Dreamless Read Online Free PDF

hands. He looked smaller. Like he had just lost the fight, even though he’d won, taking everything from Lucas. “You have to be the one to stop this. No confiding in each other, no flirting at school, and no quiet talks in dark hallways. You have to make her hate you, son.”
    Helen and Cassandra were working in the library, trying to find something—anything—that could help Helen in the Underworld. It was a frustrating afternoon. The more the two girls read, the more they were convinced that half the stuff about Hades was written by medieval scribes on serious drugs.
    “Ever see any talking-skeletal-death-horses in Hades?” Cassandra asked skeptically.
    “Nope. No talking skeletons. Horses included,” Helen responded, rubbing her eyes.
    “I think we can put this one on the ‘he was definitely high’ pile.” Cassandra put the scroll down and stared at Helen for a few moments. “How are you feeling?”
    Helen shrugged and shook her head, unwilling to talk about it. Since Castor had caught her and Lucas outside his bedroom, she’d been tiptoeing around the Delos house when she had to come over to study, and stuck inside the hell-house each night.
    Usually in the Underworld, Helen could count on at least one or two nights a week where she was walking down an endless beach that never led to an ocean. The endless beach was annoying because she knew she wasn’t getting anywhere, but compared to being trapped inside the hell-house it was like a holiday. She didn’t know how much longer she could take it, and she couldn’t talk about it with anyone. How could she possibly explain the perverted wool coat and lurid peach curtains without sounding ridiculous?
    “I think I should go home and eat something,” Helen said, trying not to think about the night that awaited her.
    “But it’s Sunday. You’re eating here, right?”
    “Um. I don’t think your dad wants me hanging out here anymore.” I don’t think Lucas does, either , she thought. He hadn’t looked at her since the day Castor had caught them with their arms around each other, even though Helen had tried several times to smile at him in the hallway at school. He’d just walked by like she wasn’t there.
    “That’s nonsense,” Cassandra answered firmly. “You are a part of this family. And if you don’t come to dinner, my mom will be offended.”
    She walked around the table and took Helen’s hand, leading her out of the study. Helen was so surprised by Cassandra’s uncharacteristically warm gesture that she followed quietly.
    It was later than the girls had thought, and dinner was starting. Jason, Ariadne, Pallas, Noel, Castor, and Lucas were already seated. Cassandra took her customary place next to her father, and the only spot left was on the bench, between Ariadne and Lucas.
    As Helen stepped over the bench, she accidentally jostled Lucas, running her arm down the length of his as she sat down.
    Lucas stiffened and tried to pull away from her.
    “Sorry,” Helen stammered, trying to shrug her arm away from his, but there was no room to move over on the crowded bench. She felt him bristle, and she reached under the table and squeezed his hand as if to ask, “What’s wrong?”
    He snatched his hand out of hers. The look he gave her was so full of hatred it froze the blood in her veins. The room went silent and the chitchat died. All eyes turned to Helen and Lucas.
    Without warning, Lucas threw the bench back, knocking Helen, Ariadne, and Jason onto the floor. Lucas stood over Helen, glaring down on her. His face was contorted with rage.
    Even when they were possessed by the Furies, and Helen and Lucas had fought bitterly, she had never been afraid of him. But now his eyes looked black and strange—like he wasn’t even in there anymore. Helen knew it wasn’t just a trick of the light. A shadow had blossomed inside of Lucas and snuffed out the light of his bright blue eyes.
    “We don’t hold hands. You don’t talk to me. You don’t