Jennifer Estep - Kiss of Frost

Mystified and still a little worried, I followed Metis out of the building. We stepped out onto the upper quad. Snow flurries had been flying through the air all day, and now, the fat flakes drifted down, dusting the ground like powdered sugar. Despite the cold, students still hung out on the quad, clustered together in tight groups, texting on their cell phones as best they could with their gloved fingers.

I thought we might be going to the Library of Antiquities to speak to Nickamedes about something or maybe even to the gym to talk to Coach Ajax, but instead, Metis cut across the quad. I followed her, and the two of us headed over to the math-science building. Like all the other structures at Mythos, the building was covered with statues of gryphons, gargoyles, and other mythological creatures, looking hard and sinister underneath their thickening coats of snow. As always, the creatures' eyes seemed to follow my every move, as though they were just waiting to shake off the snow, break free of their stony shells, and attack me. I shivered; pulled my gaze away from a pair of snarling, fanged gargoyles mounted on either side of the stone steps; and hurried after the professor.

Metis led me inside the building. Instead of going into one of the classrooms or up to a lab on another floor, I followed the professor down several flights of stairs. Down, down, down we went until it seemed like we were going into the belly of the academy. Every once in a while, when we came to a door, Metis would stop and either punch in a code on an electronic keypad or mumble a few words in a language I didn't understand.

I didn't know how far underground we were, but we'd passed the last classroom three floors ago. There were just as many lights on down here as in the rest of the building, but for some reason, the shadows seemed darker, longer, and deeper, like blood slowly oozing across the floor. Maybe it was silly of me, but I took care not to step in the shadows, just in case there was something hiding in them that I couldn't see.

Finally, on the bottom floor, Metis walked down a long hallway and stopped outside a strange door. Unlike the other metal ones we'd passed, this door was made out of the same dark gray stone as the rest of the building. Iron bars thicker than my wrist crisscrossed in a tictac-toe pattern over the stone, and two giant sphinxes had been carved into the surface. The creatures stared at each other, just like the pair above the main academy gate, and I got the sense that this was definitely a door designed to keep something in .

The professor stared at the door a moment, as if the sphinxes might turn their heads and reveal some secret to her. But the statues remained fixed where they were, so she looked at me.

"I guess I should tell you where we are," Metis said.

"The Mythos Academy prison, right?" I asked. "I saw the sign for the morgue on the floor above this one, so I'm guessing this is the prison that Nickamedes was talking about at the ski resort."

Metis tried to smile, but her lips twisted into more of a grimace. "Correct. This is where we keep Reapers, Nemean prowlers, and other threats to students before they're shipped off to a more permanent facility."

I stared at the reinforced door and the staring pair of sphinxes. My stomach twisted. Somehow, I knew exactly why Metis had brought me down here today. "Preston Ashton's still here, isn't he?"

Metis nodded. "Unfortunately, yes. We've been questioning him ever since we brought him back from the resort, but Preston has been… less than forthcoming about what the Reapers are up to. I was hoping you might be able to help us, Gwen." She hesitated. "I was hoping you'd be willing to use your psychometry on him."

I heard what she said, but for a second, her words didn't actually register. Then they sank in, and my stomach twisted even more. My knees felt like they were going to go out from under me, and I staggered back a few steps. I started to put my hand against the wall to steady myself, but thought better of it. I had no idea what kind of memories I'd see down here, but I doubted they'd be happy ones.

"You want me to-to touch him?" I whispered.

Metis nodded again. "We've tried everything we can think of, but Preston won't talk to us, and so far, he's been resistant to all the magic we've thrown at him. With you, he doesn't have to talk. You can see his memories whether he wants you to or not."

"So what? You want me to dig around in his brain and see what I can come up with?" I asked. "What if there isn't anything to find? What if he doesn't know anything about what the Reapers are planning? Yeah, Preston's one of them, but he mainly wanted to kill me because he was Jasmine's brother, and he thinks I murdered his sister."

Metis's face hardened until her features looked as cold and remote as those of the sphinxes on the door in front of us. "Then at least we'll know that, and we can put him in a real prison where he belongs. But if the Reapers are planning something, like we think they are, then we're all at risk. And this is a chance to strike back against them-the first good chance we've had in a long time. Please, Gwen, I know I'm asking a lot, but we've run out of options here."

I knew Metis wouldn't ask me to do this if there was any way to avoid it. She'd promised my mom she'd look out for me. More than that, she was just too good a person to ask me to do something like this unless it really was a last resort. As much as I wanted to, I couldn't say no. Not if there was a chance of stopping the Reapers and saving other people, no matter how slim it was. My mom would have done the same thing if she was here, if she'd had the kind of magic that I did.

I blew out a breath. "All right. I'll do it."

"Thank you, Gwen. This means more to the Pantheon than you know."

Metis drew an old-fashioned skeleton key out of her pocket and slid it into the lock on the door. It turned with an ear-splitting screech. For a moment it seemed like the sphinxes looked in her direction, narrowing their eyes and judging whether or not the professor had the right to be down here. Apparently, they were satisfied she did, because the professor yanked open the heavy door and stepped through to the other side. I hesitated a second, then followed her.

The prison was larger than I'd thought it would be, given the fact that we were so far underground. It was shaped like a dome, just like the Library of Antiquities was, although with a much lower ceiling. I glanced up, but no gold or jewels adorned the top of the dome. Instead, an enormous hand holding a set of balanced scales had been carved into the rock. I shivered. Somehow, that was creepier than if the faces of all the gods and goddesses in the Pantheon had been up there, glaring down at me.

The glassed-in cells were arranged in a circle, rising up three stories, and forming the walls of the prison. They were all empty, but a stone table stood in the center of the open space, directly below the carving of the hand and the scales.

That's where Preston sat, his hands shackled to the table and his legs anchored to the floor beneath it. Coach Ajax stood on one side of him, while Nickamedes hovered on the other. Preston's head hung down, and he stared at the floor.

And there was one more person in the prison: Mrs. Raven, the lady who manned the coffee cart in the library. She sat at a desk just inside the door, thumbing through a celebrity gossip magazine. I'd never paid much attention to her while I was working in the library, but now that I did, I realized that she was an old woman, even older than Grandma Frost. Everything about her was extreme and opposite. Her hair was completely white, although her eyes were as black as coal. Her skin was even paler than mine, yet wrinkles painted thick black streaks all over her face. Her fingers were long and slender, but old, faded scars marred her hands and arms. She wore a long, flowing, white gown made of a fine silk, and black combats boots adorned her feet. I noticed those in particular since she had them propped up on the desk and was leaning back in her chair. Weird. Even for Mythos.