‘Hades?’ whispered Danae.
The woman nodded, pointing down the passage towards the belly of Tartarus.
Atalanta and Telamon immediately set off, following her direction.
‘Wait,’ hissed Danae.
They paused and looked back.
‘We can’t leave them.’
Telamon ran a hand through his flame-red hair. ‘There’s forty-odd people, we’ll never get everyone out.’
‘We came for Heracles,’ said Atalanta.
Danae drew herself up. ‘What would he do?’
The two companions looked at one another.
Telamon sighed. ‘You’d better have a plan.’
Danae chewed her lip. ‘There might be a way to save everyone. If I can create a distraction to draw out Hades, you can grab Heracles and lead him and the others out of Tartarus.’ She turned to the Missing. ‘You all need to come with us.’
The woman who’d spoken and a couple of other people moved towards them; the rest remained cowering in the cave.
Danae clenched and flexed her hands. They didn’t have time for this. Every moment they waited might be Heracles’ last. ‘If you come with us now, you might die, or you might live to see the sky again. If you stay here, you will perish in this mine. The choice is yours.’
The Missing gazed at one another, then slowly, like anemones appearing from their shells, they emerged into the passage.
Danae, Telamon, Atalanta and Charon led the way, creeping towards the cavernous heart of Tartarus. When they neared the end of the tunnel, Danae gestured for the Missing to linger behind them as she, Atalanta and Telamon peered around the corner.
‘Fuck,’ breathed Atalanta as she took in the vast mine above them and the hulking forms of giants moving across the walkways between the caves. ‘Those things are huge.’
‘You’ve fought a giant before, haven’t you?’ asked Danae.
Atalanta shook her head slowly. ‘Geryon was a mouse compared to these.’
‘There are more Missing working in the caves above. If we can make it up to the top entrance, there,’ Danae pointed past the walkways snaking up the sides of the mine to the platform where Hades first led her into Tartarus, ‘we can free more people on our way out.’
‘Anything else we should know?’ asked Telamon.
‘Ah, yes,’ said Danae. ‘Hades has a dragon imprisoned beneath that …’ Her tongue stilled as an icy wave of horror sluiced through her body.
Someone was lying across Typhon’s grate, their limbs bound to the iron bars.
Heracles.
‘No, no, no!’ Without thinking, Danae drew Charon’s knife and pelted towards the grate. Heracles appeared to be unharmed, but if the dragon breathed its steam before she freed the hero, he would be roasted.
She fell to her knees, sweat stinging her eyes as she slashed at his bindings. Heracles appeared to be unconscious. She was surprised to find he was tied with roots severed from the walls, grey and dull without their pulsing light, but easy to break. With a grunt of effort, she pulled his limp frame away from the iron grate, just before a billow of steam erupted from below.
She collapsed, gasping as the hot air seared her lungs. Atalanta and Telamon hurried to her side, Telamon scooping his arm around Heracles’ torso.
‘No,’ Danae croaked, ‘stay back …’
‘What do we have here?’
Her head snapped round.
