No one moved.
“Excuse me, Medusa,” Plank said hesitantly, still staring at the ground. “The stories tell us that you are a gorgon.”
After a beat, she murmured softly as though to herself, “I long for darkness to take my heart at last, to crush the useless thing into non-existence. But I float somewhere between goddess and gorgon for now. Such changes take millennia.” Bitterness filled her voice. “As I am still transitioning, I do not possess the full powers of a gorgon. Neither do I possess the powers of my previous goddess form.”
Medusa jerked and glared at the glowing sword. “Remove it,” she hissed at Jagger, who obliged.
“Well, I ain’t lookin’ first,” Locks whispered.
Barrels sighed and lifted his head. Ebba tensed, her chest tightening until a few breaths passed and Barrels didn’t turn to stone or lose his marbles.
“I’m quite all right,” he said mildly.
One by one, they did the same. Ebba raised her chin and looked upon Medusa’s face.
She’d expected that someone with venomous reptiles wiggling out of her head would be as ugly as her pets, but that wasn’t true. Her mouth was full, her lips painted with a deep orange that complemented her milky-green skin. Her body was lithe and draped with the black dress in the same way cloth was draped over some of the statues and artwork in the chamber.
The snakes forming her hair were black, and a thin strand of the milky-green was wrapped around them in rings to match Medusa’s skin. Her eyes were sharp, normal-shaped but with the vertical irises of a serpent.
Ebba hadn’t been turned to stone yet. Things were looking up.
The candlelight from above snagged on the centerpiece of Medusa’s onyx dress. The material hanging from her shoulders was gathered into a short cylinder which also held up the material covering her from waist to ankle.
The cylinder was short and situated vertically between her breasts. Through the black gauzy material wrapped around the object, tarnished silver glinted.
Ebba would recognize a tarnished silver tube like that anywhere.
They’d found the next part of the weapon.
Seventeen
Ebba couldn’t see the others from where she stood obscured by gauzy curtains, but she could hear her fathers complaining from the far side of the chamber.
Two female daedalions had whisked Ebba off down the stairs.
They’d separated her dreadlocks into sections and the layers overlapped into some bun arrangement at the nape of her neck. A white dress had been flung over her head, unfortunately of the same gauzy make as Medusa’s, but the immortals had wrapped solid lengths of fabric around her chest and hips, so at least everything wasn’t hanging out for dinner. They’d then crisscrossed golden twine up her arms to just above her elbow, and from ankle to knee, careful not to scratch her with their scaled talons. And more of the gold thread wound just above her hairline in layers.
Rings were shoved on her fingers and toes, but Ebba managed to fend off the hawk-women from removing her golden hoop earring.
“How do I look?” she asked the two daedalions.
They tilted their heads to an unnatural angle only birds could achieve and nodded.
Ebba wouldn’t mind taking the golden thread and rings with her when she left, but the dress could go to Davy Jones. The ladies at the Maltu brothel had shoved her in some fairly uncomfortable dresses during her stay, but they’d been uncomfortable because of the boning in the corsets. The white dress she wore showed no more skin than when Ebba changed in the sleeping quarters each day or went for a swim, she supposed, but the barely-there fabric, plunging cut, and leg slits appeared designed to entice and seduce.
The dress she’d worn back at Zol had reflected who she was. Ebba didn’t feel the same about this dress. In fact, she’d spent the last twenty minutes reconciling with herself the fact that Caspian and Jagger would see her in this garb.
She brought her hands to her narrow waist, saying quietly, “I ain’t sure I want to be seen in this.”
That Ebba was confessing her fears to two hawk-women she’d just met didn’t escape her.
One of them watched, not reacting, but the older of the pair stepped closer and leaned in to embrace her, careful not to touch the scabbing wounds on her back.
The unexpected hug had Ebba blinking back a burning behind her eyes. She had to be tired or something.
“Are ye the woman who loved the man from the enemy family all those years ago?” Ebba asked her.
The woman held a finger to her beak.
“Sorry,” Ebba whispered. Would that comment make Medusa mad? She’d thought the creatures were mindless servants to the immortal’s will, but they clearly had minds and thoughts of their own.
The younger daedalion drew the curtain aside, and Ebba took a huge breath that threatened to upset the feeble parameters of her white dress.
Have dinner with Medusa, steal the middle of her dress, escape the army of daedalions, and row the log back to their ship while fighting off the hawks as they attached the new boom and the various sheets and sails. No problem.
Feet bare, Ebba padded back to the table, the two hawk-women at her back. From the voices at the top of the steps, she gleaned the others had beat her there. Sink her. She’d hoped to get seated before them to conceal as much of the dress as possible.
Holding up the hem of her dress, Ebba reached the top of the steps and hurried to the table, eyes on the ground as though the whole lot of them had snakes for hair.
“That ain’t a dress.” Locks pounded his fist on the table. “Surely there’s something more decent for our daughter to wear.”
Ebba took the only empty seat as Medusa laughed. “Your daughter is a young woman. It is her nature to think of reproduction and to dress for a potential mate.”
She what now? “There ain’t no lookin’ for mates or brats here, Lady Medusa,” Ebba told her. “Not by a long shot. And I’d be preferrin’ a dress that covered more.”
“You will wear the dress,” the goddess boomed, her snakes winding into a tangled chaos. She took a deep breath and the snakes slid free of each other, hanging limply once more.
Ebba was wearing the dress. What she wanted was for the subject to change.
Gathering her courage, she glanced up at her fathers. They all wore togas made of solid white material. Thank the fishes for small mercies; she couldn’t have handled it if they were dressed in gauzy stuff.
And that was as far as she was letting her eyes roam.
She was seated between Jagger and Caspian. The prince sat next to Medusa. Despite Ebba’s intent not to look, she stole a look from her peripheries. They were showing a fair amount more skin than her crew—only wearing loose white pants, their torsos bare.
Ebba took another steadying breath.
“But, my dark beauty,” Medusa purred, “won’t you take a proper look at the younger males? I dressed them especially for you.”
She had? Why? To mess with Ebba’s skull? She scrunched her nose. “I’d rather not. Ye can look, though.”
Medusa’s orange lips spread wide. “Oh, I will. You have no idea how long it’s been since a mortal man came to this place. There is something so enticing about mortals. Their emotions, their fragility.” She glanced at Caspian. “I must admit, I have always found them intoxicating.”
He smiled at her and peered about the table. “I’m starved,” he announced.
Medusa’s eyes tightened, but she recovered from his unsubtle change of subject, clicking her fingers. The daedalions surged forward at her command, and Ebba tensed before realizing they were just removing the covers from the food.
“Stop yer stressin’,” Jagger whispered.
She turned to him and frowned at his gleaming, muscular arms. “Jagger, are ye wearin’ oil on yer body?”
He quirked a brow, his eyes glinting. “I am.”
Her eyes flicking across to where his tribal tattoo covered the top of his chest and out to each shoulder tip
, she traced the leaping animals and the waves and swirls of the piece.
“You prefer the flaxen one then,” Medusa said, making Ebba jump. “I am glad,” the goddess continued. “For I find myself enamored with your one-armed companion.”
Ebba glanced at Caspian and found him watching her, jaw clenched.
“I ain’t enamored with anyone,” she said, very aware of her fathers at the table.
“Don’t say that, Viva.” Jagger wrapped an arm about her shoulders, and Ebba slapped his hand until he removed the offending limb. She ignored his quiet chuckle in her ear.
“You were staring at his body, my beauty, even when you didn’t want to. That is the first sign of deep attraction. Just ask my two lovers.” Medusa pointed at the woman who’d hugged Ebba and then the male daedalion standing directly opposite.
The immortals stared at each other as though no one else was in the room.
“Disgusting, aren’t they?” Medusa hissed, her snakes spitting at the two lovers.
Ebba didn’t think it was disgusting; she felt profoundly sorry for all of these creatures, despite the fact they’d been the ones to put them in Medusa’s lair.
“There ain’t nothin’ deep-like goin’ on here. I was only lookin’ at Jagger because I like his tribal tattoos,” she said, cheeks heating.
Medusa leaned forward over the table. “I know. Aren’t they delectable?”
Ebba shrugged. “They’re beautiful; I ain’t sure about de-lickable.”
“Keep telling yourself that, my dark beauty. One day, you will care enough to admit your feelings.”
Her words shouldn’t have affected Ebba, but they did. Her stomach churned with a heavy discontent.
“Is that roast beef?” Peg-leg exclaimed.
“Carrots,” Stubby said.
Never more relieved for her fathers’ overprotectiveness, Ebba loaded her plate with the succulent beef and array of roasted vegetables. Her fathers were doing the same, and it wasn’t until Grubby made to pop a carrot in his mouth that everyone paused.
Ebba peered at the food she’d selected . . . from Medusa’s table.
Medusa smiled, tapping a curved nail against her orange mouth. “You believe I would poison you, do you? You are my guests.”
Caspian popped his loaded fork of roast beef into his mouth and chewed. Ebba made a sound of alarm and reached for him. He placed his fork down, and took her hand under the table, bringing her fingers to the purgium at his waist.
Her shoulders relaxed. Right, he’d be healed if he ate it.
Did a part of her still wonder if Caspian would give himself over to melancholy again if she let her guard down? Or was it that she’d had to watch over him for so long that Ebba had trouble accepting he could protect himself now? He was darker than he’d been, perhaps, but he wanted to live. She could see it.
They all watched as he swallowed.
How long would it take to poison him? Should they wait? Or. . . .
He shrugged after a full minute. “Seems okay?”
“Well . . . I’m hungry,” Peg-leg said, shoveling carrots into his mouth. “Nice to see a balanced meal on the table.”
Stubby groaned. “We still have fresh produce on the ship.”
“Not for long,” Peg-leg snipped.
They tucked into their food with varying states of mistrust.
The tender meat fell apart in her mouth, and Ebba groaned, only slowing her chewing as a group of the daedalions came in with buckets of the sweet, steaming water they’d passed above ground.
Without prompt, the creatures began to wash the outer walls of the chamber with the water.
“Why do ye bleach the rock with that stuff?” she asked Medusa, who’d cut a dainty morsel of beef to consume.
If the goddess had time to eat that slow, she had too much time. Clearly, she hadn’t grown up with food-stealing pirates.
Meanwhile, Jagger was appropriately stuffing food into his gob.
“Light,” the goddess replied, setting her fork and knife down to answer. “My snakes prefer to be underground, but it is too dark for my liking. So we bleach the stone.”
“Ye should hurry it along and get it all done,” Ebba replied. “All streaked like that, it just looks like scratch marks in the stone.”
Medusa smiled and said nothing. She picked up her fork and ate her plankton-sized portion of beef.
A shiver worked up Ebba’s spine.
She scooped up the last loaded fork of carrots and leaned back as she chewed. Ebba placed her hands over her gut and groaned. How long since she’d eaten so much? And actual meat instead of fish? She eyed the gravy and potatoes with longing.
Maybe if she waited a bit, she would be able to fit more in.
She glanced across the table at her fathers and discovered Plank and Stubby were having a furious silent conversation. It ended when Stubby folded his arms, and Plank straightened.
“Medusa,” Plank started. “We’ve come to ye because we’re on a dire quest to save the realm.”
Her snakes quieted, and for a heartbeat the only sound in the chamber was the splaying bristles of the daedalions’ brooms as they washed the walls.
“I know what it is you seek, mortal.” She drew a ringed forefinger between the valley of her chest to the bottom of her breast bone. “You wish to take the scio.”
The scio.
Ebba stared at the tube that formed the centerpiece of her dress. The fourth part. So very close.
“Come and get it,” Medusa purred at Plank, her eyes flickering over his raven curls and upright bearing. Apparently, age wasn’t a factor for the goddess when considering whom to fall in love with.
Grubby squinted at the woman’s writhing snakes. “Give her a haircut first, Plank.”
Jagger choked on a laugh, and Locks shushed Grubby as the goddess froze. The light in the chamber seemed to snuff out before resuming normal levels. The change made Ebba realize just how little they knew about the woman’s powers. Was Medusa humoring them? Could she have killed them at any point? Obviously, she could turn people into hawk hybrids at whim. Or was that only back when she still had her goddess powers? The immortal had confessed she didn’t have the full powers of either a gorgon or a goddess at the moment.
“You threaten my snakes?” Medusa hissed at her father. The question, a clear threat, hung heavy in the air.
The scrubbing hawks were moving closer, now working on the stairs below the raised area where they sat.
The goddess stroked the snake closest to her face, and the reptile leaned into her touch. “Only my snakes have been loyal,” she murmured, watching the creature. “Only my snakes love me. Only they understand and stay true as eons go by.”
They were part of her body, so the snakes didn’t really have a choice. This wench seemed high maintenance. The goddess couldn’t expect to find a true love who would jump at the click of her fingers or to the hiss of her snakes. Medusa seemed to be going about love the wrong way. Not that Ebba was one hundred percent certain what the right way should be. But if a thousand years had passed without success, that surely had to be an indication to switch tactics.
Ebba blinked slowly, inhaling as much air as her stuffed gut would allow. Caspian was resting back too. Jagger still ate. Oversized sod.
Water exploded from the cup Grubby held as he jumped.
Ebba jolted upright and stared down the table to where Medusa had blurred to her father’s side. Locks was half raised from his chair, hand on his cutlass as he watched the goddess.
She leaned into Grubby’s side, and a snake slid over his cheek; a menacing caress.
“Would you like to harm my snakes, selkie?” she asked him. “Answer wisely.”
If wisdom was required, Grubby was going to die.
“I don’t like to hurt any creature, if I can be avoidin’ it,” he replied. “But I’ll kill anythin’ to save Ebba.”
Medusa’s eyes slid to her, and the goddess left Grubby to walk to her side, hips swaying. “Anyth
ing to save Ebba, you say?”
Ebba wanted to speak, but she also wanted to keep the food inside her. She’d really eaten far too much.
“You inspire such loyalty from your males,” the goddess murmured. “How?”
Sink her, a direct question. Ebba lifted her eyes to look at Medusa. The effort it took was colossal. The immortal’s snakes danced before her, their motion almost hypnotic.
“They’re my parents,” she answered, pressing her lips firmly together and swallowing hard.
“And these two?” the woman said, gesturing to Jagger and Caspian. “Where does their loyalty come from?”
Ebba snorted, immediately regretting it. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply, willing the masticated mess of beef and vegetables to remain within.
“Ebba saved my life,” the prince said.
His voice was slurring and she wanted to look at him, but now that she’d closed her eyes, she couldn’t seem to open them again. Her chair had felt hard and rough when she first sat, but appearances were deceiving because not even Felicity’s hammocks could compare to such comfort.
“Ebba saved my life too,” Jagger said, chewing.
His voice wasn’t slurring. Ebba’s eyebrow twitched at his remark. That was the second time he’d mentioned her saving his life. She wished her fathers would reply to the pirate and ask why. But they were silent.
The scrubbing of the daedalions was soothing, like listening to a gentle tide on a pebbled beach. The sound was growing louder. They’d reached the top of the steps and were working around the table. Close as the hawk-people were, Ebba could smell the heady aroma of the water from the pools above emanating from their buckets. So sweet.
“How did she save your life?” Medusa demanded.
The clang of a fork alerted Ebba that the immortal was back in her chair.
“She was full of life. I hadn’t seen joy in so long; it was like starin’ at the sun for the first time. The workings of her crew offered ha’piness too. I was jealous o’ their life to start, but then I just wanted it. When I went back to Malice after Pleo, all I could recall was the look in her green eyes as I left. She’d be sad if I died. I wanted to preserve her viva. When I could barely see straight through the dark, that’s what I clung to. Then I focused on findin’ her beads. I couldn’t recall my own name sometimes, but I had the memory of her face and her joy.”
Dynami’s Wrath Page 17