Charon took hold of her fingers and squeezed them tight. With a shaking hand he touched his chest, then pressed his palm to hers.
His crimson eyes swirled into a blur as tears flooded her vision. She felt his arm grow limp, then his breath stilled.
‘I will be the light,’ she whispered, ‘I promise.’
Across the cavern, Telamon had Heracles slung over his shoulders and was leading the Missing up one of the stone staircases. Danae looked back at the grate to see Typhon rising out of its watery prison, the dragon’s taloned front legs clawing the edge, its great wings straining against the walls.
Hades cowered before it, arm still outstretched.
Suddenly, Danae was yanked backwards by a rough pair of hands and dragged away from the pit. Atalanta hurled her against the cave wall and shielded her with her armoured torso.
Then came the blaze.
Danae was forced to hide her face as flames roared from Typhon’s throat. The fire was so hot and bright, it felt as though the sun itself had emerged in the deepest realm of the world. Then the blaze darkened. She lowered her arms and through the lights bursting across her vision stared at the blackened rock floor, her gaze settling on a charred mound of scorched flesh and bone.
The smouldering remains of a man who had thought himself a god.
19. Flight and Fury
The dragon lifted its great head and unleashed a roar that shook Tartarus to its foundations. It had hauled itself halfway out of its watery cage, an orange glow simmering in the cracks between its emerald scales. Then the dragon drew another breath and chased its freedom cry with fire.
The heat was blistering, as were the screams from above. Danae’s head snapped up, eyes searching the spiralling stairs. Relief rippled through her to see Telamon still with Heracles and the Missing, frightened but uncharred, fleeing up the stone steps.
She looked back at the leviathan whose body was swiftly expanding into the cavern. Atalanta’s hand tightened around Danae’s arm as Typhon’s wings bashed against the circular wall, the dragon’s obsidian spines grating against the rock.
‘Come on!’ shouted the warrior, dragging Danae towards the steps.
Danae’s legs shuddered beneath her. She felt stretched, like a frayed rope held by its last strand, but she forced her body to keep moving. Atalanta did not look back at her as they climbed, but she did not let go of her either.
The cavern trembled as Typhon finally writhed free of the water, claws scraping the rock, wings and tail bashing into the walls.
The stone steps beneath them shook again, but this time it was not the dragon. During its reaches for freedom, Typhon’s claws had ripped through several of the giants’ chains, freeing a clutch of the hulking creatures. Now theyfled, thundering up the steps, sending a torrent of dust and loose stones raining down on Atalanta and Danae. The warrior grunted and increased her speed, taking the stairs two at a time, dragging Danae with her.
Danae’s lungs felt like they were tearing. She couldn’t get enough hot, acrid air into her chest.
‘The other … Missing,’ she gasped, pulling on Atalanta’s arm as she slowed to stare into the caves. Shades pelted past them, whips and weapons abandoned as they fled towards the entrance.
The warrior glanced back, her jaw tight. ‘We can’t save everyone.’
Then one of the giants above them tripped, breaking through a chunk of the staircase and sending a slew of rocks crashing down on Typhon.
The dragon bellowed and launched itself into the air, attempting to climb, the spines on its sail-like wings raking through the staircases below, obliterating them. Danae’s eyes widened as its shimmering emerald belly moved past them, so close she could have reached out and touched the burning-hot scales. Then a claw came crashing through the stairs ahead of them, leaving gouge marks the width of Danae’s head across the cavern wall.
‘Shit!’ Atalanta flattened herself against the rock, her arm thrown out in front of Danae as the dragon slipped back down towards the pit.
There was now a gaping hole where the next four steps should have been.
‘We have to jump.’
‘What?’ Danae rasped.
‘You’ll get there, just put your legs into it.’
She did not give herself time to think as she summoned the last of her strength and ran, then leapt into the air.
She landed with a thud on the other side, her legs dangling towards the pit. Gasping, she dragged herself fully onto the step and rolled out of the way to clear a path for the warrior to jump across.
Time seemed to slow as Atalanta soared through the air. She was like a gazelle, all power and grace, her dark braids flying out behind her.
