The Mighty Ones' Fall

Chapter 18: Imprisonment

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"How am I supposed to know what he was thinking?" I shouted back at Layna, who kept asking me why Brady disappeared from our group, why I didn't try to help him. She didn't want to believe that he actually ditched us, her especially. "I told him to come with us! I thought he was actually on our side for once! I'm just as mortified as you are!"

"Jace, just calm down," Hannah pleaded, still clinging to Damien's arm, her brown eyes wide and watering. "Another monster might hear you."

I turned away from them, balling my fists and muttering angrily to myself. I refrained from telling Hannah that I didn't care if a monster found us, that it didn't matter. We had lost a member of the group, which meant we also had one more Knowing member working against us - the very last thing we needed. Most likely, the rest of the base camp already hated us, and would do nothing to help us end Jason's reign once we got back. If we ever got back.

"We're wasting time," Damien said calmly, stepping away from Hannah for a moment. "Brady's gone, and that's that. Our main focus has to be on getting home safely. Preferably before Brady and the Warriors."

"Right. There's just one problem, genius," Darius mouthed off to his twin. "How are we going to get back to Kentucky with no money? You think the harpies and erinyes will give us another free flight with a complimentary back massage?" He was frowning and arching his eyebrows very pointedly.

I took my chance to speak up and regain the leader's position. "Actually, that's not a bad idea. Remember the prophecy? We all know that Alec's going to die, which is exactly what the monsters want. We can convince the harpies to take us back to the Knowing camp by telling them that Alec's supposed to meet us there, and that we're using ourselves as bait and Jason's going to kill Alec as soon as he sets foot in the base camp."

Darius scratched his head and groaned. "You do realize I was kidding, right?"

"Yeah, but I'm not. We're kind of out of options, unless you have a better idea."

"What about Lady Athena, Lady Artemis, and Alec? We should talk to them and work out a plan," Hannah suggested. She lowered her head sheepishly and admitted, "I've decided that Jace is right about killing Jason. If it has to be done, so be it. The longer we wait here, the more people at base camp will be influenced by Jason without opposition, and the harder it will be to take him down." 

I let out a sigh of relief and allowed myself to smile a little. There was only was person left to convince: "Layna?"

Frowning, Layna gulped and tugged nervously at the collar of her V-neck shirt. She avoided eye contact, staring at the grass instead. I could tell she hated being in this position, and probably hated the general idea of what she'd been thrown into. If I were her, I'd probably hate my father, too. This was all his fault anyway.

Finally, she sighed and requested, "Okay, I'm in. But I want words with my father before he dies. If he dies. There are things we still don't know about him and me. You said yourselves I shouldn't have the Sight because I grew up in a Sight-less society, and I have a feeling Jason knows exactly why I do. He must have had reasons for lying to me, and to Alec before me."

"Deal," I agreed, giving her a nod. It was a relief to be on the same page as her again. 

"We should go back to the area where we were just attacked," Hannah suggested after a short pause. "Alec and the goddesses must have heard all the ruckus, and they'd probably go check it out."

That sounded like a pretty good idea to me and everybody else, so we followed Hannah back the way we came, moving at a relatively quick pace. We had completely crushed the grass and bushes in our earlier frantic sprint, making it easy to find our way back to the scene of the fight. The other good news was that there seemed to be no monsters in sight.