Olympus Drive Book 5: Situation Normal

Adrian

I'm chained to the floor of the dark rail car. This train only runs one way. I walked its tracks back out of the pit. And now it carries me back down. I try to move but of course the chains bind me far too tightly. My chest and throat ache from where they were cut open. I try to strain to see some light from beyond. But there is nothing. It is back to my darkness.

She didn't know me. I knew she wouldn't. But I had hoped for her mercy. From some memory of something forbidden for centuries, that is too sweet to ignore. It was stupid. But I wanted to look into her eyes and have her smile at me one more time. Perhaps that is my greatest punishment. That she looked on me and felt no real pity, and didn't know me. That I'll go to my final grave with that blank look of unfamiliarity in her sweet eyes.

Something rattles the door. I sigh. I don't know why I thought he'd let me live after this. I did try to get out. I begged him to let me live here with my memories. But this is what I did with it. Now I shall die. I wonder if I'll come back again. Or if I'm finally done.

I don't know much. But I do know I have lived a hundred lives. I suspect it's always gone much the same. I wasn't born in luck, but instead pain, betrayal, fear. A son with no father who wanted to acknowledge his own crimes, and a dead mother who cared just enough deliver me to caring arms. No. I've never had luck. But I have had good memories, and long days in the sun. I smile as I close my eyes, and I hear the claws skittering up to me. At least let me go, skin covered in scars, broken from trying to live until finally I was forced to die, and cast into the deepest pits of hell, a smile on my face, thinking of her.

Jaws reach me and I feel the creatures begin to tear at my flesh. I don't try to move. It doesn't matter. They tear at me anyway, happily feasting on my living flesh.

And then they start screaming.

I open eyes in time to see that blood red blade, forged from the blood of thousands of men, slashing over me. Most women couldn't wield a broadsword of that size, with that dexterity. She's not most women.

"What are you doing here?" I manage to choke out.

"Rescuing you," she says, slashing the chains, her dark hair braided over her shoulder. Black floor length dress sweeping the blood of the train car floor. "I assume you know how to use this?" she holds out my Gladius, in its scabbard, smooth and sure as the day she gave it to me.

"Where did you find this?" I was sure he'd locked it up, or destroyed it. The familiar weapon seems to slip with joy into my hands.

"Later, move," she shoves me out of the car. The night creatures claw up it, running alongside, fighting furiously to consume me. they won't harm her.

"What are we doing?" I ask, nearly falling as one takes hold of my shoulder. But my blade swings true and decapitates the monster, sliding through it smoothly to meet another that lunged for my neck.

"We're getting ready to jump---this train runs all the way into Tartarus—we need to get you off," she says, defending me from more night creatures as the slather for me, lunging of the top of the train car to snatch me up in their triple rowed teeth.

"Jump? Into what? The Styx?" I ask, staring into the blackness.

"Trust me," she takes hold of my arm, "On three."

"I trust you," I sigh. Of course I do.

We do jump, and it's more painful than I expected. She rolls to a three point landing, sword in hand. I'm slightly less graceful but do manage to hit the ground unscathed. I raise my sword, prepared for an onslaught of more monsters. But they don't come.