A Thousand Thrones

Eight

Eight

Damon's hand balled into a fist and he punched the wall.  The crack widened with a groan as he shouted out in frustration.  Castor's growled again, his ears moving this way and that, trying to detect any sound around us. 

Damon leaned his forehead against the wall for a moment before spinning around toward me.  He had this look of determination on his face as he neared.  When he was right in front of me, he took my hand with one of his and reach around his back with the other.  Before I could even open my mouth to speak, he was pressing something cool to my palm.

"I know you don't remember how to use this, but I'm giving it to you for protection," he said, his eyes locked on mine. 

I looked down and saw the bronze dagger he'd pressed to my hand.  The blade was running up along my forearm and the hilt, which had huge, dark blue sapphires at the end on both sides, was tight in my grasp. 

"What was that?" I asked him.  "Please.  Just tell me what's going on.  I mean, her hair...it wasn't hair.  It was snakes."  I swallowed hard.  "She called you Hades.  What...?"

"Shh," he said, pressing a finger to my lips.  He brought his other hand up to my cheek, cradling it softly.  "I promise you, Persephone, that I will tell you everything, absolutely everything, once we get out of here and back at the house.  We'll be protected there.  But right now, Castor is showing that there are more monsters to come."

I glanced over at Castor, who was staring at the door and growling louder than he had before.  The hair on his back was standing up and he was leaning slightly back on his haunches, like he was ready to pounce on anything that came through.  Even I was scared of him at that moment. 

"I need you to follow right behind me and never let go of my hand.  But if you must...well, I know you can take care of yourself."  He smiled, a real smile, and it was the first time I'd seen it in real life, though it was under unimaginable circumstances.  "I know what you can do.  You hardly need my help most of the time."

I closed my eyes, shaking my head and willing this all to be a dream.  But my hand instinctively tightened around the hilt of the dagger, like I'd done it a million times before.

"Persephone, we need to go.  We can hold off whatever is to come, but only for a little while," he said.

I was shaking.  I couldn't help it.  But I opened my eyes, only to have them widen as I looked at him. 

He wasn't wearing the black t-shirt and jeans anymore...but the black armor, the same kind as he had been in my dream of him.  It looked exactly the same, no scuffs, no scratches, nothing.  Though unlike my dream, he didn't have a sword sheathed on his side, but a long, bronze scepter in his grasp.  Seeing where my eyes had landed, he looked at his hand and sighed. 

"That won't do me any good," he said.

He then twirled the scepter around once.  It shrunk before my eyes, forming into the same bronze sword he'd carried in both of my dreams.  It was like a bigger version of the dagger that was in my hand, right down to the dark blue sapphires on both ends of the hilt.

I reached out and touched the breastplate of his armor.  "It's exactly the same," I whispered. 

He looked at me like I had snakes for hair.  "Do you remember?" he asked breathlessly.

I shook my head, still tracing over the black armor.  "No, but I've seen you in my dreams wearing it," I said, and then looked up into his eyes.  "Do you promise?"

He just stared at me.  "Promise?"

"Promise to tell me everything, starting with what happened at the bonfire."