“Gig?” Helen called, and ran outside the tent, blindly heading for the edge of the line. The burning balls of pitch that the Myrmidons had launched at Helen and Lucas blotted out everything with huge clouds of black smoke.
“Here!” Claire shouted back hoarsely, somewhere behind the smoke screen.
“Helen, don’t!” Orion yelled, but Helen didn’t listen.
It didn’t matter to Helen if Claire had chosen Matt over her. The sound of her best friend in pain wiped everything else away. Helen charged into no-man’s-land.
A new wave of arrows was unleashed as soon as Helen set foot on the line—warning shots from the Myrmidons.
“Lennie!” Claire howled, her voice jagged with pain.
Claire was somewhere out there in the dunes, but Helen couldn’t see her. Too many arrows were falling, and fires were raging in the rose-hip bushes and in the marsh grass.
Helen felt a giant swell of power surge up and out of her, as a desperate need to find Claire overtook her. Several things happened at once. The fires on the ground extinguished in a hiss of frost and steam. A great wind blew and whipped all the smoke back, revealing Claire and Daphne crouched on the sand. And a hundred arrows paused in midair, their bronze tips balancing on the edge of Helen’s magnetic field. Everything was still for a moment.
Her heart in her throat, Helen saw that even though Daphne was shielding Claire from the fires with her body, they had both been shot several times with arrows.
Claire was bleeding badly.
Helen ran to her, her hands tingling with panic. She was belatedly aware of the fact that by running into no-man’s-land she had taken the field. Inadvertently, Helen had made it okay for the Myrmidons on the other side to do the same.
Helen heard Lucas, Orion, and Hector sound their battle cries behind her to summon their soldiers. As one, they charged headlong into the fray that Helen had unwittingly started. All she could see was Giggles, crying and clutching at the arrow in her chest.
“Get out of her!” Helen screamed nonsensically to the arrows sticking out of Claire. They all obeyed and jumped out of Claire’s skin, making matters much worse. Rivers of blood began to flow from Claire’s body.
Helen got to Claire and Daphne before the charging armies met. She pulled them both close and rocketed into the air as the Scions and the Myrmidons met in a clash of swords and shields beneath her.
As she rushed Claire and Daphne to Jason, she glanced down and saw Castor, Hector, Orion, and Lucas plowing into the Myrmidon phalanx without their armor. Lucas took the lead, blocking furiously. The sight of Lucas knocking blades out of the way with his bare hands sent a shiver through Helen, and even though she knew a sword or an arrow couldn’t kill him, she was relieved that she had to focus on flying and couldn’t watch. In a moment she had Claire and Daphne in the tent.
“I’m fine,” Daphne insisted, limping off toward the table and chairs. Helen laid Claire down in front of Jason and Cassandra. Jason reacted immediately, his hands glowing blue to stop Claire’s bleeding even as his heart crawled with hurt over what she’d done.
“Jason, wait!” Claire pleaded.
“Claire, for once in your life, could you please just shut up?” Jason said angrily. Helen looked in his heart, yellow and bruised, and she could see he was so wounded by Claire’s betrayal that he couldn’t even look her in the eye.
“Pallas won’t fight you and Hector,” she gasped, stubbornly continuing. “Daedalus refuses to fight Orion, and the gods have lost the support of most of the Scions on their side because they’re hypnotizing mortals.” Blood began to pour out of her mouth.
The one freaking power Helen didn’t have, and it was the one that she most wished for—the ability to heal her loved ones when they were suffering.
“Do something!” Helen yelled at Jason.
“Her lung is punctured,” he said as Claire struggled under his hands. “I have to put her under.”
“Claire, please, calm down,” Cassandra said soothingly. “Let Jason work.”
“No!” Claire replied, knocking Jason’s glowing hands away. She tried to sit up, but more blood poured out of her mouth. Still, she fought to deliver her message. “Tantalus, a handful of the Hundred Cousins, and the Myrmidons are all that’s left,” she said, choking on her own blood. “Tantalus leads them all. He’s the brains, and he’s heavily guarded by the Myrmidons.”
“Try to keep still,” Cassandra said, easing Claire back down.
“I’m so sorry,” Claire coughed. “Ari and I thought we were doing the right thing.”
“I know,” Jason replied, and the mustard-colored bitterness that Helen saw in his heart morphed into a gorgeous red-gold cloud. “Now, seriously, shut the hell up,” he whispered tenderly.
He passed a glowing hand over Claire’s head, and she blacked out. Helen watched for a moment as Claire’s wounds began to close, and Jason’s face grew paler with the effort to heal her, before she turned to Daphne.
“Thank you,” Helen said grudgingly. “For getting her.”
Daphne nodded and looked down at a wound in her thigh. “I’m in no position to request anything in return. But I’m asking you to leave Tantalus to me.”