Face of Death (13 page)

I looked at the empty wooden bench. It wasn’t exactly sanitary.

“Here.” Matt sat down and motioned for me to join him. “You can put your head in my lap so your hair doesn’t stick to whatever this substance is coating the bench. My guess is year-old chewing gum and…well, I don’t want to know what else.”

Put my head in his lap and sleep? That was way too intimate.

“Jodi.” He frowned at me. “You know you can trust me. I’m not going to do anything to you while you sleep.”

He wasn’t the one I was worried about. “I know that.” It was four in the morning, and I was exhausted, so I curled up on the bench next to him and rested my head on the edge of his lap, not daring to touch any more of him than necessary.

I closed my eyes and wondered what Alex was doing.

Heat prickled against my skin as I led the soul past Tony and Ethan and into the depths of Tartarus. He cowered behind me, not wanting to follow but unable to stop his legs from moving. I knew the feeling. Hades had done the same thing to me on several occasions.

“Please, don’t make me go. I’m sorry. For everything. Please.” He grabbed my hand, squeezing it with every sobbing heave of his body.

“I’m sorry, but there’s nothing I can do. Once the judges make their decision, I have to follow their judgment. They said to bring you here. I’m powerless to change your fate.” Even as the words left my mouth, they felt foreign. I was going through the motions down here. The only reason I was aware of what my body and Ophi soul were doing in the underworld was because my human soul was asleep. When I tuned out one soul, the other took over.

The man, Henry Something-or-Other, continued to wail. Knowing what awaited him in Tartarus, I couldn’t help feeling sorry for the guy, even if he had done terrible things in his life. I wasn’t really one to judge.

“Oh, good. Another one.” Abby smirked. “Who knew there were so many damned sinners in the world?”

“You’re one to talk. Your punishment didn’t end too long ago.”

Her eyes burned into mine. “And it will be time for yours again soon.”

I turned away, not wanting to see Henry’s horror or the look of pleasure on Abby’s face, and headed back to the palace. As I passed the Fields of Asphodel, I felt a pull in that direction.

“Jodi.”

Alex. I fought the urge to run into his arms. I had to be careful in case Hades was watching us. We never really knew where he was. Ever since we’d made the deal with him, we’d seen him less and less. It was strange, but the second I tuned in to my Ophi soul, I had access to all my memories in the underworld. I just had to be careful not to access them all at once. Between the torture and bringing souls to their own personal forms of Hell, it got overwhelming really quickly.

I walked slowly to Alex, looking around for signs of Hades. “Hey.”

“You came.” He looked deep into my eyes. “It’s you. How? Did you release your soul already?”

“No. My human soul is sleeping, and that brought my focus back here. It’s happened before, though. When we were in Tartarus. The pain yanked my focus back to my body.” Just in time to see my dad. That image was hard to get past.

“The double vision thing is tough, huh? Tony said it would be, but I’ve been hoping he was wrong.” He reached for my hand, lacing my fingers through his. God, I missed him.

“Is it okay to be holding hands like this? I mean, will Hades—”

“He’s been leaving the underworld a lot. No clue where he’s going, but we end up unsupervised. He thinks we’re all still under his control, but when he’s gone we can do whatever we want. Our powers are too strong for him to keep a hold on.”

“He doesn’t have a clue, does he?”

“Not at all. Something’s going on. He’s too busy to notice us.”

“That can’t be good. What could he be looking for?” The thought hit me like a speeding Mack truck. “Do you think he knows what I’ve done?” I clutched Alex’s hand, squeezing it so hard he looked down at it.

“Easy, Jodi. I don’t think he suspects anything, but you
have
been different since you left.”

“Different how?”

“Every time you go by the Fields, I call out to you, but this is the first time you’ve responded.”

I’d been ignoring him. “I’m so sorry.”

He shook his head, dismissing it. “You’re not all here. I get it.” He got quiet for a moment, which could only mean he was thinking of how to ask about Matt.

“Things aren’t going so well for the human me, either. Matt had a tough time adjusting at first, but after I showed him his reflection—Brian’s reflection—he was pretty much up for believing anything I said. I left out some things, though. I didn’t want to overload him.”

Alex’s head jerked up. “What kind of things?”

“The whole ‘I brought him back wrong’ thing. You know, the bunny-eating incident.”

“Anything else?”

“He knows about us. I told him.”

He nodded and started breathing normally again. “Good. If he does anything, tries anything—”

“Matt’s not like that. He knows how I feel about you.” I didn’t want to tell him about the kiss—
kisses
. Or that Matt had said he still loved me. It wasn’t the right time to tell him. I didn’t know how much time I had left before I woke up and my focus shifted back to my human soul.

“I don’t want to, but I should go. I only have a couple hours to rest before the bus comes to take Matt and me back to the school.”

“He agreed to go with you?”

“Yeah. He needs to get used to his new body and decide how he’s going to start his life over.”

“Wait, you’re not ever going to release his soul? I thought this was just a temporary thing, to give him a break from his afterlife.”

“No. He deserves to live, Alex. I can’t let him die again.”

“Jodi, he’s a zombie. Maybe you gave him permission to act like himself, but he’s still not alive. He’s been dead too long.”

I hadn’t thought about that, but Matt seemed so different. He wasn’t like the other souls I’d brought back. He seemed so alive.

“I don’t know. I’ll figure it out. There’s still time for me to decide what to do about him.”

“Please think about this…”

Alex’s image faded as Matt gently shook my shoulder. “The bus is here.”

I sat up, rubbing my eyes. Alex was gone. I was with my human soul again. With Matt. I hadn’t gotten the chance to say goodbye or tell Alex I loved him.

“You okay?” Matt rubbed my arm, concern all over his face.

“Bad dream.” This going back and forth between souls was too much for me to handle. Matt wouldn’t be able to understand.

“I know what you mean. My dream was really strange.”

We got on the bus and found seats in the back, away from everyone else. Not many people were on the bus this early in the morning.

“What was it about?” I kept my voice barely above a whisper in case Matt’s dream had been of the underworld, too.

“You. Me. That Alex guy and some other people I don’t know. We were in a cemetery, and this guy was telling you to choose your dad and me. He must have meant over Alex. At first, I thought the dream was just my mind trying to process you being with Alex now, but then something weird happened. The guy said you weren’t allowed to have any kids. Strange, right?”

Not strange. Matt’s dream was exactly what had happened in the cemetery the night Hades brought him back to life.

“Then you and I talked, but you were crying, so I wiped a tear from your cheek. I don’t remember anything else, so that must be when I woke up.”

No, that was when he’d died…again. My mouth couldn’t form words. I couldn’t tell him the truth, could I? How would he react to knowing I’d killed him again? That he’d once been in Heaven, and because of me Hades had sentenced him to eternity in the Fields of Asphodel, where he barely knew his own name?

“Matt, how much about me do you really want to know?” Letting him decide for himself was the only fair thing to do.

“What do you mean? You told me about what you can do.” He looked around to make sure no one was eavesdropping, even though we hadn’t said anything too bizarre. Yet.

“I’ve done a lot of bad things, not all on purpose.” I played with the hem of my shirt. “There’s more to tell you about us. You and me.”

He straightened up in the seat and stared at me. “Go on.”

“Your dream, it wasn’t a dream. It was a memory. That really did happen.” He shook his head, but I continued. “Matt, when you kissed me in my backyard and you died, I brought you back to life. Only, I did it wrong and Alex had to…” I couldn’t say it. He’d hate Alex even more.

“What did he do to me?” His fists were clenched at his sides.

“He had to release your soul, only he wasn’t powerful enough to do it yet so he poisoned you with his blood. You died again.”

“He killed me?” His voice was way too loud, and a few people turned around to look at us.

We both slumped down in the seats, hiding from view.

“He had to. You weren’t you anymore. It was your body, but your soul didn’t fully return. You were a zombie. I watched you rip apart a bunny.”

His hands flew to his face, covering his eyes. “Please, tell me you’re making this up. I’ve handled a lot since we came back. I’ve believed a bunch of crazy stuff, but this is too much.”

“I’m sorry. Do you want me to stop?”

He lowered his hands. “No. Keep going. How did I end up in the cemetery with you?”

“It was months later. Hades had this plan to get me to wipe out the Ophi line, but I refused. He raised you—only this time, you weren’t a zombie. You were you. Human. Alive. When you touched my tear you died again.” I looked away, unable to face him after such a huge confession.

He didn’t say anything for a long time. We rode along, watching the scenery go by. Part of me felt like an idiot for unloading all that on him. Maybe ignorance really was bliss. But didn’t he have a right to know what had happened to him, no matter how bad it was?

The bus pulled up to a stop, and a bunch of people got out. Matt and I had at least another two stops before we’d be close enough to walk to the school. I wondered how long he’d keep up the silent treatment. Once the bus was back on the road, I turned to look at Matt.

“Do you hate me?”

He sighed and shifted in the seat so he was facing me. “I could never hate you.”

“Then why the silent treatment? I figured you’d yell or ask more questions, but you didn’t do or say anything.”

He brushed a strand of blonde hair out of my face. “Have I mentioned how much I miss your hair?”

Me too. In the right lighting, my crazy waves almost looked Medusa-like. In a non-creepy-snake kind of way. Without my powers or my hair, I wasn’t feeling connected to Medusa at all, and she was the one I had to talk to if I was going to save the Ophi.

“Did I lose you?”

“Sorry, just thinking.”

“I figured that.” He fidgeted with his hands, like he didn’t know what to do with them. “Look, there’s something I need to ask. I’m not trying to be the guy who steals someone else’s girlfriend—”

“I know you’re not like that.” Was I saying this to convince him not to go there? Or did I really know this was true?

“I just need to know. If I hadn’t touched your tears, if I hadn’t died again that night in the cemetery, what would you have chosen?”

He meant
who
would I have chosen. Instinctively, I reached for his hand, but I stopped before our fingers grazed each other. I tucked my hands under my legs to keep from touching Matt. “You have to understand that there is no way for us to be together. My powers have killed you more than once. I won’t put you in danger again.”

“You aren’t a danger to me now. Can’t we stay like this?”

Stay like this? Forever? “I don’t know if that’s even possible. My soul is split. I didn’t want to mention this, but my dream last night wasn’t a dream, either. While I was sleeping, my focus slipped back to the underworld where my body and Ophi soul were delivering someone to Tartarus. I saw Alex. He said I’ve been kind of out of it, not responding to him when he calls to me.”

I couldn’t help noticing the way Matt’s eyes lit up at that.

“Maybe you’re becoming fully human again. Maybe your Ophi soul is fading away. Can it do that?”

“Honestly, I don’t know, but I don’t think so. I’m stronger as an Ophi. I have a lot of power. Here,” I released my hands from under my legs and motioned to the bus, “I’m defenseless.”

“And you don’t want to give up the power you had.”

I thought about how some Ophi had turned evil as a result of having too much power or even just craving too much power. It had happened to Victoria, Troy, Abby, and Chase, just to name a few. I didn’t want it to happen to me, too.

“I don’t, but to be honest, the power scares me a little, too.”

“Is this life really so bad? Being human? Being with me?”

This time he took my hands in his. My heart ached, knowing what he was really asking. He wanted me to take Hades up on his offer that night in the cemetery. He wanted me to choose him.

“Hades could make it so we could be together. You’d be human. I bet he’d love that idea.”

Maybe he would, but I’d have to give up Alex. I’d have to let Hades keep the souls of my friends forever. “Matt, you don’t understand what that would mean. I’d be sacrificing every Ophi for my own happiness.”

“So, you admit you’d be happy with me?” Hope filled his eyes.

“I was happy with you before all this happened, but a lot has changed. I love Alex.”

“You said you thought you were falling in love with me. I already love you, Jodi. We’d be perfect together. I think you know that.”

Maybe I did. Suddenly, this all felt like a huge test. A one-question multiple-choice test worth all the points in the world.

Who would I rather be?

A. Ophi and be with Alex

or

B. Human and be with Matt.

Matt stared at me while I struggled to make sense of what was happening. I was literally two different people right now, and they both wanted different things. I couldn’t please both. Ultimately, I’d have to make a choice, one that would hurt more than just one half of my soul.

“Am I wrong?” Matt said, breaking me from my internal debate.