A BLINDING LIGHT overcomes me, blotting out the rest of the world other than that sheer, cold brightness. My body begins to solidify. I stretch my fingers. Now is the opposite of when I was in the Underworld: I can feel everything, but see nothing from all the light. I can sense it happening, like the gradual realization that you can not only move but also feel things after waking up from sleep paralysis.

My lungs fill. I can breathe again. My heart starts to pound in my chest, a startling realization, as my body warms. Blood bursts into my veins. It flows to my fingertips, my toes, my brain. Coming back to life is just as sudden and just as painful as dying for the first time.

Slowly, the light fades. I blink at the world as it fades into being, cupping my hand over my eyes. The moon shines overhead, glistening alongside all the starlight. Beneath my feet, the grassy hills slowly form into mountains.

Ezra and Dahlia, having come back to life before me, instantly race to me, attacking me with hugs. We collapse on top of one another, sobbing and gasping for breath.

And then another person joins our pile. Someone warm, and small, and brown.

Marisol.

How did she get here?

I let my question remain unanswered and appreciate the feel of my friends' embrace.

After a while, we disentangle ourselves from each other. I stand and stretch my legs, feeling my blood flowing in my veins, my muscles tensing and relaxing, my stiff joints popping back into place. All I can think: I'm alive, I'm alive, I'm alive.

"Holy shit," Marisol says, shaking her head. She's wearing a velvety purple tunic, and clean black faux-leather boots. Veins of gold wound through her braids. They come together at the crown of her head, forming a shimmering circlet encrusted with rubies and precious stones. I can smell the olive oil pressed into her skin. "I can't believe you guys actually did it. You came back from the dead. Holy shit."

"How did you know we would come here?" Dahlia asks.

Marisol shrugs. "I'm... I'm the goddess of prophecy, I guess. Now that Apollo's dead. I just... I just knew you would be. I saw it happen. But still. Holy shit." She cups her hands around my cheeks. Tears spill over the rims of her eyes. "I also saw myself doing this."

And then sea meets the sun and she kisses me.

Kissing her is as natural as anything I've ever done. Kissing her is turning water to wine, pressing grapes beneath my tongue. Kissing her is a bonfire, the warmth melting into my skin, my bones, my very being.

She steps away and it's like the world shatters before me. Like my life is divided neatly into three parts: before kissing Marisol, kissing Marisol, and after kissing Marisol. And now that I've reached the after stage, all I want to do is kiss her againandagainandagainanadagain.

"Are you okay?" her skin is the warmest golden brown color and so soft.

I want to live in this feeling forever.

I'm dizzy and mostly useless. My lips feel like pressed grapes dripping in sunlight. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"You died," she reminds me. "All of you literally died and came back to life."

I've spent my whole life on the verge of dying. I've watched those closer to me than blood die. My childhood taught me two things: life is short and eventually everybody dies. Instead of living, I've always felt like I was in the process of dying.

Finally having died with a sword in my hand—it just feels like I ticked a milestone in my life. Not like I died. Not like my life ended.

I shrug it off. "You kissed me."

"Not as important as the fact that you died."

Ezra interrupts us to give voice to what should have been my first question: "Is Apollo dead?"

Marisol nods. "I mean, yeah."

"How did you kill him?" I ask.

"You had him distracted," she explains. "So I found a rock and beat him over the head with it. It was right when he—"

"Stabbed me?"

"I didn't know that he was going to do that. I thought you were a better fighter than he was. I didn't think he could."

"I was. I am. But he poisoned his blade. If he had fought fairly, I would have won."

I can say this with confidence now that he's dead and I temporarily was. What's he going to do, come back from the grave and kill me again? What are any of the gods going to do? Fuck the gods. My father's a god. I kissed a god, or, more accurately, a god kissed me. I fought a god, and I would have won if he wasn't such a fucking coward, hiding behind trickery.

The gods? Cowards. Assholes. Rapists. Murderers. Genocidal. Incestuous. They don't deserve to be gods.

People like Marisol do.