Joshua and the Arrow Realm (6 page)

“Are you ready to lead?” His puffy white eyebrows rumpled up but his lips didn't move. His voice echoed inside me.

Maybe
, I wanted to say, but my words escaped me. The walls pressed closer and the voices of my friends tumbled together and grew faint.

“You will be tested, faithful one.” His voice pierced my head. I put my hands over my ears and closed my eyes to push the dizziness away. “Take the knife of Leandro. ‘Tis hidden in his boot. Plunge it through his heart like a poisonous root. What he seeks stands before him, but he cannot see through the gloom. Die he will soon. End his suffering under tonight's moon.”

“No! He's my friend.” Waves of tiredness beat against me.

“What's he doing to you, Joshua?” Charlie said, pulling me closer. “You leave him alone, you crazy old man.”

He didn't. His voice crooned on in my head, making me so sleepy. “A desolate wind crosses our land of sea and
stone. You must cross it alone. All will forsake you. Kill them now to end their pitiful life so abhorred. Only the heart of a true warrior can command ancient powers to be restored.”

“I won't!”

“Fail to face your destiny and die. Lose faith and die. Are you ready to die?”

“No!” I stumbled.

“Neither am I. Which is why you must.”

The cool stone charged up to slap me. Hands pulled me up but couldn't stop the black that rushed in.

B
lurred faces hovered over me. Cold rattled inside me from the stone floor. I breathed deeply, inhaling a bitter smoke and muck stench. The day's events spun inside me all over again. Hands stood me up as my vision cleared. I shook off Charlie and Leandro's grip. The strange face was gone, but humming floated from the hole in the wall.

“What did you do to him with your spells old man?” Leandro strode to the hole, reaching an arm through to grasp our neighbor's neck again without luck.

“All is well within his well,” the voice sang. “The past is leaves in his book yet to be read. A faithful heart will read them all and not get dead.”

“I'm fine,” I said.

“Fine, fine, fine.” The voice giggled. “Your mind is not mine, mine, mine!”

“We're not fine,” Charlie muttered.

The humming continued.

“I know what he is,” Leandro said, giving up his quest to choke the crazy man. “A rare breed that hides away. He carries the ancient magic of Hypnos. He hypnotizes folk and forces them to do what he wishes.”

“According to his riddles I've been forced to listen to, Artemis found him scavenging for roots in the Perimeter Lands,” Apollo said from the floor. I'd forgotten he huddled there. “She threatened to flush out his secret cave community there and use them as slaves—and bait—if he didn't do as she ordered. He's the leader of hundreds of cave dwellers in the Perimeter Lands. They're harmless folks unless provoked. Then you risk being hypnotized and waking up tossed in a bog. Artemis uses him to command her soldiers.”

“What did he command you to do?” Leandro asked me with eyes of concern. I opened my mouth but couldn't tell him. He put his hands on my shoulders. Their warmth soaked into me, chasing some of the cold away. I wanted to lean into all of his warmness but was frozen with confusion over what happened.

I swigged water from Ash's canteen. My friends waited for an answer. “Nothing,” I mumbled.

“And you came here for nothing,” Apollo said. “There's no use fighting. It's hopeless.”

“Stop saying that.” But he just stood there with a sad look on his face. “We didn't come here for nothing.”

“
Oui
,” Charlie butted in. “We came here for you, King-man.”

“I'd listen to your friends, King,” Leandro said, crossing his arms. “It all started in the Lost Realm with one boy, one king, and one hope to change our world.”

Something stirred inside me with his words—
something bigger than me.

The floor shook. Marching feet hammered our way.

“Here comes the queen's army,” sang our neighbor. “Ruled by the mean and smarmy.”

Leandro bent down to his boot. “Don't do it,” I said. “They'll kill you.”

He let his hand fall and straightened. “How did you know?”

“The Hypnos guy told me.”

He frowned but there was no more time to talk. Soldiers ripped open the cell and grabbed me and Charlie.

“No!” Apollo came to life and hooked my shirt with his fist. “Take me instead.”

“We intend to soon, prisoner, queen's orders, but not yet.” A soldier pushed him into the wall and held a knife to Leandro, who struggled to get to us. “You'll be later, traitor. The queen has other plans for you.” Then Charlie and I were hauled down the corridor.

“Leandro!” I twisted around, reaching for him while digging my heels into the floor. A soldier thrust a hissing vape in his face and locked the cell.

“I'll find you,” he called out. Leandro's face creased with fear, and he clutched the bars next to Apollo, his pale face frozen in a grimace.

We turned the bend and my friends were gone.

They took our neighbor too, who turned out to be a short, fat man in a frayed gray robe. He waved lumpy arms at us, his giggles filling the air like bubbles. “The beasts soon feast!” His high-pitched voice cut into my ears.

“Feast on this.” Charlie kicked at Hypnos as we turned another corner, but the old man jumped to the side and Charlie kicked the soldier instead, receiving a
hard
whomp
to the head for it. With each step, I grew farther and farther from Leandro and Apollo. We'd met up again only to be separated, and Charlie and I were now on our own. No weapons. No orb. No one to watch over us.

The guards' swords clattered on the walls as we climbed the steps out of the dungeon. The torches crackled from the wind racing through the stairway, and the soldier's vapes hissed back. Out of the corner of my eye, a vape's snake tongue waved near my head. I leaned back, but the soldier's calloused hands choked my wrist, pulling me tight to him as we mounted the stairs. Rough rock scraped my side, ripping across my skin.

“Time to hit the showers, you ignorant Barbaros,” my guard grumbled and pushed me along. “You're stinking up the castle!”

Charlie and I soon found ourselves separated, shoved down different corridors. Fear that I'd never see him again zipped through me. His eyes reflected the same thought as he turned the corner. I was pitched headfirst into a cell where I waited until a servant arrived to spray me with water from a thick hose while another cranked a rusty wheel on a wall to pump it in. I sucked in water by surprise, but the cold liquid tasted good and soothed my dry throat. The soldier on guard laughed at me as I was led into another room with a giant rusty fan. A servant pumped a pedal attached to it, and it blew me dry within minutes.

After what seemed like the longest hour of my life, Charlie and I were thrown back together in a corridor. Shivering, we cast grateful glances at one another as we trod in front of our guards. The scent of roasting meat and fresh baked bread clung to the air, stirring my stomach
juices like crazy. The clanging of pots mixed with voices. Wood smoke wafted by as we passed a kitchen. The servants stopped their duties, hands in midair, to stare as we were forced along the hall.

“Hurry Reekers, the queen awaits in her personal throne room.” My guard gave me a good shake.

Light and shadows crept up the forbidding walls that stretched taller with each step. The echoes of our feet on the hard slab crowded around us until we reached the queen's royal room. Over the doorway, an archer on her horse raced along with the words:
Hunt well or die. Mercy breeds weakness. We live on through wretched flesh. Immortality shall be ours again!

The soldiers shoved us into a brightly lit room. A tiered chandelier dripped with wax from dozens of lit candles. More candles lined steps, a yawning fireplace, and windowsills. I squinted from the light that burned in blazing streaks and wondered how the heck we were going to get out of this mess.

Q
ueen Artemis sat at the end of the room on a massive bronze throne that shimmered in the fire's flickering flames. Colorful tapestries filled with bloody scenes of hunters riding horses through a forest hung from the walls. They chased monstrous beasts—and those beasts chased kids as bait. Sheer terror was painted on the kids' faces as curved teeth snapped at their feet.

I shivered even as sweat broke across my upper lip. Artemis tapped her fingers on the throne and waved us forward. Flames burst across her black sunglasses, her eyes spears of fire. Charlie and I were shoved toward her. Hypnos hung back on the arm of his soldier, humming to himself.

“I've been waiting for you.” She pointed at me. A whack from behind forced me on my knees. Charlie fell beside me, breathing heavily.

“Why?” I asked.

A boot to my back knocked my face onto the floor.
“For the love of Olympus, don't question the queen, Reeker fool,” a rough voice snarled.

Charlie reached for me, but a swift kick sent him sprawling too. I rubbed my face and sat back on my knees again. The fire's flames crackled and spit at me.

Artemis laughed along with it. “You're going to give me the world, that's why, Oracle.”

I kept my mouth shut, not wanting another boot to my back. Hypnos hummed louder. It filled my head with an aching buzz.

Charlie and I found ourselves hauled up, our sleeves pushed aside, and our forearms stamped with the mark of the Arrow Realm slave brand. I tried to wrench away, but the soldier gripped me harder, pressing the stamp deeper into my arm and hissed in my ear. “Do you want a fire brand instead, Reeker?”

I shook my head and let him do his dirty work, becoming a slave on Nostos for the second time. I traced my new mark. A black arrow. It flared across my skin, encircled by a ring of fire. Around the ring read the words:
No escape. Your armor of flesh and bone fuels us on!

Artemis stood, turning her bracelet back and forth. The light glimmered across her purple velvet tunic and sparkled in her gnarly crown. Her face looked young, but up close, she could be old enough to be my mother. It struck me that her mother had been queen when my mother was imprisoned here, and now I was this queen's prisoner.

“That Wild Child betrayed me like Leandro.” She pointed at me. “What do you think should happen to her?”

“Leave her alone,” I said.

Artemis smiled with her thin lips. “Don't worry; I
swear by the gods she won't be harmed. I have a special place in my heart for the Wild Childs, like Leandro. You see, the dead father of my daughter was one. Leandro, on the other hand …” She spread her hands out and cocked her head.

“Don't hurt him! He's my … my—” I squeezed my hands to my thighs.

“He's what? Your friend? Your leader?” Her eyes blazed. Charlie glanced at me, chewing on a finger. “Or something else.”

“He's my friend. He wants to help your world—my world. Can't you see that?”

Artemis motioned to a soldier, who dragged me and Charlie closer to her.

“I see many things, Joshua.” My name on her lips sent a quiver across my chest as she circled me. “Now Hypnos will see into you and you shall give me the world. Come, Hypnos! It's time to do your duty or your people will pay.”

Hypnos stopped humming and edged along the wall toward us, pulling on his tufts of hair as his nails
click-clicked
across the rough stone. Charlie pushed up against me as the soldiers crowded us in, their breaths hot on my neck with vapes poised to zap us into ash. The fire's smoke stung my eyes. I grew woozy as the shadows crept taller around me, wanting to suck me up in darkness.

“I don't have anything to give you,” I mumbled, trying not to faint. Charlie clamped a hand on my arm as I swayed. I closed my eyes, and when I opened them, Hypnos stood before me with his head bowed and his hands clasped over his big belly.

“You have it all, Reeker boy,” Artemis said. Her purple outfit floated before me between the flames. I tried to focus but her fire eyes burned into mine, erasing everything
around me. I shut my eyes again to make her go away. Charlie shook me, but it made the dizziness worse.

“What are you doing to him?” Charlie's fingers pressed tight around my arm, then he was pulled away and rough hands held my arms at my side. “Leave him alone. He's been through enough!”

Charlie's shouts faded as words flew like arrows through my head.
Release your powers to the queen. Give them to her or die. Your companions die. Your grandfather dies. Your father dies. Artemis sees all. Now so do I. This will come to pass. Command your powers!

My father? How could he know my father and grandfather? Uncertainty swam through me in my frozen state. Hands gripped my shoulders, and I opened my eyes to the chubby face of Hypnos. His musty breath curled up my nose.

“You are the Oracle,” Artemis said, her voice rising. “The Black Hearted one has prophesied it.”

Leandro! Apollo! Where are you?
I needed friends who understood this Oracle business.

“Listen to my slave here, Oracle.” Her voice flowed over me like warm honey, soft and soothing. I stopped shivering and the hands on me relaxed. “Obey his request. Show your powers and release them to me. You can go back to your little life on Earth with your friends and family. Don't you want that, boy?”

Yes. So tired of fighting these prophecies. So easy to give in.

“No, don't do it, Joshua!” Charlie's words jerked me up. “She'll kill you when she's done. We stick together,
mon ami
!”

“Quiet, Reeker fool,” Artemis said and joined Hypnos's side, her sunglasses sucking me in to their black holes.
“Only you carry the powers of the ancient Olympians inside you. Only you can relinquish them to their heirs. Except you'll be handing them over to one heir: me.”