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About three hours into following the empousai, Theo passed out.
It was the pain, Percy kept telling himself. He had one arm beneath the crook of her knees and the other under her neck, his sword sticking out in front of the both of them, a defense system built for one being used to protect two. At first, it had been hard for him to adapt to the dead weight. Carrying one demigod through Tartarus was hard enough. But Theo had already made it so far, and Percy had already been worried about her foot getting worse.
She had kept insisting that she was fine—that the pain would pass and she would be all better, once her sip from the River of Fire had settled in. But time kept moving on, the boils on each of their arms dissipated, the burning sensations in the backs of their throats faded, and even the bloodied backs of Theo's hands had calmed to small red patches of scar tissue. Everything else was fine, except for Theo's foot.
Even when she had been conscious and walking for herself, it had already been difficult to stay far enough away from Kelli and her comrades to avoid getting spotted but still keep them in view. Now Percy had to stay extra vigilant—he couldn't let the empousai catch them. There was no doubt in his mind that he was too weak to fight back.
The heat from the River of Fire baked Percy's skin. He wondered how Theo had been able to dip her hands in the flames like it was nothing—or had it hurt her and she had acted fine with it for his sake? Just like she had with her foot?
Gods, just thinking about Theo trying to act fine for Percy's benefit made him feel sick to his stomach. If she was hurting, he should have been the first one to notice. If she needed help, he should have asked before she even had to say anything. He resented the fact that he had gone so long without realizing his girlfriend was in so much pain.
At least all the rest of her body seemed to have healed, and Percy. Both of their various cuts and scrapes had faded. He had enough strength to carry her just fine. That in of itself was a blessing from the gods, because just three hours ago, he hadn't had enough energy to keep his head upright.
He glanced down to Theo while the gang of empousai wrangled to a break, treating themselves to a beached carcass of a monster Percy couldn't even recognize. But Kelli and her friends were busy with engorging in a dead body, so Percy took his chance to inspect his girlfriend. He set her up against a boulder and held her by the shoulders.
Her skin was pale and sweaty. Her hair, she had tied back with one of the strips of cloth she'd used on her knuckles, and it blended remarkably well in with the spots of blood and dirt throughout her dark blonde hair. Her breathing was shallow.
Percy was hit with another pang of guilt just from looking at her. "Theo," he murmured, pressing the back of his hand to her forehead. "Theo, come on..."
