It was worth a shot. It was our only shot.
“And you want me to help you?” said Ingrid.
“We want all of the girls to help us,” I said. “Persephone doesn’t know who they are, but we were hoping you might.”
Ingrid set the bunnies down and stood, brushing dirt off the white dress that must have been the height of casual fashion back in the 1920s. “As it happens, not only do I know who they are, but while Henry was trying to figure out who was behind the murders, he even let me meet them. It’s a bit of a walk, but I can take you there.”
At last, some luck. “We don’t have time to go on foot. The battle’s about to start,” I said. “I’ve got a faster way, though.”
With Ingrid’s help, we gathered up eight of the other ten girls. Two of them hadn’t been in the sections of the Underworld Henry had allotted for them, and we were running out of time. Eight would have to do for now.
I stood before them, shuffling my feet nervously. Because Ingrid lingered by my side, I saw the meadow in front of me, but every time one of the other girls edged closer, the background shifted into their afterlives instead. Forests, a white sand beach, an empty theme park—it was bizarre, but I forced myself to ignore it. As long as the other girls could see me and each other, that was all that mattered.
“I’m Kate,” I said. “Henry’s wife.”
The word felt strange on my tongue, but it got an immediate reaction from the girls. A whisper rippled through the group, and the ones in the back jostled for a better position.
“That’s impossible. You actually passed the tests?” said a girl with curly auburn hair. “Like, survived and everything?”
I held my tongue. Of course they thought it was crazy. Calliope had killed each and every one of them. After a while, even Henry had thought it’d be impossible for anyone to make it. “Barely,” I said. “I got lucky.”
“Can’t believe it was Calliope,” said the same girl. “The bitch stabbed me in the back and threw me in the river. I thought it was James.”
“Yeah, well, turns out you aren’t so smart, after all, Anna,” said a dark-haired girl on the other side of the group. The top of her head barely reached my chin.
The first girl—Anna—snorted. “Like you’re any better, Emmy, insisting Ava was behind it.”
“She’s slept with every other god,” said Emmy. “Don’t see why she wouldn’t go after Henry, too.”
“That’s enough,” said Persephone. “Let Kate speak.”
For the third time in an hour, I explained everything that was happening. No one interrupted me. “The battle’s about to start, and our numbers are dwindling,” I added at the end. “I wouldn’t ask this of any of you if we weren’t desperate, but we are. We need fighters.”
“I don’t know how to fight,” said Emmy, and the other girls murmured in agreement. Anna, however, cracked her knuckles and stepped forward. The background shifted into a garden that put Versailles to shame.
“A chance for a stab at Calliope? Count me in.”
One down, seven to go. “I can get us into the castle undetected,” I said. “Calliope and Cronus can’t hurt you.”
“Are you sure?” piped a voice from the back.
“Don’t be an idiot, Bethany,” said Anna. “Of course she’s sure.”
“I am,” I said quickly. “I swear, if you do this, you won’t be in danger.”
“It’s true,” said Persephone. “I faced off against Cronus and Calliope a year ago. They tried their best, but I’m still here. Not a scratch on me.”
Another murmur rippled through the group. “You’re sure the weapons will work, too?” said Emmy.
I hesitated. No, I wasn’t sure. Even if one of us managed to take out Calliope, I had no idea if this would work on Cronus. And what if they weren’t corporeal on the surface? What if they were ghosts, like I was in my visions?
“We have to try,” I said. “If nothing else, we need to distract them long enough to get Henry out of there. We need him on our side. The council is heavily outgunned, and if we don’t find a way to help, they will fall. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but eventually Cronus will get the best of them. Of us,” I added. “And Henry will die with them.”
Silence. I shifted my focus from one face to the next, searching for any sign that they would agree, but none of them met my eye. Before I could give convincing them one last shot, however, Bethany called from the back, “Count me in.”
“Me, too,” said Emmy, and one by one, the others also volunteered.
“Thank you,” I said. “I can’t tell you what this means to—”
Crash.
The earth around us trembled, and several of the girls shrieked. Ingrid clutched my arm, and we all looked up at the sky above us. Most souls had no idea where they were and thought their afterlife was the real thing, but Henry’s girls knew the difference. They knew that the sun’s warmth was an illusion, and beyond the fluffy clouds was the ceiling of an enormous cavern. And that was why they were the only ones who could help us.
The trembling subsided, but it didn’t matter. The battle raged above us, and we didn’t have any time to waste. “I need a whiteboard and a marker,” I said, and several of them stared at me blankly. “A blackboard and a piece of chalk then.”