Helen ran toward his voice, the sound of her shoes pounding against the ground, ringing out in all directions through the petrified forest of columns. She reached the head of the hall and
skidded to a stop in front of a giant, white marble throne on top of a raised dais. It was carved to look like hundreds of skeletons, contorted in agony to support the man who had claimed it. She stopped.
Lucas sat on the throne of death, black shadows seeping out of him like oozing tar. Helen looked for his heart and saw only darkness.
“Oh, Lucas,” she said, her voice high and breathy with disbelief. “What did you do?”
“The only useful thing left for me to do.”
“You’re usually right,” she said, clenching her fists in frustration. “But this time you are so wrong.”
“Hector’s the one everyone needs in their lives. Not me.”
“I need you.”
“You have Orion.”
“I don’t have Orion. We’re just friends.”
“Helen.” He sighed tiredly like he didn’t want to hear it.
“I know that the lord of the dead has to be able to judge hearts. So judge mine,” she said, striding forward and mounting the steps that led to his throne. “Look at me, Lucas. Am I lying?”
He studied her as she came closer, and doubt began to creep into his eyes.
“I’m not with Orion,” Helen continued, climbing the steps slowly toward his throne. “I never really have been, and I’m certain now that I never will be, and you know why? Because it’s impossible for me to love anyone like I love you—and I really tried with Orion.”
“I’m sure you did,” Lucas said, trying to sound forbidding, but there was the hint of a laugh in his voice.
“It didn’t work. It’s like I have a built-in heckler in my head. I can’t even make out with another guy without hearing this stupid voice, telling me I’m an idiot and I’m screwing everything up.” Helen climbed a few more steps, and all the joking left her tone. “You’re the only one I’ll ever love. The only one I’m capable of loving completely. You’re it for me.”
He looked away and swallowed. “So we love each other. So what? That doesn’t change the fact that we can’t be together.”
His voice sounded convincing but, even as he spoke, the doubtful look on his face began to deepen, like he didn’t really believe what he was saying anymore. Like he didn’t fully understand why they couldn’t be together.
Helen trudged up the last few steps, the weight of what she was about to tell him suddenly pressing down on her, slowing her pace.
She knew what it felt like to have her heart broken. Lucas had done that to her once. This wasn’t simple and straightforward like that—like a single stab that was so painful you wished it just frigging killed you. What she felt now had so many barbs attached to it that no matter which way she turned the situation around in her head, she found a new way to get wounded by it.
She crossed the dais to where Lucas sat in his throne and climbed into his lap. He stiffened with surprise as she sank against him, but was so overwhelmed by her sadness that he instinctively held her close. She couldn’t make herself say it out loud, so she put her arms around his neck, placed her lips close to his ear, and whispered the whole truth to him.
Helen could feel his skin heat up with emotion as she told him about Daphne’s desperate plan to raise Ajax from the dead. Helen wasn’t exactly sure what she said. She just let the whole ugly mess tumble out of her mouth and into his ear. A few times she felt him cringe and the breath rush out of him in disbelief as a new revelation sank in. Finally, when she started talking about her behavior toward Orion on the beach and said the word “Shield,” Lucas pulled back and held a finger to her lips.
“Don’t tell me any more,” he whispered. He understood that when she left Orion’s presence, any hope of salvaging her plan to defeat the gods was endangered. “Don’t even think it here. You need to get back to Orion immediately.”
“I’m not going anywhere without you.”
“You have to go back, Helen,” he said firmly, but instead of pushing her away, he only held her tighter. “I have to stay here. I made a vow.” He choked on the word, realizing the enormity of his mistake.
“But Lucas, the gods are using your absence to say you’re dead and you didn’t really win the duel. This isn’t just about you and me. You have to come and show yourself to the gods, or they’ll send Tantalus’s army against us.”
“My little brother will send his army against you regardless of what you do, niece. If Lucas returns to the battlefield and proves he’s alive, Zeus will just find another reason to attack,” said Hades’ sad voice. Helen eased off of Lucas’s lap and the two of them stood side by side, holding hands, while Hades approached from the stairs.
“Did you know?” Helen asked Hades. “About Daphne? Did you know what she was doing?”
“I see a lot, but I don’t see everything,” Hades said, shaking his head. “No being is omniscient. Even the Fates have Nemesis to block them.”
“I need him,” she whispered, squeezing Lucas’s hand.