Elysium

I opened my eyes and bumped into darkness. I gasped for air violently, taking one hand to my chest, pained. I wasn’t sure of where I was. I didn’t know what had happened, I couldn’t remember anything.

And then it all came back, in a heart-beat—I was Silena Beauregard, demigod from Aphrodite’s cabin. I had just been injured during the battle against Kronos. A drakon had wounded me badly, very badly to be . . . alive.

Looking around, I could see I was in front of a river. I recognized it soon, when I saw all the things that the tide carried with it—dolls, pictures, roses, college diplomas, toys, all the dreams that people let go when they died. The Styx River. The one in which Thetis had sunk her son Achilles to make him invulnerable, leaving just his tendon as a weak point, which had been the only way to kill him back to the Trojan War.

I held my breath, finally understanding. I was dead. The wound the drakon had made in my chest had killed me. It had drained out the life of my eighteen-year old body, sending me to the Underworld.

Dead. The word resonated in my head. I was dead. No more pegasus riding, no more Saturday afternoons with my father, no more summers at the Camp. 

Dead.

And then something clicked in my head. I was dead. Like Charlie. I could almost feel my heart racing, though it wasn’t beating anymore. I would see him again! After a week of thinking he was irreparably gone I would see him again! Again!

My smile froze. He hadn’t just died. He had been killed. Murdered. And it was my fault.

My thoughts were abruptly interrupted when a boat appeared sailing through the forsaken river.  It was Charon. He was here to take our souls to Hade’s kingdom—The Underworld.

I boarded. Breathing heavily, though it seemed I was the only one having problems with it—I didn’t need to anymore, but I kept forgetting it.

I wanted to see him. I wanted to see Charlie so, so badly it hurt, even if I wasn’t supposed to feel anymore.

And then a fact made its way to my head. He was a hero. He had lived as one and had died as one. He had been one. He was going to pass eternity at the Elysium. I was a traitor. I deserved to spend eternity in Tartarus, to suffer endless pains, though my guilt and my own regrets already haunted me endlessly. Charlie’s dead had been my fault. Completely mine. For trusting Luke, for not being brave enough to speak up.

I would be sent to some other place while he stayed at the Elysium. I was truly not going to see him anymore. I felt a whimper trapped in my throat, but there were no tears to shed inside of me. Not anymore. I wasn’t going to see him ever again.

Just once. Please, I prayed, only once. Seeing him, I didn’t ask for more—knew I didn’t deserve it—not to touch him, not to talk to him. Just seeing him was enough.

"One more time" I whispered. "I know I don't deserve it, but there's something I need to tell him. It's not about me" I said. "He needs to know, he has the right to know. After that, my soul can disappear into nothing if that's my punishment. But one more time. Please."