Daphne strapped the quiver with its single arrow to her back, then tested the golden strings in the onyx bow. Satisfied, she bit her lip and looked around, the air around her cracking and hissing with pink sparks of magic. "Over there, behind the knight and the centurion. The Reapers won't immediately see us when they come in. Hopefully, I can pick a couple of them off before they realize what's going on."
"You three do that," Logan said, strapping the shield he'd swiped from the wax Spartan to his forearm. "I'll hide over there behind the Viking. When the Reapers move to attack you, I'll come up behind them. Divide and kill, right?"
I nodded. It was a good plan, even though my stomach twisted at the thought of Logan's being separated from the rest of us. But the Spartan was the best fighter at Mythos. This sort of situation was what he'd been training for his whole life-what we'd all been training for.
We scrambled up onto the dais and around to the far side. Daphne took up a position between the knight and the centurion, looking like another proud figure standing there, the golden arrow nocked and ready in the onyx bow. Carson moved to her left, while I stood on her right, the two of us flanking and protecting our archer, just like Coach Ajax had taught us to during all the mock fights we'd had in gym class. Across the room, Logan slid behind the wax Viking.
"We'll be okay, right?" Carson said, fear making his eyes seem more black than brown behind his glasses.
"Of course, we will," I said, trying to make my voice light. "Just think how jealous all the other kids will be when they hear that we took on a group of Reapers-and won."
Carson tried to smile at my lame pep talk, but his lips twisted into a grimace instead. I knew how he felt. After what I'd just seen, I didn't know if I'd ever be able to smile again. There would be no winning. Not today. Not with the other kids outside injured.
Not with so many dead.
Beside us, Daphne remained silent, although pink sparks snapped all around her now, cracking like fireworks, letting Carson and me know she was just as scared as we were. The Valkyrie stared at me a moment, then at the band geek, before turning her attention to the open doorway. Carson gripped his staff and pushed his glasses up his nose, while I tightened my hold on Vic.
I looked at Logan. Even from across the room, I could see the anticipation in his face. The emotion made his eyes glitter like ice. The Spartan was ready for the Reapers, ready to put his fighting skills to the test. Logan gave me a thumbs-up. His certainty in himself, in us, and in what we were about to do, made my stomach unclench the tiniest bit.
We hunkered down and waited for the Reapers to come.
Less than a minute later, the first Reaper stepped into the weapons room. The figure wore a black robe over his clothes and heavy black boots, but I thought it was a man, given how tall, thick, and strong his body looked.
But the most frightening thing about him was the mask.
A rubber mask covered the Reaper's face from his forehead all the way down to his neck, completely hiding his features. That was scary enough, but it took me a second to realize that the mask actually formed a specific, terrifying shape-the face of the evil god Loki.
Once upon a time, when the other gods had first imprisoned Loki for his many crimes, they'd chained him up beneath a giant snake that had continually dripped venom onto his face, causing him unimaginable pain. The venom had eaten away at the handsome god's features, melting them into something twisted, ugly, and utterly grotesque. That was the face the Reaper proudly sported over his own, and the sight chilled me to the bone-even more so than the bloody sword dangling from his hand.
One by one, the Reapers stepped into the room, until seven of them clustered near the doorway. Seven of them, four of us. Not the best odds, but not terrible either, considering it had looked like there had been close to twenty armed Reapers in the main part of the coliseum. Besides, we had Logan. With his fighting skills, the Spartan was worth a dozen Reapers.
I crouched behind the stuffed horse, my heart pounding, a tight grip on Vic, waiting for more of them to file into the room, but none did. I wondered what the other Reapers were doing, but I wasn't going to complain. I was just happy they hadn't all decided to come in here at once. We would have been killed for sure. Now, at least we had a fighting chance.
One of the Reapers stepped forward. "Spread out."
I blinked. That-that was a girl's voice. I shouldn't have been surprised, since Reapers could be anyone, from parents to teachers to students and everyone in between. The two Reapers that I'd battled before had been kids my own age. Still, something about the low, throaty voice bothered me. It almost sounded ... familiar. Like I'd heard it somewhere before-
"Take anything that looks interesting or that has magic attached to it," she said.
I frowned. I'd thought the Reapers might have seen us standing in the doorway, that maybe that was the reason they'd headed in this direction, but it sounded like they'd just come in here looking for artifacts.
"And start searching for the Helheim Dagger," the girl continued. "They could have moved it here, according to our calculations."
My breath caught in my throat. The Helheim Dagger? How did she know about that? And why did she think it was here in the museum? My mind started churning. The girl barked out a few more orders, but I wasn't really listening to her words anymore. Instead, I concentrated on her voice, comparing it to another one-the voice I'd heard the night my mom had died.
The voice of my mom's murderer.
Where's the dagger? Where did you hide it? ... Fool. There's no place you can hide it that we won't find it. It's only a matter of time.... The sneering voice rang in my head, the words playing over and over again.
Thanks to my psychometry magic, I never forgot anything I saw, heard, or felt when I touched an object. Not only that, but I could call up those memories whenever I wanted to and examine them the way someone might look at scenes on her favorite DVD. I suppose it was my own version of a photographic memory, only with perfect playback every single time.
A few weeks ago, my mentor, Professor Aurora Metis, had asked me to use my Gypsy gift on a Reaper boy named Preston Ashton. I got vivid enough vibes from objects, but I could get major whammies, major, major flashes of feeling from touching another person. I could see everything a person had ever done, from childhood to old age, all the feelings he kept locked away in the deepest, darkest part of his heart, and all the secrets he so desperately wanted to hide from everyone-even himself.
Professor Metis had wanted to know what Preston and his Reaper friends might be planning, what their next move might be against the Pantheon. So I'd taken Preston's hand in mine and used my Gypsy gift to delve into his mind.