Anne Ursu - The Shadow Thieves

Mr. Metos closed his eyes. "They knew I was coming. The Footmen were waiting for me. Charon must have told them. I was a fool." He shook his head and broke off in a fit of some very nasty-sounding coughing.

"Oh…"

"I thought I could just sneak down here and free the shadows. This is all my fault." He blinked and stared at Zee intently. "Zachary, you have to go. You have to go now. They're already in the City" He smiled grimly. "I'm afraid I had quite a good view"

"What do I do?"

"You enchanted these shadows, Zachary." He motioned around him. "You know what to do."

Zee nodded. He did know what to do. He had known all along.

"Zachary," he continued, "when you get to the Styx, there's a bridge. The shadows built it, I saw them. Just cross it." Zee looked at him questioningly. "Don't worry about Charon, you'll find him lying unconscious in his boat with a nice lump on his head." He closed his eyes and took in a labored breath, then looked at Zee again. "And then head straight for the City, as fast as you can. You'll know where to go… Charlotte certainly did."

Zee stopped. "Charlotte?"

"Zachary," he said, and coughed again, "you'll learn that there are some people in the world you can't make deals with. A Footman tried to drown her, but she turned the tables on him." Mr. Metos allowed himself another grim smile. "That's a tough cousin you have. She made her way all the way to the City, and that's the last I saw of her. Now, go. Go as fast as you can. It may already be too late."

Zee nodded. He regarded Mew, who stared at him earnestly, her bound leg dangling in the air. "You stay with Mr. Metos, okay?" She narrowed her eyes and glared at him. He leaned over and scratched her on the head, and she mewed softly. "You can come save me if I get into trouble." He turned to the shadows and motioned to the injured pair. "Protect them. If I don't come back"-he gulped-"take them to the Upperworld. Listen to Mr. Metos, he will tell you what to do. Follow his orders as if they were mine."

Mr. Metos nodded. Zee nodded back, and with a last glance at the bleeding man, the injured cat, and the lurking shadows, Zee made his way to the Styx.

YES, CHARLOTTE DID HEAR SOMETHING. VERY definitely. Some sort of rumbling thing, some sort of stomping thing, some sort of banging and thumping thing. Something was coming.

The shadows were coming. The shadows were coming, and they were coming loudly and they were coming soon. In the throne room the two gods and the girl froze, listening to the approach of their doom.

So this is what it sounds like: Gentle at first, a thunderstorm off in the distance. It grows louder, and louder still; the sound begins to overtake the pounding of your heart. There is fire, there is destruction, and there is this – this relentless approach. You are still, you are aware, and there is nothing you can do but wait.

Hades stood up and swept to one of the pairs of glass doors, and Thanatos quickly followed, with Charlotte-heart in throat- following right behind.

From the balcony one could look over the entire Kingdom. Charlotte could not help but think Hades did not do that very often. On a given day, standing on this balcony, he could see his bustling City; he could see his languishing Dead; he could see the great, smoking blackness of Tartarus; the steaming, snakelike form of the Styx, with Charon on his boat and the unending line of Dead waiting patiently in the rope lines to cross into his Kingdom.

Now, though, now Hades looked down upon a vast and unending column of dark marchers bursting into his City. The shadows were alive now; they were tall and dark and fierce, like creatures of night black flame moving inexorably through the Kingdom. And there were so many. They stretched on from the inside of the City through the plains back to the shore. The City's iron gates lay twisted and useless on the ground.

"Impossible," he said. "How did they get over the river?"

To Charlotte that didn't seem the best question to ask at that moment. However they had gotten over the river, well, they had gotten over the river, and the point was pretty much moot. The Dead throughout the Kingdom had flown away from the wide path of the marchers and were cowering in the distance, so clustered together that they looked like great masses of light.

"How did they take down the gates?" Hades asked.

The marchers carried fire, they carried smoke, and they were working their way through the City toward the Palace. The Immortals, unprepared and untrained, were fleeing in droves. A few were fighting back- some threw small lightning bolts, some spit acid, some breathed fire or ice. But the shadows, they kept on marching. Smoke rose up in the City, stones tumbled everywhere.

"Why is everyone running?" Hades asked.

The shadows threw bits of themselves at buildings, the bits pierced the stone, and the stone burst into pieces. Sometimes the shadows walked right into buildings, seeping into the mortar, and the bricks tumbled down around them. Unharmed, they moved on.

"How can they do that?" Hades asked.

Harpies flew in and out of the chaos, cackling merrily, some throwing bits of building at the fleeing Immortals, some dive-bombing the crowd of shadows. The shadows threw their fire at the Harpies -a bit of shadow hit a Harpy and exploded her from the inside out- and, screeching, the rest flew away. Griffins soared in from the horizon, pecking and clasping, but to no effect. Their claws went right through the shadows.

"How is that possible?" Hades asked.

They moved so steadily, determinedly. They moved like fire, like wind, leaving ashes and rubble in their wake. And they were entering the Palace grounds. Crash! The iron gates went down, and the shadows began marching through the breech. They circled all the way around the grounds, turned to face the Palace, and stopped. The rest filed in, lining up beside them. Fifty thousand shadows stood in a perfect circle around the Palace, staring toward it, ready to attack.

Charlotte desperately scanned the shadows, but nowhere did she see the thin, mortal form of her cousin. "Zee," she whispered, "where are you?"

His words rang in her head again. If I can-

If I can -

They were all on the grounds now, filling in around the Palace, a great moat of shadow. Charlotte expected them to throw their flames, their magic, but they were perfectly still. Waiting. But for what?

"This is ridiculous," Hades said. He picked up his scepter, muttered a few words, and aimed it down at a regiment of shadows.

Charlotte gasped. "Wait!" she said, grabbing his robes.

He looked down at her. "What?"

"What are you doing?"

"Well, now… I'm not sure, you understand, because I've never done this to a shadow army before. It doesn't work on everyone. But I believe I am going to shoot a ray of interminable fire at them out of my scepter. The fire, you might be interested to know, is blue." He turned back and began to aim.

"You can't!" Charlotte jumped up and yanked on his scepter arm. "Those belong to children. You'll kill them!"

Hades tilted his head. "And?"

"They're just kids!"

He turned to Charlotte, smiled slightly, and patted her on the head. "Everybody dies eventually. Trust me." He picked up the scepter again.

"No! There's got to be another way! Anyway, you can't get them all at once, they'll tear down the Palace!

Look what they did to those buildings! Look, they're just enchanted. If you can break the spell, if you can get Philonecron -"

Hades said matter-of-factly, "Philonecron is not here. I banished him." He looked over at Thanatos. "Right?"

Thanatos nodded.

"See?" He began to aim again.