Every time she grabbed something, pale blue sparks of magic streamed out of her fingertips before winking out. Valkyries always gave off more magic when they were upset or emotional. Zoe would tell me what was bothering her when she was ready.
But she wasn’t ready yet, and she scooted over and started fiddling with the scissors, ribbons, and bolts of cloth on the other side of her desk, since she loved making clothes and jewelry as much as she did weapons and gadgets. Zoe grabbed a clear plastic box full of red heart-shaped crystals, which she used to embellish some of her designs. She shook the box, making the crystals inside rattle around, before setting the container back down on her desk.
Finally, she sighed and raised her hazel gaze to mine. “I hate field trips because I have an annoying tendency to get carsick whenever I go on one.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Carsick?”
She slumped down in her chair. “Well, more like bus sick. I don’t know why, but every time I get on a bus to go on some stupid field trip, I always get sick and have to throw up before we get to our destination. Just ask Mateo. I puked all over his boots when we went to the Powder ski resort last year. Everyone on the bus saw me literally lose my lunch. It was so embarrassing.”
“Well, then it’s a good thing that this isn’t a field trip and that we aren’t taking a bus.”
“Oh, no,” Zoe said sarcastically. “We’re going to explore some creepy old tunnels that run underneath Mythos Academy, the school of warrior kids, mythological monsters, and artifacts that summon mythological monsters. What could possibly go wrong?”
I rolled my eyes. “Oh, come on. Where is your sense of adventure?”
She sighed again and slid even farther down in her chair.
I turned my attention back to my own desk, making sure that I had everything for our so-called field trip. A flashlight, a digital camera, a notebook, several pens, a couple of bottles of water, and some chocolate chip cookies. Okay, okay, it was probably overkill to bring snacks, but Zoe was right. You never knew what might happen at Mythos Academy, and if we did get stuck in the tunnels, I didn’t want to starve before someone rescued us.
I wasn’t the only one who might be thirsty, so I cracked open one of the bottles and poured a healthy amount of water into a small green pot on my desk that contained a beautiful flower with delicate white petals and a heart-shaped emerald-green blossom in the center. The winterbloom perked up as the water soaked into the soil, and it spread its petals wide, as if it were thanking me.
“There you go,” I cooed, and stroked one of its velvety petals. “There’s some water for you.”
“Have I told you how weird it is that you talk to that flower?” Zoe snarked.
“Don’t listen to her,” I said, still speaking to the flower. “She’s just jealous that she doesn’t have anything as pretty as you on her desk.”
The winterbloom stood up even taller with pride. I stroked its petals a final time, then capped my water bottle.
Once I had stuffed all my supplies into my green messenger bag, I glanced around, making sure I hadn’t forgotten anything. Zoe and I were in the main briefing room in the Bunker, beneath the Library of Antiquities on the Mythos Academy campus in Snowline Ridge, Colorado. Few people knew of the Bunker’s existence, since it was the supersecret headquarters of the Midgard, a team of students and adults who had been tasked with battling a new group of Reapers.
A long rectangular table dominated one side of the room, and all the seats were facing the monitors that took up most of one wall. Zoe’s desk was off to one side of the center table, along with mine, while two more desks sat on the opposite side of the table.
One of those desks featured a laptop, along with a couple of keyboards and monitors. Several miniature foam footballs, soccer balls, and tennis balls were stuffed between all the computer equipment. That desk belonged to Mateo Solis, the Roman who was the Midgard’s computer guru and another one of our friends.
Battle axes, swords, and other weapons covered the second desk, along with myth-history books with sticky notes on their pages to mark certain passages. That spot belonged to Ian Hunter, the Viking who was the team’s warrior muscle, in addition to yours truly.
My gaze moved to the back half of the room, which had several rows of floor-to-ceiling shelves. Books lined many of the shelves, but they weren’t your normal paperbacks and hardcovers. No, these volumes were all extremely old, with worn pages, tattered covers, and frayed spines. Many of the books looked like they would disintegrate into dust if you pulled them off the shelves, much less tried to open and read them, but the books—and the knowledge they contained—were far more dangerous than they appeared.
As were all the other artifacts here.
Weapons, armor, jewelry, clothing, and more sat on the shelves next to all those old books. Golden swords, silver shields, diamond rings, bronze sandals. Each artifact was more beautiful than the last and had some magic that made it very, very powerful.
Like the Gauntlets of Maat, named after the Egyptian goddess of truth. Once the gold gauntlets were placed on your arms, you couldn’t take them off, and you had to answer truthfully any question you were asked. Oh, you could try to resist the artifact’s magic, but for every lie you told, the gauntlets would heat up a little more, until they finally erupted into flames and burned you alive.
And that was just one of dozens of objects that would burn, freeze, or otherwise torture you to death. Not to mention all the artifacts that would make you see monsters that weren’t really there or fall in love with someone you hated or otherwise mess with your mind and heart so badly that you lost all your free will.
I leaned to the side and peered down one of the aisles at the shelf along the back wall. My gaze locked on a glass case sitting all by itself. Unlike other warriors, I didn’t have enhanced eyesight, so I couldn’t see it clearly from here, but I knew exactly what that case contained: a jewelry box made of polished jet, with silver vines running across the top and wrapping around small, heart-shaped ruby flowers.
The Midgard had recovered the jewelry box from the Cormac Museum a few weeks ago. We had kept Covington, the Reaper leader, from stealing the artifact, but we still didn’t have any idea what it was, what magic it might have, or what it might contain. Still, something about the box seriously creeped me out. Just looking in its direction made me shiver, and I wondered what was so special about the artifact that Covington had been willing to kill to get it—
“Well, I, for one, am looking forward to our adventure, Rory.” A voice with a lilting Irish accent cut into my thoughts.