Page 51 of Wicked Ties
Liesin took a key from around his neck. “Good thing I do. There’s only one problem.”
Of course, there was. I put my hands on my hips. “What problem?”
“It’s going to take all my strength to get that door open, and when I do, I can leave it open for one second. No longer. Or the things that are trapped inside will come out . . . and we don’t want that. Do we?”
I didn’t even want to think about the implications of unleashing something from the underworld. Instead, my mind was working overtime. The Crone wasn’t far away, and any moment she would be here, no doubt following the scent of that book or somehow tracking it. If it was my key to life, I’d have kept magical GPS on it, too.
I clapped my hands together. “Here’s what we’re going to do. Astrid, I need you to hide this whole thing.”
Her eyes widened and she waved her arm toward the never-ending gate. “You want me to hide the gates of Tartarus?”
“If she knows that’s where she is, she won’t go near it. I need you to make it look like we stopped outside some river of lava and are about to throw the contracts into it. I’m also going to need you to camouflage Liesin behind your mirage. That way, he can keep hold of the real contracts and get ready to open the door when needed.”
“Anything else I can do for you?” She crossed her arms over her chest.
“Yeah, Tilly is going to need a fake book of contracts that looks exactly like the one that Liesin has.”
Astrid clapped her hands together and gold smokey magic poured from her palms. “If I’m holding this whole thing up, I can’t help you fight. It’s going to take a lot to hide this.”
“Understood.” I knew it would come down to me and Tilly. It always had been the two of us, and if she chose me, it would always be the two of us.
Astrid went and stood next to Liesin. A wave of magic rolled up the gates of Tartarus and for a moment it looked like a curtain being closed together. Images began to appear over the curtain, and we saw the landscape extend before our eyes. It looked wide and vast, with desolate mountains in the distance, plumes of smoke rising from the ground, and a river of lava running right by us.
Astrid peeked her head out from behind the curtain, and it was like her head just floated there in the middle of nothing. Even to me the magic was impressive, and I’d lived it my whole life. She pointed a finger at Tilly. “Just one more thing.”
A book the exact same as the other one appeared in Tilly’s hands. I strolled next to her, and we stood in front of the fake lava river that felt surprisingly real. I held my hand out toward it and heat ran over my skin. “Is this real?”
“I’m detail-oriented.” Astrid disappeared behind her magic, and then it was just the two of us.
“Are you ready?”
She nodded. “What’s the rest of the plan?”
“We’re going to fight her back, just the two of us. At the last second, Liesin, you open the door, and we’ll throw her through.”
I didn’t see Liesin, but he answered, “You have one second, psychic.”
“I know, death boy.”
And then we were silent, waiting. Was it true what they said, the anticipation was worse than the event? In this case, no. We’d be lucky if we lived. We couldn’t kill the unkillable, but we could trap her forever . . . in theory. We just had to survive to do it. And then I felt it. Her power rolling toward us like an asteroid.
Tilly shuffled from one foot to the other. “Maze.”
“I know.”
“She’s . . . ”
The Crone strolled out from the opening between those towering, maze-like rocks. She spread her arms wide and smiled at the two of us. “Here.”
Her eyes locked on the book, and she snickered. “That belongs to me.”
“Not anymore.” Tilly made a show of opening the book and began to tear a page.
The Crone took a step toward her, and I let my magic flow from my hands. It pooled on the ground at my feet and crept toward her. I couldn’t hold back, couldn’t be controlled. In this, my darkness had to flow, and I needed to let it. For my family, for Tilly, for us all.
She hesitated. “Mazerial, you’re not strong enough to take me on.”
“And yet you look old as shit.” It was true. Her hair had thinned, and she no longer filled out the dress. Her body was thin and frail, she’d already begun to hunch over slightly, and her skin was leathery with age. “Using so much power against us seems to be taxing.”
