Solstice (37 page)

I
check the clock on my FON; it’s Sunday afternoon. While it felt like an eternity in the Underworld, it’s only been about twelve hours of real time. And aside from me, the Botanical Haven is empty; my mom isn’t home.

My parents are gods. I am a god.

I look at the plants in the Botanical Haven around me and realize, from the changes in weather we’ve been having, half are on the verge of dying. A raw humidity presses in from all sides; the glass is so wet with condensation, I can’t see out. At the sink in the back, I fill a glass of water for myself, drinking the whole thing and refilling it before turning to the plants. They need moisture, so I throw open some windows. When I open the window, I notice dark clouds hanging in the west over the Hill Country. But they aren’t moving. They stay still like a threat that could descend on Austin in a second.

The heat pumps in through the windows, and I’m moved by the powers inside me. Around me, life returns to everything. Leaves grow, and flowers bloom. I change them with a mere thought in my mind. Pinks become blues. Yellows become reds. Life blossoms and flourishes, limbs grow to the ceiling, and roots dig out of pots and reach for the floor. The Botanical Haven is a thing alive and under my control. It flexes and bends to my will. I grow vines around the railings and hang flowers from the rafters. Fruit blossoms and then bursts into being on orange and cherry and avocado trees. Vines produce tomatoes and kumquats and black grapes. It’s a power I’ve always had though I’ve never known how to harness it like this.

A knock on the door shakes me from my zone. My mind immediately flies to Reese, coming to visit again. Knowing my mom isn’t home somehow. He knows I’m Persephone. He’s been waiting for me to find out. He’s been courting me forever, since even before I knew Shayne. And of all the gods who’d pursued me before Shayne, Ares never gave up. Once I made my decision, Hermes and Hephaestus and Apollo acquiesced and recognized me as Queen of the Underworld. But Ares remained unwavering. Biding his time. Always nearby.

I glance around a tall tree and look through the glass. But I don’t see Reese. I see Chloe. I rush to the door, unlock it, and throw it open. Chloe’s standing there with her arms wrapped around herself, shivering even though sweat beads down her face and arms. The humidity’s so thick, the air around her seems hazy.

“Chloe!”

She doesn’t move. I grab her and try to pull her in, and she finally lets me. I take her upstairs, drape a blanket across her bare arms even though it’s well over a hundred, and start some coffee brewing. It’s only when she’s sitting there at the table that she finally seems to realize where she is.

“Piper.”

“Hi.” I fill a cup of steaming coffee and slide it over to her. “You’re shaking.”

Chloe nods. “My body can’t seem to keep up with the temperature changes.”

My mind can’t seem to keep up with anything. “It’s like autumn is coming,” I say.

I try to think of something to keep the conversation going. Having Chloe here with me soothes something deep inside me. Like everything else about my life is off but Chloe is still the same. She’s just been freaked out recently; that’s all. She’s getting better. “If autumn is coming, that’ll blow a lot of scientists’ global warming theories right out of the water.”

“My mom says people used to play in snow,” Chloe says. “They skated and made angels.”

I think of the frozen River Cocytus, of doing just that. “It sounds like fun, Chloe. Maybe if we went far enough north—”

Chloe smoothes the top of her bandana. “You think there’s still snow anywhere?”

I want to tell her about kissing Shayne on the snowy banks of the river. I want to tell her about blowing icy breath. And trees with icicles. And a glacier beyond the ocean. I want to tell Chloe everything. “I’m sure there is. I think there are winter wonderlands just waiting for us.”

She pats my hands. “That sounds so nice, Piper. Like paradise.”

“Yeah,” I say. “Just like paradise.” I’m trying to find a way to start. To explain the oddities which have become my life.

But Chloe doesn’t give me the chance. Instead, she looks at her arm. “My tattoo keeps changing.”

I’m looking at it, too. Pure black. Ebony. And it spells out a Greek word I read clearly as
Fate
.

“It’s probably just the light,” I say.

Chloe’s holding her coffee cup with both hands, but she hasn’t taken a sip. I pick up mine and put my lips to it, hoping she’ll take my lead and do the same. But she sits there unmoving, her eyes still fixed on my arm.

“Did you know Hannah Reed is pregnant?”

So Chloe’s heard about the classroom incident, also. I’m sure it’s all over the school by now. “Yeah, I was there when she told everyone.”

“Do you think she’ll keep the baby?”

I try to grasp what Chloe is saying. “Yeah, I think she’ll keep it. She misses Randy a lot.”

Chloe nods and finally takes her eyes off my arm and looks at me directly in the face. “Randy misses her, too. I asked him about the baby.” She sets the coffee mug down in front of her.

I hold my breath. Chloe’s been talking to Randy Conner again from the dead. But Randy is in Asphodel; he shouldn’t have any memories of who he is.

“He wants me to tell Hannah to keep the baby.” And then Chloe’s hand flies out like lightning and grabs mine. “But what if she doesn’t listen?”

I don’t look down, but her grip is icy. “You can’t control other people, Chloe. You can’t make her keep it.”

Her clutch loosens. “Do you think the baby would go to Hell? Do you think Hannah would go to Hell?”

I pry my wrist out of her hand, and she hardly seems to notice. I don’t want to think about Hannah or her baby. I want to stop this conversation now and get back to Chloe. To me. To us. “Hannah will keep the baby.”

Please, Hannah, keep the baby. Because I don’t want Shayne to have to judge something so small and innocent. The way I used to help him judge all souls which came to the Underworld so long ago. He’s had to judge alone for the last eighteen years. He’s had no one to share the burden with.

This seems to be good enough for Chloe. “Randy asked me to do something for him.”

I hold my breath. “Something like what?”

Chloe picks up her coffee. Finally. She takes a long sip, the steam pouring out around her lips. “He asked me to kill his father.”

I’m right to hold my breath. I’m afraid to move. I wish I could snap my fingers and make this whole encounter go away. Make Chloe normal again. I think I should have let her die on the creek side.

“So I did.”

“No, Chloe, you didn’t.”

“Yeah, I did.” She says it as calmly as if she’s telling me about a lecture she fell asleep in. Like she couldn’t care less.

“No.” I breathe it out. Chloe can’t be a murderer. I know what happens to murderers in Hell. Not that Randy’s father wouldn’t deserve death. If he did make it to the Underworld, I’d place him in the chamber with Aeacus and Tantalus and Pirithous. I’d strip the skin from his body and then set him to burn for eternity. I’d feed his eyes to Tantalus and cut his hands off so he could never hit anyone again. And I’d visit him every week to make sure things hadn’t become too bearable for him.

“Yes,” Chloe says.

I shake my head. “Please tell me you’re lying, Chloe. Please. Just tell me you’re lying.” Persephone passes judgment on murderers. I know what will happen. I have designed those punishments myself.

Chloe laughs. “Don’t worry. No one will ever know.”

I’ll know. And that’s worse than anyone else.

“You didn’t do it.”

But Chloe nods, and whether she did or didn’t, she believes she did which is almost as bad. “Randy asked me to. He told me how to do it. It’s why I’m still here, Piper.”

“What do you mean, why you’re still here?” Her words are like crazy words spinning around in my head. How can everything have changed so much in such a short time?

Chloe shrugs. “It’s why I didn’t die. I needed to do this. It’s why Thanatos didn’t take me.”

She says the name Thanatos, assuming I know who she’s talking about. I do. He’s the winged man who collects souls and brings them to the banks of the River Acheron. But I pretend I don’t know. “Who?”

“Death. I saw him there. That day by the creek. But he left me, and I knew there was a reason. And killing Randy’s father was the reason. Don’t you see that, Piper? God, it makes such sense now.”

She saw Death, but she acted like she didn’t? Or did she only remember him afterward?

“I think you need some sleep, Chloe.”

Chloe sets down her coffee cup, now halfway empty and still steaming. “Yeah. You’re right.” She stands up and heads for the stairs, leaving me there at the table. “But I just thought you’d want to know.”

I watch her leave. I do want to know. And I don’t want to know. And I know whatever else I do in life, I cannot let Chloe end up with an eternity in Tartarus because of my selfishness. No matter what.

T
he more I think about Chloe, the more certain I am she didn’t do it. She did not kill Randy Conner’s father. He may be an abusive monster, and he may deserve to die a slow, painful death and suffer an eternity in Tartarus, but Chloe did not kill him.

It turns out I am wrong—partly. When I get to school Monday morning, the word is out. Randy’s father is dead. One of the terrorist groups made good on its threat. They planted a bomb under the steel struts of a downtown dome and then blew it up. Hundreds of people had died in the explosion and in the fires that came afterward, and Randy’s father had been one of them. And now they’re threatening to blow up more if the city doesn’t dismantle all the disperser missiles.

It was a terrorist casualty. Chloe could not have been responsible. She didn’t do it.

The humidity from the day before has doubled, and smoke from the fires mixes with it. It feels like we’re living in a giant brick oven. It feels like every bit of rain that poured down during the hurricane has lifted into the air and hangs there smothering the city of Austin. Normally, I’d text my mom to see what the city council plans to do in response to the terrorist threat, but today is not a normal day, and my life is far from normal.

I head to first period, trying to do the things I’m expected to do, but how can I when everything has changed? I’m not even the person I thought I was. My life to this point has been some kind of fabrication.

The tube is already on when I get to class. That kid from our school is being interviewed, the sophomore who claimed he could predict when the next heat bubble was coming. He’s sitting by a table with a giant piece of equipment on it that looks like some kind of satellite dish connected to a coffee maker. I have to wonder where he got the materials to make it.

The camera zooms out, and I recognize the city council chambers. It’s a full room except for my mom and, of course, Councilman Rendon. Wherever my mom is, she’s even missing the council meeting.

“So what you’re saying is that you were approached by one of these terrorist organizations?” the acting councilman asks the kid. My mom had mentioned Councilman Morse taking over in the interim until elections were complete, but this seems way early for her to be having news conferences. Is she power hungry just like Rendon was?

The kid, whose name—Toby Garcia—flashes below him on the screen, nods. “That’s right. They came to my house Friday night when everyone was sleeping. They grabbed me from my bed and started asking me all sorts of questions.”

“What kind of questions?” Morse asks.

Toby pats the equipment beside him. “Well, they wanted to know all about the HB Predictor.”

The words
Heat Bubble Predictor
flash on the screen.

Morse nods to encourage him to continue.

“So I told them about it. Told them how it can predict the bubbles.”

“But it didn’t work this week, did it?” Morse asks, and the way she annunciates it, it’s like she’s almost happy the HB predictor is flawed.

“Something else happened,” Toby says. “Something happened to change the weather. Because a bubble was coming; I guarantee it.”