Page 222 of The Games Gods Play
We made it.
They’re all smiling at me, and my arms go limp at my sides, my mouth closing around whatever protest I was about to make. And, after a beat where my heart feels like it could fly, I smile back.
But then nothing else happens.
Where is Zeus? The Labor is over. Time to announce me as the winner and be done. Right?
I catch sight of two of my bone soldiers at attention in the distance. Shouldn’t they fall apart now? Their service to protect us from the monsters is over.
That’s when my friends, still standing before me in a line, all go deathly still, eyes wide, expressions turning to masks of unadulterated fear.
And a trio of growls sounds directly at my back. Close enough to feel their hot breath on my neck.
108
The Final Blow
Every part of me gets hit so hard with another burst of adrenaline, fear, and shock, my skin feels electrified.
It can’t be.
I very slowly turn and find Cerberus is there before me, bigger than ever, as if he’s grown to the same proportions as the other two monsters.
“Kill the mortal,” Cer snaps inside my mind. He lifts all three heads and sniffs the air. “Kill her,” Rus snarls. Ber just growls, showing me teeth designed to rend the flesh from my bones.
Sour bile rushes up my throat, and I swallow the burn back down.
This isn’t him. This can’t be him. The rage pouring through his voices is…feral. Rabid. Which is when I catch sight of Ber’s eyes. Black, soulless eyes. Like the minotaur. Zeus has to have them spelled. All of them.
But…the Labor is over.
We crossed the last finish line. Do all of us have to cross, like the other two gates? Except the gate is already gone. Thoughts fly through my head in a thousand directions.
Run. Hide. Help Cerberus.
Where the hells is Hades? Forget interfering. Zeus took Hades’ godsdamned pet and is loosing him on me after the Labor is already over. That fucker is cheating. If the hound is killed, Hades will never forgive himself. We can’t kill him. I won’t let the others. But I can’t let him hurt them, either.
Holding my axes up before me—a barrier between him and them—I face him. “Don’t—”
A black paw slams into me from the side. I hear Cerberus growl as, on a cry, my arms flailing, I sail up into the air and back down. When I hit, my axes go sliding away in opposite directions and the wind knocks out of me so forcefully, my next breath sounds like I’m dying.
That horrible noise of trying to make my lungs work again is immediately drowned out by Cerberus’ howls as he leaves the other champions behind and runs straight at me.
I see my friends scatter as soon as his back is turned, helping one another try to get to safety somewhere. Anywhere. My lungs are still struggling, and I’m swinging wildly between needing air and needing to run. The axes are too far away to get to both of them. I have my last pearl in my hand before I even think. It’s my only way out. There’s nowhere to hide here.
“Cerberus,” I yell. He’s so close. Right on top of me. “Don’t do this. It’s me. It’s Lyra.”
Cer…smiles. “I know.”
What happens next comes so fast, I don’t realize what I’m seeing until it’s over. Cerberus lunges for me, and a massive spear made of bone lifts into the sky over his head, startling white with my changed sight.
“No!” I scream.
Too late.
The skeleton soldier plunges it into Cerberus’ back. With a pathetic, horrible, heartbreaking yelp from all three heads, the hellhound twists around on the soldier, even as he falls to the ground.
And I have to scramble back to not get crushed when he does.
