Page 101 of Lovesick Gods

“Now, now,” Cho said, “don’t get carried away. I might deserve it next time.”

But he didn’t deserve it. Hedidn’t. “Mal, I…I have to tell you something.”

“Sure, Sparky. But let’s get out of this alley first, huh? Gotta be somewhere better we can go for now. Hey…” Glancing around them, he shifted to look behind Danny. “Where’s the suit?”

“Oh, uhh…” Danny looked over his shoulder at where he’d ripped the suit off of him. He couldn’t exactly leave it for someone to find. He needed to destroy it.

Wearing nothing but his underwear and Cho’s duster, he got to his feet and ventured back into the middle of the alley, feeling the ground with his foot. Cho stood behind him, a little wobbly but steady enough. Danny still wanted to make sure he got checked out by someone with official medical credentials, whoever this ‘nurse’ might be.

Finally, Danny felt the scrape of fabric on his foot, though there appeared to be nothing in front of him. Reaching down to pick the suit up, he wondered how best to dispose of it, when his hand accidentally gripped the spot on the glove that triggered the invisibility. The suit shimmered into existence in his fingers.

Danny gasped and dropped the suit with a start. The air was too still as he waited for something to happen, for Ludgate’slaugher to come resounding up at them like some storybook monster.

When nothing happened, he released a shaky laugh and looked at Cho, who had his hand out, like he was ready to fight regardless of the state he was in. Then Cho relaxed, and they shared a smile.

Danny reached for the suit again.

“There you are, Zeus.”

The mosaic of Ludgate’s image flickered to life, and faster than Danny could pull back, a hand reached out of the many mirrors as if they were one—a thousand tiny reflections working in sync—and seized Danny’s wrist.

By the time he screamed, he was already being pulled into the suit like disappearing down a rabbit hole.

Chapter23

Danny landed hard on his shoulder and the sharp edge of his hip, only softened by having Cho’s duster around him. Gasping for air, he felt, for a moment, as if all the oxygen had been sucked out of the room. But then he breathed, blinked, and rolled onto his back. Above him was a canvas of black and a million twinkling stars.

“And to think there was a time when I was frightened of you,” Ludgate’s voice encircled him like a din from every direction. “You’re just a scrawny kid.”

Leaping to his feet, Danny spun around, fists up in a fighting stance, but his composure failed him when he took in his surroundings.

The blackness wasn’t the sky, and it definitely wasn’t a ceiling. It was…everywhere. Even the ground beneath his feet was a void of black that he was somehow standing on. And the twinkling lights weren’t stars; they were mirrors. He could see dozens, hundreds,thousandsof them, some close, others spiraling into the distance like a labyrinth.

And in every one of them was an image of Ludgate.

The seams in Ludgate’s suit were reflective and glowing as if infused with power, giving him the impression of something larger than life—like a god—while Danny barely had enough energy left to use his lightning.

“So easily brought to tears over Prometheus?” Ludgate mocked him, causing Danny to wipe furiously at the remaining wetness on his cheeks. “How did all that go down anyway, youending up as his kept boy? You secretly his partner in crime, Zeus, and the hero thing was always a front, or do you just like the taste ofroughnow and again?”

Using his waning strength, Danny lightning jumped to the nearest reflection and brought around a sparking punch that connected squarely with Ludgate’s image, only for a shriek to tear from his lips as he fell to his knees. The glass hadn’t shattered, but the bones in his hand had. He held it limply in his lap, willing the bones to knit together faster as it pulsed with pain.

Ludgate’s laughter made it so much worse. “You can’t destroy the mirrors here, Zeus. That only works in your world. This world ismine.”

Strong fingers wrapped around Danny’s neck and squeezed until he gagged, only to hurl him backwards before he could attempt to fight back. He struck one of the mirrors and felt a rib snap on impact. It all happened sofast.

Ludgate reached for him out of another reflection, and Danny scrambled to his feet, backing away even as he coughed from the pain in his side. It would heal, it wouldheal…

A sharp kick to his spine sent him spiraling forward into the reflection he’d been escaping, meeting Ludgate’s hand that gripped his shoulder and wrenched him down as a knee rammed up into his stomach. Danny coughed again and doubled over, feeling like he was going to be sick, like he was seeing stars. He had tofocus.

“Come on, Zeus, you’re not eventrying,” Ludgate spat.

Danny backpedaled away from the mirror, attempting to gauge how close he was to others, keep out of range, but there were so many. Even when he spun around and tried to strike out against Ludgate’s limbs that escaped the safety of the glass, one misstep always brought him too close to danger. He’d receive a kick or a punch or get knocked into another mirror,tossed around like a weakling. Like he was in high school again, surrounded by bullies.

Thinking of the alley he’d come from, of Cho waiting for him, Danny desperately tried to summon the power to jump back to the normal world. He felt electricity pulse through him, but his form flickered with a jolt like he’d hit a wall, and he remained in the exact same spot he’d started. He couldn’t jump out of this place.

The next time Ludgate struck him and Danny stumbled, he coughed blood onto the floor, and it seemed to disappear into the blackness like it was never there. The breaks in his hand were healing, slowly. Soon he’d be able to use it again if he could just breathe and see straight. He had to get away from the reflections, had to think, had tofight…

On his back, bloody and bruised as bad as Cho now, Danny grabbed the next limb that came into view—an ankle. He had Ludgate now,he had him. “You can’t…hide in mirrors…forever.”

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