Walk With the Shadows [ Percy Jackson OC ]

TWENTY-FIVE | Ophelia

OPHELIA DROWNED IN NIGHT SHADOWS AND FIRE. All around her, heat blazed in her face, burning but not killing. She could still breathe amidst smoke. She couldn't see beyond her arms. Reds, oranges, golds spun around her.

Chaos. Entirely chaos. All around her, black and fire. Ophelia tried to scream. As she opened her mouth, sulfur and smoke choked her cry. Tears steamed down her face. She reached out. She reached for where the sky must be.

But no one reached back. Ophelia screamed. Fire consumed her. Hot, blazing, but not deadly. Eternal flames. Stumbling forward, the flames moved but didn't depart. She fell to her knees. She hit gravel. The pieces of rock dug into her bare skin as she clawed forward beneath the inferno.

How had she gotten here? Last she remembered, Alex had unlocked the doors. Another burst of flames shot into her face. Ophelia hid, choking. She had been beside him, together. Then a crash, shrapnel.

Had she died?

Was this it?

Ophelia glanced around. Flames forever? No. She dug her nails into black gravel and ash and pulled herself forward. Her hands were stained black.

This couldn't be it.

Strangled by ash and fire, Ophelia carried on. She couldn't be dead. She couldn't. Not alone forever in the Fields of Punishment.

Ophelia narrowed her eyes. Did she see someone beyond the fire? Still and silent, a shadow swayed like a man beyond a curtain. Inching forward, the flames moved and allowed her sight.

Samuel. Her half brother sat cross-legged as if meditating, surrounded by fire. Ash covered him, hands and feet scabbed. All around him flames danced and suffocated. Samuel, killed by fire, sentenced to sit in it for all eternity.

Anger filled a deep pit of her stomach. How could the gods do this? He had smiled while her friends burned, but still. To burn forever?

Another flash of flames caught Ophelia in the face. She screamed as it left a hot white scar across her arms and cheeks. But crying only made it worse. This had to be a dream. It had to be. Ophelia willed herself awake. Out. She needed out!

Samuel looked over, flames separating them again. "Ophelia!"

You need to leave, now!

Blackness.

Infinite black. Stretching on as far as her dark-piercing eyes could see, Ophelia watched men and women struggle against their deepest sins and regrets. Acting as servants for Hades unto eternity, at his whims. She floated above it all. Riches below, below screams and cries and tears. Ice and fire, blood and bones.

Why did they deserve this? Her siblings, their cousins who had been tricked and schemed into fighting for the Titan lord, why did they deserve to suffer eternally? Freedom of choice meant nothing to the god of the Underworld. He wanted subjects. He couldn't get the living so he stole the dead.