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Books. Change. Lives.
Copyright © 2021 by Katee Robert
Cover and internal design © 2021 by Sourcebooks
Cover design by Dawn Adams/Sourcebooks
Cover image © Alexxxey/Shutterstock
Internal images © Julia Dreams/Creative Market, etse1112/Getty Images, GreenTana/Getty Images, LokFung/Getty Images, Roberto Scandola/Getty Images, Vectors Market/Noun Project, Vectorstall, PK/Noun Project
Sourcebooks and the colophon are registered trademarks of Sourcebooks.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing from its publisher, Sourcebooks.
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.
All brand names and product names used in this book are trademarks, registered trademarks, or trade names of their respective holders. Sourcebooks is not associated with any product or vendor in this book.
Published by Sourcebooks Casablanca, an imprint of Sourcebooks
P.O. Box 4410, Naperville, Illinois 60567-4410
(630) 961-3900
sourcebooks.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file with the publisher.
Contents
Front Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Map of Olympus
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
Epilogue
Excerpt from Electric Idol
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Back Cover
To Erin and Melody—your podcast has brought me so much joy over the last few years, and I hope Hades’s boastful floors give you a little joy in return.
Chapter 1
Persephone
“I really hate these parties.”
“Don’t let Mother hear you say that.”
I glance over my shoulder at Psyche. “You hate them, too.” I’ve lost count of the number of events our mother has dragged us to over the years. She’s always got her eye on the next prize, on the newest piece to move in this chess game only she knows the rules to. It might be easier to stomach if most days I didn’t feel like one of her pawns.
Psyche comes to stand next to me and bumps me with her shoulder. “I knew I’d find you here.”
“It’s the only room in this place I can stand.” Even though the statue room is the very essence of hubris. It’s a relatively plain space—if shining marble floors and tasteful gray walls can be called plain—filled with thirteen full-body statues arranged in a loose circle around the room. One for each member of the Thirteen, the group that rules Olympus. I name them off silently as my gaze skips over each one—Zeus, Poseidon, Hera, Demeter, Athena, Ares, Dionysus, Hermes, Artemis, Apollo, Hephaestus, Aphrodite—before turning back to face the final statue. This one is covered in a black cloth that pours over it, spilling down to pool on the floor at its feet. Even still, it’s impossible to miss the wide-set shoulders, the spiky crown that adorns his head. My fingers itch to grab the fabric and rip it away so I can finally see his features once and for all.
Hades.
In a few short months, I’ll have won my freedom from this city, will have escaped, never to return. I won’t have another chance to look on the face of Olympus’s boogeyman. “Isn’t it weird that they never replaced him?”
Psyche snorts. “How many times have we had this conversation?”
“Come on. You know it’s weird. They’re the Thirteen, but really they’re only twelve. There’s no Hades. There hasn’t been for a very long time.” Hades, the ruler of the lower city. Or at least he used to be. It’s a legacy title, and the entire family has long since died out. Now, the lower city is technically under Zeus’s reign like the rest of us, but from what I hear, he doesn’t ever set foot on that side of the river. Crossing the River Styx is difficult for the same reason leaving Olympus is difficult; from what I hear, each step through the barrier creates a sensation like your head will explode. No one voluntarily experiences something like that. Not even Zeus.
Especially when I doubt the people in the lower city will kiss his ass the same way everyone in the upper city does. All that discomfort and no payoff? It’s no surprise Zeus avoids the crossing just like the rest of us. “Hades is the only one who never spent time in the upper city. It makes me think he was different from the rest of them.”
“He wasn’t,” Psyche says flatly. “It’s easy to pretend when he’s dead and the title no longer exists. But every one of the Thirteen is the same, even our mother.”
She’s right—I know she’s right—but I can’t help the fantasy. I reach up but stop before my fingers make contact with the statue’s face. It’s just morbid curiosity that draws me to this dead legacy, and that’s not worth the trouble I’d be in if I gave in to the temptation to snatch the dark veil away. I let my hand drop. “What’s Mother up to tonight?”
“I don’t know.” She sighs. “I wish Callisto were here. She, at least, gives Mother pause.”
My three sisters and I all found different ways to adapt when our mother became Demeter and we were thrust into the shining world that exists only for the Thirteen. It’s so sparkling and extravagant that it’s almost enough to distract from the poison at its core. It was adapt or drown.
I force myself to act the part of the bright and sparkly daughter who is always obedient, which allows Psyche to play it cool and quiet as she flies under the radar. Eurydice clings to every bit of life and excitement she can find with a borderline desperation. Callisto? Callisto fights Mother with
