Chapter 34

Her mother had said she didn't need to go to school until she was ready, but Opal's mother didn't know what she knew, she did have to go to school. At the end of the day she set up camp in front of the janitor's closet. She just sat cross legged leaning against the lockers across the hall, holding her violin case in her lap. Five minutes dragged into ten, twenty, an hour, but she was not detoured, Herry's truck was still in the parking lot. At an hour and thirteen minutes the janitor's door flew open. Theresa stood frozen in the doorway, eyes wide and jaw slacked. Opal scrambled to her feet to take the redhead's hands.

"Please, I know what's through there," she stammered, "I have to get in, my dad, I can save him like Orpheus tried to save his wife, please."

"Go to Hades?" Theresa muttered, and then shook her head firmly, "No, I'm sorry, I can't let you in."

"Please," she clasped her hands together over the handle of her violin case and begged. Just then the portal behind Theresa came flaring to life, casting a brilliant blue light into the closet and out into the hall. When Jay stepped through his face instantly turned hard.

"What is this?" he asked Theresa.

"Jay," Opal turned to him and told him what she had just told Theresa. Jay thought her proposal over in silence for a moment, both girls watching him expectantly, both hopping for a different answer.

"I can take you to the passage to the underworld," Jay said slowly, Opal's face lit up and Theresa's narrowed with irritation.

"Jay, what are you doing?" she hissed at him.

Still speaking to Opal he said, "I can take to the passage, but I can't promise Persephone will let you through." He glanced up to Theresa to see if she understood, and the calmed expression on her face confirmed she did see his tactic. There was no way Persephone would let this girl through to the Underworld. He gestured for both of them to follow him back through the passage to the god's secret sanctuary.

On the other side of the magnificently impossible portal was the rest of Jay's team. They all sent him their own personalized variation of the same shocked face. Herry was the fastest to snap out of surprise and he snatched jay's upper arm to drag him to the side.

"What are you doing?" he whispered harshly to his leader.

"She wants a chance to meet Hades," he told him.

"Jay, you can't let her go to the underworld," he raised his voice slightly in his anger, "how many times have we almost lost our lives there?"

"Don't worry buddy," Jay patted his shoulder, "I don't doubt that Persephone won't let her through."

Herry didn't say anything back to him, and the panic etched into his face didn't fade. He dropped Jay's arm and fell into step as the group started off down the hall, he followed in a brood. He watched Opal as they walked, shifting her gaze form statue to statue, tapestry to tapestry. This place was pretty overwhelming on first visits. He remembered felling the same way when he first stepped through the portal. There was nothing else like it he had ever seen before or probably ever would, immaculate and extravagant.

Jay led the way to Persephone's solarium and paused for a moment at the door. The goddess would not be happy about the surprise, and they all knew how Persephone was with her anger management. He took in a breath and pushed open the golden door. Persephone looked up from watering her plants, greeting Jay with a smile and a warm hello in her soft spoken, soothing voice. Everything about her mannerism changed when Opal was ushered in behind him.

"Jay," her skin morphed to an unflattering gray and her hair tangled like it had a mind of its own, her soft voice was now screaming and fierce, "What are you doing bringing mortals here?"

"She's a descendent of Orpheus," he pointed out, not detoured by the woman's outbreak.

Her hair flattened back to its neatly combed appearance and her skin returned to a healthy glow, "You're Oriole's."

"I'm her granddaughter," she said quietly and nodded, "My father just passed, I thought I could play for Hades like Orpheus did."

"Absolutely not," the coin flipped again and the raging goddess was back, "The underworld is no place for mortals, especially ones that have no training as heroes."

"Please," Opal flicked her violin case open and removed the instrument. She began playing, as the song progressed Persephone's shoulders hunched and she faded back to her usual appearance. With a blissful sigh she clasped her hands together and placed them under her chin, her head tilted to the side as she listened to Orpheus' descendent beautiful performance with the violin.

"Jay?" Herry whispered warningly, his heart bingeing to threaten bursting from his chest. Jay just shook his head and sent his friend a wide eyed face. Opal concluded her song and everyone looked over to Persephone with curiosity.

"Oh, that was so beautiful," she cooed and skipped over to the mural of the seasons painted on the wall. With a wave of her hand the static figures jumped to life, they smiled at their goddess and parted the curtain to the underworld.

"She's not going by herself," Herry instantly voiced.

"She has to do it on her own," Persephone said. Herry staggered back a step, running shaky hands through his hair. Opal took a terrified look down the dark gate to hell, the smell of sulfur wafting through the open passage. She gripped her violin, frozen to the spot in fear. It was dark. Her heart hammered in her ears, her stomach constricted so small she'd be lucky to fit a grape into it. She couldn't let the darkness get to her, her father needed her. She straightened her back and held her head high. For her dad. She sucked in a deep breath as she steeped through the threshold and into a nightmare.

The door to Persephone's study exploded open and a gray haired blur bolted for the passage to Hades. Percival pounded a frustrated fist into the bricks. A sickening snap sounded and the man retreated with his hand exploding in pain. Cradling it gently in the other he turned back to the crowd with sharp eyes.

"Persephone," he screamed in anger at the goddess, "what have you done?"

"She's going after her father Percival," she told him, still blissful form Opal's performance.

"I promised, Persephone, I promised Oriole I would keep her family safe, keep them away from all of this insanity," he yelled.

"It's too late," the goddess said, "she's on her own now. Now that man will need his body to return to, if you'll excuse me I have to go talk to our resident god of thieves about robbing the morgue."

Opal stood in the darkness, any light from the living world snuffed by the entrance of the gate closing behind her. The muggy heat stuffed her lungs. The smell of rotten eggs burned her nose and chocked her throat. Her eyes adjusted to the dim lighting, the hazy backdrop of this forsaken place. Shadows began to jump and shift and her muscles constricted. She clenched her eyes shut when the moaning of a banshee floated up from the trail she was to follow and bore into her ears.

It wasn't that she was afraid of darkness, she was afraid of all the things that it concealed. This was a place straight from her worst imaginations. There was no way to know all the horrors this darkness hid. She knew they were there. Every single hair on her body stood on edge. She could feel their presence all around.

What was she thinking? Tears pricked at her eyes and spilled over her clenched eyelids. She couldn't do this. She spun around, but there was no sign of the portal. She was alone and stranded. Dropping to her knees and clutching her instrument to her chest she let out a hysteric scream. The tears raked over her body huddled on the ground. She cried her throat raw, her lungs burning in their struggle for air. She didn't know how long she sat there on the gravel crying. She spent even more time after the tears finally subsided, frozen on the ground with eyes wide and unblinking.

"For you dad," she breathed out a long breath and got to her feet. The darkness constricted in on her again. New fear rippled up her spine, threatening to paralyze her again. She took in a deep breath and closed her eyes to summon her father's crooked smile into her mind. For her dad. She took her first step forward.

The heat and the confinement of the tunnel soon stirred up the sticky sweat that began running down Opal's brow and back. Breathing was hard with the thick air and she was soon panting as she walked. For a long time the only sound was the crunch of gravel under her feet. She thought she heard a breath other than her own and she twirled around in a panic. Fresh tears sprang up in her eyes as she peered back into the black of where she just came, she saw nothing. Felling the fear's crippling grip fastening her feet to the ground she closed her eyes to summon up her father's face to fight it. For her dad. Calming herself with a deep breath she turned and pushed forward. Telling herself her breath was the only breath she was hearing in the never ending shadows.

She began her slow pace again, listening to the crunching of the gravel of the path beneath her feet. Then she heard a similar sound further off behind her down the trail. With a sharp gasp she twirled around, but there was still nothing. She stood still and listened for any more curios sounds that she wasn't creating, but it was so difficult to hear over the hammering of her heart in her ears.

Then she felt it, a hot puff of air on the back of her neck, her blood ran cold in her veins and her stomach filled with ice. Slowly she turned to look right into the glowing red eyes of a hellhound. The smell of rotting flesh knocked her in the chest and she gagged. The beast barred its yellowed teeth, one of its top canines snapped in half, saliva dripping from its lips in a steady stream. A low growl puffed from its mouth and into her face, its hot breath burning like steam. Opal was paralyzed under its stare. This is why she was afraid of the dark, because of the monsters it concealed.