I change into some loose-fitting pants and a tunic that I hope doesn’t look conspicuously Olympian. Last, I plait my hair into a loose braid and then pull on a pair of walking boots.
In the mirror, I scrutinize my reflection.
I don’t exactly look mortal, but I think it’s close enough to pass inspection once I cross over into the mortal realm.
Because I need to see Theo.
I need to see him with my own eyes and find out if he remembers me too.
Chapter 27
I breathe so deeply the moment I’m outside the great doors of Hades’s House I think my lungs might burst from delight. I’d forgotten how free it feels to be outside of stone walls and dark corridors.
I head in the direction of Hestia House, up the hill, just in case anyone is watching me go. As I walk across the lush green hills, I realize the other things only a few days of darkness have made me forget. The sound of birdsong, the wind whispering through the flowers and across the meadows filled with tall grasses. For a moment I feel the hairs on the back of my neck and arms rise, like I’m being watched, but when I turn all I see is the tail of a dog-like creature slinking into the bushes on the far end of the meadow. I quicken my pace because while animals wandering freely aren’t uncommon here, animals who are spying are.
As soon as I clear the hill that crests to Athena’s palace, I cut behind it and head down the hill on the other side toward the God Gate that leads to the mortal realm. I’ve not been to the crossing place since I was a girl, and even then Clea and I only dared to go there twice. Once was around the mortal’s summer solstice when we could hear the music wafting up from the gate while we picked flowers nearby. We didn’t cross through but stopped to look out and watch their revels in the forest. Though the mortal realm exists on a separate plane from Olympus, there’re places, like the gate, where the veil between the two worlds is very thin.
The second time we ventured through the gate into the woods over a year later, we got hopelessly lost. We had been following one of the older girls who had decided to sneak out to meet a mortal lover. In the dark, we lost sight of her and got turned around. Sura found us a few hours later where we huddled, cold and wet from the rain that had started to fall. We felt extremely foolish when Sura ushered us back and we realized we’d only been a few tree groves away from the gate the entire time. But the fear of having been lost was enough to keep us from the gate from that point on, especially when Sura told us a warning tale of how one descendant had ventured too close to the gate only to get sucked to the other plane, never to return to Olympus.
I know that descendants regularly visit the mortal realm and return without issue, so I’m not sure that tale was true. But back then, it’d done what Sura had intended—it kept us safely home.
As I approach the gate now, I’m surprised by how much smaller it looks. When we were younger, the God Gate seemed like such a grand, terrifying, mystical thing. Now I see it for what it is. A simple country gate that’s powerful because of the power the gods have given it, not because it holds any special power of its own. I open it slowly and step through, ready for the rush of mystification I felt as a child, but there’s nothing. Simply a small, quiet click as the gate latches behind me.
It’s only once I’m walking through the forest that I realize I have no idea where Theo would have gone when he left Olympus. But if he was able to meet a mortal girl, I’m hoping she lives in the village near the gate.
I brush my hands along the leaves reaching down in my path. For a moment, there’s a crackling along my skin as my new power reaches out to find the life force of the trees. I quickly yank my hand away. Most of the time, a descendant’s power doesn’t work in the mortal realm and I don’t want to be an exception. Lately, whatever I touch seems to burn and die.
When I hear children laughing in the distance, I know I must be closer. I quicken my pace and clear the woods on the edge of an aspen grove.
I’ve never been this far out into the mortal realm and it...it is a sight to behold.
I know what automobiles are—I’ve studied them in Hestia’s books. But I’ve never actually seen one up close.
A large truck roars past perfuming the air with the acrid stink of exhaust.
I double over and cough.
It isn’t until my lungs are full of fresh air again that I’m able to straighten and decide on a course. With traffic clear, I hear the children again and see a park to my right, just beyond the tin roof of a quaint little bookshop.
At the park, I stop a young woman who looks to be about my age. Her dark hair is pulled back in a braid similar to my own, but her clothes are much more structured and close-fitting than mine. There’s a silver hoop pierced through her left nostril and more in each ear.
“Excuse me...I’m looking for a friend. His name is Theo.”
The girl looks at me, her eyes flaring wide for a moment. I immediately check myself. Did I forget something important like shoes? I don’t see anything out of place. Usually mortals can’t tell when we’re amongst them, but I’ve never been to the mortal realm so it’s possible I’ve misrepresented myself.
“Reyla’s Theo?” the girl asks, her accent slightly rougher than that of girls in Olympus.
“I’m not sure. We’re friends from...where he lived before.”
“Oh, so definitely Reyla’s Theo.” The girl smirks, but not unkindly. She points at a row of houses just across the way. “The blue door with the number 34 on it. That’s where they live.”
I bow my head. “Thank you for your kindness.”
The girl looks uncomfortable for a moment before jerkily mimicking my bow. “You’re welcome,” she says with an amused expression.
Though I’ve studied mortals for most of my life, I’m now realizing how very little I truly know.
I approach the door the girl pointed out and knock, unsure suddenly if I want Theo to be here or not. I hadn’t considered if my presence would be an unwelcome reminder of his home after he’d been banished. But my worries lift the moment Theo opens the door and a huge smile breaks across his face.
“Ana! What...what’re—” He looks past me into the street, a frown etched between his eyes. “How are you here?”
“I’m not sure,” I reply. “Suddenly I remembered you and...well...I was curious to see how you’re doing out here in this place.”
He pulls the door open to allow me inside. It smells like lavender and honeysuckle. The electronic contraption that I think is a television blares across the room. Theo says, “Trini, turn down the TV.”
I scan the room for someone who looks like a Trini, but there’s no one there.
A tiny black box glows orange, lets out a soft PING and the TV goes quiet.
“Who are you talking to?”
Theo grins and nods at the black box. “Trini. She’s a smart speaker. She controls most of the house.”
The black box is made of mortal plastic and metal. I go to it and give it a poke. It feels like nothing. There’s no magic, no electrical zap. “This thing controls your house? And you talk to it?”
“Kinda cool, huh?”
It hasn’t been that long since Theo left Olympus, but already he talks and acts like a mortal. Already he’s fit right in.