The Shadow Prince

chapter forty-three HADEN

I was born to a race of warriors. My training began when I was six years of age. I have fought and bested Underlords who are twice my size. I have killed a hydra with my bare hands. Placed my head on the altar and left myself to my father’s wrath or mercy. I have traveled through Persephone’s Gate into a realm unknown to me. But I have never experienced fear quite like the anticipation I feel: knowing that in mere minutes, I am expected to sing with Daphne in front of the entire town.

I’m pressing hard on my knee to stop my leg from shaking, and in turn, the row of chairs beside me, when Daphne sits down next to me. I breathe out a small sigh. I’d almost been afraid that she wasn’t coming.

“Want one?” she says, offering me an orangish, discuslike thing. It’s speckled with brown spots. “Might help calm your nerves.”

“What is it?” I try not to wrinkle my nose at her offering.

“It’s a pumpkin chocolate-chip cookie, dork.” She makes a teasing face at me. “You eat it.”

She drops the said cookie into my hands. It’s soft to the touch, yet firm. “You made a pumpkin into this?” I sniff it. It smells too sweet to be a squash.

She smirks. “Believe it or not.”

I start to take a tentative bite.

“And, no, I didn’t make it. Lexie and her Sopranos just gave me a whole box of them from Olympus Hills Bakery.”

I pull the cookie away from my mouth and cast it onto the table in front of us. “Are you sure they’re not poisoned?”

She smirks again, thinking I’m joking. “Good point.” She takes a cookie out of the box and takes a bite out of it anyway. I watch, horror-stricken, waiting for any signs of a toxic reaction.

“Mmm,” she says, and takes a second bite. “Lexie and I have reached an understanding.” She looks up as Lexie, Bridgette, and a couple of the other Sopranos call out their wishes of good luck to us. They’re manning something called a Check Your Heart booth as part of the festival. Signs posted around their booth announce free cholesterol tests and blood pressure screening. There’s a long line at the booth. I’m not surprised. With there now having been seven “heart attack” victims—three of which were fatal—in the last few weeks, I’m sure the humans are getting anxious about their well-being. The school principal even announced that they’re banning something called trans fats from the cafeteria, indefinitely.

If they had any idea of what is really causing the attacks, I doubt they’d be gathering out in the open en masse like this. They’d all be at home with their doors and windows locked tight—not that it would do them much good.

Watching the crowd mill about the festival makes my nerves bristle more. This place could be a feeding frenzy for a Keres. I can only hope it isn’t hungry tonight.

Brim and I have gone hunting for the Keres every night for the last two weeks without much luck. Every scent trail has led to either a dead end or another hapless victim. How it manages to keep eluding me, I don’t know. If I didn’t know that Keres are mindless beasts, I’d almost call this one cunning.

The question that keeps nagging at me is what am I even supposed to do when I find it? How do you attack something that has no form? How do you stop something you cannot touch?

How do you kill a shadow?

I pull out my phone and send a quick text to Dax, telling him that I want him to patrol the perimeter of the festival. I wait for a response but none comes. Dax is supposed to be here somewhere, but I haven’t seen him all day. I’ve barely seen him at all in the last two weeks.

I try Garrick next, sending an order to get his ass to the festival to help with patrols, but that message goes unanswered also. Ever since he admitted knowing the truth about my involvement in his banishment, he’s become more and more obstinate to my commands. Like he knows that I know if I push him too far, he’ll go squealing to Dax about what I did. He’s probably glued to that stupid Xbox device he brought home a couple of days ago.

My “entourage” has been anything but attentive as of late.

“Oh. It’s starting,” Daphne says, pulling me out of my frustrated reverie. She squeezes my arm with happy excitement.

How can she be so confident?

We watch as the mayor walks out on the temporary stage that has been erected for the night’s entertainment in the middle of Olympus Row. Each end of the street has been blocked off to make the festival a pedestrian event. The crowd quiets as Mayor Winters announces the lineup for the entertainment. Tobin will perform first, then Daphne and I, followed by a group number by Lexie and the Sopranos, and then a few more students—but I am too distracted to catch their names. Distracted by the look of disappointment that crosses Daphne’s face as she scans the people in the crowd.

I think I know whom she wishes to see.

“He’ll come.”

“You don’t know that.” She gives me a weak smile. “Things have been going well between us. We eat breakfast together every morning and we go to school together.…”

I nod. Joe had been visiting music class each morning, running through songs and assigning some of the parts. I’d even seen him bring Daphne lunch on a couple of days.

“I just thought he might come tonight.” She washes down the last of her cookie with a swig of water from a bottle. “But I guess that’s what I get for hoping on Joe,” she mumbles to herself.

“It’s not our turn yet. There’s still time. He’ll come.” I hope for her sake that I’m right.

“Funny,” she says. “Just a couple of weeks ago, I wouldn’t have cared if he never heard me sing again.”

Tobin takes the stage, to much applause from the audience. Surprisingly, Daphne doesn’t light up as she usually does when she sees him. Almost like there’s a fresh strain between them. Tobin performs a rocked-out version of one of the older songs in my new music collection. He starts out kind of stiff, like something is agitating him, but once he gets into it, I would be lying if I didn’t admit that he’s good. The audience seems to agree, clapping enthusiastically when he finishes.

I take the pumpkin cookie—poisoned or not—and shove it in my mouth. (Anything to help stop my urge to run and hide.) Surprisingly, it’s the first thing I’ve eaten in the mortal world that doesn’t make me want to gag. Actually, I could eat about ten more. I eye the box sitting next to Daphne.

She looks at me and smiles in the strangest way.

“What?”

“You’ve got chocolate on your mouth.” She reaches out and brushes her fingers over my lips. “There,” she says. “That’s better,” and she absentmindedly sucks the chocolate from the tip of her finger.

If it were possible for an Underlord to spontaneously combust, it could have happened at this moment.

“Come on. We’re up,” Daphne says, taking my hand.

My mouth runs dry and I regret having eaten the cookie. I down half a water bottle as she leads me to the stage.

Her friend Iris joins us there. Daphne asked her to play the violin in the background, while Daphne is on the piano, and I am the guitarist. Once we’d started rehearsing the song, and I discovered that my voice is supposed to carry the bulk of the lyrics—with Daphne joining in, complementing mine in certain parts—I wasn’t sure I could pull this off.

“You can do this,” Daphne had said after a few failed attempts during rehearsal. “Your voice is perfect for the song and your playing is technically spot-on. You just need to open yourself up to the emotion of it all. Let the words fall through you—like the song says.”

I try to remember that now as I start the intro on the guitar. The first few lines of the song are mine alone, and then Daphne joins in. The timbre of her voice makes me tremble. It sounds like how I imagine her caress might feel. I close my eyes briefly, calming myself. As I play, I concentrate on nothing but the sounds of our voices. Iris’s violin in the background fades away, and as far as I am concerned, the audience disappears. All that remains are our voices mixing together—no, more like clasping. Like two lovers who have found each other’s hands in the darkness. It’s a reaching, yearning sound that makes a wanting ache burn inside my chest.

This time, there’s nothing uncertain about it.

When the final note of the song falls, the audience erupts in applause. The sound startles me. I have almost forgotten that Daphne and I are not alone on the edge of her couch, rehearsing. The moment had felt like such an intimate one to me that cheers from the crowd feel intrusive.

Daphne takes my hand and I follow her lead, bowing to the audience.

“Your song,” she says, leaning close to me, as if listening to my heartbeat. “It’s beautiful.”

I tilt my head, studying her face, not sure what she means. Daphne smiles at me, but then her gaze flits to the audience, who stand on their feet, clapping for us. She’s still looking for Joe.

I can feel her mounting disappointment until I hear a loud, sharp whistle from the back of the crowd. My gaze follows Daphne’s as she finds Joe standing near the kettle corn booth. The smile returns to her face.

“That’s my girl!” Joe shouts over the applause. “That’s my daughter!” He starts making his way through the crowd. Daphne’s smile folds into a frown. Joe’s steps are too heavy, lumbering, and he almost pushes over an older man in his haste to get near the stage.

“That’s my daughter!” he shouts again. The volume of his voice strikes me as inappropriate, and his voice is tinged with anger. He holds a long-necked, brown bottle in his hand.

“Oh no, Joe,” Daphne says under her breath.

“That’s my daughter. She’s perfect. She’s everything a man could ever want in a child. And I gave her up. I traded her for fame and fortune.”

Mayor Winters suddenly appears on the stage. She takes a microphone. “The Joe Vince, everybody! How about a round of applause for our local rock star?” She leads the crowd in an awkward spatter of applause. A couple of camera phones flash.

Joe looks around, jerking his head back and forth as if he can’t figure out why people are clapping for him.

“Did you all know that Joe Vince is writing the school musical?” the mayor goes on, trying to defuse the situation. “Isn’t he fantastic?”

“What? I’m not fantastic. Don’t clap for me!” Joe shouts. “I’m nothing but a lying, worthless son of a …”

“Sounds like Mr. Vince has been enjoying our little party too much,” the mayor says, cutting him off. “How about we find someone to take him home?”

Tobin’s dad and another man break away from the crowd. They approach Joe like he’s an injured cat.

“Let’s go, Joe,” Tobin’s dad says.

Joe wipes the back of his mouth with his hand. He looks up at the mayor. “You know what I did. You know what I gave up to become the ‘God of Rock.’ And I’m not the only one here guilty of the same sins.” His gaze moves from the mayor and locks on to me. “And now the devil has come to collect.”

I take a step back, letting go of Daphne’s hand.

Did he really just say what I thought he said? Was he outing me in front of Daphne and the entire town?

But how would he even know who I am? What I’ve come here for?

Tobin’s father makes a move to grab Joe, but Joe takes a swing at him—too slowly—and Tobin’s father moves easily out of the way. Joe lurches forward, stumbling. He falls onto the asphalt. I hear the crunch of glass under him as he tries to break his fall with the hand that was holding the beer bottle. More camera flashes go off.

“Joe!” Daphne says, jumping down from the stage. I follow her without even thinking.

He tries to push himself up, but then looks, bewildered, down at his hand. It’s covered in blood.

“Bloody, buggering hell,” he says, holding his injured hand. “How did that happen?”

“What were you thinking?” Daphne asks. I can’t tell if her question is directed at Joe or at Tobin’s father for inadvertently causing Joe’s fall.

Joe blinks up at her. “Daphne, when did you get here, love?”

“He’s drunk out of his mind,” I say. “He probably has no idea what he just did. Or even what he’s said.”

At least I hope that’s true. Or at least that Daphne will believe it.

More camera flashes go off as Daphne grabs some napkins from a nearby table. She presses them into Joe’s hand. The blood soaks right through.

A Keres would be able to smell that much blood from a mile away.

“There’s a first-aid tent at the other end of the street,” Tobin’s father says.

“No. We need to get him out of here,” I say, helping Joe up. I need to get him as far away from this crowd as possible.

“Good thinking,” Daphne says. “I wouldn’t be surprised if pictures from this little event end up in the newspapers tomorrow.”

“I’ll take him home,” I say to her. Or at least to an area out of sight that will be easy to defend. “Stay here with your friends. Go find Tobin.”

“Yeah, right,” Daphne says. “I’m not sticking you with Joe. He’s my dad.”

“You called me dad,” Joe says. He reaches out and runs his fingers down her face, almost poking her in the eye.

“I already regret it,” she says, looping his arm around her shoulder.

“Really, Daphne, I can handle it.”

“I’m taking him home,” she says. “Don’t argue with me.”

A rotten egg smell wafts by on a breeze. It could be from one of the garbage receptacles placed around the festival or it could be a Keres.…

There’s no time for arguing.

“We’ll both go,” I say.

“Stop the car,” Joe moans from the backseat. Daphne had ridden her bike to the festival, and Joe was in no condition to walk the lake paths—nor did I want him out in the open—so the three of us had piled into my Tesla.

“We’re almost home,” Daphne says tersely. I can feel the anger radiating off her. I’m glad it’s not directed toward me.

“Stop. The. Bleeding. Car.”

I slam on the brakes. Joe is out the door before we even come to a complete stop. He stumbles onto the grass and I hear the sounds of his heaving onto the gravel path that leads to one of the lakefront beaches.

“Nice,” Daphne mumbles. She wipes her hand down her face.

“He’ll be fine by morning.” If I can keep him alive until then.

I run through different options in my head. If the Keres has locked on to his scent, then we need to get as far away from town as we can. Maybe take him to a hospital in LA? The cut doesn’t look deep enough to warrant stitches but … no. I couldn’t risk leading a Keres into such a populated area as Los Angeles, and definitely not a hospital. Simon’s house, perhaps? Where Dax and Garrick can help … But what excuse do I make for taking Daphne and Joe there instead of home …?

I open the door and stand outside my car. I sniff the air to determine if the Keres is on our trail, but the smell of Joe’s vomit is too overwhelming.

Joe heaves again. I turn away. It sounds particularly violent.

“What do you think he meant by all that?” Daphne asks loudly, as if trying to cover up the sound of her father’s indiscretions with her question. “What he said about trading me for fame and fortune?”

“I don’t know.” I’d pass it off as alcohol-addled ramblings if his words about the devil coming to collect hadn’t hit so close to the mark. “Maybe he really regrets not being there for you as a kid. Like he traded your childhood for his career.”

“Do you really think so?” Daphne almost sounds hopeful.

“Daphne. Come here,” Joe moans. “I need your help.”

She sighs and pushes open her door. “I am not going to hold your weave back as you puke, Joe.”

“Dappphhhnnneeee?” he says with a whiny urgency that makes me look at him. He sways in the glow of a street lamp, looking as though he’s about to fall over. “Have I always had two shadows?” he asks, pointing at his feet.

“What?” she asks.

I hear her gasp as she sees what I see. Joe does indeed have two shadows. One is shorter, about half his height in length, but the other stretches out to the border of the lamplight.

I suddenly feel as though a cold wind has wrapped around me and pierced into my bones. Two shadows. Two shadows. The Keres has been with us all along. It’s attached itself to Joe. He’ll be dead in a matter of minutes.

“What the …?” Daphne starts to say as the second, long shadow suddenly curls forward and rises up off the pavement.

I toss my car keys at her. “Drive,” I say. “Get out of here!”

Joe moans and clutches at his chest, and starts to convulse as if having a seizure. I know better. The Keres is draining the life out of him.

“No,” Daphne says, throwing the keys right back at me. “Joe!” She runs toward her father, but the shadow swirls around him, wrapping him in a transparent black cocoon. “What’s happening?!”

A surge of lightning builds in my chest, but I don’t know what to do with it. What if I throw it at the Keres, and it merely passes through it and strikes Joe? That would kill him faster than the evil bloodsucker that has him in its clutches. Blue light webs between my fingers, and then engulfs my hand and arm. I can feel it burning the fabric of my shirtsleeve off my arm. It will incinerate my skin next, if I don’t throw it soon. I look up at the street lamp above Joe. I pour all my concentration into shaping the crackling wisps of lightning into a blue sphere.

“Get back!” I shout at Daphne.

She looks at me. Her eyes widen as she takes in the ball of lightning I cradle in my hand. I am breaking another one of the steadfast Champion rules by letting her see me this way. I have no choice but to expose my powers in front of her, I tell myself. Either that, or let her watch her father die.

“Haden, what …?”

“Get out of the way.”

She twists out of the way, and I fling the lightning at the street lamp. An explosion of light and glass follows. The Keres sends a screeching, shrieking wail into the night, but it doesn’t flee like it did before when Lexie was the victim.

Has it already figured out that it doesn’t have to be afraid of my lightning?

The Keres forces Joe to the ground. He wails in pain, calling Daphne’s name. Another bolt of lightning works its way through my body. Do I dare take a shot directly at the beast?

Daphne steps in front of me. She plants her feet—staring down at the shadow creature—and screams.

Not out of fear. Not out of anger. But in a determined, deliberate way, focusing her voice right at the black, writhing cocoon. The force of it reminds me of the stories of banshees I heard as a child. The timbre and tone match the horrible, screeching wail that comes from the Keres. The shadow unwinds from Joe, and for a few seconds, the Keres becomes solid, looking like a statue of a monstrous, black, stone angel. Its giant wings bristle, its claws outstretch, its terrible, jagged teeth protrude from its jaws. It flings itself at Daphne, becoming shadow once more.

“Scream again!” I shout at Daphne.

She throws her hands out in front of her defensively and shrieks.

The sound rips the air and the Keres takes solid form again. I can see its terrible claws swipe toward her chest, ready to tear her heart out from behind her ribs.

I fling a bolt of lightning at its abdomen. The electricity catches it midflight and forces it against the lamppost. The Keres explodes into a thousand pieces, raining shards of stone on top of us. Daphne throws her hands over her head. Joe lies as still as death as bits of Keres fall onto his back.

Daphne hasn’t looked at me since I killed the Keres. I wish she’d look at me. She’s crouched over Joe, kneeling in the debris of broken glass and fragments of stone. She presses her fingers against his neck, and then holds them in front of his mouth.

“He’s okay,” she says softly. “I think he’s just fainted.”

I don’t say anything in response. I am too afraid to. Not until I see how she sees me now.

Now that she has seen what I can do.

Now that she knows I am not human.

Why doesn’t she look at me?

Daphne slowly rises, brushing Keres dust from her arms with her perfect, calloused fingers. Her hair drapes like a golden curtain in front of her face. She can probably see me, but I can’t see her.

“You killed it.” Her voice shakes, but I can’t tell if it’s out of fear or relief. “You killed that thing …” She takes a step closer. “… with lightning …” Another step. “… that came out of your hands.” Two more steps. “I saw it.” She is only inches from me now. “So don’t you dare try to deny it.”

“I won’t,” I say, wishing more than anything I could see her eyes.

“Good,” she says, closing three of the six inches that still remain between us. “Then you will know what this is for.”

Before I can react, Daphne attacks me. She lunges forward, crossing the last three inches of space between us. Her hands wrap around my neck, and she yanks my head forward against hers. I tense, expecting to be bashed in the face with her forehead, but instead, her warm lips close over mine. Her fingers slip into my hair, and shooting, tingling pain spreads through my skin wherever she touches me.

Panic overtakes my body. I feel my eyes go wide. I try to raise my hands to thrust her away. Is she trying to steal my breath? My soul?

There are stories of creatures that can do so, I am sure.

But it isn’t pain running through my body. It’s pleasure. Warm, radiating tendrils of it, curling through me under her touch. Her caress. It feels just as I imagined it would when she sang.

She presses harder with her lips, imploring mine.

I yield.

I melt.

I surrender.

My arms raise now, closing around her, pressing her closer against me. My lips give in to hers, parting, wanting, giving, beckoning for more in return.

Electric heat swirls inside my chest and shoots through my entire body. I pull away from Daphne just as a blue spark passes from my lips to hers.

She places her fingers on her lips, but I can tell she’s smiling.

“What … what was that for?” I ask, dragging in a deep breath, trying to calm the fiery nerves in my body.

Daphne tries to laugh, but it sounds like she’s out of breath also. She sweeps her hair away from her face. She smiles and her eyes fill with a bright happiness I haven’t seen in her before. “For saving my life. And Joe’s.”

She steps closer again, and I brace myself, hoping to Hades she will press her lips against mine again—wondering how she will respond if I do it to her before she gets the chance.

“For being honest with me,” she says. Her hands clasp my arms and she stares into my eyes. I can’t help but flex under her fingers. I want her to feel how strong I am. She laughs, and I know she’s on to me. Her fingers slide up and down my upper arms. Her touch feels so soothing over the scars in my right arm—my skin left uncovered when my lightning burned my sleeve away. Like I didn’t know just how badly the scars pained me until her mere touch made that pain lessen.

Harpies, my scars …

I start to pull away from Daphne, but I am too late. Her hand clasps tightly under the scars. “What is that …? What the hell?” Her voice falters, and I know she’s seen it.

Her name. Carved and scarred into my skin.

She lets go of me and backs away quickly. “What … why? What the hell is that?” Fear strikes into her eyes. “Are you insane?”

“I can explain …,” I start to say, but I don’t know if I really can. Not without exposing the whole truth. Not without breaking the most steadfast rule the Underrealm has placed on me. Not without losing every chance I have of ever getting her to fall in love with me.

“No. I don’t really want to know,” she says. “You’re sick, Haden. You’re sick and you obviously need help.”

From the way she looks at me now, I know any chance I had with her is over. She doesn’t see her friend standing in front of her. She doesn’t see her singing partner. She doesn’t see someone she would ever want to embrace again. She looks at me the way I feared she would after I killed the Keres.

She sees the real me.

She sees the monster that has come to take her away.

“Daphne, please …”

She lifts her hands defensively in front of her the way she had when the Keres tried to attack. “Don’t come near me.”

“Daphne, what’s going on?” Joe says groggily from behind her. I’d all but forgotten he was here. He rocks up on his knees.

“We’re getting out of here.” She grabs his arm and pulls him to his feet with one hand, and holds her other hand up to ward me off. “Don’t you dare follow us,” she says to me. “Or I’ll call the police.”

I let her go. I let her walk away.

She takes every particle of my hope and happiness with her as she leaves.