She shakes her head, and her bandana slips off center. “I told the terrorists I wouldn’t join. Said I didn’t want any part of blowing up a dome. But they used me anyway, and the next thing I knew, Randy’s dad was really dead.”
“Randy asked you to kill him.”
“I didn’t mean to do anything. I swear.” Chloe presses her hands against her face. “But Randy shouldn’t get the blame.”
I shrug. “No, he shouldn’t. Maybe if you go explain things, everything will be all right.”
Chloe looks up then, taking her hands away. “Yeah, maybe. But I’m scared.”
I nod. “You should be.” I know I’m not comforting her, but I don’t care.
Chloe bites her lip, and my eyes meet hers. “I’m so sorry for everything, Piper.”
A gust of wind blows, and she turns away from me, looking out toward the barren water. Before I realize what she’s going to do, she puts her hands up into the wind and jumps.
Chapter 42
Sacrifice
Chloe falls, and I run to the edge, but she’s already gone. I’m too slow. My stomach tightens into a knot so hard and full of disbelief, I can’t stand it. I lunge out on the cliff, but stop myself, unable to go beyond the rim.
I heard the words before and tried to stop them, but it was useless. Chloe is dead, and there is nothing I can do about it. Maybe there was never anything I could really do about it except postpone it.
“No! No! No!” I’m staring over the side, but I can’t bring myself to actually look for her body. She’s dead. She’s gone. And though she’s killed herself, I feel like I’ve pushed her. “Please come back. Don’t leave me.” I want the old Chloe here with me now. I want us to be friends, before my knowledge of phoenixes or the Underworld or Persephone ever came back to me. “Please, Chloe.”
Lightning cracks, and this time it strikes a building across on the other shore. In seconds, the building catches fire, and smoke fills the air.
Off to the side, I hear the college kids coming toward me. Did they hear me screaming? Did I scream? I can’t face them or anyone. Before they can reach me, I run the other way.
Chloe cannot be dead.
It was her fate, and she knew it. But what is my fate? To be a curse to everyone I know?
I will not have it.
I direct all my thoughts to the Underworld. Not to travel there, but to command there. I was once the Queen of the Underworld. I should have power. And I want that power back if only for this one decision.
I see the Underworld before me. I rule it.
“Randy and Chloe will be moved to the Elysian Fields,” I command. I have no idea if I even vocalize it. But I know I will make it happen with my sheer will. I may not be able to count on Shayne to do it for me, so I will do it myself.
The ground underneath me seems to quake at my words. I think for a second it will split and swallow me whole. Maybe I will have to take their places in Tartarus. Maybe this act will ensure Chloe and Shayne being together. But whatever the cost, I accept it.
“Now,” I say. “Put them in Elysium.”
The ground trembles one more time, and I feel it happen. I feel their souls move from the fires of Tartarus to paradise. My best friend may be dead, but now she’s in her rightful place in paradise. It’s where she should have been last week. I shudder from the power I’ve exerted. I’ve done it. Chloe and Randy are going to be okay. They’ll have paradise forever.
I turn my mind from the Underworld back to the world around me. I run down the embankment, heading out into the street. I don’t know where to go. I love Shayne. And I want to be with him now more than anything. But the image of Shayne and Chloe drops back in my mind. I stop and force it away and focus on the earth.
It’s still hot as a sauna, but the wind is blowing so hard, it’s almost pushing me over. The lightning is a storm of light and sound, striking everything it can. Sirens explode in the air, and smoke is thick. I run in the direction of the Botanical Haven, because if my mom is somehow responsible for this weather, I have to make her stop. It’s killing the earth.
My legs pound; I run forever. I’m almost there. Sirens and wind are rampant around me, and lightning is striking everything in sight. It cracks so close it feels like it’s next to me, and one of the Spanish Oaks in our yard splits in half and falls to the ground.
Another branch falls, and it smacks onto the glass roof of the Botanical Haven. I hold my breath even though the glass is shatterproof because it hits with such force.
The glass holds.
The rest of the world isn’t as lucky as we are. I can only imagine how this lightning storm is wrecking downtown Austin. Wrecking the world.
Chloe flashes through my mind, jumping over the side of the cliff. I ache at the thought of her and Shayne together, but I’ve paid the price for my mistakes.
I run across the rocks that make up our yard and pull the door open. My mom is inside, clipping dead leaves off the plants like everything in the world is as it should be. How could she be so oblivious to the earth outside the Botanical Haven when she’s always claimed to love it? The leaves drop to the floor at her feet like the branches outside. I slam the door shut behind me to let her know I’m home. I need to confront her, and it has to start here with her killing everything around her for her own selfish needs.
The wind beats on the glass walls and ceiling, but I try to filter it out. But another branch slams into the roof, and I jump. The glass groans under the weight but holds.
“Why did you do it, Mom?”
She has her scissors in her hand, hanging down at her side, her gloves still on. “What?”
“Kill the phoenix. Why did you take me from the Underworld?”
The smile evaporates from her face like the mist sprayed over our hot Earth. “Who told you that?”
I shake my head. “It doesn’t matter. I know—that’s what matters.”
Her eyes narrow, and her face turns red. “It does matter. Nobody was allowed to speak of it. Whoever told you will go to Tartarus.”
“You’ve lied to me my entire life.”
“Ares told you, didn’t he?”
“Ares didn’t tell me.”
Her eyes are wild, moving around the room, looking for something or someone to blame. “He did. I know it.”
I uncross my arms and take a step closer to her. “You don’t know anything. You killed a phoenix and me at the same time.”
My mom shakes her head. “No! I would never kill you. Someone has been lying to you. I love you.”
“Love me! You killed me, and then, when I was reborn as Piper, you hid me away from everything I ever knew.”
“You’re wrong. It wasn’t like that at all.”
“You never even told me who my father really was.”
My mom’s hand flies to her mouth. “You know about that?”
I nod. “I know everything, Mom. Everything. I know who you are. Who I am. Who I used to be.”
“But how—?”
“I loved Hades, and you took me away.” When I say his name, I think of Chloe and Shayne. It can’t be true. “Everything was perfect, and you ruined it all.” Tears well up inside my eyes, but I refuse to let them fall.
“Perfect! How can you even say that? I was forced to be away from you for half the year. My precious
