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Chapter Forty-two

Asteria

My hand tightened around Calix’s as I stared down the portal at the other end of the room.

He squeezed it back, gently pulling me down the bridge before us. On either side of it, the night waters of the Otherworld floated far below, twinkling in the light of the portal. The bridge was crafted entirely of star opal and arched high over the water, leading directly to the portal.

I looked down at the drop, reminding myself I could fly and had no reason to be concerned now. Calix chuckled, “It will probably take a while before human fears like heights leave you completely.”

“So unfair,” I grumbled.

He smirked at me, but my attention was taken by the immense portal before us. It was tall and circular, stretching to the cavern’s ceiling, and was surrounded by a ring of star opal that shimmered and shined brightly. Stalagmites of star opal surrounded the portal where it loomed at the end of the bridge, while stalactites extended from the ceiling in jagged points.

But inside the star opal, the portal itself swirled in a black mass. It looked like liquid smoke and swirling tar in turn. The thought of stepping into it… I swallowed hard.

“We’re supposed to go through that ?” I asked shakily, hating the tremor in my voice.

“Hey.” Calix turned to me, lifting my chin up to meet his eyes. “You are Asteria Earendel. Queen of Day. Future queen of Night. The former human who is going to destroy the pompous prince of Dusk. You managed to bring the great King Calix to his knees, my réalta. You can do absolutely anything .”

I smiled widely, leaning up to kiss him. I mumbled against his lips, “So humble you are, my dorchadas.”

He rumbled a laugh, “I have no need to be humble.”

I shook my head at him with a fond smile. It was true, of course. I wouldn’t be humble if I were him, either.

“You are a force of nature. A flaming comet that crashed into my life and turned it upside down,” Calix said, the colors of the Aurora creeping into his eyes. “You will walk into Tartarus and make it bow to you . Not the other way around. Understand?”

“And will it bow to you ?” I raised a brow at him, but my shoulders leveled, and I straightened my spine. He was right. I could do this. I wouldn’t let even Tartarus itself scare me.

I’d tried so hard to keep control of my emotions since I was young, letting rage win out to hide the fear that plagued me deep inside. But something told me that walking into the personification of everyone’s worst nightmares would bring that fear to the fore in a way Cyrus only wished he could.

I was stronger than that, right ?

But fuck… Tartarus itself!

This was insane.

“Of course it will. I’m with you after all,” he teased, pulling me toward the portal.

I took a deep breath. Calix looked to me, waiting for me to be ready. I gave him a nod, and together… we both stepped forward, our boots going through the swirling black mist.

Our bodies fell through the mist, and I closed my eyes until a haunting roar reached my ears. I opened my eyes, finding Calix beside me, still gripping me tightly as he looked around with eyes as wide as my own.

We stood on a black stone path, with jagged boulders lining it on either side, leading to a fork in the road just ahead of us. The sky was a dark grey color, rumbling with flashes of lightning. In the distance, a volcano burst with lava and plumes of smoke. Screams and whimpers of pain reached my ears from a distance, along with a maniacal kind of laughter that disturbed me greatly.

We looked at one another and, by mutual agreement, turned to walk in the opposite direction from where that laugh had come from. Since it came from the left, we immediately took the path leading right instead.

We crept along it, trying to stay as quiet as possible. But a sudden growl made me jump, and I looked up to find a deranged version of a mountain cat facing us. Its bright yellow eyes were locked on us as it licked its sharp teeth. Calix growled back at it, and it stood up, its burgundy fur bristling.

Calix let go of my hand, grabbing a knife from his belt and throwing it at the creature as it pounced. It fell before us and dissolved into a black puddle. Calix grabbed his knife from the mess, wiping it on his leather pants before putting it back on his belt.

He had just opened his mouth to say something when the puddle began to move. I watched with wide eyes as it began to reform and grabbed Calix’s hand. I pulled him with me as I ran. Wanting to get as far away from that thing as we could before it reformed.

“What in the Otherworld was that?” I hissed as I looked around wildly.

“I have no idea.” He shook his head, his silvery-white hair brushing against his armor. His forehead was creased in concern. Neither of us knew what to expect here, not when the myths about Tartarus were so varied.

We continued on, our hands never straying far from the swords on our belts. The rocky path twisted and turned through a desolate landscape. There was nothing but grey rock as far as the eye could see. But we journeyed on, until we finally came to a dead end. A gigantic rock wall stood before us, what had to be thousands of feet up in the air. I couldn’t even see the top of it with my Fae eyesight as it disappeared into the smoke-colored clouds.

The sound of pained moans reached my pointed ears, and I tilted my head back to try to catch where the faint sound was coming from. As I looked back up the wall, I gasped, my hand flying up to cover my mouth.

What I had thought were crevices within the rock were actually people. They were chained to the wall, row after row, all the way up, with their feet dangling.

“Calix…” I didn’t even know how to finish the thought.

“It’s Tartarus,” he replied grimly, his eyes flashing as he looked at me. I didn’t miss how his hand tightened on the hilt of his sword, the tension in his body clear. “All these people, Fae or human, all those who died within our world, they all end up here or in Elysium. We’re bound to find others elsewhere, too.”

“ Great ,” I said sarcastically. He huffed a breath that he might have intended to be a laugh, but it never quite made it there. I eyed him speculatively, noting how uncomfortable he really was. “What’s wrong?”

He sighed heavily, eyeing the people hanging above us with sorrowful eyes and stiff shoulders.

“This is what my power does. It pulls the pain of those tortured here and injects it into my enemies,” he replied despondently.

“Calix,” I called his name patiently, grabbing his face and cupping his cheeks. “We’ve been over this.” He shook his head in protest, and a flash of rage went through those purple eyes; only I knew it was directed inward in this case.

“You’ve never actually seen those tortured here before. This is tame for Tartarus, Asteria.” He scoffed. “I know. I’ve felt the echoes of it when sending my power into people. I don’t feel the pain myself, but I can tell what it is.”

Nox, he knew what kind of torture went on here?

“And I torture them with that pain anyway,” he smirked, a mockery of his usual one, more sarcastic than amused. “And now you’ll get to see exactly how fucking deranged I am for doing so.”

I stared at him for a solid beat, and he stared back at me, just waiting for the rejection to come.

“Fuck you,” I replied blandly.

“What?” he asked, confused. His brows furrowed as he looked at me. I stepped away from him, shaking my head.

“I said. Fuck. You.” I stressed as I jabbed a finger into his chest. “If you think so little of me that you believe this is what will send me running?—”

“Well, something is!” he shouted, throwing his hands up in the air.

“Excuse me?” My head reared back, taken completely by surprise by his outburst.

He ground his teeth, shaking his head. “You think I can’t see the way you’ve been pulling away from me? You can’t say how you feel about me, which is fine. I understand if you’re not ready. But combined with how I feel you trying to pull away in the bond…”

“How am I pulling away? The bond is always open!” I argued, putting my hands on my hips as we stared each other down.

“It’s open, yes. But you’re not really there. You’re shutting down. Like you don’t want to feel it. It’s only when we have sex that I can feel how you feel about me, and I can feel it, which leaves me confused about why you’re pulling away from me!” Calix explained, and my heart sank at the look on his face as he swallowed hard.

“If you don’t want to be with me—” He forced out, the pain on his face too much for me to take.

“I do!” I shouted, making him blink rapidly. But I could feel panic rising at the thought of how incredibly messed up this situation had become. “It’s not you, Calix.”

He rolled his eyes, and I winced at my own lame-sounding excuse.

“I swear. This has nothing to do—” I tried to say, but cut myself off and ran a hand down my face.

How did I explain how twisted up I was about something taking him from me? That I was burying all my emotions to exert some control over them. I’d tried to shut down my hopeless fear. Desperately attempting to prevent my feelings from brewing chaotically within me when I needed to be balanced more than ever… and in the process, I’d been inadvertently shutting out Calix and confusing the Tartarus out of him.

Maybe Tartarus was exactly the place to explain it, then?

I opened my mouth to do just that when a loud roar had us both looking at one another in shock. He grabbed my hand as his wings shot out, and I took his cue, my own unfurling behind me even as I internally cursed the timing of whatever horror had found us.

We flew up the giant wall, getting away before whatever that creature was reached us. It took longer than I expected to reach the top, but when we did, we flew even faster down the other side. We both silently agreed to keep our wings out as we continued, just in case.

I wanted to finish our discussion, especially with that mulish look still on his face and his pain echoing through the bond. But this place was making me distinctly uncomfortable. It was so dark that I was only able to see a tiny bit ahead of me, thanks to my Fae eyesight. The rocky ground was surrounded by three sides of what looked like a jagged mountain range, but I couldn’t see across the expanse in front of us to see if the way ahead was open or enclosed.

We walked a bit further, and I tugged Calix’s hand to get him to stop as I spied a doorway carved into the rock on our right. He nodded silently, and we made our way over to it. We made it about halfway there before the ground began to rumble under our feet.

“What now?” I groaned in complaint, my head falling back for a moment as I grappled with the knowledge that Tartarus apparently had it out for us.

Haunting wails echoed around us, and Calix’s head whipped over to where they seemed to be coming from. He inched closer, and I followed him, only for him to stop short, putting out an arm to prevent me from going any further.

I looked at him in confusion, and he nodded downward. I flinched as I turned my eyes in that direction, realizing there was a giant pit before us. The haunting sounds were echoing from deep inside it. Deep, deep inside . I couldn’t see a single thing down there, so it had to be coming from miles down. I couldn’t see where the pit ended when looking across either, meaning the doorway was the only way around it, outside of flying.

“The abyss,” Calix whispered in realization, looking around us worriedly. “We need to get out of here.”

“Wait, the abyss ?” I whisper-shrieked, yanking on his sleeve. “You mean like?—”

“The abyss is where the worst of the worst go. Souls so evil they’re tossed in here to experience the worst torture imaginable. This is where I pull power from when I want to get truly creative,” he explained, his brows pulling downwards.

“So, not good news for us then?” I joked, but it failed to lighten him up at all.

“Come on,” he said urgently, grabbing my hand. But the next thing I knew, I felt his fingers being yanked out of mine as something that must have been the size of an elephant hit me hard , and I soared through the air from the impact, straight into the rock wall.

It certainly felt like being trampled by an elephant , I thought deliriously as I groaned in pain.

“Asteria!” Calix roared, and what I could make out of his face through the blur of my eyesight was some mixture of horrified and panicked. However, another roar echoed his before he could take a step toward me.

Then another.

And another.

I looked up, trying to shake away the dizziness from the hit I’d taken. Attempting to see what in the Otherworld hit me.

Oh. Fuck.

The thing was huge, and seriously gross. It had grayish-black wings and legs, with a red-lined tail that was similar to a dragon’, but the rest of it… the wings ended in three long and sharp claws it used for hands, and it managed to stand on just its two legs when not flying. Its head wasn’t even a head, but instead, hundreds of black and dark green snakes making up a large mass on the top of its body. I had no idea how it didn’t fall over; it was so top-heavy. The snakeheads slithered and snapped, while its claws attempted to gouge out Calix’s stomach.

He had his sword out, slashing at the creature while he tried to send his shadows at it. It managed to bat away the shadows like they were nothing. Still, watching Calix work was incredible. The way he moved in battle truly was beautiful. He moved smoothly around the thing as its claws aimed for him, dodging snakeheads as he spun his blade in quick moves to slash at them.

I shook my head, forcing away the remaining dizziness as I dragged myself up to join the fight. I wrapped my hand around the dragon hilt of my sword and drew my blade, the silver metal shining in the darkness. I snuck behind the creature, meeting Calix’s eyes with a nod. He distracted the heads as I lifted my blade and drove it into the spot between its shoulder blades.

Its many heads all wailed loudly in response, making me wince at the ringing in my ears. Its arms batted behind its body to try to reach me, but I held on to my sword, moving with it and preventing its claws from touching me. I barely got the blade out in time, but I managed to duck and roll beneath its claws as I pulled it free. Calix roared as he slammed his sword into its neck, making the heads recommence their racket, but it still wasn’t stopping or slowing down, even with boiling black blood beginning to seep from the wound. I began to hack at its tail while Calix attempted to get a hit into its softer stomach.

I tried using my starlight to distract or blind it temporarily, but it paid my power no mind at all. Ignoring the shimmer like it didn’t even see it. Our powers didn’t seem to work on this creature in any way, so I had to assume it was somehow immune thanks to some weird Tartarus-related reason.

Between the two of us, we managed to hack and slash until it finally began to weaken slightly. Calix managed to get under the heads while I distracted it, and with a loud growl, he drove his blade in just under its neck, dragging his sword down until he’d slashed the thing open completely down the middle.

In the aftermath, we both stood there, panting. My hands were on my knees as I tried in vain to catch my breath. But roars from more of those creatures echoed even closer now, and they sounded pissed . They were coming, and we were in no way prepared to face one more, let alone the number it sounded like was headed this way.

Calix grabbed me by the waist, pulling me into him as his lips slammed down into mine. I eagerly met his tongue even though I knew we needed to prepare. The post-battle high still thrummed through me, and I could feel it echoing in him.

I tried to show him with my kiss the depth of my feelings for him. My heart ached in my chest at just the thought that he didn’t realize it now beat for him alone. My hand curled behind his neck, holding him to me like I could keep him there forever should I just grip him hard enough.

But the roar of angry monsters forced us to pull back from one another.

“You are so fucking sexy when fighting legendary creatures of myth.” He smirked at me, a fang exposed as his lip lifted. “My father used to tell me scary stories about the Ladon who guarded the abyss, and you just went charging in to stab away at the damn thing.”

“What else was I supposed to do? I’m not letting those things put a damn finger on my mate,” I told him fiercely, making his smirk soften, becoming a surprised smile.

“I promise I’ll explain everything.” I caressed his face, following the line of that sharp cheekbone, before running my fingers across his soft lips. “But right now, it’s time to get as far away from those things as possible.”

“Okay,” he agreed, pushing my hair, which was admittedly all over the place from the fight, back behind my ear. “As long as it’s not me, or us. I could take a lot of things, my réalta, but losing you would destroy me in a way nothing else could. My kingdom and the realm besides could burn to ash, every damn thing in my life lost, and I could find a way to recover. But losing you? There is no recovery from that. I would rather burn down my own kingdom than face a day without you, and if that’s what it took to keep you, I’d torch it all tomorrow.”

I felt breathless in the wake of his words, knowing how much his people and kingdom meant to him. I couldn’t help pulling him back down for another kiss, my lips caressing his with all the passion and feeling pent up inside me. The next roar sounded ever closer, and I forced myself to pull back, looking into those lilac eyes I loved so much.

“You’ll never have to, because you’re stuck with me, okay?” I replied, a soft smile on my face. “I would burn all the realms myself to keep you .”