This Cold Year ― Percy Jackson & Annabeth Chase²

―x. naomi, percy, and annabeth die (well, sort of)

THE DARKNESS DISPERSED with a massive sigh, like the last breath of a dying god. In front of them was a clearing—a barren field of dust and stones. In the center, about twenty yards away, knelt the gruesome figure of a woman, her clothes tattered, her limbs emaciated, her skin leathery green.

Her head was bent as she sobbed quietly, and the sound shattered all Naomi's hopes.

She realized that life was pointless. Her struggles were for nothing. This woman cried as if mourning the death of the entire world.

"We're here," Bob announced. "Akhlys can help."

If this sobbing ghoul was Bob's idea of help, Naomi was pretty sure she didn't want it.

Nevertheless, Bob trudged forward. Naomi and her companions couldn't do much else but follow. If nothing else, this area was less dark—not exactly light, but with more of a soupy white fog.

"Akhlys!" Bob called.

The creature raised her head, and Naomi's stomach dropped.

Her body was bad enough. She looked like the victim of a famine—limbs like sticks, swollen knees and knobby elbows, rags for clothes, broken fingernails and toenails. Dust was caked on her skin and piled on her shoulders as if she'd taken a shower at the bottom of an hourglass.

Her face was utter desolation. Her eyes were sunken and rheumy, pouring out tears. Her nose dripped like a waterfall. Her stringy gray hair was matted to her skull in greasy tufts, and her cheeks were raked and bleeding as if she'd been clawing herself.

Naomi couldn't stand to meet her eyes, so she lowered her gaze. Across the ghoul's knees lay an ancient shield—a battered circle of wood and bronze, painted with the likeness of Akhlys herself holding a shield, so the image seemed to go on forever, smaller and smaller.

"That shield," Annabeth murmured. "That's his. I thought it was just a story."

"Oh, no," the old hag wailed. "The shield of Hercules. He painted me on its surface, so his enemies would see me in their final moments—the goddess of misery." She coughed so hard, it made Naomi's chest hurt. "As if Hercules knew true misery. It's not even a good likeness!"

Naomi grimaced. When she and her friends had encountered Hercules at the Straits of Gibraltar, it hadn't gone well. The exchange had involved a lot of yelling, death threats, and high-velocity pineapples.

"What's his shield doing here?" Percy asked.

The goddess stared at him with her wet milky eyes. Her cheeks dripped blood, making red polka dots on her tattered dress. "He doesn't need it anymore, does he? It came here when his mortal body was burned. A reminder, I suppose, that no shield is sufficient. In the end, misery overtakes all of you. Even Hercules."

Naomi inched closer to Percy. She tried to remember why they were here, but the sense of despair made it difficult to think. Hearing Akhyls speak, she no longer found it strange that she had clawed her own cheeks. The goddess radiating pure pain.

"Bob," Percy said, "we shouldn't have come here."

From somewhere inside Bob's uniform, the skeleton kitten mewled in agreement.

The Titan shifted and winced as if Small Bob was clawing his armpit. "Akhlys controls the Death Mist," he insisted. "She can hide you."

"Hide them?" Akhlys made a gurgling sound. She was either laughing or choking to death. "Why would I do that?"

"They must reach the Doors of Death," Bob said. "To return to the mortal world."

"Impossible!" Akhlys said. "The armies of Tartarus will find you. They will kill you."