Worlds Beyond: Shattered (ON HOLD)

Chapter Seventeen

A week passed by since we got here.

Or maybe more. Time went by very differently down here in the underworld. It was always night, so telling when a day ended and when another started was starting to get more and more difficult. I suppose time didn't really matter for immortals. Eternity was everything they had to worry about.

Everything I had to worry about.

I had accepted my immortality, granted, not by choice, but accepted it nevertheless. I was getting a little better at this whole magic thing, but I still had issues getting the hang of it. Learning how to manipulate shadows was still something I couldn't master very well, but I did learn how to make swords out of my darkness thanks to Cecil's help. Controlling my inner darkness to use it as blasts was no different from shadows, sadly. It was always the same thing, I was able to hold onto that mass of power inside me for only a moment before my powers went rogue on me, blasting away to the nearest thing to me.

I almost destroyed Erebus once, a forest nearby and we earned an extensive lecture from Charon, who informed me said forest apparently belonged to his father, so we were forced to practice somewhere else. We decided to try Hades' back garden and sadly, it only got worse. I had already blasted five of his pomegranate trees and almost decapitated him once.

Hades. That was something else that had me worried. He had been acting really weird the past few days, avoiding us at all cost, not even Cerberus was able to contact him. It seemed as if he had shut himself off everyone for unknown reasons that not even Persephone knew about. Hades was a complex god, I knew that. I also understood that need to shut yourself off everything and everyone for some time, to sort through your thoughts on your own. But that made me wonder, what had Hades so worried?

I only hoped it wasn't linked to my god powers, ones we still had no words of according to Hades. Macaria said it'd only take two days to figure out whether I'm a goddess or not, but it's been more than a week. Maybe she was just busy. After all, she was a death god. Cerberus explained to me that Macaria's job was that to collect souls and bless the ones that deserved it, bringing prosperity and wealth in their next life. He told me she worked hand-to-hand with the main death god of the greek pantheon, Thanatos. I wondered how that god was or how he looked like, but when I asked Cerberus about it he shivered as if the mere thought gave him chills.

"You really don't wanna know. Pray ya never get to meet him." He had told me a few days ago during dinner, but that just made my curiosity grow. It made me wonder what kind of person Thanatos was for Cerberus to feel that way about him. I'd ask Macaria, if only she'd drop by the castle.

I took a deep breath as I sat in the bathtub of my bathroom, trying to calm myself before our next training session. And this one would be more than just magic, it'd be a sparring session. That thought just made me grunt and slump further down into the water until it reached my chin.

I really didn't want to fight my friends, even if it was just for training. Cain insisted I should be taught how to defend myself physically, not just magically. A shield spell could only work so long until my powers gave up on me. There was apparently a limit to how much magic you could use in a short period of time before your powers stopped working, your body as a whole. That didn't sound like something very enjoyable, and if I wanted to protect myself... I'd need to learn everything. Even fighting.

With that thought in mind, I slid out of tub and quickly dried myself, letting my dark hair dry on its own as I went back into my room and paused in front of my closet. I thought about using magic to dress myself, but at this rate I'd use up all my powers and God knows how much I had left, and I had a weird feeling I'd need my powers soon. So I fished up a black tank top, my tight black jeans and one of my red knitted cardigans my mother had made for me.