, I guess,” I muttered. I never really knew how to handle
compliments, and I could already feel my cheeks heating up. But Grace
wasn’t even done.
“I don’t care what the judges say, you did a better job than most in
there. You were smart. You were resourceful. You made do with what you
had.” Oh, God, I was going to die of embarrassment. “But that trial was
easy, Sera. From now on, things will get more serious, so try to learn as
much as you can before the second one rolls in, okay? Keep to yourself—
and learn.”
 I knew she meant to give me a friendly warning, and I understood her.
But the truth was that she scared me shitless.
If the first trial hadn’t been serious, what the hell did these people plan
for the second?
I promised her I’d keep my eyes open, though, and I went downstairs to
eat. Even though nobody talked to me directly, I still heard most of what the
others said. Since Maia was sitting with them when I first got there, and the
table of the Elysean students was still empty, I thought I’d sit close to the
middle for once, not at the very edge. I was exhausted, and I didn’t care
much for chatter at that point, but I was glad I could hear them talking all
the same.
“I’m telling you, that’s what I heard,” the girl Donna was saying to the
others as she bit into the chicken wing. Even though I’d had three already, I
reached for another—so damn tasty. Whoever cooked in this place deserved
an award. “He literally cut off the entire plumbing system at the Academy
on a dare.” Her voice was hushed, and her wide blue eyes moved to the
doors behind me every few seconds to make sure nobody was coming
through.
“Which one was that—Lorenzo, right?” asked Isaac as he drew on a
napkin near his plate—a sports car. He was obsessed with them, it seemed.
Every time I saw him, he was drawing cars or wheels or finish flags on
anything he could.
“From House Sapphire, yes,” said Marie. She’d been almost as bloody
as me when we came out of the Dome earlier, but she looked perfectly fine
now. They all did. I was the only one with a wound on my face, it seemed.
“It’s literally my dream to be part of them—ugh!” And she closed her eyes,
breathing in deeply as if to calm herself.
“Wow, all that power,” said Elaine. “I wonder if he’s into blondes.” And
she started playing with her long, shiny hair, eyes sparkling as her mind
wandered far away.
 “Right? Who even dares someone to shut down plumbing?” Nick said
as he stuffed more rice in his mouth—he ate like a savage, mouth wide
open, food spilling out every few seconds.
“Can you imagine? They say the Academy is huge,” Donna said in awe.
“Guess what Denis did to end up here, though,” Ethan said, grinning
widely as he looked at the others from under his lashes. Out of all of them,
I’d say he was the most cunning. I could see his mind calculating
everything all the damn time, and it wouldn’t surprise me if he’d been the
one to push me in the frozen forest.
“What?” most of the other candidates asked in unison, and I stopped
eating, too, just to hear what he’d say. Apparently, Blue Eyes’ name was
Denis, and he was House Sapphire, too. I hated that guy more than the other
students, even more than Sketchbook Girl. Something about the way he
always winked at me…
“He set the courtyard on fire just to see how much water he can
manipulate with his magic,” said Ethan in a hushed voice.
I flinched, leaning away on the bench. What a fucking psychopath.
“He burned down a small portion of the building, almost got people
killed, and refused to put the fire out all at once because he said he was in
the Academy to learn, and he was learning the limits of what he could do in
practice,” Ethan continued.
Shivers broke down my spine. I really didn’t want to be in an Academy
together with the likes of Blue Eyes.
Most of the other candidates were impressed, though. Especially the
girls. And I got it—he was a handsome guy. All of them were. But a minute
later, the hall doors opened and all the Elysean students came in, led by
Denis himself, and Angel was right behind them. The others stopped
speaking and moved away from one another right away, as if being caught
talking was a damn crime.
 Angel no longer wore her sparkly, backless dress, but a pair of elegant
black trousers and a crisp white shirt with no gemstone anywhere on her
that I could see. “Attention, please!” she called, smiling brightly as she
stood in front of the statue of Zeus—who somehow looked angrier today
than he did yesterday. Probably just me and my shitty mood, though. Not to
mention the exhaustion. “Madam Carmine will address you in a minute.
Please pay attention.”
Goddamn it, I really didn’t need this. Not tonight. But not a minute
later, we heard the footsteps—Madam Carmine’s high heels slamming
against the marble floor. I flinched involuntarily, and every person in the
room, Elysean and mortal, seemed to hold their breath with me as we
waited for her to make her way between the tables, and finally turn to us.
“Congratulations on completing the first trial,” she said, and her voice
was dull, her eyes dark—she seemed more pissed off than usual. It
definitely wasn’t a good sign.
Her eyes skimmed through the faces turned to her, and she said, almost
in a rush: “We will be holding a feast two nights from tonight to celebrate
your triumph and to honor our Father, to thank him and all of the gods for
their help.” The whispers erupted almost immediately. “Rest tonight.
You’ve earned it.” I could have sworn that the moment her eyes locked on
mine, she held back a flinch. “Get back to work tomorrow. We expect great
things from all of you.”
The students and the mortals clapped their hands as she made her way
out of the Hall again. I didn’t bother.
A feast—how fucking fancy. No, thank you. I would rather just lock
myself in the room all night.
I ate as fast as I could until my stomach started to hurt. Then I made my
way out of the Hall, ignoring the stares of the Elysean students. Ignoring the
way Sketchbook Girl didn’t even raise her head from her sketchbook, but I
somehow felt her attention on me.
 I fell asleep with only my bra and panties on as soon as my head hit the
pillow.
When I woke up, a ruby and a sapphire were glistening on my
nightstand.

B .
That’s what I needed—books and knowledge and preparation.
Beginner’s luck wasn’t going to last forever. I’d completed the first trial,
but almost by accident. I planned to complete the second intentionally.
Except the moment I entered the Midas Hall for breakfast and saw
Sketchbook Girl, my skin crawled. Would those wasps still be waiting for
me in the library?
If they were, I’d have no choice but to find Madam Carmine and ask her
to make them go away. I needed the library—without it, I had no hope of
figuring out the things that they wanted me to have figured out already.
Like the Elysean Houses I’d known nothing about, and those gemstones—
what the hell was that about? And who really were the rest of those Elysean
students, who designed the games, and was there a rhyme or reason to them
or just pure fun for the creators?
So much I didn’t know still. So much to learn, just like Grace said.
Some of the other candidates were making fun of me today—sticking
out their tongues at me, making out with thin air while they tried to imitate
the snakes that had licked my ears. Word had spread. The cameras had
apparently showed most of what we all did in the Dome while I’d been in
there about to fucking die.
If anything, it made me hate the entire Elysean race even more.
This morning, though, Maia sat with me again, and she told me plenty
of things while we ate.
 “Apparently, House Ruby is the biggest and strongest of all,” she said.
“They’re descendants of Zeus, Athena, Apollo and Dionysus.” She sounded
in awe already. “The mortals they pick for the Academy almost always
make it through. Very well connected. Very rich.”
“Why Houses, though?” I wondered.
“Basically to preserve power. They marry among one another, too, most
of the time, to keep the magic pure.”
Huh. Here I was, thinking Elyseans were all equals. What more did I
learn wrong about them?
“The houseless, though—they are considered and treated almost like
us,” Maia said, lowering her voice as she looked around.
“What’s houseless?” I knew godless—good ole me—but I’d never
heard the term “houseless” before.
“Descendants of the lesser gods. Only the main ones are considered
Holy Bloodlines. Nobody knows for sure where they come from, but they
don’t belong to any house. Their magic isn’t pure. They’re considered the
lowest rank of Elyseans around here—the staff is mostly houseless. Angel
is one, too.”
“You’re joking,” I whispered. Angel, Grace—even Eeda?
“Nope. There’s so much of this stuff in the library. The blue butterflies
are basically the librarians. They lead you to whatever books you need. I
read so many newspaper compilations I got dizzy, but they were worth it.
You should, too.” Then she flinched. “Are you coming to the library
today?”
I nodded. “Absolutely. I think I will make that my permanent home
until the second trial.”
“What about the…you know.” And she smiled sheepishly.
“The wasps—yes. If they’re still there, I’ll go talk to Madam Carmine
about it.” What other choice did I have?
 Another flinch from Maia—Madam Carmine wasn’t exactly a friendly
face. I’d gone through worse, though. Much, much worse.
“I heard Amelia is very powerful,” said Maia, nodding her head behind
my back. “She’s House Emerald. They call her gifted—she’s extremely
powerful.”
Yes, I’d figured she was House Emerald judging by the gemstones on
her rings. As much as I wanted to turn and look at her, I resisted—I did not
need more trouble right now.
“Let me guess—House Emerald are descendants of the Muses.”
Everything that had to do with art came mostly from the Muses.
Maia nodded. “A few others, too. Hera, Persephone and Hermes, I
think.” She wrinkled her nose. “The guy with the wand going about? That’s
David—he’s an actual sorcerer, a descendant of Hermes. They say he’s very
powerful, too.”
This time, I did turn, but one look at Denis grinning ear to ear as he
popped grapes in his mouth and I turned back to my plate. Shit. Since when
was I so easily intimidated, damn it?
Possibly since I’d been chased by wasps that came alive from pencil
lead with a blow of breath.
“Yeah, I noticed,” I muttered, stuffing another apple slice in my mouth.
The guy with the stick that had an emerald attached to the butt of it—an
actual sorcerer. Imagine that. It made me curious. So damn curious to know
about the descendants, what they could do and whose powers they’d
inherited.
I desperately needed to get to that library.
“Ready?” I asked, and Maia eagerly nodded. “Let's get going.”
Together we made our way to the library, and even though they all
watched me—and threw grapes my way as I passed by the Elysean table,
making a mess out of my shirt—nobody messed with Maia.
 16

The Cyclopses were called Steropes, Brontes, and Arges. Once freed by their brother,
they went hard at work to prepare for the War of Gods, forging the Trident for
Poseidon, the Helm of Darkness for Hades, and the Lightning Bolts for Zeus.
In the First War, the Titans fought to the best of their ability, but no one was
mightier than Zeus and his Lightning Bolts. In the end, the Titans surrendered, and
Zeus threw them in the depths of Tartarus. His brothers, the hundred-armed monsters,
became their guards.

Gaea, seeing her firstborn children, the Titans, locked away in Tartarus, raged once
more.

—Book of Creation, 6th Edition, 502

by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

Cold sweat on my palms. Maia pulled open the library doors and I held my
breath, determined to look brave even if I was about to start screaming.
Silence in the library, and the view of it in daylight mesmerized me all
over again—the butterflies were flying about the shelves with their
beautiful, inscribed wings, and the solar system hovering in the air glowed
with the sunlight streaming in through the windows over the shelves lining
the right wall. It was almost too beautiful to be true, that place.
And then they rose up in the air, and the buzzing filled my head
instantly. Wasps as big as my fist, over twenty of them, their dark beady
eyes on me.
“Shit,” Maia whispered. “Shit, they’re still here.”
I swallowed hard, contemplating whether I was brave enough to run
inside, grab a book from those shelves and just kill them all right then and
there.
But I wouldn’t.
I stepped back. “You go in. I’ll figure something out.”
Maia looked pale as a sheet, all excitement drained from her eyes. “You
sure? Maybe you could talk to Amelia, ask her to get them off your back?”
The buzzing grew louder as the wasps came closer to the doors. “Yeah,
I’d rather shit in my hands and clap.” And I meant it. “Go ahead. It’s okay
—I’ll find my way in there eventually. Go.” I moved backwards down the
hallway as the wasps came closer and closer, heart in my throat. If they
attacked me, what the hell would I do? How did one defend themselves
from fucking wasps?
But Maia waved her hand at me reluctantly, and when the wasps were
too close, she just shut the door, taking them from my sight. Thank God. I
stopped walking and sighed. The day wasn’t over yet though. It was still
super early, and I intended to make every hour count. So, I turned to go find
Angel and have her tell me where to find Madam Carmine. I didn’t care
how scary the woman was—I was going to face her and demand she do
something about those wasps today.
Instead, I ran into a wall made out of cocky Elysean pricks who were
waiting for me right around the hallway corner with wide grins on their
faces.
 Three of them, and though Sketchbook Girl wasn’t there, the boys all
looked deadly enough in their own right. Especially Denis, and David the
sorcerer with the wand that wasn’t in his hands at the moment.
I swallowed hard, cursing my luck.
“Can I help you, fellas?” I said because fake it till you make it was
literally the only strategy I had. I was going to fake being brave until I was
actually brave for real.
“I think you can,” said the first with the dark hair and sun-kissed skin,
the three small sapphires around the collar of his black shirt—last time,
they’d been on his chest pocket. That had to be Lorenzo, the guy the
candidates were talking about last night.
“We’re very curious,” said Denis, those deep blue eyes of his like
oceans on their own. “Very curious about how you knew.” The crystal
around his neck seemed to be pulsating with blue light already.
Still not freaked out all the way. “Knew what?” Fuck, my voice was so
dry my throat hurt.
Lorenzo leaned closer, his brown eyes scrolling down my body in a way
that made me feel completely naked. “How to get through the trial,” he
whispered, like that was a dirty little secret.
“Where have you been reading?” said David the sorcerer. No wand on
him still, and no other gemstone on his person, just the unusual mossy green
eyes on his picture-perfect face.
“Who have you been talking to?” asked Denis.
“Nobody,” I said, focusing on my anger. It did me good. Gave me
courage. “And I haven’t read anything because those stupid wasps your
friend unleashed on me won’t let me into the library.”
The boys looked at one another, those sneaky smiles still on their faces.
They moved before I had the chance to blink. Denis grabbed my arm
and slammed me against the wall lightning fast. To my right, David had his
long fingers around my neck, pinning me in place, while Lorenzo came
close enough to touch the tip of my nose with his. His wide brown eyes
were all I could see.
God, I could hardly breathe, but try as I might, I couldn’t get them off
me.
“Let go of me,” I said in vain—of course they wouldn’t.
“Not so brave now, are we,” said the asshole in front of me. “You’re a
pretty good liar for a godless whore.”
“Rot in hell, you—” The hand around my neck squeezed tightly, cutting
off my vocal cords.
“Here’s the deal, godless,” Lorenzo breathed against my lips. “You
made it through the first trial unscathed. I am willing to offer you an
opportunity. Pledge allegiance to me and you’ll make it through the second,
too.”
“Rot. In. He—” David’s hand around my neck squeezed again. I choked.
And Lorenzo growled, his hand on my cheek while he sniffed the other,
then whispered: “I like the sound of you choking. Maybe I’ll put you on
your knees soon and give you something to keep that pretty mouth busy.”
Instinct took over and I raised my knee with all my strength. It slammed
right in his balls.
The way the wind left him, and his eyes bulged was everything. He
pushed himself back, breath held and teeth gritted as he tried to keep from
making a single sound. David was squeezing my neck harder, but if he
killed me right now, it would be totally worth it. I had no regrets.
“You—”
The sharp sound of footsteps coming our way fast stopped the asshole
from saying whatever unoriginal comment had taken root in his mind. They
all stepped to the side and let go of me, and a second later, Angel slipped
around the corner, looking as disoriented as usual.
When she saw us, she stopped. “What are you doing standing in the
hallway?”
 “Just congratulating Sedorah on completing the trial,” said David with a
wide smile that looked perfectly genuine. “She nailed it, if you ask me.
We’re very proud of her.” The playfulness in his voice would fool anyone
into thinking that he really wasn’t doing anything bad until now.
I forced a smile on my face, too. “Aw, thank you, David. That’s so sweet
of you.”
“Oh,” Angel said with a nod. “Alright, then.”
“If you’ll excuse me, fellas, I was actually on my way to find Angel
when you caught me,” I said, hands behind my back so they wouldn’t see
them shaking. My throat was a bit raw, too, but if it showed in my voice, I
didn’t even care. I just slipped by Angel’s side and laced my arm in hers.
“That’s okay,” said Lorenzo, holding both hands in front of his crotch.
Unfortunately for me, his balls seemed to have already recovered. “We’ve
got time.”
“Yeah, we’re not going anywhere,” said David, shaking his head was he
smiled. Denis winked at me, too.
“We’ll see you around, Sedorah,” they said, and I practically pushed
Angel to keep walking down the hallway, pretending my heart wasn’t about
to beat right out of my chest.
But even when we turned our back to the boys, their threats remained
with me. They weren’t going anywhere. We were all stuck in this Palace for
at least another week.
I was so screwed.

“T ’ ,” Angel said, face twisted like my words had tasted bad, too.
“It is. I can’t get into the library at all,” I said when we made it to the
Seasons Hall, and I’d already told her everything.
“I see,” she said, nodding her head, eyes on the floor.
 “So, can you just make them disappear or tell that girl to take them
back?”
The way she suddenly looked at me, you’d think I’d asked her to give
me a million dollars.
Angel laughed, but it sounded a lot like a scream. I noticed that her skin
was just as flawless as the rest of the Elyseans and her long hair just as
shiny, but she wasn’t wearing any of those colorful gemstones. Just like
Grace and Eeda weren’t. Was it because they were houseless, like Maia
said?
“Oh, I’m afraid I can’t do that, Sera. The students don’t really listen to
me. I’m just Elliot’s coordinator,” she said, and she sounded a bit afraid. “A
bit of advice, though? You’ve had a target on your back ever since that
video was shared, so I suggest you lay low for a little while until they forget
about you, okay?” She came closer, looking to the sides to make sure
nobody was around before she whispered, “Just stay away from them.”
“But—”
“All of them. They don’t care about being punished—do you have any
idea who their parents are?” she whisper-yelled. “And stay away from
Shade, too. He’s dangerous.”
Oh, God. My heart fell all the way to my heels. “Why? Why’s he
dangerous?”
She raised her brows. “Have you met him?”
Fuck, I couldn’t believe Angel was warning me, too.
“Look, I can’t just disappear from the Palace—trust me, I’d have
preferred that. But I still need to use that library, so just point me to Madam
Carmine and I’ll talk to her directly.” She definitely looked like someone
whom the students listened to if the way they behaved every time she came
to the Midas Hall for her speeches was any indicator.
Except Angel smiled in a way that said she had more bad news for me.
“Madam Carmine is unavailable at the moment.”
 “When will she be available?”
“No idea. She’s in the Dome, preparing for the next trial. She spends all
her time in there with the others, building.” The Dome where I’d almost
died. Where I would most definitely die the second time if I couldn’t get
those wasps off my back.
“There must be something I can do,” I said, and I hated how defeated I
sounded.
“Then do something,” Angel said. “Either stay away or make friends
with them, Sera. You can’t get through these trials alone—or with enemies.
Maybe talk to Amelia. Ask her nicely. She’s reasonable.”
Even she didn’t believe her own words.
So that’s all I had. Talk to Amelia. Ask her to make the wasps disappear.
Otherwise, I wasn’t going to survive even the students until the next trial.
And what did it say about me that I would gladly take my chances on
my own anyway rather than ask that girl for anything?
When Angel left, I hid by the stairway near the library, sitting on the
floor by myself, trying to figure out a scenario in which I didn’t lose my
mind—and/or life—in this place. God, I missed my old life. I missed movie
nights with Miles and milkshake dates with James and Layla. They were
goofs who pissed me off on the regular, but I loved them anyway. They
were like the family I’d never had.
Look at me now.
“Why the long face?”
I blinked the darkness away and looked up to see Eeda pushing her cart
full of laundry toward the stairs.
“Morning, Eeda,” I said with a forced smile and got up to go help her.
“Good morning to you, too, dear. And congratulations on passing the
first trial.” Her smile was genuine, her eyes wide and open and honest. She
wore that same grey dress again and the shawl that covered half her hair.
Houseless—what a strange word.
 “Thank you,” I said and grabbed the cart’s end.
“You’re so kind to always be here to help me, but you don’t have to,
dear,” she said—and the cart had gotten even heavier than yesterday. What
the hell did she keep in that thing?
“I thought you said you’d need me back here today,” I teased. That’s
what she said to me yesterday, right before the trial began.
“I was only kidding,” Eeda said, chuckling. “Really—you don’t have to
come here every morning.”
“I know. I want to.” Who in the world would let a woman her age carry
this cart up the stairs all by herself? “It’s no bother.”
Her laugh was such a sweet sound. “You should be preparing for your
second trial instead,” she said when we reached the second floor. Damn,
that one was definitely heavy. I was racing to catch my breath already.
“I know. I will, don’t worry,” I said and stepped to the side to leave,
but…
“Come. Sit here with me a minute. I can take a little break.” And she
went and sat on the first stair.
At first, I wanted to say no. Not because she was Elysean, but because
she probably had work to do. I didn’t want to keep her.
But other than Maia and Grace, there was no other friendly face for me
to see today. So, swallowing hard, I went and sat near her, and I told her all
about the wasps before she could even ask me.
By then, she probably thought I was pathetic.
“I’m sorry to hear that, dear,” she told me anyway. “But maybe it’s a
sign. Maybe you should get out there and get some air instead. Take a break
today, enjoy the Palace—there is no place quite like it. No people to bother
you at this time of day, either.” And she turned to me with that warm smile.
“Wanna know a little secret? At nighttime, if you climb the Stargazing
tower and look at the sky through the archways, you will see the most
magnificent view the gods have ever created.”
 “Then maybe I’ll go check it out,” I said with a nod.
“You should,” she said, and tapping my knee, she stood up. “I have to
go. Try to make the best out of where you are right now, dear. No point in
wishing things were different, is there?”
No, I supposed there wasn’t.
I stayed on the stair for a moment longer, wondering what the hell I was
going to do with the whole day. I didn’t want to stay locked in that room all
day. I wanted to go to the goddamn library.
“Hey, Eeda!” I called just as the idea popped into my head, and she
stopped pushing her cart down the hallway. “You wouldn’t happen to have
anything in there that could, say, contain wasps, would you?”
Eeda’s lips stretched into a smile slowly. “I think I can find something
that might help.” Just now, she looked so much younger with a devilish grin
and a spark in her eyes, almost like she was proud of me. Then she went
through the laundry in her car and pulled something from the bottom of it—
a dark grey bag, the fabric thick and sturdy, and it even had a lace at the
end.
“There. This should do the trick,” she said and offered me the bag. It
was exactly big enough. Exactly what I needed.
For a moment, I was speechless. I’d used my denim jacket to catch the
Iriade the day it had found me back home, but this was a million times
better.
“Thank you, Eeda. I will make sure to bring this back,” I told her and
started running backward to the stairs again, smiling so big my cheeks hurt.
“You’re very welcome, dear,” she called, waving at me until I ran down
the stairs, feeling like I’d just sprouted wings and could fly.
Those wasps better watch out because I was coming for them. I was
done hiding. Now, it was their turn.
 17

“Know yourself; the secrets of the entire universe are written within you.”

—Eros: the Burden of Love, 239

by Sherida Marquise, House Opal

The wasps were clueless. If I could only stop shaking, stop sweating so
much, this whole thing would have been even easier, but there was only so
much a girl could do. I was almost as afraid as I had been in the trials, when
those snakes had wrapped around my body like ropes and held me down.
No way was I ever going to get that memory out of my head, but I was still
going through with this. I was still going to finish this once and for all.
So, even though the wasps had already risen in the air behind the
shelves, I stepped into the library. The other candidates, including Maia,
were already there. No Elyseans, though, which served me.
Just like always, the wasps shot for me all at once. My heart just about
broke my ribcage. Every instinct in me screamed to get the hell away, turn
back and start running.
 Instead, I moved as fast as my body allowed just as the wasps were
close enough—looking even bigger than I remembered—and I caught them
in the bag. A goddamn miracle if I’d ever seen one because I caught all of
them as they came, even though I was too afraid to tie up the lace after.
The wasps buzzed—I heard the sound of them, but I couldn’t feel them
in the bag at all. Was it the fabric—was it that thick?
Did it even matter?
I could hear them. They were there. I’d actually caught the damn wasps,
exactly as I did the Iriade.
My laughter echoed in the high ceiling of the library. The others
watched, definitely disappointed, except for Maia who was giving me two
thumbs up, smiling ear-to-ear.
“Be right back!” I called, intending to go find a room with a big door
and a lock, to throw the bag in and make sure those things never made it
out.
Fuck, it felt good. It felt so incredible to finally do something about
those damn wasps that I was flying!
Too bad it was so short-lived.
I’d barely made it to the Seasons Hall before I saw them and froze in
place, my feet stuck to the marble floor.
No, no, no, no…
Amelia and four other Elyseans were coming my way, and for once, she
had her sketchbook under her arm, so she saw me right away.
Our eyes locked.
She smiled.
I probably should have run, but there were two problems with running
—one, I couldn’t get my body to move; and two, my stupid pride forced me
to raise my chin.
Was it too much to hope that she would miss the sound of buzzing
coming from that bag that was keeping the wasps contained even better
than I’d hoped? Seriously, I still couldn’t feel them at all.
But it was.
Amelia raised her hand while her friends laughed, shaking their heads at
me.
“Make her scream,” Denis said, and I finally felt the stupid wasps when
they lost it. They moved so suddenly, like they were finally there, pulling
me to the sides, raising my arm and pushing me back.
I tried to hold on. I held on with everything in me, but they were too
strong. Her magic was way too much. It pushed and pulled until I slipped
and fell on my ass on the floor, and the bag was no longer in my hand. The
wasps flew out, spreading all around me as I looked up at them, completely
helpless. They didn’t attack, though. And then one of the Elyseans stepped
forward, looking down at me like I was an insect—David the sorcerer. This
time, he had his stupid wand in his hand, complete with the gemstone on
the butt of the handle.
“Run,” he whispered and raised his wand at me.
I scrambled to my feet and ran out the door faster than I ever had
before.
By the time I made it to my room and locked the door, the cold reality
settled in, making me throw up everything I’d eaten for breakfast. I would
have no choice but to pledge allegiance to one of those students if I was
going to survive this wretched Palace all the way to the second trial.

I after midnight when I made my way out of my room again to

go find food. Except the Midas Hall was closed, just like I expected. I
didn’t dare go to the library for fear of whom I’d find there, so Eeda’s
suggestion it was—I was going to explore the Stargazing tower of the
Palace.
 I barely found the doors to it down a narrow corridor on the second
floor that was a maze of identical hallways, up a set of wooden stairs.
Behind the doors, more stairs spiraled up and up and up—until I was sure
I’d walked a hundred stories, and I was about to collapse from exhaustion.
But when I reached the top, I had to admit that every step had been
completely worth it.
The room at the tip of the tower was wide, half open, so much bigger
than it had looked from the outside. So goddamn high. Planets, twice as big
as the ones in the library, hovered in the air, shining with transparent gems
that caught the moonlight and reflected it everywhere. Wooden floors and
gorgeous drawings on the walls, so full of life—gods and animals and titans
together on one side, and all the constellations on the other.
But nothing beat the biggest archway in the middle, just like Eeda said.
“Wow,” I breathed as I stepped in front of it, feeling as tiny as a drop of
water. The archway stretched at least sixty feet high, revealing the city of
Idaea beyond the Palace walls. So many beautiful lights. The white
buildings, the statues and the shiny gemstones on them reflecting the
moonlight made it look like this entire place had come right out of a
fantasy. Even the air shimmered around the statues when I looked at them
from up here, but then I raised my eyes up to the sky and I forgot how to
breathe completely.
It was exactly like Eeda said—possibly the most magnificent view to
have ever existed. The moon shone right in the middle, and somehow, from
here, I could see the stars keeping her company with twice as much clarity.
There were so many of them, shining like precious gems, and the Libra
constellation was at their back, like a roof over the polished silver of the full
moon. It was more than anything I’d ever seen before when looking at the
sky, the night a deep indigo.
I rested my head on the stone archway and looked at it, at all of it, and I
let myself breathe. I let myself feel all that I needed to feel.
 Hurt. Betrayed. Humiliated. Stuck. Afraid—it was all very normal, I
realized. Considering the circumstances, there was no other thing to feel
right now, and that was okay. I could handle it. I could keep fighting, keep
trying.
For some reason, the moon reminded me of Shade, of his eyes that were
almost the same color, of the way he looked at me, like he couldn’t make up
his mind about me yet. There was a reason why I was so intrigued by him
—he was the first person I’d actually witnessed doing magic since I came
here, and as much as I didn’t want to admit it, it fascinated me. Just a tiny
bit. The way that darkness spread out of his hands was the most beautiful
and terrifying thing I’d ever seen. I could pretend to others I wasn’t in awe
of it, but I could never lie to myself.
By the time I returned downstairs, I felt a million times calmer—and
lost in thoughts, trying to imagine what Shade was really like underneath
that cold exterior, what it must feel like to him to wield that kind of magic.
That’s why I wasn’t paying as much attention as I should have before I
heard the noise.
Thud.
Something hit the marble floor of the hallway around the corner just as I
slipped in through the narrow corridor that led to the tower. I froze mid-
step, ears strained, heartbeat tripled instantly.
Silence.
I waited a moment…
“Hello?”
Was it the students? Were they messing with me, was that it?
No answer. Taking in a deep breath, I started walking again, slowly
turning the corner. Just before I did, something else touched on the marble
floor, then whooshed like the wind.
Except when I leaned to the side, there was nobody there.
 My stomach fell. I wanted to call out again, demand whoever was there
show themselves, but my voice wasn’t working. Every hair on my body
stood at attention as if my instincts felt something I didn’t.
Slowly, I moved forward, heart hammering in my chest, never even
blinking my eyes. I almost made it to the end of the hallway before I heard
the voices.
Someone was coming through the door on my left. I stopped, hoping it
was just someone from the staff, that I could move past them and get to my
room already. I didn’t know any other way to get there.
The door opened.
None other than Denis, David the sorcerer, and one of the other guys I
hadn’t had the misfortune to speak to yet came through, their eyes on me.
You’ve got to be shitting me…
Swallowing hard, my body moved forward on autopilot, and I prayed
with all my heart that they just let me move past them. I wasn’t close to my
room—it was on the other side of the building—but I could run. I could get
there in no time.
Please, please, please…
The boys stepped in front of me, spreading out to the sides to block my
way. I stopped walking, rubbing my sweat-slick palms against the leather of
the vest, which made no difference at all.
“A bit late to be wandering about the Palace, isn’t it?” said Denis,
looking me up and down slowly.
“What’s the matter, little mortal? Couldn’t sleep?” said the other I
hadn’t spoken to before. He had a small ruby hanging around his neck.
Dark hair, dark eyes, perfect face that scared the shit out of me when his
smile said he was coming to devour me like a damn savage.
“Just taking a walk,” I forced myself to say. “D’you mind?”
I was going to try to walk around them again, but they moved at the
same time.
 “You know, you never did tell us how you did it,” David said, pulling
something out of his pocket—his wand. Every inch of my skin raised in
goose bumps.
“And you haven’t pledged your allegiance to any of us,” said Ruby Guy.
It was so unfair that such good looks were wasted on him. His up-tilted eyes
could have been drawn, and those long lips were almost too beautiful to be
real. “You’ve turned down Lorenzo, I hear. How about me, godless? Do you
want to be mine?”
I’d rather claw my own eyes out and walk on hot coal—at the same
time. “No, thanks. I’m good.”
“So, you want to die in the trials for real?” David asked me, scratching
his pointy chin with the tip of his wand.
“I won’t die,” I said, when I probably should have kept my mouth shut.
They exchanged a look and laughed coldly.
“Are you really that big of an idiot to think you can complete them on
your own?” said Denis.
“A mere mortal playing a game of gods?” said Ruby Guy—and he must
have thought it was the funniest thing in the world from the way his
shoulders shook.
You’re not gods, I was going to say, but by some miracle thought to bite
my tongue. Instead, I said, “I won’t just play it. I’ll win, too.”
“You will if you play for me,” he said, coming closer, looking exactly
like an animal stalking his prey. I moved back slowly…
“Only in your dreams,” I whispered out of sheer stubbornness, but even
my whisper broke.
The boy stopped coming at me, but his smile didn’t fade away.
“Oh, boy. You’ve got a mouth on you. You’ve got balls, I’ll give you
that. Much bigger ones than most,” said David cheerfully, like he was
paying me a damn compliment. “I swear, nobody’s entertained me more in
weeks.” And he slapped the back of his hand to Ruby Guy’s shoulder as he
laughed. “Mind if I give it a shot with her after you’re done, Jasper?
Because I don’t think she’ll change her mind about you. No offense—
you’re just not as good looking as me.” And he ran his fingers through his
hair as if it needed fixing—it didn’t.
Denis laughed. “I don’t think looks are what she’s after, though.”
David gasped, putting his wand to his chest. “A mortal immune to
beauty? Surely there’s no such thing.” Such a damn drama queen.
Denis laughed harder, but Jasper didn’t find it as amusing. “We’ll see
about that,” he said, slowly raising his hand, looking at me from under his
thick lashes. The ruby resting on his chest glowed. “First, I have a trial of
my own for her. Let’s see if you have the answer to this, little mortal…”
Suddenly, the air became warmer, but it could have also been my
imagination because a second ticked by and nothing happened.
No wasps, no magic blast, no nothing came at me.
“Oh, yeah…” said Denis, stepping closer to the walls as he smiled. “I
like this part.”
David smiled, too, throwing his wand in the air and catching it again as
he stepped aside. “Me, too. Stay strong, Sera. You got this!” His voice
dripped with sarcasm. I’d have flipped him off if I wasn’t so panicked.
“What…what are you doing?” I asked, slowly backing away. I couldn’t
see anything, and that almost made everything worse. Was he supposed to
hurt me or something? Because I couldn’t feel anything, either.
But Jasper smiled like all his dreams had suddenly come true, and his
ruby glowed so bright, I couldn’t look at it at all.
And then I heard the footsteps. Someone was running—someone on all
fours, like a cat or a dog or a horse…
Or a leopard.
An actual leopard turned the corner of the hallway right behind the
Elysean, its eyes almost the same red as the ruby, focused on me.
No way in hell…
 It wasn’t alone, either. A smaller leopard came behind it, and another
animal that looked almost like a dog, except with more feline features and
deep grey fur. The moment they locked eyes with me, they lowered their
heads and growled, the sound of it vibrating right through my chest.
I looked at Jasper again, shaking my head because no way in hell was
this real. Just no way.
But he smiled. “Run, mouse, run,” he sang.
I didn’t fucking hesitate.
Somehow my body held me, and I turned and ran when the three
animals launched themselves at me. I saw nothing, heard nothing but the
beating of my heart, felt the hard surface under my feet that I barely even
touched, and I kept on going.
Part of me still insisted that this wasn’t real. No way could it be real—
being chased by leopards inside a damn Palace? No way in any hell.
Except I was, and they were so close behind me I could feel them, and
their footsteps were in my ears, and I just needed to hide. That was it—I
needed to find a place to hide and stay there until the end of time. Never
come out, not for any reason at all. Stay hidden until the world fell apart.
I didn’t know how long I’d been running or in which part of the Palace I
even was, but I saw doors and I slammed against them with my whole body.
They gave, but my foot must have caught on something because the next
thing I knew, I was flat on my stomach, breathing so heavily my lungs
burned like I’d drunk liquid fire.
The footsteps behind me stopped coming, too.
Panic rang every alarm in my head, and I looked up to see where I’d
walked into, if there was any place to hide here. Instead, I found a man
standing not three feet away from me, looking down at me with his hands
behind his back, his brows raised, his smoky eyes curious.
Shade.
 The low growl of the animals came from right behind me. I jerked up
and dragged myself deeper into the room, not exactly sure that the predator
behind my back wasn’t worse than the wild animals looking at me from the
doorway.
But Shade moved, too.
As I dragged myself back, he stepped forward, closer to the animals, so
perfectly calm you’d think he couldn’t even see them.
But he could. And the animals could see him, too.
He walked slowly and the animals instantly backed away, heads
lowered to the floor, strange noises coming out of their throats like they
were crying. Shade kept going, and they backed away from him until I lost
sight of them completely.
Gone. The animals were gone. But someone else was running down the
hallway, too.
We heard the voices—the Elysean students, including that guy Jasper
who’d somehow unleashed those animals on me. Shade turned to look at
me, brows narrowed now, a pissed off look in his eyes that seemed
completely black with the storm brewing in them.
That’s how I knew that I was screwed.
Darkness exploded from his raised hand the next second. My mouth
opened, the scream about to tear me apart.
But I never made a single sound before his magic swallowed me whole,
and the world around me disappeared completely.
 18

Angry that Zeus had put her firstborns, the Titans, in Tartarus, Gaea unleashed two
terrible creatures onto the world—Typhon, father of all monsters, and his mate
Echidna.
Typhon was so mighty and so big, that his heads touched the sky, and his eyes
leaked venom, and magma dripped from all his mouths.
So mighty he was that when the new gods saw him, they all turned and fled in
terror.

—Book of Creation, 6th Edition, 530

by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

My eyes popped open to bright sunlight and a ceiling that had become
familiar to me by now. I sat up with a jolt, heart racing like my body
believed I was somewhere else, in my last memory—with Shade and the
leopards and the Elysean boys coming for me. But, instead, I was in my
room, wearing the same clothes I’d had on yesterday, and nothing hurt that I
could tell.
I was alive and physically fine. All alone.
 The image of Shade looking down at me when I stumbled through those
doors was so vivid in my mind still. It had been a big room, the lights low
—and the shelves full of books.
Fuck. There had been a lot of books in that room. I’d barely seen
anything, but there had been books—like a miniature library, one where no
big ass wasps had come out to attack me.
My lips stretched into a wide smile despite the situation.
I knew exactly where I was going to spend the night tonight.

I to spend the night at the stupid feast, it seemed. I’d just

forgotten all about it.
“Most wear white—it’s the color of the gods,” Grace told me, looking at
the dress I’d picked from the ones she brought me. “At this point you want
to impress them, don’t you?”
Yeah, no—except I didn’t tell her that. “White just washes me out,” I
lied. “Black complements my skin tone perfectly.” I waved the thin satin
fabric of the dress around—it really was gorgeous. A V-neck with thick
straps tied in elegant knots, the back lower than normal, the dress slightly
flared up as it went down to the ankles, with a slit that probably reached my
thigh. “Besides, if they didn’t want me to wear black, they wouldn’t have
given you this dress to bring to me at all.”
“And if you were to think just a bit harder, you’d realize that everything
is a test,” Grace said.
I met her eyes. She really did look concerned, and I appreciated it, but I
had thought harder. I knew exactly what they wanted to say when they
brought me this dress.
And I knew exactly what I wanted to say back when I wore it tonight.
So, I pushed the closet on wheels with five other dresses hanging on it
to the side, and I smiled at Grace. “It’s enough that I’m even going,” I said,
never mind that I had no other choice—Madam Carmine, apparently,
wanted all of us there, and I didn’t want her to come knocking on my door
if I didn’t show up.
“How about I let you do my makeup and even my nails exactly like you
want?” I offered.
Grace sighed, shaking her head. “Sure, why not.” And she went to the
blue case she’d put on the vanity table, that was full of everything—
brushes, eye shadow palettes, nail polish, highlighters, and a bunch of
things I had never even seen before. “What color do you usually paint your
nails?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know, I mix it up.”
“How about red, then?” Grace said and turned to show me a little bottle
of red nail polish. I flinched, but she wasn’t even fazed.
“It’s just so…red.” Really, really red.
“It’s timeless,” Grace told me, raising the small bottle to the ceiling like
it really was something precious to be admired. “It’s graceful. It’s all-
encompassing, the color of all ages. It represents youth as well as graceful
aging. It represents girls and women alike. The color of blood, of fire’s
roots, of passion and confidence—but most importantly, it’s the color of
love.”
I blinked, at a loss for words—or thoughts—for a long moment.
“It’s just a color.” I had never before heard anyone speak of a color like
that.
Grace smiled sweetly like one does at a lost little puppy. “And that is
why you are stuck, my dear. Nothing is ever just one thing. There’s more
than what the eye can see. You have to learn to look deeper.” She put the
nail polish on the vanity table and turned the faucet on to fill the tub.
I was actually looking forward to the baths she gave me now. The smell
of those shampoos was everything.
 “I’m not stuck,” I told her, putting the black dress on the bed gently. It
really was the most beautiful dress I’d ever seen, and I didn’t want to ruin
it.
“Sure, you’re not,” Grace deadpanned. “So, what’s it going to be?”
I chose the red polish.

T an actual museum in the Palace I’d never heard of before. Big

and beautiful, just like everything else in this place, and it made me wonder
what more hid inside these walls that I had no idea about. I’d been so
caught up on getting into that library that I’d completely neglected the
space around me—and last night, the view from that tower proved that it
could offer me so much more than I could see. Maybe both Grace and Eeda
were right. Maybe I could go exploring again when the night was over.
But right now, I had to walk on six-inch heels—gorgeous golden
sandals, but the straps bit into my feet—and I had to go through the open
doors and into the museum left of the Seasons Hall all by myself.
I thought I could handle it just fine, but the moment I stepped through
the doors, I realized how utterly unprepared to be here I was.
When Madam Carmine said feast, I’d imagined it would be a simple
celebration with the candidates and the Elysean students, maybe the Palace
staff—that’s it.
Instead, over two hundred people were in the room, and almost all of
them wore white.
The view in front of me tilted. Fuck, I stood out like a sore thumb, and
my heart was slamming in my chest already. It was incredible how this
place managed to make me feel even more a stranger than normal. I was
literally the black sheep in their midst, but I tried to keep my chin up
anyway and pretend I wasn’t sweating. Had Maia known that it was going
to be this big? Had Eeda or Grace? I’d spoken to all of them earlier in the
day and none had said anything. Maybe they assumed I knew?
But so many people were there, standing around the elegant cocktail
tables, wearing fancy dresses and so much gold and gemstones I risked
going blind—and then Angel found me. She wore silver again—it was
definitely her color. Her cheeks were flushed as she looked down at my
dress, then tried to hide her flinch. She failed miserably.
“You weren’t supposed to pick black,” she finally choked out, like she’d
tried to stop herself from saying it—she’d really tried—but in the end she
couldn’t help it.
It made me smile. “And you weren’t supposed to bring me here against
my will, but here we are.”
Angel turned red in the face instantly. “What happened to make friends,
not enemies, Sera?!” she hissed, keeping the fake smile and speaking
without moving her lips at all. She could give Layla a run for her money.
“Yeah, you said that, not me,” I reminded her, batting my lashes
innocently.
She groaned deep in her throat, but the mask of perfection that was her
face didn’t change at all. “At least your wound isn’t showing,” she finally
said—and she was right. Whatever Grace had done with her makeup, the
small red wound on my cheek from when I’d fallen onto that tree in the trial
was perfectly invisible tonight. “Let’s just go find your seat,” Angel said in
an exhausted whisper.
I felt pretty proud of myself—until she dragged me all the way to the
head of the room, toward the stage they’d set up for the band and the three
women in front of microphones who were singing in a voice that was surely
made in heaven. The crystal chandeliers, the display stands made out of
gold and glass and velvet, the people—most Elysean, possibly from those
important Houses Elliot had mentioned…it was all too much.
Suddenly I could barely fucking breathe.
 But Angel kept dragging me by the hand and I finally saw the other
candidates, all of them wearing white, and for some reason that made me
feel a bit more at ease. Especially Maia’s smiling face.
Grace had done my hair in big locks, had pinned half of it behind my
head and let the rest loose down my back. Maia had her strawberry blonde
curls wrapped up in a high bun, revealing the angles of her face, making her
look even more beautiful than usual. The pale pink, almost completely
white dress she wore complemented the shade of her hair perfectly, too. She
and the others sat at a round table, drinks in hand, tipsy smiles on their faces
—except when they saw my dress. Totally worth the flinching and nose
wrinkling. I definitely made the right call.
“There. Sit over there. Take it easy on the wine—and please behave,
Sera,” Angel whispered in my ear, pointing at the empty chair near Maia—
thank God. “There are cameras. People are watching.”
I nodded. “Don’t you worry about me. Worry about them,” I said,
nodding my head at the table ahead of ours where the Elysean students sat
—all of them watching me.
For a second, the image of leopards coming for my neck was perfectly
vivid in front of my eyes when I saw Jasper, the guy who’d unleashed them
on me last night. Lorenzo sat right beside him, looking at me like he wanted
to set me on fire. Maia said he was Elliot Embers cousin or something,
which meant he never really got in trouble for anything around here.
“Just sit, Sera,” Angel said like she’d already had enough of my shit.
But even before I was close enough to sit down, I felt his eyes on me,
and my body was perfectly aware of his attention like he was a damn
magnet. I only had to search for a second before I found him sitting two
tables away to the left of the stage, a drink in hand while he watched me,
eyes wide and lips parted.
My step faltered for a second—Shade was wearing a tuxedo. An actual
tuxedo, with a crisp white shirt and a black jacket, and his hair was sleeked
back, his face clean shaven, his eyes as bright as the moon like I’d seen it
from the tower last night.
Butterflies erupted in my stomach, taking my breath away.
“Sera, come on!” Maia called, bringing me to the present, and I lowered
my head until I sat down.
Tough luck. I could see him perfectly fine from my seat, too.
I panicked, not going to lie. I panicked and dragged my chair to the side,
hoping that Ethan, who was sitting on Maia’s other side, would shield
Shade from my view. He did for a second, but every time he moved, those
smoky eyes seared my skin as if by magic, and I still hadn’t caught my
breath properly.
Damn it, why was he so beautiful?
And what was wrong with me?!
Probably just my stupid hormones. He’d saved me last night,
technically speaking. If those leopards had gotten to me—or those boys—
God knows where I’d have ended up come dawn. He was the one who did
his strange magic on me, then somehow put me in bed again, safe and
sound. Ugh.
And just the thought of him being there while I slept, completely
unconscious…did he carry me himself?
Goose bumps on my arms.
“You look amazing, Sera,” Maia said. “Black is definitely your color.”
She was absolutely right, even if she was just being nice—but even then, I
couldn’t stop shaking.
“Thank you, Maia. You, too. Absolutely gorgeous,” I said, pouring
some red wine from one of the jugs. I needed to drink. I needed to stop
feeling so damn stupid over a guy—and an Elysean guy, no less.
Every plate on the table and every piece of silverware, the white lilies in
the middle, the white tablecloth that shimmered golden under the
chandeliers—all of it was perfect.
 “Thank you,” Maia said. “My Grace did a great job taming my curls.”
“Grace helped you get ready, too?” I said, for a moment forgetting that
my Grace couldn’t have, since she was with me for the past three hours.
“My Grace,” said Maia. “We all have one of our own. Grace is not their
real name, but that’s what they are, apparently. Donna told me.” And she
nodded her head toward Donna, who’d done her short ash blonde hair in
thick waves that gave her that Marilyn Monroe vibe. The black eyeliner and
the bold pink lipstick definitely worked for her—she looked flawless.
“Of course,” I muttered, shaking my head. “The Graces that sent
Aphrodite to the gods.” They were goddesses of beauty who, according to
the mythos, found Aphrodite when she came out of the sea, got her ready,
put her on a carriage and sent her off to Olympus to wow the gods.
I should have seen it before—or at the very least when Grace held such
a heartfelt speech about a color earlier. Not going to lie, though, red looked
amazing on my fingernails. Maybe this was my color for real.
“Yes—you know that story? I just read it and I absolutely loved it,”
Maia said, so excited it was almost funny.
“I do. I do know the story.” I knew the story of every god to have ever
been made up by the people.
Or every god who actually existed.
“Well, our Graces are their descendants,” Maia continued. “They’re
houseless, but they are employed in every Elysean house in every city. The
highest paid help, Donna said.”
I nodded. “Makes sense.” With the way Elyseans appreciated their
looks, it would make sense that the Graces would be paid more than
everyone else.
The need to ask Maia again about the boys who’d cornered me last
night—especially Jasper—came over me, but I bit my tongue. I’d asked her
during lunch already, though I hadn’t told her about the animals at all
because I didn’t want to freak her out. More importantly, I didn’t want to
put her in danger because I told her something those boys didn’t want
anyone to find out. I could read—tonight, after the party. I could go to that
library and read and figure out everything that was still not making sense to
me.
Assuming Shade wasn’t there.
Just the thought of him made me look up—our eyes locked instantly. He
still watched me, sipping his drink slowly, those stormy eyes dark, those
beautiful lips slightly stained red with the wine.
“Rumor has it he’s here as punishment, too. Nobody knows what he did,
though,” Maia whispered to me, and when I realized she’d caught me
staring at Shade, the glass of wine almost slipped from my fingers.
“Oh,” I said, cheeks already burning.
“He’s House Opal, of Hades’s Bloodline,” she continued, making ice-
cold chills rush down my back again. “The others are still saying to stay
away from him, but they won’t tell anyone why.”
“So fucking hot, though,” said Marie, who was sitting a few feet to my
other side. She wore a baby blue strapless dress that brought her boobs
almost to her chin, and she’d let her long, dark hair loose around her
shoulders. The smoky blue eye shadow made her eyes extra seductive, and
she knew just how to use that as she looked at Shade from under her lashes
in a way I’d never know how.
It made my stomach heat up like I’d swallowed fire.
“For real. I’d pledge anything to him if he asked,” said Erica, sitting
next to Marie, with that same confidence she’d had before entering the first
trial. I’d thought it a tragedy that I didn’t know anything about her then.
Now, I wanted to throw my wine on her face—the way she looked at Shade
and pushed her golden-brown locks behind her shoulder dramatically made
my insides clench. She even winked at him, and for a moment, I wanted to
pull out each strand of hair from her head. I wanted to pluck out all her
eyebrows, too, see what she looked like without them.
 I also wanted to drench her in gasoline and set her on fire so badly…
Yeah, okay, maybe that last one was a bit over the top, but whatever the
hell it was that I was feeling, nothing short of seeing her on fire was going
to make me feel better.
Which was why I lowered my eyes to the plate to gather myself—I am
not jealous over Shadow Boy, I am not jealous over Shadow Boy, I am not
jealous over Shadow Boy.
Eventually, I gave up and just focused on my surroundings, tuning out
the conversation completely.
Easy to do—so much perfection around me. Elyseans looked like they’d
come alive right out of a painting. The way they danced, the way they
walked and talked and laughed could hypnotize you if you let it. And if I
didn’t know any better, if I hadn’t seen what they were capable of with my
own eyes, I’d have been fooled just like the rest of the candidates who were
in absolute awe of them.
All the judges were there—including Madam Carmine. She looked
absolutely flawless with a velvet dress on, the red so dark it looked black.
The ruby around her neck shone like it was full of blood. Out of every
female in the room, the two of us were the only ones dressed in dark
clothing. Some of the men wore black, like Shade, but most wore suits and
tuxedoes that were white or silver.
Madam Carmine was far enough away, sitting at a table in the middle of
the room, so she didn't see me, or when she did, I wasn’t looking. Good
thing, too. I didn’t want to see the way she judged me tonight, at least.
Everybody else was more than enough.
Minutes turned to a blur, and the first course of the meal was served by
immaculately dressed waiters—all Elyseans, probably houseless. The food
was superb, the music exactly right, and the dances of the Elyseans kept my
eyes on them for minutes at a time despite my better judgment. The other
candidates were even talking to me—a word here and there about the first
trial, about someone’s outfit, about what color someone’s hair was, whether
it was natural or a dye. It was all very normal. We even talked about the
other Elyseans students again.
“I heard Blair’s parents are very rich, extremely powerful,” Elaine was
saying. She wore a white halter dress that shimmered golden; eyeshadow
that shimmered golden; white lipstick that shimmered golden; a golden tiara
on the mess of curls on her head—and she made it all work somehow.
Fucking impressive. She looked unearthly as she sipped her wine. “Check
this—she’s here because she was dating a houseless, and her parents
brought her here to—quote, humiliate her the way she’d humiliated them.”
The others laughed. I was surprised myself—Blair, the beautiful blonde
who’d been one of the first Elyseans to threaten me in the library, before
Sketchbook Girl unleashed her wasps on me. She didn’t seem like the type
to fall for someone houseless, but what the hell did I even know? Right
now, she sat back in her gorgeous white dress made out of smooth satin,
sipping her wine and looking bored out of her mind as she analyzed the
crowd.
“You guys heard about Rebecca, though?” Nick said from the other side
of the table. My eyes moved to the Elysean student sitting near David,
listening intently to whatever he was telling her. She was flawless, too, her
hair cut close to her chin and styled pin straight, her wide eyes rimmed with
black eyeliner, the emerald shining on her golden bracelet mesmerizing.
Nobody had heard anything about her, it seemed. That’s why we were
all suddenly leaning over the table to try to get closer to Nick, just to hear
what he had to say.
“Apparently, she deals some sort of heavy stuff,” he started, wiggling
his brows. He looked very handsome tonight, too, and those scars all over
his face suited him even better with his hair styled back. He wore a white
suit that was obviously made for him. I wondered if what Maia said was
true, that he’d fought in cages before. I wondered what kind of life would
force a teenager to go down that road.
“No way,” Donna breathed.
“Yes, way,” said Nick. “They found the drug all over her room at the
Academy, and they said it was some really heavy stuff. Very powerful
hallucinogen. Her family made a deal with the Academy to bring her here
instead of putting her in rehab. Apparently, she liked to use what she dealt,
too.”
Holy hell, I would have never said. Looking at Rebecca now, she
seemed so calm. Not at all like someone craving drugs. She was even
laughing at whatever David said. It just proved how well looks could hide
truths—not just for Elyseans, but for everyone else in the world.
The conversation continued to the other candidates, to their experience
with drugs and alcohol. I’d never done any drugs, but I had drunk plenty of
times with Layla and James, just like most of the others here. Some of them
—Albert, born and raised in Germany, and who’d only lived in the States
for the past two years, and Mark who was so obsessed with numbers and
counting he could literally tell you how many laurel leaves decorated the
plates, had the best, most cruel jokes I’d ever heard, and I couldn’t stop
laughing if I tried.
A couple hours in, I was perfectly relaxed. The music was on point, the
wine and food delicious, and nobody even looked at me wrong. So many
beautiful things to see around us that they’d displayed inside those glass
boxes. Swords and shields, and even a perfect replica of the Golden Fleece
that looked so real it was kind of freaky. Horns and teeth from goats and
dragons and all kinds of creatures, and dresses made out of leaves and
flowers, too, worn by Hera, Athena, Selene, Eos, and plenty of other
goddesses, the plaques said.
But when Angel invited us to go dance among the Elyseans, I didn’t
think I had the stomach for it. Dancing was not my thing.
 I stood up from the table anyway, and while the others went to the dance
floor, I slipped to the side of the stage, toward the wall and the people
hanging out close to it.
Toward Shade.
Like I said, alcohol was not a stranger to me—I’d snuck out and drank
with Layla and James plenty of times. And though I had a light buzzing in
my head from the glass of wine I drank, I wasn’t drunk by any means.
No, this wasn’t the alcohol. I was just plain stupid.
Because though Shade had his eyes on me, and I could see the warning
in them to not come any closer, I still did. I still took one step after the
other, and I went all the way to him, and I turned my back to the wall like
he was doing and pretended to be looking at the crowd.
His eyes on the side of my face burned me.
“Are you lost, Snowflake?”
I almost rolled mine.
“No, actually. I wanted to talk to you.” I turned to face him. His brow
was arched, his skin glowing, and the way that wine had stained his lips was
a damn crime. “I wanted to thank you for last night.”
He looked surprised. “You want to thank me for putting my filthy
shadows on you again?”
“You don’t have to be a dick about it,” I muttered and turned to the
crowd again, blood rushing to my cheeks. I had called his magic that, but
that was before.
“And you don’t have to be so naive as to come to me in front of all
these people—or speak to me in that manner.”
Was he serious? I faced him again, hands on my hips. “I was trying to
thank you for keeping those animals away and for taking me to my room.
Apparently, that’s a mistake,” I spit.
“Finally, you understand something,” he said, bringing the glass to his
lips as he watched me from under his lashes. Fuck, he was so damn
infuriating.
“What the hell is your problem?” He can’t look away from me for a
damn second all night long, but when I try to thank him, he calls me a fool?
Yeah. Yes, because I absolutely was.
“My problem is mortal girls who can’t pay attention to what goes on
around them,” he said, then looked down at my dress like he was both
appalled and in awe of it.
Goddamn Elysean prick. I looked at his tux, too, and tried to judge him
without uttering a single word. Unfortunately for me, he looked fucking
god-like in that thing. Fuck. My mouth went dry instantly, and it got worse
when my eyes scrolled back up to his face, and I found him staring at me.
“Didn’t anybody tell you that white and gold are the colors of the
gods?” he asked, and I could be mistaken, but he seemed to be having
trouble not looking down at my cleavage, which I had unfortunately
adjusted before coming here. I was too ashamed to admit it to myself, so I
didn’t even think about it.
“Every day for most my life, actually. Did anybody tell you?” His tux
was black, too. Or maybe he was an exception because he was of Hades’s
descent?
“Who?” he asked instead of answering me.
And the wine must’ve had me more tipsy than I realized because I
leaned a bit closer and whispered, “A monster wearing human skin. And
she wasn’t even Elysean. Imagine that.”
It was kind of funny, though. I’d always imagined Miss Aldentach
waking up in the morning as a monstrous alien and putting on her human
face like we put on clothes.
The way Shade analyzed my face you’d think I was a book to be read,
and he was perfectly focused on every single word.
“Your bitterness hasn’t diminished your beauty, Snowflake. I almost
wish it had,” he said, and those damn butterflies rioted in my stomach. My
cheeks heated up, too.
I was so blaming this on the wine tomorrow, but for tonight…
“Are you calling me beautiful?” I asked, and those gorgeous eyes of his
darkened, like angry clouds before rain.
“You are,” he said. “Even a blind man would see it.”
Damn. I swallowed hard. “Even though I’m wearing black?”
“Especially because you’re wearing black,” he said, taking a big sip of
his wine before he loosened up the button of his shirt. “Your dress makes
my shadows envious, Snowflake. And if you were to think clearly, you
wouldn’t take that as a compliment.”
I blinked—what the hell did that even mean?
And why did the idea of wearing his darkness the way I wore this dress
made me wish I could try it? Stupid brain. Stupid body that was heating up
at the thought of him touching me, even if it was with his shadows.
“We don’t have to be enemies, do we?” I ended up saying. He was so
confusing, but he’d saved me nonetheless. That counted. It meant
something to me.
Except Shade flinched at my words and he didn’t even try to hide it.
“Stay out of my way, Snowflake. I am not your friend,” he said,
shocking me all over again.
With his wine in one hand, and the other in his pocket, he moved away
from the wall and went back to his table without waiting for a reply.

B I returned to the table, I was hyperventilating.

My own damn fault for wanting to thank an Elysean. What the hell was
I thinking? Why was I so damn pathetic? Why, oh why, oh why…
People around me and they all seemed to sit down at the same time.
Except this time, it wasn’t just the other candidates, but a few Elysean
students as well. Amelia and Jasper were the only ones missing.
 I attempted to stand up again, when David raised his hand. “Sit down,
mortal. Relax. We’re not here to hurt you.”
“You sure about that?” Did he not remember last night? Because he was
there, too, when his friend unleashed fucking leopards on me.
“Of course. It’s all part of the game—Sedorah, was it? I like your
dress,” said Rebecca. Her eyes were a brown so light they looked almost
orange. “Relax. We’re drinking tonight. This isn’t about the trials.”
“Yeah,” the others said, raising their glasses. “Tonight, we’re not
playing.”
They all drank and turned to one another, making jokes and laughing
like they really were friends.
And it got me thinking, what if they were right? What if it was all just
part of the game?
Of course, it wasn’t—I wasn’t goddamn stupid. Not most of the time, at
least.
But one look at Shade sitting at his table, watching me from the corner
of his eye, and the anger returned. The shame and the disappointment, too,
so I thought, screw it. I could drink with these people tonight just to spite
him. I could send them all to hell tomorrow, just like I’d been doing since I
got here, no matter the price I’ve had to pay.
A waiter must have filled my glass with wine while I was away, for
which I was thankful. Right now, I would just focus on the others until my
heart no longer raced, and my idiot brain stopped replaying the way he’d
looked at me, how he’d called me beautiful. I knew enough to know it
didn’t matter one bit, but tell that to my body.
The others talked about the Academy, though, and I was curious, if
anything. In terrible need of a distraction, too, so I listened.
“It is build on the side of a rocky mountain and stands on the back of
Atlas,” Rebecca was saying as she licked icing off her fork, grinning
mischievously at the boys who couldn’t look away from the way her tongue
twisted and turned masterfully. Slowly. If they could tell she was doing it on
purpose, they didn’t care.
“It’s called the Arges—which is…” Denis said, grinning ear to ear as he
looked us over. “Anyone?”
“Cyclops,” I blurted without really intending to. I just wanted for him to
keep talking. Keep distracting me.
And they all nodded like they were impressed. “Exactly—one of the
three original Cyclopses, the best blacksmiths to have ever been created,”
Denis continued, then winked at me. Ugh.
“The Arges was built in their vision,” Rebecca said again, scooping
more chocolate cake on her fork. The way the boys were looking at her,
especially Ethan who was barely breathing as he waited for her to bring the
cake to her mouth, was hilarious.
“And the gods stand tall and proud over it, watching us,” said Denis.
“Oh, they watch our every move,” said David in a hushed voice, leaning
closer to the table as he raised his hand, the wide sleeve of his gorgeous
green tunic embossed with gold moving to the sides. “Two-hundred, fifty
feet tall, wide, carved out of the purest marble, with eyes as alive as we
are.” He put his hands to his chest dramatically. “They watch us. They see
us. They punish and reward us. And if you were ever”—he leaned closer,
raising his index finger—“ever to make it all the way to the Arges, you best
be warned, mortals: the gods will know.”
A second ticked by and none of us even breathed.
The way we were watching him, the way he spoke—so damn
passionately and in that hushed voice—was indeed funny. That’s why all of
them burst out laughing.
I couldn’t help a smile myself as my mind went to places, to mountains
and buildings sitting on the back of the titan Atlas. I wondered if they were
kidding—was the Academy really built on top of a statue? And did gods
really stand around it?
 How would that even work? How big was that place?
“But the inside is where the real magic happens,” Rebecca was saying.
“Each Holy Bloodline has their own sector, but even so, different kinds of
magic clash together all the time—boom!” David and Denis clapped their
hands together at the same time for effect, making us all jump back,
startled.
Shaking my head, I looked away at the crowd for a moment, but I was
still smiling. I was…enthusiastic to imagine magics clashing together,
apparently.
It took me a few moments to remember myself, and when I did, the
anger was right there, waiting under the surface, this time directed at my
own self, too. How silly of me to wonder. How silly of me to want to see it.
To want to be there, to experience all of what they talked about. Wasn’t it
sad how easily these people messed with my mind and made me want to be
among them, made me wish I could belong here, even after everything?
Ugh. More alcohol was what I needed, so I picked up the glass from the
table, determined to drink half the wine in one gulp just so I could stop
wanting to see that damn Academy.
Except it didn’t budge.
What the hell?
I grabbed it with my other hand, too—it was like the glass was glued to
the tablecloth, and it wouldn’t move an inch. I tried again and again—
nothing. The glass wasn’t fucking moving.
Anger spread in my veins like wildfire. I looked around the table at the
others—which one of them was doing this? Which one of them wanted to
piss me off more than I already was?
But none were looking at me—none, except Shade. And he was pale as
a ghost.
It only took me a second to see the grey shadows around the glass that
shouldn’t have been there. It only took me a second to feel the coldness of
his magic against my skin. The fucking prick was playing games with me,
trying to keep me from my wine. Didn’t he already do enough damage to
my self-esteem?
Fuck you, asshole, I thought to myself, and I grabbed the glass again
with both hands, and I pulled with all my strength. The sudden look on his
face, eyes wide and full of horror, made my fucking night.
For a second.
Then the stupid glass finally moved, and I had been pulling it so hard
that there was no chance to stop in time. Every drop of wine in it ended up
on my chest.
The whole world seemed to hold its breath for a long moment.
Then people whispered. People laughed. People clapped.
I saw red.
My ears whistled as I stood up, my dress soaking wet and sticking to my
skin. I smelled like wine and I had tears in my eyes and the people wouldn’t
shut up. They just kept laughing and clapping like mad. Someone called my
name—I thought it was Maia, but I couldn’t see anything. I just wanted to
get out of here. I just wanted to disappear under a rock, somewhere nobody
could ever find me again, and fade away into nothing.
I didn’t even feel how much my feet hurt as I ran out of the museum and
into the hallway, then all the way to the courtyard. Once I made it outside, I
had the good sense to take those stupid sandals off my feet and continue
barefoot. There were people sitting on the benches inside the face maze, so
I had no choice but to follow the canal to the side of the Palace and keep
going until I found myself near the two temples I could see from the
windows of my room.
I walked into the first—small fires burned on the lanterns, and not a
single soul was in sight. Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades sat around me, and I
went behind the legs of the first statue, sat down on the floor, and closed my
eyes.
 I would not cry. Screw them all—I wouldn’t shed a single tear because
of that guy. Because of any of them. So, I hugged my knees to my chest and
I breathed until it stopped feeling like the entire world was resting on my
shoulders.
But never for a second did that laughter stop echoing in my mind.
 19

…thus Zeus looked upon his creation and said:

“Not everything is as it seems, rather what you make of it. Even fear can be your
worst enemy when you treat it as such, and your best ally when you put it to good use.
So, see, not only what is, but what could be.”

—God of Thunder, 9th Edition, 141

By William Gendar, House Ruby

I spent hours reading the vases around the temple last night, and maybe
that’s why all my dreams were infused with god stories.
Poseidon, giving the people an olive tree—except it grew overnight and
killed an entire city with its roots.
Athena, competing with a mortal woman in the loom, weaving day and
night for years—until they both turned to black furry spiders that crawled
all over me and I couldn’t get them off my body.
Sisyphus tricking Hades—whose face I couldn’t make out because it
was covered by thick shadows—and chaining him to a tree, before he slew
the god and cut him to pieces.
 Terror after terror, and sleep didn’t leave me until I felt the warmth of
the sun on my face.
And while I got dressed and went downstairs, the wine-stained dress no
longer on the floor where I’d left it, I realized I was already giving up.
I was tired. It was too much. I just wanted to go home.
But it wasn’t meant to be.
“Sit with me,” Eeda said when I helped her with her cart. The library
was off limits still—the wasps were there. I checked. I didn’t even go to the
Midas Hall for breakfast, knowing they’d all laugh at me. I wasn’t hungry
anyway.
That stupid fucking party.
And the stupid stormy-eyed man with darkness at his fingertips.
“What did you even put in there? It’s heavy,” I told Eeda when I sat
down, trying to distract myself. And I was right—her cart just kept getting
heavier by the day.
“It is, isn’t it,” she said, and it wasn’t a question. Her hand touched mine
gently. “I heard about what happened last night.”
It was like she’d slapped me across the face.
“Yeah,” I said with a flinch. “The asshole—Shade—was just messing
with me. He wouldn’t let go of my glass, and I pulled too hard. Then when
he did let go…” I made a gesture with my hands of the way the wine had
spilled all over my chest. “I gave everyone a good laugh, though, ha-ha-
ha.” My own laugh was so fake it gave Elliot Embers a run for his money.
“You know, I took your dress to the cleaners last night,” Eeda said, and I
turned to her.
“You did?” Was she in my room while I slept?
She nodded. “The cleaners took one look at it and said it couldn’t be
washed. The stain couldn’t be removed.”
I narrowed my brow. “Why not?”
“Because it was made with the Elixir,” said Eeda.
 “With what?”
“The Elixir—a special kind of wine Elyseans sometimes drink in
celebrations. The Wine of the gods, they call it,” she told me. “A wine so
strong that it would wipe the mind of any mortal who drank it for hours.
One could do with them as they pleased.”
My mouth opened and closed a couple of times. “I was…I was just
drinking wine.”
Was I? Because I left the table to go say thanks to the asshole, and when
I returned the glass was full. I’d just assumed that the waiters had refilled it.
“The stain on your dress was from the Elixir,” Eeda repeated, patting
my knee before she stood up. “And you seem fine, don’t you?”
I looked up at her while she grabbed her cart again.
“What…what do you mean?”
“You seem fine to me, dear. You didn’t lose yourself last night, did you?
Your mind wasn’t wiped clean, and you didn’t do things you don’t
remember.”
And she started pushing the cart down the hallway.
“Are you saying that he did me a favor?!” I called after her.
Eeda laughed, waved her hand at me without turning her head at all, but
she didn’t answer.

T stone on the stairs caught my attention when I

went back down. It must have been Eeda’s—I thought I heard something
falling when we were carrying the cart up, but she insisted it was nothing. I
ran up the stairs again and to the hallway, calling her name, but nobody was
there. The hallway was completely deserted.
With a sigh, I put it in my back pocket. She’d be here tomorrow at the
same time, like always, and I could return the stone to her then. Right now,
I had so much stuff to figure out, and—
“No, please. Get off me!”
Every inch of my body froze when I looked down to the side of the
stairway and saw Elaine backed against the dark corner while Denis
towered over her, his hands on either side of her head.
“Don’t you understand? I can’t!” he said, and even his voice was
transformed.
Every drop of my blood froze as I watched the girl trying to push him
off.
“Please, just step back. Please, gods…” she whimpered, and the asshole
didn’t listen.
He didn’t fucking listen, and there was nobody on the other side of the
archway, nobody coming up or down the stairs, nobody who could hear her
begging—just the three of us.
I lost it.
I ran so fast I reached them in the blink of an eye. My hands were on his
blue shirt and I pulled with all my strength before I even realized what the
hell I was doing.
“She said get off, you fucking prick!” I shouted, and Denis must not
have expected me because he moved back, and he suddenly looked
shocked. Not just that—but his cheeks were flushed, his eyes completely
red as he watched me.
Then he said, “But I love her.” And he made an attempt to reach out his
hand for Elaine, who wasn’t crying, but she was shaking from head to toe.
I stepped in front of her and slapped his hand away as hard as I could.
“Don’t touch her!”
“You don’t understand,” the asshole hissed, his bloodshot eyes on
Elaine trying to hide behind me. “You don’t get it—I’m in love with her. I
need her,” he said, his skin glistening with sweat. “Eros has shot me right in
the heart and I don’t want to live without her. I cannot live without her.”
 I must have lost my goddamn mind.
“What the hell are you saying?” I thought I whispered, then looked at
Elaine behind me to see if she could give me an answer. “Just…what the
hell?”
“I don’t know! I was on my way to the library when he grabbed me and
brought me here,” Elaine whispered, fisting the back of my vest tightly.
“Hey, back the fuck off!” I shouted at Denis when he attempted to come
closer. “I will hurt you.”
Empty threats—I couldn’t hurt him if I tried.
But lucky for all of us, before he could try to grab Elaine again, we
heard the footsteps right outside the archway, and Angel with two other
men wearing identical suits and black sunglasses appeared in front of us.
“He’s acting stupid,” I said, pointing my finger at Denis. “It’s not our
fault! We didn’t do anything—he was—”
“Sedorah,” Angel cut me off before she waved her hand at the two
hulking guys with those black sunglasses, same as all guards wore around
this place. They immediately grabbed Denis by the arms.
“No, wait!” he shouted, but Angel was already in front of him.
“Easy, Denis. Easy. We’ll take care of you, okay? We’ll take care of
you,” she whispered, and the guy cried.
My God, he was crying.
“But I love her,” he said while they dragged him away. “Elaine—I love
you!”
I shook my head at Angel, who looked as pale as the walls around us.
“What the hell was that?!”
“A spell,” she said, as Elaine stepped to the side to see her better.
“Somebody has done a spell on the Academy students, most likely a
Hedone descendant. They’re acting strange, but it won’t last long,” she
added when she saw my face. “It won’t, just a few hours. So, get to your
rooms, now, and stay there, okay? Somebody will come get you when it’s
safe.”
And she slipped through the archway.
“Safe?” Was she serious? We weren’t safe from those pricks without a
spell done to them! “Hey, hold on!” I called after her, but Angel was
already running down the hallway and she didn’t answer me.
“Thank you,” Elaine told me, arms wrapped around herself, still
shaking.
One look at her and my curiosity took a step back. “Yeah, no problem.
Come on, let’s get upstairs.”
Hedone—I knew who that was. Goddess of pleasure, daughter of Eros,
god of love. Who in the world could do Hedone spells on people? How was
that even possible?
Fuck, and I always thought I knew a lot about Elyseans.
Elaine didn’t say a single word to me as we went up the stairs, but her
room was five doors down from mine, so I went with her, just in case. She
was crying silent tears, shaking so badly. And when she slipped into her
room and closed the door, I felt a bit better. She was going to be okay.
Probably scarred for life, but okay.
I turned to go to my room, just as something moved around the corner.
None other than Lorenzo stepped forward, the same guy I’d kneed in
the balls three days ago—and his eyes were just as red as Denis’s had been.
No.
There was no time to think. Instinct took over and I ran. If I could make
it to my room, I could lock the door. Angel would find this guy in no time
and those men would drag him away, too—I just needed to get to the room.
But he ran, too, and unfortunately for me, he was faster. He moved like
a goddamn soldier. My hand was inches away from the handle of the door
when he grabbed me and slammed me against it.
Hands on my face. His nose touched mine.
 “I love you, Sera,” the asshole whispered against my lips, then groaned.
“You smell divine…” His nose was on my cheek, and he sniffed hard.
Every alarm in my head rang at the same time—this was worse than last
night’s nightmares. I pulled up my knee on instinct, ready to catch him in
the balls again, but he must have been expecting it because he instantly
blocked my leg with his.
“So feisty, I love it,” he told me, kissing my cheek while I tried to push
him off.
“Get the fuck off me, asshole!” I shouted at the top of my lungs.
But he didn’t budge. “I love your smell. I love your soft skin, mmmh…”
I had never felt so helpless in my life. He must have been made out of
goddamn steel.
Get off, get off, get off, I shouted, but he didn’t give a shit.
“I’ve been watching you. I know how you walk, I know how you talk. I
know how you smile—I love you, Sedorah. Stop fighting me,” he said, and
I couldn’t take it anymore. The way he pressed his body against mine and I
felt all his hard muscles showed me exactly what he intended to do with
me.
Taking in a deep breath, I prepared to scream until I collapsed. No
fucking way was I going to let this guy get his way with me. No way—I’d
claw his eyes out with my fingernails first.
But before a single sound left my lips, something wrapped around his
neck from behind. I almost didn’t believe my own eyes but tendrils of
darkness, like snakes made out of black ink, wrapped around Lorenzo’s
neck and arms and he was pulled off me like he weighed nothing at all.
Free.
I was free.
Shade was at the beginning of the hallway, hand raised while his
shadows dragged an unconscious Lorenzo toward the corner.
 Bile rose in my throat. I closed my eyes and rested my hands on my
knees, trying to catch my breath. It was over. The asshole was unconscious
—maybe even dead if I was lucky—but it was over.
Footsteps echoed in my head.
“Get in your room, Sedorah.”
I straightened up and looked at Shade who was halfway to me, and his
eyes…
Fuck, his eyes were just as bloodshot as Lorenzo’s had been.
“Not until you get the hell out of here,” I said through gritted teeth. If
he’d lost his mind, too, he couldn’t be trusted to be alone on our floor.
He clenched his jaws hard. “Get. In. Your. Room,” he ordered again,
and his voice was smoky, just like his damn shadows.
It took all I had to resist the urge to slip behind that door. “No. You get
out of here first.”
Shade moved so fast I could have sworn he simply materialized in front
of me. I backed away slowly until I was against the door.
“I am trying to resist it, but I won’t be able to for much longer,” he said,
and it was a damn warning.
“How do I know you’ll leave?” I breathed. “The other girls—”
“I don’t give a damn about the other girls—if you don’t disappear from
my sight right now, I won’t be able to stop myself. Do you understand me?”
He spoke slowly, his every word crystal clear. And I did understand. I
just didn’t move a single inch.
“Did you know?” I asked instead, and my lips were so dry from
breathing so heavily, my tongue came out to lick them.
He growled. An actual, honest-to-God growl that had my toes curling in
my shoes even before he pressed himself against me.
I felt him. I felt all of him.
And I must have been out of my goddamn mind because I didn’t push
him away and I didn’t go into the room, either.
 “Did…did you know that they put the Elixir in my wine, Shade?” I
insisted, eyes closed, my body perfectly still against his. A fire burned
under my skin and a part of me, a big part of me, wished he’d come even
closer. The smell of him, of fucking raindrops, intoxicated me.
“Do you not have any instincts at all, mortal?” he whispered, and when
my eyes opened, I found his on my parted lips. His hands came up and he
cupped my cheek, looking down at me with those red eyes that should have
scared me shitless. They had terrified me on Lorenzo. “You should run from
me,” Shade said. “You should hide from me. You shouldn’t talk to me.”
I actually agreed with him.
Not that I was about to admit it to his face, though.
Or do something about it.
“Then maybe you should stop saving me from wild animals running the
hallways and from people trying to roofie my drink,” I said in a breathless
whisper.
“Sedorah,” he said, and I could have sworn it was a warning. His hand
was on my cheek. Our lips so damn close.
I’d kissed guys before, four of them. I’d never really wanted to, not the
way I did right now. I’d never wanted to die just to know how any of them
felt and tasted. No, not even close.
“Shade,” I whispered, just to say something so the silence didn’t
suffocate me slowly.
His eyes closed. His body slammed against mine. He kissed me.
His lips were unbelievably soft—like little cushions against mine. My
body was a damn traitor because my arms locked around his neck, and
when his moved around my waist and pulled me to his chest, I moaned.
Right in his mouth, I moaned.
And he lost control.
His tongue slipped inside my mouth like he was starved for the taste of
me. Every inch of my body was on fire, and I forgot all about Lorenzo and
where I was, and who he was—in that moment, it didn’t matter. I just
wanted him to keep kissing me like his life depended on it, explore my
mouth with his tongue, make me cry out the way I never had before.
His body was hard against mine, his cock pressing against my stomach.
I tried to grind my hips against his, completely lost to the feeling like I
really had drunk from the wine of the gods. But the sounds he let out, and
the way he held me to his chest, and the way he devoured my mouth left no
room for any other thought. Any other want. Any other need. I just wanted
to be lost right in this spot forever.
But Shade moved away too soon.
“No,” he whispered, eyes squeezed shut, arms in front of him as he
stepped back. I fell against the door again, breathing like I’d been running
for hours, trying to find any semblance of pride and dignity inside me.
There was none. The way I’d kissed him had sent everything I thought I
knew about myself right to the depths of Tartarus.
“Get in your room,” Shade said when he looked at me again. God, he
seemed just as desperate as I felt, breathing just as heavily, the bulge in his
pants so damn tempting.
But this time, I didn’t argue. This time, I forced myself to grab that
damn handle and walked into the room before I made an even bigger fool of
myself.
When the lock turned in place, I slipped down the wall and to the floor
with my eyes closed, trying to control my raging hormones and my
hammering heart.
Shade had kissed me. And my God, how I’d kissed him back.
The spell. It was just the stupid Hedone spell, and I must have caught
some of it, too.
But I decided right then and there that it was never going to happen
again.
 20

The Typhon was large and mighty. He fought fearlessly, and when the new gods fled,
he chased after them time and again.
Eventually, Zeus had no choice but to regain his courage and face him, and when
his brothers and sisters witnessed him taking a stand, they, too, returned to fight
against the Typhon.

Thus, the Second War of Gods began.

—Book of Creation, 6th Edition, 589

by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

They brought food to our rooms, for which I was thankful. But when night
fell and I risked going crazy from my own thoughts, I decided it was safe
enough to walk out. Angel and those guys in suits had probably found all
the Elysean students already. Nobody was going to attack me. Didn’t she
say the effect of the spell would only last a few hours?
She did—and I would be just fine.
Besides, I didn’t even intend to go to the ground floor. I would just go to
the library I’d stumbled upon two nights ago when I was getting chased by
leopards.
Sometimes, my own stupidity astounded even me, but oh, well.
I made it all the way to the polished white doors in one piece, though.
And when I pushed them open, I had half convinced myself that Shade
wouldn’t be there at this hour. I had half convinced myself that I didn’t care,
that the reason I was here for wasn’t him, obviously, but the books.
But when I saw him sitting in a leather recliner with a book in his hand,
my legs almost let go of me.
Books my ass, Sera.
Taking in a deep breath, I straightened my shoulders and raised my chin
anyway. So what that I’d kissed him back earlier like I’d die if I didn’t? It
had just been the stupid spell, that’s all.
“Are you out of your mind, Snowflake?” Shade said, looking down at
the book until he finished speaking, so perfectly calm you’d think he was
asking me how my day was.
Then his eyes met mine and my breath caught in my throat to find them
still a little bloodshot.
“I need to use this library,” I said, and to my surprise, my voice didn’t
waver.
He closed the book he was reading. “You need to stay in your room.”
This library wasn’t big, not even a quarter of the size of the one
downstairs, but it had books. It had comfortable looking recliners with nice
round tables to their sides with reading lamps on them, too.
“I need to read books. The second trial is coming soon.” I stepped
inside, pretending I was as brave as I was in my imagination, and closed the
doors behind me.
The light of the hallway disappeared. It was much darker in here than
I’d realized. The dim light of the lamps gave the room a completely
different feeling. Much more…intimate.
Shit, I shouldn’t be here…
 Too late.
Shade stood up. No more bulge in his pants—not that I noticed.
“I doubt you’ll make it to the second trial if you keep this up,” he told
me, and he seemed in perfect control of himself. Not at all like he had been
that morning, which was a good thing.
So why was I so disappointed?
I stepped closer. “I did notice that you worry about me. A lot.” It was
meant as a teasing, but my voice came out breathless instead.
“This is the Academy’s library. Mortals are not allowed,” he said, his
voice growing colder the closer to him I went.
“Well, tough luck, because I can’t get to the other one.”
He cocked his brow. “You sure about that?”
If he saw those wasps coming for my head, he wouldn’t have asked me
that question. “I am. So how about we come to an agreement? You stop
trying to save me, and I just come here and read books, and we stay out of
each other’s way?”
The corner of his lips turned up just a bit, and I had no choice but to
look.
I looked.
The memory of his kiss hit me all over again the way it had all day. I’d
had to touch myself a few times just to try to get it out of my system and
calm my body the hell down, but apparently, it hadn’t worked as well as I’d
hoped.
“Also, while we’re at it, don’t ever kiss me again,” I said, my voice
suddenly dry.
His smile stretched all the way and he came closer. My stupid body
refused to move because of course not.
“Don’t flatter yourself, Snowflake. It was just the spell,” he told me, and
he could have fisted me in the damn gut. “You weren’t spelled, though. And
I dare say you enjoyed it more than I did.”
 Oh, God.
“Don’t flatter yourself, Shadow Boy,” I said, forcing myself to roll my
eyes. “And you weren’t spelled last night when you didn’t let me drink that
Elixir, were you? Or when you chased those animals away and made sure
those boys didn’t get to me?”
He tried to hold back a flinch but couldn’t. I had him. Oh, I had him
good.
And that was definitely bad news for me because now I could never
resist the curiosity.
“Why? Why do you even care?”
Slowly, Shade raised his hand and touched my cheek with his fingertips.
Again, I didn’t move away. Stupid body.
Just that his touch warmed me to my bones, and could you blame me for
liking it?
“Haven’t you figured it out already? You’re a pretty face, Sedorah
Sinclair,” he whispered as he analyzed my every feature. “Elyseans have a
weakness for beautiful things.”
This time, I had no trouble leaning away from his touch.
“Good. So, we know where we’re at. Let’s just stay out of each other’s
way, shall we?” I stepped to the side and around him, pretending my gut
wasn’t turning and my heart wasn’t hammering in my chest.
By some miracle, Shade didn’t stop me. Instead, I heard it when he
sighed, then sat down in his recliner again and picked up his book.
I’d never admit to disappointment, obviously, but I was also excited.
Because it had actually worked. I was in a library, surrounded by thousands
of books on all sides, and no wasps—or shadows—were coming for my
head.
Finally.
S .
What the hell was it about his very presence that was so loud? He
hadn’t said a single thing for the past two hours, yet I constantly heard him
there, even though I sat in a recliner in the back behind a shelf and couldn’t
even see him. I didn’t even recognize myself anymore—what was
becoming of me?
But at least I had books. At least, for as long as I could focus, I was
learning so much about modern Elyseans and the way their society worked,
which was the goal.
Everything Maia had told me was true. The four main Houses basically
ruled every Elysean and their cities—Ruby, Emerald, Sapphire, and Opal.
They were created almost a millennia ago, when descendants of the main
gods joined forces and decided that they were stronger together and weaker
apart. They remained the same since.
I didn’t need to ask Shade to know what color his gemstone was—it
would be an opal, though he didn’t keep it anywhere that I could see.
Because House Opal were descendants of Hades, Ares, and Aphrodite—and
those who came from Hades’s Bloodline could control shadows.
Shade. Is that why he called himself that—because of Hades? What was
his real name?
Why was he here in the first place? And was it true that he only cared
about me because I was a pretty face?
Questions. Always so many questions buzzing in my head.
House Sapphire was very powerful, too—descendants of Poseidon,
Hephaestus and Hecate. And the more I read, the more I understood
everything going on around me.
What Miss Aldentach hadn’t known, or at least hadn’t taught me, was
that the gods had given their descendants godstones through which they
carried their magical power—the Divine Light of the Holy Bloodlines, the
books called it. And the more power an Elysean had, the bigger the stone.
The bigger the stone, the more power they could use at any given time
before they dried out and had to replenish with rest and worship and
sacrifice.
How strange that Miss Aldentach—or anyone else for that matter, now
that I thought about it—never even mentioned the godstones when the
Elyseans wore them with such pride and downright flashed us with them.
But what was more interesting were the abilities each House and each
descendant had.
One of them in particular. Descendants of Dionysus could literally
communicate with animals. Mostly feline, but others, too, if they grew
enough power through the years. They could manipulate them, get them to
do their bidding—the same way Jasper had brought the damn leopards and
the strange dog-like creature up to chase me.
But they weren’t the only ones with animalistic abilities—the
descendants of Poseidon could shapeshift into any animal they chose.
Actually shapeshift.
God, no wonder Madam Carmine had made us sign those non-
disclosure agreements. Nobody out there had this information—we only
knew about mainstream powers, like making fire or growing plants or
manipulating water.
The book I was reading called The Great Houses—1980 to 2000 was
very detailed, and I couldn’t read it fast enough. Focus was no longer an
issue, and maybe that’s why I didn’t notice Shade had moved at all until he
spoke.
“Why do you hate the gods?”
I barely held back a scream.
He stood to the side of his recliner from where he could see me behind
the small shelf, resting his elbow against it, perfectly calm. His eyes were
still a bit red, but by now it was obvious that he was in perfect control of
himself.
 Taking in a deep breath to calm my racing heart, I said, “I don’t. I just
hate men.” The kind who claimed to be gods specifically—like him.
“Why?” he asked without missing a beat, and I could tell he’d been
stopping himself from asking me probably since I’d sat down. Now that
he’d started, he wasn’t going to stop.
It almost made me smile—pretty face, my ass. He liked me. He just
didn’t want to admit it.
But the worst part was what I felt—which was way too much when he
came closer to me.
“I know your story. You were saved by an Elysean—why?”
My blood came to a boiling point within a split second. “You don’t
know anything about me,” I spit.
That Elysean didn’t save me. He ruined my life.
Arching a brow, Shade slowly squatted in front of my recliner. The way
the light of the lamp fell on the side of his face should have been illegal.
How was it fair that he looked like that?
“Then why are you here?”
He looked genuinely curious.
No—he looked like a god staring up at me with those wide puppy eyes
just now, asking me to willingly surrender my soul to him, and I was about
to fucking say yes.
Ugh.
I looked down at the book on my lap but didn’t actually see anything.
“Because I had no choice.”
Again, he didn’t hesitate. “How so?”
“I was two days away from my eighteenth birthday when the Iriade
found me, so my guardian decided for me. He signed the papers.” I
shrugged. “Here I am.”
Suddenly, he looked confused. “May eighteenth,” he said. “I saw you in
your window that night after midnight. That was your birthday?” I knew
he’d been watching me from the temples while the others sacrificed to the
gods. I could have sworn I felt his eyes on me even then.
I nodded. “Talk about cutting it close, right?” I tried to joke. It’s what I
always did to make things hurt less. It never actually worked, but I was still
trying.
“Have you pledged your allegiance to any of the students?” he asked me
next.
“No, of course not,” I said, way too fast. But just the idea of it freaked
me out.
His head leaned to the side a bit as he analyzed me. I wanted to look
down at my book again so badly, but whatever spell he put on me when he
looked at me like that didn’t let me.
“So, how did you know about the nymph trees and the snakes?”
Shivers rushed down my back. “I know a lot about the gods,” was all I
could say.
Moving a bit closer to me, he whispered, “Where did you fall from,
Snowflake?” He’d asked me that the very first time he saw me in the
courtyard, too.
Right now, he looked so damn fascinated, so curious, I almost spilled all
my guts out to him.
Good thing I had the sense to stop myself and smile. “California.”
He returned it, then shook his head and stood up. I thought he’d go back
to his recliner, or even leave the room altogether, but instead he went over
to the other side, to a half-hidden shelf at the corner, then searched the
spines for a moment. When he found what he was looking for, he came
back and put a book on the small round table at my side.
“Don’t get distracted. The Academy students are mean. They have to be
—that’s the point of them being here. It’s to show you that it won’t be easy.
Just pay attention,” he said.
 I grabbed the book—Tales of the Clever and Cunning Mortals of the
Nineteenth Century—the hardcover a dark brown, the letters embossed in
gold.
“I do pay attention,” I muttered.
Suddenly, Shade put his hands on the armrests of my recliner and leaned
closer until he was right in front of my face.
Move! the voice of reason shouted in my head. I needed to move—why
the hell wasn’t I moving?
Don’t look at his lips, don’t look at his lips, don’t look at his lips…
I looked at his lips.
“You don’t,” Shade whispered, and my toes curled in my shoes. His
index finger was under my chin, and I was already raising my head to meet
those lips with mine…
I do, I should have said, but my vocal cords didn’t work and the way he
looked at me made me want to stand perfectly still just to be stared at by
those stormy eyes forever, but…
“Now get to work,” Shade said and suddenly moved away.
The disappointment swallowed me whole long before he went back to
his recliner and sat down, disappearing from my view.
Damn him—and my body for reacting to him the way it did. Whatever
he was doing to me, it was much more dangerous than the Elysean trials. I
really needed to learn how to control myself with him.
Eventually, I got my shit together and read the book he brought me. I’ll
admit, the stories were very good. I appreciated his help, and I was going to
say so when I was done. But I must have fallen asleep on that recliner at
some point because, when I woke up, Shade wasn’t there.
When I woke up, I was in my room with the sun shining on my face.
And for reasons I would not allow myself to think about at all, I smiled.
“Y .”
I reached for the small yellow stone in my back pocket and threw it at
Eeda when she showed up by the stairs with her laundry cart.
“Oh!” she said, catching it right away—she looked a bit too old to have
reflexes so fast, but what did I know about Elyseans?
Well, actually, I knew a lot more now than I did last morning. Having
read about them for hours, I knew plenty.
Like the fact that Eeda here, who was houseless, came from families
and descendants who hadn’t wanted to submit to the rule of the main ones
—Zeus, Poseidon, Hera, and Hades. They didn’t marry among one another,
didn’t save power, and there were a lot of different kinds of them out there,
all of them half as powerful as the Elyseans from the main Houses.
“Thank you, dear. I was wondering where this disappeared to,” Eeda
said, slipping the yellow stone in the pocket of her grey dress. “You look
okay. Have you eaten?”
We grabbed the cart together—yep, heavier than yesterday. Just like I
expected.
“Not yet. Woke up late today. I wanted to help you and return that stone
first.”
The way she looked at me made me uncomfortable. “My dearest Sera,”
she whispered like I said the best thing she’d ever heard in her life.
I hated moments like this. So awkward—like what the hell do I do?
“No biggie, really. But I gotta run now,” I said, just as we put the cart
down on the hallway of the second floor. “My Iriade brought me the date of
the second trial this morning. It’s in three days.”
“I heard,” Eeda said with a nod. “Are you better prepared this time?
“I think so,” I said, trying not to panic. I really was better prepared this
time…wasn’t I?
“Good. Now hold on a moment.” She reached for that same pocket and
handed me something—a small rock, grey, very ordinary looking.
 “What’s that?” And why was she giving me a rock?
“Don’t let the looks of it fool you, dear,” she said. “This is what I call a
transmitter. It’s a magical object that enables us to communicate with
whomever we want through our minds.”
“You’re joking.” I raised my palm and she put the rock in the middle of
it.
“Not at all. You’d have to be within eyesight with that person, though.
Otherwise it won’t work,” Eeda said. “It’s also undetectable by anything—
even the Daedalus Dome won’t catch it. There are plenty of spells to fool
that Dome, but you won’t need magic for this. It’s the only thing I have to
thank you.”
“But you don’t have to. This must cost a lot—you should save it.” I
tried to give it back, but she raised her hands.
“Nonsense. I want you to have it,” she said and winked at me. “Stay
strong. And remember—nothing in this place is ever what it seems.”
Her words stayed with me even after I made it to the Midas Hall to find
Maia talking to Elaine, though both their plates were empty.
Only three of the Elysean students sat at their table, though: Amelia
with her sketchbook; Blair, playing with her hair, looking as bored as ever;
and David tapping his magic wand to the corner of the book he was reading.
None of them paid me any attention, but both Maia and Elaine smiled at
me when I approached. I was thankful for it—friendly faces were what I
needed to see after the past few nights. And what they told me was even
better.
“Apparently, a Hedone descendant who works in the kitchen cast the
spell and she refuses to say why. She made it so that whoever the Elyseans
already had feelings for would be amplified to incredible proportions,”
Elaine whispered. “I knew it—didn’t I? I told you that Denis has a thing for
me. I knew it!” And she laughed.
She hadn’t been laughing at all last morning.
 “You sure about that?” I asked because I wouldn’t have held my breath
over Lorenzo having any kind of feelings for me other than pure hatred.
But then Shade…
“A hundred percent. I heard Madam Carmine tell Angel with my own
ears,” Elaine said.
My cheeks flushed bright scarlet.
“Did you get anyone?” Maia suddenly asked me.
“Um…no. No, I just saw Elaine to her room, then went to mine.” Right
after I was almost assaulted by Lorenzo, then kissed Shade like I wanted
him to get under my skin.
Ugh.
“Me neither. I’d have been so freaked out,” Maia said. “I’m just glad the
effect is gone and they caught the woman who did it. Angel said they were
making sure it would never happen again, thank the gods.”
“Yeah,” I breathed, nodding. “Yeah, totally.”
The prick had lied to my face—Elyseans have a weakness for beautiful
things. Yeah, right. He definitely liked me—and never mind how that made
me feel just now. I was ignoring that part completely, and I already couldn’t
wait to rub it in his face when I went to the library today.
Would he even be there?
Of course, he would—he was never anywhere else. He didn’t hang out
with anyone else, either.
But when I finished breakfast and told the girls that I was going back to
my room to rest, I went straight for the library, intending to spend the whole
day in there. The doors were unlocked, the books all in place just like I left
them. But Shade wasn’t there, and the table by his recliner which had held
three books last night was empty.
“Hello?” I called anyway when I closed the door. Some lamps were on,
but apparently there were no windows in this place because it was still as
dark as if it were nighttime.
 Nobody answered. Shade was definitely not here.
I fought the disappointment as I went back to the end of the room, to the
same recliner where I’d sat last night. Where I’d apparently slept, too,
before Shade took me to my room somehow.
When I saw the small plate on the side table, I almost had a heart attack.
On it was a chocolate cupcake as big as my fist, with pink icing on top
and colorful sprinkles shaped like small snowflakes all over. A purple
candle was in the middle of it, and the words Happy Birthday were written
on the plate with chocolate.
I sat on the recliner and the second I grabbed it in my hands, a small
flame lit up the tip of the candle, making me laugh. That little fire didn’t
scare me. That one I actually liked.
“Make a wish,” I told myself, and with my eyes closed, I held the
cupcake to my chest for a moment. Then, I blew out the candle and held
back a couple tears.
“Elysean prick,” I whispered, smiling so wide my cheeks hurt.
I ate the cupcake slowly, savoring every bite, committing it to my
memory. Definitely the best cake I’d ever had, and I was sad when there
was no more left. I licked the chocolate off the plate, too, until it was
perfectly clean, feeling brand new somehow, like I was finally, truly
eighteen.
Then, I got to work.
 21

“Love is not peaceful. Love is a thunderstorm that shall not leave a stone untouched
in your mind and body when it is felt right. Love is alive.”

—Eros: the Burden of Love, 300

by Sherida Marquise, House Opal

Shade didn’t come back.

They said he’d been called to the Academy for something, so for three
days and three nights, I went to that library by myself and waited, and he
never showed up. Rather disappointing to be expecting to see him every
time I went through those doors.
So disappointing to be disappointed, too. These trials had made me lose
my damn mind for real. How I missed him must have been a trick or a spell
or something—how could it be real when I knew what he was?
And now, I was standing in front of the judges at the Daedalus Dome,
waiting to enter the second trial already.
Forgive me if I still can’t believe that this is actually my life.
 Closing my eyes, I focused on breathing, focused on controlling the
shaking of my hands. The sounds of the audience, of Elliot and Angel
speaking in their microphones, of Elaine at my side—Elaine who didn’t
hate me anymore.
It’s going to be okay, I said to myself, and my biggest flaw had always
been that I never really figured out how to lie to myself. So, of course, I
didn’t believe it.
“…by the judges. Isn’t that exciting?” Elliot was saying.
Focus! I shouted at myself in my mind, and slowly the black dots in my
vision disappeared. I saw Elliot’s face with semi-clarity again.
He stood proud in his dark green shimmery suit, the emerald attached to
his thick, strange tie. He looked impeccable, just like always, so perfectly
hiding who he truly was with that face.
And Angel wore a sparkly pale pink dress that fell on her thighs and
demanded all your attention. No gemstones on her, only golden chains
decorating her long neck. That’s because she was houseless. I wondered
which god’s bloodline she came from. I wondered if she could do magic.
I wondered if Eeda could, too.
So easy to get distracted in my head.
“Oh, so exciting—all of you who manage to get through this trial will
be right here, at the Palace’s open doors, to greet your families, your
friends, your loved ones,” Elliot continued.
Miles. I was going to see Miles if I made it out of this one.
Open doors, he said—I could actually walk out of this place if I was
careful. I could be free.
My eyes searched the applauding crowd sitting on the benches behind
the judges just like last time, except this time there were a lot more
Elyseans there. The Iriades flying over our heads were more vocal than last
time, too. They wouldn’t stop with the chirping.
 I still searched, even though I knew Shade wouldn’t be there, so
desperate to see his face at this point it was kind of pathetic. Someone must
have really done something to me—a spell, just like the Hedone one. A
spell, nothing more.
“…but make no mistake,” Elliot was saying—so hard to keep focus.
“We’re watching. We’re always watching. The gods will be watching, too—
so make sure you entertain them, my dear mortal friends!”
The audience cheered. I was halfway into rolling my eyes when I
noticed someone staring back at me, someone from the other side of the
benches.
Someone with eyes made out of smoke, with clean-shaven skin, with
dark hair half combed behind his head, half of it loose on his forehead.
I forgot to breathe.
Shade was standing on the left of the benches, barely a few feet away
from the crowd, hands behind his back, eyes on me.
Holy shit, he was back.
For the first time since I first saw him, his shirt was grey, not black. And
the way it made his skin look a bit darker, and his eyes a bit lighter, was not
fucking fair. I was staring, but not only that—he could tell I was breathless.
That’s why the corner of his lips turned up a bit, the asshole.
“…your attention is appreciated,” Elliot was saying, his voice piercing
right through me.
My cheeks heated up when I found him looking right at me. Fuck—
could they all tell I was staring like a goddamn idiot?
“It is the second trial. The Daedalus Dome is ready. Our leaders have
been hard at work for days to prepare it for you. How about an applause for
them?”
The crowd clapped, and so did the candidates at my sides. Again, I felt
Elliot’s eyes on me, but if they thought they could get me to thank them for
creating a death trap and putting me in there against my will, they had
another think coming. I kept my hands to my sides and my eyes ahead until
they were done congratulating these monsters for coming up with clever
ways to kill us. Yay for them.
“This trial is a bit different from the first, but it will also have two parts.
You have to complete the first to gain access to the second,” Elliot said.
“Your focus, your knowledge and your ability to learn, your cunning will be
tested—but that is not all.” He raised a finger and waited a heartbeat. “The
trial will also test your agility—and your ability to make decisions under
stress and in a limited timeframe.” The audience seemed to love that by the
way they cheered.
“What you have to remember going in there is that everything will
require your attention. It is of utmost importance that you know your
surroundings at all times, my dear mortal friends, for this trial is, if I dare
say, quite deadly.”
My traitorous eyes moved to Shade again. Just like always, I found him
watching me. For whatever fucked up reason, that gave me comfort. It
calmed me down. I’d been in the library. I’d read everything I could read in
those three days. About gods and about Elyseans, I’d read story after story,
so many of them my mind buzzed. I was prepared this time. I wasn’t going
in completely clueless. I was a bit more hopeful that I could walk out of that
Dome again, alive.
Shade’s expression was unreadable. His jaws were locked, his
unblinking eyes two storms brewing. If I actually managed to escape from
this place tonight when they opened the Palace gates after the trial, I was
going to miss that stupid perfect face of his more than I even knew.
“The first part is the simple part—you will have to find a token of your
god—it matters little what it is. But you have to find it before you can get
through to the second part. Find your token, and your way will be free—
well…” Elliot turned to the audience with a sneaky smile I wanted to slap
off his face. “Not exactly free if I’m being honest.” The audience laughed.
“But that is it. That is all I can say to you about the trials at this time, my
dear mortal friends,” he said because he couldn’t pass up an opportunity to
tell us what we were—mortals—even when he called us friends. The way
he grinned made my stomach twist and turn in an awful way. I remembered
him in the limo that night perfectly fine.
“Just like last time, you will not be allowed anything with you inside the
Dome, I’m afraid. So please, empty your pockets now, before it’s too late,”
Elliot said, and I could have sworn that everyone knew I had that small rock
in the pocket of my leather pants, the one Eeda had given me. I almost
stepped forward to tell them all about it—I hated lying so much. It made
everything so unpredictable.
But none of the other candidates moved, and so I stayed put, too. They
all had pledged allegiance to the Elysean students, and they would most
definitely have stuff in their pockets, just like some of them had had
matches last time. So I’d keep the rock. I’d trust Eeda.
To our side, the doors of the Dome opened slowly, revealing nothing but
pure darkness on the other side, just like last time. Goose bumps broke all
over my skin.
“Such incredible candidates we have this year, right?” said Elliot, and
the crowd cheered once more. “None of them breaks the rules, not even
once.” He laughed like he actually really believed what he was saying.
“Cunning Ethan, brave Erica, tempered Emily, and Marie, who spends
more time praying than most, sacrificing to the gods, learning so much
about our ways every day…” Elliot said. I risked a glance to the side. The
four of them whose name he’d mentioned were beaming, while the rest—
especially Nick—were looking like they might break something any
second.
Please don’t say my name, please don’t say my name, please don’t say
my name…I prayed, only because I knew he’d have something humiliating
to say about me. Yes, I hated these people, but the feeling was definitely
mutual. For most, at least.
Lucky for me, Elliot didn’t mention anybody else’s name before he
turned to us again. “I’ve only got one question left to ask you now.” He
spoke with so much enthusiasm you’d think he was talking about a
goddamn miracle. “Do you have what it takes to be gods?!”
The crowd exploded into applause. Everyone was so damn excited to be
watching us. They would transmit most of what happened inside the Dome
on the large screen at our back across from the benches. Not that it made a
difference, though.
When Elliot and Angel began to call our names, my body was light as a
feather, like I really believed I was in a dream, not the real world. Like I
believed I wasn’t really here, not really about to enter a deadly trial that
might kill me for good. Except my name was being called and I had no
choice but to step forward, looking at Shade one last time. I could have
sworn he nodded his head a bit.
The judges watched me. They no longer expected me to bow to them. I
walked toward the darkness of the Dome with my head up, praying I
survived to see sunlight again.
 22

The new gods fought the monster Typhon in a long and bloody battle, until most of the
earth had withered. At last, when the Typhon pulled a mountain from the ground to
hurl at Zeus, the young god struck it with the thunderbolts the Cyclopses had gifted
him, and the ruins of the mountain trapped the monster underneath.
To this day, the furious Typhon spits his fire from the tip of it.
His mate, Echidna, escaped with her life, hiding in a cave to protect Typhon’s ugly
offspring—Chimera, Hydra, Sphinx, and the Nemean Lion among them.

—Book of Creation, 6th Edition, 603

by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

The sun inside the Dome was already setting, even though it was noon in
the outside world. But this place was a world of its own, apparently,
whatever the creators of it wanted it to be. And this time, it wasn’t a
freezing forest.
I was standing at the bottom of a low hill, atop which was a castle made
out of light grey stone, with two pointy towers with grey flags on them. To
the sides, large dense woods stretched as far as the eye could see, the green
merging beautifully with the greyish blue sky as if they were one—a work
of art rather than real. Behind the castle, I could barely make out snow-
tipped mountains in the distance, and the sun retreating behind them. The
air was warm, calm, and the smell of pine filled my nostrils, calming me
like a charm.
I let go of a long breath—it was actually nice to be here.
The candidates who’d already entered the Dome looked at one another,
at me, at the castle. The next one came through behind me from the pitch-
black darkness, and I stepped to the side to make way for Pablo with the
curly hair, who had yet to say a word to me, but he had never insulted me,
either.
Wind blew to the side, making goose bumps erupt all over my arms. It
should have felt unnatural, knowing it was probably made by Elyseans, but
it didn’t. It felt just like normal wind.
A couple of minutes later, all fourteen of us were inside. We couldn’t
see or hear if the doors behind us closed, but we were all alone. I looked at
Maia, and she nodded as if to say she was okay. Good. I would be, too. At
least for the first part of the trial. It shouldn’t be hard to find the token.
“See you on the other side, losers!” called Ethan with a wide grin on his
pale face. He had something in his hands already, but I couldn’t see what it
was. Cunning, indeed.
“Race you there, sucker,” said Marie, both of them in the best mood,
probably because Elliot had spoken their names. They all started running up
the hill to the castle walls together.
So did I.
Most of them had something with, something that the Dome should
have recognized when they walked through, just like the stone Eeda had
given me that was still in my pocket. They’d all been smart to make
alliances with the Elysean students. Their chances of surviving here today
were much better than mine.
 By the time we made it to the gates of the castle, most of them had
already employed the help they had brought with. Maya had something
with her, too—chocolate. She had chocolate and a small match, and she was
already kneeling on the mowed grass to set it on fire as a sacrifice.
A couple others had food, too, and plenty of other things. In Ethan’s
hands had been two small insects of some kind, like large flies that buzzed
almost identically. He released them from his fists and cheered as they flew
up the gates and to the castle. Would they find the token for him while he
stayed down here, perfectly safe from whatever this trial might have in store
for us? Quite possibly.
Sweat beads on my forehead. Another girl, Donna with the ash blonde
hair, had a piece of paper with her, and when she opened it and read the
contents in a whisper, sparks flew from it like tiny fireworks, and they shot
into the dark grey sky before they slipped right over the castle gates and
disappeared. The girl laughed.
“Let’s open those things,” said Marie, and the rest of them ran to the
gates. I followed, feeling smaller by the second. They all seemed to know
exactly what they were doing, and it freaked me out.
Maybe I should have made deals with those students, too. Maybe I
should have swallowed my fucking pride and made deals with Jasper or
Lorenzo or even goddamn Amelia. I shouldn’t have relied on books alone,
not when I had no clue what the trial would even be.
Too late now.
Breathe, I told myself, taking in the castle in front of me. It wasn’t big,
but the towers were tall, at least a hundred feet in the air. The others were
going through the wooden doors atop the stone stairs, following their flies
and their fireworks and whatever else they had help from. They’d probably
find their tokens in no time. How the hell was I going to find mine? Who
was my god? How would I even know?
 Cursing under my breath, I ran inside the castle, too. A long corridor
was ahead, and they were all running, all cheering, all calling to one another
to hurry up, race me, you’re going to die, loser!
They were having fun.
Meanwhile I was begging my body not to let go.
As soon as we reached the round hall at the end of the corridor, they all
spread out up the three wide stairways on the other side of the hall. Wooden
floors and stone block walls, torches burning on them. Empty tables and
chairs scattered all over, and a large piece of fabric hung on the wall
between the first two stairways, dark brown with four coats of arms sewn in
golden threads, shaped exactly like the godstones. A ruby, a sapphire, an
emerald and an opal—the Houses. I could have sworn I saw them before in
Idaea when we were exploring with Miles, but back then I’d had no clue
what they were.
Footsteps echoed in my head as the others ran up the wooden stairs, and
I still analyzed the ground floor of the castle, searching the high stone
ceiling for cameras or anything else that didn’t look like it would belong
there. I couldn’t see anything other than cobwebs in the corners and spiders
crawling close by. I was not going to let a damn spider come anywhere near
me this time. Fuck that. The snakes had been more than enough—I would
not be asking a spider for help today.
“It’s okay,” I told myself, going for the middle stairway. I realized that
people would be watching, and it wasn’t a good look to talk to myself, but
screw them. Screw all of them to all hells. “It’s fine. I’ll turn over every
stone in this place until I find whatever they left here for me. I don’t need
tricks—I just need to pay attention,” I whispered under my breath. Pay
attention, know your surroundings—that’s what Shade said. And despite
knowing who and what he was, I trusted him with all my heart.
A , if not more. I was in one of the rooms on the
third and last floor of the castle—there were countless of them, almost all of
them the same. No token for me yet, but others had found theirs. I heard yet
another candidate run down the stairs, cheering because they’d found what
they needed to find, and I was losing hope with every new room I entered.
Nothing in any of them. I had no choice but to climb the first tower.
A spiral stairway went up and up and up until I couldn’t feel my quads
anymore. Sweat lined my forehead and soaked the back of my shirt. A
goddamn token. How was I supposed to find anything in this place made
out of wood and stone and not even a single clue as to what I was to find
exactly, and where it could be hiding?
But when I finally climbed all the way to the top of the tower, I froze in
place.
The room was wide and round, a large opening on the wall that showed
the mountains and the setting sun at the castle’s back—the sun that seemed
to be stuck in the same place even though I’d been in here a long time.
There were axes and spears and swords mounted on the walls, and a man
sat cross-legged in the middle of the room, facing the opening on the wall
and the setting sun.
“Hello?” I said, moving to the other side so he could see me, and I him.
So I could see who he was and if he could help me.
The man had his eyes closed, breathing even. His wild dark hair was
held back by a brown leather tie, the same fabric that was wrapped around
his hips, too. He was a very hairy guy and had a wooden pendant resting
against the long hairs of his chest, but nothing else was on him. His hands
were raised toward the sun, and they sometimes moved to the sides only
slightly—the only indication that he was actually awake.
“Um…hi,” I tried again, waving my hand in front of his face. He didn’t
move a single muscle. “I’m Sera, one of the candidates in the trials. I was
wondering if you could help me out with something?” I spoke slowly as if I
thought he might not understand me.
If he even heard my voice, he didn’t react at all.
“Heeellooo,” I called a bit louder, going even closer, just in case he was
really asleep. I even clapped my hands real hard, and the sharp sound would
have woken anyone up.
This guy gave me nothing. His closed eyes didn’t even twitch.
“Great,” I muttered with a sigh, and sat down on the floor just to rest for
a minute. I was tired—I’d been searching the castle for so long. I wondered
if everybody else was gone already, if they’d all found what they needed to
find. Was I really going to be the only one stuck in here for…how long
exactly?
The wind blew harder against my back, just as the guy turned his right
hand all the way until his knuckles faced the sun, then back again. I was
wearing the milky white leathers of the uniform, but I still felt the bite of
the cold. It stopped coming three seconds later, and only a slow breeze blew
the strings of hair that had fallen from my ponytail to the side—just as the
man sitting there turned his left hand slowly.
How strange that his hands moved just as the wind did.
Pay attention, Shade’s voice in my head said as I analyzed the man
again, his face full of rough edges, cheeks covered in a dark beard as wild
as his hair, his pendant against his chest, engraved with a figure I had to
focus hard to make out.
Swirly lines came together to form what first seemed like a cloud to me
but wasn’t. I’d seen something similar in one of the books I read just two
nights ago, and the memory was perfectly clear in my mind still.
“The Wind Keeper,” I whispered to myself. I’d heard the story before. It
was actually one of my favorites—of how the winds had brought on the
destruction of the world at the request of Zeus and how he then chose a
wind keeper to make sure that all four winds never stormed together to
destroy the rebuilt world again.
“The mortal.”
It was all I could do to hold back the scream that built up in my chest at
the sound of the voice.
The guy sitting on the floor not five feet away from me had opened his
eyes and I hadn’t even noticed. Fuck.
“Hi,” I said, and even that little whisper broke as I forced myself to
smile. “Hi, hello. So sorry to wake you up.”
“Greetings,” the man said, not bothering to smile, just looking at me
like he couldn’t even see my face. Like he was a damn robot. “You know
my name. I know yours,” he added, like that was supposed to mean
something to me.
“Right,” I said with a nod. “The…erm, the pendant”—I pointed at my
chest, looking at his—“the pendant gave you away.” He said nothing, just
stared ahead. “Right, so…” I cleared my throat and sat up straighter. “I just
have a question for you—I was told to find a token of my god somewhere
in this place. You wouldn’t happen to know where it is, would you?”
“There is a story,” he said, as if he’d learned the words by memory and
he was now reciting them to me. “Of Prometheus, who stole fire from the
gods to give to man.”
I blinked at him. “Are you…are you saying it’s Prometheus? Because
no offense, but he was actually a titan.”
The guy continued to speak as if I hadn’t said a single word. “There is a
story—of Prometheus, of how he taught man to trick the gods.” I was going
to ask again, but he didn’t give me the chance. “There is a story—of
Prometheus cast in unbreakable adamantine, chained at the top of the
mountain.”
“Where the eagle came and ate his liver every day—yes, I know the
story. Is Prometheus my god then?”
 The man couldn’t care less that I spoke. “And so goes the story: chained
at the top is where he shall be found.”
Damn. “Top of the mountain?” Was he kidding me? I was supposed to
climb a fucking mountain?
“Chained at the top is where he shall be found,” the guy repeated, and
suddenly, his eyes glazed over as he looked at me. “Quick. Now, before he
awakens.”
What the… “Who?”
“The guardian,” the guy said, and just like that, he closed his eyes and
raised his hands again.
“Hello?” Slowly, I stood up and went closer. “That’s it—that’s all
you’re going to tell me?” I waited. Not a peep, just the wind blowing at my
back. “Who the hell is the guardian?!”
The man didn’t even flinch.
Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath and turned to the missing wall, to
the permanently setting sun, the damn mountains in the distance. Was I
really supposed to go all the way there, climb one of them—there were
eight—and find Prometheus chained to it?
Chained at the top is where he shall be found.
The mountains were too far. No way could I walk all the way to them
and survive without food and water. It would likely take days, if not weeks.
I looked up at the sky again, barely any stars visible in it. I was hoping
to find a constellation to point me in the right direction like last time—I’d
read a lot about them the past few days—but there was nothing there, even
though I was at the top of the tower. If there was something out there, I’d
have seen. I would have seen something, but…
The thoughts in my head came to a halt. Top of the tower.
I looked up at the stone wall over my head. Was it possible that my
token was at the top of this tower instead of a mountain?
 My legs shook as I stepped on the stone ledge, reaching for one of the
metal hooks on the wall meant for holding weapons. I made the mistake of
looking down and I almost screamed again—we were so, so high.
Incredibly high off the ground, definitely a hundred feet at the very least.
I slipped back inside, barely breathing. “You sure you can’t help me out
here?!” I shouted at the Wind Keeper still sitting on the floor, but he didn’t
even blink his eyes.
Cursing under my breath, I closed mine and stepped onto the ledge
again, determined not to look down for any reason this time. The wind
blew, strong for a second, then soft against my side. I kept my head up,
trying to see the tip of the tower. Lucky for me, the stone blocks were old
and full of holes and sharp edges, so I was able to hold on perfectly until
half my body was outside the tower. My heart almost beat out of my chest.
Every instinct in me screamed to get inside, move, get off the wall—I was
not goddamn Spiderman! But I reached out as far as I could anyway, until I
caught a glimpse of the pointy tip of the tower.
Chains glistened under the orange light of the setting sun, wrapped
around the very top. And among them, I could barely see something
shining, something small, something that most definitely shouldn’t have
been chained to a tower.
My token.
Slipping back into the room, I forced myself to calm down, asked the
Wind Keeper for help again, and he ignored me just as well as he did every
other time. I searched the weapons, every inch of the room, but there were
no ropes or stairs or anything at all, which meant I had no way of getting up
there except to climb.
Funny because the only things I’d ever climbed were trees when I was a
kid and when I snuck out of Gary’s house to go meet James and Layla. I
had never climbed fucking towers before.
 “You can do it,” I told myself. I didn’t believe it for a second, of course,
but I had no other choice but to try. And if I fell…
Well, at least I’d die from the fall, and not from starvation.
Teeth gritted and my resolve stronger than ever, I took the smallest knife
I could find mounted on those walls, and I stepped onto the ledge again.
I thought being held down by snakes was the worst thing I’d ever
experience in my life. I was dead wrong. To be out there with the wind
beating at my back, limbs shaking and aching as I climbed up the rough
surface of the pointy rooftop beat everything else I’d ever done. I forgot
about everything, everyone, even the point of this stupid climb that was
most likely going to cost me my life, and just focused on where I could hold
onto next, where I could stick the blade of the knife to help me climb faster.
An eternity must have passed. Every inch of me was covered in sweat,
and the wind howling near my ear was the only encouragement I had.
But somehow, I made it. Somehow, I climbed the stone blocks all the
way to the tip of the tower, to the strange chains wrapped around it. They
weren’t made of iron like I first thought. No, the chains were a dark grey,
almost matte, and the feel of them was different from iron. Adamantine, the
Wind Keeper had called it.
I’d read about that, or maybe even heard it from Miss Aldentach. It was
supposed to be a metal alloy as strong as the gods, which Gaea used to
forge a scythe to beat her husband Uranus, and then Zeus chained
Prometheus with it, too. Fiction, but here it was, wrapped around a small
figure that seemed to have been carved out of bone. It was white and it was
dirty, shaped like a head with only half a face engraved on it.
Holding onto the knife I’d stuck between two stone blocks with one
hand, I reached for it with the other. My feet didn’t slip—I was basically
lying on my stomach, so gravity helped plenty—and I closed my fingers
around the figure.
 Nothing happened. No lightning struck me. No fire burned me. But
something was engraved on the bottom of the strange figure—the outline of
a flame.
Goose bumps on my skin. It had to be it. This thing belonged to
Prometheus, and he was the god—or titan—I was supposed to find.
I found it. I had actually found the token, and I was still alive.
Laughter bubbled out of me as I slowly put the figure in my pocket. All
I had to do now was keep not looking down and get back inside the tower.
Then, I could figure out how to get the hell out of the Dome and call it a
day. Easy.

A would have been if the ground didn’t shake with a deafening

roar the very next second.
 23

“Death is the price and the prize.”

—Kingdom of the Dead, Volume II, 97

by Phylis Petra, House Opal

The tower shook. It was all I could do to keep from slipping.

The roar came from much closer the second time, and then I heard the
other sound, too—like large wings beating. I almost passed out right there
on the rooftop.
The creature flew up from the other side of the tower, revealing himself
to me in all its glory, beating his enormous wings as it took over the sky,
letting out that incredible roar once more.
A goddamn dragon half the size of the fucking castle.
My eyes closed on instinct. I held onto the chains at the tip of the tower,
every muscle in my body locked tightly. I wished the thing away with all
my being, hoping he would fly off to wherever he had come from and
ignore me just like the Wind Keeper had. It must have been the guardian
he’d warned me about. I’d expected a man or a dog or something—but an
actual dragon?! You’ve got to be shitting me.
As if he could read the thoughts in my head, the dragon roared once
more. It all happened so fast the world around me turned to a blur. He was
behind me, right there, roaring at me, and I turned my head to look at him
just in time to see the large claws coming for me.
I moved on instinct.
Letting go of the chains, I held onto the handle of the knife still stuck
between the stone blocks and I moved to the side, missing the dragon’s
curved claws by an inch. They sank into the stone instead. The tower
groaned like it was in pain. Stone broke, blocks falling inside. Three
seconds later, half the rooftop had caved in, and the dragon flew up in the
air once more.
He was large—probably over a thousand pounds, his scales a deep
green that shimmered golden under the sunlight, his membranous wings the
same color, spanning at least twenty feet. His tail was long and pointy, too,
and both his front and back legs were tipped with razor sharp claws as big
as my head.
Once more he roared as he lowered to the ground, circled the castle,
then came up again—for me.
My instincts were in charge of my body now, so I didn’t need to think
about what I was doing—I couldn’t if I tried. I just pulled the small knife
off the wall and I reached for the edge of the caved roof, hoping to climb
right inside the tower through the massive hole.
But the roaring dragon reached out his claws for me again. I screamed
as I ducked, nearly slipped off the rooftop completely, and a claw grazed
my back from one shoulder to the other before the dragon flew away. I was
bleeding but the pain never reached me, the adrenaline erasing every trace
of it for now, giving me a chance to move.
 Except I must have pissed the dragon off because he no longer took his
time to lower to the ground and circle the castle. Instead, he came around
the tower again, then slammed his massive tail to the wall barely ten feet
below me. The tower shook and groaned. I held on with all my strength,
able to see the dragon through the corner of my eye as he circled around me
once more. The scream was stuck in my throat, nearly suffocating me, when
he turned his body slightly to the side and slammed against the tower with
all his strength.
The tower almost collapsed.
It was a miracle I managed to hold on, that my fingers didn’t slip while
pieces of stone fell all over the castle. The sound of it, the sight of it, the
feel of the wind at my side was surreal.
A dream. A fantasy. But I was going to die anyway because the tower
was slowly tipping to the side.
This time, I screamed with every fiber in me. Both my hands were
wrapped around the handle of that knife that was somehow still stuck
between two stone blocks. My shoes slipped and the tower kept on tilting to
the side until that knife was the only thing holding me up a hundred feet
into the air.
I was done for.
The dragon was going to eat me or incinerate me or just squash me to
death. I could tell he was waiting for me to fall as he circled the ruined
tower right below me, faster by the second. My life didn’t flash by me when
the knife began to slide out of the stone wall, or when my hands got too
slippery to hold onto the handle. I felt nothing, thought nothing, heard
nothing when once again my instincts took over, and I let go.
I let go just as the dragon was flying below me, waiting for me to fall,
and I landed right on his back.
My vision was blurry and dark after that, so I didn’t remember the
images, but I remembered the fear, the feel of his scales and the leather of
his wings under me. I remembered the pain. The sounds he let out.
His roar shook me to my core when he realized I was on his back, and
in an attempt to get me off, he slammed onto the other tower, too, knocking
it down easily. But his wings were at my sides and I held onto the talons on
top of them curved like hooks for as long as I could. The dragon lowered
toward the ground again, then tilted his body the same way he’s done
earlier, before he crashed right onto the castle’s wall.
No way in hell could I withstand the impact. I fell off the dragon’s back
and rolled and slammed against whatever was in my way, until I hit the
ground and kept on rolling for a few more times. White hot pain suffocated
me, more than I’d ever felt in my entire life. It took away every single one
of my senses, numbed my body, especially the left side of my waist. Every
inch of me was paralyzed and I couldn't even tell if I was breathing. I
couldn’t tell where I’d landed, where I’d stopped, if the dragon was roaring
again, coming for me.
All I could do was let go and pray the pain didn’t follow me wherever I
ended up, in this world or the next.

P . I breathed and it intensified, coming straight from my

left side, burning up every cell in my body.
The memories came to me slowly, as if my mind was reluctant to make
sense of them yet—and who could blame me? I’d actually seen a real-life
dragon, a monstrous creature that had almost killed me…had he?
Was I dead?
I forced my eyes to open and saw light—orange light fell on my side,
the sky a dark blue-grey, the stars far and faded but there nonetheless. I
don’t know why it made me think of Shade. It made me miss him, too,
which was absurd, but I was not dead yet. I was still in the Dome. And
when I sat up, I found the source of the pain that paralyzed me completely
for a second.
I must have fallen on something sharp because the left side of my waist
was torn open, and I was bleeding. The leather vest and the shirt underneath
were ruined, too, and it hurt. My back hurt from where the dragon had
clawed me, but my side was so much worse. God, it hurt so much with
every single breath I took, but I was alive.
And I couldn’t hear the dragon’s roars anymore.
The castle was in ruins. The towers had fallen on the rest of the
building, causing it to collapse. Half the side of the circling wall, probably
where the dragon had slammed to get me off his back, was on the ground,
too. Pieces of broken rock everywhere I looked, but no soul in sight.
Where were the other candidates? Was the trial over already? Had they
made it out? Was I here all alone—and with that dragon?
What about the Wind Keeper—had he made it out before the dragon
came?
Questions filled my head, and pain filled my body, but I forced myself
to stand up anyway just to test my legs. They held me. My body was weak,
the side of my waist still bleeding, but I needed to move. I needed to find
my way out of this place before it was too late or before the dragon came
back.
So, I started walking around the ruins of the castle, as fast as I could
without doubling over from the incredible pain that shot throughout me
with every step.
It wasn’t long before I saw the shoe.
It was dirty and bloody and torn, and it was there among the ruins, all
by itself.
My heart skipped a long beat as my eyes searched the surrounding area,
already knowing what I was going to find—a body.
 I froze. A miracle I didn’t collapse as my unblinking eyes stopped on
the arm and leg I could see among the ruined rocks—rocks that had fallen
over…who? The hand was that of a man, but that’s about all I could make
out before my senses came back to me, and I moved.
Tears blurred my vision as the pain stabbed at me, but I didn’t stop
trying to push the goddamn rocks away.
“Hold on,” I told whoever was stuck under there. “Hold on, I’ll get you
out. I’ll get you out. I’ll get you out, just hold on…”
As if I couldn’t see that there was no way anybody could survive being
crushed by those huge rocks.
As if I couldn’t see that whoever it was under there was long gone.
I could—I just didn’t want to believe it. So, I kept trying and trying to
push the giant rocks away, never mind that I could barely move the small
ones. Never mind that I could hardly see from the tears, or that the side of
my waist was bleeding even more. Never mind that I collapsed a minute in.
Fuck, I couldn’t even see. I couldn’t see who it was, who had died under
those rocks. White leather pants and a white latex shirt—and that white
shoe a few feet away, but I couldn’t see their face. I had no clue whose body
was under the ruins.
So I cried and cried in silence, hoping my chest would get lighter so I
could breathe. Hoping the weight of this reality got off me somehow.
It didn’t. Nobody came—not the dragon, not another candidate. And
suddenly I didn’t want to see. If there was another body trapped in these
ruins, God, I didn’t want to see it. Too much. Way too much.
But I was going to die, too, if I didn’t keep moving.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered to the arm and leg sticking out of the rocks. I
was so, so sorry that I didn’t have the power to annihilate every fucking
Elysean in the world and save all of us from their cruelty masked as
generosity.
I was just sorry.
 And then I kept moving.
I set out for the mountains, toward the forever setting sun, because
where else could I go? It was the only direction I had. I kept my eyes
forward, refusing to see anything other than the ground and the forests and
the mountains. I passed trees and walked narrow paths between them,
through the forest and out in the open, through unusually silent meadows
and over small hills.
But the mountains never seemed to be closer.
Both my hands were on my wound, hoping to stop the bleeding before I
collapsed again, and I didn’t dare release the pressure for fear of what I
would see. I just kept going for what must have been hours but felt like
days to me, trying to distract myself from my own body, from the memory
of that arm and leg under the ruins, from my surroundings, with thoughts of
Miles and my friends. Thoughts of Shade and the way his kiss had felt.
Even here, even now, to think about it made my heart skip one too many
beats.
Hours later, I finally saw a strange shape behind a low hill east of where
I was walking. Once more I froze, the fear paralyzing me just as well as the
pain had. I recognized what it was—the wing of the dragon, the skin dark
green, the talons at the tip of it enormous.
But it wasn’t moving.
I waited, gave it plenty of time, but the wing looked like it was standing
upright, like it was detached from the dragon’s body, and never moved a
single inch.
Fear had become a constant in me by now, so I was used to it as I forced
myself to climb that hill, looking about me in hopes I’d find a snake or a
bug, any other living thing, even spiders—but there was none.
Just the dragon, dead on the ground.
My instincts warned me to move away, but I had to see better, so I went
closer. The dragon lay on its side, one wing up, the other crushed
underneath its body. Its jaws were open, its sharp teeth stained red. Its eyes
were closed, though, and there was a spear going through his chest that had
no doubt pierced his heart. The other wing, the one crushed underneath, was
torn, too, and swords and knives were around it on the bloodstained grass.
The same kind that had been mounted on the walls in that tower.
Had the Wind Keeper slayed the dragon?
Maybe the other candidates?
Either way, the relief was instant. It was bad enough that I had to walk
with this wound on me. I didn’t need to fear a winged beast coming to set
me on fire and eat me whole. It had already killed one of us.
God, I prayed with all I had that it was only one of us and not more.
So, I kept on going, the sun behind those mountains my destination. I
must have been on the right path if I found the dragon’s body, at least, so I
didn’t let myself stop.
I thought for sure it would be hours until I encountered something else
—if I did—but it wasn’t.
At first, I only heard the sound, but the deeper into the dark woods I
went, the more I could tell each time the ground shook as if by a massive
earthquake. It came every minute, like clockwork, though, which meant it
wasn’t an earthquake. Probably not another dragon, either.
When I was finally close enough that every groan and shake of the
ground threatened to make me lose my balance, I was at the edge of the
deserted woods, and I could just barely make out the other candidates on
the other side of the tree line. They had their backs turned to me, so they
hadn’t seen me yet, but they were there. Alive, all of them with their shoes
on.
An energy boost propelled me forward—I wasn’t alone. I’d found them.
The trial wasn’t over yet, and I wasn’t stuck here by myself. Tears in my
eyes—the happy kind for once. I never thought I’d be so happy to see
another human being alive and breathing before, but here we were.
 The moment I slipped out of the tree line and into the open, I saw why
the other candidates had their backs turned to the woods and what they were
looking at.
I’d come closer to the mountains than I’d realized. The large ones with
the sun at their back were still far, but two smaller ones were right in front
of me now, with yellowish rocks that went on for about fifty feet, before the
trees began. And in the valley between the mountains was a massive
boulder, almost perfectly round, the yellowish surface of it smoothed out—
and it moved. It rolled from one mountain to the other, slamming against
their sides, making the ground shake and groan—again and again and again.
It was almost as tall as that tower I’d fallen off, and by the looks of it, it
never stopped rolling.
“Maia,” I called when I saw her strawberry blonde curls among the
other candidates.
She turned together with everyone else, and they were all shocked at the
sight of me standing there. But the way Maia looked at me was like a knife
in my gut—in my already ruined side. Her eyes were wide and full of tears
as she took me in, probably noticing my wounds, but she didn’t move. She
didn’t come closer, didn’t wave, didn’t even smile.
All she did was shake her head.
I knew that same second that whoever she’d pledged allegiance to,
whichever Elysean students she’d chosen to work with and hadn’t told me
about, didn’t want her to come near me.
It hurt, I’ll admit, but the sting would pass, and I wouldn’t hold this
against her. After all, we were all trying to survive this thing. It wasn’t her
choice. She was smart to have accepted help from the Elyseans. Much
smarter than me—and it showed. She wasn’t dead under a pile of fucking
rocks. She wasn’t wounded. Her clothes were dirty but not torn. She wasn’t
bleeding anywhere that I could see.
 Most of them weren’t, but I only counted nine students in front of me.
Four girls and five boys. Isaac, Pablo, Elaine and Jessica were missing.
Who had the dead body belonged to, I wondered? Isaac or Pablo?
I was dying to tell Maia about it, if she’d only just come closer. But she
didn’t. She wouldn’t.
I dragged my feet forward anyway, choosing to deal with this after we
all got out of here.
“You look like the fucking dead,” said Nick, his face crisscrossed with
brand new wounds, some still bleeding. He and the others were all standing
twenty feet away from the boulder.
“Thanks—that’s exactly how it feels.” Except I wasn’t under the ruins
of that castle. Pressing my hands onto my wound harder, I winced in pain.
“What the hell is that thing?”
“That’s our way out,” Nick said.
“Out—yeah right,” said Marie from my side. “We’re never going to
make it through that valley fast enough.”
“Shut up, we will,” said Ethan, who was bleeding on his back almost as
badly as me, his leather vest gone, his white shirt now red with blood. Mine
probably looked the same. “We just have to figure out which event this is
from.”
“Jason,” said Nick. “Fucking Jason and his ship in the Black Sea. He
had to get through the clashing rocks just like this.”
“Sail,” I said, moving a bit closer, just as the boulder slammed against
the left mountain, then began to roll to the other side. “He sailed between
the clashing rocks. There’s no water there.” I knew the story of Jason, too,
how he and his ship of heroes had had to sail through the Black Sea and get
through two large clashing rocks that guarded the straits. But from what I
could see here, only a wide path between the mountains hid behind the
moving rock. No water, no ship, no nothing.
But the other candidates didn’t seem to agree with me.
 “We need a bird,” said Marie. Out of all of us, she was the most eager to
complete these trials and become Elysean—it had been her dream since she
was a girl. She told us at the party how she’d analyzed the trials with her
older sister every year, and she was better prepared for these challenges
than the rest of us.
But even she seemed to be stuck with this one.
“Remember—Jason used a bird of some sort to see if they could make it
to the other side in the story. Maybe the boulder isn’t as wide as it looks.
Maybe if we run really fast we can get to the other side of it—this could all
be just an illusion,” she said.
“Or maybe it will squash those stupid brains right out your skull
instead,” Ethan snapped.
“Where the fuck are we going to find a bird? This place is deserted. We
killed the dragon. Nobody else lives around here,” Nick said.
So they had killed the dragon. Even better.
I moved closer to the rolling boulder as they talked, flinching every time
it slammed against the mountains. It looked wide, too wide. Impossible to
get to the other side of it without it crushing me, even if I could run at my
full speed right now.
No, that couldn’t be the answer to this. Running to the other side wasn’t
possible.
For a moment, I wondered what Shade would say if he were here. I
wondered what I would do if he were here. I’d probably kiss him again, I
thought, mortified. But if I was going to die here today, might as well feel
like I was on top of the world for one last time, right?
Fortunately for me, Shade wasn’t here. He was out there, safe from the
cruelty of his own people, and I was here, safe—at least—from making a
damn fool out of myself again.
When my legs threatened to give, I sat on the ground to rest, unable to
look away from the boulder—it hypnotized me the way it rolled and rolled
with perfect accuracy each time. I tried to think up any story I knew that
had something like this happen in it, but the others were right—the story of
Jason was the only one that had clashing rocks in it.
“The dragon,” someone was saying—it could have been Maia. But I
was already lying on my side as I watched the boulder, and my lids were so
heavy. I’d lost so much blood, and I didn’t dare check if I was still bleeding.
Could be—I didn’t really feel anything anymore, just pain on my side. Pain
on my back.
“The answer is with the dragon. We should go back and gut it or
something,” the others were saying.
“I’m not going anywhere—what if the stupid boulder stops? We’ll miss
our shot,” said someone else.
“It’s not going to stop, you fool. If it did, we’d already be out of here!”
“Suck it, asshole! You think you’re smarter than me?!”
“This rock is smarter than you, you idiot!”
On and on they went. I couldn’t tell who was shouting anymore.
Darkness around me. My eyes closed, though the ground shook every
minute, and the sound of it filled my head completely.
Even through that, I focused on Shade’s stormy eyes that could have
been imprinted on the inside of my lids, and I fell asleep.
 24

At last, Gaea settled. She eventually healed from the Second War of Gods, grew her
mountains and her trees, filled her seas and her rivers again.
Here began Zeus’s undeniable rule as Lord of the Universe.
The Cyclopses, the great smiths, built a towering palace on the top of Mount
Olympus for the new gods, hidden in the clouds which the goddesses of the seasons
rolled away whenever a god desired to travel to earth. Only they were allowed
passage through the clouds, as it should be.

Peace finally reigned in the universe for the first time.

—Book of Creation, 6th Edition, 648

by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

My stomach growled worse than the mountains when beaten by that

boulder. I was so hungry I could barely stand, but I refused to sit down for
fear I’d sleep again. I’d slept plenty, or so it felt, and my wound hadn’t
closed. I was still bleeding out, only slower.
But when I woke up, I was all alone in front of the boulder, and I
thought the others had managed to find a way through and had left me
behind. They had at the castle. They left behind the other three, too—and
the candidate who’d died. Did they even know? Because I didn’t have the
guts to say those words out loud, not yet.
Right now, it didn’t matter anyway—of course they would leave me
behind. They probably had orders from the Elysean students, those twisted
psychos, not to help me or each other.
So, I panicked as I paced in front of the boulder, trying not to think
about my waist, the pain, the hunger, but then the others came back. They
hadn’t figured anything out, it seemed. They’d just gone searching the
woods for a bird because they still believed that this trial was inspired by
Jason’s story.
Needless to say, they came back empty-handed.
“Nothing. Not one damn living thing,” Donna spit, pushing her dirty
hair away from her face furiously. Just a few nights ago she’d looked like a
younger version of Monroe. Now look at her. Look at all of us—hungry,
wounded, one foot in the grave.
“I told you we should have gone back for the dragon sooner,” Marie
said. “Now we don’t even have food—do you realize we’ve been here at
least a day?!”
A day. It did sound right, according to the way my stomach growled.
“Perfectly good meat wasted,” she muttered.
“Where is the dragon?” I asked in half a voice.
“Gone,” Albert spit in a thick German accent, trying to pull his hair out
of his head. “It’s gone—it just disappeared!”
I met Maia’s eyes and the sorry in them made my insides twist
uncomfortably. She still refused to even come near me. I still pretended I
understood.
“We’re going to fucking starve,” said one, and just like that, they started
arguing again.
“It’s all your goddamn faults—how fucking stupid are you?!”
 “Shut up. If you knew anything, you’d have figured out a way across
already!”
“This isn’t fair. They said they’d help me get through—this isn’t fair! I
did everything they asked!”
“What the hell are they good for if they can’t even get us out of this
place?!”
“Pledge your allegiance, and I’ll keep you alive, they said. That’s
exactly what they said to me…”
They were crying. A few of them were crying because none of them had
any clue how we were going to get to the other side of that rock.
And neither did I.

S .
I barely saw the others as they separated into two groups—some
planned to go up the mountain on the left, some on the right, to see where
the boulder led and if there was a way around it. If they could walk all
around the mountain to get to the other side.
How much time had passed? I had no clue, but I kept passing out
randomly.
The good news was that I was no longer bleeding. My skin had closed
together, and though it looked awful, the pain had lessened a bit, too. Same
on my back, but all of it had drained me of my energy completely.
Add the fact that I was starving, and I could barely see the others as
they prepared, with the branches they’d carved into makeshift spears in
their hands, to climb up the mountains.
“Hey, you—godless!”
I turned to find Emily pointing her finger right at me. Funny, I’d always
associated that name with sweet little girls with blonde pigtails who loved
stuffed animals—like the little Emily from one of the foster homes I’d gone
through growing up. This Emily, though, had ginger hair and murder in her
eyes as she shouted at me.
“You should help, too,” she told me, and she was accusing me.
“She can’t even fucking stand. Don’t waste your time. We don’t need
her anyway,” Nick told her, trying to wipe his face, but the blood on his cuts
had dried and it didn’t budge.
“Fine,” the girl said. “But when we figure this out, you’re not coming
with.”
Was it possible that my spirit was so broken that I didn’t care anymore?
Because I didn’t even feel compelled to flip her the bird and give her a
piece of my mind at all.
Almost like I’d given up, which didn’t sit well with me.
I hadn’t, had I? I was just too weak, too hungry, fatigued from blood
loss. Not enough blood in my veins to help me think or see clearly, so that’s
why I had black dots in my vision almost all the time.
“Leave her alone,” Maia said to Emily, but she still refused to even look
at me.
None of them did while they spread out to the mountains and started
climbing.
Tears pricked the back of my eyes. I couldn’t go with them. I knew my
limits—I could barely walk fifteen minutes at a time on straight terrain.
Climbing with that wound on my side was out of the question, but what
other choice did I have?
I couldn’t stay here. I couldn’t stay here alone—what if there was
another dragon out there?
Worse yet, what if they really did find the way out, and I remained here
forever, all alone?
Climbing it is.
I went after the group on the right, with Nick, Emily, and Albert.
 Albert, who had tall limbs and was apparently very flexible, had almost
reached the trees up the mountain already. The rocks that made the bottom
part of it were pretty smooth. Not too many edges to hold onto. I tried,
anyway.
When they saw that I’d joined them, Nick and Emily turned to look
down at me. God, they were so different from that night at the party. I had
rarely seen them the past few days because I spent most of my time in the
second floor library, and I’d thought things weren’t that bad between us
anymore. I’d been wrong, it seemed. At least they didn’t comment, only
continued to climb. I did, too.
It had been easy at that tower—plenty of holes and sharp edges to keep
me steady. Here, the rocks were so smooth, and my waist hurt so much I
constantly felt like I was going to throw up. Except my stomach was empty,
so the only thing that made it up my throat was bile that seemed to burn my
tongue.
Block dots swam in my vision. My hands shook, my muscles refusing
to cooperate.
I was so close to the first tree line—the others had already disappeared
behind them—that I could have cried if I’d had the energy.
I could have cried because I knew that I wouldn’t make it even before I
slipped. My fingers were numb, my feet paralyzed. No way could I hold on
for even a second longer.
I hit the ground on my side—my good side, thank God—but the pain
still shocked my system. I rolled on my back and looked up at the sky,
trying to draw in air slowly when it felt like every bone in my body was
broken. I’d never been more thankful to pass out.

T .
 My sleep was restless, and not just because I was lying on the hard, cold
ground. The nightmares, the stories—spiders and snakes and wicked gods
throwing lightning at me, the sound of them like a twisted melody that took
root in my mind and refused to let go. Even the thought of Shade’s kiss, of
his body against mine, couldn’t warm me up anymore. It seemed like it had
never even happened, that kiss. Just a beautiful dream, and those always
slipped away from me eventually.
When I came to, I was all alone again. The others had disappeared up
the mountains, and the remaining three still weren’t there. I forced myself to
stand up, no more hope left in me. It was okay, though. Not all of us would
die here today. The others were on their way out. Maybe they’d already
made it.
I sat in front of the rolling boulder, barely ten feet away. I would have
gone even closer if the ground didn’t shake quite so much every time it
slammed onto the mountain. I looked at it, allowed it to distract me,
hypnotize me with its precise movements, with the sound of it rolling. I let
it take my mind off my pain and the weakness of my body and the thought
that I was doomed.
As I watched, I noticed that engraving again, one I’d seen before, but it
always slipped right past me and I couldn’t make it out clearly. The boulder
moved too fast, and I hadn’t been exactly focused, but right now I was. I
was trying so hard to forget everything else that I was focused on every inch
of that smooth surface, so I recognized the face just a few minutes in—
Apollo, the god of fire, with the sun at his back.
Laughter bubbled out of me, but it didn’t sound quite right.
“Figures,” I told the boulder, shaking my head as I fought the weakness
of my limbs. The dragon should have been my first clue—it was a well-
known story how Apollo slew a dragon and saved the oracle of Delphi.
Such a pretty tale. I’d always liked that one, too—a proper hero story.
 For a second, my stomach fell—what if we’d needed the dragon alive to
breathe fire onto this rock to stop it from moving? After all, why would
Apollo be carved on its surface if they didn’t want us to use fire on it?
Fire, my worst nightmare of all. The gods were indeed cruel, if they
were even real.
I looked up at the dark sky. “I really hope you’re enjoying yourselves,” I
said, imagining the Olympians sitting on their golden thrones, laughing
their hearts out at us petty humans. Mere mortals. Insignificant.
Had the others noticed the engraving yet? Maybe we ought to go back
for the dragon and try to find it again because it would make sense. Apollo
slew the dragon in Delphi, and the others did the same here. It would make
sense to use its body somehow to get through.
But then again, they’d already searched for it, and it wasn’t there. Albert
said it had disappeared.
So, I waited, half of me hopeful that the others had made it out, half of
me terrified that they had. Until I finally heard them coming down the
mountain and could see their shadows near the tree line.
They were back.
I tried not to be so happy. I really tried, but in the end, my survival
instincts were the only thing guiding me right now, so I was. I felt light as a
feather.
They found me sitting cross-legged in front of the boulder again, and
they sounded as pissed as before. Apparently, the mountain was endless,
and they kept moving in circles, always going back to the beginning, just
like I had in that forest in the first trial. Which meant that was not the right
way to go.
“I can’t do this anymore,” Marie was saying when she sat on the
ground. “There’s nothing here. No clue, no nothing! The trials are always
supposed to have clues—I can’t do this anymore!”
She would definitely know.
 “We don't have a fucking choice,” Ethan spit, and he was even more
aggravated than usual.
“Guys, we just need to rest, that’s all. We’re exhausted,” said Maia and
to hear her voice made me shiver. She had such a pretty voice. I wondered
again what it would be like to hear her singing.
One day, if we survived this, I might even ask her to sing for me.
“And then what?” Nick said. “What the fuck are we going to do with
rest?!”
“Hey, don’t take your anger out on her,” Emily hissed at him. “You said
you’d lead us out. You said to follow you—you’re just an incompetent piece
of shit!”
“You’re one to talk—you can’t even go five minutes without losing
your temper,” Mark spit.
“And what about you, huh?” Donna turned to him. “Can’t you use your
fucking numbers to figure a way out of here?”
Albert laughed coldly from the other side. “Götter, you’re stupid.
Numbers aren’t magic!”
And on and on they went, but at least they didn’t fight physically. I was
really glad for that.
When they finally stopped arguing, I would ask them about the dragon
again, just to make sure they’d checked that same place by the hill where
I’d seen the body. If they ignored me, I would have to go back there myself
—which was all the way to the other side of the big forest at our back. I’d
no doubt collapse before I made it back here, even if I did find the dragon’s
body.
Maia spoke again—shouted something at someone, and her voice struck
me again. It was sweet but powerful, soft and hard at the same time. Yeah,
no doubt she could sing very well.
Apollo could, too, as he was also the god of music. According to Miss
Aldentach, he was the one who even taught the Nine Muses how to sing.
According to Miss Aldentach, he shone as golden as the sun—the same sun
that was burning still behind the moving rock, never letting darkness creep
close. According to Miss Aldentach, he even wrote the hymn of the gods
we still sang to this day.
Something pricked the back of my mind, something I must have read
recently—on that same night Shade let me sit in the Academy library with
him. It was a story about the Nine Muses, about the son of one of them.
About the guy who made Hades and Persephone cry—which was a big deal
because they were extremely cold gods, according to myth.
The story in that book had it that Orpheus, son of a Muse, who chose to
live with his father on Earth instead of in Olympus, sang almost as well as
his aunts.
The fiercest warriors put down their swords and savage beasts lay at his
feet, or something like that. My eyes closed as the memory came over me,
the pages of the book in front of my mind’s eye…
Trees pulled up their roots and even hard rocks rolled up to him when he
sang.
My eyes snapped open.
The boulder rolled and slammed onto the mountain to my right
viciously, as if it was in a rush.
I don’t really know what I was thinking, but something came over me,
this need that couldn’t be natural as I’d never had it before. Not ever. It
must have been foreign, but I was too weak to even try to question it. Too
weak to resist it.
Before I knew it, my mouth opened, and I began to sing.
I sang the hymn of the gods that I knew by memory because I’d woken
up to it for years while I lived at the orphanage. It had been our wakeup
call, and it went off from the small speakers in our rooms at six-thirty sharp
every single morning. I knew every note and every word, every single
second of it—the hymn that Apollo himself wrote for mankind to honor the
gods.
“What the fuck is wrong with her?” someone said from behind me, but I
couldn’t even tell who he was.
He was right, though—I’d probably lost my mind from blood loss and
hunger and exhaustion and pain. And my voice sounded so bad—like
screeching tires, only worse—because my vocal cords weren’t working
properly. Most of my words were slurred together, too.
But I sang the hymn anyway.
The others laughed. They laughed their hearts out as I spit out the
words, and tears slid down my cheeks, cold and empty, weightless.
“Oh, my gods…” someone said from behind me after a minute, and the
others were no longer laughing.
Because the boulder had slowed down.
I noticed because it no longer beat against the mountains at the same
speed as it normally did. My ears had gotten used to the bang-bang-banging
of it, always perfectly accurate, just like clockwork. If there had been a
minute between beats then, now it was a minute and a half.
And the longer I sang, the slower the boulder moved.
I couldn’t stop the tears now, especially when the others were already
around me, singing the hymn with me at the top of their lungs. We sang and
sang until the boulder rolled slowly enough to be considered crawling.
Hands around my arms—someone pulled me to my feet. Nick on one
side, Emily on the other, holding my weight on their shoulders. Their eyes
were stuck on the boulder as we continued to sing, too terrified to stop now.
But it moved so slowly.
We went into the valley the moment the boulder touched the left side of
the mountain, and we kept going until we reached the very end, singing and
walking and crying together.
The boulder never crushed us.
 Eventually, the others let go of me and started to run. The valley hadn’t
been as long as I’d feared, and I still had some energy left, so I ran, too. Not
nearly as fast, but I was moving.
“The tokens! Make sure you’ve got the tokens!” someone shouted—it
could have been Marie.
I reached for my pocket, heart in my throat, terrified that it would be
empty.
It wasn’t. The token I’d found at the tip of that tower was still in my
pocket—half the face of Prometheus with the flame engraved at the bottom.
I held it in my hand tightly and kept on going until the sun no longer shone,
and darkness consumed me completely.
Doors pushed open ahead. Blinding light took my vision away. The
sound of the outside world hit me like a freight train.
My legs gave up on me when the applauding and the cheering filled my
head because I knew what they meant—it was over. I had the token. I was
bloody and dirty, but it was in my hand.
I’d made it. I was still alive.
 25

“Of all virtues, modesty is truly divine.”

—The Magic of Music, 55

by Naska Totaj, House Emerald

Everything was spinning so fast in front of me. Whoever was playing with
the globe, tilting it on one side, then the other, needed to stop asap. I had no
food in my body to throw up. All I had was the burning bile that seemed to
be stuck in my throat permanently.
The sun was setting here, too, in this world. And things looked a bit
different than I remembered when I entered that Dome, but I couldn’t really
put my finger on it.
Was it Angel’s dress?
Was it the look on Madam Carmine’s face?
Most importantly, was it Shade, whose shirt was no longer grey but
black, and who was at least three shades paler than he had been earlier, and
who looked at me like he was going to explode into a dragon any second
now and swallow me whole?
 And how crazy was it that I was glad to see that face, that expression,
that I’d really missed him just as much as I thought I had in the Dome?
So crazy.
The world continued to spin.
“What an incredible two days,” said Elliot Embers—his suit had
changed, too. No longer that deep green, now a midnight blue with a silver
shimmer to it.
And…did he say two days?
“We’ve watched your every move, my dearest mortal friends. And
we’re happy to have you here with us right now. It has been almost thirty
hours since you entered the Daedalus Dome, and you gave us all a real
scare there, but we’re happy you’re here.”
The audience applauded. They looked different, too. That’s because
they were. We’d been gone a day and a half in that Dome apparently. It had
felt like a lot longer to me.
The judges looked concerned, too—at least Madam Carmine did as she
looked at me. A specific kind of concern, one she mixed with disgust so
masterfully you couldn’t tell where one started and the other began. She
could definitely teach me a few things.
Right now, though, my legs were shaking so badly. I barely saw, barely
heard what Elliot was saying as I struggled to keep awake. My eyes
continued to go back to Shade. Whatever it was about his face, his stormy
eyes, the way he watched me, calmed me down. Soothed me a little bit.
And then I heard my name being called.
“Our Sedorah,” Elliot was saying. If I’d had the energy, I’d have
flinched. “Knocked out cold when facing the dragon—such a shame. You
did not participate in killing the beast, which was one way to go about
completing this trial—because you were busy being unconscious.” He said
it as a joke. The crowd—and him—laughed their ugly hearts out. If I’d had
the energy, I’d have flipped him off and told him to go suck a dick…or
something.
As it was, he continued. “You will get less points for that, but you did
figure out the way into—shall we say—a stone’s cold exterior, am I right?”
Another laugh from the audience at his lame ass joke. “Tell me, my dearest
friend, how did you know?”
But I could no longer see his face.
Black dots in my vision. My mouth opened to say I saw Apollo’s face on
the boulder’s surface, but I found I couldn’t speak.
Seconds later, I found my legs were giving up on me.
I found I was falling.
Ah, shit. Here were go again.

I’ there was an infirmary in the Palace, but I was in it, and

it was fancy as all hell. The ceiling tall, the windows big, letting in just
enough of the sunlight burning outside—yes, I’d slept. I’d slept the whole
damn night, and most of the morning, too. It was almost afternoon, and
tonight was the night—the same night they opened the gates of the Palace
for our family and friends.
Miles. James and Layla. They would be here tonight.
And I couldn’t get the doctor to come back here fast enough.
He called himself the healer, though, and he was on the other side of the
room, tending to an older man who seemed unconscious, cleaning the
wound on his arm. It must have been a houseless Elysean, judging by the
grey uniform he had on. Someone from the staff.
“Can I go now?” I asked when he made his way toward my bed. It was
a big bed, comfy and soft, and I’d been changed into an ugly white dress,
too, but who was complaining?
 “In a minute,” he said, his wide shoulders blocking my view of the door
when he came closer. His name was Marcus and he was a big fella, over six
foot four, with a square head and big hands that didn’t look like they
belonged to a doctor at all. He couldn’t be a day older than thirty.
He was very angry at me, too, always muttering under his breath since I
woke up a few hours ago. Always looking at me like he maybe wanted to
hurt me instead of heal me, but he healed me all the same.
I didn’t need to see the gemstone hanging on the chain around his neck
that he kept under his light blue scrubs—it would be a ruby because healers
were descendants of Apollo. They said they could heal any disease out
there, that they knew exactly what the body needed because they put their
patients to sleep and spoke to their subconscious directly. I even read
somewhere that in the past, there’d been healers powerful enough to bring
back the dead, which was absolutely ridiculous, but Miss Aldentach had
never really spoken to us about this, so I wasn’t sure, and I was definitely
not keen to ask.
Especially since Marcus became more pissed by the second.
He touched my forehead, told me to look up and checked my eyes,
pressed his fingers below my ear and down my jaw, to my throat and
collarbone. Whatever he was searching for, he didn’t find it.
“Why is he not waking up yet?” I asked, nodding at the front of the
rectangular room, at the man he’d been tending to just now. He’d been out
of it since I woke up.
“Because I put him to sleep. He’s injured and the body heals best when
it has energy to spare,” Marcus told me. “Say, aah.” I did. He was happy
with what he saw in my mouth.
“I’m fine,” I told him. “Really, Marcus, I’m okay.”
“Oh, I know. I know perfectly fine that you’re okay—I am responsible
for your okay, Sedorah,” he told me, and I could see the sweat beads lining
his forehead just fine when he turned to look at the door, as if to make sure
nobody was coming in.
Paranoid didn’t even cut it with him.
“As you should be—you’re a healer, are you not?” I said, trying to get
him to calm down so he could just let me get the hell out of here.
Instead, that made him finally lose it. “Yes, a healer—for Elyseans. A
healer who has been specifically forbidden from healing mortals with
magic!” he whisper-yelled, like he’d been holding back on me for all his
life.
I flinched. “Really? Why, though?” If he could heal with his magic, why
would he be forbidden to use it?
“Because it’s the rules of the trials,” he hissed. “You’re supposed to be
on your own until you complete them—those are the rules! The godsdamn
rules that I had to break.” His eyes were slightly red now as he paced in
front of the bed, looking almost funny with the scrubs on. “Bribed. Me,
Marcus Acceso, bribed into using my magic—have the gods no mercy?!”
And he raised his head to the ceiling. “Forgive me, Father. Forgive me,
goddess, forgive me,” he whispered, over and over again.
“Hold on a minute,” I said, confused. “You were bribed into healing
me?” Was that what he was saying? Because that made absolutely no sense.
“Yes—are you deaf, too?” he said, again looking at the beginning of the
room, at the closed doors, terrified that someone might hear.
“I’m not deaf, Marcus. Calm the hell down,” I muttered.
“I can’t calm down,” he told me, pacing in front of the bed again. “How
am I going to calm down when I’ve been bribed to use my gift?!”
I rolled my eyes. “If it’s such a big deal, you should have just said no.”
Yeah, it felt great not to hurt as much as in the Dome, especially on the side
of my waist, but if he was going to act like this about it, I wished he hadn’t
healed me at all.
 Marcus laughed coldly. “No? You think I can just tell someone like him
no? Are you out of your mind, mortal?!”
“Who?” I demanded. If he was going to be so damn paranoid about it, I
wanted to know who’d bribed him to help me.
Because I had a sneaky suspicion it might be Elliot, playing some sick,
twisted game with me. And if that was the truth, I needed to know.
But Marcus suddenly moved back like I’d slapped him, closed his eyes,
and breathed in deeply.
“It’s fine,” he said, running his fingers through his disheveled hair. “It’s
fine. No harm done. You’re okay.”
“It’s what I keep telling you—I’m—”
“You lost enough blood to die. I had to keep you unconscious for almost
twenty-four hours. There was no other way to heal that wound on your side,
with or without magic.” He suddenly came closer and pulled my dress up. I
was only wearing the white panties I’d woken up in, so I blushed instantly.
But Marcus was focused on my wound, the tear on the left side of my
waist. The scar remained, the skin pink but not too raw. Not half as bad as I
expected, to be honest.
“The other is even better,” Marcus said, as if he were talking more to
himself than me now, then pushed me to the side so he could inspect my
back where the dragon had clawed at my shoulders. That one didn’t hurt at
all anymore—it had probably been superficial.
“See? As good as new,” I said, a fake smile all over my face as I batted
my lashes at him. “Whoever bribed you, just tell them—”
“Hush!” he hissed, turning to the door in panic. “Don’t you dare say that
word, Sedorah. If my reputation gets ruined because of you—”
“Oh, stop it, for the love of God. I’m not going to say anything to
anyone—just let me get out of here!” I was already exhausted from the
drama, I swear, even if I liked him. Despite being pissed off, he took care of
me so well. Just like Grace and Eeda, he made it really hard for me to stick
by my belief that all Elyseans were monsters hiding behind picture-perfect
faces, bribe or no bribe. But I really needed to leave this room, right now.
With a sigh, Marcus looked at the bedside table, at the empty bowl of
stew he’d brought me earlier. Of course, I ate that—and the chicken breasts
and mashed potatoes before that. I’d eaten everything he brought me.
Finally, he said, “Yes, sure. Sure, you can—at last. I’ll gladly sign your
release, mortal.”
I hadn’t been happier in a long time, even if Marcus seemed to be
uncomfortable. He’d get over it in no time—I meant what I said, nobody
was going to find out about this. I wouldn’t tell a single soul.

T , I was back in my room to find Grace waiting for me

with a smile on her face and a red nail polish in her hand.
 26

The new gods sat on their high thrones in the Palace over the clouds, and Zeus sat
highest of all with his thunderbolts at his side. Only Hades, the eldest of them, god of
the dead, remained in his own Palace in his dark kingdom—the Underworld.
There were no more wars, no more monsters coming to claim their right to rule,
but only they, among themselves, sometimes argued and sometimes fought.
Zeus with his thunderbolts, stronger than all other gods combined, had but to raise
his thunder, and order would fall in place among his fellow gods once more.

—Book of Creation, 6th Edition, 670

by Ophelia Marvos, House Emerald

The gates were finally opening. I held my breath together with every other
candidate standing with me on the front step of the Palace, waiting.
The people poured in like mad. Those who already saw their families
were running to them, too, but it took me a second to find Miles’s face as he
tried to elbow his way through the crowd.
My heart almost beat out of my chest.
James and Layla were behind him, and so was Gary. Him, I didn’t even
acknowledge, not even when he said good evening, Sera, and had the
audacity to smile. I could easily pretend he didn’t exist at all—for now, that
was all I could do to get back at him for basically ruining my life. I liked to
tell myself that I was going to plot my revenge on him eventually. Just as
soon as I got out of this place.
Angel led us and our guests to the side of the Palace and to the
courtyard, the gardens near the temples where they always feasted on nights
they sacrificed to the gods. You could even make out the round structure of
the Dome under the moonlight from here.
“Oh, my gods, you’re famous!” Layla kept shouting, squeezing my
cheeks, kissing me, then looking around with her eyes wide and glossy to
see what she could see, before turning back to me again.
If she kept that up for much longer, she was going to pass out.
“Calm down. Breathe,” James was telling her. “Stop talking for a
second.”
“You’re just jealous she’s going to be an Elysean and you’re not,” Layla
said, and every hair on my body stood at attention at the same time, but I
didn’t stop smiling. Not for a single second. I knew Layla meant well, and I
wasn’t going to let anything ruin my mood right now. Especially since
Miles was here.
“You were ah-mazing!” he told me. “I watched the whole thing on TV,
except the parts where you were bleeding. Dad didn’t let me see that. But
the way you climbed that tower was fantastic, Sera!”
To see the pride in his eyes almost made this whole thing worth it.
“Seriously, though. Are you okay?” James thought to ask. “We saw the
parts they transmit to us. It looked like you were hurt pretty badly.”
“I’m fine,” I said with a nod. “They took me to the infirmary and
patched me up.” Because someone bribed the healer on my account.
I searched for Elliot with my eyes but couldn’t find him in the crowd.
“Why did you collapse like that in front of the judges?” Layla asked. “I
freaked the hell out—I thought you died!”
 “Blood loss, exhaustion, hunger—take your pick,” I said. “I tried to stay
awake.”
“I’m so sorry, babe. That fucking dragon—I swear,” she said, hugging
my side again. I winced as a little pain shot up my side. My wound was
closed but it still hurt. Not my back, though. You could barely tell where the
dragon had scratched me, and even the small wound that had remained on
my cheek from the first trial was now completely gone. Marcus had really
done wonders on me. I shouldn’t have been able to even stand right now,
after just a day.
“Sorry, sorry!” Layla said, stepping away from me again.
“It’s fine, just a little sore.” I touched my side over the leather vest, as if
I could feel the wound. I couldn’t, but the pain was already faded.
“You actually rode a dragon,” Miles said in a whisper, like he was afraid
to even bring it up. His cheeks were flushed, his eyes glossy. To him, I must
have been huge right now. “That’s all they showed on TV—just you riding
the dragon.”
I grinned, wrapping my arm around his neck as slowly as I could. “I
sure did. It almost killed me—but I rode a dragon.”
“So cool,” James said in awe. “I can’t believe you’re the cool one, kid.
So fucking proud to be your friend.” And he hi-fived me. My poor heart.
“We’re fucking rock stars at school now,” Layla said. “Everybody wants
to know everything about you.”
My smile fell. “Don’t tell anybody anything,” I muttered. Not that there
was much to tell, but still.
“Oh, please. As if I would,” Layla said, waving me off. “But talk to me
about the trials. Why didn’t they give you stones for slaying the damn
dragon when you were unconscious?”
And she was right. Apparently, this time, I’d gotten three stones that had
been delivered to my room—a ruby, a sapphire, and an emerald, all larger
than the first two, but because I hadn’t helped with the dragon, I didn’t get
more. As Grace told me, there had been several other ways to deal with the
dragon and to get the boulder to stop moving—and one of them had been to
trick the dragon, bring it all the way across the dark forest, then make it
burn the boulder to a crisp so we could pass through the valley. Killing it
hadn’t been wrong, but it hadn’t been the way the judges preferred, either.
I was just glad it hadn’t eaten me, or made that castle fall on my head.
And they still wouldn’t tell me who the body I’d seen had belonged to. I’d
asked Grace about it, but all she said was that they didn’t know yet. Right
now, the four who hadn’t been in the second part of the trial with us were
still missing—Pablo, Jessica, Isaac and Elaine. My heart ached but I was
choosing to believe that at least three of them were alive still. Alive and in
the hospital or something, with another healer.
“You literally got them all out—what the hell? You deserved at least
five—any idea how much those things cost out there? They gave the Slim
Shady wannabe six—each house gave him two,” said James, probably
talking about Ethan, and I loved him for it.
“It’s fine,” I reassured them. “Doesn’t matter—I made it out.” I didn’t
dare even mention the body to them, especially not with Miles there. I was
too much of a coward to even let myself think about it. I’d rather just
change the subject. “Grab something to eat, will you? The food is
delicious.”
The tables were set with twice as much food as usual. There were no
chairs. Everybody was standing, moving to and from the temples,
sacrificing to the gods, talking, laughing. Gary was nowhere to be seen, for
which I was thankful, and we managed to stop at the corner of the first
table, and sample all the cakes they had brought there tonight.
Seriously. I ate like I was still starving.
“Tell us everything,” Layla said, mouth half filled with cake, lips stained
with green icing. “Why does your skin look like that? Is that foundation?
And your hair—what the hell have you done to your hair? And do you have
a spare leather suit for me, too?” She eyed the leathers wrapped around my
body greedily, making me smile. She would have definitely appreciated
these things much more than me.
“No, I don’t think so,” I said, but she wasn’t even listening to me.
“Start from the beginning—all of it. They only let us see fragments of
the trials on TV, so we don’t really know anything—give us the details.”
Then she shoved another bite in her mouth.
God, it was so surreal to see her face. To see all of them—they hadn’t
changed one bit, just as excited to talk about anything Elysean, even if it
involved me directly this time. For a moment, it was like the past two weeks
hadn’t happened at all. Like I’d never left Gary’s house and everything was
just…normal.
I wished with all my heart that it could be, even though I knew that
wasn’t how life worked. No amount of magic could possibly erase the past
and make it into something different, but I still wished.
“I can’t,” I told Layla, smiling despite the images in my head—of that
golden quill and the way it had absorbed my hair. “I was forced to sign
papers and swear that I wouldn’t speak about anything I saw and heard and
smelled here with anyone ever.”
It was like I’d slapped her across the face.
“That’s bullshit!” Layla said, shaking her head. “Why? They already let
us in the Palace—what other secrets are there to keep?”
Oh, if she only knew… “Plenty of them, actually.” So much more than
I’d ever realized—and I was still the least educated on Elysean ways
compared to the rest of the candidates. For now.
“Like what?” James said in a hushed whisper, leaning closer.
“C’mon, tell us just one,” said Miles, eyes sparkling even in the dark.
And just the thought of uttering the words to them about anything at all
made me feel like my scalp was on fire. I reached out my hand to scratch
the back of my head—I wasn’t in actual pain right now, but I could imagine
how intense it would be if I told them something I wasn’t supposed to, and
my hair was pulled out of me—violently—like Madam Carmine said.
Swallowing hard, I shook my head. “I can’t. I really, truly can’t. I’m so
sorry, guys.”
They pushed a few more times until they realized that I wouldn’t budge
—I couldn’t if I tried. Eventually, they gave up trying.
“Hey, you didn’t talk to Dad at all,” Miles whispered in my ear while
James and Layla were distracted with the Elyseans around us.
The hair on my forearms stood at attention. “Yeah…”
“Did he do something? I mean, I know you don’t get along, but I
thought—”
“Nothing,” I cut him off. It’s one thing what Gary did to me, but to
break Miles’s heart by telling him what a cruel bastard he was? Fuck no.
Not as long as I could help it. “It was nothing, Miles. I’m just overwhelmed
by all this, and I saw you three, and I just don’t really care about much
else.”
He’d know I was lying—I could see it in his eyes. But even so, Miles
didn’t push. Instead, he smiled for me. “Alright, then. So long as you’re
okay.”
“I’m officially the adult now, kid. You can’t worry about me—I forbid
you,” I teased.
He laughed. “Oh, I know. I got you a leather backpack, by the way. Like
the one you liked at the mall, remember? You kept staring at it,” Miles said.
“They wouldn’t let us bring anything with to the Palace, so I’ll give it to
you when you come home. It’s not real leather, but I think you’ll like it.”
“I already love it. Thanks, kid. You didn’t have to, but thanks,” I said,
smiling so big my cheeks hurt. I wasn’t one to obsesses about things like
that, but that biker type backpack had really been something. That he’d
even remembered to get me something like that for my birthday meant
everything.
 “You’re very welcome,” Miles said with a toothy grin, before Layla
grabbed me by the arm and pulled me until her mouth was right next to my
ear.
“Hey—what about guys? Have you met any hot guys? Have you fucked
anyone yet? Please tell me you’re not a virgin anymore,” she whispered in a
rush.
My cheeks all but melted off my face. I didn’t mean to be this shy, and I
hated it, but I still was.
“Stop, it, Lay,” I muttered, trying to get away, but she wouldn’t let me.
“Stop it yes or stop it no?” she insisted.
I closed my eyes, mortified. “No, I haven’t fucked anyone. Yes, I’m still
a virgin. Happy?”
She flinched. “No, I’m not happy. What the hell are you waiting for,
Sera? You’re in an Elysean city, in an Elysean Palace, surrounded by more
beauty than anywhere else in the world—find someone to get those damn
panties off you already!”
I put my hand over her mouth. “Miles is right there!” He was standing
right next to me on my other side, talking to James.
But Layla rolled her yes. “Even he would agree with me, but whatever,”
she told me, then took her plate full of cake in her hands again. “All I’m
saying is live a little, Sera. For the love of gods, just live a little.”
Live a little. Funny—I was trying. I was literally trying to stay alive.
“I’m trying, I swear.”
“I know you are,” she said, her smile soft again as she nudged my
shoulder. “I just want you to have the best experience you can have in this
place. You more than deserve it after the fucked-up life you’ve had.”
“Even after last time?” When I’d shouted my guts out at her and James
right in front of the school grounds?
“Oh, please,” she said, waving me off. “As if that was the first time we
snapped at each other. We’re friends, babe. Friends argue. Doesn’t mean I
love you any less.”
Her words warmed me all the way to my bones. “You’re a pain in my
ass, Lay, but I love you, too.”
She grinned. “Are we gonna kiss and make up now?”
“Ew,” James said from the other side, having finished his conversation
with Miles. “Don’t you dare kiss in front of everyone.”
“Relax,” Layla told him, laughing. “It was just a joke. You’re so
sensitive, I swear.” He really was.
“Hey—what about the others, though? They never announced anything
about the candidates who didn’t make it out with the rest of you,” James
said.
Something hard fell in the pit of my stomach. I blinked, and I was in the
Dome again, waking up to the ruined castle, and that shoe…that arm and
that leg…
I looked around the crowd, the smiling faces of every living candidate
with their family and friends. They looked completely different right now—
like kids, like teenagers, like they should have been out there in the world,
not in here, fighting for their lives.
Maia was there, too—she’d apparently gotten her hair from her dad.
Identical strawberry blonde curls, except he kept his shorter. She had eleven
people around her, and she still avoided my eyes the way she’d done when I
first came downstairs. Maybe she thought I blamed her for not helping me
in the trial—I didn’t. It had hurt, sure, but what I cared more about was that
she hadn’t come to visit me in the infirmary after.
“They’re probably not allowed to attend. Only ten of us completed the
trial,” I said reluctantly.
“There’s only nine of you here, though,” Layla said, making me turn
again. Making me count.
She was right—Ethan was nowhere to be seen. I wondered why. He was
alive, he’d made it out the Dome, I was sure of that. He’d even gotten six
gemstones according to James—so, where was he?
“Oh, my gods. Act natural, act natural, act natural,” Layla suddenly said
without even moving her lips, holding her shoulders back and her chin up,
pretending to look to the side as she sipped her drink.
Then…
“Good evening.”
I half turned to find none other than Shade right to my side, looking too
much like a damn god for my liking. Dark, shiny hair combed back to
perfection, eyes like storms waiting to erupt and wreak havoc on the world.
His lips were stained with red wine again, and now that I knew they tasted
better than should have been possible, it was very hard to keep my eyes off
them. And the way that shirt hugged his wide chest…
He was looking me over, too, at least, analyzing every inch of me as if
he was trying to make sure I wasn’t missing a limb.
“Um…hi,” I said, my tongue suddenly tied—he was close. He was way
too close, and my body was hyperventilating, and I maybe wanted him
closer, which was so wrong on so many levels and it freaked me out.
Fuck, I wished I didn’t remember what it was like to kiss him.
I wished I didn’t remember the cupcake he’d left me in the library,
either.
“Congratulations on completing the second trial,” Shade said, still
watching my face like that, like he was expecting to find something wrong
with it.
“Thank you,” I said, feeling my cheeks flushing again.
“She rode a dragon,” Miles told him, like that was the highlight of my
life. Maybe now it would be since he found it so cool.
I thought the Elysean prick was going to just wave him off or even
pretend he hadn’t heard him at all, as unimpressed by anything as ever. But
then the most incredible thing happened—Shade smiled.
 I’d seen his lips stretched before. I’d seen him grinning mischievously,
too, but never an actual real smile, with teeth and everything. Fuck. My
poor heart.
“Yes, I saw that. Impressive,” he said, and I’d have questioned my
hearing if the others hadn’t been there to witness those words. He
remembered himself quickly, though, so his expression turned back to
neutral instantly. But his eyes weren’t very stormy when he looked at Miles.
He almost looked kind, which was a clear indicator that I was seeing things.
Shade was anything but kind.
And when he turned to me again, I could have sworn a monster was
lurking behind that face, waiting to come and devour me.
In a bad way? Good?
No idea.
“Hi! I’m Layla, Sera’s bestest friend in the world.” Before I knew it,
Layla was offering her hand to Shade, and again—I thought for sure he was
going to ignore her. He was going to look down at her and sneer or
something, but he shocked me once more when he reached out his hand and
shook hers.
Who’d kidnapped the real Shade and replaced him with this guy?
“Actually, I’m her bestest friend in the world—James is the name,”
James said, grinning so widely he looked like a different person. And Shade
shook his hand, too.
I just stood there like an idiot for a moment, until I remembered myself.
“And that’s, um…that’s Miles, my cousin,” I finally said, and Miles
looked up at Shade, jutting out his chest. He looked adorable.
“She’s more like my big sister, though,” the kid said, the only one not
about to melt into a pile of goo at Shade’s feet. The rest of us were a lost
cause already.
“Is she now,” Shade said, throwing me a quick look.
 “She is. And she saved everyone in the trial. She brought everyone out,”
Miles told him, as if he wanted to make sure Shade knew. My cheeks kept
getting warmer and warmer…
“That, she did,” Shade said with another look my way, and I somehow
knew that he didn’t particularly like that fact. Maybe he’d hoped I’d die in
the Dome or something?
Yeah, probably not.
“And who might you be?” Layla asked, batting her lashes at him, but he
was not about to answer that.
“I just wanted to congratulate Sedorah,” Shade said instead. “It was a
pleasure to meet you. Enjoy your evening.”
Before any of us could comment, he turned around and slipped back,
the crowd swallowing him whole right away.
“Oh, my gods. Oh, my gods. What was that? Who was that? What in the
world?!” Layla said, her voice pitched so high it hurt my ears.
“Oh, no. Here we go,” James said, rolling his eyes, as if he hadn’t been
drooling all over Shade, too.
“Nobody—just Shade,” I said, hoping my cheeks weren’t as red as they
felt.
But judging by the look on Layla’s face, they were. “Tell me
everything.”
I shook my head, smiling. God, I’d missed this so much. And it wasn’t
that I didn’t want to tell her—I just didn’t know what the hell to say about it
yet, or how to say anything in this place without somebody else listening.
When I got out, I would. I’d tell her and James everything, just not now.
“There’s nothing to tell—he’s from the Academy. That’s all I know. I
want to show you around the Palace. Come on, walk with me,” I said, and
with Miles by my side, I led them to the front of the Palace again.
The truth was that I didn’t just want to show them the Palace. I also
wanted to find the best spot I could run away from. My friends would help
me. I was sure they would. If there was a chance, I’d ask them. If there was
a chance to get out of here, I’d take it. Right now, even if it killed me to
never see Shade again. Just the thought of it felt like a stab to my wounded
side—I’ll never see Shade again, ever—but I’d do it anyway.
Except the gates were closed again, and half a dozen men wearing black
suits and sunglasses stood guard in front of them, hands folded in front.
They all looked like brothers, which made me think they were of the same
bloodline, definitely houseless.
Impossible to get through them and out those gates, nonetheless.
My stomach twisted and turned as the others asked me questions about
what they’d seen on TV in the trials, and I answered automatically without
revealing anything I wasn’t supposed to.
Fuck, there had to be a way out of this place. Some hidden door, some
secret underground tunnel or something—there had to be.
But there wasn’t. We went all the way around the courtyard, and the
guards, so many more than I’d ever seen before, kept a close eye on us and
the other candidates who’d brought their guests to show them the Palace,
too.
No way out. Disappointment and fear threatened to make me sick all
over again. How silly of me to assume that they’d just let us wander outside
the gates tonight, just like that. How silly of me to think they wouldn’t
make sure that I, the only one of the candidates who didn’t want to be here,
wouldn’t be closely monitored to make sure I wouldn’t step a toe outside
the Palace grounds.
Nothing worse than feeling like I might suffocate on thin air. I had to
remind myself to breathe every few seconds. It was okay. Those gates
would open again when our guests left, and maybe that’s when I could
make a run for it. Get in the trunk of any car, let someone drive me to
wherever they were going. Disappear for a while. Just…disappear.
 But an hour later, when Elliot asked for our attention, thanked our
guests for coming and asked them to leave, Angel gathered all of us on the
front steps of the Palace again. She didn’t let me go with Miles and my
friends to the gates—I had to hug them, say goodbye, and move back in
front of the Palace doors to watch them leave from afar.
Tears in my eyes, but I refused to let them spill. I would remain in this
prison for another week. For another trial. But I’d already completed two,
hadn’t I? I could finish their last stupid game, get those gemstones, and start
my life anew when this was over. Free. Not on the run from anything or
anyone—just simply free.
Yeah, I’d take it because I had no other choice. And once I was out of
this place, I was never going to let anyone decide the way I lived ever
again.

I the footsteps before I made it up the stairs to the second floor,

tired already. Exhausted. Disappointed. Happy to be alive, too.
So many different emotions they were making me dizzy.
But the footsteps were precise, and they were in a hurry, and I
instinctively stopped to see who was coming up the stairs, terrified
already…
Until I saw Shade.
Butterflies came alive in my stomach, turning my mind blank for a
second. His effect on me was scary all on its own. I stepped to the side to
make way for him to pass—he seemed to be in a hurry. I even thought
about saying hi to him again, maybe thank him for being nice to my friends,
except he never gave me the chance.
Before I knew it, his hands were on my face, and my back was against
the wall, and his lips slammed onto mine.
 The entire world suspended in that second—until I realized what was
happening and I moved.
He tasted like wine. Rich, delicious wine I could drown in and die a
happy woman. I kissed him back like it was the most natural thing in the
world to do, like I did this all the time, like the thought of not kissing him
was the world’s biggest impossibility. My lips parted when his tongue slid
down my bottom one, and he grabbed it between his teeth and sucked on it
like it was fucking Ambrosia.
A whimper slipped out of me—he felt so damn incredible. My eyes
opened just a slit to see his squeezed shut like it hurt. At the sound of my
moans, he slammed his body to mine, pinning me to the wall, then stuck his
tongue in my mouth like he was in a race.
My arms were wrapped around his neck tightly though I hadn’t even
noticed that I’d moved. But his body was flush against mine, and his tongue
was in my mouth, and we kissed like the world was about to end any
minute. His hand slipped under my shirt, and if I were in control of myself,
I probably would have considered stopping him. As it was, I melted in his
hands, my skin craving his like a damn drug.
His touch was gentle, fingers closing around my hips as he pulled them
to himself, pressing his hard cock against my pelvis. Another moan escaped
me, and he pressed harder as he growled, his hand moving farther up, his
fingertips lightly tracing the wound on my waist I’d forgotten even existed.
He slowed down the kiss as he ran his thumb over the scar slowly,
gently, just a ghost of a touch. Then he let go of my lips and rested his
forehead to mine. He breathed as heavily as me, and I realized what this
was—he’d been worried. The asshole really did like me, and he’d been
worried about my wound, about me dying in the trial.
I don’t know why that made me feel like I might explode into fucking
fireworks any second.
 “I’m fine,” I muttered, running my hands down his neck, then up to his
hair just to see if it was as smooth as it looked. It was. Thick and smooth,
like silk wrapped around my fingers.
“Does it hurt?” he whispered against my lips, and I shook my head.
“Not at all.” Which was the truth—I didn’t feel anything that wasn’t
him right now. “I’m fine, I promise.”
Closing his eyes, he let go of a long breath.
“Get some rest,” he finally said, and without ever opening his eyes, he
let go of me and stepped back.
“Shade,” I whispered, but he was already rushing down the stairs,
disappearing from my view within seconds.
What the hell just happened?
A minute later, I was leaning against the wall still, in the middle of the
stairway, breathing heavily, skin on fire, so wet between my legs it was
ridiculous.
Get some rest? “Really, Shadow Boy?” I whispered to the air.
When I got no answer, I laughed and went to my room to get some
goddamn rest.
 27

“Make me your villain, but do not curse my name when I fill those shoes, for I will
never be the victim.”

—Chronicles of Athene, Book III, 71

by Gustav Allen, House Emerald

“Please follow me.”

The waffle was halfway to my open mouth, dripping Nutella on the
plate, and my teeth ready to sink into that heavenly goodness. Almost
starving to death will raise your appetite, apparently, but I had to pause and
look up because I recognized the voice perfectly.
Shade was standing right behind my seat at the table in the Midas Hall,
and he was looking right at me.
Did he just say please follow me?
I was genuinely going to ask, but then he simply turned around and
walked out of the Hall without a glance in either direction and without
waiting for a reply. He just walked out.
 I blinked, sure that I’d seen wrong, that I’d imagined the whole thing.
But one look at the other side of the table, at Emily and Nick and Marie—
the only ones who’d woken up as early as I did with hunger this morning—
and I realized it was real. The way they were watching me, eyes wide and
lips parted, said that they most definitely saw Shade talking to me just now.
With a sigh, I put the waffle back on the plate and stood up. What the
hell was so important that he would risk being seen talking to me—or
disrupt my breakfast?
Not like I hadn’t eaten—I was on my fourth waffle and second glass of
milk—but still. My eyes were still hungry, even if my tummy hurt. I hadn’t
planned to stop until I either passed out or threw up.
Now, I could do neither.
I waved at the others awkwardly. They’d said hi this morning, hadn’t
called me godless or insulted me in any way. They hadn’t invited me to sit
with them, either, but Marie had actually smiled at me, and Emily nodded
her head. Baby steps.
No matter, though. It was more than enough that they’d helped me walk
down that valley in the trial—I’d been so weak. I could talk to them later,
when I came back to finish my breakfast as soon as Shade said whatever he
wanted to say to me.
Unless…he planned to kiss me again.
Shit.
I stopped right by the door when I found him at the end of the hallway
that would lead to the other side of the Palace where the museum room was.
I’d only been there once for the party.
Was he going to slam me against walls and kiss the good sense out of
me like he did last night?
Because I was all up for it, and that was just it—I shouldn’t have been.
Hadn’t I had a real talk with myself last night when I went to my room
and had to touch myself just to get release and get him out of my mind long
enough to fall asleep?
Hadn’t I decided that I was going to stay away from him for the next
week, until I completed the third trial and was out of here?
I most definitely had. So, why was I following him now, even though I
knew how much trouble I could get myself in by doing so?
Because I want him.
I was attracted to him. As it turns out, you could hate what someone
was and still want to kiss the living hell out of them at the same time.
Besides, hadn’t Layla said to just live a little? That’s what kissing him
felt like—living.
Pathetic, Sera, I said to myself in my head, but that didn’t make my step
falter at all. No, I followed Shade around the corner and into a hallway that
was pretty much the same as on the other side. I’d been to that party and
knew that the first double doors led to the museum room, but I hadn’t paid
attention to the rest of it, the other two sets of doors farther down. Golden
plaques adorned them, engraved with beautiful cursive letters I hadn’t
noticed before, either.
Museum
Magic Room
War Room—and that’s where Shade was headed.
I should have been afraid—or at the very least more cautious—but
curiosity got the best of me, so I rushed my steps to get closer instead.
There was a single statue in front of the double doors to the War Room, of a
soldier with a helmet, armor covering his body, a large sword in his hand. It
was entirely made out of marble, except its eyes—they were two black
stones that shimmered in all the colors of the rainbow.
Shade stood before it and raised his hand toward the statue’s face, then
said, “Pati introites.”
The goddamn statue moved.
 It moved—the soldier that had his sword half drawn from its sheath
around his hips pushed it down, lowering his arms to the sides, allowing
more than enough space to walk around him and through the doors that
clicked open.
Shade didn’t look at me. He didn’t seem to notice I was standing there
with a dumbfounded smile on my face—because no way did that just
happen—so he just moved around the statue and through the open doors.
Shaking my head, I followed, touching the soldier’s arm as I went. Yep,
solid marble—and it had still moved. Definitely a trick of the mind. It had
to be.
But the inside of the room wasn’t.
Lights went on the deeper Shade went into the wide corridor, toward a
wooden door.
“Where are you taking me?” My voice echoed but Shade didn’t answer.
The doors behind me closed on their own as I went, and finally, I saw inside
the others.
The room was round and big, everything in it either red or black.
Red and black mats on the floor. Weapons, a million of them, on one
side of the wall, and weights—dumbbells and barbells and kettle balls—on
the other. Opposite the door were mannequins—that’s the only word that
came to mind. They were made out of something black that didn’t quite
look like marble or plastic or anything else I could name, and they were
shaped like human beings, each with a round black gemstone in the middle
of their foreheads.
“The War Room, Snowflake,” said Shade, slowly taking his jacket off,
throwing it on the mats. There were no windows in this room, but the big
lights overhead were bright enough to enable me to see everything clearly.
“The War Room that has been here for the past two weeks. You had access
to it as well—you should have known this room in your sleep by now,” he
said. No—he accused me.
 And shit, he was right. He was absolutely right.
I grabbed my hips in my hands and turned to him with my chin up
anyway. “I thought the mightiest weapon of all were books.”
“Yes, they are—and books should have taught you by now that they’re
not the only weapon you need to succeed in these trials,” he said, and the
way he came closer to me, the way he looked at me from under his lashes,
you’d think he was going to strangle me or something.
He was definitely pissed. It took all I had not to back off.
“Didn’t you see? I saved everyone in that trial,” I said, just to spite him.
I didn’t mention that strange need that had fallen over me in the Dome,
though, the one that had practically forced me to sing as soon as I’d thought
of the hymn—like a foreign instinct. I was sure I remembered wrong. It had
just been the blood loss and the exhaustion that made me feel strange
things, that was all.
“You did, and you put an even bigger target on your back,” Shade said.
“You have to understand that they do want you alive. They want all of you
to succeed, but on their terms.”
I did get that—Elyseans wanted everything on their own terms.
“So why didn’t you tell me what the second trial would be?” I spit.
“You could have told me—you can tell me what the third trial is, too.” I had
no idea if he could actually do that, though. I just wanted to piss him off the
way he did me.
But Shade must have thought I said the funniest thing in the world
because he laughed. It wasn’t pleasant. “You think they tell anyone what the
trials are?” he said, so angry his eyes were dark raging storms.
I crossed my arms in front of me. “No, but you must have heard from
someone.”
“There’s nobody to hear anything from,” Shade said, that cold smile on
his face still. “Do you realize how little Elyseans care about these trials?” I
blinked, shaking my head. “Over ten thousand of us live in Idaea. How
many have come to see you enter? Nobody cares about them. They literally
bring students here as punishment.”
My mouth opened and closed a few times, but I found nothing to say. I
remembered the audience just fine, and there had been a hundred people
there at the very most, including the Palace staff.
“So, then why hold these trials at all?” I wondered. If they literally had
to force a handful of people to watch, what was the fucking point?
“For reasons you wouldn’t understand, even if I could tell you,” he said
reluctantly, like it pained him to utter those words. I could see it in his eyes
that he was honest. He was telling me the truth.
Did it even matter, though? I didn’t want their reasons—they wouldn’t
change anything here. I was still stuck in this Palace, still forced to
participate in the damn trials against my will.
I sighed. “Either way, I’d say I’m doing just fine.” And I was—despite
everything. I was still alive. Still breathing.
But Shade shook his head, then toed his sneakers off and put them to the
side before he came closer.
“You almost died,” he said. “You’re not doing fine.”
“I—”
“Arms up. Defend yourself,” he said, apparently done with the talking,
and the next second, his fist was right in front of my face.
Oh, God.
“What the hell—”
“Defend yourself, Sedorah. Arms up!” he ordered.
I raised my arms—I felt so silly. I didn’t know how to fight. But Shade’s
fist came for me again, and I ducked to the side, but he slammed it onto my
shoulder.
Fuck! “That hurts,” I hissed, rubbing my shoulder.
“Good—be more careful next time.” And he came at me again.
 He kicked and hit me, not enough for it to really hurt, but enough to piss
me the fuck off.
“Stop it!” I hissed as I moved back, trying to avoid his hits—the way he
moved was otherworldly. Was he a ninja in disguise or something? Because
his every movement was precise, like he was in a goddamn dance.
Meanwhile, I was backed against the wall five minutes in, breathing
heavily, sweating more than I should have been.
But that wasn’t all—he whispered something under his breath,
something I didn’t even understand, and the next second, the air changed
like it was charging. Five of the black human-shaped dummies moved. They
all moved in unison, and they came closer to us, stopping a few feet behind
Shade in a semi-circle, their empty eyes on me.
I almost passed out.
“If you can’t even keep me off, how are you going to deal with all of
them?” he growled, pointing his thumb behind his back. “Do you really
think these are games, Snowflake? Really?” And he attacked me again.
“Stop!” I shouted when his fist was in front of my jaw—he hadn’t even
broken a sweat.
He leaned closer until our noses almost touched, and he was even more
pissed than before. His eyes had turned into dark clouds, and those
dummies were still behind him, waiting…
“What is it that you want?” he spit. “Do you want to die, is that it?”
“Fuck you.” I tried to push him off me, but he could have been made
out of steel. I grabbed his shirt in my fists as if that was somehow going to
make him move—it didn’t.
“Answer me—do you want to die?! Because you almost did once, and I
can call that an accident, but the second time? It will be plain stupidity,” he
hissed. “You must learn how to fight—do you not realize where you are?
You’re living in a den of monsters. We just look like we’re the same.”
Oh, God. “I know very well where I am,” I said in a broken whisper.
 Did I, though? Because with every trial that I went through and
survived, I seemed more at ease with being here, even if I didn’t want to
admit it.
“So, answer me then—what is it that you want?” he said, his voice a
touch softer this time.
My eyes closed and I squeezed his shirt in my fists with all my strength.
“I want to be free,” I said. “I want to…I want to be out there.” Not in here.
Not trapped in this building.
Suddenly, his hand was on my cheek and I had no choice but to look up.
He was so close, his eyes light again, on my parted lips.
“Freedom is not out there. It’s in here.” He pressed the tips of his
fingers to my temple just slightly.
My eyes closed again—whatever the hell he did to me when he touched
me wasn’t something I could explain.
“Look at me,” he whispered, and I obeyed. Not on purpose, it was just
my body that behaved like he was my god. “I need to know you can handle
yourself in there, Snowflake.”
The question was at the tip of my tongue—why, I wanted to ask, but I
knew he wouldn’t answer me. And I already knew the answer. I already
loved the answer even if I refused to let myself think about it.
“I can’t learn how to fight in a week,” I said reluctantly.
“You can learn how to defend yourself, at least. Raise your arms,” he
said, and it took all I had not to refuse. But I knew that he was absolutely
right—I could learn a few moves and be more prepared the next time, say, a
fucking dragon came to eat me.
“Like this,” Shade said, showing me by raising his own arms.
Fuck, he looked so handsome just now, surrounded by black and red. I
tried not to notice, or at least to not give it my attention. Good thing I had
no choice but to focus on his movements the next second, when he began to
attack me again.
 This time, though, he was much slower. This time, he gave me
instructions with every new move he made—raise your left arm to the side,
duck, kick, step back. This time, he was patient with me.
It actually wasn’t as impossible as I’d believed. It was even easy to just
obey him blindly, and even though my muscles ached when the hour was
over, I could move. Not nearly as well as he did, but I could move, and I
even managed to land a couple kicks of my own, which I’m sure he
deliberately let me do, but still.
It took all the energy out of me to move like that, though, so I had no
choice but to step back eventually.
“Just a second,” I said, wincing at the slight pain that remained on the
side of my waist, resting my hands on my knees to catch my breath. When
that didn’t work, I just sat on the mats. “I just…I just need a second.”
I thought Shade was going to make me get back to my feet, tell me that
I didn’t have a second to spare, but he surprised me when he sat down in
front of me instead. His hair had fallen in front of his eye, no longer
combed back like usual but standing in all directions. I’d be damned if he
didn’t look even better like that. I probably looked like I was on the verge
of dying with the way I was breathing, my cheeks flushed and my hair
probably all over the place, but he pulled it off. He pulled everything off,
unfortunately for me.
“How come you haven’t been to this room yet?” he asked after a
minute, his beautiful eyes taking in every inch of me. He always looked at
me like he was seeing me for the first time and couldn’t get enough of the
sight of me. By now, I was pretty sure I’d never get tired of that look.
“I didn’t even know this existed, to be honest.” The dummies behind
him, that were perfectly motionless and had been since they stepped away
from the wall, would have scared me out of here if I did.
“You should have. Carmine told you this place has everything you need
to prepare yourself—she was right. You should have known every room in
the Palace by now. The others do.”
I flinched—yeah, the others worked together. They talked and shared
information—not with me, though. At least they hadn’t until now, except
Maia. And Maia spent all her time at the library, didn’t she? I was pretty
sure she’d never been here before.
But if she had, would she have told me?
That question made me uncomfortable. I stood up, moving closer to the
walls, running my fingertips over the black paint. Shade followed, moving
so soundlessly I didn’t hear a thing until I saw him next to me.
“Yeah, I’m pretty isolated,” I admitted, despite my better judgment. I
was isolated, and I always tended to run, to never allow myself to want or
expect help from anyone for anything, just because it was easier that way. It
always had been. If I don’t expect anything from people, how can they
possibly hurt or disappoint me?
Right now, though, it wasn’t doing me any favors. In this Palace, being
isolated had only left me behind, and maybe I ought to change that. For the
third trial, at least.
“But I’ve been reading,” I said, shaking my head. “I’ve been preparing.
I’m doing my best.” I hated to say those words out loud, but I figured since
he’d bothered to show me this place and teach me a couple things that
might help me…
“I know. Keep at it,” Shade said, and again, he caught me by surprise.
This part of him, when he wasn’t trying his best to make me hate him, was
by far my favorite.
Pressing my back to the wall, I looked at him. Really looked at him and
realized just how much of him I still didn’t know. Realized just how much
of him I wanted to figure out so badly.
Then, I said, “Come closer,” because I must have lost my mind. But the
side of my waist no longer hurt. I was no longer breathing as heavily, and
my muscles were throbbing, but I was also feeling alive. So much energy
running through me so suddenly.
Shade came to me, looking like he was being torn apart as he did, like
he wanted nothing more than to stop himself but couldn’t.
God help me, I was about to take advantage of that right now.
I grabbed his shirt in my fists and pulled him even closer until his warm
breath was blowing against my lips. I must have been crazier than I gave
myself credit for because I was leaning in, searching for his mouth with
mine, until my lips brushed his.
I just wanted a break. A little break from my reality, that’s all. We could
go back to sparring after.
Shade growled, his hand closing around the back of my neck as he
pressed himself to me a bit harder. I was already light as a feather—his
hands on me were everything.
This. This was exactly what I needed.
“You should know better than to allow this,” he whispered.
“I do.” Unfortunately, it still didn’t stop me.
Instead, I let go of his shirt and slowly trailed my hands up his chest and
around his neck.
“I’m Elysean,” Shade said. “You of all people should know what that
means.”
My eyes popped open. “Just shut up and kiss me, Shadow Boy.”
He did.
His tongue was in my mouth, his hands all over me, his body flush
against mine. I did know who he was and what that meant, but this felt like
nothing I could have ever even imagined. If it was wrong to want it, so be
it. Right now, my whole world had turned upside down. This was all I had,
so I would take it.
And he took everything from me, too.
 He unbuttoned my vest in a rush, and his hands were under my shirt
again, thumb tracing the scar on my waist that had barely hurt while we’d
sparred. Whatever Marcus had done to me had worked miracles, and Shade
could see it for himself, too. That’s why he wrapped those hands around my
waist tightly and pulled me up. I jumped and my legs locked around his
hips instantly, his hard erection rubbing against the seam of my leather
pants in exactly the right spot. Then he thrust his hips forward and moaned
right into my mouth.
Fuck. No control left in me. I was starved for him, and I couldn’t get
enough of sucking his lips into my mouth, biting him, exploring him. His
tongue slid against mine so smoothly. Our bodies had already picked the
rhythm, moving against one another, grinding faster by the second in
perfect sync. He had one hand on my ass, the other under my shirt, moving
farther up until he reached my bra. The stupid bra I wished would just
disappear when he squeezed my breast, making my back arch and push my
body into his even more.
Colors burst behind my closed lids. My hands were in his hair, holding
on tightly, making sure he couldn’t move away even an inch. He was so
much better than any fantasy I’d ever had—even those about him. And
when I felt a bit of cold coming from my sides, my eyes opened just a slit to
the most fascinating thing I’d seen yet—darkness was spreading from us,
from where Shade’s feet were firmly planted on the floor, consuming the
mats, the walls, the dummies, wrapping us up in the same nothingness I’d
been in twice before now.
Safe. I wasn’t afraid—I felt safe in those all-consuming shadows, safe in
Shade’s arms, which might be the stupidest thing I’d ever felt in my life.
But it was real, and I clung to it as the world around us fell apart and our
bodies moved as one.
His hand slipped under my bra as if he knew exactly what I needed, and
he cupped my breast, massaging my hard nipple with his fingertips until my
eyes rolled in my skull. He thrust his hips against my pussy, and for a
second I just imagined that we were naked, that he was sliding inside me,
and I almost exploded into a thousand pieces.
God, I was so, so close…
“Shade,” I breathed when he let go of my mouth to trail kisses down my
jaw, on the side of my neck. I couldn’t stop grinding against his cock,
wishing our clothes weren’t there at all. Wishing his mouth was on my
breast, his warm tongue on my nipple, then down lower.
Fuck, the thought of his face between my thighs…
“Damn it, Snowflake. You taste like sin,” he whispered in my ear, then
sucked my lobe in his mouth. “Such a beautiful, deadly sin.”
“Please,” I choked, my hips moving faster, body desperate for release,
and then…
Something moved.
We both froze in place and our eyes snapped open.
Something moved somewhere close, but I couldn't see shit from the
darkness, just Shade’s face, his hungry, bloodshot eyes, his lips raw red…
“Stay here,” he whispered and stepped back, letting go of me.
My legs barely held me when he turned around and simply disappeared
from my sight like he’d never been there in the first place. Panic grabbed
me by the throat—what the hell? Why was I still in the darkness? Had he
forgotten to take me out or something? How was I going to find him now?!
But then I heard the voices.
They seemed to be coming from somewhere far away and from a few
feet to my side at the same time. Someone spoke, her voice ice-cold—I
could have sworn it was Madam Carmine, and she sounded pissed. Then
Shade said something, too, but I couldn’t really understand their words, just
recognized who they were.
My eyes closed and I sat down on the floor that must have been
underneath that darkness because it held me just fine. My heart was still
slamming against my chest, and I ached between my thighs, my skin on
fire, begging for his hands, for his mouth…
The sound of a door slamming closed echoed in my ears.
The next second, the darkness disappeared, slipping into the walls,
giving way to light and color and shapes again.
I blinked the blur of the intense lights away for a moment, and when my
eyes adjusted, I looked around with my breath held.
Shade was gone. I was all alone in the War Room.

I D .
Elaine Atkinson was dead.
Pablo Alvarez and Jessica Kechinkov were in a coma.
I blinked and I waited, and I blinked some more, but her words still
made little sense to me.
Angel was standing at the head of the table in the Midas Hall at dinner,
and I’d just started eating when she gave us the news.
It had been him whom I’d seen under those ruins—Isaac Donovan, with
the dark brown hair and the chubby cheeks. We’d barely spoken once at that
party, and I didn’t even remember what we said. He hadn’t mocked me or
cursed me the way others had, though. He’d seemed nice since the
beginning.
Elaine, too—we’d even shared a conversation once, after Denis attacked
her in the hallway that morning. I’d almost considered her a friend.
And now they were both dead.
“Cause of death?” I asked, and my voice sounded so strange in the
complete silence of the Hall. The Elysean students weren’t at their table,
either—it was just us mortals.
I knew Isaac’s cause of death—a fucking dragon had ruined a castle,
and the pieces of it had crushed him under. But I had no clue how Elaine
had died.
Angel pursed her lips together. “That is confidential information that
will be disclosed to close family only,” was the answer she gave me.
I wanted to tell the others. I wanted to tell them that I’d seen Isaac’s
body in the Dome, but I didn’t. I couldn’t bring myself to speak those words
out loud still.
Appetite lost, I stood up and left the Hall right after Angel did.
What was the point in staying, anyway—Maia was still not talking to
me, still avoiding my eyes like the damn plague. Fuck, I wanted to grab her
and shake her until I got through to her head—I didn’t care about what
she’d done in the damn trial!
As it was, I went straight for the War Room, hoping the others wouldn’t
follow right away. Hoping Shade would be there, waiting for me. He’d
make it hurt less.
Or, at least, he’d distract me perfectly fine with that mouth of his.
Earlier, when he’d disappeared, I’d gone and searched for him around
the Palace, and upstairs in the library, too. He hadn’t been anywhere. How
pathetic of me to be chasing after an Elysean, but here we were.
Even now, the War Room was empty. The statue of the soldier let me
through without trouble as soon as I said those two words Shade had said to
him earlier. I’d even searched their meaning in books, and the closest thing
I could come up with was that they meant, allow me entrance, though the
Latin words for that were a bit different.
The black human-shaped dummies had taken their places by the wall,
probably after I left. I had no clue what the hell I was doing when I
approached them, but I just knew I needed to blow off some steam.
Two of us dead already, another two in a damn coma. And we still had
another trial to face.
“So, erm…how does this work exactly? Because I would like to train,” I
said to the dummies. It was meant to be a joke—of course, they weren’t
going to respond.
Except they did.
Two of them moved forward, their legs in perfect sync as they strode to
me slowly, then stopped five feet away. I forgot how to breathe for a
moment.
“Right,” I whispered, already sweating. It was just so surreal to see
them moving—they looked like statues. And the soldier by the doors, too—
who in the world would expect him to move with those opal eyes and body
made out of marble?
“Don’t attack me or anything,” I told the dummies and went closer,
slowly, just to touch one of them. They didn’t feel like marble, but it wasn’t
plastic either—maybe something in between.
“Raise your hands,” I said, and to my surprise, they both did so without
a peep.
Wow. So, I could actually use them to train for real. I wondered if I told
them that I was a beginner, if they’d know how to teach me to fight, or
defend myself. The black gemstones on their foreheads that caught the
overhead lights and turned them into rainbows were the reason why they
were able to move—I read about that earlier, too. The godstones. They
belonged to House Opal, and the dummies were probably made by someone
from Ares’s Bloodline, the god of war. Same with the statue of the solider
outside that had godstones for eyes.
I wondered if the cyclopses that guarded the gates of the city had moved
because of those emeralds in their foreheads, a creation of descendants of
the Muses, no doubt. I’d seen that happen firsthand with Amelia. The way
she’d blown on that paper and the way those wasps had come to life right
then and there…
“Wait a minute,” I whispered to myself.
Something nagged at my brain suddenly, something that took my breath
away once more.
 Yes, I remembered how Amelia had made those wasps come to life
from her sketchbook—the wasps without godstones of any color anywhere
on them.
What was it that I’d read in that book earlier—The Power of Art and
Beauty? Didn’t it say that all magical creations needed godstones to
function in the real world?
Oh, God.
Was that why I hadn’t felt the wasps in Eeda’s bag that day when I
captured them, right until Amelia caught me in the Seasons Hall? Had she
made the bag in my hands move with her magic? Because, fuck, I really
hadn’t felt the wasps in it at all, only heard the sound of them, until I saw
her.
My mind blanked out for a moment, and I raised a finger at the
dummies, which still had their hands up.
“Hold on a sec. Stay right there. I’ll be back,” I said, and I ran out of the
War Room.
Heart in my throat, I ran as fast as my legs could carry me. The wound
on my waist stung a little just now, but I didn’t care. I stopped in front of
the library doors, perfectly aware that what I was about to do could very
well cost me a lot of pain, if not my life.
I opened the door anyway.
Elysean students—including Amelia—in exactly the same recliners as
they had been that first time I came here. The candidates were deeper into
the room, behind the hovering planets.
And the wasps already rose in the air behind the first row of shelves,
more than twenty of them, all their eyes on me.
Mine were on them, too.
I stepped into the room.
The whispers stopped for a moment. Everybody watched me.
 No godstones. The wasps, not one of them, had godstones on their
bodies. They didn’t look like statues by any means, but they were a creation
of a Muse descendant. They’d need godstones to be able to function in the
real world, just like that soldier statue and the dummies.
Not real, I said to myself and stepped deeper into the room. Not real,
not real, not real…
The wasps were already coming for me. It took all I had to resist my
instincts, not to turn around and run out the door and hide at the edges of
the world, but I’d done that already. Plenty of times. If they could hurt me,
let them. I was not going to run again.
Every step felt like moving a mountain on my own while the wasps
buzzed and came for me, the sound of them permanently present in my
nightmares. I held my breath, hands fisted to the sides, and I watched them
until they were right in front of me.
My eyes closed on instinct. The buzzing seemed to pass right by my ear
before it faded some. I didn’t feel the bodies of the wasps if they slammed
onto my face or if they grazed me or pricked me with their stingers. There
was no pain—nothing at all.
My eyes opened. The wasps buzzed somewhere behind me like they’d
gone right through me.
I looked at Amelia, incredulous still.
My God, that bitch had tricked me! Here I thought those wasps were
going to kill me if they caught me, and they couldn’t even touch me this
whole time?
She smiled. Amelia smiled, but it wasn’t evil. It wasn’t malicious. She
nodded at me, too, then she raised a hand and the emerald on her ring
glowed.
I turned just in time to see the wasps that were now flying in circles and
not even remotely interested in me fade out of existence and end up a pile
of lead on the floor.
Gone.
The wasps were gone.
And I was finally free to be in the goddamn library.
 28

The Second War of Gods left the earth barren and unpopulated, and so wise Zeus gave
the titan Prometheus and his brother a number of invaluable gifts and tasked them
with creating life.
Prometheus shaped the new man in the image of the gods with great care, while
Epimetheus created the animals, and used up most of the gods’ gifts on them, leaving
for man only a few. Therefore, animals were stronger, had enhanced senses, and coats
of fur to shield them from the cold, while men nearly died in the long winter nights.

Thus, kind Prometheus traveled to Olympus to ask Zeus for sacred fire to give to his
creation.
Zeus refused.

—Book of Creation, Volume II, 2nd Edition, 49

by Warren Marvos, House Emerald

Maia kept watching me for a couple hours, but every time I’d raise my head
to look at her, she’d lower her eyes to the pages of the book she was
reading. The others smiled and nodded at me from a distance but otherwise
left me alone, for which I was thankful. I didn’t have the energy to spend on
anything else right now—I wanted to read.
 The blue butterflies with the inscribed wings were as incredible as Maia
said. Earlier, all I did was walk between the shelves, wanting some space to
breathe and come to terms with the fact that the wasps were gone. But the
butterflies knew. One of them stopped right in front of me on the shelf,
beautiful blue wings fluttering, the letters written on them moving and
changing right before my eyes. Once it got my attention, the butterfly flew
over to the other end of the shelf and stopped again—this time right over
the books on the third row down. My eyes skimmed over the spines—
Modern Myths, The Influence of the Gods in Elysean Culture, Elysean
Politics and More, Rare and Common Talents and Magical Gifts, The
Daedalus Palace—and many more books that were exactly what I was
curious about. How incredible—what I wanted to know was more about
this Palace, about how the Elyseans operated, and what all their magic
powers could be. This butterfly simply brought me here as if it could really
read my mind.
At first, I thought it didn’t have godstones anywhere on it, but it did. It
had two small emerald eyes—so tiny I barely made them out, but they were
there. This gorgeous thing was a creation of a Muse descendant, too, and
possibly the most beautiful thing I’d seen in this place yet.
After reading for almost four hours, my eyes were tired, my body heavy,
and I’d run all out of distractions to keep myself from thinking about Isaac
and Elaine.
I’d run all out of distractions to keep myself from thinking about Shade,
too, unfortunately. It was time for me to get to bed.
I left behind two candidates when I walked out of the library. Maia had
probably left a long time ago while I was reading. I made my way up the
stairs, wondering about this place and the other spaces that book said would
be here—like the Magic Room where you could learn about magic and
spell protection. Or the Art Room, where you could learn all about how
Elyseans merged art with magic, and something I’d had a hard time
believing myself—an actual Menagerie full of wild animals was between
these very walls on the ground floor.
Tomorrow. I would do some exploring tomorrow, I decided.
But it wasn’t meant to be.
I didn’t hear or see them, but the second I stepped into the hallway of
the second floor, someone grabbed me by the wrist and pulled me back
against the wall. Lorenzo’s smiling face filled my vision, and David and
Jasper were with him, too.
“There she is,” Lorenzo said—and he no longer told me that he was in
love with me, at least. The effects of the Hedone spell had definitely worn
off long ago, thank God.
“The godless whore who somehow has all the answers,” said David
from my side, the tip of his wand touching under my jaw.
I moved my head away and tried to knee the asshole in the balls, but he
saw it coming this time, too, so he blocked me.
“Get the fuck off me,” I spit. “Get. Off!”
“Not until you tell me the truth, mortal,” Lorenzo whispered. “Not until
you tell me how you knew. Who helped you? Who are you working with?”
“Nobody—I know the damn stories!”
“How? How do you know?”
The image of Miss Aldentach was right in front of my eyes, but I
doubted they’d care if I told them about her, so I didn’t bother.
“None of your business. Let me go!” I tried to move, but they held me
back by the arms harder.
“Is it Shade?” Jasper whispered in my ear, making goose bumps break
down my back. “Is he the one helping you?”
“How would she manage to convince him, though?” said David from
the other side. “The guy’s a fucking monk.”
“I don’t know, but I heard he even took her to the Void,” Jasper
whispered. I’d heard that name before—the Void. Eeda had mentioned it
two weeks ago, while she was warning me about Shade.
And that seemed very interesting to David. “No way,” he breathed.
“You handled the Void?” I’d even go so far as to say he looked impressed.
"Are you fucking him, mortal? Is that it—did you give him your pussy in
exchange for answers?”
“I want some of that, too,” Lorenzo said, and David snorted.
“Yeah, we know, Zee,” he said while he and Jasper laughed. Lorenzo
didn’t seem too happy about it.
“Shut it, fuckers. Neither of you were any better,” he spit—and I
assumed they were talking about the time they were under the Hedone spell.
It had affected all the guys, but not the girl students. Or maybe the girls
hadn’t cared for any of the male candidates?
“I will scream,” I said through gritted teeth. “If you don’t get off me
right now, I will scream.”
“But with a bit of magic, all that effort will just go to waste,” David said
from my side, waving his wand in front of my face.
Oh, God. “What the hell do you want from me?” I hated it that my voice
broke, but I was terrified.
“The truth,” Jasper said. “And if you can’t tell us that, then I’ll have to
call my friends to help me out again. I don’t know how you fooled them last
time, but they’ll be more careful tonight not to lose your scent.”
The face of the leopards and that strange animal they’d unleashed on me
last time came to my mind. I couldn’t even assume that they weren’t real
now, like the wasps, because they were real animals, possibly coming
straight out of the Menagerie downstairs at Jasper’s call.
Fuck, I was so screwed.
“Let go of me. I am not working with anyone. Nobody’s helping me—
just let go of me!” I cried out, and I was this close to begging.
But the boys suddenly let go of me for real and stepped to the sides,
pressing their backs against the wall.
 Tears in my eyes.
“No…” I whispered, but Jasper’s smile said it all.
“Oh, yes, baby,” he said. “You better start running.”
I turned for the stairs the next heartbeat, planning to run outside the
building, find a guard, find Angel—find anyone to see what the hell these
boys were trying to do. Anyone willing to fucking stop them before they
killed me for real.
But the second I turned, I saw the leopard standing at the bottom of the
stairway by himself, watching me with those red eyes.
Then his friend came.
The boys laughed. “Run, mouse, run!”
I ran.
Angry tears spilled down my cheeks, but I ran down the hallway and
was going to get into my room, only to find the other animal that looked
like a dog right in front of my door, waiting.
I had no choice but to turn the corner because the leopards were behind
me, too. I ran to a part of the floor I hadn’t been to before, but I didn’t care.
They didn’t rush, the animals, like they were taunting me, like they knew
how slow my legs were and they were trying to give me hope that I could
get away before they sank their teeth in my neck. I turned corner after
corner, trying to open a few doors as I went but they were all locked. It
made me wonder if the hallway went on forever, until I saw a set of white
doors engraved with the face of a goddess I hadn’t seen before, and the one
on the left seemed to be slightly open.
I slammed onto them with my whole body without a second thought.
Outside.
Cold air in my nostrils. My body moved forward, unable to stop the
momentum. All I saw was a white railing and the dark sky over our heads
before I slammed onto something, and my body toppled over.
 My instincts were faster than I’d thought because I’d grabbed the railing
with both hands, and now I was hanging onto it by a thread from a balcony
on the second floor that I hadn’t even known existed.
Not only that but the wound on my waist hurt again like somebody was
burning me with pure fire, and the railing was made out of smooth stone, so
my fingers were already slipping.
Fast, too fast. I couldn’t hold on.
A scream built up in my chest—would I die? Could I really hope to
survive a fall from the second floor?
I never got to find out.
Hands wrapped around my wrists, and Maia’s face was suddenly in
front of me.
“Push!” she urged me, and I did.
She pulled me up within seconds, and I was no longer hanging onto the
railing, and I was no longer going to fall off the second floor. I barely
breathed as Maia helped me to my feet because I must have lost balance
without realizing it.
But the animals were coming. I could hear their footsteps perfectly fine
—they were coming for me again.
“Get the doors!” I shouted and launched myself at the doors of the
narrow balcony, hoping they’d be enough to hold the animals back, at least
until someone found us.
But the night wasn’t done surprising me yet because before I knew it,
something moved from the other side of the hallway fast as lightning.
“Quick—get in here!”
It was Eeda holding up a bundle of sheets in her hands and nodding at
the empty cart in front of her.
I didn’t look, didn’t dare turn my head to the side, afraid if I saw the
animals I’d freeze. If they were close enough to sink their teeth in me, I
didn’t want to fucking know it.
 With Maia in tow, I just jumped into the cart that seemed way bigger on
the inside than it looked from outside, and somehow it fit the both of us.
Barely, but we fit. Eeda put the sheets she’d been holding over our heads,
and it was like she’d cut out the outside world from us completely. No
sound and no light reached us in the cart, and Maia and I didn’t dare make a
single sound when the wheels started spinning.
We were moving, and the leopards hadn’t jumped in the cart yet.
God, when was this going to end? Leopards and fucking dragons
coming for my neck—what the hell had become of my life?
Goddamn it, Gary, I thought to myself as I kept my eyes squeezed shut,
afraid to even breathe too loudly.
We didn’t go far. The cart stopped moving barely a couple minutes later.
The next second, the sheets were off us, and the world returned—bright,
and even the silence was loud.
Eeda’s smiling face filled my vision, and I’d never been happier to see
her than I was right now.
“All clear. They’re gone,” she told me. “You might want to stay away
for a little while, though. Maybe hide in the tower until they fall sleep?”
I jumped off the cart and hugged her to my chest while she chuckled.
“Thank you, Eeda. You literally saved my life.” If those leopards had
gotten to me…God, I didn’t dare even think about what it would be like to
be eaten by wild animals. What an ending that would have been.
“Thank you so much,” Maia said to her, cheeks flushed as she tried to
tame her curls away from her face. “Thank you—that was…thank you.”
“You’re very welcome, dears. Now go, before they find you. Get in
there,” she said, and she was pointing at the doors in front of which she’d
stopped the cart—the ones that led to the tower. “The Stargazing tower is
the perfect spot to hide.” And she winked at me.
“The what? We can get up to the tower?” said Maia, and she sounded
surprised.
 “Sure, you can. Just don’t tell anybody about it,” Eeda said, and maybe
it was just my imagination playing tricks on me, but I could have sworn I
heard footsteps coming, so I grabbed Maia by the hand and opened the door
the next second.
“Thank you!” I called to Eeda one more time. I owed her. I owed her
big time.
We ran up the spiral stairs, still freaked out even though nothing and
nobody was around us. When we reached the room at the top of the tower,
though, I breathed much easier.
Alone. We were alone. And for now, in the beautiful tower with the
solar system floating in the air, the gorgeous paintings on the ceiling, and
the magnificent view of the night sky ahead, we were safe.

“I’ . I’m a terrible person,” Maia said for the third time.
“And I keep telling you, you’re not. Stop it already. I don’t care—I’m
glad you made that deal,” I repeated.
“I should have helped you. You looked so bad—I should have helped
you. If something happened to you…” Her voice trailed off as she shook
her head. “She just said not to go near you for any reason at all, and I…and
I…”
“You chose to survive. Nothing wrong with that.” And there really
wasn’t. “Why not come see me after, though?” Out of everything, that had
hurt the most.
She smiled at me. We were both sitting in front of the archway, the
moonlight falling on our faces so I could see her perfectly. “Because I was
ashamed. And I thought you’d try to strangle me or something. I wouldn’t
have even stopped you.”
 I almost laughed. “I wouldn’t have.” But it was nice to hear the apology,
I’ll admit.
For a moment, we sat there in comfortable silence, watching the sky and
the moon and the stars…
“Who the hell did that? Who sent those animals after you?” Maia said.
Shivers rushed down my back. “Jasper. He, David and Lorenzo
cornered me as I was coming up, and he called for them.” I didn’t tell her it
had happened before, though. I didn’t want her to worry.
“So, Jasper is House Ruby, huh,” she whispered.
“Well, yeah.” He always wore that big ass ruby around his neck for all
to see.
“I wonder what Blair is,” she whispered, and I turned to look at her—
was she joking? “We know about most, but I haven’t heard about Blair.”
I figured she was just messing with me. “Right,” I said, rolling my eyes,
but she was still staring at the sky, so she missed it.
“Some of them are so secretive about their Houses—like, why? I don’t
even know what House Rebecca is. Imagine that.” Rebecca—the Elysean
student she’d pledged allegiance to, the one who had been caught dealing
hallucinogens at the Academy.
I turned to Maia again—how did she not know, when that girl carried
her emerald on her clothes at all times? How did she not know about Blair,
either, when she wore her sapphire on a flower-shaped brooch every single
day?
And Jasper, too—how had she not known?
But Maia sighed. “I wish we could see their godstones, at least. It would
be easier to know who to stay away from. They say the bigger the godstone,
the more powerful the Elysean. I, for one, would have loved to know who I
was talking to when dealing with them.”
That’s when I knew for sure that she was messing with me, so I
laughed. “Except we can see their stones.”
 Maia looked at me for a second, eyes wide, the silver moon reflecting in
them. “Don’t be silly. We’re not Elysean.”
I blinked.
Blinked again.
Another ten times or so, then I thought to breathe.
“What…what do you mean?” My voice sounded so strange just now.
“I mean only Elyseans see godstones,” she said.
Her words stabbed at my gut.
“But…but we do see them.” We did, didn’t we? “You see them. You saw
the ones they gave us after the trials, right?” Everybody saw them—a
couple candidates played with them at mealtimes every day to show off. No
way had I made that up.
And Maia said, “Well, of course. Those are just gemstones. They
become godstones after they’re filled with magic—that’s what we can’t see.
Don’t tell me you didn’t know that.”
If I didn’t pass out from shock that second, I never would.
The smile I gave her was so fake it hurt my cheeks. “Of course, yeah.
Yeah, I read about it, I just forgot.”
And Maia nodded right away because…because she wasn’t messing
with me. Because she meant it.
The view in front of me kept spinning again.
“I read plenty about them, too. So freaky to think we’ll have godstones,
too, if we finish the Academy and actually eat the Ambrosia and drink
Nectar. They’re supposed to be the most delicious thing to have ever
existed,” she said.
I shook my head, unable to stop my hands from shaking, but I put them
under my thighs so she wouldn’t see them.
“Hey, remember the big cyclopses at the gates of Idaea?” I forced
myself to say.
“Yes?” said Maia.
 “Do you think they have those godstones anywhere on them?” Because
they did. Big, huge emeralds shining on their bald heads. Emeralds that
were impossible to miss.
Maia shrugged. “Could be. Maybe. It would make sense—they could be
called upon to protect the city in case something happened?”
She was absolutely serious.
“Possible, yeah—and what about the butterflies? Remember the blue
ones in the library? Do you think they have godstones on them?” They did
—two stones for eyes, same as the soldier in front of the War Room.
Maia shrugged again. “I don’t think so. They’re so small—where would
one put godstones on them?”
“Right? Waaay too small!” I laughed and it was the most awkward
sound I’d ever made. “But what about Arthur O’Brien and Avery Johnson?
Do you think they had godstones on them that day when they did their
magic in Idaea?”
They had. Avery had had a ruby around her neck, Arthur an emerald
sewn to the breast pocket of his his jacket.
“Probably, yeah,” Maia said with a nod. “They probably did. Gods, they
were so lucky…”
White noise in my ears. I couldn’t breathe properly. My throat was tight,
my body heavy, hands shaking.
“Can I ask you something, Sera?” Maia said after a minute. I couldn’t
answer with words—I barely managed a nod. “How’d you know?” she
whispered. “Don’t get me wrong—you saved us, and I appreciate it so
much, but how did you know to sing the hymn in the trial?”
Apollo, I wanted to say. I saw Apollo’s face engraved on the rock’s
surface.
Just like I saw Pan’s face on the tree in the frozen forest.
Just like I saw the engraving of the winds on the pendant of the Wind
Keeper.
 Instead, I said, “Just a lucky guess,” because what if I wasn’t supposed
to see that, either?
Did she even believe me? I didn’t dare look at her face before I said, “I
think I need to go lie down now, Maia. The animals are probably gone.”
She nodded. “Yeah. Yes, we both need to rest. Now that the wasps
aren’t there anymore, can we maybe go to the library together?”
I smiled. “Sounds like a great idea, actually.”
When we made it back to the second floor, the hallway was deserted.
Maia’s room was just around the corner from mine, so she would get there
safely in no time.
No sounds. No animals. No footsteps other than ours.
“Hey—how’d you know that, by the way?” she whispered when I
opened the door to my room. “How’d you know the wasps would go right
through you?”
Oh, God.
Because they didn’t have godstones on them.
“I actually found another library up here on the second floor, and I read
about them. I’ll tell you all about it tomorrow.” The lie flowed easily
because it was partly true.
Pressing her lips into a smile, she nodded. “Night, Sera.”
“Goodnight, Maia.”
I waited until she turned the corner, and I heard the door of her room
opening. Then I closed mine and lay on the bed still dressed, refusing to
think a single thought.
 29

“A kiss shall never be just a kiss. It shall be a soul served into your body.
Lucky are those who’ve tasted the true kiss of love, and unlucky, for they will never
again find satisfaction in the ordinary.”

—Eros: the Burden of Love, 355

by Sherida Marquise, House Opal

Sleep left me like it was being chased by leopards.

Or maybe that was me in my dreams, running like my ass was on fire,
trying to get away while the animals I couldn’t see but knew were there
came for me. I ran in the darkness illuminated by red and green and blue
stones that popped up without warning, scaring me even more.
That’s why I woke up all the way immediately, so thankful that it had
only been a nightmare. Just a stupid nightmare that couldn’t chase me into
the real world.
The sky was still dark outside my windows, and the clock on the
nightstand said it was just a little past two a.m. I’d have liked to sleep a
little more, but it was fine. A few hours were better than nothing. I could
use a glass of water, anyway.
But the moment I sat up on the bed, I saw the darkness slipping from
under my door and I froze again. Even my heart forgot how to beat for the
longest second.
Tendrils of shadows had slipped into my room from under the door, and
they moved forward and to the sides, licking the floor like they were tasting
it, like they were living, breathing things.
And I knew exactly who they belonged to.
Pushing the cover off me, I got up and went to the door slowly, thankful
that I had only taken my vest off when I slept. The shadows were slightly
colder against my bare feet, but the floor underneath was just the same. It
didn’t stop me. It didn’t swallow me whole, either. I was used to that
darkness, and I wasn’t even afraid of it, which should have alarmed me.
But when I pulled the door open, I could hardly believe my eyes.
Shade was sitting on the floor across from my door, back against the
wall, elbows resting on his knees. His shadows spread around him, all over
the floor and up the wall behind him in thick tendrils.
His eyes had been closed, head laid back, and he was so pale he
resembled a ghost. But when our eyes locked, the ribbons of darkness sort
of snapped back inside him, underneath him, like goddamn rubber bands.
He was on his feet and in front of me in a heartbeat, hands on my face
as he analyzed every inch of me, checking to make sure I wasn’t wounded.
Had he heard about the animals already?
“I’m okay,” I said breathlessly, his hands on my face making a mess of
my insides even though I didn’t want to even acknowledge it. So what if his
skin was soft and warm and made me want to stay connected to him
forever?
He’s Elysean, Sera, a distant voice of reason whispered in my mind,
trying to warn me.
 Yes, he was—and so goddamn beautiful it hurt to look at him when he
was so close.
“Was it Jasper again?” he said, and I thought I nodded.
“I’m fine, I promise. He was just messing with me,” I said, for some
reason trying to make him feel better about it. Just that the image of him
sitting outside my door, shadows spilling out of him like that, looking like
he was in pain, did something to me and I had no clue what it even was.
His forehead pressed to mine, and I closed my eyes, holding onto his
forearms.
“He’s crossed the line,” he said, and it was a goddamn warning.
“He was just playing with me. If he really wanted those leopards to hurt
me, they would have. I can’t outrun a damn leopard,” I muttered, soaking
up his warmth like he was the sun. I had even leaned in closer, my hands
tightly around his wrists to keep his on my face.
What the hell are you doing, Sera? asked that same voice again. I had
no answer.
“Why are you up, Snowflake? It’s two in the morning,” Shade said, and
he leaned his head back a bit, as if he was just remembering himself.
Remembering who I was.
I did, too. But it was two in the goddamn morning, and apparently, I
didn’t give a shit about right or wrong or common sense at this time of
night.
“Why are you sitting outside my door, Shadow Boy? It’s two in the
morning,” I said, and an amazing thing happened—he was caught off guard
by my terrible imitation of his voice, so he smiled just like he had that night
with Miles. For a second, he hit me with the full intensity of his most
genuine smile and his face transformed completely.
It made me do something stupid, which was rise on my tiptoes and kiss
him.
 For so long now, everything was bad, bad, bad—fear, secrets, guilt,
running away from everything all the time, and the only time when it felt
good was when Shade was kissing me. I wanted some of that right now.
Just a tiny bit. And we had been interrupted earlier in the War Room, so…
Shade’s arms wrapped around me instantly. Before I knew it, our bodies
were one and his tongue was in my mouth and my fingers in his hair, and I
was alive. Without the weight of everything that came with being me, I was
light as a feather when he kissed me like that.
So, I did something even stupider—I pulled him into the room and
slammed the door shut without ever breaking the kiss.
He moved us with ease, slamming me against the wall, putting his body
on mine like he was afraid I might move away. I felt all of his hard muscle
underneath that black shirt, and I wanted to touch him so badly. Since it was
two in the morning and the whole world was asleep, why the hell not?
My hands shook as I reached for the hem of his shirt and slipped my
hands underneath. He growled like an animal, so much more dangerous
than those leopards, and I was dripping between my thighs. He sucked my
tongue in his mouth until it hurt, but he didn’t stop me. He didn’t move
away from me, didn’t push my hands aside. Instead, he leaned in, eyes
squeezed shut as he kissed me like my hands were just as sizzling hot
against his skin as his were on mine.
I couldn’t think straight if I tried. My hands moved up and down the
smooth skin of his stomach, tracing the lines of his abs, and farther up to his
chest. His were under my shirt, too, up my back then lower, gripping my ass
and slamming me to him until I felt every inch of his hard cock against my
stomach.
I was burning with a fire he controlled every time he stuck his tongue in
my throat and claimed a little bit more of me for himself.
“Shade,” I breathed, running my fingernails down his chest as I ground
my hips against his erection. I needed his hands all over me. I needed him
to touch me until I couldn’t keep my eyes open.
“Fuck, Snowflake,” he said, breathing as heavily as me. “You should
know better than this.”
He sounded just as desperate as I felt.
“Touch me,” I said against his lips, and he kissed me again like he
wouldn’t survive if he didn’t.
His hands moved to my waist, squeezing me until all air left my lungs,
and the stupid shirt was in the way, so I took it off. Screw common sense—I
pulled it off me, and the way Shade looked down at me made it worth it. He
was in awe, frozen in place for only a second, watching my breasts move up
and down as I breathed like I’d been running, before he put his mouth on
me again, kissing my lips and down my jaw, then the side of my neck.
I was completely lost to the feeling when he sucked on my skin, kissed
and bit me in a spot under my jaw that made my knees go weak. If he
wasn’t holding me up, I’d have probably fallen to the floor. I moaned so
loud it would be a miracle if nobody heard, and I held his head to my neck
with all my strength, wanting him to stay right there forever.
His hands moved to the clasp of my bra as if he could read my mind.
Before I knew it, the bra was off me and he squeezed my boobs, making my
eyes roll in my skull. But then he moved away, stepped back a bit, and I felt
like the world ended when his mouth was no longer on me.
“Shade,” I warned because he couldn’t leave me like this. Not now.
Except the way he was looking down at my half-naked body said he
wasn’t planning on leaving. His bloodshot eyes were on his hands that were
massaging my breasts, grabbing my nipples between his thumb and index
finger, playing with them slowly…
Fuck, it felt better than anything I’d ever experienced before.
“Look at you, Snowflake,” he whispered under his breath, licking his
lips as if he were preparing to devour me. “So perfect. My perfect little sin.”
Slowly, he came closer again, and I held onto his hands, eyes closed and
back arched as he continued to play with my boobs. Every touch was
perfect. I was already dying for more. “You’ve gotten into my head, you
know that? I can’t fucking stop thinking about you, and now I know why.
Look at what you’ve been hiding from me under those clothes…”
Another one of those growls and I could have sworn my legs gave up on
me.
Except his arms were around me so he pulled me right up, crashing his
lips to mine. My legs locked around his hips instantly. We were moving,
and a second later, my back hit the mattress, and Shade lay on top of me,
still kissing me like he was in a race.
“Last chance,” he told me, licking my jaw, biting the side of my neck
again until I moaned. “Last chance to stop me, Snowflake.”
“Don’t—” But before I could finish speaking, he kissed the breath out
of me, as if he didn’t want to hear it.
“If you don’t stop me now, I’ll lose all control.” He said it like a
warning, his eyes two dark storms. “I won’t be able to hold back.”
Gripping his face in my hands, I held him still for a second. “Then
don’t. Don’t hold back. I want this. I need this, Shade.”
I must have been out of my damn mind.
Shade didn’t ask me again.
His kiss erased every thought in my head while his hands traveled to my
breasts again. Then he trailed kisses down my neck and to my collarbone, to
my chest. When he sucked my nipple into his mouth, I died and went to
heaven, but he brought me right back with the way he bit me, exactly as
hard as I needed for the pain to add to the pleasure. My hands were tangled
in his hair, my back arched as he played with me, and I raised my hips,
desperate to feel him there.
He must have noticed because he brought his hand down to my pants,
right between my legs. My body locked down as I whimpered, eyes
squeezed shut as he rubbed me slowly. I was so close, I was going to come
if he kept going for just a few seconds longer.
He didn’t. Instead, he let go of my boob and sat up between my legs,
then pulled his own shirt off and threw it to the side.
Shade dressed in greys and blacks was perfection. But Shade without a
shirt on, and with black leather pants hanging low on his narrow hips?
Absolutely divine.
He ran his hands up and down my naked chest, completely fascinated
by every new inch of skin he saw. I was so embarrassed, even considered
covering myself a little, but I didn’t dare stop him from exploring me. I
wanted him to keep going more than I cared about being shy, so I just
focused on his face, on the way his eyes traced every curve of me.
The reality of the situation hit me as he eased my pants lower on my
hips. He moved so slowly, holding my eyes, giving me all the time in the
world to stop him again.
The truth was, I didn’t want to.
The truth was, I wanted him more than I wanted to breathe, so I only
watched him.
A small smile snaked on his lips, as if he knew exactly what I was
thinking. “I’m tempted to think they made you just to fuck with me,” Shade
said, pulling up my legs so he could slide my pants off easier.
“You and I have different opinions about who created us,” I said
breathlessly, shaking a bit as he ran his hands down my naked legs.
Then he put my heels against his shoulder, turning his head to kiss my
ankle as his fingers dug into my thighs. How in the fuck did he know how
to touch me so perfectly?
“You and I have different opinions about a lot of things,” he whispered,
spreading my legs to the sides before he let them down on the bed gently. I
gripped the sheets so tightly my hands hurt. I was only wearing a pair of
white panties—terribly non-sexy—and they were probably completely
soaked, and he could see it.
He could see everything, and he took his time analyzing it, too, with his
eyes and his hands, until he reached my clit with his thumb.
My soul just about left my body. My back arched and my hips shot up,
needing to feel him lower still.
“Have you ever done this before?” Shade asked, leaning over me as he
held himself up, just a few inches away, because he wanted to see me. The
look on his face said he loved to see what he was doing to me.
I shook my head, then regretted it the next second—what if that made
him want to stop?
It didn’t.
Instead, his brows narrowed, and he looked at my eyes like he was just
seeing them for the first time. His thumb no longer rubbed my clit. Instead,
he touched the tips of his fingers up my torso, between my breasts, up to my
jaw…
“You shouldn’t give me something so precious, Snowflake. I’m a selfish
man,” he said. “I will take it. I’ll take anything I can get from you—don’t
you realize that by now?”
Again, he was warning me.
“Good. I’m selfish, too,” I said, my voice barely a whisper as I touched
his face, ran my thumbs over his lips, and my fingertips over his long
lashes, just to convince myself that he was real. That he was here, hovering
a few inches over me, touching me like he wanted to know every edge and
every curve of my body in detail.
“Why?” he asked, closing his eyes as I ran my fingers through his hair. I
was pretty sure he liked it when I touched his hair like that.
“Because you’re the only good thing I have here,” I said, and I prayed
to the stars that he didn’t find that desperate—it was just the truth.
“I am no good,” he whispered against my lips, then kissed me.
 I knew that. He was definitely no good. He was just good for me, for
now.
“What is your real name?” I asked when he moved lower to my neck,
massaging my breasts with his skilled hands.
But Shade didn’t answer. Instead, he put his mouth to work on my
nipples again, one then the other, slowly, until I could no longer tell where
we even were. And when he moved lower still, licking my stomach, kissing
my pelvis, slowly pulling my panties to the side, I held onto the sheets for
dear life.
“Perfect,” he muttered, his warm breath blowing against my soaking
wet folds, before his tongue flicked over my clit.
My back arched, and it was all I could do not to explode right away. But
I wanted to feel more. This was a one-time thing, and I wanted to remember
it. I wanted to feel all of it forever, so I held myself back as long as I could.
His tongue must have been made for me—the way he played with my
clit was insane. My hips shot up and I was dying the most wonderful death
as he ate me like I was his favorite thing in the world. He brought a hand to
assist him, too, the tips of his fingers sliding down my folds as he tortured
my clit with his tongue and teeth and lips.
Impossible to hold on for more than a minute. The next time he held my
clit between his teeth and pressed his tongue over it while his fingers were
right at my entrance, I let go, screaming out his name like he was my
goddamn savior.
In a way, he was.
My body was light as a feather, his mouth still on my pussy, licking and
sucking every drop he could get out of me. I fell back on the bed, so spent
you’d think I had run a marathon.
It was definitely the best orgasm I ever had.
“A ,” Shade said, sinking his teeth in my thigh until I cried out.
I’d just come seconds ago, and he wasn’t coming up. Instead, he only
rose long enough to take my panties off before he settled with his face in
front of my pussy again, kissing and licking and biting.
“I…I can’t…” I breathed, even though I was already turned on—how in
the fuck does that happen?
But a flame burned in the pit of my stomach and even though only one
lamp was on in the room, I saw exactly how he looked up at me. How he
smiled a mischievous little grin that made me want to eat him the way he
was eating me.
“Yes, you can, Snowflake,” he said, and it sounded like a damn promise.
Holding my eyes still, he let out his tongue and flicked it over my clit as
I watched—the sexiest thing I would probably ever see. His hair was all
over the place, the devil in his dark eyes and wicked grin, and heaven right
at the tip of that tongue that already seemed to know my body better than I
did.
When he dove in again, I lost control within seconds, which should
have been impossible. But I grabbed his hair in my hands, and I moved my
hips against his face like I’d done it a million times before, like it was the
most natural thing in the world to have him between my thighs, eating me
like that. And judging by the sounds that came out of him, the way he dug
his fingers in my hips, and the way he absolutely devoured me, he enjoyed
it just as much as I did.
I wanted to stay there forever, but the things he was doing to me must
have really been a sin because no way could I resist. My muscles locked as
the second orgasm tore me open, twice as intense as the first. I cried out his
name again, reached out to him like he really was my god, and he kept
moving his tongue at exactly the same speed and pressure, making it last a
long time.
 So long that by the time it let go of me, I fell back on the bed as if from
the damn sky, completely spent.
I was pretty sure I blacked out for a couple seconds there, but his lips
were still on me, on my stomach and my breasts, on my neck, and then my
forehead. Before I knew it, Shade was lying on the bed next to me, arms
wrapped around me as I struggled to calm my racing heart and just breathe.
What he just did to me was otherworldly. I wasn’t experienced in the
least, but I’d heard plenty of stories in school and nobody said it would feel
like this. Layla never felt like this—she tended to overshare, so I knew
every detail of the few times she’d had sex with her ex.
It didn’t feel like this when I touched myself, either.
No, it was all him.
Shade whispered things under his breath that I couldn’t even
understand, fighting the need to sleep as I half lay on his naked chest. I
wanted to see so much more of him. I wanted to do so much more with him,
now more than ever. I always thought it would be at least another couple
years before I’d want to be with a guy, but Shade had turned everything I
knew about myself upside down within days. He kissed me and I lost it. He
touched me and the world in front of my eyes just wasn’t the same
anymore.
I wanted more.
He must have noticed how hard I was trying to keep my eyes open
because he said, “Sleep, Snowflake.”
It would be so easy to do—it wasn’t just that I was completely spent. It
was the way he held me to his chest, too. The way he rubbed circles on my
shoulder and kept his lips pressed to the top of my head.
If anybody saw us right now, they’d think we’d been here a thousand
times before. They’d think we were lovers, that we did this every single
night. But sleep would have to wait because I still wanted to see him. I still
wanted to talk to him. Just as soon as I gathered some energy.
 When Shade saw that I wasn’t planning to close my eyes, he chuckled,
and the sound warmed me even more than his skin. I never liked men’s
laughs—too throaty and weird—but his was something different.
Something extraordinary, just like the rest of him.
“Adryan,” he finally said.
“What?” I blinked the blur away and looked up at his face—peaceful.
He looked so peaceful, and it gave him a glow I’d never seen on him
before. It fascinated me all over again.
“My name,” he whispered, running his thumb over my bottom lip. “It’s
Adryan.”
I reached out my hand to touch his cheek. It looked so soft—definitely
rounder from down here. “Why Shade?”
“My mother used to call me that. She joked about how I only ever
showed the world a shade of myself since I was a boy, and it stuck,” he
said, and I could have sworn his voice changed just now. I was burning with
curiosity already, but I didn’t want to ask questions about his parents and
make him feel uncomfortable. That was the one thing that made me want to
run any time it was brought up, too.
“Where is your godstone?” I asked instead, as a way to change the
subject, but also because I was curious about that, too. I’d never seen his on
him, and he wasn’t even wearing a shirt.
In fact, now that I was focusing on his torso, I could see his skin just
fine. I could see the scars on him, too, three long diagonal lines made of
white scar tissue across his chest, like someone had tried to claw his heart
out a long time ago.
I tried to lean back, suddenly alert, just to see him better, but he held me
tightly to him and said, “It’s on my back.”
“What do you mean, on your back?” Elyseans either wore their
godstones around their necks or wrists or fingers or clothes, but…
 “My stone is in my body. Right here,” he said, and turned to the side
just slightly, tapping the base of his neck.
“Let me see.”
I rose on my elbows, and I saw.
A black rectangular stone that wasn’t reflecting any light in the darkness
of the room was literally halfway inside his skin, right between his shoulder
blades. That same white scar tissue surrounded it, and it was half the size of
my fist.
“You can’t see it. It’s just there,” Shade said and touched the stone with
his fingertips.
I saw it, though. I saw it perfectly fine.
A lump the size of a tennis ball was suddenly in my throat. I lay down
on the bed, praying my cheeks didn’t betray me. I felt like I was lit up with
a different kind of fire from within now. This one definitely didn’t feel
good.
“Why, though?” I whispered anyway, not letting myself think about it
right now—what if Shade noticed? What if he asked me questions?
I couldn’t tell anyone. Not yet, not now, probably not ever. It was just a
glitch that I could see those things, anyway. I was sure of it. Something in
their magic must have gone wrong—it wasn’t even about me.
“Why what?”
“Why do you have it in your back?” I blurted. “I-I-I heard from Maia
that they keep it on chains and clothes and stuff.”
Shade smiled lazily as he looked down at me. “We keep it wherever is
more convenient,” he said, as if to remind me that he was Elysean, too. And
he was. I kept forgetting—so easy to forget when he was half naked in my
bed—but he was. “It just so happens that mine was put inside me.”
I clamped my mouth shut and closed my eyes for a second, focusing on
the tips of his fingers as they moved up and down my cheek.
 Then I sighed—easy. It should have scared me how easy everything was
with him.
“Sleep, Snowflake. You’re tired. You can barely keep your eyes open,”
he whispered, kissing the tip of my nose before he pulled the covers over us
slowly. Shivers broke all over my back and he chased them away with his
hands, pulling me to him tighter.
The way he touched me and the way he spoke to me before today were
two very different things. Right now, he held me like he couldn’t breathe
without touching me, but the way we’d met, that darkness that came out of
him…
“What’s the Void?” I asked, eyes closed as I traced his scars with my
fingertips. Then the curves of his muscles, every inch of his skin that I
could reach. God, he was perfect. So perfectly perfect it should have been
impossible. I was trying to find a flaw—there were none. Even the tissue of
his scars looked beautiful, like colors on a painting.
“Where’d you hear that?” he said, continuing to kiss the bridge of my
nose and my forehead.
I’d heard it from Eeda first, when she was warning me about Shade,
but…
“The Elysean kids,” I muttered. Jasper said that he’d heard Shade had
taken me to the Void, and the other two had been very surprised. I thought I
knew what it was already, but it couldn’t hurt to ask.
“It’s a timeless space between dimensions,” Shade said, making me
open my eyes again for a moment.
“Is it the darkness you took me to that night? When I first saw you?”
“Yes,” he said, and even though he made it sound like it wasn’t a big
deal, I was pretty sure it was. Otherwise, Eeda wouldn’t have counted it as a
caution that he was tied to the Void, and those boys wouldn’t have sounded
so impressed that I’d handled it.
 “How do you even reach it?” A timeless space between dimensions—
how did one get to a place like that?
“All midnight casters can. It’s part of our heritage,” Shade said.
“Midnight casters?” I was pretty sure I hadn’t heard that name before.
“That’s what they call my kind,” he explained.
Midnight caster. I liked it. “Does it scare you?” Because the Void had
scared me at first. It had scared me shitless, but it didn’t anymore.
“Sometimes,” Shade said. “But generally, it is a safe place. Possibly the
safest in the universe…most of the time.”
“Why?” Pushing my head back, I looked up at his eyes. They were half
closed, too, the storms in them calmer than I’d ever seen. It was the most
beautiful look on him yet, and I wanted to see him like that every single
day. “Why did you take me there? Why not just let me run?”
“Because they’d have caught you and they’d have probably hurt you,”
he said without missing a beat.
They most definitely would have. I had no doubt about that by now.
“So why save me?” I didn’t know him then. I’d never seen him before
nor he me.
“Curious little mortal,” he whispered, but he was smiling lazily again,
and it almost hypnotized me. That’s why I leaned in and kissed him,
wanting to capture that smile with my lips.
The next second, his hand cupped my face, and he pulled my lip
between his teeth, growling.
Fuck, I loved how he reacted to me. I couldn’t get enough.
I pressed myself against him harder, trying to feel for his erection, but
Shade didn’t let me. He broke the kiss and with his eyes closed, he stayed
there for a second until his breathing calmed down a bit.
“Because you looked terrified,” he then said, and I knew what he was
doing—he was trying to distract me. He still thought I shouldn’t do this,
shouldn’t give him this, so he was trying to give me time to change my
mind. If he knew what his touch was doing to me, he wouldn’t have
bothered.
“I did?” I said, toes curled as I pressed my lips to his again but didn’t
kiss him. We just spoke like that, mouth to mouth.
“Like a little fly caught in a web,” he whispered, smoothing my hair
away from my face. “The most beautiful little fly I’ve ever seen. And I
wanted to catch you myself.”
I smiled—he had. Look at me, I was practically drooling all over him.
I’d come on his mouth, too—twice.
Slowly, I lowered my hands down to his stomach again, and I felt it
when his breath caught and his muscles clenched. I smiled wider.
“You did a damn good job with that,” I said, touching the waistband of
his jeans.
“What are you doing, Snowflake?” His hand moved over mine, but he
didn’t stop me yet.
“It’s only fair,” I said, cheeks burning with embarrassment, but I didn’t
let it slow me down.
“Stop,” he breathed, but when I slipped my fingers under the waistband,
he let me.
“I want to,” I whispered, then slid my hand all the way down his
underwear and wrapped my fingers around his cock.
My own muscles clenched this time, and I forgot how to breathe
completely. He was hard. So deliciously hard and big and long and so, so
smooth. I’d never touched a guy before, but I definitely didn’t expect it to
light up my body like a fucking Christmas tree.
Fuck, I wanted him so bad it was ridiculous, but he grabbed my wrist
and pulled my hand away the next second.
“Shade!” I complained, but he slammed me to his chest and wrapped his
arms around mine, locking them to the sides.
“Go to sleep,” he told me.
 “But it’s unfair. You did all that and I—”
“You’re naked in my arms,” he cut me off. “The taste of your pussy is in
my mouth.” That chuckle again. My cheeks about melted off me. “There’s
nothing unfair about any of this.”
I sighed, pressing my lips to the side of his neck. Fine. He wanted me to
have more time—I wasn’t going to change my damn mind. He’d see for
himself. God help me, I wanted it to be him, and no amount of time or
thinking was going to change that.
“Goodnight, Snowflake,” he said.
“Will you stay?” I whispered, eyes closed, half my mind gone already.
If he answered, I didn’t hear it. I just clung to his heat and I slept better
than I had since I was a little girl.
 30

His brother had used all the best god gifts on the animals, leaving mankind vulnerable
to the biting winter cold, so Prometheus set out to Zeus to ask for the sacred fire to
save his creation.
Zeus refused, for fire belonged to gods and gods alone.
But Prometheus loved his creation dearly, and he refused to stand by and do
nothing to ease their suffering. That is why, despite knowing how angry Zeus would
be, he decided to steal the fire and bear any punishment the gods would see fit.

—Book of Creation, Volume II, 2nd Edition, 87

by Warren Marvos, House Emerald

A glitch.
That’s what all of this was—a damn glitch. Never-mind that I couldn’t
find anything about it in any of the books I’d been reading for five hours
now. It was a stupid glitch in their magic, and I would not let it get to me. It
was their magic’s fault that I could see those godstones, not mine.
It was their mistake.
I looked to the side, to the recliners in the library that the Elysean
students had claimed for themselves. Amelia with her sketchbook in hand
and the emeralds in her rings. David playing with his wand, his own
godstone at the bottom of its handle. Lorenzo with the sapphire around his
neck…
A glitch. Definitely a glitch.
But it also made me curious again—why didn’t they wear their
godstones in their bodies like Shade? And why did he wear it in his back?
Where had those scars on his body come from?
And why was I constantly turned on all morning?
It was ridiculous—I’d had to go and change twice because my panties
were too uncomfortable. Absurd.
I’d woken up alone in my bed, and on the pillow where Shade had been
lying last night was a flower—the most beautiful tulip I’d ever seen, the
petals so dark they looked completely black with a slight reddish hue to
them. It smelled of honey, only better, and that scent would forever remind
me of the best morning of my life now. I’d left it in the room because I
didn’t want anyone to see it, and I didn’t want to ruin it by hiding it in my
pocket, but I already missed it like it was a part of me. I missed it because I
knew he’d left it there.
God, I already couldn’t wait to see him again…
The small blue butterfly flying in front of me caught my attention. It
fluttered its wings gently, coming closer and closer until it rested on the
corner of the book on my lap—the book about godstones, the fourth one I’d
read so far. Then it flew over to the shelves again, slowly, as if it wanted me
to follow.
I did.
The butterfly took me to the far end of the library, to one of the shelves
mounted on the wall, and stopped on the spine of a large book with a black
leather hardcover. I picked it up and read the block of letters on the front:
Deadly Plagues and Godly Diseases.
 Chills rushed down my spine. Why in the world would the butterfly
think I wanted to read something like that? I wanted to be informed about
how to pass the last trial, not know about diseases…but did I?
Because these butterflies always seemed to know exactly what I was
curious about.
“Sera?”
I put the book in its place again like it was on fire and turned to Maia,
coming closer to me.
“Hey, you,” I said, feeling like I was caught red-handed—for picking up
a book in a goddamn library.
Seriously, Sera…
“What’cha doing down there? Find anything interesting?” Maia said,
her cheeks pink and eyes glossy—she was in such a better mood since last
night. She’d been ecstatic to come with me to the library, too.
“Nothing, just checking,” I said and started walking toward her.
“Well, I did,” she said with a grin. “Come on, you’ve got to see this.”
She’d found a book of records about the greatest stories of the gods—
only the real events with real names and even dates. It would no doubt be
invaluable in the last trial, and it was incredibly helpful to do quizzes with
her and Marie, brainstorm about what they’d make us do, how many parts
the trial would have, how we could get past the challenges sooner. We even
visited the museum to see ancient artifacts and to read about them, just to
refresh our memories. So many incredibly things to see there. The Belt of
Aphrodite, the Golden Apple of Eris, the Chair of Forgetfulness that was
supposed to be in the Underworld, too. They even had the necklace of
Harmonia, daughter of Aphrodite, that the stories said would keep its
wearer young and beautiful forever.
Then, we went to the War Room, which Maia had indeed seen before,
but hadn’t used because she wasn’t comfortable with the dummies. Ethan
and Nick were already there, though, sparring, and they made it look easy,
so we decided to try it, too. It was definitely not like it had been with Shade,
but the dummies were much gentler than I initially thought, so we ended up
training with them for hours, until our muscles screamed in protest.
After dinner, we planned to go back to the library for another couple
hours, though we could barely keep our eyes open.
Having a friend made life infinitely better, and it should have been
enough for me. More than enough. Except it wasn’t because I hadn’t seen
Shade the whole day. And despite everything, all I could think about was
him.

“L ,” Donna whispered from my side. She sounded in awe

instead of terrified as I was, and I wished I could ignore her. I wished I
could not look at the arm of the girl on the screen—the arm that was barely
holding onto her shoulder. Yet she was still standing, and they let her. They
fucking let her, instead of taking her to the infirmary right away.
Half an hour ago, Angel came to the Midas Hall just as we were
finishing dinner, said she’d been given permission to show us a video on
one of the screens that lined the wall in front of Artemis’s painting, if we
wanted to see it.
The video was from two Elysean Trials—eight whole years—ago, of
the day the candidates had come out of the Dome after their last trial. We all
wanted to see it, except now I was the only one regretting having said yes.
There were only five of them left, most barely standing, and the woman
Donna was talking about with the shredded arm wasn’t even in the worst
condition—the guy in front of the line seemed to be missing a good chunk
of his thigh, and he had his eyes closed, skin pale as a sheet, but he refused
to pass out. He refused to collapse because the judges—the same judges as
today, including Madam Carmine—were about to give their finally verdict.
 The setting was pretty much the same as in the present. The judges sat
at the same place, the audience on the benches behind, and the Dome
looked identical to what it was now, made out of frozen glass with nothing
but all-consuming darkness inside the wide-open double doors through
which the candidates had just walked out.
Elliot Embers and Angel weren’t there, though. In their place was an
older woman wearing a pink sparkly dress who smiled so brightly you’d
think the teenagers in front of her weren’t within an inch of their deaths.
The judges looked a bit younger than they were now—especially
Madam Cyan, who didn’t have as many wrinkles on her face, and also
Mister Ravenar, who had no silver hair on his head or beard.
God, I didn’t want to see this, but I still watched as if I were hypnotized
while the judges offered their stones to three of the survivors—House
Sapphire, House Emerald and House Ruby. Meanwhile Ravenar looked
bored out of his damn mind, and he didn’t even bother to look at the
candidates or the hostess when she called his name and asked if House Opal
would like to welcome a candidate to the Academy this year—“It has
been…how many years now since you’ve extended your welcome to a
mortal? Twenty? Thirty? Ha-ha-ha…”
Ravenar didn’t even acknowledge her.
Eventually, the video ended.
Everybody was whispering, waiting still to see if another would start
soon.
“That’s Beatrix Hob and Mason Rogers,” Marie whispered. Of course,
she was in awe as well.
I knew those names—Miles adored them both. They were the mortals
who’d graduated the Academy about six years ago, and became Elysean.
I’d even seen pictures of them in his notebook-turned-album, and they
looked so much different now than they did in that video.
The others sighed and whispered their wows, completely infatuated.
 “How many died?” I found myself asking Angel, even though I wasn’t
even sure I wanted to know.
She raised her head from whatever she was writing on her folder.
“What?”
“How many died?” I said again, and the others all fell silent. “If only
five candidates came out of the Dome, how many died in the trials that
year?”
Angel gave me a tight-lipped smile as she closed her folder. “That’s
confidential information,” she simply said.
Nobody said a single word after, and Angel didn’t show us another
video.
I was relieved. The memory of Isaac Donovan and Elaine Atkinson was
still so fresh in my mind. I didn’t want to see—or be reminded—of more
death. I didn’t want to find out just how many odds were against me for the
last trial. I would rather just be with Shade and forget.
That night, I was more restless than when I lived at the orphanage.
That’s why I was stupid enough to leave my room at midnight and go
search for him in the Academy library. I thought for sure he would be there,
sitting in the recliner, reading all by himself.
He wasn’t. The disappointment was like a damn arrow right through my
heart.
The tulip stayed with me on the pillow all night as I waited, waking up
every hour to check for shadows under the door. There were none.
Shade was nowhere to be found.

I ’ him again for two days.

O , I was sick with worry. I’d read so much that I knew
the stories Miss Aldentach had taught me by heart again in detail. I’d
sparred so much with the dummies in the War Room that I actually
managed to dodge most of their hits now. I felt better than ever physically,
impressed with the difference three days had made though every muscle in
my body aches, but my mind was dark, my thoughts with him every waking
second.
I asked everyone about him. I asked Angel—she refused to tell me, said
she didn’t know. I asked Eeda every morning when I helped her up the
stairs with her now impossibly heavy cart—she had no clue. I even asked
Grace when she came to prepare my baths, but all they could tell me was
that they had no idea.
And I was tired of it.
I was in the library, chewing on the butt of the pen in my hand and
watching the Elyseans sitting in their recliners. David, Lorenzo, Blair and
Rebecca.
My mind was half made up already. God help me, I was going to go ask
them where Shade was.
“Stop staring at her like that—she’ll notice,” said Maia, sitting next to
me at the table.
“I’m not staring at her in particular.” Not at Rebecca, the girl she’d
made the deal with—I was staring at all of them, trying to figure out who to
talk to. Definitely not Lorenzo or David. Or Jasper for that matter, wherever
he was…
“Well, stop. I already told you—I won’t be abandoning you this time. If
you need my help, I’ll be there. Promise.” The guilt in her eyes was evident
when she smiled at me.
“That’s not it and you know it. I don’t want you to help me if she tells
you not to. Do you understand? You need her help.”
 “I need you more,” she told me, and I seriously loved her for it. So, I
turned to her with my whole body.
“Listen to me, Maia. It’s the last trial. You need to get to the end of it—
do you understand? You have to.” She’d done the work. She’d sat here and
read with me and trained with me every second of every day. We rarely
went out to the courtyard, and when we did, it was just to stretch our legs
for a bit. She deserved to survive the last trial.
“And I will. We will—together.”
“Promise me,” I said. “I need you to promise me that you’ll make sure
you take care of yourself first.” Because if she didn’t make it—worse, if she
didn’t make it because of me—I’d never be able to live with myself.
“Only if you promise, too.”
“Deal,” I said, and we shook hands on it.
Then, I stood up. “I’ll be right back.”
Slowly moving to the solar system that hovered in the air between our
table and the Elysean students, I stopped there for a second to look at the
globes. I couldn’t see the top of them from the floor, but I was willing to bet
anything that they would have godstones on them—how else would they be
in the air like that, slightly spinning, never falling?
A masterpiece—every star that twinkled in the air, every constellation
and every shape of every planet was perfectly made. It inspired me to move
somehow, and I slowly made my way to the Elyseans.
Maia called my name. I didn’t turn. I just kept going, the thought of
being close to Lorenzo or David making my stomach twist and turn
uncomfortably.
But when they noticed me approaching and slowly turned to me, openly
stared at me, I realized I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t talk to them, least of all to
ask them for favors. They’d just make my life a living hell again, but…
The library door opened and someone else stepped inside—Amelia with
her sketchbook under her arm and her backpack around her shoulder.
 Amelia, who had terrorized me the very first day here, but who’d also
left me alone and had actually nodded at me when I’d figured out that her
wasps couldn’t really hurt me that day.
I don’t know why I took that to mean something, or why she seemed
less intimidating to me than the boys—my instincts definitely needed work
—but I found myself moving around the recliners and toward her, heart
hammering in my chest.
She narrowed her brows when she realized I was going straight for her,
and she stopped walking.
Before I could even think about what I was going to say, I blurted, “You
owe me.”
Her brows shot up and she smiled—she was very petite, shoulders
narrow and all her features small, but I knew better than to think she was
helpless. Who knew what else she drew in that sketchbook she kept about
her at all times—I wasn’t keen on finding out.
“Do I?” she said, perfectly entertained.
I flinched, looking back at the other Elyseans who were grinning ear-to-
ear as they watched, like they were expecting Amelia to grow an extra head
and devour me any second.
“An answer,” I said, and my palms were sweaty already. “I just…I just
have one question.” My voice broke, too. I hated that I sounded so scared.
“What kind of a question?” she said, and she hadn’t attacked me still,
so…
I swallowed hard. “Shade. I want to know where Shade is.”
At that, her face broke into a huge smile—this one different. “Is he the
one who told you about my creation?”
“No,” I said without missing a beat, which surprised her. “No, I figured
that out myself. I just need him for…something else.”
“How, then?” she said, leaning closer. “And don’t try to lie to me—I’ll
know. How did you figure it out? How did you figure the trials out, too—
who’s helping you? We all want to know.”
“Nobody,” I said. “It was all just me.”
Her brows shot up again. “Liar.”
Gritting my teeth, I raised my chin higher. “I thought you said you’d
know if I lied.” And it could be absolutely true—some Elyseans had what
the books called the Verita sense. They could tell when someone was being
honest, but it only worked when the person truly believed that he was. It
was fairly easy to cheat the sense—for Elyseans. Right now, I had no
ambition to learn.
And the way she fell silent for a second said that she was thinking about
it—I really hadn’t lied. I’d gone through the trials myself. I’d figured out
that her wasps hadn’t had godstones on them myself, too.
“He’s being kept in the Art Room,” she finally said, leaning her head to
the side as she analyzed me. Her voice was barely a whisper. “Where did
you grow up?”
“Here and there,” I said. “Why is he being kept there?” And who was
going to keep Shade anywhere?
“Where is here and there?” Amelia asked. Her curiosity made me
fucking sweat, but I didn’t dare tell her to mind her own business now.
“Orphanage. Foster homes,” I forced myself to say because who cared?
I wanted answers, and she obviously had them. “Why is he being kept in
the Art Room?”
“Punishment,” she said. “He’s been tasked with rearranging and
cleaning everything in there as punishment for disobeying orders.” Leaning
even in closer, she whispered, “They tell me he was supposed to be at the
Academy three nights ago, but he left without notice and came here, then
attacked Jasper, who hasn’t woken up since.”
Every word she said was like a knife straight to my gut.
“I have to go,” I thought I said, and I was pretty sure Maia was calling
my name again, but I just opened the library door and walked out.
 “Break a leg,” Amelia sang, her voice a soft melody on its own, and I
ran down the hallway like my tail was on fire.
Three nights ago was the night Jasper had sent those leopards after me
again.
The same night I’d found Shade sitting outside my door at two in the
morning, before he ended up half naked in my bed.
The realization made goose bumps break all over me. He was being
punished because of me.

W ’ use for the Magic Room—it was for spells and

such, which we didn’t need because we couldn’t actually do magic. And we
had no use for the Art Room, either—that was for creations, for people like
Amelia, who, again, had magic to create with.
That’s why the candidates stuck to the library and to the War Room—
maybe the Museum to check out artifacts in the flesh that we read about—
all things we could actually use. That, and the Art Room was right next to
the Menagerie. I’d taken special care to stay away from that part of the
Palace on purpose.
Right now, I couldn’t care less that those leopards were so close. If
Shade was in that room, that’s where I would be, too.
The golden sign on the doors was beautifully engraved in cursive
letters. The golden handles moved smoothly and soundlessly in my hands. I
held my breath as I pushed the doors open, then stepped inside with my
heart in my throat.
Empty. The room was empty, and it was the most incredible thing I had
ever seen.
The statue of the Muses took over the entire wall opposite the door,
even bigger than the one I’d seen in the city that day with Miles. All of
them were as tall as the ceiling, all of them with green stones on their
bodies—some on their hair, some on their faces, some on their clothes.
They seemed to be looking right at me as I entered the rectangular room. In
front of them was a podium with a large book on it—an emerald as big as a
damn apple on the front cover—while tendrils of spooky green light spun
around it slowly.
Tables to the sides, and the room seemed to be divided into smaller
sections—a corner full of canvases and colors and paintings that looked
more real than reality. Another with pieces of marble and wood and other
materials I didn’t recognize carved into a million different things, while a
large leather bag full of sharp blades was mounted on the wall behind them.
The corner to my right had every instrument I’d ever seen—and others I
hadn’t even known existed—resting against the walls and on the floor, or on
the shiny black piano that took up most of the space near a golden harp.
To my left were books—large books like they were made for giants,
three of them spread out on a table behind which were shelves full of scrolls
and glasses full of feathers and pens and colors. Most of the baskets and the
hardcover books that had been on the fourth shelf were on the floor, and a
bucket and a rag were near it—like someone had been cleaning it.
Shade.
Pulling up the sleeves of my shirt, I went to that same bucket. I grabbed
the rag, squeezed it tightly in my shaking fists, then began to clean the
reddish wood of the shelves.
The words still echoed in my mind: Shade was being punished because
of me.
Minutes passed, maybe even an hour, and I kept on cleaning shelf after
shelf, rearranging the books that had been on the floor, before taking out the
next row.
I was thankful for the time, even though I hadn’t really calmed down
much. I was still shaking.
 Eventually, the door opened, and Shade walked in with a bottle of water
in his hand, then froze right there, unblinking eyes on me. He looked
shocked at the sight of me, and I forgot how to breathe all over again. My
insides squeezed tightly.
Fuck, his face. I’d missed his stupid, perfect face so much it hurt.
I turned to the shelf again just to distract myself, and once he got
himself together, Shade closed the door and came closer.
“What are you doing here, Snowflake?” His voice was soft, almost
apologetic.
“Just cleaning this stuff up. It’s dusty,” I said without meeting his eyes.
Right now, I just needed another second to come to terms with the fact that
he was okay. He wasn’t wounded or anything, he wasn’t away—he was just
being punished with cleaning shelves. All was good.
“I see,” was what he said, before he put down the bottle of water, then
came around the table and grabbed another rag.
We didn’t speak for a while, didn’t look at one another, just cleaned
shelves in silence.
Little by little, I calmed down all the way, and before I knew it, I was no
longer feeling restless.
 31

“Everything has a solution. Every note can be reached, every melody reinvented,
every wrong made right, every broken heart made whole.
Yes, everything has a solution—except Death.”

—The Magic of Music, 104

by Naska Totaj, House Emerald

“So, how does this work exactly? How does one convert art into magic?” I
asked after a while.
We’d gotten so used to the silence only being disrupted by the water and
us moving books in and out of shelves that I almost startled my own self.
Shade took so long to answer that for a second I wondered if he even
would.
“You have to have a natural affinity for it first. Just like with mortals,
artists have to be born,” he said. “They have to have enough power to begin
with, so that they can harness more.”
Harnessing power. I’d read about that. “Into their godstones?”
 He nodded. “Exactly. It’s a matter of knowing the shade of your magic,
the weight of it, the fabric of it, so to speak. The purer it is, the more
powerful it will be,” he explained. And it made sense—the way Elyseans
married among their own, families from the same Houses, it was for this
reason primarily. “Then, just like with every other magic, it’s a matter of
bringing to life things that do not exist in the real world, but they’re
powerful enough in your imagination.”
He raised his hand for a second, and his shadows sprung at his
fingertips, swirling in the air like black flames. “Art is more beautiful than
most magics, I’ll admit.” He fisted his hand and the shadows disappeared
when he turned to look at the instruments on the other side of the room.
“Not only that but notes from the piano or the violin or the harp give more
power to magic, shape it better. Or a painting or a drawing—it shows the
magic exactly what the caster wants.” The corner of his lips turned up a bit.
It was so fascinating to hear him speak like that, to see this side of him I
hadn’t seen before. I realized I could listen to him talking for days.
“They work so well together, in fact, art and magic, that sometimes it’s
silly to think they’re different things. The way words on a page can
transport us to different worlds and realities. The way shapes and colors on
a canvas can breathe life into us. The way a melody can make us feel more
than any event we’ve ever gone through.” He raised his hand again with a
grin, and darkness burst into a small explosion right over his palm.
“Magic,” he whispered dramatically.
I laughed a bit. “Well, I did always believe that art is the closest thing to
real magic we have. In the outside world, I mean.”
“It’s the realest magic we have, too,” Shade said, picking up the rag
again.
“So, they teach this stuff at the Academy?” I wondered, guilty for being
curious, but I couldn’t help myself. Just the way he spoke about it made it
impossible to resist wanting to know more.
 “They do. They teach you exactly how they connect, how to make them
work together,” he said. “If you have a natural affinity for it first, like I said.
A natural magical affinity, which mortals do not have.”
I rolled my eyes. “For fuck’s sake, you’re not immortal, either,” I
muttered, just because I hated that word—mortal. I hated what it meant and
how the Elyseans used it.
“It’s not about physical immortality,” Shade said, turning to rest against
the long table. With his hands in his pockets, and with so much focus when
he spoke like that, he looked like a different guy. I seriously loved listening
to him speak.
“Our souls rest in the Underworld, too.” His eyes sparkled a bit, more
silver than grey just now. And I knew that story just fine, but I hung onto
his every word anyway because I wanted to hear it from him, too. “But
when we die, we go to the Elysium Fields, which is where we get our name
from. It’s near Hades’s domain in the Underworld, except it’s ruled by
Cronus. They say it’s quite beautiful—the entrance is close to the pool of
Memory of the goddess Mnemosyne. She, like all gods of the Underworld,
is crueler than most. They say they forgot what it was like to be good a long
time ago,” Shade said, his every word drawing me in.
“But the Elysium Fields is a happy land of eternal day. No cold or snow,
with games and music that never stop,” he said. “The reason why we call
ourselves immortal is because every soul that lives there can choose to be
reborn on Earth whenever they please. They have to give up the memories
of their past lives while they’re here, of course, but they can make that
choice. That is why we’re different.”
I smiled, shaking my head—that definitely sounded infinitely better
than what I remembered from Miss Aldentach.
“Do you really believe that’s true?” I wondered—no judgment, just
simple curiosity.
And Shade knew. That’s why he shrugged. “Not often, to be fair.”
 It probably wasn’t common among his kind to admit to that, and I
appreciated his honesty more than he knew.
“Why didn’t you come to see me, Shade?” I asked before I could stop
myself. It’s the one thing I was more curious about than anything else—
why hadn't he come to talk to me all this time he’d been here?
But he picked up the rag and went back to the shelf without a word.
I wasn’t about to give up so easily, though.
“Shade,” I tried again, and he just kept putting the books in place.
“Were you hoping I’d changed my mind?”
He’d hoped I’d change my mind about being with him that night in my
room, too.
“Well, you did complete two trials without help from anyone, without
access to the library, which has never been done before since the trials
began, and that would suggest that you’re smart,” he said, his voice
completely different from a minute ago. “So, yes, I was hoping you had.”
Putting the rag down, I grabbed my hips and turned to him. “I was
worried, asshole. You could have just let me know you were okay,” I said,
way too loudly but I didn’t even care. “And what the hell did you do to
Jasper? Were you hoping to get in trouble, too—was that it?” Because he
knew this place better than I did. Way better.
“You shouldn’t have worried. I was fine,” he said without bothering to
even look at me. So fucking infuriating, so I had no choice but to stride over
to him.
“You got in trouble because of me.” And that meant something to me,
damn it. It meant a lot, even if I wouldn’t admit it to him.
“I got in trouble because of my choices, not because of you. Jasper
needed to be reminded of the Palace’s boundaries. I should have done it the
first time he dared to let those animals out of the Menagerie. And, no,
Snowflake,” he said, finally turning to look at me. “I wasn’t hoping to get in
trouble. I was hoping you’d learn your lesson.”
 I saw red. “When was that—when your face was between my legs or
when you left me a goddamn flower on the pillow before you left?!” I
snapped.
Suddenly, Shade towered over me, so close we could kiss if I just raised
on my tiptoes.
“You’re all the same, aren’t you,” he whispered. “So very tempted by
the look of things…” His hand closed around my chin.
“I don’t—”
“You got what you wanted. You had my face between your legs, didn’t
you? What more do you want?”
Oh, God. What the hell did he think—that I just wanted him for sex or
something? Had he forgotten that I was a damn virgin?!
“You’re a goddamn fool, Adryan,” I spit, using his name on purpose. “I
couldn’t care less about how you look. I care when you’re being an asshole
for no reason.” I threw the rag on the floor. “I just wanted you to tell me
you were okay before you fucking disappeared on me—that’s it. Guess I
shouldn’t have expected that much from an Elysean.”
I turned around and strode to the door with my heart in my throat,
wanting to burst into angry tears so badly. But not in front of him. Never in
front of him.
Except as soon as I grabbed the handle, he said, “I didn’t think you’d
worry.”
Fucking hilarious. I turned around, smiling so bitterly my face hurt.
“And I didn’t think you’d be stupid enough to end up cleaning this place,
attacking your own kind because of me, when you didn’t even tell me about
the stupid wasps!” I shouted. “I mean…why?! Why not tell me—you knew.
I know you knew.” Amelia thought he’d been the one to tell me about it.
Shade didn’t even deny it. Instead, he said, “At first, it was proof to
myself that I didn’t care about you. And then it was because you’d have no
reason to come to the library upstairs.”
 Oh.
The words died on my tongue as I shook my head. What the hell—how
was I ever going to figure this guy out?
“I don’t understand you,” I said with a tired sigh. He was hot and then
cold, told me to basically leave him alone, then turned around and admitted
he’d kept things from me just because he wanted to be in my company.
“And you shouldn’t try. You should just walk away, Sedorah.” Even
though I hated his guts right now, I liked the way he said my name. Almost
like a praise. Ugh.
“Okay, Shade. I’m walking away right now.”
I walked out the door, sure that he would stop me again. He didn’t.
So that’s how I ended up sitting on the floor of my room all night,
waiting for his shadows to slip under the door.

“E ,” I hissed at the room.

It was two in the morning and I hadn’t slept at all. My ass was numb
from sitting on the floor too long, but I also didn’t want to move. My eyes
burned, but how was I going to stop looking at the door? What if his
darkness slipped under it and I missed it?
Never mind that I was not going to open the door even if he showed up.
Fuck that—I wouldn’t. He wanted me to leave him alone? Fine, I could do
that. I could stay away. In fact, he wouldn’t even see me at all anymore until
I completed the last trial, then left this place for good.
Two thirty-five.
I slammed the back of my head against the wall, looking up at the
window over my head for a moment. The moon didn’t feel like shining
tonight. It was unusually dark outside—or maybe it was just me.
Two forty-four.
 My own thoughts mocked me. How silly was it that I couldn’t bring
myself to get up, get into bed, and sleep? I’d been angry plenty of times
before. I’d never had trouble handling it.
Then again, I’d never had to deal with the likes of fucking Shadow Boy,
either.
Two fifty.
I closed my eyes and took in a deep breath, knowing that this was for
the best. I knew I was better off staying away from him but tell that to
whatever the hell it was inside me that made me feel like I might throw up
and pass out at the same time. Whatever it was that refused to leave me
alone.
Two fifty-two.
Darkness slipped under the door, the thin tendrils moving slowly,
licking the floor, spreading like they were coming straight out of a dream.
He’s here.
Every inch of my body was suddenly alive. I waited, breath held and
unblinking eyes on them, watching them as they stretched, tested, moved.
Suddenly, every last bit of resolve I had gathered since I sat here,
swearing to never see his face again, disappeared somewhere like it had
never even existed. Suddenly, it didn’t matter how much I hated his guts—
he was here.
And I was already on my way to the door.
I pulled it open before I could take a single breath.
There he was, arms raised, hands resting over the doorframe, head
lowered like he was exhausted and couldn’t keep his eyes open, either.
Darkness spilled from under his feet, consuming the floor and the walls all
around him.
When our eyes met, they snapped back inside him again, just like they
did that night.
And Shade looked fucking furious.
 “If you were smart, you would tell me to get lost.”
I flinched—here we go again. “If you were smart, you wouldn’t be here
at all.”
He threw his head back and laughed that unpleasant laugh of his. “Don't
you think I’ve tried? I have, Snowflake—I just can’t.” He leaned closer.
“But I will if you tell me to stay away.”
How in the fuck was I going to do that when my whole body was alive
just because he was near? And I wanted to do everything in my power to
keep him here, not send him away.
I shook my head, exhausted, too. “Why?” I choked. “Why do you want
to stay away so desperately?” I should have been the one to want to keep
him at arm’s length, not him. Why the hell did he care about what he took
from me? What kind of a guilt did he carry that made him think he was
taking advantage of me, or that I only wanted him because of his looks, or
that I just wanted sexual favors from him or whatever?
Because the truth was that I didn’t. Whatever it was about him, I wanted
all of it. Everything.
God help me, I wanted to know him.
“Because you’re sunlight,” he whispered, looking down at my parted
lips as he grinned wickedly. “And I’m the deep, deep dark.”
If he thought I didn’t know that, he really was a fool.
“I’m not sunlight,” I promised him. “There’s nothing light about me.”
And even if there were, I knew he wanted me. I knew it, saw it in the way
he looked at me, touched me, kissed me—that’s what I wanted to
remember. We weren’t going to be here forever, and my mind was made up.
So, I raised my chin and swore to myself that I would say it even if I
died of embarrassment.
“I want you to be my first.”
There. He could hold that against me his whole life now, but I said it.
 The next second, Shade was in my room, backing me against the wall as
the shadows slipping out his hand closed the door without making a single
sound. He pressed his forehead to mine, eyes squeezed shut, and he just
breathed.
“Shade,” I said, not sure what to expect at that point, but at least we
were in the room. He was still there, even if he refused to speak. “Do you…
do you want that, too?” I asked, and my voice shook a little.
“I don’t want to just be your first,” he whispered, raising his hands to
my face. “I want to be your only.”
His words were like honey down my throat, soothing me. Despite
everything, that’s exactly what I wanted to hear—that he was in this with
me. Equally.
I grabbed his wrists, rising on my tiptoes, eyeing those lips that had
already been all over me. “Then why do you resist me?”
Shade smiled, holding me in place as he brought his lips closer and
closer… “When have I ever, Snowflake?” And he kissed away every ounce
of everything bad inside me within seconds.
He pulled me up and I locked my ankles around his hips, already
grinding against him, so desperate it would be pathetic if I cared. I would
die for real if he stopped now.
But he didn’t. He wouldn’t—he wasn’t in control of himself any more
than I was. Not now.
Before I realized he’d moved, he put me on the bed and fell on top of
me, his hard cock pressing right between my legs. And because I knew
exactly what was coming, what he felt like, how he touched me, I almost
came just by the friction alone.
But Shade was in a rush to get me naked, so he pulled himself up and
basically tore the white shirt off my body to see I wasn’t wearing a bra.
Just in case we’d get to this.
 He growled, his hands on my boobs instantly, squeezing so hard it hurt.
He dug his fingertips in my waist then closed his mouth on my nipple,
sucking and biting like he was in a race again. I had no problem with that
whatsoever. I wanted him naked, too. And if he planned to just go down on
me and sleep again, he was in for a surprise.
Pulling the black shirt up his back, he barely let go of my nipple to let
me take it off him all the way. His mouth was hungry on my skin, biting and
sucking, probably leaving a trail of bruises behind. I was trying to get the
damn pajama bottoms off me as fast as I could, but my hands were shaking
and I was just so full I was afraid I was going to burst. Two nights. It had
only been two nights and look what I’d become—a rabid dog desperate for
him. He’d known exactly how to unlock my appetite because, until him, I’d
been sure I wasn’t a very sexual person. Turns out, I was dead wrong
because I could do this with him all day, every single day.
He kept whispering things to me that I was too far gone to understand,
especially when he finally got my bottoms and panties off in one
movement, almost tearing the fabric in the process.
Gentle Shade had been amazing, but in-a-rush Shade was scorching hot.
My moans were so loud my ears rang, but when he closed his mouth on my
clit and slipped his fingers down my soaking wet folds at the same time, I
had no hopes of trying to stop myself, so I didn’t bother.
“Shade,” I breathed, wanting him to come up here, needing to touch
him, to feel all of him in my hands, but he was relentless. He kept going,
swirling his tongue on my clit and teasing my entrance with his fingertips,
growling like a damn animal as he sucked on my folds.
Even though I was desperate for him to be inside me all the way, I also
wanted him right there, so I fisted his hair and ground against his face in
perfect rhythm with his tongue.
“Come, Snowflake,” he whispered. “Come for me. Let me hear you.”
He pressed his tongue flat on my clit then moved it in circles. Add the
fingers that kept teasing my entrance gently, and I was a goner.
Fuck, I wanted to do this with him forever.
His name rolled off my tongue over and over again as he stayed down
there until he made sure my orgasm couldn't possibly last any longer. And
finally, he began to trail kisses up to my stomach and my breasts, hovering
over me while I raced to catch my breath, completely spent. He grinned as
he looked at my parted lips like he loved to see me like that, then slipped
his tongue in my mouth.
I tasted myself all over him—it was a a strange kind of sweetness,
definitely not bad, and Shade made sure I memorized it when he kissed me
for minutes, furiously, desperately, until my lips were completely numb.
No longer surprised that I was turned on again, I reached for his jeans,
afraid that he’d stop me, but he didn’t. He just kept kissing me while I
undid his button, then slipped my hands underneath.
The moment I grabbed him in my hands, he fell on top of me, knocking
the breath out of my lungs. But his cock was in my hands so who needed
air?
I moved my hands up and down, praying I knew what the hell I was
doing. The way he moved his hips again and moaned that sexy sound,
almost as loudly as I did, said he was loving it, so I kept going.
Shade pushed his jeans down to his thighs, and his cock was against my
throbbing center for the first time. I adjusted the length of him right over
my pussy just so I knew what he felt like. We both stopped moving, just
savoring this first for a second. When I opened my eyes, I found him
looking at me, breathing just as heavily, our hearts slamming against our
chests as if they were one.
And I knew it—I saw the question in his darkened eyes, so perfect they
belonged on a work of art. So, I said, “Don’t you dare.”
He was going to ask me if I was sure again. He was going to take it
slowly so that I had time to stop him again. And I didn’t want to fucking
hear it.
The corner of his lips turned up just a bit, and he pressed himself onto
me harder. A moan ripped from my throat when the tip of his cock pressed
against my clit—he felt incredible.
“This is going to hurt a little, Snowflake. I need you to hold onto me as
hard as you can,” he whispered. “I need you to keep your eyes on me.”
I nodded, a bit afraid, but mostly just excited and so damn ready to
come again.
And again.
And again…
He lowered his hand to guide himself to my entrance, while I held his
eyes and dug my fingers into his shoulders, just like he asked.
My God, this was really happening. I was really about to lose my
virginity to Shade.
Should I have been terrified? Because I couldn’t wait to feel him all the
way inside me instead.
I felt the tip of him at my entrance, and my entire body sort of opened,
needing to feel more. But then he thrust his hips, hard and fast, and it hurt
like hell—like I was being cut wide open by the sharpest blade in the world.
When he moved back, I braced myself, breath held and muscles
clenched…
“Breathe,” Shade whispered, and the second I did, he thrust inside me
again.
The pain blinded me. My back arched and my mind was blank, and it
hurt so much I couldn’t even cry out.
“Good girl,” Shade whispered, kissing my face, my parted lips, holding
himself perfectly still. “It’s over, Snowflake. It’s done.”
It was done. He was inside me and I felt him—fuck, he was massive.
But it was done.
 Slowly, I opened my eyes again, afraid to even breathe properly in case
that pain returned.
“Let your body adjust for a little bit. Don’t move,” he said, his voice
dark and hoarse, his eyes bloodshot. I did as he asked, tried to relax my
muscles, tried to feel all of him—and I did. We were so perfectly connected,
I suspected this might be a dream.
Except I realized that the world around me didn’t exist anymore. Shade
had wrapped us up in his shadows, and the bed, the room, the sky was no
longer within our reach. We were secluded, just the two of us in
nothingness. In the Void.
Safe. We were perfectly safe.
“Was it bad?” he whispered, and I had no clue why I was so relieved to
be in the complete darkness with him, when my room had been empty, too.
It shouldn’t have made a difference, but it did.
“A little bit,” I admitted, kissing his soft lips. “Not as bad as I thought.”
I could still see him, possibly with the light of my nightstand lamp, even
though I couldn’t see said lamp at all. How he managed to bring light with
us here so that I could always see his face was beyond me.
“You did so good,” he told me. My muscles clenched on instinct—I
apparently loved to be praised like that—so I felt all of him inside me
again, every little inch.
He growled. “Don’t squeeze me like that, Snowflake. I’m only a man.”
“I thought you were a god,” I teased breathlessly, and he smiled.
“I’m only a man when it comes to you,” he corrected, then moved out
of me a little. “Tell me if it hurts.”
It did hurt. It was very uncomfortable to feel him sliding out of me at
first, but with every new, slow thrust, it got better. With every new, slow
thrust, my body fired up again, the need building up in me even faster than
before.
 My hands ran up and down his back and my hips picked up his rhythm
immediately. I closed my eyes and focused on the feel of him sliding in and
out of me, filling me so completely that it made me think I must have been
half my whole life. The pain was there, but the pleasure was so all-
consuming that I hardly felt it while I cried out his name.
Then he said, “Do you want to come on my cock, Snowflake?”
I probably should have been embarrassed, and I probably shouldn’t
have loved how he spoke to me, but I did. Screw it, I absolutely did.
“Yes,” I breathed—yes, yes, yes, a million times.
“Right away?” he teased, and I could feel his smile against my lips, but
I couldn’t even think to open my eyes.
“Yes,” I choked. “Please, Shade, yes!”
“That’s it, keep begging,” he said, picking up the speed, thrusting
himself deeper every time until I was sure he’d hit the very bottom of me.
“Keep begging, my pretty little Snowflake.”
He buried himself inside me, then pushed deeper, growling as he bit my
jaw, and I lost it. It hurt and it felt so incredible my lungs didn’t work, and
my eyes didn’t work, and my brain felt like it had shut down, too. All I
knew was the sizzling pleasure that took over every inch of me, locking my
body in place while he continued to move slowly, whispering praise in my
ear.
In those moments, it occurred to me that this guy could make me
believe in Zeus and Hera and Hades and whichever god he liked.

S himself up on his knees between my legs, looking down at

me like he couldn’t decide whether to eat me, tear me apart, or fuck me
until I passed out.
I was really hoping for the latter, especially when he looked like that
naked and buried inside me to the hilt. Fuck.
 “The things I would do to you…” he whispered, running the tips of his
fingers down my chest, between my breasts and to my stomach, before he
pressed his thumb to my clit.
Then he started moving in and out of me, his eyes on where we
connected, lips parted and eyes completely black while he fucked me and
played with my clit.
It still hurt to be stretched like that, but it was also the most explosive
feeling I’d ever had. We were in the darkness—the Void—and I still had no
clue where the light was coming from, but I saw him. I saw all of him,
every curve and every muscle, every scar decorating his chest.
“Yes,” I told him while he pulled my legs and held them up by the
ankles, then continued to thrust his hips, watching every inch of his cock
disappearing inside me.
“I would bend you over until you risked breaking,” he said, his thrusts
more desperate now. “I would fuck that beautiful mouth of yours until you
cried tears for me. I would spread these gorgeous legs until I was so deep
inside you, you couldn’t feel your own self anymore.”
Oh, God. “Yes, yes, yes…” If this is how he felt when I was in pain still,
imagine what it would be like when only the pleasure remained and he did
all those things to me…
I would collapse. I would lose my fucking mind.
“One more,” he said, his breathing heavy again, circling my clit faster.
“I want to see how you come all over me. Give me one more, baby.”
His wish must have been my command because my body rushed to
obey. The orgasm was almost painful the way it hit me, so intense it locked
my body in place.
That’s perfect, Shade said. That’s perfect, my pretty little Snowflake.
Less than a minute later, he let go, too.
I blinked the darkness away and saw his face just as he thrust deep
inside me like he meant to break me apart, then threw his head back and
came, moaning my name. The veins in his neck were perfectly visible.
Every muscle in his torso was locked. He held me by the hips tightly, his
biceps clenched and his abs in full display as he kept himself deep inside
me, riding his high, filling me with a different kind of satisfaction, one I
hadn’t even known existed before. To see his pleasure so clearly made me
feel invincible, just as good as coming on his cock.
When he fell over me, hugging me to his chest, for a moment there I
was whole. The world wasn’t a foreign place like it had been my whole life.
I belonged here.
And that was more dangerous than any trial any god or Elysean could
ever come up with.
Shade lay at my side and wrapped me up in his arms, and little by little,
the darkness faded, leaving way for the room. I was slightly shaking, and he
took my hands to his lips and kissed them, a completely different man from
what he had been in the Art Room.
I adored this side of him, and I was too exhausted to try to trick myself
into thinking it was just the sex. Just the pleasure. Just the first time.
No, it was just him.
We settled in silence for a little while, until our breathing evened out
and our hearts no longer raced. Until it didn’t feel like a dream anymore,
but I accepted that this was reality.
“What’s it like over there?” I wondered, though I’d been avoiding books
about the Academy since the others spoke about it at the party, and I liked
what they said. “At the Academy. What’s it like there?”
“It’s very beautiful,” Shade said. “Gold and marble. Space for
everything. More magic than there is in the rest of the city.”
“Wow,” I breathed, trying to imagine hallways as big as they were here,
and huge rooms, and temples…
“The most beautiful deathtrap you’ll ever see,” he said, making goose
bumps break all over my body. Slowly, he leaned down and grabbed the
blanket and put it over us. I was lying on his shoulder, eyes half closed
already, his naked chest under my hand.
I couldn’t pick a single thing that would beat this moment. I was
completely, utterly peaceful.
For a second.
“You’ll get through the third trial, Snowflake,” he told me. “And when
you do, you leave. You don’t come to the Academy no matter what. You
leave.”
My eyes closed and every cell in my body felt like it turned inside out
for a moment because I knew he was right.
And I hated it.
I hated that he was right, and I hated that I wanted him to be wrong, and
I hated that I wanted him to ask me to please go instead. Please go to the
Academy so I could see him again, so we could do this again—every night
and every day and for the rest of forever.
How fucking silly of me. Silly mortal.
“I know,” was what I said because I did. I knew better than to want this.
I knew better than to think our very nature didn’t put an entire world
between us.
It did.
“I have to go now, Snowflake,” Shade said, kissing the top of my head.
“Stay.” I held onto his shoulder, terrified of being alone for the first time
since forever.
Just that my mind couldn’t be trusted right now. My own thoughts had
turned against me, and I hadn’t even noticed when. Sneaky fuckers.
“I can’t. Carmine suspects,” he said. My heart jumped.
“What?”
“She doesn’t know anything for sure, but she suspects.”
Oh God. “About us?”
 “Yes. I made no secret of the reason why I wiped Jasper’s mind. Maybe
I should have.”
I sat up, holding the sheet to my chest. “What?!” Did he just say wipe
Jasper’s mind?
Shade flinched, sitting up, too. “It’s only temporary. It shouldn’t last
longer than another day.” I shook my head, unable to form words. “I was
pissed, Snowflake. I wasn’t thinking straight. He hurt you. He really
shouldn’t have.”
“But…but how?” How could he wipe someone’s mind, just like that?
“I brought him into the Void,” he told me, and it was like a slap to my
face.
“The Void? You mean, the same darkness that was all around us until
just now?” I whispered.
Shade nodded. “Most minds can’t handle it,” he said, running his
fingertips down my jaw. “But some can.”
Suddenly, what David said to me in the hallway that night made a little
more sense…You handled the Void?
“Wait a minute…so that day when you first saw me, when you pulled
me into the Void in the garden, how did you know my mind could handle
it?” I asked, shocked already.
But Shade smiled a bit. “I didn’t, Snowflake. I was sure you couldn’t,
actually.”
My jaw hit the floor. “You knew my memory would be gone and you
still put me there?!” Was he serious?
“Yes,” he said without missing a beat. “I was trying to do you a favor.
You really looked like you needed to forget.”
Well, fuck. My mouth opened and closed a couple times because what
the hell could I say? I’d have given anything to forget where I was that
night we met.
He was impossible.
 “You’re a goddamn fool, Shadow Boy,” I finally said, grabbing his face
in my hands before I kissed him.
“A bigger one than you know,” he said, giving me that smile again, the
one that was completely genuine, and it transformed his face so that he
looked at least a couple years younger. It erased the traces of whatever
Shade carried on his shoulders, whatever kept those storms in his eyes
forever raging.
Curiosity burned me—what was it? What more about him didn’t I
know? What had he gone through to give him that aura, to make him look
so dark and distant most of the time?
“What were you doing out there in the courtyard that night, anyway?” I
remembered how he’d looked. How his shoulders had been hunched while
he played with this shadows…
“I was actually going to run away myself,” Shade said. Definitely not
what I expected.
“Really?” He nodded. “So why didn’t you?” The thought of Shade
wanting to run way from this place just as badly as I did was…interesting.
“I don’t know. You rang the alarm that night, and then I just…never got
around to trying again,” was what he said.
He lay down on the bed again and pulled me in his arms. I smiled
against his neck, filling my lungs with air that smelled like raindrops and
Shade. Whatever his reasons were, I was really glad he hadn’t gotten
around to trying to run away again.
“You wanted to make things easy for me since day one,” I teased. I
loved putting my head on his shoulder—so much more comfortable than
any pillow could ever be.
“Yes, well, simply being here is plenty hard,” he said, kissing the top of
my head.
“Hardship doesn’t scare me, though.” It never had.
 “What does?” Shade said, running his hand up and down my arm that
rested on his chest.
I shrugged. “Easy. Easy lacks purpose, and when you lose that, you’ve
already lost everything.” My biggest purpose had always been to be free, to
be alone, to teach myself how to live, unlearn everything I was taught and
relearn it all with more love. More compassion.
I wanted to love life the way I never had before.
The way I do right now…
“A purpose,” Shade repeated, as if he were tasting the word on his
tongue.
“Yes, a purpose. Something worth dying for.” Something I would get
through the Elysean Trials for.
“I’ve never had that,” Shade said in a hushed whisper. I kissed the side
of his neck and he immediately leaned into my lips.
“Sometimes it hides in plain sight. Sometimes you just have to look
deeper,” I said. “Sometimes it’s something as simple as making it through
the day, or as complicated as becoming so great the whole world knows
your name. I’ve been on both ends plenty of times.”
Shade listened intently, absorbing my every word. I could tell he was
thinking about it as we lay there, locked in each other’s arms for a while.
Eventually, though, it was time for him to go.
Eventually, he kissed me one last time and stood from the bed.
“Will you be back?” I asked as I watched him put his clothes on.
God, he was perfect. Every inch of him down to the opal buried in his
skin was exactly right. And his cock—wow. He was huge, even bigger than
I’d realized, and for a second it wiped my thoughts completely.
I had that thing inside me? Was he serious?
How the hell had I even survived?
Now I was afraid to look between my legs.
 “I don't know,” Shade said. “It’s better if I don’t. The trial is in two
days. You need to prepare.”
“I am prepared this time. I am,” I told him, as the idea of him not being
back here again clawed at my insides. Please, I wanted to say, but I resisted.
“I know, Snowflake. You are,” he said without missing a beat. Then he
came to the bed and grabbed my face in his hands, analyzing my every
feature. “How do you feel? Are you still sore?” I loved the concern in his
eyes even if I couldn’t bring myself to smile.
“A little,” I muttered, and he kissed the tip of my nose.
“You’ll be okay. You just need to rest,” he said, trailing more kisses on
my cheeks and lips. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“I’ll see you,” I whispered but stayed seated and kept my eyes on him
while he moved backward to the door, slowly, watching me, grinning
mischievously. My smile didn’t reach my eyes, though I tried. I didn’t want
him to know how terrified I was of both seeing him and not seeing him
again.
“Sweet dreams, Snowflake,” he whispered as he slipped out the door.
“Goodnight, Shadow Boy,” I said to the empty room a second later,
feeling like everything that had just been given to me minutes ago was
ripped out of my fingers all over again.
There wasn’t nearly as much blood on me as I thought there would be,
but I had stained the sheets a little. I’d just tell Grace I cut my finger or
something.
I went to the bathroom and I washed myself, then lay down again,
wondering why I didn’t ask him about that nickname—Snowflake. Why did
he call me that? I liked it, I didn’t want him to stop, but I wanted to know
why. If he came back here tomorrow, I would ask.
Sleep took me because I was exhausted, but my dreams weren’t sweet.
Instead, I spent the whole night chasing after Shade in the darkness, and
I never once found him.
 32

When Prometheus stole fire from Olympus, it did so much more for his creation than
he had imagined.
With fire, man no longer feared the cold of winter. With fire, man no longer feared
wild beasts, as the flames dancing in their hearths drove them away. With fire, man no
longer kept their eyes downward, but as they watched the smoke rise up to the sky,
their thoughts rose with it, and they saw the gods.
Thus, they built temples and they began their worship. Thus, they made the first
sacrifice by sharing with the gods that which to them was most precious: their food.
Even so, Zeus was furious.

—Book of Creation, Volume II, 2nd Edition, 120

by Warren Marvos, House Emerald

I didn’t see him the next day.

This time, I didn’t need to ask Amelia or even Angel where he was
because everyone knew.
Apparently, his punishment had ended that first time four nights ago
when he went back to the Academy. Then, he was punished again when he
left the Academy to return to the Palace, to sleep in my bed, half naked,
then wipe Jasper’s memories by pulling him into the Void for unleashing his
leopards on me. For that, he’d been punished to clean the Art Room, but
now, he’d been called to the Academy again, and I wasn’t sure he’d be
allowed back. Nobody was. I had no phone, no means of communication,
no way of knowing what the hell to expect. I didn’t even know what he did
there—was he a student or a teacher or an employee of some kind? So, so
much I still didn’t know.
Despite it, I wasn’t angry. In fact, as much as missing him made me
sick, I was thankful for the time because whether I realized it or not, I had a
decision to make at the end of all of this.
I still searched for him, though. I went back to the Art Room—all the
books were in place, the instruments rearranged, the canvases laid in a
perfect order. The messiness was mostly gone, though there were far too
many things in there to ever let the room look tidy.
I searched for him in the other parts of the Palace as well. Maia even
convinced me to go with her to the Menagerie—she said it was good fun, a
beautiful place, and the caretakers were of Dionysus’ Bloodline, so we
would definitely be safe from the animals. I went, just in case Shade would
be there.
The Menagerie was right around the corner from the Art Room, and it
was technically a greenhouse, a miniature jungle with cages built in
between the plants and the leaves and the vines, and there were a lot more
animals than leopards in there. Three women were walking about with a
basket in their arms, giving food to the animals they passed by—all of the
cage doors wide open, but none of the animals even attempted to come out.
Monkeys, cobras, giraffes, so many kinds of colorful birds. The leopards
were there, too, and I thought they’d be the ones to scare me shitless, but
they never got the chance. Instead, in the cage across from them, the only
one in the entire place that was closed, I saw a dog.
With three heads.
Sleeping.
 I stopped walking, shocked out of thoughts for a moment.
“Yep. They have an actual Cerberus here,” Maia whispered. “He’s only
up at nighttime, and he sleeps during the day, so…” she brought her index
finger to her lips. “Ssshh.”
A three-headed dog, offspring of Typhon, the father of all monsters,
guardian of the gates of the Underworld—and he was sleeping here, in the
same building I slept, caged. Not only that but it seemed small. It seemed
young, smaller than even the leopards that were on the other side. Its fur
was a dark grey, and its pointy ears perked up even though its eyes—all six
of them—were closed.
The Cerberus was really real.
My memories instantly took me to Matilda, a woman who’d fostered
me for six months once. Her daughter, little Emily with the cute pigtails,
had been a few years younger than me, and had loved stuffed animals—
especially the Cerberus. She’d had him in every possible size, and Matilda
used to tell us stories about how the dog of the Underworld loved to play
with mountains when it was awake, and how only music would get him to
calm down and sleep. That’s why she played her old guitar for us every
single night when she put us in bed. That sound was one of the three good
memories I had growing up in the system.
I wondered where the mother and daughter were now. I wondered what
they’d do if they actually saw a Cerberus with their own eyes. They’d
probably be ecstatic.
But I couldn’t stay there with Maia for longer. Yeah, the caretakers were
here, and, yeah, those leopards—and the Cerberus—were in their cages and
they didn’t look like they were going to rip my throat out any second, but
those faces, those furs, just the colors on them made every hair on my body
stand at attention. The smell was a lot, too, and even though the huge
flowers were gorgeous, and the large trees and vines and plants made me
feel like I was literally in another world altogether, I had to go. I was too
uncomfortable.
Besides, Shade was definitely not there—though I could picture him
with a Cerberus by his side just fine now that I thought about it.
Maia stayed—she loved animals, which was why she came to this place
every day. She was safe with the caretakers, so I could go back to help Eeda
with her cart and then wait for her at the library.
“You really don’t have to come here every day,” the woman said as we
pulled the cart up the stairs. Same grey sheets, and there was just no way
that this thing could get any heavier. I’d helped her with it every single day
since I got here, and I could swear my biceps were visible from it now.
“I know. I want to,” I said with a smile—how unfair was it that they let
a woman her age carry all this load by herself? “You should definitely
consider requesting someone else do this, though. You don’t have to carry
all this weight.” I wouldn’t be here for more than two days—the trial was
tomorrow. My Iriade had brought me the piece of paper just that morning. I
doubted anybody else was going to come help her out.
But Eeda waved me off when we reached the second floor, then went
and sat on the top stair like we usually did for a second.
“Don’t you worry about me, dear,” she said. “Tell me what’s bothering
you.”
I raised my brows in surprise—how the hell did she even know?
“It’s written all over your face,” she added, as if she could read my
damn mind.
Her warm brown eyes made me feel at ease just like they had that first
day, so I shook my head.
“Just things,” I said, too embarrassed to talk about it.
But she nudged my shoulder with hers. “Boy trouble?”
I blushed bright scarlet. “Something like that.”
“It’s that Ravenar boy, isn’t it.”
 I turned to look at her, embarrassment forgotten. “Ravenar?” That was
the name of one of the judges of the trial, wasn’t it?
“Yes, Ravenar. One of the smallest Houses in the world in number but
more powerful than most,” she told me, then squeezed my hand. “I don’t
want to stick my nose in your business, so to speak, but since I’ve told you
this before, I’ll say it one more time: stay away from that boy. Nothing
good will come of it.”
I remembered that first time she warned me about Shade just fine, and I
was still just as curious. “Why, though?”
“I’ve only heard rumors, and it is not my place to tell you,” she
whispered, leaning closer to my ear. “And despite him keeping you from
drinking the Elixir that night, I don’t think you should trust him.” I opened
my mouth to speak, but she added: “Before you ask again, all I know is that
he’s had a terrible past. He’s bad news, like you kids call it.”
I don’t know why I was so tempted to believe her. Maybe it was
because of Shade, because of how he behaved, almost like he was
constantly thinking that he didn’t deserve to be talked to or even liked. He
had assumed I wanted him because of how he looked since we first kissed,
and he was always hoping I’d change my mind about it, too.
“Go read, dear. The trial is just around the corner,” Eeda said, patting
me on the shoulder before she got up and left.
“I’ll get right to it,” I said with fake enthusiasm. “Thank you, Eeda.”
I went back to the library after I decided that I would talk to Shade
about this first. Eeda was right—it wasn’t her place to tell me anything. If
there was something to tell, Shade would tell me. I trusted him. He had the
right to speak for himself.
The hours dragged and I constantly felt like my stomach was twisting
and I was going to throw up any second. It got old fast, but at least the
books were good. This time, the butterflies of the library took me to
different titles: the collection of The God Wars and the History of
Constellations—all very entertaining.
But when the day ended, I still didn’t feel any better. And even though I
woke up every ten minutes all night long, Shade never came back.

M . I looked at the nail polish in wonder—what

in the depths of Tartarus did it matter what my nails looked like when I was
about to go into a goddamn trial to—very—possibly die?
But, apparently, there would be a crowd today. Apparently, mortals
would be allowed to come all the way to the Palace today to watch us enter
the trial, and we needed to look our best, so Grace had even blow-dried my
hair and turned it into beautiful soft gold-colored waves that looked wasted
on the expression on my pale face. I was going to fucking throw up, and
Shade was nowhere yet. He hadn’t come back yesterday, either. I’d waited
the whole day.
I’d waited the whole night, too.
I’d transformed into someone else completely, and I had no idea who
this girl was when I looked at the mirror. I looked beautiful, the blue of my
eyes bright despite how I felt inside, my skin glowing because Grace had
put those suckers all over me since she woke me up—meredines she called
them, but to me they were still Leeches From Hell. The brand-new white
leather suit I had on must have been a size smaller than usual, though Grace
insisted it was the same. But I could have sworn I looked taller, leaner, and
Grace even tightened the thick leather belt a bit, to accentuate my waist.
Because that was important, not how I was going to complete the final trial
—no, no, my waist had to look slim.
God, I was going to be sick.
 “Cheer up,” Grace told me as she sprayed some body mist over me. It
smelled gorgeous, like flowers you rarely come across. Almost like honey,
like the black tulip that had already withered in the drawer of my
nightstand.
Memories rushed back to me, and for a second, I was back to the best
morning of my life.
But Shade hadn’t brought me another.
And now I was going to cry, too.
Get it together!
“Sure, I’ll cheer up. After all, I might just be walking into my death—
what’s not to be cheerful about?” I deadpanned.
Grace tsk-ed me. “You’re not going anywhere with that attitude, miss.”
I sighed, sitting at the edge of the bed. I didn’t want to be here. I wanted
to be in Gary’s house, playing video games with Miles. Or at Fairytale
drinking strawberry milkshakes with James and Layla. I’d took those things
for granted so many times. What would I give just to have them annoy the
shit out of me right now?
A lot. I would give a lot, just not this entire thing, this whole experience,
apparently, because if I hadn’t come here, I’d have never met Shade.
And that was way more fucked up than I cared to admit to myself, now
or ever.
“Chin up. Eyes ahead. Shoulders back,” Grace told me. “And why are
you playing with that rock? Put it in the bin.” And she made an attempt to
grab the rock I was throwing in the air and catching again.
I moved away. “Hey, back off. Eeda gave this to me.” And she said it
would enable me to communicate with a person only through our minds if I
had them in my line of sight.
I wondered if maybe I could use it talk to Shade if he showed up with
the audience today before we entered the Dome. I hoped so. I really hoped
so.
 “Who?” Grace said, raising a skeptical brow as she looked at the rock. It
was grey and perfectly ordinary-looking, but there was magic inside it. I
knew there was.
“Eeda from laundry,” I said, holding up the rock between my thumb and
index finger to show her. “And you know what? Maybe it wouldn’t be so
horrible to have someone else carry that cart around every once in a while.
She’s not that young anymore and that thing is extremely heavy. Just ask
my arms and back.”
With a sigh, Grace grabbed her hips and shook her head at me. “What in
the world are you talking about, girl?”
I rolled my eyes. “Eeda—the woman who carries the laundry to the
second floor every morning, remember?”
Grace blinked. “Nobody carries laundry anywhere. We have pipes and
separate laundry rooms on each floor.”
My mouth opened and closed a few times. “But Eeda—”
She shook her head as she cut me off. “There is no Eeda in laundry.
There is no Eeda anywhere in this Palace—I know all the staff. Get yourself
together, girl. Focus on the trial!” She put her hands on my shoulders and
basically shook me.
Every hair in my body stood at attention.
Grace said something else that I didn’t really understand. Then smiled.
Then walked out of the room before I remembered how to move.
When I did, I ran out the door and to the ground floor, down the library
hallway and through the archway to the stairs where Eeda always showed
up with her cart after breakfast. Always.
She had always been here every single day for the past three weeks.
She would be here today, too, and then I’d tell her about Grace and we
could laugh about it together. Because Grace had just forgotten. She’s just
forgotten Eeda from laundry, and she would remember as soon as she saw
her again.
 So, I sat on the floor and waited—it was still a bit early. I hadn’t gotten
breakfast because I knew I’d just throw it all up again. Safer that way.
I didn’t even know why I was so freaked out about it—and so what if
Grace forgot about Eeda or didn’t know Eeda at all? The Palace was big,
probably more people worked here than she realized. No need to be so
nervous about it. Definitely no need to be shaking like I was.
“Just wait. She’ll be here in no time,” I whispered to myself, fisting my
numb hands to get some feeling back into them.
So, I waited.
And waited some more.
Eeda never showed up.
It felt like I was walking in a dream when I went to the door on the far
right through which Eeda always came. It would lead me straight to
laundry, I thought, and Eeda would be there, probably running late today
because of the trials. Or I could ask someone else from the staff about
where she was.
The door opened without trouble.
Behind it was a small room full of metal shelves and cleaning supplies.
No other doors in there—not on the other side, not behind the shelves, or
the toilet paper rolls that were stacked up against the wall, or the buckets or
the mops or the detergent bottles that smelled like vomit.
No doors, just the one I came through.
No laundry, no cart, no Eeda.
Bile rose in my throat.
“There you are! Sera, by Zeus’s Bolt—I’ve been looking everywhere
for you!”
A hand on my shoulder and I was pulled back, out of the room. Angel’s
face filled my vision—I must have been in shock because I was numb all
over again.
 “I know this is overwhelming for you, sweetie, but now is not the time
to go hiding in the supply closet!” she hissed though a plastic smile was
plastered all over her face. “Madam Carmine will be speaking to you in the
Seasons Hall in just a minute.”
I blinked, watching her lips frozen in place as she spoke through her
teeth—while she smiled.
Angel was such a curious woman. I never had paid her much attention,
but now that I thought about it, she really was something.
“Sera!”
She clapped her hands right in front of my face, making me blink. A
noise went on in my ears and the world tilted into focus.
“Get to the Seasons Hall, now!”
I moved. There was ground beneath my feet because I didn’t fall with
every new step I took like I expected. My legs knew where the Hall was, so
they took me there without me having to even think about it. By the time I
made it to the open doors and saw that the other candidates were already
there, waiting, I could actually make sense of my thoughts.
A mistake, I figured. I had no idea why that door led to a supply closet,
or why Eeda had always come out of it with her cart. I had no idea why
Grace didn’t know who she was. I had no idea about a lot of things, but I
knew one thing for certain—I was not crazy. I hadn’t lost my mind. I knew
Eeda. I remembered her with clarity.
And once I found her, she would explain this madness and it would all
make sense.
But right now, I really did need to focus.
So, I walked into the Seasons Hall inhaling deeply, my attention on the
others. Eight of them—Emily was nowhere to be seen. Maia waved and
smiled at me, but her cheeks were so pale she didn’t even blush like usual.
I was okay. I was still alive, about to get into the third trial and be done
with this whole thing once and for all. I’d come such a long way, hadn’t I? I
knew so much more, had felt so much more than I ever thought possible.
Yeah, there were secrets everywhere, but that was okay. I was in an
Elysean city. I was a foreigner here. Of course, there would be things I
didn’t understand.
Right now, I stood next to my friend in one of the most beautiful
buildings to have ever been built, with the statues of the Seasons holding up
the shimmery curtains at my back—just like I imagined the real Seasons
had held back clouds when gods came to visit Earth from Olympus. The
morning sunlight streamed through, warming me to my bones, and I slightly
turned so I could feel it on the side of my face, too, hoping it would melt the
ice around my heart.
It definitely helped. The sky outside was a perfect blue and I chose to
see that as a good sign.
Everything was going to be just fine.
 33

“Simplicity is your enemy; simple lives are not noble for they do not hone the soul nor
the mind.”

—Metis the Wise, 403

by Elh Pordier, House Ruby

Madam Carmine’s footsteps pierced right through my brain. The heels of

her leather boots were gorgeous—high and thin enough to probably slit
throats. Not that she’d need them with those fingernails.
Just the look on her face was enough to scare anyone away. Her dress
was a deep maroon, hugging her perfect figure before it flared around her
legs all the way to the ankles of her boots. Her ruby was still sewn to the
collar of her dress, making her look regal—skin so fair it looked white in
contrast with the all-consuming black of her hair. She might be the most
striking person I’d ever laid eyes on, Elysean or otherwise.
Behind her was Angel, and she seemed to be dragging Emily along with
her, while the latter looked like she was about to pass out for real.
 My God, she looked worse than the rest of us. Her skin was grey, not
white, and she couldn’t even drag her feet properly. Were they seriously
going to let her into the trial like that?
I looked at Madam Carmine when Angel brought Emily to stand next to
me in line, but the woman wouldn’t even glance her way, hands folded
back, as if she were irritated that she’d been made to wait for a moment.
“She’s not well,” I told Angel—she could see it for herself. Emily could
barely stand, for fuck’s sake.
“I’m fine,” she hissed anyway, before Angel could say anything. Then
she made an attempt to straighten her shoulders and almost collapsed. Her
eyes alone told me that she was not fine by any means.
“Emily,” I started, but she didn’t want to even hear it.
“Don’t talk to me,” she spit, and Maia squeezed my hand from the other
side to tell me to drop it.
They wanted me to just stand there and watch while the girl was clearly
in no condition to even walk, let alone go into that fucking Dome?
“Candidates.”
Madam Carmine’s voice echoed in the tall ceiling of the Hall, making
shivers dance on my back. I had no choice but to look at her.
Her dark eyes moved from one face to the other, her expression now
unreadable. “Out of the fourteen who came through those gates three weeks
ago, you are the ones who remain,” she said—like it was not a particular
accomplishment, that, but just something that had happened. “Today, you
will enter the Daedalus Dome for your third and final trial.” Slowly, she
began to pace in front of us. “The first two have been designed to weed out
the weakest of you.”
I flinched, and Angel must have noticed because when I felt her
watching me, I turned to see her widening her eyes in warning. I ignored
her.
 “This one, though. This trial is different. You will be thoroughly tested
in this trial. It was designed to weed out the strong among you,” she said,
then paused a second for emphasis. “So that only the strongest may have
their chance because only they truly deserve it.”
Gritting my teeth, I sank my nails in my palms until my skin broke. It
was all I could do not to speak.
“It is a privilege to be here today—I hope you all know that…” As her
voice trailed off, her eyes stopped on me.
God, that woman hated my guts. The way she looked at me said she
wanted me dead on the spot already. I wondered what she’d do if I flipped
her off right now—and I might have, had I not been so damn nervous.
But I wasn’t too nervous to ask her about the others. “What about
Jessica? What…what about Pablo?” I said, and I hated it that my voice
broke, but I wanted to know. All they’d said to us was that they were in a
coma. That’s it. I had to know if they were awake.
Angel all but passed out as she widened her eyes at me again to get me
to shut up. Madame Carmine raised her chin as she looked at me. “At
present, everything is the same, Sinclair. If there are changes, their families
will be notified,” she told me.
My stomach twisted and turned—everything was the same. They hadn’t
woken up yet.
Madame Carmine continued.
“If you pass this trial, candidates, there is a good chance that you will be
offered a place at the Elysean Academy of Divine Light and Beauty. Your
lives will be changed forever.” If they don’t end here first, I wanted to say,
but kept my mouth shut. “You will be more than you’ve ever been. You will
be celebrated as gods until the day you die, even if you don’t become
Elysean. You will reap the benefits of this until your last breath.”
Just then, the candidates smiled. Even Emily, who still looked grey in
the face, raised her chin and smiled proudly.
 They were fucking idiots.
“This is the chance of a lifetime, so keep your focus. Use your brains,
use everything you learned in the past three weeks here—that, too, will be
tested. Your capacity to learn is just as important in this trial as your will to
fight,” Madam Carmine continued. “I am certain you already know this”—
her eyes stopped on Emily’s face—“but this is not a game. You can lose
your life in the Dome. You can be stuck in the Dome. If you do not possess
the skills and the knowledge necessary to get through it, there is a chance
that you will never make it out. If the Dome claims you, there is nothing
anybody can do for your remains—do you understand me? Your families
will not have anything to bury.”
No more smiles. Every inch of me rose in goose bumps.
“This is not. A. Game.”
She said the words slowly, separately, as she wanted us to understand
them without a shadow of doubt.
And I did. I had since day one. Anybody who didn’t found out the day
Isaac and Elaine died. This was most definitely not a game.
“I have hope that you have been smart and that you have used the
resources provided to you here,” Madam Carmine said. “I assure you, you
will need each and every one of them.” She stepped back with a curt nod.
“Good luck, candidates. You have one hour.”
With that, she turned around and left the Hall—and all of us speechless.

T ’ that comfortable, or maybe it was just me. We all sat

at a round table in the Seasons Hall, in silence at first, and then the others
started whispering. Emily looked better, some color returned to her cheeks.
She was even smiling now, as if she was proud for getting through whatever
that had been—possibly her body trying to warn her to get the fuck away
from here while she could.
 “I wonder which House will pick me,” Nick was saying as he scratched
his cheek. “It better be Ruby. I want fire.” He raised his hand in front of his
face and watched his fingers as if he could already see flames burning on
his skin.
“I want water,” said Marie—possibly for the hundredth time. “House
Sapphire are the most sophisticated out there—imagine what I could create
if I end up in Hephaestus’s Bloodline…” She then kissed the tips of her
fingers with her eyes closed, pressed them to her forehead, and raised them
toward the ceiling as if she were saluting the gods in Olympus.
Except that wasn’t how it worked, was it? She wasn’t any god’s
descendant. However the Elysean made the candidates into them, it didn’t
tie them to the gods by blood. It just wasn’t possible.
I said nothing.
“I, for one, would love to be picked by Opal,” said Emily.
“Good luck with that,” said Donna. “They haven’t picked a candidate in
over four decades.”
“Yeah, they stay away from the trials. I heard they’re basically forced to
fund their share and participate in them,” said Erica.
“You can keep your shadows—I want to be Emerald. I want a magic
wand so bad I’m gonna die,” Maia said. “Just like Harry Potter.” And she
waved an imaginary wand around while the others laughed.
“Maia, can I talk to you for a second?” I said and stood up. Surprised,
they all looked at me.
Maia nodded. “Yeah, sure.”
She came with me a few feet away from the others—I didn’t want them
to hear this, not right now.
“What’s up?”
“Hey, remember the woman who saved us that night from the
leopards?” I asked. Maia had seen Eeda, too. She’d been in her cart with
me.
 “Yes?”
“You remember her, right? The grey dress, brown eyes, white shawl on
her head?”
“Yes.” She looked up at the ceiling for a second, like she was trying to
remember. “Yep, yep. I remember that. Why?”
“No reason,” I said with a sigh. “Just…just wanted to make sure that
you saw her. You’ve seen her before carrying her laundry around, right?
You know her name?”
At that, Maya narrowed her brows. “Not really. That was the first and
last time I saw her, to be honest. What’s this about?”
First and last time she saw her—but it could have been because Maia
was always at the library. She never had to run away from wasps made out
of pencil lead and magic—she was in the library.
“Nothing at all,” I told her, then nodded back at the others. “You go
ahead, I’ll be right back.”
“Okay, just don’t be long,” she said with a wave.
But I couldn’t stay here. I didn’t want to listen to them talking like that,
like we weren’t about to walk into a deathtrap, like it was all worth it. I
made it out of the Hall and up the stairs as if in a dream. Only after I saw
the doors to the Stargazing tower did I realize that that’s where I was
headed, and I was actually relieved. A moment to myself—that’s what I
needed. This morning—this whole month had been insane to say the least.
Now that it was almost over, I needed some time to gather my thoughts.
So, I climbed the spiral stairs and I sat in front of the archway in the
middle, looked at the blue sky and tried to forget and to remember at the
same time. It was peaceful up there, like nothing and nobody could get to
me if they tried. Not even the hard truth of my reality.
It must have been a long time before I heard movement behind me.
“Morning, Snowflake.”
My body locked down, my eyes closed, and I breathed.
 Even though he whispered, I knew his voice. I would know his voice
anywhere.
I didn’t turn, didn’t move at all as he came closer, only smiled as I
stared at the sky again.
Shade was finally here.

H to me on the wooden floor, looking younger, smoother,

happier in daylight. My heart tripped all over itself—it was so good to see
him. So good to get lost in those storms he used for eyes—exactly what I
needed right now.
My body must have had a mind of its own because before I knew it, I
was dragging myself closer, needing to feel the heat of his body just a bit
more. After all, I might really die soon, so why the hell not?
Shade didn’t hesitate. He put his arm around me and pulled me to him
until I was almost sitting on his lap. His lips were on mine, gentle, slow—a
reminder of what it was like to be like this with him. It had only been two
days, but it felt like months to me. And, in those moments, I didn’t even
want to be alarmed at the thought.
So I just lay my head on his shoulder and closed my eyes and let him
trail little kisses all over my face while I pretended the world outside didn’t
exist. Nothing existed except us.
“You missed me?” he whispered against my lips, making my heart skip
another beat.
“A teeny tiny bit,” I muttered and smiled when he smiled.
Then he leaned back and looked at me. I barely saw him because my
eyes were open only a slit, but with the blue sky at his back he took my
breath away.
“I’ve lived in a city of gods my whole life,” he whispered, running his
thumb over my lips. “Yet somehow, you are the only divine thing I’ve ever
seen.”
My toes curled and the butterflies in my stomach about turned me inside
out. My cheeks felt so warm, and I hid my face under his neck a little.
“Keep talking like that and someone will think you actually like me.”
He chuckled that sound I adored. “They wouldn’t dare.”
I kissed the soft skin of his neck, wondering where all that fear went.
Wasn’t I just about to have a full-on panic attack just minutes ago? Where
did all of that go?
“Where were you?” I asked Shade as he held perfectly still while I
trailed kisses down his neck.
“Academy,” he mumbled, pressing his neck to my lips again, making
me laugh. I sat up straighter and continued to kiss him. “I just got back. I
couldn’t leave sooner.”
And there were so many things I wanted to ask—why not? Why the
Academy? Was he a student? What did he do there? Did they punish him
again? What was his favorite color? What was his favorite memory?
Instead, I just enjoyed the feel of him because in the end, it didn’t really
matter.
Not anymore, anyway.
“How are you, Snowflake? Still sore?” he whispered. Blood rushed to
my cheeks while I shook my head. No, I was no longer sore between my
legs—just really turned on all the damn time now. “Good,” he said,
bringing his jaw, his cheek to my lips so I could kiss it. “Have you been
preparing?”
“Mhmm.”
“Have they messed with you again?”
“No, but Jasper is up. Seems okay.” Better yet—he’d stayed away from
me the past two days since I saw him in the Midas Hall.
“Good,” Shade said and brought his lips to mine. “You will get through
this one, too. You’ll be just fine.”
 “I will,” I said, as if I believed it a hundred percent.
“Your hair is so beautiful,” he suddenly said. “Like it was woven with
sunlight.” And he ran his fingers through the soft curls, curtesy of Grace.
My cheeks flushed and I couldn’t stop smiling.
“You like my hair?” I said, a bit surprised.
“I like every inch of you,” he whispered. “Your hair, yes, but those
lips…” and again, he ran his thumbs over my lips. “I’m a slave to them.
You can make me do whatever you please if you only ask.”
I wanted to ask him of so, so much, but then again, I wanted him to
want it all without my having to, so I said nothing.
“But these curls are not going to do you any favors in the trial. Turn
around, Snowflake,” Shade said.
Surprised again, I did as he asked and turned until I was sitting between
his legs. He ran his fingers through my hair, then started to pull it up, away
from my face.
“Are you braiding it?” I asked because it felt like it.
“Not exactly a braid but something close,” Shade said, continuing to
pull my hair gently. My eyes closed involuntarily—I liked his hands on my
body, and apparently, I liked his hands on my hair, too.
“Where in the world did you learn how to braid hair?” Not something
guys generally knew, at least not back home.
“My mother called them knots, not braids. She loved how her hair
looked like this. I used to do them for her when I was a boy,” he said, and I
have no idea why that broke my heart a little. He just sounded so sad when
he said it that the questions were at the tip of my tongue: do you still do
your mother’s knots? Where is she right now? Where is your father?
But I bit my tongue because now was not the time for questions. When
he was done with what he called knots—which, when I ran my hand over
my hair, felt exactly like actual knots going down the back of my head—he
turned me around.
 “There. Even better,” he whispered. I didn’t need a mirror to know I
looked beautiful—his smile was better than any reflection I’d ever seen.
“Remember to always know your surroundings. Remember to fight if it
comes to it.”
“I will,” I promised him.
“And most importantly, remember to run when you should. Picking
your battles is just as important a skill as knowing how to fight.”
I grinned. “Yes, I’ll run when I can, Shade. You don’t have to try to
protect me all the time, you know. I’m not that weak.”
At that, he raised his brows like he was surprised, those storms in his
eyes soft right now. “You think I want to protect you because you’re
weak?” he said, bringing my face closer until the tips of our noses touched.
Fire on my cheeks. “Well, don’t you?”
Shade shook his head. “I don’t want to protect you because you’re weak
—you’re not. I want to protect you because you’re important.”
My poor heart all but burst. I leaned in and kissed him until I couldn’t
breathe. “It was you, wasn’t it,” I whispered, but it wasn’t even a question.
“Me, what?”
“You bribed Marcus into healing me with magic.” I’d foolishly thought
it was Elliot playing some sick game on me, but it wasn’t. I saw it so clearly
now—it was Shade.
And he didn’t deny it. He didn’t say anything, only closed his eyes and
gave me a lopsided smile I could die for. It was a purpose on its own, that
smile.
“I’m gonna do it,” I said breathlessly and surprised even myself.
His eyes opened again, and he pulled me closer. “Do what?”
The words almost got stuck in my throat, and I still couldn’t believe I
was saying this, but it needed to be said because it was the truth. No matter
what I told myself, this was my truth now.
 “I’m going to come to the Academy.” And I hadn’t realized that I’d
decided until he found me here. Until I saw him and I felt grounded again—
like I belonged. For the first time in my life, I belonged.
Shade froze, hands still on my face. “You…you promised you wouldn’t,
remember?”
I narrowed my brows. “No, I didn’t. I said, I know.” That night in my
room when he told me not to go to the Academy, I never promised him that
I wouldn’t. I just said I knew that it would be a stupid idea—and I still
believed it. A very stupid idea. But things had changed for me now.
Everything had changed.
Apparently, though, this place wasn’t done breaking me yet.
Shade let go of me and leaned back, taking away all his warmth.
“Why?” he spit, brows narrowed as he shook his head. As if he really
couldn’t think of any reason at all why I’d want to go to the Academy.
“Why would you do that—why, Sedorah?!” It fucking hurt, not going to lie.
My mouth opened and closed a few times, but I couldn’t speak. I just
looked at him and tried not to freak out—he was only asking. No big deal.
It was just a question.
But how could he ask me that? How could he not know already?
He did.
The next second, he stopped shaking his head, and the shock faded from
his darkened eyes.
“Me?” he finally choked, pointing at his chest. “Because of me?”
My vocal cords failed me once more. I couldn’t answer, terrified of
what he might do if I did. Why was he looking at me like that—I didn’t get
it. Why was I suddenly feeling so worthless?
Shade jumped to his feet, laughing an ice-cold sound as he turned his
back to me for a moment. I stood up, too, just to do something, but it felt
like I might collapse any second.
 “My gods, you can’t be serious,” Shade said, as if it wasn’t enough that
he basically threw my heart to the ground. Now he was stepping all over it,
too.
“Shade, don’t,” I said because I knew him. I knew he thought I should
know better than to want him.
“Don’t what? What the hell do you think is going to happen?” He
turned to me again, eyes wide and dark, skin so pale he looked sick. Just as
sick as I felt.
Except he was sick of me.
“What do you think happened here—you think any of this was
accidental?”
I shook my head and turned to the sky, arms wrapped around myself. He
was just pissed, that’s all. He was just pissed. He didn’t mean it.
“Look at me, Sedorah. Did you really think that this—you and me—was
an accident, that I didn’t plan this?”
Oh, God.
“I’m a godsdamn distraction, nothing more,” he hissed, coming so close
that I had no choice but to look at him, and it was so easy to see in daylight
that he hated me. He fucking hated my guts right now and I couldn’t even
look away when he smiled like that.
“I know your type. I’ve seen it before—all one has to do is show you a
bit of kindness, just act like they care, just one tiny bit, and you forget all
your limits. You give away everything you have without question, just like
you did with me,” he told me. “I did exactly what I was supposed to do—
distract you from the trials so you’d be too busy to see more, to notice what
goes on around here, to prepare as well as you should have. I distracted
you.”
Tears in my eyes but I couldn’t stop them. “You…you don’t mean that,”
I choked, more for my benefit than his because he didn’t. He couldn’t say
that to me—it was Shade. I knew how he looked at me. I knew how he
smiled.
But he laughed that same sound again and stepped back. “You actually
think you know me?” he mocked. “Then you’re way worse than I thought.”
He looked down at me, shaking his head as if he were disappointed. “To
think that I told Carmine it would be too much. That I would be too much
for you,” he whispered, like…like Carmine had asked him to do this. Like
he’d really, truly planned to do this to me since the beginning.
I was drowning in thin air.
“You’ll die your first day there,” Shade then said with a sigh. “The
Academy is no place for little girls who forget how to use their brains the
moment they get a bit of attention from people like me.”
With that, he turned around and left, disappearing down the stairway
lightning fast, leaving me in about a million pieces all over the tower floor.
I wanted to be angry. I wanted to be furious, disappointed, anything
other than this deep sadness that was drowning me slowly, sucking the life
out of me.
But I couldn’t. All I could do was take it and be thankful.
I’d been about to make the biggest mistake of my life just minutes ago,
but my eyes were wide open again. I saw clearer than ever. All Shade did
was prove me right once more.
Elyseans were exactly the same monsters I’d always known them to be.
And I couldn’t wait to be done with them forever.
 34

Zeus did not punish the fire thief, Prometheus, because the other gods loved the smell
of burned food that came from man’s sacrifice. But kind Prometheus knew how hard
his creation worked for their food, only to burn the best of it for the gods. And so he
advised man to separate all the good parts of their prey into one side, and the scraps
and fats in another—the last ones to burn as sacrifice, certain that the Olympians
would not be able to tell the difference.
That was the first time that man was taught how to deceive the gods.
Unfortunately, Zeus did find out, and Prometheus was severely punished. He was
cast in unbreakable adamantine, chained at the top of the mountain, where an eagle
would descend to eat his liver every day, only for it to grow again, cursing
Prometheus to an eternity of pain and suffering.

—Book of Creation, Volume II, 2nd Edition, 191

by Warren Marvos, House Emerald

I don’t care.
How many more times would I need to say that to myself to believe it?
I don’t care, I don’t care, I don’t care, I don’t care…
“Ladies and gentlemen!”
 The crowd went nuts. There were over two hundred people around us.
The benches where the staff usually sat behind the judges had multiplied
and they were full to the brim. James and Layla were there, holding up a
white card with my name written in black on it. Other people with more
signs and the names of the other candidates—and more students and staff
from the Academy of Divine Light and Beauty were here with us today, too.
I was going to throw up.
“Welcome to the most important event in the world in the last four
years!” Elliot Embers said into the microphone.
Don’t look, don’t look, don’t look, don’t look…
I looked.
Easy to find him—he was a damn magnet to my eyes where he sat, on
the first row of the benches behind the judges, somewhere behind Ravenar
himself. Definitely related—how had I not seen the resemblance before?
Same dark eyes and hair, same skin tone.
And he was still looking at me, except now his face wasn’t
expressionless. Now, he didn’t try to hide how pathetic he found me with
that small grin stretching his lips and his chin raised so that he looked down
at me.
Superior, he said with his attitude. I’m far superior to you, measly
mortal. I was only there to distract you.
And it had worked so perfectly well, I wondered who’d come up with
the idea, him or Carmine? It was actually impressive. Against all odds, they
somehow made me, possibly the only person in the world who hated
Elyseans, want to go to their goddamn Academy and become like them.
Such a fool. Such a naive fucking fool I was—that’s all it had taken, just
one guy. A tiny bit of attention.
Bile in my mouth. My hands were shaking so much. Tears pricked the
back of my eyes again as cold sweat layered my skin everywhere.
I don’t care, I don’t care, I don’t care, I don’t care…
 Elliot kept talking. The crowd kept cheering.
Emily fell to her knees and threw up.
My eyes closed, knowing that if I saw it, I was going to be next. And I
didn’t want to throw up in front of him, not for any reason. I wouldn’t. He’d
seen me cry of heartbreak today, which nobody had in years. That was more
than enough for a lifetime.
Angel came to help Emily to her feet again, saying, “just the nerves,
she’s so excited!” into the microphone, as if the people couldn’t see that she
was barely standing.
As if the people couldn’t see that all of us were terrified, shaking, pale
as ghosts. We didn’t want to be here. Fuck what anybody said—none of us
wanted to die.
But here we were, and if I made a scene right now, I would only be
making everything worse.
“For the third and final Elysean trial,” Elliot eventually said. “This one
will have three parts instead of two. It’s like difficulty levels in video games
—there’s easy, then medium, and now it’s time for hard.”
The crowd cheered.
I looked at Shade again. How had I been such a fool to believe anything
he said? How?
“More interesting yet—the Daedalus Dome has been personalized for
each candidate as well,” Elliot said. “Which means that how you complete
the first challenge will determine the second. It will be different for each
and every one of you, so choose wisely, my dear mortal friends.” Applause.
“But before we go any further, I just want to say, it has been quite the three
weeks, hasn’t it. These lucky mortals come straight from the ordinary world
have had the chance to live among Elyseans, dine with them, learn with
them, make friendships with them.”
Get properly destroyed by them, I added in my mind.
And the asshole still held my eyes.
 Elliot kept listing all the ways in which we were lucky to be here for
three weeks, while I came up with a list of places I could live in the world,
as far away from any Elysean as possible. I’d move to fucking Peru. I’d
hide in a mountain somewhere, just so I wouldn’t have to see a single
Elysean ever again for the rest of my life.
Forcing a smile on my face was like pulling out my heart with my own
hands, but I did it anyway.
Thank you, I mouthed to Shade, too, just for good measure.
His smile faltered—suck a dick, asshole. He thought he hurt me, but he
saved me. He fucking saved me from whatever stupid spell this place had
put on me. And I was so glad that I would never have to see him again.
“Don’t forget, my dear mortal friends,” Elliot said. “This final trial will
test your fighting skills.” A rush came over me—I didn’t know how to fight
by any means, and my muscles were still sore from trying to learn in the
past week, but I wasn’t as helpless as I used to be, at least. I could throw
punches and kicks just fine.
“More than that—it will test the strength of your character,” Elliot
continued, waving a hand toward the sky dramatically. “And most of all, it
will test your ability to see the beyond.” I hated that grin on his face, the
one he usually had on when he wanted us to know he was speaking of a
secret.
Something touched my hip, and it was all I could do not to jump to the
side before I realized it was Maia. She’d stood next to me this time when
we came out in front of the judges, and she touched the pocket of my
leather pants, I thought.
“I was told to give you that,” she whispered under her breath while
Elliot spoke.
Casually, I slipped a finger in the pocket to find a small piece of paper
in there.
 “By whom?” I asked, but Maia only shook her head, eyes ahead, skin so
pale it was whiter than the suits we wore.
God, we were all a mess.
I thought she’d tell me once Elliot announced that the Dome would
open its gates. No mention of Isaac and Elaine or Pablo and Jessica—of
course not. The crowd exploded into a loud cheer, but Maia didn’t even
look at me. It was okay, though. I’d see what that piece of paper was when I
got inside. It was time, anyway. Elliot was already calling names while the
Iriades flew over our heads, extra close so that we clearly felt the wind
created by their small but strong wings.
I felt it in my hair—in the few strings that had escaped the knots Shade
had done on me. I wanted to run my fingers over it just to spite him, but I
didn’t have the heart yet. Just as soon as I got inside.
Closing my eyes for a minute, I prayed. I prayed with all my heart that
we all made it. I prayed with all my being that we walked out of that Dome
in one piece.
And then I could get out of here once and for all, start my life anew.
My name was called last. The crowd cheered, and I could have sworn I
heard Layla’s voice as she screamed her guts out. I looked their way, but I
could barely make them out as they held up that sign that said, Go Sera! I
appreciated their support more than they knew.
With one last look at the asshole who’d somehow managed to turn me
against my own self within weeks, I ignored the judges sitting comfortably
across from me and Elliot in his sparkly suit.
Then, holding my chin up and my shoulders back, I finally entered the
third trial.
The darkness didn’t give way for a single sliver of light and the panic
was already squeezing my throat, but I kept going. I kept walking, knowing
I’d see something eventually. Knowing the game had to start somewhere,
whatever they were going to have us do this time.
 Was it another dragon? Maybe another mythical creature we had to fight
our way through? Knowing my luck, they’d put a fucking phoenix in there
somewhere and challenge me to face its fire.
Or maybe snakes, more snakes to hold me to the ground while they
licked my ears for days—ugh.
I kept on walking.
This darkness was different from Shade’s. His Void had always been
safe. I’d breathed easy in it. I didn’t breathe easy now, but eventually, I
heard the voices. I heard the dripping of water, the footsteps, and saw the
shapes of the other candidates as they rushed forward.
“Hurry up! Grab all you can carry,” someone was saying, and the faster
I walked the clearer the view.
We were in a valley, the sky pitch-black, no moon or stars in sight. Just
emptiness.
Dry fields and leafless trees mixed in with others that looked sick, about
to fall apart, and two piles of metal near their roots—weapons. Knives and
maces and chains—there were weapons in two small piles right there on the
ground.
Which meant that we would definitely be fighting something for the
first part of the trial, and everybody was already putting everything they
could carry on their person.
A fight was exactly what I needed. To blow off some steam, to keep my
focus sharp because right now it was shit. So, I started for the trees, too, to
grab some of those knives, maybe even a sword if I could carry it.
I barely took three steps before I saw someone moving to my side.
Too late.
Something slammed against the back of my head so hard my head
popped. I hit the ground face first, my body completely paralyzed. Dirt in
my mouth, in my nostrils. Wet dirt. Warmth spread down the side of my
neck and I knew it was my blood, but I couldn’t move. My limbs no longer
responded. Screams filled my ears, coming from somewhere close by.
My mind shut down completely.

T absolute that I was sure I’d gone deaf for a while, not
even aware that I’d come to. But eventually, I began to hear the sound of
water dripping somewhere close by. Memories came back to me slowly,
lazily, and each new image made the hammer pounding in the back of my
head more violent.
The pain was incredible. It was a miracle I could even move. The way
my head hurt said I shouldn't have been able to, but I still reached out my
hand just to feel for the wound. It was there on the back of my head, all
right. My blood was cold, almost completely dry, and it didn’t look like I
was bleeding anymore.
Pushing myself off the ground, I managed to roll on my back to see the
dark over me—it definitely wasn’t a sky. Just pure, uninterrupted darkness,
and that was the first thing that terrified me.
A small light came from somewhere to my left—a single torch on the
ground still had some fire at the tip, though it looked like it would be out
soon. Trees around me, most completely naked, some with dark leaves on
them. All I could see in the distance were more of those tree trunks—black,
like the trees were sick. To the right, near the torches where the weapons
had been, there were only empty sheaths for knives and daggers and
swords, nothing more. The others had taken everything with, and the only
thing on the ground was something shiny that looked kind of like a flute. A
damn flute.
Whoever had hit me in the back of my head had really gone the distance
to make sure I had nothing left to use here.
 Angry tears streamed from my eyes and I laughed. I laughed my heart
out—wasn’t it amazing? I was a real special one. Not only did I have to
watch my back from Elyseans, but from my own kind, too. How absolutely
amazing.
The dripping sound was coming from the other side, from the very first
tree at the edge of this place, half hidden by the all-consuming darkness.
This one was a poplar, on the smaller side, with large leaves that looked
completely black—and those leaves were the ones dripping. They were
dripping all over the ground, and it drove me fucking nuts to have to hear it.
It felt like those drops were falling right on the back of my head. If they
didn’t stop soon, I was going to fucking explode.
Sitting up was torture, especially since my neck was killing me, too.
Whoever had attacked me had been male, no doubt. None of the girls
would’ve had the strength to hit me quite so hard. I just hoped Maia was
okay.
And I was absolutely screwed.
Getting up, I walked like a drunk all the way to the stupid black poplar
and started pulling those leaves off—perfect heart shapes that just wouldn’t
shut the hell up.
“Stop, stop, stop!” I hissed as I went, and I yanked as many off the
branches as I could. But I overestimated my strength because, seconds later,
a wave of dizziness hit me from everywhere at once, and I fell flat on my
back again.
God, my head. My skull was on fire, and to make matters worse, the
drip of one of those leaves was now falling by my ear.
Right by my fucking ear.
Closing my eyes, I gritted my teeth and forced myself to calm down. I
was strong, wasn’t I? I’d had a tough life, and what did Miss Aldentach
always say to that? What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger, child—never
mind that I didn’t want to be stronger. Never mind that I hadn’t chosen a
tough life or to be strong in the face of it. Never mind that I’d just wanted
an easy life for once, a boring life.
No, never mind any of it—this hadn’t killed me, so I still had a ways to
go until I actually died by whatever we were supposed to fight with those
weapons they’d left for us.
I just needed to calm down.
Easy to do once I trained my mind to focus on the sound of the water.
Drip, drip, drip—no time to think, plan, panic, or fear. Just that drip-drip-
drip.
The tree itself looked old, the bark rough, the leaves so beautiful now
that I didn’t hate them. Their veins lightened up to a deep maroon, while the
edges were completely black. I imagined that’s what my heart looked like
right now. Black and veiny and drip-drip-dripping away with the ache.
But my heart would most definitely not have a face engraved on the
back of it like that leaf.
Heart in my throat, I stood and gently pushed the leaf up to better see
the back of it, as if I hadn’t pulled out more than a dozen of them just a few
minutes ago. It was a face created by those same maroon veins, and it was a
face I knew by memory—I’d seen it many times before in her warnings. I
saw it even now in my mind, the way Miss Aldentach looked terrified every
time she spoke about Lethe, goddess of forgetfulness and oblivion. Her hair
was as long as time, and her eyes were without pupil or iris, two dark
abysses without beginning or end.
Even now, the memory of the sound of Miss Aldentach’s voice while
she walked us through what to do when we died and went to the
Underworld made me want to throw up:
You must not drink from the river of Lethe—she will take all your
memories, all of them! she would tell us. You must instead drink from the
Mnemosyne, the river of memories, my children. Never from the Lethe!
 We’d been seven years old and dreams of dying and grim reapers and
rivers that could make you forget your own name haunted my sleep for
years to come.
But that face—Lethe with the long hair and the abysses for eyes was
right there on the back of the leaf, barely visible in the dark. It was a black
poplar from the Underworld, this tree, and those always belonged to the
goddess Lethe in the stories. Apparently, in this trial, too. And these leaves
were dripping water from her river itself.
Pulling out the leaf, I held it below another and caught ten drops in the
heart of it. There was no telling what was waiting for me down this road,
and if it came to it, I could drink this. I could forget. I could send all of it to
hell—the Elyseans and the candidates and this whole damn city, and just be
done with it.
It would be easier. I’d already given up, hadn’t I?
So, with the leaf in my hand, I picked up the torch from the ground and
made my way into the dead woods without looking back.

I minutes or hours or days.

Eventually, I remembered the letter Maia had put in my pocket, and I
pulled it out to see what it was.
Two words scribbled in black ink: see yourself. That’s it. That’s all it
said, just see yourself.
Without even trying to figure out what that meant, I put the letter back
in my pocket and continued.
Eventually, the fire on the torch died out. Eventually, I could see light
somewhere ahead, coming from something that shimmered golden.
I was so tired, and my head hurt so much. I was barely walking, as if the
soil underneath my feet was sucking the energy out of me with each new
step I took. But I had a destination now, and I kept my eyes on the gold
shimmering in the distance, and I made my way to it one breath at a time.
Doors.
Two large doors shaped into a triangle were made out of gold, and they
were lit from within. That’s where the light was coming from—those doors.
They were in the middle of nowhere, just planted there on the soil so dark it
looked completely black. I looked at every inch of it, going closer and
closer, even touching the gold with the tips of my fingers. There would be
an engraving on it somewhere, I was sure of it. There would be the face of a
god to tell me how I could get these doors to open. All I had to do was find
it.
“Greetings, mortal.”
I jumped back, the leaf almost slipping from my hand. My heart was
almost out of my ribcage by the time the darkness lifted from my eyes and I
saw movement to the left of the doors. Someone was coming from behind
them.
A woman who was not quite a woman, and a lion that was not quite a
lion, and an eagle—but only on the wings.
I was paralyzed in place as she walked over to me on all fours—the
head of a woman, old and with a pointy nose and chin, with wide green
eyes and hair the color of hay all around her head like a lion’s mane. Her
body was that of a lion, too, covered in glossy, orange fur, a thick tail
swooshing to the sides and large paws on her legs, while her wings were
spread halfway, full of white and brown and ash-grey feathers.
A Sphinx. The third trial was a Sphinx.
“Do you speak, or shall I read your thoughts?” she said, sitting on her
hind legs right near the corner of the golden doors.
“I-I-I speak,” I stuttered, too shocked to think much yet, and she smiled.
My God, her face was so ordinary. The top of her head reached my chin,
but her wings extended another few feet higher as she stretched them to the
sides and then folded them on her back again.
“Good,” she said. “I am Sphinx, guardian of the Golden Doors of
Freedom. To get past them, you shall fight me or answer me a riddle.”
My mouth opened and closed a few times, my whole body shaking, the
pain in my head already intensified. I knew about Sphinxes from both Miss
Aldentach and what I’d read in the Palace. They were siblings with the
Cerberus—that should have definitely been my clue. If a three-headed dog
could be real, sleeping in a cage in the Palace, then a woman/lion/eagle
would be real in the Dome, too.
Sphinxes were not very wise, but they thought in riddles that were
notoriously difficult to solve, according to the stories. But they weren’t very
good fighters, and it’s always advised to choose to fight them first, so then
they would offer you the easiest riddle they knew in exchange for their life.
That’s how it worked—that’s how every story I read in the library went. It’s
why I assumed they’d never put Sphinxes in the trial—too easy.
I guessed the joke was on me because this was not easy in the least. Not
for me, not with my head wound, and the way the view kept swimming
before my eyes, and the way I barely moved my limbs.
Oh—and the fact that I had no weapons on me whatsoever.
I couldn’t fight this Sphinx with my bare hands when I could hardly
stand on my own. I couldn’t force her to give me the easiest riddle she knew
—I couldn’t do shit.
“Tick tock, mortal. Tick tock,” she said as I blinked the blur of tears
away from my eyes.
I had to try.
Even if I lost and she beat me, I could still choose the riddle next. I
could still try, and if I couldn’t solve it, then I’d be stuck here forever.
Those doors wouldn’t open. The Dome would claim me, just like Madam
Carmine said, and nobody would ever even find my body.
 But I had the leaf with the water from the Lethe, didn’t I? Even if that
happened, I could still forget. I could forget my whole life—Miss
Aldentach and Gary and Elliot—even Shade.
I could forget all of it, and that sounded so, so tempting right now.
Forgetting meant it wouldn’t hurt anymore. Forgetting meant I wouldn’t
have to carry this pain with me ever again.
Except…
Every thought in my head came to halt as I looked up at the Sphinx’s
green eyes. She was smiling, tail wrapped around her legs, chest puffed as
her wings fluttered slightly.
I had the Lethe drops right there in my hand still—and a brand-new idea
that took root in my mind.
“The riddle,” I said, my voice strong, smooth, light as a breeze. “And
give me the most difficult one you can think of because I have this.” And I
raised the leaf in my shaking palm, praying she didn’t notice. Praying she
thought nothing of it. Praying this worked, that all those books I read were
right about the Sphinx.
Her brows shot up. “And what might that be—a leaf?”
“Yes, a leaf,” I said, forcing a smile on my face. No idea if I succeeded.
“And in it is the Elixir of Olympus. Once I drink this, I will be wise. Wiser
than anyone.” She rose on all fours slowly. “As wise as a god.”
Reminding myself to breathe, I clamped my lips shut and I waited. I’d
never wished harder that I’d been a better liar as I waited an eternity for her
wide, curious eyes to study the leaf in my hand, the clear water inside it that
she could barely see.
“So, speak. Give me your riddle, Sphinx. I will drink this Elixir, and I
will solve it right away.” I raised my hand toward my mouth, thinking—
what if she wants me to drink it? What if she lets me?
Then I would. I’d drink it and I’d forget.
This would be the end of my story.
 But the Sphinx spread her wings wide and said, “Wait,” before she
smoothed them down again.
Wait. My eyes closed for a split second, terrified she’d notice my relief.
But her attention was on the leaf still. “You are merely mortal, are you
not? You could never be as wise as a god.”
Swallowing hard, I looked down at my hand again. “You really think
so?”
“Your body would wither and die. You could not possibly withstand
such power. Such knowledge,” she told me, licking her thin lips as she
came closer and closer.
“Oh,” I said, narrowing my brows. “But who could?”
Please, please, please… “Someone smarter than you.”
I didn’t hesitate. “Someone like you?”
The Sphinx beamed. “Something like that.”
“How about a trade then? I’ll give you the Elixir and you let me through
those doors, and we’ll call it even.” Now my voice shook. It shook so hard I
barely spoke.
“On one condition,” she said, moving that tail from one side to the other
like pointers on a clock—so damn distracting. I couldn't look away. “I drink
first, and when I become as wise as the gods, I shall let you go through
these doors.”
I pretended to think about it for a second. I closed my eyes and begged
my heart to calm down. And when I couldn’t take it any longer, I nodded.
“Deal.”
It all felt like a dream still. My head pounded and my body shook, and
the Sphinx’s wide eyes never left my face as she came closer, standing on
all fours, wings spread, mane wild around her head.
“Give me my Elixir, mortal,” she said, licking her lips again.
Holding the leaf in both my hands, I reached for her mouth, begging
anyone who’d listen that this water was what I thought it was, that I hadn’t
gotten the whole thing wrong. That I survived this.
The Sphinx opened her lips, and I poured the drops into her mouth
slowly, shaking like I was being electrocuted. And when there was no more
left, I stepped back, letting the leaf fall to the ground.
I didn’t breathe, didn’t blink, didn’t think at all as I watched her pupils
dilate for a little while, and then she licked her lips again. She looked down
at the ground and then at the Golden Doors to the side. She shook her body
like an animal out of water, and her wings spread out all the way again,
feathers ruffled.
“Hello,” she said, and I almost collapsed. “Who are you?”
Tears sprung from my eyes. “Hello,” I choked. “I’m Sera.”
Sitting on her hind legs, she raised her front paw, brought it to her lips
and began to lick it as she watched me.
I couldn’t stop crying.
“Sera,” she repeated, narrowing her brows, then lowered her paw a bit.
“And who am I?”
My God, it had worked. It had actually worked.
“You’re-you’re-you’re the Sphinx,” I said, stuttering so badly I barely
got the words out. “You’re the-the-the wisest creature in the universe.”
She stopped licking her paw again. “Am I?”
“Yes, you are,” I said, wiping my face with my hands that were still
numb. “You are. And you said you were going to let me through those
doors, too, as soon as I told you my name.”
Again, she looked at the doors. “Did I?”
“Yes, you did. So, I’m going to leave now because I don’t have much
time. But it was good to meet you, Sphinx. It was so good to meet you.” My
voice broke a million times.
She must have noticed because she shook her head as if she didn’t know
what to make of me.
 “I suppose it is,” she then said and turned to the woods, sniffing the air.
“I smell meat. I am wise. Therefore, I know I am hungry.”
I said nothing, only continued to get closer to the Golden Doors, hoping
my legs didn’t fail me now.
“I am wise. Therefore, I know that meat I shall find down this lonesome
path,” the Sphinx said as she kept going toward the deserted woods. “I am
wise. Therefore, I know I am wise—yes, yes, I most certainly am…”
Putting my hands on the doors, I pushed forward with all my strength,
not quite convinced that I was here, that the Sphinx was leaving, talking to
herself still, that these doors would even open for me.
But they did.
The doors opened, and they’d been so heavy that my legs gave up on
me and I fell on all fours as soon as I stepped through to the other side.
My head was pounding, and more blood, fresh blood must have been
coming out of the wound because I felt the wet warmth trailing down my
neck like a snake. But there was no time to check if I was okay or if the
Sphinx had remembered something and was coming back.
Because I looked forward, and once again, I wished I’d never set foot in
this place.
 35

“When Death speaks, even the gods fall silent.”

—Kingdom of the Dead, Volume II, 140

by Phylis Petra, House Opal

The smell of sulphur made me want to gag the second I breathed in. I
looked ahead, at the river coursing not twenty feet away onto ground so dry
it was completely cracked.
But in the distance, the darkness was disrupted by burning mountains.
I saw them, saw their shapes and the flames that outlined them, dancing
on them like they were in a celebration, casting hues of orange and red and
yellow all around. Fire burned on the ground, too, between the cracks here
and there, and some of it was liquid so the lava spilled out as it bubbled.
The loud sound of doors closing behind me made me scream and jump
back to find the Golden Doors of Freedom gone. They were gone, and in
their place was now more dry, cracked ground, and more mountains of fire,
and more lava bubbling on the surface every few feet.
 “No,” I breathed, shaking my head, because I’d seen drawings and
heard stories. So many goddamn stories, and this place looked exactly like
they said the Underworld would be—and I refused to fucking die.
So I did the only thing I could think of—I ran.
I ran back to where I came from, even though there were no more doors.
I’d find them. I’d find those golden doors no matter where they were
hiding, never mind that I was falling to my knees every few feet, and my
head was bleeding more, and I was about to run out of breath. I still didn’t
stop.
It wasn’t fair. The Sphinx said the Golden Doors of Freedom—not this!
There would be a way back. I knew it in my bones, but…
I fell to my knees for possibly the tenth time, and I couldn’t get up again
right away. I remained on the ground on all fours, blood dripping from my
neck, limbs shaking, and even the old wound on the side of my waist had
begun to sting. When I raised my head and saw the river—again—barely
twenty feet away, I almost passed out altogether. I’d run away to the other
side. I’d run toward where I came from. I should have been far away from
the river right now, far away from those mountains outlined with fire.
But I wasn’t—and something was moving to my side.
I froze, my head turning slowly as if I didn’t want to even see what was
floating near the river—the black robe of a creature whose face was hidden
in the shadows of its hood. It was a miracle that I wasn’t unconscious yet.
Maybe it was the fear shocking my system constantly, keeping me awake.
The creature was at least a few inches taller than me, the hood of its torn
robe drawn so that I could see nothing but darkness where its face should
have been. The robe moved, floated to the side as if it could feel wind when
there was none. The air was dead still.
Everything was dead silent, too.
Until the creature spoke.
“Greetings, mortal.”
 His voice sounded like screeching tires, except more robotic. I
scrambled to my feet and backed away slowly, even though it was definitely
not moving.
“What…what…who are you?” I choked. “Why am I here?” Where was
I—because I surely couldn’t be in the real Underworld, could I? Unless…
“Am I…am I dead?” Had the Sphinx killed me?
Better yet, what if whoever had hit me when we entered the trial killed
me, and the Sphinx was just in my imagination?
“You have tricked your way through the Golden Doors of Freedom,” the
robotic voice of the creature said, and I had no idea whether to be thrilled
that I hadn’t died yet or terrified that I was probably about to.
“I-I-I—”
“You have stolen the Sphinx’s memory by wielding the power of the
goddess Lethe,” he continued.
“I had no ch—” But again, he wouldn’t let me speak.
“You have tricked a godly creature,” he said. “Thus, her doors have led
you here.”
“Where?” I looked around, the fire and the darkness and that awful
smell—God, what had I done?
He pretended I hadn’t even said anything.
“To return to the land of the living, now you must willingly share your
most powerful memory with Mnemosyne.” The arm of his robe extended
toward the river coursing in silence behind him.
My breath caught in my throat.
“One memory taken, one memory shared.” Slowly, he floated back as
his robe kept moving with a wind only it could feel. “Drink, mortal. And let
the goddess decide if your memory is worthy. If it is, you shall be set free.”
“Wait,” I breathed because he was starting to disappear, to blend into the
darkness behind him the farther he went. I tried to go after him. “Hold on a
second, just wait! And what if she doesn’t?” I cried. “What if she doesn’t
find my memory worthy?!”
He didn’t answer. He didn’t wait. He just disappeared into the
background, and I hit the ground on my knees once more.
One memory taken, one memory shared.
“Breathe,” I whispered to myself. I needed to breathe and calm my
racing heart.
The Mnemosyne was the good river. “She said so, remember?” Miss
Aldentach said to always, always drink from the Mnemosyne, the river of
memory, when we died.
And maybe I hadn’t died—I refused to believe that yet—but it was okay
to drink from this river. It was okay if it got me out of here.
But…like all gods of the Underworld, Mnemosyne is crueler than most.
That’s what Shade had said to me in the Art Room. I remembered his words
—I remembered all of his words, always.
Except this was the Dome, was it not? Not the real Underworld, not the
real goddess of memory, just the trials. Games. And I needed to get out of
here to finish them.
God, I needed to leave fast, before all this fire burning around me grew
brighter and bigger and came to swallow me whole. So I crawled all the
way to the water and I sat on my legs in front of it, crying and shaking and a
bigger mess than I’d ever been in my life.
Too much. All of it was too much—the real world, the trials, the
Underworld. This was going to break me for real if I didn’t find a way out
soon. I would never learn how to be whole again.
So, I put my hands into the water—ice-cold and light, like it was made
out of air, not liquid. I let it wash away the dirt and blood from my skin
first, then took some in my palms, and brought it to my lips.
“The most powerful memory I have,” I whispered to the river.
“Please…”
 I drank.

T I felt the water sliding down my throat, everything changed.

T and bigger, and it was everywhere already. It

burned the blue car and the road and the trees on the side, too. The night
was dark, the moon hiding behind clouds, the stars far away as if they didn’t
want to witness any of what had just happened, either.
“He didn’t mean it,” one of the three men on the dark road said. “He
didn’t…he didn’t mean it.”
And he was standing between two men, one sitting at the edge of the
road, arms wrapped around his head, vomit on the asphalt near his feet. The
other was standing in the middle of the road with his hand in his hair,
looking like he might collapse from shock any second.
His face I knew.
His face I’d seen before.
It was the same man who’d killed my parents.
Realization dawned on me and my body turned ice-cold—no, not my
body. I didn’t have a body.
I didn’t have anything—I tried to look down at myself, but instead I was
just being pulled forward by some invisible force, and I had to see. I had no
choice but to watch every single detail of the scene around me from all
angles at the same time.
I saw everything.
A scream tore from my throat, but these men must have been too out of
it because they didn’t hear it.
 “He killed them,” the man in the middle of the road said. “He…he
killed them, Tobias.”
“He didn’t mean it!” shouted the other guy standing in between them
still.
“It was an accident,” said the one sitting down as he barely raised his
head. “An…an…an accident. I was just…I was just trying to play with fire
—I didn’t see them coming. I didn’t see…”
The memories in my mind were muddy at best, but somehow, right now,
I could see everything as if through someone else’s eyes. I could see it all,
hear it all, and I wished with all my heart that I couldn’t.
It hurt. It hurt so much I couldn’t breathe wherever I was.
But the memory didn’t stop playing like a movie in front of my eyes.
“Was it an accident that you’re drunk, Peter?” the man said. “Was it a
fucking accident that put those drugs in your fucking mouth?!” he shouted
at the top of his lungs, before Tobias stepped forward.
“Stop it, Alan. Stop—he’s just a boy.”
He was right. The guy who was sitting on the ground, crying, was just a
boy.
And I might have lost my mind and didn’t understand anything
anymore, but it seemed to me he had been the one to kill my parents
because he’d wanted to play with his fire.
“Who plays with fire near mortals?! By the gods—in the middle of a
street—are you insane?!” the guy, Alan, continued. “They’re dead, Tobias!
They’re dead. They are dead!”
“Keep your voice down,” Tobias hissed. “Nobody has to know, Alan.
Nobody has to know!”
“An accident,” Peter kept whispering, barely able to hold himself up.
“Accident, accident, accident…”
“By the gods, what have you done,” Alan choked, squatting on the
asphalt, shaking his head as he cried. “You will pay for this, boy. Mark my
words—you will pay for this.”
“Alan!” Tobias hissed as if he couldn’t even believe that Alan was
talking to Peter like that.
Peter, the murderer.
Peter, who was so drunk that he’d played with fire in the middle of the
street and hadn’t seen my father’s car coming while we’d been on our way
back from God knew where—nobody had ever told me. They only said that
it was dark and that the engine of the car somehow exploded.
I’d been lucky, they said, because a few Elyseans had happened to be
driving nearby, and they’d saved me. They’d pulled me out of the car, out of
the flames, and they’d saved my life, though unfortunately, they couldn’t
save my parents.
But I remembered differently, I always had. I remembered the fire
coming for us from the hands of a man. I remembered his silhouette only, as
he’d been standing near the road, fire dripping from his hands before it had
shot for us in the blink of an eye. I remembered my mother’s screams. I
remembered the impact, and than later on, I remembered that man’s face—
Alan.
Why did I remember his face when it had been Peter who’d unleashed
that fire on the car? Peter, whom I’d never seen before, who couldn’t be
older than a teenager. I’d never seen Tobias, either—only Alan.
Why?
I found out soon.
“They’re moving,” Alan said as he went closer to the burning car at the
side of the rode to inspect it. “They’re moving!” he shouted and went right
into the flames without hesitation.
“Alan!” Tobias called, but he didn’t dare go close. He just watched from
the middle of the road while whoever pulled my strings here brought me
closer to the car, closer to the dead bodies of my parents burning on the
front seats…
 To me in the back, too—and to Alan as he pulled the door open, the
clothes on his body steaming as Tobias called his name.
But it was wrong. All of it seemed so wrong because there was a little
girl in the back, and she was burning, too. Half her body was burning, but
somehow, she was awake.
Her eyes were open.
“Mommy,” she was saying. “Mommy, it hurts…”
“There now, little girl,” said Alan when he pulled the door off the
hinges and threw it to the ground.
“Mommy, please,” the girl said, and it was me. It was me, and I
remembered that moment, when I’d seen Alan’s face, how much I’d been
afraid, how hard I’d screamed for my mother.
I heard the voice now, too. I heard my voice again, and wherever I was,
a big part of me died and withered away.
Alan was trying to pull me out, but it seemed I was stuck. He called
Tobias for help, but Tobias still refused to go closer.
“Leave her, Alan! It’s too late—there is nothing we can do!” he kept
shouting.
And Alan said, “She’s just a little girl!”
A little girl who had already stopped breathing.
I didn’t feel tears even though I was crying because I had no body to cry
with. So, I saw it all so clearly it hurt. I saw my still chest, my burned
clothes, the skin on the right side of my face melted, my hair scorched…
I was dead.
The little girl was dead.
Something was very, very wrong…
“I’m sorry, little girl. I’m so, so sorry,” Alan was saying when he finally
pulled me out of the car and laid me onto the grass, his own clothes half
burned. I couldn’t see my parents’ faces—they were completely consumed
by the flames now.
 “By Zeus, Alan—what are you doing?!” Tobias said as Peter lay down
on the asphalt, and he was sleeping. He was fucking sleeping while my
parents burned fifteen feet away.
But Alan refused to let go of me. He put the fire on my body out with
his bare hands but never got burned. Tears slipped from his eyes as he
pushed the remaining hair away from my face, and I saw.
I saw myself as a five-year-old girl, half burned, one-hundred percent
dead.
“Don’t you dare…” said Tobias, standing behind Alan. “She’s gone.
Leave her be. She’s gone!”
“Just a little girl,” said Alan, pressing his hands onto my chest. “Look at
her—she’s Mim’s age, Tobias! Just a little girl. It wasn’t her time yet.”
“Alan, don’t!” shouted Tobias.
But Alan had already closed his eyes before he whispered, “Redire.”
The word seemed to hold the entire world in place for a heartbeat.
“Avoco te redire.”
Tobias screamed. The car where my parents were still burning exploded,
but Alan and the body of five-year-old me were never hit by the power of it.
Instead, they remained perfectly intact as if wrapped up in an impenetrable
bubble.
My eyes never blinked, so I saw what happened inside that bubble
clearly. I saw the skin on the body of five-year-old me coming back
together, saw her hair growing back just as long as it had been, and her
chest moving under Alan’s hands again.
Finally, her eyes opened once before they fluttered closed again. Her
lips were parted. She was breathing—I was breathing. I was alive.
And the fire from the explosion could still not reach me or the man
who’d brought me back from the dead.
 36

Zeus chose a different way to punish the mortals for deceiving him and for accepting
the sacred fire from Prometheus.
For them, he sent a beautiful, unwise woman to Earth—Pandora, made out of
marble, dressed in beautiful clothing, with a blinding smile that would make man fall
to their knees.
To her Zeus gave the curse of insatiable curiosity—and a jar, together with the
instruction to never open it in her life. But when she came to Earth to live with
mortals with her jar in her hands, she couldn’t withstand not knowing what was in it.
She could never truly be happy, and it wasn’t long before curiosity got the best of her,
and she finally pulled open the lid of the jar. From it sprang Greed, Vanity, Slander,
Envy, Disease, Violence, Old Age and Death to plague mankind for the rest of eternity.

—Book of Creation, Volume II, 2nd Edition, 213

by Warren Marvos, House Emerald

Water.
It trickled somewhere close by, my cheek wet, my mind chaotic. The
back of my head hurt so much it was a miracle that I was able to open my
eyes.
 The darkness was illuminated by the fire burning close but also far
away. The river I’d drunk from—Mnemosyne, goddess of memory—
coursed right there in front of me. I’d collapsed with half my body inside it,
the other half on the dry, cracked land.
I wanted to move, wanted to get up, find the creature with the robe and
ask him what happened next. Find the creature and ask him why why why
did it have to be that memory. Find the creature and ask him if the goddess
was satisfied with what I gave her, what she took from me, and if I could go
back to the land of the living now.
After all, it seemed, I’d already done it once.
But I couldn’t. An entire world was on my back, crushing me to the
ground. I was cold, so cold from the water, and it made the pain on the back
of my head throb even harder, twice as intense.
Something about seeing my parents in that car again. I remembered
some of it, though only what I’d seen from the backseat. I remembered how
I’d called for my mother, too, but I never actually saw either of them
burning—I was in the back before I passed out.
I’d never remembered the fire consuming me, either—I thought they’d
gotten me out before it had touched me. How silly of me, now that I thought
about it. Fire was always hungry, and it was fast. Of course, it had gotten to
me, too—I’d been right behind my parents.
And not only had it gotten to me, but the entire right side of my face had
been burned, and my clothes, and my hair…
I’d died, yet here I was. Breathing. Blinking. Feeling.
Eventually, though, I forced myself to move. The water of the river was
so cold, and I needed to know. I just needed to know if I was leaving here or
not, so that I could get it over with and accept it.
I didn’t realize that I’d already made my peace with death until I sat up
and turned around and saw the triangular Golden Doors of Freedom that
had reappeared right where they had brought me.
 The creature with the robe wasn’t there, though. I waited, searched for
him with my eyes, but he never came.
My tears dried eventually, too, though not my clothes.
These past three weeks had broken me and put me back together a
completely different person, but nothing came even close to this. Nothing
came close to what I had to pay to get through this trial.
And I wasn’t even done yet.
I dragged my feet to those doors, no longer intimidated by the fire
burning around me. I pushed them with all my strength, promising myself
that I would think it all through, figure it all out one way or the other, just as
soon as I was out of here. Just as soon as I was free.
Then, I stepped into the blinding white light.

I ’ of it at first—at that point nothing could surprise

me. I’d been engulfed in darkness in the first part of the trial, and the
second.
Now came the third because Elliot said it—this trial was on level hard.
And they hadn’t taken enough from me, so now I had one last challenge to
complete before I walked out. One last challenge in a place that could
render you blind.
I blinked and brought my hands in front of my eyes, trying to make out
anything other than white. My legs barely worked, and it was worse
because the ground was soft beneath me. So soft it dragged me down.
I saw blue next—just a soft blue spread out everywhere as I walked
without knowing where the hell I was going.
But, eventually, I was able to make out the shapes. Eventually, I saw the
sky, and I saw the clouds underneath my feet, too.
I stopped walking.
 Clouds—how strange. Actual clouds, and I was stepping on them, and
some of them fell over my ruined shoes, looking just like cotton candy.
I looked around again, sure that I was dreaming. I wasn’t.
Ahead, there were rocks, grey and yellow, sharp and smooth, protruding
from the clouds as if they were rising from the ground up to the sky. The
biggest of all rose over fifty feet. On it were three springs, and the water
sliding down the smooth rocks disappeared in the clouds around it.
In front of the rocks were the others.
Marie, Erica, Ethan, Donna, Nick, Albert…Maia.
They were all sitting on their legs, and they were staring at something—
at round pieces of rock shaped like bowls that had sprouted from the clouds
in front of them. They were so focused, none of them even heard me, but I
didn’t care.
“Maia!” I shouted, and my voice echoed so strangely in the open space.
Like it was made from something else, not sound. It spread out in waves,
growing weaker as it went, before disappearing completely.
Maia, who was sitting on the left, very close to the springs of water,
didn’t turn. Neither did anyone else. They just kept staring at whatever it
was in those rocks, and the closer I went, the more I realized that they were
smiling.
The more I realized that they were talking, whispering to those rocks.
Something nagged at my brain, something that refused to make sense
yet. Something that kept disappearing at the sight of those clouds and the
sound of that water, so I just kept going, determined to reach Maia, ask her
how she was, then figure out how to get down from…the sky? Was that
where we were?
But as I walked between the seven of them, my body slowed down on
its own. The pain was still there, but I was no longer cold. My clothes were
still wet, but they didn’t weigh me down. And my head was no longer
bleeding.
 Curious. I was so curious to see what the others were looking at and
why they couldn't be bothered to even turn when I called their names.
So, when I saw another of those rocks shaped like a bowl near Ethan, I
leaned in closer just to see what they were seeing.
I saw my reflection.

M , my body letting go of the pressure. I sat in

front of the rock that had been carved into a bowl, filled to the brim with
water so still and so pure, the surface of it was a mirror. A perfect mirror
that showed me a perfect face—my face.
The most beautiful thing the gods had ever created.
Leaning closer to the water, I smiled at my reflection—wow. “So
beautiful,” I told myself. “Absolutely perfect.”
Every line and every curve, even the color of my eyes was exactly right.
It was magnificent. It was divine—everything the gods themselves envied.
Nothing more beautiful had ever existed or would exist in the world like
me.
And I was going to sit here on the clouds for the rest of eternity to look
at my face, to be so full of life and love and beauty that even death itself
would crumble at my feet—and I would be truly immortal.
“I love you,” I told myself. I loved the shape of my brows, and the
shape of my nose, and the curve of my cheeks, and the sharp edges of my
jaw. Even my upper lip that didn’t have a Cupid’s bow at all—perfect. I had
no idea why I’d ever thought it looked weird because it didn’t. It was
absolutely breathtaking. I was going to stare at it forever, just as soon as I
apologized to myself for every single time I hadn’t appreciated my beauty,
for all the bad words I ever said about my brows or my hair or my eyes.
 I didn’t need much else—not food, water, or anything at all except for
my reflection. And the water of the spring that filled this rock was as eternal
as my face would be, so here was where I would stay.
Aphrodite herself would be jealous when she laid eyes on me. Even
Hera would fall to my feet in worship. Zeus would throw his lightning bolts
at the sky just to watch my eyes light up.
And I would never, ever need a single thing except my beauty.
 37

“There is no greater blessing than the blessing of beauty. It shall not be explained; it
is for the eyes, not the mouth. It is to be felt, not understood. It supersedes all other
traits.”

—God of Thunder, 9th Edition, 200

By William Gendar, House Ruby

My cheeks filled when I smiled—how nice and plump and perfect my skin,
a rosy undertone to it that brightened up the blue of my eyes that was bluer
than Uranus. He was jealous, too.
My lashes, so perfect and curved and long, the tips of them touching
right below my brows when my eyes were open—Zeus himself could use
them as fans to his very soul. A laugh escaped me at the thought of how the
gods would worship me. How the Muses would sing songs and write stories
about me. How the seas would drown lands just to catch a glimpse of my
face.
To see me as I saw myself. Exactly as clearly as I saw myself.
 And as I analyzed that and more, so much more for so long, something
whispered in the back of my mind—those words. Like there was a part of
me trying to reach me from far, far away. Like those words—see yourself—
were trying to whisper in my ear.
They did.
I heard them. I’d seen those words before, but I didn’t know where. I
didn’t care where because what did it matter? I was seeing myself—I was
exquisite. I was transcendent. I was me.
So, I continued to trace every shape of my features with my fingertips,
and I told myself how much I loved myself, and even when my eyelids
grew heavy sometimes, the sight of my face pulled me back from sleep,
from weakness, and I reminded myself how much I loved my beauty again.
For a long, long time.
It was perfect, as life should be—except those words kept trying to
reach me, crawling over my skin like living things, demanding I think about
them when I could think about me. I could keep staring at me.
See yourself.
I was seeing myself. I was right there, on the reflection of that water. I
was seeing the best version of me I’d ever seen, and I was in awe of it, and I
was disappointed that I’d never seen it before, not in any mirror. How unfair
was it that there was no mirror on Earth that had been able to accurately
portray my beauty…
Except that’s not how mirrors work, is it?
I remembered the one in my room in Gary’s house, for example. It had
been a good mirror. It had showed me when my hair was all over the place,
or when I’d put my shirt on inside out, or when I’d forgotten to pull up the
zipper of my jeans before heading to school.
It had showed me, a different me, an ordinary me, something far less
than I saw now.
 For a second, just a split second, I saw it. I saw her, the Sera I had been
my whole life, right there in my reflection, but it was gone too soon.
My eyes closed, and I forced air down my lungs and held it there just
for a little while. Everything changed in the darkness of my mind. The sky
and the clouds disappeared, and in my mind’s eye I saw me. The real me.
That was me, not this. My God, my stomach was about to growl right
out of me now that I was aware of my body, and my limbs were shaking,
and my head was bleeding again—-what the hell was I doing?!
Why was I staring at that stupid reflection? I needed to get out. I needed
to leave, now!
So, I opened my eyes again to do just that.
And I saw my reflection in the water.
I smiled. “I love you.”
My face was the only thing that truly mattered.

I a long time before my eyes drifted closed from exhaustion.

Again, in the darkness of my mind, my thoughts finally cleared a bit.
It was also a long time before I realized what was happening, which
story the last part of the trial was based on—the nymph Echo and the man
she fell in love with, so handsome that every human woman and every
nymph who’d ever met him lost their hearts to his beauty. In the story, he
saw his reflection on the surface of a river once, and he fell in love with
himself, too, right away. Young Echo, a nymph cursed by Hera, couldn’t
speak with her own words, only other people’s, so she waited until the man
told his reflection in the river, “I love you,” and she was finally able to say
it back.
Unfortunately, the man was too far gone, obsessed with his reflection
just like Echo was that he didn’t hear her, didn’t see her, didn’t think or do
anything else, didn’t eat and didn’t leave the river’s side at all because he
couldn’t look away from himself for a second.
In the story, that was how he died.
And that was how I was going to die, too, if I didn’t get the fuck away
from this place soon.
Eyes squeezed shut, I stood up, my body weaker than it had ever been
before. But I was safe in the darkness of my mind. That reflection couldn’t
reach me here, and I needed to get to the springs asap. There had to be a
door or something near that big rock, and I could use it to get out.
If only I could see where the hell I was going…
No choice but to take a peek from under my lashes—just a tiny peek.
The second I looked, my eyes fell on the water, the surface crystal clear,
and my face was on it.
I was gone again, kneeling in front of it, speaking to myself, admiring
my beauty for what felt like another eternity.

I . My eyes would fall closed from

exhaustion, and I would remember, and then I would need to look just to
see that I was going in the right direction, but I somehow always remained
in front of that rock bowl, no matter that I moved. I always looked down at
it the second I opened my eyes.
See yourself.
That’s what the piece of paper in my pocket said—I felt it even now that
my eyes closed again, and I barely breathed from weakness, from blood
loss, from trauma.
See yourself.
There was no way out of this trial with my eyes closed, and I needed to
see. So, I opened my eyes again, and I saw my face, so afraid I was shaking,
but I had no other option. The fear disappeared with the slow breeze
instantly.
So, so perfect. My face was unlike anything that had ever existed
before.
See yourself.
I saw my eyes and my brows and my nose and my cheeks and my lips—
over and over and over again. I admired them, and I smiled at them, and I
almost cried in joy that I’d been so lucky to have been born with them
before I was able to get through to the fog in my mind once more.
See yourself.
I did. I saw me, the girl I had always been in any mirror I’d ever come
across. I saw my own eyes but only in my memory—not the ones this water
was showing me. These eyes were different, bluer, sharper, like a drawing
rather than real. My real ones were rounder, and the colors in them paler,
my lashes blonder, my brows not as arched.
I remembered my own cheeks, too, my pores and my missing Cupid’s
bow and my slightly square chin—that was me. That was who I was, not
this reflection.
And now that I was thinking about every detail of my real face, I saw
more of it with every blink. I saw me from my own memories, everything I
was, every scar I’d gotten when I was a kid and very curious about
everything—I had two cuts on my forehead, right near my hairline. I saw
every imperfection, like the slight redness around my nostrils that never
seemed to go away.
Those were all me, and the more I thought of them, the clearer I saw.
Until there was nothing left of the Sera whom the gods would worship
in the reflection of that water anymore. I was all me, and when I raised my
head, I wasn’t compelled to look back into the reflection. I wasn’t
compelled to sit there for all my life, to stare at myself until I died.
I was free.
 My knees barely held me, but I made it up. I looked around me, at
Marie, Ethan, Donna, Erica, Maia, Albert, Nick—all of them were still
sitting near those bowls, staring at themselves, whispering as they smiled.
So, I tried to shake them, slap their cheeks, scream in their ears—
nothing worked. Nothing at all. None would close their eyes, and when I
tried to do it for them, they pushed me off like I weighed no more than a
feather.
There was nothing I could do to help any of them. They would have to
figure it out on their own.
On my way to the large rock with the springs, I passed by Maia again,
and she could barely stay seated. She must have been starving and
exhausted, too, her clothes torn and dirty and bloody. Who knew how long
any of us had been in here, anyway? I called her name, but she didn’t
respond, so I kept going, thinking maybe I’d find something else on the way
to help her.
Because she’d helped me. When she put that piece of paper in my
pocket—she’d helped me. It was those words that had given me the idea of
looking for my true self in that reflection.
The same pocket where the rock Eeda gave me was.
I stopped in my tracks as I reached for it, the flowing water from the
springs just five feet away now.
…A transmitter. It’s a magical object that enables us to communicate
with whomever we want through our minds.
Tears stung my eyes as I spun around and looked at Maia sitting there in
front of the water. Not really sure about what I was doing, I squeezed the
rock in my hand with all my remaining strength, and I thought, “Maia, see
yourself.”
My eyes closed as something popped inside my mind, like a champagne
bottle opening. Words kept coming my way in a different voice, softer, so
much more melodic…
 Maia.
So gorgeous. What eyes you have.
So beautiful, those lips would reduce mountains to rocks.
So brilliant, those eyes would start wars…
Her thoughts were a copy of my own when I was trapped in my
reflection. And they were coming straight from Maia’s mind.
“Maia, listen to me,” I thought as loudly as I could. “You have to see
yourself. Remember how your eyes really look and see them. Remember
how your skin really looks and think about it, see it. You have your
memories—see yourself the way you really are. See the real you!”
I said those same words to her over and over again until I felt myself
falling.
No more clouds under my feet. My hand hurt, too. It had turned numb
from how tightly I’d been holding the rock in my fist. My eyes opened and
no more light reached me. The clouds, the sky, the other candidates were
gone. Only the deep dark remained, the kind that wasn’t safe. And I just
wanted to be away from here, from all of this, in the Void with Shade.
Tears streamed from my eyes as I forced myself to keep moving. If
there was more to this trial, I wasn’t going to make it. I wasn’t going to
survive. All I could do right now was keep walking until my legs gave up.
So, I did.
Eventually, I saw the light.
It exploded all around me, covering me in warmth. Cheers and
applauding in my ears. Warmer air slid down my throat, filling me like I
hadn’t breathed properly for an eternity. Black dots exploded in my vision
constantly, and it took more than a few blinks to finally see the blue sky, the
sun, to see Elliot and the judges, to see the audience screaming…to see
Shade.
He was standing, eyes wide and lips parted, and I thought he looked
terrified, but what the hell did I know, right? I didn’t know him. I was just a
naive little girl who fell for the distraction he was supposed to be, nothing
more.
But I’d made it. I’d survived. Somehow, I was back in the real world, if
this was even real.
My body let go and the screams faded away. No more light in my eyes,
either, but I wasn’t worried. It was okay. As long as I survived, it would
have all been worth it.
 38

When Pandora closed her jar, terrified at what she had done, she didn’t realize that
one more thing was in it that Zeus had purposely put at the bottom: hope—and hope
never made it out.
That is why man, Prometheus’s dearest creation, became wicked, liars and thieves,
cold-blooded murderers that made the gods turn in disgust.
Zeus, with a heavy heart, decided to drown all of them in a great flood, to cleanse
the world of the evil they had become.
For all of them were indeed evil—except for one: the son of kind Prometheus
himself, who, with the advice of his father, would give mankind a second chance.

—Book of Creation, Volume II, 2nd Edition, 301

by Warren Marvos, House Emerald

Marcus put bandages on the back of my head. Apparently, the cut was deep,
but my skull hadn’t cracked. I just needed to keep my neck still until the
wound healed and I’d be just fine. Physically speaking. And I didn’t need to
ask to know that he wouldn’t be using his magic to heal me this time. Shade
wouldn’t bribe him to break the rules for me again.
God, I wanted to go lie down in my room more than anything in the
world, but they wouldn’t let me because I wasn’t done yet. It had been two
hours since I came out of the Dome, and some of the others had made it out
as well—including Maia. They were all in front of the judges, waiting for
me to begin with the selection.
The goddamn selection for the Academy that couldn’t possibly wait one
fucking day. It was mandatory that I be there, too; hence, why they hadn’t
even started yet.
“Look at me,” Marcus said, then checked my eyes—he constantly did
that. “It would be great if you stopped crying now. Do you need water?
Some more food?”
I wiped my cheeks instantly—shit, I hadn’t even noticed that I was
crying. I wasn’t doing it on purpose, but my mind was a chaotic mess and
I’d lost control of my body, too.
“I’m full,” I said because he’d already given me a banana and water,
and my stomach really was full.
It was my soul that was empty. So empty it terrified me to close my
eyes.
“Chin up, Sera. You finished first. You’ll be just fine,” Marcus said,
thinking I was like this because of what was coming. Because of the stupid
selection—I wasn’t. This had nothing to do with the judges or the Academy
—or even the damn trials.
A lump formed in my throat, and I knew that if I spoke now, if I
thanked him for basically being one of the very few people who hadn’t
hated me on the spot, I would burst out in tears again. So, I only nodded and
swallowed and smiled.
He took me back to the judges himself, holding me by the arm to
support my weight because he knew how weak I was still. I’d apparently
been in the Dome for twenty-one hours. It was the next morning here, and I
still hadn’t had the chance to sleep at all. No time for that, though I wished I
could sleep for an eternity just to avoid having to face the biggest challenge
of my life. Again, not the trials—screw the trials—but that memory. What
the goddess Mnemosyne showed me from my past.
Alan and Peter and Tobias.
My God, what had that man done to me?
Was he the reason why I could see the damn godstones and the faces of
the gods in every challenge? Was he the reason why I was such a freak that
had never belonged anywhere? What the hell had he done to me?!
“Ladies and gentlemen,” said Elliot when they put me in line with the
others—Marie, Nick, Donna, Maia, Ethan, and Erica. The others weren’t
there yet, not even Albert, who’d been in that place on the clouds. They
were probably okay, though. They would survive, they’d just get here a bit
later. At that point I refused to believe anything else.
“Such a long day for all of us, especially our candidates,” Elliot was
saying, but I barely heard him as I searched the crowd, searched for Shade
but didn’t find him. The audience was considerably smaller, too—our
friends and families were apparently gone. No sign with my name on it
anywhere that I could see, but that was okay. I’d rather James and Layla
didn’t see me like this, anyway. I was a complete mess.
“…and we have Miss Sinclair, too, who tricked the Sphinx—naughty
Miss Sinclair,” Elliot was saying, and I only heard him because he spoke
my name. He was looking at me, too, shaking his index finger at me as if he
was trying to be playful.
I almost threw up.
“So many ways one could have completed the last trial. And on the first
part, there were options, were there not?” Elliot said, but he was speaking to
the audience more than me. “Our dearest Sedorah could have picked
branches to use as weapons, could have dug up sturdy roots from the
ground, could have turned to music to appeal to the gods, could have used
animals, too—but she turned to the Lethe instead.” And this asshole turned
to me. “Tell me, my friend—how did you know? How does one determine a
tree as ordinary as a poplar is indeed from the Underworld?”
I held his eyes and swallowed hard, the memory of the goddess Lethe’s
head on the back of the leaves right in front of my mind’s eye.
“Oh, right,” Elliot said, as if he’d just remembered. “Sedorah doesn’t
like to talk much, does she? Unless she’s talking to herself inside the
Dome…”
The audience laughed and clapped their hands furiously as if that was
the best thing they’d ever heard. If I had energy, I’d flip them off with both
hands.
“Regardless—for the first part of your trial, you were faced with the
Sphinx. Easy to fight—some of others got the Chimera, so…” The crowd
clapped again, excited.
The Chimera—just like the Sphinx and the Cerberus, was a child of
Typhon. Had they brought every monster they could think of in that Dome
for the last trial? I looked at Madam Carmine sitting with the judges, her
cold eyes on me. What more had they put in there—the Hydra, too? Were
they out of their goddamn minds?!
If she saw the questions in my eyes, Madam Carmine didn’t answer.
“You could have chosen to fight her. You could have chosen to try to
solve her riddle, but instead you chose to erase her memory. The wasn’t
very fair, was it?”
Again, Elliot waited a heartbeat. I said nothing.
His brows shot up. “No excuse? No explanation?”
Was he out of his damned mind, too? I didn’t want to fucking die or be
stuck in the Dome—how was that for an explanation? Did he really need me
to spell it out for him?
Gritting my teeth, I kept my mouth shut, and the asshole smiled like
he’d won.
 “We’re curious about the second part of your trial, though,” he said,
making my heart skip a beat. I turned to the screen behind us, to the letters
of the slogan slightly moving on it. How much had these people seen on
there?
“Where did the Golden Doors of Freedom take you? We lost you there
for about, erm…” He turned to look at Angel, who chirped into the
microphone instantly:
“One minute, three seconds.”
One minute, three seconds. Impossible.
“That’s right—and then you entered the Narcissus trial,” Elliot said.
Narcissus—that was the name of the man Echo the nymph had fallen in
love with.
My stomach turned. Maybe I shouldn’t have eaten that banana.
How was it possible that they’d lost me for one minute, three seconds? I
was glad—so, so relieved—that they hadn’t seen into the Underworld,
hadn’t witnessed my conversation with the creature with the robe, but that
hadn’t been one minute. That had been a fucking lifetime.
“We’re waaaiting, Miss Sinclair,” Elliot sang as the crowd whispered,
all of their eyes on me. Even Madam Carmine looked at me like she wanted
to be inside my head just to see what I was hiding.
Swallowing hard, I kept my chin up and turned my eyes to the sky, to
the Iriades flying so far over us I could barely make them out. How had
they known? How had the one who’d chosen me known about what had
happened to me—were those birds really made by the gods? How the hell
could they have possibly known something I didn’t remember myself?
It didn’t matter, anyway. None of these people were going to get an
excuse or explanation from me. I just thanked my lucky stars that they
hadn’t been to the Underworld with me and hadn’t seen my memory.
“Like I said, not much of a talker, our Miss Sinclair, ha-ha-ha,” Elliot
said and finally turned away from me. He didn’t mention that I’d gotten
through what he called the Narcissus trial first, though. It must have not
seemed that important to them.
He went on to talk about the others, and Maia, who was standing behind
Marie, kept throwing glances at me, smiling just a bit to say thank you. But
no thanks necessary, and I couldn’t wait to find out who’d given her that
piece of paper, just as soon as this was over.
The black dots returned and the view in front of me tilted so often, I had
to keep my eyes closed for minutes at a time. It went on for so much longer
than it should have, while Elliot and Angel analyzed what had happened in
the trials, until finally, it was time for the selection.
“I know you’ve all waited for this, possibly your whole lives,” Elliot
said. “The moment when the judges, the heads of the biggest Elysean
Houses in the world, offer you an invitation to the Academy of Divine Light
and Beauty, and a godstone that will be your power source should you
complete your studies successfully. Mind you, you will not see the godstone
you are given, but you must carry it with you at all times anyway, my
dearest mortal friends,” said Elliot, batting his lashes at us lovingly.
The audience cheered, and the other candidates were all smiling widely.
The others from two trials ago hadn’t in the video Angel had showed us.
There’d only been five of them then. There was seven of us now.
Where the hell were the others? And why wasn’t Elliot waiting for
them?
“Without further ado, Madam Verdelle from House Emerald—if you
will, please,” he said instead.
The words were on the tip of my tongue—what about the others? Why
aren’t they out of the Dome yet?
I looked at the darkness between the Dome’s open doors to our side and
every hair on my body stood at attention. I didn’t dare utter a single word
for fear of what Elliot’s answer would be. I just continued to pray with all
my heart that they made it, that they were all alive and well.
 Madam Verdelle stood up slowly, a broad brimmed hat in a gorgeous
olive green on her head, her hands full of rings topped with emeralds of all
sizes. Madam Carmine stood up, too, to make way for her to come closer.
As she did, she searched her pocket that was hiding in the folds of her dress
and took out a small box made of gold with a shiny glass lid. Inside it was
an emerald about five inches long sitting in velvet.
The woman didn’t even look at Elliot, only continued to walk until she
was in front of Ethan. She pursed her lips into a tight smile, then showed
him the box. The way the emerald inside it caught the sunlight was
mesmerizing.
Ethan stopped breathing completely.
“I believe you have potential, my boy. House Emerald would like to
take you under its wing for this round,” she said, her voice much more
pleasant than I imagined, almost a whisper. “Will you accept?”
“Yes,” Ethan choked even before she finished the question.
Goose bumps covered my arms. The audience exploded into cheers.
“Good boy,” Madam Verdelle said and put the golden box in his hands.
He was shaking as tears streamed from his eyes. I had no idea how he was
holding all of that it without making a sound.
But the woman wasn’t done yet.
Instead, she took a step to the side, to Erica who was barely holding her
shoulders back—and she burst out into tears instantly.
“You’ve shown promise, too, young girl. Maybe, if you can be
persuaded to work harder, you will be worthy of our House’s name.” She
produced another one of those boxes, identical to Ethan’s, from the pocket
of her dress. “What do you say, Erica? Will you accept?”
The yes she gave was barely a whisper, and her hands were shaking so
badly while she took the box from Madam Verdelle’s hands. A miracle it
didn’t fall to the ground.
 “Good choice. Good choice,” the woman said, pleased if the way she
smiled when she made her way back was any indicator. By then, both Ethan
and Erica were on their knees, clutching the boxes tightly to their chest,
sobbing.
One House down.
The hymn of the gods burst out from the speakers. Three men with
cameras in their hands circled the two like fucking vultures. Angel had two
bouquets of flowers in her arms as she approached them, helped them both
back to their feet, then put green silk ribbons around their necks. She kissed
them on the cheeks, one then the other, while Erica still cried, trying to
smooth her long brown hair behind her ears. Every person in the audience
was standing, clapping, cheering.
No sign of Shade still.
“Such an emotional moment. Get it all out, my dear mortal friends. No
judgment here—we understand,” Elliot said when the hymn was over and
the camera guys moved away from Ethan and Erica. He even pretended to
wipe a tear from the corner of his eye. God, he was so full of shit he made
me sick.
“I already can’t wait for the next one—how about you?” The audience
clapped again. Elliot grinned widely, pleased with the response. “In that
case, without wasting another second, we now ask Mister Harkin of House
Ruby—would you, kind sir, care to extend your House’s invitation to any of
the mortals with us today?”
I could feel all of them holding their breath, looking right at Harkin as
he thought about it for a second. His suit was just as white as last time, with
a blood red handkerchief folded in the breast pocket of his jacket, the color
identical to the ruby on his black satin tie.
A moment later, he stood up. The crowd began to whisper instantly as
the man made his way from the table and to us. Ethan and Erica were
beaming though the Dome had spit them out just as dirty and as bloody as it
had the rest of us.
Harkin took his time to stare at the faces of each of us, and finally, with
a sigh, he lowered his head while he pulled a golden box from his pocket
with a gorgeous ruby inside, like he was already regretting his next move.
“Nicholas Reed—do you accept?” he said, simply, fast, like he couldn’t
wait to get the words out already.
Nick didn’t cry. He didn’t shake and didn’t sob, didn’t even fall to his
knees. He only said, “Yes, sir.”
Harkin stepped in front of him and offered him the ruby as if it were
nothing more than a piece of paper. And Nick took it the same way.
“See you there, son.”
“Thank you, sir,” Nick said with a deep nod, putting the gold box in the
pocket of his ruined leather pants instantly.
The crowd cheered and the cameras were at it again. Angel with her
flowers and a red ribbon and her fake tears, too. Through it all, Nick only
kept his head up and his eyes forward. No tears, no smile, no nothing.
Eventually, the applauding died down, the cameramen settled, and Elliot
continued.
“How about you, Madam Cyan?”
My eyes closed again. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that none of
these judges was going to offer me a damn godstone or acceptance to their
Academy. Of course, they wouldn’t—I’d made no secret as to how I felt
about them. I’d never even acknowledged them, let alone bowed to them
the way the other candidates did before the start of every trial.
So, how was I going to find out what was done to me? How was I going
to find Alan and Peter and Tobias, and how was I going to make them tell
me what the hell they’d done that night, if I had to leave Idaea right away?
How was I going to find out how to undo it?
 Because while Marcus was patching me up, I had realized something—
that memory meant everything to me. More than anything, it meant that I
would never really be free, not until I knew the truth. The whole damn
truth, which I was never going to find out there in the mortal world. The
truth that was somewhere inside these walls guarded by statues of cyclopses
that could come to life at the will of these people.
So how was I going to find my way back in here again?
Madam Cyan walked slowly—she was even older than I remembered,
dressed impeccably in a beautiful blue dress, the color of it reminding me of
the sky, of that place I’d been to in the clouds. Of the color of the water on
which I’d seen my reflection. I don’t know what magic they’d put on me
there, but I never wanted to feel like that again. Fuck, the way I’d lost my
mind at the sight of my own face terrified me even now.
It was all I could do to focus on Madam Cyan again. The tiara on her
head was full of gemstones, all of them blue. All of them perfect. I wasn’t
surprised in the least when she stopped in front of Marie and offered her
that same golden box with the glass lid. A five-inch sapphire burned blue
inside it.
Marie was on her knees when she said, I accept. She was crying before
the woman made it back to her seat—House Sapphire would only pick one
candidate, too. Angel put the blue silk ribbon around her neck gently as she
sobbed. Elliot continued to wipe his nonexistent tears for a few minutes,
too.
All of it was a bit of a blur to me.
I’d failed.
I’d survived the trials, but I was going to leave this city of gods more a
prisoner than I had been when I was dragged here against my will.
I’d failed.
The crowd was still applauding when the black dots in my vision
cleared with the tears that slipped out. I had no energy to control myself
now. No more energy left to force them back. Nobody noticed, though.
Elliot and Angel were gathered close to Ethan, Erica, Nick and Marie, who
wasn’t sobbing as violently anymore. I risked a glance to the side to find
Maia with her arms around herself, crying, too. My heart broke for her. It
really did.
My heart broke for a lot of things, but even though I looked out at the
audience again, Shade was nowhere to be found.
Instead, the sight of Mister Ravenar from House Opal, who was on his
feet, shocked me for a moment.
“I feel terribly left out.”
A wide grin was on his face as he looked at Elliot, who froze mid-
sentence as he was asking Marie to tell him exactly what she was feeling.
“Oh,” Elliot breathed into the microphone.
“Do I not get a chance to offer my invitation to a candidate today?” said
Ravenar, arms spread to the sides as he looked at the other judges.
They were just as shocked as the rest of us, it seemed.
“Of course, you do, sir,” said Elliot in a rush, so red in the face his
cheeks might fall off soon. “You just never seemed to…” He stepped to the
side, his fake smile finally faltering—he looked terrified. “Please, if you
will, Mister Ravenar. I’m terribly sorry for my impatience to congratulate
the winning candidates,” he said in a breath.
“I’m sure it was just the excitement,” said Ravenar as he came around
the table, taking off the black jacket of his suit.
And when he passed by Elliot, he put it on his arm.
I had never seen Elliot more terrified and furious at the same time, even
if it only lasted a second. I almost smiled. I guess I’d have been offended,
too, if someone took me for a coat hanger. He didn’t dare utter a single
word, though, only looked at Madam Carmine for guidance, but Carmine
was completely focused on Ravenar.
 “What do we have here,” Ravenar sang, stopping in front of us, looking
us over same as Harkin had done as he reached for something in his pocket
—-that same golden box with a rectangular black opal inside.
It would be Maia. I don’t know why, but I thought it would be Maia,
and my heart leaped with joy. If she got into the Academy, I could figure
out a way to stay in touch with her. I could ask her to find those names for
me while she was there. Just the names, especially Alan’s full name. I
already knew he was House Ruby—a healer, an Elysean that some people
believed could even bring back the dead in the past.
Apparently, they could still do it to this day. Or at least they could
thirteen years ago.
I’d almost asked Marcus about Alan in the infirmary, except I didn’t
trust Marcus so I hadn’t dared. But I trusted Maia. And all I’d need was a
name.
But then something happened that knocked the breath right out of my
lungs. Ravenar took one step, then another…and he stopped right in front of
me.
Everybody fell silent instantly.
“Sedorah Sinclair,” he said, throwing the box in the air and catching it
again. The opal that I wasn’t supposed to see inside it didn’t move at all,
like it was glued to the velvet. His dark eyes were different from Shade’s, I
realized—his were just color, no smoke or angry storms in them. But the
rest of him was very similar. Definitely related—could he be Shade’s
father?
“Do you know how many god names one could spell with yours?” the
man said. I swallowed hard but didn't make a sound, thankful that my tears
had stopped, at least. The shock probably had something to do with it, even
though half of me was still convinced that he was just messing with me.
He raised two fingers in front of my face. “Hera and Rhea.” And
another two… “Ares and Eros.” His brows shot up, as if he really was
expecting an answer from me. What did he want me to say—that I’d heard
all about how lucky I was that I could make so many god names with mine?
Yeah, Miss Aldentach raised me, buddy. She had already analyzed
everything about me that had to do with gods.
“Any other god that comes to mind?” he asked with that knowing grin
because he knew I knew, and he hadn’t mentioned that name on purpose:
Hades. My name spelled Hades as well.
I said nothing.
Ravenar’s grin spread as he turned back to Elliot who was waiting by
his side, jacket over his arm, still as red as a tomato.
“I like her already,” he said with a wild, throaty laugh. “And I especially
like how you handled the Sphinx. Very cunning, indeed.”
It made me feel filthy to have his approval, but I still said nothing, only
held his eyes.
His smile grew wider as if that was exactly what he’d expected from
me.
“So how ‘bout it then, Sedorah?” He showed me the box in his hand and
I almost passed out. Even the audience was perfectly silent still, which
never happened. “Do you accept House Opal’s invitation to attend the
Academy of Blah-Blah-Blah or not?”
No, was the word at the tip of my tongue, fighting for power over yes.
I thought I was torn before—many times over in my life, but nothing
came even close to this moment. My heart and mind and soul were divided
into two—one part begging me to leave, run, never look back, the other
desperate for the truth. Desperate to be free for real.
The Academy was in the city.
The Academy was full of Elyseans.
If I didn’t find that man, if I didn’t figure out what really happened to
me that night my parents died, I could run to the edges of the world and
never really escape these people. They would always be there no matter
what I did.
I looked at the opal inside that box, reflecting the sunlight in every color
imaginable. So fucking beautiful, it made my stomach twist and turn.
Exactly the same as the opal in Shade’s back.
Then I looked at the man holding it, the wicked grin on his face, and the
gleaming in his eyes…
But I felt him nearby, too, and it only took a second to find him—Shade,
standing right behind the empty chair of Ravenar now, looking at me like he
was begging me.
He was begging me to say no.
I immediately turned to Ravenar again. My hand shook so much it was
a blur when I raised it to grab the golden box from him. I would regret this
decision a million times before this day was over, but in the end, it wouldn’t
matter because it was already done.
So, taking in a deep breath, I raised my chin and straightened my
shoulders. Screw you all, I thought to myself.
“I accept.”

—THE END

Thank you for reading The Elysean Trials!

I hope you enjoyed Sera’s story.
If you did, will you take a moment to leave a review on Amazon? Reviews
are an incredible help to authors, and just a few words should do it. I’d
appreciate it very much!

In the meantime, you can flip the page for a chapter in Shade’s POV, that
will be the first chapter in book 2 (coming soon!)
To be notified about future releases, you can sign up
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Sincerely,
Dori Hoxa
 39

SHADE
3 weeks ago

The dark sometimes sought light, if only to absorb it, if only to prove that it
could consume it. Especially if that light was inside my mind. The magic
slipped from my hand and into the ground, owning it inch by inch. How
much longer until it burst out of me again?
How much longer until it consumed me and every thought inside my
head, every ounce of will and every attempt at controlling it I made?
There was no telling when the Void would want a taste of the world, of
all the light it could absorb, all the things it could unmake. Destroy wasn’t
the right word—this darkness that slipped from my skin, fueled by the Ichor
in my blood, unmade anything it touched. And maybe I was a little bit
crazy, and a little bit pessimistic, but I’d long been convinced that the last
thing it would unmake in this world was me.
Running away had never been easier. I was in the Daedalus Palace, far
away from the Academy, far away from any duty that tied me to that place.
I could walk out of here without anyone seeing me, and they wouldn’t even
know until it was too late.
That was exactly what I was going to do before the night was over.
So consumed by my own thoughts I was that night that I didn’t hear
movement until it came from far too close to me for my liking.
Then I looked up.
She looked like a spectral in the dark, long blonde hair, big blue eyes,
full of fear and full of defiance at the same time. I stopped breathing,
tempted to think a goddess had descended from the skies to make an even
bigger mess out of my mind.
But a goddess wouldn’t look so perfectly terrified, like a fly about to be
caught in a web, knowing very well that it was never going to be set free
again.
A goddess wouldn’t catch light in the dark of the night the way she did
—like a snowflake falling in the middle of summer, demanding the
attention of an entire world.
Demanding my attention, all of it, and my curiosity. As I stood up,
unable to sit still for once, I wondered, “Where did you fall from?”
What world did she come from, and where was she going?
She shook her head, those eyes a deep azure I had never come across
before, wide and begging. Begging me for…what? To save her?
“Sinclair, stop right this second!”
I recognized the coordinator’s voice and it all became crystal clear, and
more confusing yet: a mortal.
She was a mortal.
No Ichor ran in her veins, yet she looked like that?
I raised a brow—had the gods decided to taunt me, was that it? Was this
some kind of a divine intervention to keep me in place when all I wanted to
do was run?
 She took a step back and kept her chin up despite how badly her hands
were shaking.
Then, she turned around and made a run for it.
The coordinator would have Carmine, or even Embers handle her, I
thought. I knew. And Carmine and Embers wouldn’t hesitate to hurt her, if
only to teach her a lesson. Because she was running.
How strange—a mortal running from Elyseans. Definitely one of the
weirdest things I’d come across, but there I was.
I raised up my hand and unleashed my magic, calling to the Void. She
screamed and it pierced right through me, but how could I tell her that she
didn’t have to be afraid? The Void wouldn’t hurt her, not while I was still in
control of it. It would keep her safe, safer than anything else could—
because if she was going to be caught in anyone’s web, it would be mine.
Darkness swallowed her whole, making her disappear from this world
completely just as the coordinator and her guards saw me from a few feet
away.
“Angel, was it?” I asked when she stopped dead in her tracks,
swallowing hard.
Then she nodded, sweat glistening on her forehead. “Good. Your mortal
needs to rest. Please point me to her room. I will deliver her there safely.”
At that, she looked around us, getting more anxious by the second.
“You…you-you took her to the Void?” she asked in a shaky whisper
when she couldn’t see the mortal anywhere.
“I did.” And I could see her perfectly fine, too. I always saw the Void,
and when I started for the Palace again, I was in full control of it.
Tonight was not the night I ran from this place, it seemed. And right
now I didn’t have much of a problem with that, either.
“But she’s mortal,” Angel said, backing away as I neared her and her
guards. “Her mind—”
 “If she loses her memories, I’m sure Carmine will know what to do,” I
said as I passed her by—but she wouldn’t.
Most of the time, I knew. The Void was such a deep nothingness that it
took everything away from a person’s mind when they were exposed to it,
but I always knew who would survive with their memories intact, and who
wouldn’t. That girl could, my instincts said.
But even if she couldn’t, she might appreciate it. Because the terrified
look on her face, the shaking of her body, the fact that she’d been running
from the coordinator, said loudly and clearly that she needed a break—
maybe just as much as I did.
When they showed me to her room, I slipped into the Void and put her
on the bed, but my shadows wouldn’t let go still. The coordinator waited for
me by the door so there was no time to sit here and look at her, try to figure
out what the hell it was about her, why she was glowing.
My gods, she glowed in my Void—how was I going to look away? So
peaceful while she slept. I could sit here and watch her breathing all night
long.
“Where did you fall from, Snowflake?” I whispered, and suddenly I had
this incredible urge to wake her just so I could hear her voice when she
answered.
But the sound of footsteps echoing in the hallway outside the door left
me no choice but to pull my magic back inside of me. The Void let go and
the girl lay on the bed safely, surrounded by silk. It suited her.
Carmine was already by the door. “By Zeus’s beard, Adryan. What do
you think you’re doing?!”
I turned to her and brought a finger to my lips. “Ssshh, Headmistress.
Your lamb is asleep.”
She would incinerate me alive if she had Apollo’s fire. “Outside, now.”
She turned around and walked out the room, more furious with each
step—I could always tell by how hard she slammed those heels against the
marble. With one last look at the mortal girl, I followed her, feeling…
strange.
Not entirely in a bad way.
And I was already looking forward to what the next couple weeks
would bring.

C ’ came easier to her than most. I had yet to meet another

who worked as hard as she did to get better at it at her age. Most Elyseans
gave up trying to improve their magic skills after they completed their
studies and picked what they wanted to do for the rest of their lives. Not
Carmine—she had that look in her eyes whenever she saw my shadows
slipping out of me—of longing, like she wished she could take my place. If
she only knew what it was like to be tied to the Void, she wouldn’t have
such absurd wishes.
Magic came easy to me, yes, but I came easy to magic, too.
“You are not to interfere with mortals, Adryan,” Carmine said when we
stopped in the middle of the hallway, and her magic was done locking
around us so that nobody could hear a word we said.
I feigned innocence. “What did you want me to do—let her run away?”
“I wanted you to mind your own damn business,” she said, her voice
strained, her eyes wide with panic just like every other time she spoke to
me. She sometimes wished I was an animal, too, just so she could have a
grip on my mind and control me. Posses is the word I liked to use for her
kind. They possessed animal bodies—but Carmine here could do more than
that. She could also shift sometimes, though I heard it drained her.
“I would if you didn’t deem it necessary to bring me here…for what?” I
whispered. “Really, you have to have a reason—why?”
“You know very well why. This is your punishment—the lightest I
could give you. One would think you’d be thankful after what you did,” she
told me, making me laugh.
“Thankful? You want me to be thankful to you for controlling my life?!”
She must have lost her mind already.
“You have a duty to your people,” she said, raising her chin.
“And I’ve done my duty exactly how I was taught—including last
month.”
“You almost got your team killed!” she shouted. She lost it with me
faster than with most. Sometimes it made me proud when I cared about
trivial things.
“I didn’t,” I spit, darkness rising in me, eager to find me with a bit less
control. “I’ve been doing this for three years now, Carmine. I had no choice
—don’t you think I would have chosen an easier way if I could have?” I
roared. Nothing got to me the way her accusations did, especially about
something she had no clue of. She wasn’t out there in the battlefield, hadn’t
been in a long time.
“Would you?” she had the audacity to ask. “Nobody self-sabotages as
well as you do, Adryan. So I don’t know if you could have chosen an easier
way, but I know that you could have followed protocol and protected the
mortals in your team before taking unnecessary risks!”
The words almost burst out of me together with the Void. Shadows were
already snaking around my feet where they met the marble floor, but I
pulled them back because I realized that it didn’t matter. We’d been here
before for this very thing, Carmine and I. And no matter how many times I
tried to explain it to her, she wouldn’t listen. She wouldn't understand.
So I smiled, letting go of a long breath. “Relax, Carmine. You already
have more lambs to sacrifice, don’t you? Fourteen of them in this very
Palace. How many are you going to doom this year, I wonder? Four? Five?”
It was like I’d spit on her face—and so much more satisfactory than
trying to argue with her about things she didn’t get.
 “You know very well we need mortals, boy,” she hissed with an
animal’s growl that would have anyone lowering their heads in fear.
“Of course you need them. You always need to sacrifice to the gods,” I
said, so perfectly amused just now—the good mood fell on me out of
nowhere.
Just like Snowflake had.
“You were under orders not to go in,” she reminded me, trying to take
the conversation back.
“And I disobeyed,” I said, because I was done explaining myself.
Slowly, she took a step closer—I thought it infuriated her that she didn’t
scare me. “You’re not untouchable, Adryan. Just because you’re invaluable
against them doesn’t mean you can’t be stopped.”
She herself didn’t believe that statement, but I let her have it.
“Then by all means, stop me,” I told her. “Don’t let me near these poor
mortals that have fallen in your trap—stop me.”
“Those poor mortals save lives!” she spit.
I paused, not wanting to let her ruin this newfound good mood, but I
couldn’t help it. Not about this. “They make no difference whatsoever.”
“Godlight has saved your life countless times. It has saved mine, too,”
she said, her voice calmer already, which I hated. Maybe she’d figured out
how to get under my skin, too—we screamed at each other often.
“Except it’s not enough,” I reminded her. “None of it is ever enough.
They never stop, Carmine. And they never will.”
She knew that was true, too, so she leaned back with a sigh, already
exhausted.
“We do the best we can. Believe me, I don’t want these mortals here
anymore than you do, but we need them, despite what you think,” she told
me. “And this punishment is meant to give you time away from your team
so that it will be easier to imagine what it will be like if you risk their lives
like that again.”
 “Lives? What lives?” The good mood was already gone, and I wasn’t
going to get it back tonight. “Don’t kid yourself, Carmine. We’re all living
on borrowed time here.”
I turned around to walk away, but a second later, I stopped again.
“I’m leaving—that hasn’t changed. As soon as my mandatory service is
completed, I’m quitting.”
“Adryan,” she warned. “You can’t do that. You’re invaluable to—”
“Has it ever occurred to you that I. Don’t. Care?!”
I said the words slowly, separately, then gave it as second of silence
before I continued to walk away.
It was all I could do to keep the shadows inside—they reacted to my
emotions like nothing else. I did care. I did fucking care, and that was why
I’d stayed in that nightmare for three whole years, while most moved on at
two. But I was done. No more additional years. I was done living that life. I
was ready to start anew. Nobody was going to stand in my way.
My uncle wouldn’t like it, though. He’d had the Houses’ favor since I’d
graduated the Academy and started my service, and he wanted to keep me
there.
For a moment, as I walked out into the courtyard again for fresh air, I
wondered, what exactly would he try to do to stop me?

—THE END

For more books by D.N. Hoxa, turn the page!

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