Euryale buried her face in her hands where it was warm and safe. She hated how weak, small, and most of all, alone she felt in all of this. The gorgon took in a slow, deep breath and straightened, refocusing on the task she’d set out to do. No, she wasn’t alone, at least, not for much longer. She’d have her sister back soon enough, and Stheno had always granted her strength like no other.
Euryale slumped in the chariot. Alex deserved better, and she should be drawing her strength from him as much as from her sister. She pulled out her phone and dialed him again before she could think herself out of it.
“Euryale?” Alex said once he answered. “Something wrong?”
“No, well, yes,” she stammered. “But I’m going to free Stheno. I’d like you there when I do. Bring the kids. They should meet her right away, too.”
“How?” he asked, sounding astonished at the very notion. “I mean, of course, I’ll come. Except, you kind of took the chariot and all, but I’ll think of something. She’s still at the aquarium, right?”
“She is,” Euryale replied. “Grab a chariot from Apollo and meet me at the ticket counter. I’ll be there in a few hours.”
“Okay,” he said. “See you soon. Love you.”
“Love you, too.”
* * *
Noka Marine Aquarium.
The entire complex spanned nearly a half mile in each direction, not including the myriad of hotels and resorts that had sprung up next to it over the past year. True, the entire complex had pulled in its fair share of guests over the years and had even made a decent profit for its owners throughout that time. The penguin exhibit on the south side was often heralded as one of the best in the world—their secret being an exceptional lighting engineer who’d managed to make the small, flightless birds look extra cute.
However, with the addition of a killer whale who’d not only been found in the middle of a nearby city—alive, no less—but had also survived a fall from so high she should’ve burned up on re-entry, the aquarium still had a waiting list for Stheno’s show that extended out for the next three years. Everyone and their mother (and their mother’s mother) wanted to see this immortal marine mammal do her tricks. They also probably wanted to see if she’d fly again.
“Mommy!” the twins shouted, tearing free of their father’s grasp and running full steam toward Euryale. The gorgon barely had time to brace herself for the hit when Aison stuck himself to her hip, and Cassandra launched herself into her arms.
“Daddy says we’re going to see our aunt!” Cassandra said, eyes full of excitement.
“I didn’t even know we had an aunt!” Aison added. “Except for Miss Persephone. But she’s not a real aunt.”
Cassandra scowled and smacked her brother on the head. “She is too!”
“Is not!”
“Is too!”
“Okay, okay, let’s not get into that,” Euryale said, squeezing them both tightly, stopping the argument before it escalated into the next world war.
“Should I buy tickets?” Alex asked, looking at the row of booths that stood a few dozen yards away. His face soured as he did, and for a good cause, too. The line was enormous.
Euryale shook her head. “No.”
“No?”
“I’m not giving money to the people who jailed my sister,” she said.
“But they didn’t really know she was, well, not a whale,” Alex replied.
“Which is the only thing keeping me from tearing off their limbs and feeding them to their children.” Euryale stiffened and flashed a smile to her semi-horrified children. “Mommy’s exaggerating. No one is getting torn apart.”
The twins exchanged glances. Cassandra elbowed her brother and whispered, “I don’t think she is.”
To which Aison whispered back, “I kinda wanna see her do it. Do you think it’ll be like the movies?”
“No one is torn apart,” Euryale reiterated. She then took them both by the hand and slithered for the entrance.
“What if they want to see our tickets?” Alex asked, trotting a few steps to catch up. “Maybe I should buy some anyway.”
Euryale grinned, having flashbacks to a particular encounter she’d had with a ticket agent at an airport not long ago. “I can be persuasive, don’t worry.”
And she was. Quite.
Much to her delight (and the disappointment of Aison), the teen manning the turnstile decided not to stop the gorgon whatsoever when she simply pushed her way past not only the line, but his position as well. Euryale gave him full marks for a smart choice on that one. After all, was he seriously going to risk petrification or worse to enforce some silly thing like making sure she had a particular piece of paper? Of course not.
Once through the entrance, she grabbed a park map and gave it a look while people bustled by, and the sounds of excitement filled the air. Long ago, Euryale would’ve never thought anyone, let alone the crowds at large, wouldn’t run away screaming the moment they laid eyes on her monstrous form. And while some people did stare a little longer than they should, most people, young and old, gave her and her family nothing more than a passing glance. With the Olympians’ return over a year ago, the world truly had grown used to all things mythological.
It took Euryale a few moments to find exactly where she needed to go to find her sister, mainly because the twins were hellbent on either terrorizing the park visitors for fun or disappearing completely to do gods knew what. And given everything she was dealing with already, she didn’t need any more added stress.
“Hey!” Alex shouted. “If you two don’t settle down right this instant, no cotton candy for either of you.”
Aison and Cassandra didn’t move a muscle, each hanging off a statue of a jumping dolphin. “Cotton candy?” they asked in unison.
“Yes, cotton candy. The treat of the gods. The candy of the divine. The most amazing, to-die-for confection that has ever existed.”
Aison’s face scrunched “What’s con…con…”
“Confection. And you’ll never know what that is if you don’t behave,” Alex said, giving them each the dad finger of doom.
The twins, again acting as one, stood as tall and pleasant as any child from the 1950s, with their hands clasped neatly in front of them and faces smiling bright. It was all an act, an act they’d learned to perfect, but one couldn’t say it wasn’t effective.
“We have discussed the matter,” Cassandra said, “and we’ve come to an afford.”
“It’s aboard,” Aison whispered.
“I believe the word you’re looking for is ‘accord,’” Alex said with a chuckle.
“Right, an accord,” Cassandra corrected. “We have decided that we want some of this cotton candy.”
“Thought you might,” Alex said, grinning. He then turned to his wife, who was watching all of this play out with amusement. “Shall you lead the way then?”
“I shall.”
The gorgon then struck out for the whale encounter, which was situated on the other side of the park, nestled between the stingray lagoon and the penguin palace. The kids managed to hold their near-insatiable curiosity and desire to explore for a solid nine minutes, which not only was a full two minutes more than Euryale had expected, but did set a new record for best behavior without mother’s intervention while somewhere new. Cotton candy, it seemed, was a fantastic motivator.
When they finally reached where she wanted to be, Euryale checked a nearby, brightly colored board with a cartoon whale leaping through a red hoop for the showtimes. The next one wasn’t scheduled for another twenty-two minutes.
The gorgon then spent a half second looking the place over. The whale encounter was a large stadium that formed a semi-circle around a massive tank of water, complete with islands and a custom backdrop of a pacific island scene. A huge line swarmed the entrance, filled with guests idly waiting to be let in, all the while tackling the heat with hats, comments about the weather, and over-priced, ice-cold beverages.
Euryale hurried through t
he crowd, her husband and children following in her wake. This close to her sister, Euryale didn’t wait to be acknowledged or even seen in some cases. She simply pushed people aside. She was surprised at how, with each passing second, she grew not only more eager to see Stheno, but more willing to tear into any hapless bystander—figuratively and literally—who stood in her way.
A young woman, at best fresh out of high school, with curly red hair and skin covered in more freckles than not, held up her hand when Euryale reach the front of the line. “We’ll be seating soon,” she said. “Please wait here with your passes ready.”
Euryale continued on with a grunt, not bothering to even acknowledge her presence. She grabbed the thin rope that stretched from the wall to a post in the ground and with one jerk, snapped it clean.
“Hey! You can’t—”
Alex leaned close to the girl as they passed. “Best to let this one go,” he said. “Trust me on this.”
The girl took his advice, sort of. Though she didn’t challenge Euryale directly, as the gorgon entered into the stadium, she caught the woman grabbing a radio and talking to someone.
Euryale stopped once inside and pressed her hands against the eight-foot-tall, thick glass of the aquarium tank as she peered inside. The crystal-clear blue water held nothing, but she did see a wide channel on the other side that presumably allowed the stars of the show to come and go.
“This way,” she said, hurrying.
After hurrying through a closed gate, slithering onto the stage, and shoving aside a couple more shocked stagehands who had the audacity to stand there dumbfounded, Euryale found a door nestled between two, giant screens that took her to the rear tanks.
She redoubled her pace. Though she was ecstatic at finally seeing Stheno again, her hands grew jittery. What if she was mad at her for never coming to visit? Or worse, somehow blamed her for being cast here by Athena? Or what if Stheno just decided to lash out at everyone around her for no other reason than to quell the anger that had no doubt been building for over a year now? She was, after all, always the most violent and brutal of the three sisters. Even Euryale would admit to that.
Maybe bringing Alex and the kids wasn’t such a good idea after all.
“What?” Alex asked when she glanced over her shoulder.
Euryale paused halfway down the narrow hall. She had to speak a little louder than normal, thanks to a noisy water pump a few feet away. “She might be cranky,” she said. “I need you to be on your toes.”
“Cranky?”
“Yeah.”
Alex shrugged. “I’d probably be cranky, too, being stuck as a whale for this long.”
“I know, but when you get cranky, you want an éclair.”
“Yeah, so?”
“When she gets cranky, she wants to kill a few dozen people. Maybe a hundred.”
Alex’s eyebrows shot up, and he backtracked a few steps. “Oooh.”
“That also means you should let me do the talking,” she added.
“I’m about to let you do all this on your own,” Alex said. “Kids want to feed the stingrays, anyway. You two can meet us there when she’s out of bloodbath mode.”
Aison, who was holding a giant stack of cotton candy taller than the tower of Babel in each hand, drew them both close to his chest. “I’m not feeding them my candy cotton!”
Cassandra, carrying the same, wiped a bit of sticky, colored goo from her mouth and seconded the sentiment. “Me either!”
“Cotton candy,” Alex whispered.
“Or my cotton candy!” Aison added.
The comments of the twins put Euryale at ease, or at least, at ease enough to continue down the hall before pushing through a door. This led her out to a large pool with a catwalk that ran across its middle and two sloped entry points at opposite ends. To her relief, the pool happened to be occupied by a pair of killer whales. They swam leisurely in the water, and for the moment, it didn’t seem as if either was interested in the gorgon.
“Do you suppose she’s one of them?” Alex asked. “Maybe we should’ve asked who the crown jewel of this place was before we stormed the palace.”
“We’ll see in a moment,” Euryale said, slithering forward. She went along the pool’s edge, letting her tail flick into the water, trying to draw the whales’ attention as she went to one of the entry points.
She was about halfway there when a door flew open on the other side of area, and a couple of security guys dressed in crisp black-and-brown uniforms and menacingly clutching handheld radios barged in.
“Hey! You four!” the bigger and older of the two yelled while pointing a finger. “You can’t be in here! I don’t care who you are!”
Euryale ignored them and kept moving, which seemed to fluster the duo.
“I mean it!” the guard yelled, still approaching, but clearly not sure of himself. “We’ve got contacts, you know! Up high. Like in Olympus high. There’s a whole temple to Poseidon not even a block away. He’s going to be pissed if you don’t leave right this instant.”
Euryale felt her jaw tighten and a growl slip from her lips. The faint outline of scales appeared on her skin, and as her fangs elongated, she forced herself to remember they were only doing their job. As such, she could at least give them a chance. “Alex,” she said. “Deal with them, please.”
“On it,” he said, hastily making his way across the catwalk.
Euryale smiled, not at her husband’s quick action, but at the fact that one of the whales had come to see her. With every foot of ground she covered, it was right next to her, shadowing her every step.
This creature had to be Stheno. It had to be.
Euryale dipped into the entry point, and the moment her body sank into not even an inch of water, the whale lunged forward, sending a cold, salty spray everywhere and beaching itself next to the gorgon in the process.
Euryale felt her throat tighten, and tears of joy form in her eyes. She reached out and placed a hand against the massive creature’s head. The smooth, slippery, and rubbery skin sent a tingle up the gorgon’s arm.
“Stheno?” she asked.
The whale answered by thrashing about, thoroughly soaking the gorgon even more than she already was.
“I’m here,” Euryale said, caressing her sister. “Everything’s about to change for the better. I promise. Give me a moment.”
The whale stilled, and it tracked every movement Euryale made with its eye. The gorgon reached into her pouch and pulled out the glass sphere Artemis had given her. She then looked at it briefly before smashing it across the whale’s head.
The silver and gold flecks sprayed across the whale’s body, glowing fiercely the moment they came in contact with her skin. Light shot out in all directions from each spot, and within seconds that light burned so brightly across the entire whale’s body that Euryale was forced to shield her eyes and look away. A loud droning sound built in the air, and after a few seconds, the light faded. The world quieted, and Euryale dared a look.
Standing a few feet away, awestruck, was Stheno. Bronze skin covered a slender frame that only a fool would think was weak. While she, too, carried a nest of vipers atop her head as Euryale did, every last one of Stheno’s was scarlet in color with bands of black, all hissing and coiled, ready to strike.
“Euryale!” her sister cried out, wrapping the gorgon in a hug tight enough to crush diamond. “I knew you’d come for me.”
“Of course I would,” Euryale replied, her words wheezing out. “I’m sorry it took so long.”
Stheno’s claws dug into Euryale’s back, painfully so.
“It did take a while,” she said, drawing blood. The gorgon lifted her head off Euryale’s shoulder before glaring at the men Alex was trying to usher out the door as quickly as he could. “And for that, I’m going to enjoy making them pay for every stupid trick they made me do.”
The gorgon lunged forward, roaring with such ferocity that even Scylla would have heeded Stheno’s every command. Euryale, knowing
her sister’s fury, managed to react fast enough by latching hold of her arms and coiling her tail around her legs so that they both fell to the floor.
The act only enraged Stheno further. The gorgon struggled against her sister’s vicelike embrace, clawing at the ground, yelling obscenities that would make even the most hardened drill instructor blush, and trying to drag herself toward her former captors. “I’ll kill you all!” she roared. “You hear me? I’m going to flay you alive and put your children’s children on spits for all to see!”
Euryale, still locked on Stheno, took her attention off her sister long enough to shout out to the security guys who, for some stupid reason, hadn’t run off yet. “What are you waiting for?” she yelled. “Get out of here!”
A shove from Alex helped put the two men in gear, and off they ran.
“Run, you cowards!” Stheno yelled, still struggling, still fighting. She elbowed Euryale in the gut and even slapped her across the face, but the gorgon held on.
“Stop!” Euryale pleaded. “This isn’t the time!”
“Of course it’s the time!” she fired back. “Do you know what they did to me? You of all people should be at my side, gouging eyes and ripping hearts!”
“I do,” Euryale said, ignoring the next few blows her sister gave as well as the previous. “And if I were in your place, I’d want the same.”
Stheno hissed, as did every viper atop her head. “Then let me go. We promised to be at each other’s side forever.”
“We did, and I always will be,” Euryale said, praying to the Fates this fight would end soon and peacefully. “There are more important things going on than this. I swear.”
At first, Stheno didn’t react, and Euryale kept a tight grip on her as she seethed, snorting like a rabid bull. But as time marched on, Stheno slowly calmed, and eventually, she simply huffed and relaxed.
A Storm of Blood and Stone (Myths of Stone Book 3) Page 8