Dylan shrugged and said nothing.
“Very well. Council dismissed,” said Walter, and with enormous effort that showed in every step he took, he headed toward a corridor I’d never been down.
The other members of the council filtered out of the throne room until only James, my mother and I remained. Despite looking half a second away from passing out, James crossed the circle toward us, wearing an exhausted smile.
“Seems you finally got your in,” he said, slinging his arm around my shoulders. “Now’s your chance to prove yourself.”
“That’s the problem,” I said. “I don’t know how.”
My mother stroked my knuckles with her thumb. “You’ll figure it out. Keep your eyes and ears open, and you’ll come up with something.”
As comforting as her reassurance should’ve been, she was forgetting one thing. Cronus could see me, and now that he didn’t trust me, I didn’t stand a chance in hell at getting any more information out of him.
* * *
Every day for the last three weeks of October, I dove into my visions with the hope of finding even the smallest of clues that could help with the council’s defense. My efforts were mostly wasted, though. Calliope spent most of her time alone, staring at a holographic image of the island, and whatever strategizing she and Cronus did was a mystery to me. They were rarely in the same room together, and whenever Cronus did appear somewhere near Calliope, she was quick to find an excuse to leave.
At first I thought she was angry, with the short way she spoke to him. The more I saw them together, however, the more I noticed other things. The way her posture slipped when he was near. The way her voice and focus wavered. She wasn’t angry. She was terrified of him.
I didn’t blame her. Without anyone to curb his ambition and determination, Cronus grew more powerful every day until not even his human form seemed able to hold it. He crackled around the edges, and everywhere he stepped, he left black footprints in his wake. Though he saw me, he never acknowledged me. I preferred it that way.
I reported back to the council every evening until finally Dylan said exactly what I’d feared. “He’s growing more powerful than we ever expected. Our barriers won’t hold until the solstice.”
No one in the council questioned him. They all knew we were running out of time, and without more information, they were stumbling around blind. They’d guessed the routes Cronus would take to New York, the ways he might hammer destruction onto the city that had raised me. They had a plan for each.
They were woefully outnumbered though, and nothing Ella and Theo said to the minor gods they chased across the world brought reinforcements. James often joined them, helping them find the ones hiding from Walter’s wrath, leaving me alone with my mother and a handful of gods stretched to the limit. I kept to myself, and soon my visions weren’t just spy missions. They were another way to avoid the council, as well.
No matter how often I saw Henry in Calliope’s palace, he never again revealed he knew I was there. The more time that passed, the more I doubted that moment in the nursery; and the more time Henry spent with Calliope, the more he seemed to sink into her spell. Any hint of his defiance was gone. He did whatever she said, but Milo was always with him, and I clung to that with everything I had. He was in there somewhere, and though it would be a battle for him to break free when the time came, he stood a chance.
In the beginning of November, as Henry rocked Milo to sleep for an afternoon nap, Calliope hurried into the nursery. “Something’s wrong with Cronus.”
Instead of putting Milo in the cradle, Henry gathered him up and followed Calliope. I hurried after them, and through the windows I saw a storm brewing over the island. Black clouds swirled amid the warm ocean air, blotting out the blue sky, and thunder rolled across the sea, a warning of the danger to come.
Calliope ran up the steps and through a weathered door that opened onto the roof. Henry held Milo close against the strong winds, but despite Milo’s cries, he didn’t go back inside.
The moment I spotted Cronus in the middle of the roof, I understood. This storm wasn’t natural. His form could no longer hold him, and Cronus was now nothing more than a glowing orb of power.
Crackling with more lightning than anything natural could ever produce, Cronus’s opaque fog swirled in the eye of the storm, with a black funnel expanding upward into the sky. A warning. A message. A command.
Come and fight.
I instinctively reached for Henry. Instead of mirroring the fear Calliope wore so openly, his mouth was set in a grim line, and determination furrowed his brow. Whatever was coming, he was ready for it.
“Go,” he said, and he turned to look me straight in the eye. I love you. Warn the others it has begun.
I opened and shut my mouth twice. What about you and Milo?
I’ll make sure he’s safe. Just go.
Through the howling wind, I reached for him, my fingertips half an inch from his cheek. I love you, too. Don’t forget who you are.
Despite the swirling black mass of death not twenty feet away, Henry managed a smile. I should say the same to you. Be brave and do what you must.
My eyes burned in the wind, but as I faded from the rooftop, I couldn’t tear my gaze away from him. Please don’t do anything stupid.
Before he could answer, the brewing storm melted away, replaced by my bedroom in Olympus.
I ran down the hallway, momentarily forgetting my ability to be wherever I had to be whenever I needed to be there. I needed to run. I needed to scream, but I had no voice left for anything other than the words I’d been dreading.
Bursting into the throne room, I dashed into the center of the circle, ignoring the silence of broken conversation. Whatever the council had been discussing, it didn’t matter now.
“It’s Cronus,” I said breathlessly. “He’s escaping. There’s a storm around the island and—”
“We already know,” said Dylan, and I shook my head. He didn’t understand.
“The final battle—it’s begun.”
Chapter 16
The Last Hour
Walter had to shout four times and crack a bolt of lightning before the council came to order. Everyone was on their feet, including my mother, and the energy in the room jolted between nervous and aggressive.
“We have been preparing for this moment for a year,” said Walter once the din faded. “We may no longer have the allies we relied upon, but we have each other, and together we are strong.”
No one said a word. Even Dylan couldn’t muster up a battle cry. This would either be the day they finally sent Cronus back to Tartarus, or it would be the day the council fell. By this time tomorrow, I would either have a family or I’d be alone, subject to Cronus’s whims and darkest pleasures.