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  only happened in her mind?

  “You’re serious, aren’t you?” Claire asked, studying Helen’s

  hunched-up body.

  “Uh-huh. He doesn’t want me, Gig. He told me so himself. Can

  we drop it now? I’m just too tired.”

  “Yeah. No problem,” Claire said, rubbing Helen’s back. For a

  second, Helen let herself lean against Claire in a sideways hug.

  “Shit. I’ll kill him,” Claire offered. Helen tried to laugh at that,

  but what came out of her sounded more like a hacking cough.

  “Thanks, but no. I don’t want him dead,” Helen said. She shuffled

  after Claire to homeroom.

  Mr. Hergeshimer asked about her health as soon as he had a

  chance to process how wretched she looked. Helen assured him

  she was fine, and after studying her face skeptically for a moment

  he gave up and went back to harassing Zach about his choice for

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  the Word of the Day. Matt asked Helen in a whisper if her stomach

  felt better, and then restated his opinion that she should quit track.

  “You’re wearing yourself too thin,” he said, sounding an awful lot

  like her father.

  The rest of the morning went similarly. Every teacher asked if she

  needed to go to the nurse, and all of her acquaintances worried

  that she wasn’t better yet from her “fit” during track the other day.

  Except for Zach.

  “I had no idea you were so fast, Hamilton,” he said as he ran to

  catch up to her in the hall.

  “Yeah, I’m pretty fast,” she countered, trying to sound

  disinterested.

  “Right before you collapsed I saw you chasing that shirtless guy

  and I realized that I’ve had it backward all these years. See, I always

  thought you were the one that like to be chased, you being

  such a tease and all,” he said with a faint sneer. “But it’s hard to believe

  any guy could outrun you. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone

  run that fast.”

  “Wait, you told Gretchen?” Helen asked, a sinking feeling in her

  stomach. “I thought it was the other way around.”

  “I gotta admit,” he said, taunting her, “when you want to, you can

  move so fast it’s, like, inhuman. The only other time I’ve ever seen

  anyone move that fast was when one of those Delos kids was playing

  the hero during football practice and this freshman went down

  on the other end of the line—” Zach was cut off by Helen’s history

  teacher, who gestured for Helen to hurry up and get in the room.

  For the moment, Helen was saved, but from the way Zach was

  looking at her, she had the feeling that this wasn’t the end of the

  problem. She tried to put it out of her head by telling herself that

  he could spread as many rumors as he liked, but everyone would

  think he was exaggerating. Zach liked to gossip and even though

  people generally listened to him, Scion speed was something that a

  person had to see to believe.

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  On her way to the auditorium to meet Claire and Matt, Helen got

  intercepted by Cassandra and Ariadne. They asked where she was

  going, and she didn’t feel like lying to them, so she invited them

  along.

  When the coast was clear, they sneaked in the unlocked fire door

  and came into the auditorium from the backstage entrance. Matt

  and Claire were already sitting on the apron of the stage, their

  lunches laid out on napkins like a picnic.

  “Good. You invited them,” Matt said with a satisfied nod when he

  saw that Helen wasn’t alone. “But don’t bring anyone else along or

  we’re going to get caught.”

  “We’ll probably get caught, anyway,” Claire said with a smirk.

  “But it’s totally worth it. Where else could we get such atmosphere?”

  She gestured to the beautiful, glittery set that was growing,

  piece by piece.

  Cassandra and Ariadne looked around appreciatively, especially

  at the parts of the set that were to be Theseus’s palace. They shared

  a conspiratorial grin with Helen who managed to lift up half her

  face in something sort of like a smile. The fairyland parts of the

  Midsummer set appealed to Helen, but the Greek bits disturbed

  her. The faux Doric columns were half painted and lying sideways

  on the ground as if they’d been toppled, and they made Helen

  think of the arduous journey she’d taken the night before.

  She never wanted to go back to the dry land, but if she could find

  that river . . . Wait, what river? she thought. She turned her back

  on the half-built columns and sat down next to Claire to eat her

  lunch.

  Helen tried her best to get into the conversation, but she barely

  had the initiative to chew, let alone laugh and joke. She could tell

  that her friends were being clever and fun by the way Cassandra

  and Ariadne were reacting, but she could barely stay awake, let

  alone participate in the conversation.

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  She kept thinking about flying. Well, really she kept catching herself

  thinking about Lucas, but as soon as her thoughts slid down

  that hot knife, she shuffled her imagination over to the side and

  thought about flying instead. Maybe she would try it again on her

  own later, she decided, but this time she would do it inside her

  house so she wouldn’t be in danger of floating away. Although the

  prospect of blowing away on the breeze didn’t seem like such a bad

  idea right about now.

  “Lennie! The bell’s ringing,” Claire said, her bag already over her

  shoulder. Helen jumped up and got her things together while her

  friends shot each other looks behind her back.

  Claire tried to talk to Helen during track, but eventually gave up

  when Helen kept turning the conversation around to ask how

  Claire was instead. Helen didn’t want pity, and she didn’t want to

  talk about herself. She just wanted to switch her brain off and float.

  Eventually, Claire got the hint and started talking about the bonfire

  party on the beach that night. She was having trouble deciding

  if she was going to get a ride with Ariadne or not.

  “On the one hand I want to get to know her better, but it would

  mean I would have to go with her and Jason, and he always finds a

  way to start an argument with me. Are you sure you can’t take the

  night off from work? We could get a ride with Matt together,”

  Claire said optimistically.

  “You know I can’t.”

  “If you asked Kate, I’m sure she’d let you,” Claire coaxed

  “Gig? I really don’t want to spend the night sitting on cold sand

  watching everyone make out,” Helen said with finality. “But you

  should go and have fun. And who knows? Maybe you and Jason

  will get along tonight, for once.”

  Claire launched into a tirade about how annoying Jason was for

  always disagreeing with her. Only half listening, Helen finessed the

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  air currents around her, practicing flying with the gravity on. She

  couldn’t wait to get home after work that night and give it a try.

  Hidden behind a sand dune, Creon counted the minutes that

  passed while his cousins Hector and Jason stayed submerged. He


  hadn’t known about this talent, and he was happy that circumstance

  had led him there to witness it. He had lost track of Lucas

  earlier, which happened often considering his little cousin could

  fly, and he had to settle for following Jason and Hector to this ridiculous

  beach party. As he watched his cousins breach the waves

  and stroll out of the thundering surf, he seethed with resentment.

  All that talent wasted on cowards who were too frightened of the

  gods to challenge them, and too interested in their own pleasure to

  consider the implications that flirting with mortal girls could have

  for their entire House.

  Jason spent most of the evening talking to a tiny Japanese girl.

  He seemed to be able to control himself around women, but Hector

  was a different story. It wasn’t even midnight yet, and Creon had

  seen him rolling around in the sand with two different girls

  already. Didn’t Hector know how easy it was for Scions to impregnate

  women? Did his idiot cousin really want his firstborn to be

  from some foolish child with no character? Obviously, Hector

  didn’t care about their House, or he wouldn’t waste his time with

  such silly girls. It rankled so much, Creon had to look away and grit

  his teeth. There was only one girl on this island that was equal to

  any of them in status. Only one girl worthy of his attention.

  Helen. But Lucas wouldn’t leave her for a moment, and it forced

  Creon to keep his distance from her. He couldn’t confront his cousins

  directly or his undercover mission would be spoiled, but there

  had been a few times when Creon had considered it. Helen’s face

  had stayed with him. He thought back again to their confrontation

  out on the moors. The fear and anger in her eyes while she chased

  him had been pure, so passionate it was almost too much to resist.

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  She was powerful, and yet so unaware of her potential she was

  nearly helpless. His hands shook at the thought of conquering her,

  but he had to be patient.

  His mother had begged him to wait until she could quietly ask

  around and find out if there was a possibility someone in the family

  had left a bastard in Massachusetts. Creon had reluctantly

  agreed to wait a week on her reply, but he knew what the answer

  would be. Even though he hadn’t seen the Furies when he first encountered

  her, he knew Helen wasn’t his cousin.

  There were rumors that a few Scions in the past had found a way

  around the Furies, and Creon believed Helen was one of them. His

  mother said it was impossible—that all the other Houses had been

  destroyed—but Creon had more to go on than a gut feeling. The

  traitors were guarding her like she was the last enemy Scion, and

  she was so untrained, so ignorant of who and what she was, it

  seemed obvious to Creon that she had been purposely hidden away

  from all the Houses, even her own. But above any of these other

  reasons, it was Creon’s body that told him she was not related to

  him. He had met dozens of his female cousins, all beautiful as the

  daughters of Apollo should be, but not one of them kept him up at

  night the way Helen did. He knew she was from another House.

  He was obligated by family duty to watch and wait for a few more

  days in order to remain true to the promise he had made his mother,

  but very soon he would prove himself. He was up to this challenge,

  and although there was an alternative for unification of the

  Houses other than combat, Creon forced himself not to think about

  it no matter how tempting it was. This was his one chance at the

  glory he deserved, the last chance at this type of glory for any

  Scion. There was another Triumph waiting to be captured, and in

  his heart he knew that this Triumph would be the one to open the

  gates of Atlantis.

  Creon was destined to be the Scion to make his family immortal,

  and for that his father would honor him above all others.

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  .....................................................................

  Chapter Twelve

  Helen heard something up on the roof. She ran up the

  stairs to the widow’s walk and threw the door open as

  fast as she could, but the widow’s walk was empty. She

  sighed, relieved. She didn’t want any of the Delos kids

  sleeping on her roof anymore. She especially didn’t

  want Lucas listening to her while she had nightmares, and she had

  just woken up from another horrible one. She looked around at the

  empty widow’s walk, feeling desolate and lonely, but she wasn’t

  sure if that was because of a dream or because of her waking life.

  She went back down to her bedroom and forced herself to notice

  the writing on the mirror. Then she wrote I SAW IT AGAIN in

  Claire’s green eyeliner and made herself to stare at the words. That

  was two nights in a row she’d seen the river she couldn’t remember.

  She was racking her brain trying to picture it, but her mind’s

  eye kept looking away. Suddenly, she spotted her own reflection in

  the mirror and gasped.

  Her cheeks were sunken in, her nightshirt was pulled out of

  shape, and her arms and legs were covered in icky black muck.

  River muck.

  She had seen a river with black banks and gray water. She could

  remember thirst and not being able to drink. But why was it such a

  struggle to remember anything else that had happened? She focused

  her thoughts to try and bring the memory back.

  Her thirst was tormenting her so she had gone down to the water.

  She leaned over the foul banks of black mud and saw pale,

  crippled fish bumping around clumsily, as if they had forgotten

  how to swim. She backed away from the river, refusing to drink

  that water even if she died of thirst with the sound of its current

  rushing in her ears. . . .

  Helen ran to the bathroom and threw herself into the shower, rubbing

  at the black mud and rinsing her mouth out with gulp after

  gulp of water. She felt polluted. She scrubbed until her skin turned

  red and her eyes were stinging from being open in the spray.

  When she got out of the shower, she dragged her sheets and pajamas

  over to the washing machine. There was no blood this time,

  but Helen doubted she’d be able to get out that river mud. She put

  a half a cup of bleach into the washing machine and made sure the

  water was hot, hoping that she would be able to salvage something.

  Then she went back upstairs to clean all the dirty footprints she’d

  tracked through the house.

  It was early Saturday morning, and usually her father would be

  home during the day and working at night, but he had opted to

  work a double to give Kate the day off. Helen had a feeling that the

  two of them were avoiding each other. She had tried to talk to Kate

  about it the night before after Claire left to go to the bonfire, but

  she just didn’t have the energy to push Kate to open up. Everything

  felt duller to Helen. Muffled, like her feelings were in storage, buried

  under mo
unds of packaging peanuts.

  Helen went to her room and switched gravity off and on, alternately

  floating up and thumping down until she figured out how to

  swing her legs under her and land on the balls of her feet instead of

  all over the damn place. She worked a bit with the air currents, but

  she couldn’t do anything more than finesse her position as she

  floated or she risked blowing her room to pieces. After a few hours,

  the constantly ringing phone drove her out of doors. The Delos

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  family wanted to know why she wasn’t at their house yet for practice,

  and they wouldn’t stop calling until she answered.

  Helen had been thinking. She just couldn’t see the point of learning

  how to swing a sword if she couldn’t be wounded by weapons,

  and she didn’t need to fight if she could simply fly away. She knew

  that eventually Hector or Jason would come looking for her at

  home, so she wandered outside with no clear destination, hoping

  that a little speed would help clear her head. She was in jeans and a

  sweater, not exactly running gear, but it didn’t matter. As soon as

  she was out of the town center she went off Polpis Road, heading

  east. She didn’t care where she ended up, as long as it was away

  from people. As she ran she realized that she had come this way

  once before, and although she didn’t want to think about her first

  flight and everything that came after it, she knew it was the perfect

  place to find the solitude she was after.

  The sun was going down and she was grateful to be numb enough

  to experience something beautiful without her depressing thoughts

  barging in and ruining it. Looking around, she saw a familiar lighthouse.

  She glanced down at the sand under her feet and wondered

  if it was the same sand that had cradled her and Lucas when they

  were in so much pain. When they had died for a moment, she

  realized.

  As soon as the thought occurred to her, she knew it was true.

  They had done more than just suffer terrible injury that night, they

  had started to cross over. Or at least Lucas had. And she had followed

  him down to stop him. And there was a river . . . Wait, what

  river?

  “Hey! What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Hector shouted.

  He was furious. He stalked up the beach, his legs eating up far

  more distance than a human’s could as he came toward her.

  “How did you find me?” Helen sputtered.