CHAPTER EIGHT:
DEAD AND GONE

■ ■ ■ ■ ■

ANNAIS ALREADY HATED THE sons of Boreas. An hour or so after Leo took his nap, they arrived in Quebec. The sun was a faint yellow on the horizon, casting the city below them in warm shadows that did nothing to combat the snow dusted across the asphalt and roofs of houses. In the centre of it all was a castle, a towering mansion made of red brick with a green gabled roof. Normally, Annais would've loved the sight of it, having been fascinated with history ever since she was a child and Hea would tell her stories from her favourite ancient societies. Now, however, she frowned at the scenery, an uneasy feeling coiling in her stomach. She wanted to reach for Jason's hand again but she stopped herself.

"Please tell me that's Quebec and not Santa's workshop," Leo groaned once Mel woke him up.

"Yeah, Quebec City," Piper confirmed. "One of the oldest cities in North America. Founded around sixteen hundred or so?"

Leo's eyebrows shot to his hairline. "Your dad do a movie about that too?"

Piper blushed and stuck her tongue out at him, though he didn't seem phased as he grinned and ran a dirt-encrusted hand through his curls. Annais wrinkled her nose at him, unsure how Mel seemed so enamoured by this messy boy. He was more like an annoying younger brother to her, but if he made Melanie happy then she supposed she could look past the grease.

"I read sometimes, okay?" Piper said. "Just because Aphrodite claimed me doesn't mean I have to be an airhead."

"That's the spirit," Ezra cheered. "'Cause if you were anything like Drew, we'd have a problem, McLean."

"Damn, you're both so feisty," Leo snickered, making Piper blush again. "Since you know so much, Beauty Queen, what's that castle?"

"A hotel, I think."

He gave a laugh of disbelief. "No way."

"I feel like you're about to be proven wrong," Annais smirked at the back of his head.

And, as she suspected, he was. The warm lights outside the grand entrance of the castle illuminated a long red carpet housing several doormen, valet and porters wheeling in bags on sleek golden trays. Around them, people were making their way inside dressed in elegant suits, rich satin dresses and winter cloaks made of various furs.

"The North Wind is staying in a hotel?" Leo frowned. "That can't be—"

Jason shifted suddenly, gazing above Annais' head. "Heads up, guys. We've got company."

Looming above the hotel's tower were two winged figures. They were angels dressed in dark clothing, draped in shadows with swords to replace their halos. Instinctively, Annais slipped off her ring and held it tight in her palm, eyeing their weapons warily. Beneath them, Festus showed the same hesitancy, beating his wings unevenly with talons bared. Leo reached out to pat him on the head, sending an uneasy glance at the others as he chuckled.

"Steady, boy."

"I swear to Hades, Valdez, if this oversized puppy blows fire at them..."

"He won't," Leo was quick to assure Ezra.

The girl in question was wriggling around antsily, feeling the growing rumble of Festus' distrust beneath them. She tugged at the hairpin holding back her dark locks, making Annais' jaw drop as she realised why the silver pin was so familiar.

Penelope... how long had Ezra had this and not told her or Mel? Did she think they didn't deserve to know?

"I don't like this," Jason murmured, effectively cutting off her thoughts. "They look like storm spirits."

Fortunately, they weren't. As they flew closer, Annais noticed the solid texture of their pale skin, the distinct icy white hair and feathery purple wings that sprouted from their back like a venus fly-trap. They looked similar in facial structure but that was where the similarities ended — children of Boreas, yes, but not twins.

One of them could've been the size of Festus, wearing a bright red hockey jersey and black leather cleats over fading grey sweatpants. The other, on the other hand, looked like he could be a backup singer for the band ACDC. His hair was long and styled into an 80s mullet. He wore pointy leather shoes, designer pants that were way too tight to be appropriate and a shirt made of hot pink satin that had the top three buttons open to expose his chest. Just the sight of him made Annais feel dizzy, and not in the good way.

"I think I might hurl if I keep looking at that top," she whispered to Jason, who tried and failed to stifle a laugh as the angels pulled up in front of the dragon and hovered there curiously.

The first one gave a grunt and shook his head. "No clearance."

"'Scuse me?" Leo frowned.

"You have no flight plan on file," explained the other in a French accent so thick that it sounded fake. "This is restricted airspace."

"Destroy them?" his brother questioned with a gap-toothed grin.

"Well, that went from zero to a hundred real quick," Ezra drawled. "Why don't we hold off on the destroying for just a second?"

At the same time, the dragon began to hiss steam, and Jason and Annais summoned their swords. Leo put a hand out to stop them, exclaiming, "Hold on! Let's have some manners here, ladies and gents! Can I at least find out who has the honour of destroying me?"

"Now is not the time for jokes, Leo," Annais scowled but he had the nerve to ignore her.

"I am Cal," hockey boy grunted. Annais noted with a raised brow that he seemed very proud of himself, like it had taken him forever and then some to remember those three words.

"That's short for Calais," lover boy explained with an eye roll. "Sadly, my brother cannot say words with more than two syllables—"

"Pizza! Hockey! Destroy!" Cal offered with that same proud smile. Annais might've liked him was it not for the fact he wanted to destroy them.

"—which includes his own name."

"I am Cal," he repeated, this time with a bit more confidence. "And this is Zethes, my brother."

Zethes. What an arrogant name for an average boy. Annais had caught him gawking at her and the other girls several times already, his eyes lingering too long to be justifiable. It was clear he thought he had a chance with at least one of them. What a pity he was about to be shot down in flames (though hopefully not Festus'.)

"Wow, that was almost three sentences, man," Leo clapped. "Way to go!"

The others exchanged wary but slightly amused glances, unsure if he was being serious or not. Zethes, on the other hand, seemed to take it as a joke and shook his head.

"Stupid buffoon," he grumbled and nudged his brother's arm. "They make fun of you! But no matter. I am Zethes, which is short for Zethes. And the ladies—" He winked at the group, struggling to choose between Piper, Ezra and Annais. "They can call me anything they like. Perhaps one of them — or all three if they each want a slice of Zethes — would like to have dinner with a famous demigod before we must destroy you."

"I'd rather fall off this dragon into an ocean and drown," Ezra deadpanned.

Zethes' nostrils flared but Piper giggled in an attempt to draw him back in. Unsurprisingly, it worked. "That's a... truly horrifying offer."

"It is no problem," he preened under the attention. "We are very romantic people, we Boreads."

"Boreads?" Jason perked up at the familiar name. "Do you mean, like, the sons of Boreas?"

"I thought that was obvious by now," Annais muttered, shrugging with what could almost be considered a teasing smile when he poked her side gently.

Fuck, since when did she start feeling even remotely comfortable around him, so much so that she didn't bat an eye when he touched her? Only a few days ago, she was ready to throw him off the Grand Canyon. Now she was holding his hand and sharing smiles. The sudden 360 was enough to give anybody whiplash.

"Ah, so you've heard of us!" Meanwhile, Zethes was making a show at the mention of his father, pleased to see that Jason had recognised them. "We are our father's gatekeepers! So you understand that we cannot have unauthorised people flying in his airspace on creaky dragons, scaring the silly mortal people. Which is sadly why, unless this is an emergency landing, we have to destroy you painfully."

"Oh, brilliant," Mel let out a high-pitched laugh, hands tugging nervously at the back of Leo's shirt. "So not just regular destroying. That's nice."

"Wait," Piper protested as the two went to raise their swords. "This is an emergency landing!"

"Aw," Cal pouted.

Zethes studied Piper for a moment, lips pursed. "How does the pretty girl decide this is an emergency then?"

"We have to see Boreas, it's totally urgent," she explained. He continued to watch her, uncertain, and so she plastered on her prettiest smile and batted her lashes. "Please?"

"Well," he said, looking slightly dazed as he ran a clammy hand through his hair. Annais could see Piper's charm starting to work on him. It even sent a calming shiver down her own spine, but he still tried to fight. "I hate to disappoint a lovely lady, but you see... my sister, she would have an avalanche if we allowed you—"

"And our dragon is malfunctioning," she added, searching for any excuse that would convince him. "It could crash at any minute."

Festus shuddered and groaned, turning his head to helpfully splatter oil on the pavement below. The six demigods sat in tense silence as Zethes' brows knitted, swaying him into the lie. Then, with one more longing glance at the girls, he turned to Piper and sighed.

"Well, you are pretty," he reasoned. "I mean, you're right. A malfunctioning dragon... this could be an emergency."

"Destroy them later?" Cal asked with a smile.

Zethes rolled his eyes at him. "It will take some explaining. Father has not been kind to visitors lately. But yes. Come, faulty dragon people, follow us."

With slight reluctance, the brothers sheathed their swords back into their holders and picked bright orange flashlights out of their belts. They gestured impatiently for the group to follow then swooped towards the hotel's tower, murmuring words to each other that the demigods couldn't make out.

Leo clapped his hands together with a grin. "I love these guys! Follow them?"

But the others were far more hesitant, Annais included. Something didn't feel right, and it wasn't just Zethes' creepy attitude or Cal's eagerness to kill them. The mention of their sister... but they didn't have a choice, not if they needed to speak to Boreas. They'd just have to watch themselves and stick together at all times.

"I guess," Jason said. It took him a moment and confirmation from Ezra (Annais tried not to let that annoy her) before he spoke. "We're here now. But I wonder why Boreas hasn't been kind to visitors."

"Please, he hasn't met us," Leo dismissed his hesitancy with a chuckle.

"How fortunate for him," Ezra muttered.

Leo just laughed, seemingly amused by the affronted expression that replaced her impatient stare. "You love me, really. Now come on, Festus! After those flashlights."

By the time the dragon had caught up with them, Zethes and Cal were shooting straight for the green gabled roof and weren't slowing down. From what Annais could see over Mel and Leo's shoulders, there was no upper entrance into the castle, but just as her nerves began to rise and she considered ordering Leo to turn them around and leave, the surface slid open to reveal a cavernous space triple the size of Festus.

"Well, this cannot be good," Jason whispered in her ear, hot breath fanning across her neck.

"Stay alert," she whispered back, pushing her ring onto its allocated finger but keeping it close.

They landed in what must've been the hotel's penthouse suite, only instead of the warmth that welcomed the mortals downstairs, the lush oriental carpets and drapes hanging along the floor to ceiling windows were encased in sharp shards of ice. At the back of the room was a large staircase leading up to an array of corridors hidden from view, but undoubtedly covered in the same deadly frost. It made Annais uncomfortable, and she wasn't the only one. Mel followed Leo to the ground slowly, looking for Annais the moment she and the others joined them and grabbing hold of her hand. Ezra had her cane in one hand and the chord of her harness in the other, muttering to herself in displeasure as a light layer of snow crunched beneath her boots. She glared in the general direction of the roof, almost like she sensed the pointy icicles threatening to drop down on them at any second.

The quicker they got out of there, the better.

"Okay, fix the thermostat in here and I would totally move in," Leo declared.

"Not me," Jason disagreed, unclipping Ezra's tether from his jeans after making sure she was okay on her own. "Something feels wrong. Something up there..."

"Good to know I'm not the only one that feels that way," Annais breathed out, shivering as a gust of wind enveloped the room. At the sudden gust, Festus gave a shiver and snorted flames, his natural heat warring against the cold.

"No, no, no!" Zethes cried and marched over to them. "The dragon must be deactivated. We can't have fire in here! The heat ruins my hair!"

"Yes, because that's the biggest problem with having a fire-breathing dragon in your room made of ice," Ezra muttered as she circled the space, a pale hand ghosting along the ice-encrusted furniture with disgust.

Zethes reached for Festus but was stopped by the dragon huffing in warning and Leo raising up his hands. "The dragon's a little touchy about the whole deactivation concept, but I've got a better solution."

"Destroy?" Cal suggested eagerly.

"Oh, for the love of Hades," Annais sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. She was already impatient with them and it hadn't even been five minutes.

"Man, you've got to stop with the destroy talk," Leo insisted, ushering the Boreads away and turning to Festus. "Just wait."

"Leo," Piper began nervously, brushing past Mel to hover at the boy's side. "What are you—"

"Watch and learn, Beauty Queen," he winked at her, hooking his fingers behind the dragon's left foreleg and messing with the hidden switches and wires. "When I was repairing Festus last night, I found all kinds of buttons. Some, you do not want to know what they do. But others... aha, here we go!"

Last night seemed so long ago. Like an eternity had flown past since the events of the fire pit, since everything was revealed at once. Jason's parentage, Piper's mother, the Great Prophecy, the Min Prophecy, the one they were in now. One after the other, until Annais almost got whiplash just from the memory. By the time Jason nudged her out of her thoughts, all sixty feet of Festus had somehow collapsed and compacted into a rectangular hunk of metal the size of a suitcase.

"Ta-da!" Leo announced. "The world's heaviest carry-on bag!"

"That's impossible," Jason exclaimed, moving to get a closer look at the 'suitcase.' "Something that big couldn't—"

Ezra snorted and went to remark but was interrupted by Zethes shouting. Him and Cal both had drawn their swords with their sights set on Leo. The air in the room shifted. Leo raised his hands with wide eyes as Annais squeezed her ring and held up her sword, making Ezra follow suit with one of the charms on her bracelet. Even Mel produced a dagger from her combat boots, her chipped black nail-polish standing out against the bronze metal.

"Okay, what'd I do?" Leo asked, gulping when Zethes shoved the point of his sword against his chest. "Hey, just stay calm, guys! If it bothers you that much, I don't have to take the dragon as a carry-on."

His eyes flickered to Annais, who had stepped forward when Zethes' sword so much as appeared in front of Leo's face, her own weapon pressed to the Boread's side. "Drop the weapon, now."

"You don't scare me, girl," he hissed, faltering but refusing to look away from Leo. "Who are you? A child of the South Wind spying on us?"

"What? No! I'm a son of Hephaestus! You know, the friendly blacksmith... no harm to anyone..."

Cal shook his head in disbelief, appearing beside his brother to sneer down at Leo. "Smell fire. Fire is bad."

Annais had a front-row seat to see Leo's face drop. He was hiding something. If she didn't know it before, she did now. He looked like a kid who was caught with his hand in a cookie jar, biting down on his lower lip as he struggled to find the right words to stop them from stabbing him. "Oh, yeah, well... um, my clothes are kind of singed, and I've been working with oil, and—"

"No." Zethes' sword had picked through the material of Leo's shirt, spreading a layer of ice across the boy's tanned skin. Mel was quick to notice this, reaching for another dagger strapped to her thigh. They could outnumber the brothers if needed, they just had to worry about who else might be lurking in the shadows. "We can smell fire, demigod. We assumed it was the creaky dragon but now the dragon is a suitcase. And I still smell fire, on you."

"Hey, look, I don't know—" Leo turned to the others desperately, eyes locked with Jason's. "Guys, a little help?"

Jason approached where Annais stood, hands raised in a weak attempt to diffuse the tension. His eyes implored her to lower her sword but she refused, deliberately jabbing it against Zethes' side. One wrong move and she'd get to him before he could hurt Leo. Out of the two, he was the main threat. Cal was more likely to stab himself than any of them.

"Look, there's been a mistake," he insisted. "Leo isn't a fire guy. Tell them, Leo, tell them you're not a fire guy."

"Um..."

"What do you mean 'um,' Valdez?" Ezra groaned. She'd wandered over to Mel's side, the two conversing in hushed whispers. Ezra needed to be tethered to someone — mentally, it was a whole fighting technique that Annais didn't quite understand but it helped her, that much she knew — and Mel was her best bet considering the icy (hah) tension between her and Annais.

"Hey, Zethes," Piper giggled, plastering on a dazzling smile. "We're all friends here, right? Just put down your swords and let's talk."

"The girl is pretty," he admitted after a moment of contemplation. "And of course she cannot help being attracted to my amazingness."

"Oh please, I might not be able to see you, but even I know that's a lie," Ezra scoffed.

"But sadly, I cannot romance her this time."

"Destroy him now?"

"Say one more word about destroying us and I'll stab you," Ezra growled.

"Sadly, I think so—"

"No," Jason shouted over everyone. He sounded calm but Annais could see the golden coin clutched in his shaking palm. Their eyes met. He gave a nod. "Leo's just a son of Hephaestus, he's no threat. Piper is a daughter of Aphrodite... and the others—"

"Hades," Annais smiled, pretty venom dripping from her lips.

Zethes' already pale features went as white as paper under her stare, sword lowering a bit more. Annais almost cackled. She was used to that look by now. She would've been angrier if he seemed unbothered. Mel also recognised his fear. After another whisper from Ezra in her ear, she added, "Eris and Melinoe."

"Hades," he repeated as if he wasn't quite sure he heard them right. "Eris and Melinoe..."

"Are you hard of hearing?" Ezra raised an eyebrow.

"And I'm the son of Zeus," Jason stressed. Ezra was like a ticking time bomb. In their own ways, all of the Mins were. Just the mention of their parentage had Zethes afraid, they could use that to get him to listen, but only if the girls didn't kill them first. "Look, we're on a peaceful—"

"What did you say?" Zethes demanded. "You are the son of Zeus?"

Jason hesitated, looking at Annais again. Why did he always have to look at her? To any of them for answers? "Um, yes. That's a good thing, right? My name is Jason."

Cal gasped, his sword nearly slipping out of his hands. "Can't be Jason," he whispered in his brother's ear, though he was unable to lower his voice enough to prevent the others from hearing him. "Doesn't look the same."

Zethes seemed to agree. "No, he is not our Jason. Our Jason was more stylish—" For a moment, the blonde boy almost seemed offended, but the expression quickly faded into an eyeroll when Annais' lips twitched. "Not as much as me, but stylish. Besides, our Jason died millennia ago."

"Wait," Annais' Jason — not in that kind of way, of course — frowned. "Your Jason? You mean the original Jason? The Golden Fleece guy?"

"The Golden Fleece Guy," repeated Ezra. Each weapons, including hers, had been lowered by then, though she still seemed skeptical. "What happened to the boy with all the knowledge on Rome?"

"We were his crewmates aboard his ship, the Argo, in the old times, when we were mortal demigods," Zethes told them with his chest puffed in pride. "Then we accepted immortality to serve our father, so I could look this good all the time, and my silly brother could enjoy pizza and hockey."

"Hockey," Cal cheered, looking around like he expected a game to burst out around them.

"But Jason, our Jason, died a mortal death. You can't be him."

"I'm not," Jason agreed, slowly pocketing his coin.

"So, destroy?" Cal frowned, uncertain.

"No," his brother shook his head, sheathing his sword in an action that provided Annais with little relief. "If he is the son of Zeus, he could be the one we've been watching for."

"Wait... watching for?"

"You mean in a good way, right?" Leo asked. "Like you'll shower him with fabulous prizes? Or watching for in a bad way... as in he's in trouble?"

Neither of them spoke for a long, drawn-out moment. Then the shadows around the staircase parted to introduce a new presence in their mix. "Why, that depends on my father's will."