The Immortals (21 page)

“After they renovated it, they wanted to reopen it as a historical curiosity. But they never did, supposedly because of security concerns after 9/11.”

“Supposedly?”

“Well, really, a certain uncle of ours kept sabotaging the work. He convinced the crew that the station was either haunted or structurally unsound and they’ve pretty much left it alone ever since. Now the motormen see it as they drive the trains around the loop, but no one ever visits.”

“So this is where the Receiver of Many calls home?”

“Naw. This is too public for our uncle—since he doesn’t actually receive much of anyone these days. This is more like the foyer.” He walked over to the “City Hall” sign and dug his fingers into the mortar around the edge of the ceramic “H.” The entire letter swung upward, revealing a small button underneath. He pressed it firmly, maneuvered the “H” back into place, then turned to stare up at the chandelier. He smiled and waved at the lightbulbs. Suddenly, an exhalation of air sounded from behind them. A jagged section of tiles swung open to reveal a narrow spiral staircase stretching deeper underground.

“I guess they’re home,” Dash said cheerily.

“Of course you didn’t check first,” Selene grouched. Still, she followed him into the dimly lit passageway. For the first time in her long life, the Huntress entered the Underworld. She would have to trust the Conductor of Souls to get her out again.

After walking down at least five stories, deep enough to bypass all the sewage and electric lines, Selene watched Dash squeeze through the mouth of a roughly hewn tunnel stretching westward. The tightly enclosed space made her sweat. She tried to calm herself by thinking about the fresh air above. They must be passing underneath City Hall Park, right by the Mayor’s Office and the Tweed Courthouse. The tunnel continued for probably three hundred feet before ending at a small door. Dash pushed it open and Selene crowded beside him into the tiny room on the other side. Another heavy door on the far side remained closed. “This is like an airlock,” Selene said, her claustrophobia growing.

“That’s exactly what it was,” Dash nodded, rapping four times on the door. “Pneumatic subways don’t work if you let the air out.”

“You mean the experimental subway from the 1870s? The one with the fancy waiting room? It only operated for a few weeks, then I thought the city destroyed it.”

“Mm-hm. But urban legend collectors have been looking for
it for decades.” He lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Maybe some even found it. But anyone who manages to enter the realm of the dead, as you know, never returns to tell the tale.” He waited just long enough for Selene to start worrying that he was telling the truth. “Kidding! Uncle Aiden’s a pussycat.” He pecked her on the cheek and turned to leave.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

“You didn’t think I was going in with you, did you? I’m the
Psychopompos
. The
Conductor
of Souls, not their babysitter. Have fun accusing the most fearsome son of Kronos and his wife of leading a homicidal Mystery Cult. I’ll be back to pick you up when you’re done, but I try to keep my visits to the Underworld to a minimum. Safer that way.”

“What?”

“Come on. Big strong goddess like you.” He winked. “You’ll be fine.” But despite his cavalier attitude, Dash left with all the speed his name implied.

Before Selene could go after him, the heavy door before her swung open. Selene shifted her backpack so she could reach her bow more easily. She was prepared for a three-headed guard dog or perhaps a cadaverous boatman. Instead, a middle-aged woman stood in the doorway, squinting suspiciously.

Selene suppressed a gasp of dismay. She should’ve remembered that, like Leto, Persephone would fade faster than one of the Twelve. Still, the transformation was shocking. Demeter’s beloved only child had once had hair as yellow as wheat sheaves, dewy skin, and a body so irresistibly nubile that Hades himself had emerged from the Underworld to steal her away. Now, Cora’s hair was brittle, her lusterless eyes sunken, and the flesh hung slack from her arms. She wore a pink chiton richly embroidered with flowers. It couldn’t have been cheap, but it looked tawdry compared to the simple linen she’d worn in her prime.

“Cousin, it’s me…” Selene ventured. “The Huntress.”

Cora’s eyes lit up. “Oh yes, we’ve been expecting you!” She called back over her shoulder, “Dearest! Aiden! The party’s starting!”

Cora opened the door wider. Selene hesitated a bit.
What party?
she wondered.
What am I getting myself into?
She followed Cora into a long, vaulted chamber. Ornate gas brackets cast the room in a warm glow that reminded Selene how much better everything had looked before the advent of electricity. The floor gleamed with alternating black and white wooden planks, covered here and there by oilcloths of mauve Victorian bouquets. In the center of the chamber, a fountain jetted water in a tinkling arc. “As Time Goes By” echoed through the room from a baby grand in the corner, its keys flashing beneath invisible fingers.

“Do you like our ghost?” Cora asked as they passed the piano. “He’s very good, isn’t he?”

Selene murmured a noncommittal assent, her skin prickling. Then she noticed the power cord running out of the back of the instrument. A player piano, that was all. But Cora didn’t seem to be joking. How far gone was she?

Cora prattled on. “I’ve been getting ready for the party, although good fruit this time of year is hard to find. You know, I’d heard you were living in the city these past few hundred years, but I guess, well… we just don’t run in the same circles. In fact,” she added with a saccharine smile, “last time we met, you were trampling a field of flowers with your rowdy band of nymphs and dogs. Or was it dogs and nymphs? With your followers, it was always so hard to tell.”

Before Selene could retort, Cora continued her onslaught. “I’ll have to lend you something to wear, of course. That leather jacket and those baggy pants will never do. You’ll look much better in yellow anyway.” Selene bit back a snort of disgust.

“No, no, it’s no bother. We have plenty to spare. We’ve done very well for ourselves, as you can see. Isn’t it beautiful?” She
swept an arm across the lavish room. “Aiden lets me do all the decorating, of course.”
Of course,
thought Selene. “Do you like the flowers?” Cora went on. “I thought they’d be a nice touch for the Great Gathering.” She stopped to primp one of the many wilting pink bouquets tumbling from every surface. Selene breathed shallowly, trying not to gag at the smell of rot.

Cora opened a narrow, iron-studded door at the far end of the waiting room and led Selene into a stone-walled chamber. No pink or mauve here. Only black and gray—colors of the eternal night. A fire burned in a soot-stained hearth by the door, casting flickering shadows across the walls and floor and making the room uncomfortably warm. Despite the medieval décor, a modern sprinkler system peeked from the ceiling, and computer monitors covered the walls, each displaying jagged colored lines of oil prices and stock indices. Behind a vast desk, the Receiver of Many sat in a throne-like leather armchair. Even seated, he loomed over the room, impossibly tall. In the firelight, the pinstripes on his black suit glinted like shards of dark purple amethyst. Beneath his long black hair, his face looked as pale and gaunt as a cadaver’s, but his skeletal appearance didn’t mean he had lost his powers—as the Lord of the Dead, he’d always resembled his charges. In fact, he displayed none of his wife’s frailty. Mankind’s worship of money had only increased over the centuries, and he had clearly benefited in his other role as the God of Wealth.

Selene scanned the rest of the room, looking for danger. No swords, guns, or bows, but in a large glass case lay a dark Greek helmet with long nose and cheek guards.
Hades’s Helm of Invisibility,
she remembered,
forged by the Cyclops for the war against the Titans. Probably doesn’t work anymore.
Either way, as long as it stayed safely in its case, it shouldn’t be a problem. Of more concern was the seven-foot-long wooden staff mounted beside it. On top of the staff perched the bronze figurine of a bird. Hades’
scepter had always served more as a symbol of his dominion than as a useful weapon, but that didn’t mean the bird’s wickedly sharp beak couldn’t draw blood.

“See who’s come, my love!” crowed Cora, sitting on the corner of the desk and gesturing Selene to a narrow wooden chair beside the fireplace. “I’m sorry our first guest couldn’t be someone more fun,” she whispered loudly in Aiden’s ear. She pecked him on the cheek.
At some point,
Selene thought,
I’ll have to figure out when she got so nice to him. Last thing I knew, she was his eternally miserable sex slave.

“Offer our guest some refreshment, my love,” he said, stroking her hand with one long bony finger.

“Oh! How could I have forgotten?” Cora moved to a credenza against the wall and lifted a platter of overripe pears and browning apples toward Selene.

“No, thank you. I just ate.” Selene perched on the front of the chair, ready to flee if necessary.

Cora frowned. “But you must!”

“No really, you know I prefer meat.”
I also prefer not getting trapped in the Underworld by eating the food of the dead.

“What kind of party will it be if you don’t eat something?”

“I’m not here for the… party.”

Cora’s face fell. Aiden just sounded angry. “Then why
are
you here, Huntress?”

No use dancing around the point. The Lord of the Dead wasn’t known for his patience.

“Because someone’s brought back the Eleusinian Mysteries and is sacrificing innocent women—those I’m sworn to protect—as part of the rites. The hierophant leading the cult is no mere mortal—he’s an Athanatos of significant strength.” Selene fixed her uncle with an accusatory gaze. “Is it you, Hidden One? Have you revived the Mysteries in the hopes of bringing back Cora’s youth and beauty?”

Cora gasped indignantly, her hand reaching for the drooping flesh of her neck.

“How dare you,” Aiden seethed. “My beloved is young and beautiful until the end of time!” Selene could swear she saw a glint of red sparks within the black depths of his eyes.

She tensed, ready for a fight. “Perhaps love has blinded—” she began. But she instantly regretted her candor when her uncle rose from his desk, his hands clenching into fists.

Cora moved to stand behind her husband, clutching his wide shoulders like a shield. “Why’s she being so mean?”

“I just want to know if you’re involved in the murders,” Selene said carefully. She eased her hand into the backpack at her feet, feeling for an arrow.

Aiden raised a long arm to silence her. “You dare insult my wife,” he said with quiet intensity. “You dare accuse us of participating in forbidden rites.” His voice grew louder. “Such impertinence!” He pounded the desk before him. “Why would I bother seeking strength that way? Power approaches my very doorstep all on its own!”

Selene kept her voice calm, but her fingers closed around an arrow shaft. “So you’re not using the rites to—”

“I don’t have time for this!” Cora huffed, suddenly more annoyed than offended. “There’s so much to do for the party and here comes the Huntress with her terrible clothes and her worse manners, talking about things she knows nothing about. The Eleusinian Mysteries reversing millennia of decline! Hah! It doesn’t work that way. The Mysteries didn’t have that sort of power, not since the ritual changed.”

“What do you mean, changed?” asked Selene.

“I don’t remember exactly,” Cora said with an impatient pout. She emerged from behind her husband. Aiden patted her hand and slowly lowered himself back into his chair. It seemed as long as Cora was happy, her husband’s temper remained in check.
Selene released the arrow in her bag and made a mental note to play nice with her cousin.

Cora moved to the credenza and plucked a few slices of fruit from the tray. “You know how those old memories are,” she insisted, popping a withered piece of apple into her mouth. “No one ever wrote down the original rituals. No one even
talked
about them. So all I have now are vague, hazy images. Grain. A crown.”

“Then maybe they
did
once involve human sacrifice. Maybe that’s what originally gave them power.”

“Oh no, no. How gory! We’d never condone it. I may have forgotten the details of the cult, but I’d remember if we received offerings of
human flesh
. Maybe your hierophant’s just killing women because he doesn’t like them. Or to get back at humanity for abandoning us. I can see the temptation—mortals are such ungrateful little mammals. But their deaths can’t be adding to the power of the ritual—certainly not.”

Selene felt a weight lift from her shoulders. If the original Eleusis cult hadn’t included murder, then hopefully she was right that the killings themselves had nothing to do with her own strengthening. She must be gaining power from some other aspect of the ritual. But if the Goddess of Eleusis herself didn’t know what gave the rites their power, who would?

“So you’re not involved, but have you been talking to anyone about the Mysteries? Helping them re-create the rites? What about your mother?”

“She hasn’t mentioned anything to me. And she would if she knew anything, because she writes me letters
all
the time. As if forcing me to live with her for nine months of the year on her filthy Peruvian farm weren’t bad enough,” she said with a sniff. “I’m old enough to live my own life with my husband, but a deal’s a deal, you know.” She lifted a mushy hunk of pear to Aiden’s lips and he slurped it from her fingers. Cora used her sleeve to tenderly wipe the juice from his dark beard.

“The gods’ memories are long,” Selene said, her expression carefully neutral. She was determined not to get involved in a squabble between Persephone and Demeter that had clearly persisted for centuries.

“But even gods can change,” Aiden said softly, his eyes fixed on his wife.

Cora rested her lips against his forehead. “Even gods can learn.”

Right. You learned how to be a pampered housewife with no self-respect,
Selene thought, repressing a grimace. “If it’s not your mother, who else could be doing this?”

“The Sky God always envied our Mysteries, but of course, he’s probably still in his cave,” Cora mused. “The God of War’s still floating around somewhere, running a mercenary army in Africa, I think, but I doubt he’s bright enough to come up with a new cult for himself. Of course, the Smith’s awfully clever, but he’s not really the murdering type, now is he? I would say Asclepius, since he’s got a connection to our cult, but the poor man died long ago. Then again,” Cora considered, “the Wine Giver is really your best bet. When he joined the Mystery, it changed. He siphoned off some of the worship and offerings for himself. We haven’t seen him in centuries, but I wouldn’t put it past him to bring back our cult and keep it all to himself. He was always jealous of Mother and me.”

“An Athanatos can
change
a cult?” Selene asked eagerly. “Take it for himself?”

“The Wine Giver did. He told his own story alongside ours, then added his own attributes to the ritual. You’d have to ask him the details.” Cora turned to Aiden. “Speaking of wine, my love, did you put in that order for the Dom Pérignon?”

“You know I prefer something darker. Champagne’s a little… bubbly… for my taste.”