Dreamless (Starcrossed Book 2)
Dreamless: Chapter 13

Lucas had hovered over the water and watched Helen soar away from him as she headed back toward the center of town. That dress and those damn wings had almost done him in. He wondered, not for the first time, how all the full mortals that Helen had grown up with didn’t suspect that there was something supernatural about her. No matter how down-to-earth she was on the inside, Helen’s beauty really was inhuman. Especially when she had held her arms out to him and said his name like she just had.

He’d almost lost it. And the thought of what he would have done if he had lost it turned his stomach, if only because he wanted it so badly. They were inches away from crossing a dangerous line, and unless she stopped tempting him in her maddeningly innocent way, Lucas knew it would happen eventually.

Lucas had lied to Helen. The truth was there were nights, more than just one, where he had ducked under that blue tarp covering her broken window and watched her sleep. He always felt bad after he did it, but he couldn’t seem to stop. No matter how hard he tried to stay away from her, he would eventually end up in her room and hate himself for it later. Lucas knew that one of these days he was going to be too weak to walk away, and he was going to crawl into bed with her and to do more than just hold her. That’s why he had to make sure that if that day ever came, Helen would kick him right out again.

Lucas had tried everything else, even scaring her away, but nothing worked. Orion was their last chance. He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment and hoped that Orion would just do what he was good at. Lucas had asked Orion to make Helen stop loving him. Then she would never try to touch him again, never look at him again like she just had. Lucas tried to convince himself it was better if she moved on, even if that meant that she moved on to another guy. But here he stopped.

Helen couldn’t be with Orion, either—at least not forever. That was the only thing that was keeping Lucas from losing his mind. They could never have a life together. But that didn’t mean they couldn’t . . .

He abruptly shut off his thoughts before they could overpower him. Already the dark tendrils were swirling out of him, inking up the sky. He tried to calm down and not picture Orion and Helen together, because he could picture it—all too easily.

Even though Lucas had never laid eyes on Orion in person, he still had a pretty good idea what he looked like. He was a descendant of Adonis—Aphrodite’s all-time favorite lover. Because Aphrodite favored this one guy above all others, the House of Rome handed down close approximations of the Adonis archetype on a regular basis, much the same way the House of Thebes repeated the Hector archetype again and again. Half the paintings and sculptures that came out of the Renaissance looked like him, because the old masters like Caravaggio, Michelangelo, and Raphael had painted and sculpted Orion’s ancestors obsessively. Florence was literally littered with images of the sons of the House of Rome.

But it was more than just good looks that made a legend, especially in the genetically gifted Scion gene pool. There was a reason why both Casanova and Romeo, arguably the two most famous lovers in history, came out of Italy. Calling Orion a “handsome bastard,” while accurate, didn’t even begin to cover the effect he could have on a woman. The children of Aphrodite were irresistible sexually and most of them could sway people’s emotions to a certain extent, but Orion had told Lucas that his gift was much more powerful than that.

Orion had a rare ability. He could make Helen fall out of love with Lucas with a light touch. If that wasn’t bad enough, after Helen’s feelings for Lucas were severed, Orion could control Helen’s heart so that he could have the kind of casual relationship that wouldn’t violate the Truce—no commitment, no strings, just sex. That asshole could do whatever he wanted with Helen, and there was nothing Lucas could say against it.

The thought made Lucas want to beat the crap out of something, but instead he reminded himself that his family was probably worried about him and forced himself to head home.

Fortunately, Orion seemed squeamish about using his talent for any reason—even self-defense. He’d been deeply offended when Lucas had suggested that he had touched Helen’s heart in the cave for a cheap thrill. And after seeing the two of them in the Underworld together, Lucas knew that Orion would never force Helen into anything. In fact, Lucas was sure he’d protect her with his life. That made him hate Orion less, which only made things harder. Lucas wanted to hate Orion, but since he couldn’t, there was no one left to hate but himself.

Heading down the eastern coast, Lucas stayed out over the water so he didn’t have to fly too high and freeze his ass off. He’d left his jacket in his locker, but it didn’t really matter. He could think himself warm whenever he needed to. In fact, Lucas was beginning to believe he could think himself hot—really hot—almost as if he were on fire. But he didn’t have time to deal with that odd new talent right now. It only took him a second before he was landing in his backyard.

The guilt hit him as soon as he touched down, and he started looking around for his little sister. He shouldn’t have left her alone at school for Helen. Now that the Fates plagued her nearly every day, Cassandra was even more fragile than a fully mortal child. It took all of her strength to just survive each possession, and the fact that she did survive when so many past Oracles had died made Lucas suspect she was probably stronger than he was. But as strong as she was, after a possession she barely had enough strength left to breathe.

The other day he had found Cassandra sitting halfway up the stairs, slumped over and panting. After half a dozen steps, she’d been so worn out that she’d had to rest a minute and catch her breath. Lucas had carried her to her room, but it had been a struggle for him to go near her. She still had the aura of the Fates clinging to her, and although Lucas loved his little sister dearly, the Fates sent a chill down his spine.

Even Cassandra was scared of them, and she had to suffer their presence inside of her several times a week now. Lucas couldn’t know exactly what that kind of physical and mental intrusion felt like, but from the way she looked afterward, he assumed it had to be like rape.

The fact that this was happening to his baby sister, and that there was nothing he could do to stop it, made him very angry.

Striding across the back lawn toward the house, Lucas struggled to control his rage, reminding himself that he needed to be more careful. So many things made him angry these days. Since that disastrous dinner when he’d struck his father, he had developed a “side effect” that was tied to his anger.

He discovered it in full at Helen’s track meet when he saw her surrounded by the Hundred, but it didn’t start there. It had started with his father, just a small seed at first. But it was growing.

Part of him wondered if it would be easier if he talked to Jason or Cassandra about it, but he couldn’t bring himself to do that just yet. It would only worry his family more if they knew. Hell, it worried him.

Lucas had almost told Helen in the hallway earlier that day, but he couldn’t spit the words out for the life of him. Helen had been so afraid of Creon, and Lucas didn’t know if he could bear it if Helen started looking at him like that. He still hadn’t decided if he should talk about it with anyone, even though the reality was that eventually his all-knowing, all-seeing little sister would replace out.

“Cassandra?” Lucas called out as he entered the kitchen. “Jase?”

“We’re in here,” Jason called from the library.

Jason’s voice didn’t sound right. He was tense, but Lucas assumed it was because he was still angry with Claire for disappearing with Helen all day and making them worry. The way Jason was handling the situation with Claire really frustrated Lucas. He wanted his cousin to wake up and realize that he’d been given a gift. He’d fallen for someone he could actually have.

The heavy double doors to the library were tilted open, and even before Lucas entered the room he could feel the tension and hear the barely controlled anger in everyone’s polite voices.

“Where were you?” Cassandra asked with narrowed eyes. She’d been grilling him about his whereabouts a lot lately, even though half the time she already knew the answer.

“What’s going on?” Lucas asked instead of answering her.

“Matt finally decided to share something with us,” Jason said tightly. He was so furious his cheekbones were flushed. Lucas had seen that particular shade of red before, and he knew firsthand how hard it was to get Jason that angry. He looked at Matt and raised his eyebrows questioningly.

“I’ve been in touch with Zach. He called me the night before last, and warned me that something was going to happen today, but he didn’t know what, exactly,” Matt replied heavily.

“Why didn’t you say anything, Matt?” Ariadne asked in a hurt voice. “Even if Zach didn’t know the specifics, why didn’t you warn us?”

There’s another problem just waiting to happen, Lucas thought. But there was no way around it. Scions tended to fall in love young because they tended to die young. At least Lucas couldn’t replace any fault in Ariadne’s taste. Matt had proven his loyalty to the House of Thebes many times over. Which was what made this current situation so puzzling. Matt usually made better choices and showed more sense than this.

“You wouldn’t understand,” Matt replied sullenly.

“Try us,” Lucas said, his internal temperature rising. He hated it when full mortals acted as if they were so different from Scions, as if they didn’t have all the same feelings.

“If I told you what he told me, what would you have done to him? Questioned him? Beat him up?” Matt exploded. “The guy’s a compulsive liar. Most of what he says is bullshit, and that’s what I thought his warning was. He has no idea what he’s gotten himself into!”

“And that’s supposed to make it all okay?” Jason said.

The argument continued, getting more and more hurtful with every exchange. Lucas hadn’t been on Nantucket for very long, but he still had every single class with Matt at school. He spent more time with the guy than he did with his own father, and he couldn’t remember ever seeing him get angry before. Like Jason, Matt was levelheaded, but right now both of these usually calm individuals were so angry they could barely see straight. Everyone was riled up.

This much discord isn’t natural, Lucas thought. Discord. The riots, the uncontrollable anger—even angelic, goody-two-shoes Helen had wanted to do something bad. It all added up.

“Eris,” he said out loud. He felt like kicking himself. “Listen, everyone. If Ares tried to instigate some kind of conflict with Helen in the Underworld, then it only makes sense that his sister would try to do the same in the real world. The Truce doesn’t include her—she isn’t one of the Twelve. She can use her powers here on Earth.”

“Oh, gods! Of course!” Cassandra passed a hand across her face and smiled up at him. “How did I miss that?”

“Well, I had more to go on than you. I actually saw her,” he explained. “In the hallway with Helen while we were hiding. Eris and Ares look very similar, like they’re twins or something, except Ares is covered in blue dye. That’s what threw me.”

“How can you know what Ares looks like?” Claire asked, her eyes drilling into Lucas. “The Greeks loathed him so much that they barely wrote any myths about him at all—let alone one that describes his appearance in an authoritative way.”

Figures Claire would be the one to spot that, Lucas thought. He sighed and came clean.

“I’ve seen Ares. I found a way down to the Underworld and I was there when Ares confronted Helen and Orion.”

When everyone stared at him with dropped jaws, he went on to explain about the Getty robbery, what the obols could do, and how he had given one to Helen. He didn’t apologize for any of it.

“And you didn’t tell us about this, why?” Ariadne asked through clenched teeth.

“You wouldn’t have understood,” he said, consciously echoing what Matt had said a few moments ago. “All that matters is that Helen can dream again.”

“Look, we’re all committed to protecting Helen, and if you’d come to us with this idea, you know we would have agreed to the robbery to save her life. So why’d you do it alone? Luke, what if you’d been seen?” Jason asked seriously. “The Getty is blanketed with surveillance cameras.”

“Not an issue,” Lucas replied with certainty.

Jason gave him a doubtful look, but Lucas shook his head once in warning. Jason knew him well enough to know that Lucas was trying to tell him something. He took the hint and dropped it for the time being, but Lucas knew his invisibility secret probably wouldn’t last the night now that Jason was suspicious. He was willing to let that one go as long as no one suspected his other, much more frightening secret.

“Kids!” Noel shouted anxiously from the front door. Everyone reacted to the alarming tone in her voice.

“Mom?” Lucas shouted back as he rose from his chair. A moment later, she appeared in the doorway, out of breath and looking around wildly as she counted heads. She didn’t get the number she was hoping for.

“Where’s Helen?” she asked, her tension mounting.

“I left her at work,” Lucas replied quickly.

“Oh, no,” Noel whispered to herself, fumbling with her cell phone as she dialed a number. His father’s number, Lucas realized. Castor was still in Conclave with the Hundred. Leaving the meeting could be seen as a breach. Every decision the Conclave had come to up to that point could potentially be scrapped, and his mother knew it.

“Mom! Are you sure you want to do that?”

“Screw Conclave! Castor and Pallas need to come home now. There’s a huge riot in the center of town, Lucas. Right outside the News Store!”

Heat swarmed Helen’s skin, making it sting and prickle with sweat. The bone-dry air smelled like struck matches and wiggled like the surface of a lake. Light blinded her, although there appeared to be no true sun.

Orion released Helen’s hands so he could turn and face the only tree in the dry lands. Three small girls stood in its shade, their thin shoulders quivering as they cried. Orion gestured for Helen to join him so they could approach the Furies together. The three sisters reached out for each other fearfully. As Orion took a step closer, they wrapped their arms around each other in a miserable huddle.

“Wait.” Helen put a hesitant hand on Orion’s arm. “I don’t want to frighten them.”

“Have you come to kill us, Descender?” the one in the middle asked. Her voice was still childlike, even though it was rough with tears. Now that Helen could see them clearly without feeling their influence, she wondered how she could ever have thought they were grown women. They were just children.

“We know how you Scions hate us and want us dead,” whined the one on the left. “But it won’t work.”

“We don’t want to hurt you. We came to help.” Helen held her hands up in a peaceful gesture. “Isn’t that what you wanted the first time you led me here? For me to come back someday to help you?”

The Furies sniffled and cringed as they clutched at each other, still terrified. Orion slowly took off his backpack and laid it on the ground, glancing up at them soothingly as he did so to make sure none of them were startled. Helen thought it looked as if he were approaching a herd of skittish deer, but his tactics seemed to be working. The Furies watched him carefully with wide eyes and pursed lips, but they did seem to be more at ease.

“We’ve brought you something to drink,” he said gently as he unzipped the backpack and took out the three canteens.

“Poison?” asked the whiny one on the left. “A trick to send us to Tartarus, no doubt. I told you already. It won’t work.”

“Sisters. Maybe this is best,” the smallest one on the right said in a thin, wispy voice that could barely be heard. “I am so tired.”

“I know you are,” Helen said, her heart going out to the three girls. “And I know what it is to be really tired.”

“We only want to help ease your suffering,” Orion said. He sounded so kind that the one on the left wavered and took a half step toward him.

“There is no end to our suffering,” said the leader in the middle, restraining her sister. “You Scions may replace peace, even happiness from time to time, but we Erinyes are tormented always. We were born of blood spilled by a son who attacked own his father. We are fated to avenge the wrongful death.”

The leader glared at Orion accusingly, and he looked up at the Furies with pleading eyes. Helen took a reassuring step closer to him. He was starting to lose focus on the reason they were there. That wasn’t like Orion at all.

“I didn’t kill my father, no matter how much the Fates would have liked that,” he declared in a strong voice. “I was born to bitterness, but I don’t choose to be bitter.”

“But it’s not a choice for us, prince,” whispered the smallest one. “The murders are always inside our heads.”

“We Erinyes can never forget the blood that your kind has spilled. We remember every moment,” the leader said with deep sadness. The three girls began to weep again.

“And that’s why we are here. My friend and I think you’ve suffered enough for the Scions’ sins,” Orion said in his soothing voice. “We only want to give you some water to drink. Aren’t you thirsty?”

“We’ve not had a single drop of water in over three thousand years,” said the one on the left.

All three of them were tempted, that was obvious. It was so hot and dry, even in the shade of their miserable tree, that Helen, who had grown used to deprivation, was desperate just to wet the inside of her mouth for a moment. Finally, the littlest sister stepped forward on legs so skinny and frail they nearly folded up underneath her.

“I am very thirsty. I wish to drink,” she said in her tiny, whispering voice.

Her thin arms shook as she held out her hands. Orion unscrewed the lid and helped her steady the canteen and raise it to her lips. She swallowed a small sip, and then looked up at Orion in shock. She grabbed the canteen and tilted it back, swallowing the entire contents in a series of loud gulps before swooning against Orion. He caught her and held her, glancing at Helen reassuringly.

“You’ve killed her!” the whiny one gasped.

“He can’t kill any of us,” the leader said. “Look. She stirs.”

The littlest one clutched at the hem of Orion’s shirt, burying her face in his chest. He stroked her hair with his free hand and spoke softly in her ear as her shoulders started to shake. Helen could tell from his tone that he was telling her that it was okay and that she was safe. The littlest Fury suddenly threw her head back and revealed that she wasn’t in pain or crying. She was laughing.

“Sisters,” she sighed. “It’s . . . heaven! The Heirs have brought us heaven to drink!”

Helen quickly handed the other two Furies their canteens, and watched as they joined their sister in euphoria. The littlest one kissed Orion on the cheek in gratitude and then threw herself into the waiting arms of her two bigger sisters. The three girls cried with joy as they hugged each other, bouncing and squealing and laughing all at once. They looked like three young girls, jumping around at a slumber party.

Glancing over at Orion, Helen saw him staring at the three girls with intense, but seemingly conflicted, emotions. She went and stood close to him, trying to offer him whatever reassurance she could. He seemed shaken up by the mention of his father, and she wanted to let him know that none of that mattered now. The Scions were free of the Furies, and soon he and his father could be together again.

“You were right,” Helen said. He looked down at her with a questioning smile. “Setting them free was way better than eternal joy.”

They both turned their attention back to the girls, and watched their rejoicing. Then Helen shrugged and made an “eh” noise, pretending like she was still debating it. Orion laughed at her joke, but he didn’t say anything. He just draped an arm over her shoulders as they watched the three sisters hug and dance.

The littlest one was the first to break away. At first, it seemed that she had grown tired from all the excitement and needed to go sit for a moment. She staggered away from the group and covered her eyes with a hand. Orion quickly released Helen to go to her aid when she wavered as if she was about to collapse. She bent her head. Red drops stained her white dress as she wept bloody tears. Her sisters took her from Orion, asking what was wrong. Not long after, the other two began to weep as well.

“What happened?” Helen asked Orion.

“I don’t know. All she said was that she couldn’t get their faces out of her head,” he replied with a worried frown as he watched the girls huddle together and speak privately. They seemed to come to some sort of a consensus, and the leader approached Helen and Orion.

“It appears this joy was not meant to last,” she said.

The other two girls continued to cling to each other as they cried, and Helen desperately wanted to help them. Orion crouched down and picked up the discarded canteens, frantically checking them for any leftover drops of water but they all were empty.

“We’ll get you more,” he promised, but the leader shook her head.

“As much as I want to feel that again, I’m afraid it will never last,” she said sadly. “We cannot repay this gift, but we wish to give you something in return for the few blessed moments you gave us.”

“A gift for a gift that we’ll remember forever,” moaned the whiny one.

“We release the both of you from all of your blood debts,” the leader said, and waved her hand in the air in blessing. “We will never torment either of you again.”

She stepped back and joined her sisters, then the three of them began to retreat into the shadows of their tree.

“Wait! Don’t give up yet,” Orion pleaded. “Maybe we didn’t bring you enough. If we get you more . . .”

“Orion, don’t,” Helen said, putting her hand on his arm to stop him from chasing after them. “They’re right. We could spend forever bringing them water, but in the long run joy is just an experience—it’s not supposed to last. I see that now. Persephone must have meant a different river.”

“And what if she didn’t?” Orion asked, frustration cracking his voice. “What if this is our best hope at helping them?”

Helen stared up into his bright green eyes and shook her head mutely. She didn’t know what to do next. The littlest one poked her head out from somewhere deep in the shadows.

“Thank you,” she whispered before ducking back into the extreme dark on the other side of the tree trunk.

“We have to help them,” he said urgently. “We can’t let them suffer like this forever!”

“We won’t! And I swear to you, we’ll keep trying until we get the right river!” Helen’s eyes suddenly went out of focus, and she grabbed a handful of Orion’s shirt to keep herself from falling over.

“What’s happening?” Orion asked, bracing himself. The landscape blurred and Helen felt the world slow, like she was about to wake up.

“I think they’re making us leave,” she told him. She wrapped her arms around Orion’s neck and held on tight. . . .

Matt and Claire ditched the car when they discovered that the traffic was stopped dead for the night, and instead started running down the post-sunset dark of the deserted street, toward the center of town.

Technically, they weren’t supposed to be doing this, but neither of them was willing to sit safely at the Delos compound while the Scions went out to fight. Matt was more than a little insulted that Ariadne had begged him to stay behind, like he was a child who couldn’t defend himself. He’d tried to argue, but Ariadne, Lucas, and Jason had simply run away so fast Matt could barely see them move, let alone get a word in edgewise. It really annoyed him when they did that.

Cassandra warned them not to go. Common sense had told her it would most likely tick everyone off. Matt much preferred it when Cassandra used her unusually deep wellspring of common sense, as opposed to her talent as an Oracle, to suss out the future. He couldn’t even force himself to watch anymore when the Fates pushed their way out of her, like they were digging their way up from under her skin.

It was one of the many things that made Matt question the value of Scion “gifts” and the so-called gods that gave them to the Scions to begin with. What good were the Fates if they only used people like cups to be filled and then emptied, and eventually tossed away? As much as Matt abhorred violence, the thought of what the Fates did to Scions made him want do something athletic, preferably while wearing a pair of brass knuckles.

As he and Claire neared the town center, they could hear shouting and more than a few screams, but the voices were disconnected. In one spot, there were shrieks of fear, and in others there were shouts of rowdy enjoyment. It sounded as if different parts of the crowd were watching different movies.

“Hold up, Claire,” Matt said as they rounded a poorly lit corner. “The streetlights are out down that way.”

“But the News Store is that way,” she protested.

“I know, but let’s circle around back and go in through the alley. I want to get an idea of what’s going on before we go charging down the middle of the street.”

Claire agreed, and she and Matt slipped around the back of the News Store. It was quiet in the back alley, although they could both hear the raised voices of the crowd, like sneaking down the side hallway of a stadium while a rock band performed. They got the sense that something big was happening close by, but they felt strangely separated from it.

“My God, it’s dark,” Claire said, her voice wavering with fear.

“Yeah, and it’s not a normal darkness, either,” Matt murmured nervously as they went in the back entrance to the News Store.

“I think I’ve seen this before,” Claire whispered as she rubbed her arms in either cold or fear. “When Hector was attacked by Automedon and the Hundred at my track meet, this same menacing blackness covered everything. I think it means a Shadowmaster has been here.”

Inside, the store was a mess. Tables were overturned, crystal jars of candy had broken on the floor, and everything was covered in a layer of flour that must have been deliberately flung out of several torn bags. Matt and Claire picked their way through to the front, looking for injured people who might have been left unconscious, hoping like crazy that they wouldn’t replace Jerry or Kate. Thankfully, the News Store was entirely empty.

The darkness seemed to be getting thicker as they made their way to the front, and Matt and Claire stumbled blindly out onto the street. They paused as their eyes adjusted to the fog-like darkness left by the Shadowmaster. Coming down the street was a mob of people in costume, led by a tall woman. As the gloom dissipated, Matt instinctively cringed.

“That has to be Eris,” he said in a lowered voice to Claire.

“Then who’s that?” she asked, facing the opposing street. She was pointing at a tall, skinny boy who seemed to be made up of spare parts. His arms were too long for his body, and he walked with a bandy-legged stride, even as he hunched his rounded shoulders. Despite his towering height, he seemed to creep rather than walk. Still pointing in mute fear, Claire backed up against Matt. He could feel her entire body trembling, and the gasping breaths she took threatened to turn into screams in her throat.

Matt had known her since kindergarten, and if there was one thing he was absolutely sure of, it was that Claire Aoki did not scare easy. Looking around at the behavior of the crowd, Matt could see people running around, frightened far beyond any normal measure. It was as if each person were being chased by his or her own worst nightmare.

“It has to be another god, like Eris.” His voice shook as he spoke. “Think, Claire! Eris is Ares’ sister, and she is the personification of chaos—she makes people feel like creating havoc. So what do we feel when we look at that creepy kid?”

“Panic?” Claire wheezed, trying not to hyperventilate. “But I thought the god Pan was a goat!”

“No, no, it’s not the damn satyr! There was another,” Matt groused, digging thorough his memory. The convoluted, inbred family tree of the gods popped into his mind. “Ares, the god of war, walks with Eris, the goddess of discord, and with them is his son, Terror. That freaky kid has got to be Terror.”

“Matt,” Claire gasped, using one arm to point one way and the other arm to point another. “The two mobs are headed right toward each other!”

Matt’s heart sank. Eris and her nephew were herding their crazed groups down adjacent streets that met at a large intersection kitty-corner to the News Store.

With every step, the horrible gods drew their helpless followers closer to an inevitable clash. Even Matt and Claire, who were making a conscious effort to control their reactions, felt more crazed as the gods drew near. Finally, like a cork blasting out of a shaken champagne bottle, the group surrounding Terror met with the bedlam around Eris, and a full-blown stampede began. In the midst of it all, Matt saw Eris laughing and her misshapen nephew sneering with satisfaction at her side.

Terrified people clashed with rioters in costumes, tearing each other apart in a frenzy of destruction and fear. There was nothing Matt and Claire could do but get out of the way. Gripping Claire’s hand tightly, Matt pulled her behind a parked car, ducked down, and used his body to shield her from the flying glass and debris.

The two of them held on to each other, trying to control their emotions so that they didn’t join in the fray. The air stank with the smell of rotten milk and burning plastic, and Matt noticed that the scents seemed to play on people’s emotions—the more intense the scent, the greater the swell of feeling both in himself and in the crowd.

The glow from the streetlight above them dimmed and then disappeared as a dark pall fell over the intersection. Matt found he couldn’t see more than two feet in front of his face.

“What are you two doing here?” growled a voice from inside the nexus of darkness.

Lucas’s voice, Matt realized with a jolt.

“Come on,” Lucas said, holding his hand out to them from the billowing folds of his cloak of shadows, motioning for them to follow him. “I’ll hide you in here until I can get you someplace safe.”

Matt and Claire hesitated, neither of them wanting to go near him. As they balked, the shadows broke up and moved away from Lucas. There was something menacing about the sound of his voice and the way the tattered ends of darkness clung to him. His blue eyes were black and he seemed so angry.

“Ah, Lucas?” Claire asked in an uncharacteristically timid way. “Are you, like, a Shadowmaster?”

Lucas’s face fell and he nodded sadly.

“Just how many secrets have you been keeping from the rest of us?” Matt asked, stunned to a hush.

Lucas opened his mouth and looked back and forth from Matt to Claire pleadingly, but whatever he was going to say got interrupted. Moving faster than Matt could focus his eyes, Jason and Ariadne appeared next to them, already asking a dozen questions at once. Lucas held up his hands and tried to explain that he had only recently discovered his talent as a Shadowmaster, when they were all interrupted a second time.

“Kids! Where’s Helen?” Kate shouted frantically. They all spun around to see Kate, half running, half limping back toward the vandalized News Store. Her clothes were torn, her hair was disheveled, and she was covered in dirt and flour like she’d been rolling around on the ground, fighting.

Hector was next to her, carrying Jerry who was unconscious and bleeding badly from a head injury.

Hector’s eyes were wide and his mouth was parted in surprise. Matt turned back around and saw Lucas, Ariadne, and Jason bristling with tension. He couldn’t hear what they heard, but Matt knew from the looks on their faces that all of the Scions were being taken over by the Furies.

“Jason, no!” Claire screamed, throwing herself in front of him before he could attack his brother.

“I’ve got Ari!” Matt yelled as he tackled her.

Ariadne hissed at him and scratched at his neck and chest, but quickly stopped herself when she saw Matt’s blood begin to flow. Ignoring his injuries, Matt covered her eyes with his hand and tucked her close to him as she shook with rage. Glancing up, Matt saw Lucas tilt his head like a lion on the hunt and take a step toward Hector.

No one was left to restrain him.