Love or Fate by Clea Hantman Read Free Book Online

jersey. Only the goop wasn’t invisible, so now it appeared that a floating piece of goop was walking down the dark corridor all on its own.
    Apollo panicked and tried to scrape it off, rubbing against the other wall. That just made it worse. Now he was a walking pile of goop and grime.Despite his fear and his inability to see much around him, he hoped upon hope that it would stay dark all the way to the Furies’ lair.
    It stayed dark, all right. So dark that Apollo didn’t see the end of the tunnel coming. Still hunched over, he walked right into a craggy rock wall. “Ow!” he yelped, and then swallowed deep. He turned to his left and walked right into another wall, although this one wasn’t rocky. It was itchy. It was covered in a dried-grass-like material, spiky and scratchy. Apollo turned around quick and tried the third and final direction.
    SMACK!
    “Owww,” said the wall.
    “Yowww, whoa!” said Apollo, not just out of pain, but out of confusion—he had never encountered a talking wall before. And really, who has?
    “Please, sir, watch where you’re going,” said the wall.
    “So, you can see me?” asked Apollo.
    “Of course, I see all. For I am the wall.”
    “Rhyming? No! Are you a Fury? Show yourself, Tizzie. Or is it Alek? Meg!” screamed Apollo.
    “Quiet, quiet. I’m not a Fury. Do I look like a Fury? No. The rhyming was just a coincidence. Now, do you want to get through or not?”
    Apollo nodded, still confused.
    “Well, all right, then. But before I let you through, you must first answer a question.”
    “Fine, but how is it that you can see me? Is it the goop?” asked a worried Apollo.
    “I told you, I’m the wall, I see all—oops, I mean I see everything. No rhyming. I am a gatekeeper. So riddle me this. Recite the Greek alphabet…backward. You have twenty-five seconds.”
    “You’re kidding—that’s the question? I thought it would be harder than—”
    “Quick, you now have but eighteen seconds!” warned the wall.
    “Right, then.” And Apollo recited all twenty-four letters without taking another breath. “Omega, psi, chi, phi, upsilon, tau, sigma, rho, pi, omicron, xi, nu, mu, lambda, kappa, iota, theta, eta, zeta, epsilon, delta, gamma, beta, and alpha. Whew!”
    “Well done. Just nine seconds. Could be a record.”
    “So that’s all? That was it, I can be on my way?”
    “No, no. That wasn’t really the riddle. I just love to torture you dead souls.”
    Apollo’s invisible shoulders drooped.
    “No, now here is your real riddle. And it’s a hard one. Oh, you’ll never know this one, it’s so very obscure, very hard. I’d say it’s practically impossible.”
    Sweat dripped from Apollo’s invisible hands.
    “I mean, I don’t know how in Tartarus you’ll everknow this. Ha! Oh, this will be fun. I mean, have you ever even heard of this being, I wonder? Doubtful!” and the wall laughed and laughed.
    “Get on with it, please!” Apollo snapped.
    “Oh, back to the gates you’ll go! Okay, then. What is…are you listening? What is the favorite color of the Muse, the middle one, the most rambunctious of the nine Muse sisters, Thalia? Hee, hee.”
    “You’re kidding, right?”
    “Nope. That’s your question. Get it wrong and you are bounced out of Tartarus to the Gates of Cerberus. Tee hee. Go on now, take your hapless guess.”
    “Easy. It’s purple,” Apollo said, relieved.
    “I’m sorry, that is…what? Why, that’s…CORRECT!”
    The wall sounded aghast and very disappointed.
    “Yes, yes, so I can move on, right?” Apollo eagerly asked, amazed at his luck.
    “Well, yes. I guess you’ve won…why, a brand-new path. Have fun cruising the halls. And thank you for playing the game!” With these last words the wall disappeared and became a very narrow entranceway into another corridor.
    This new corridor was well lit and filled with strange creatures that had, at one time or another, belonged to the land of the living but were now killing time in