Separated from Yourselves

by Bill Hiatt

  “I suppose I shouldn’t question my good fortune, but that was…odd,” said Gwynn.

  “I wouldn’t worry, Majesty,” said Tal. “When we first started treating her, she was very weak, and I had no trouble reading her thoughts. Her desire for peace is sincere.”

  Gwynn smiled. “If you guarantee her honesty, then honest she must be. I would like to hear of your recent adventures, but I must go now and prepare for our negotiations.”

  We settled down to share stories with one another, but after a while I had a chance to talk to Tal alone.

  “It’s not like you to read someone’s mind unless you absolutely have to,” I said.

  “I don’t usually, but she’s the enemy, and I wanted to make sure her offer to negotiate was genuine.”

  “Tal, she didn’t make that offer until after you treated her,” I said, raising an eyebrow.

  “Yeah, but that part I picked up in her mind by accident when I first started. Then I knew I had to follow up, just to be sure.”

  There was nothing inherently implausible about what he was saying, and in the past he had read hostiles without their consent. However, if Tanaquill was already thinking about peace talks when Tal was working on her, why had she so rudely rejected them just a few minutes before?

  “Where’s White Hilt?” I asked. He had a sword in his scabbard, but it wasn’t the distinctive one he always carried.

  “I lost it during the final battle on Olympus. Hermes is finding it for me. I’d have waited, but I wanted to get here as soon as I could.”

  “And a good thing you did,” I said. “You saved Tanaquill.”

  Yeah, he could have lost White Hilt in battle—but why hadn’t anyone, including me, noticed? We were on Olympus for a while before coming to Annwn, and Tal had never mentioned losing the sword that he had used so much it had almost become a part of him.

  Maybe I was just being paranoid. As far as personality was concerned, he did seem like himself—and I should know, having been his friend as long as I could remember. He wasn’t anything like the time Dark Me pretended to be Tal.

  Yeah, I was probably being paranoid.

  Probably.

  Chapter 31: Family Reunion (Tal)

  As far as we could tell from deep underground, the fake Olympians had returned to Olympus and remained oblivious to our escape.

  “Is it just me, or does it seem odd that they are all clustered exactly where we’d want them to be?” I asked.

  “Indeed,” said Hermes, “but perhaps they need to plot before they disperse to their individual residences. They may also be staying together for self-protection as much as anything else. They have shown themselves to be very crafty in defending themselves.”

  “Cowards!” muttered Ares.

  “We are nearly at the base of Olympus,” Demeter announced. “Gaia will send us to the surface when we are ready.” Having passed through thousands of miles of rock and soil, I couldn’t have told where we were without a lot of magic probing, but I was relieved to hear we were near our destination.

  “Prudence would suggest having a good attack plan,” said Athena. “We have not really spoken of strategy in our haste to reach this point.”

  “We need some way to neutralize the advantage of their arms,” suggested Hermes.

  “Let me summon up the power of my primal self,” said Eros, “and then we shall see how well they can fight the power of love!”

  “But I thought you couldn’t—” I started, then remembered it had been false Eros who had failed to summon primal Eros.

  “Perhaps my double feared primal Eros would be able to tell the difference,” suggested Eros. “I have no such fear.”

  “With two primal forces behind us, we can strike those impostors much harder than they expect,” said Zeus. “Try at once, Eros.”

  In contrast to fake Eros’s long, fruitless struggle to summon his primal counterpart, the real Eros had been working only five minutes when I began to feel power surging all around me, almost overwhelming, yet not rough. I could not help being overcome by memories of Eva, though—probably not the best way to prepare for battle, but unavoidable.

  “Are we all ready?” asked Zeus, looking at all of us. Everyone seemed not only ready but lighthearted about the upcoming battle. I guess we were all feeling the love.

  “Gaia will release us from the ground and shake the foundations of Olympus at the same time,” said Demeter. “Hopefully the impostors will be confused enough to be unprepared for us.”

  Suddenly there was sunlight striking me in the face, and then we were all flying up the side of the mountain. Unlike the faeries, all of the Olympians weren’t naturally inclined to fly, but apparently all of them could if they needed to, unless Hermes was giving them a little boost. Either way, we reached the peak and flew straight into the throne room with no obvious resistance.

  The entire structure was shaking as if it were in California, and the “big one” had just hit. As if on cue, the shaking stopped when we entered the room.

  The earthquake had misdirected our enemies’ attention, and our rapid ascent had them off guard. Apollo and Artemis sprayed them with arrows, Hermes with magic, and I with White Hilt’s flame, all before they had time to get a proper defense going. Several of the fake Olympians immediately suffered serious injuries, though none was down yet. Our successful first assault gave Zeus the time to aim his thunderbolts strategically enough to stun the false Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades, as well as Cronus. Then he turned his full wrath against his own double. Thunderbolts would be less effective against fake Zeus than against others. However, fake Zeus had still not managed much of a defense yet, and the impostor got a big shock—literally—when Changó, this time riding inside Hestia—joined the real Zeus in bombarding the false one.

  While Zeus was hammering his counterfeit self, I continued spraying flame from White Hilt in as wide a pattern as I could manage. Fake Hephaestus would be fire resistant, but most of our enemies were not, and I kept those still standing on the defensive.

  I could feel dark energies building around Hecate and knew she was about to unleash a major attack. I thought about focusing my fire against her, but Eros beat me to it. The love lord pulled every ounce of power he could gather from his primal self and poured it out against the witch goddess. Like so many who have turned their backs on love, Hecate may have underrated its power, but as wave after wave of pure love rippled over her, its golden glow contradicting her darkness, even she could not deny its might. She fell to her knees, her face twisted in agony, and the power she was trying to accumulate dissipated.

  In contrast to our long, grueling battle earlier, this one seemed almost easy. By this point Fake Zeus was toast—literally—and the Zeus-Changó team had switched its attention to Cronus, who was no match for the two of them, either. Hades and Poseidon had seized their elder weapons from their dazed impostors, after which those copies didn’t stand a chance.

  From that point, the Olympians could double or triple team those frauds who remained standing. Hecate collapsed completely under the weight of Eros’s maximum attack. I joined in the battle against fake Ares; with real Ares, Hades, and Apollo all at my side, we made short work of the pretend lord of war.

  Fake Artemis and Apollo managed to do some damage with their arrows, as did Athena with her spear, but once Poseidon and Zeus teamed up with Changó against them, that trio of impostors also fell.

  When the last of Hecate’s manufactured allies had suffered defeat, only about an hour had passed.

  Between the two battles, much of the building had been reduced to a smoking ruin, and it was hard to ignore the smell of burned pseudo-Olympian flesh.

  Hermes must have noticed the discomfort on my face, because he said, “I, too, would rather have avoided this. Sometimes there is no other way.”

  “I’ve never been a pacifist,” I told him. “I’m not sure which frightens me more, though: all this destruction, or the fact that it doesn’t bother me as much as it used
to.”

  “That is only a sign that you are becoming more of a man,” said Ares, who must have overheard. I decided against getting into an argument with him; we were never going to agree anyway.

  “Lord Ares, I wanted to mention to you that one of my friends recently discovered he is the reincarnation of your son, Ascalaphus.”

  “Ascalaphus lives again?” asked Ares, his features softening visibly at the mention of the name.

  As Ares and I talked about Alex, I found out what I had already suspected: that Ares had been replaced before Alex had made first contact.

  “You thought it was I who wanted to kill you? Ascalaphus thought it was I who would use him, utterly indifferent to his fate?” I had never seen so much sorrow on Ares’s face, though I had to remind myself that I had only seen his real face recently.

  “Alex couldn’t remember the real you, and I had never met you in any of my earlier lives. If we had known more about you, we would have recognized the false you for what he was.”

  Ares sighed. “I can hardly blame either of you. I was once as bloodthirsty as your myths describe. In ancient times, perhaps I would have acted somewhat the way the false me did. I have tried…to change. Even in ancient times, though, I loved Ascalaphus, and I grieved much for him when he fell at Troy.

  “Can I meet him?” continued Ares eagerly. “I would have him know me for who I really am.”

  If anyone had told me I would get choked up over something Ares said, I would have laughed at them, but something about his sorrow stabbed through me like a knife.

  I had been embarrassed by Dark Me’s early shenanigans, but even he had not sunk to the depths the false Ares had. I couldn’t imagine what it would be like to have anyone, much less my own son, see me as so completely uncaring, so ready to let that son die to advance my own goals.

  “I’m sure he would want that, my lord,” I told him. “And by the way, it’s true we didn’t know we were dealing with your double, but we did suspect you were being controlled somehow by Hecate. I think in his heart Alex always felt what he was seeing wasn’t the real you.”

  OK, so I might have been embellishing just a little. I really didn’t know for sure. Getting a smile from the usually grim Ares made me feel justified in manipulating the truth a little bit. Not long after, I saw him talking about his son—with Eros, of all people.

  Was Ares Eros’s father? I think the myths said different things, and it felt awkward to ask, so I didn’t.

  Hephaestus and Athena were already involved in a discussion of how best to rebuild, a conversation in which other Olympians gradually joined. I drifted over as well, fascinated by how quickly they were bouncing back from their recent captivity. Soon Olympus would be as it once was.

  Before long Zeus called us all together.

  “Today’s victory would not have been possible without the help of Changó and of Taliesin,” Zeus announced, nodding to me. As if on cue, Changó appeared again in a burst of flame from White Hilt.

  “What say you, my fellow Olympians? What reward can we offer them?” asked Zeus, giving us a smile like rain in a drought-stricken land.

  “My Lord Zeus, I require no reward, nor do I think God would be pleased with me if I accepted one,” said Changó, his fiery body bowing slightly.

  “What of you, Taliesin?” asked Zeus. “Surely I can do something for you. Few mortals could have accomplished what you did. These days very few would even have wanted to.”

  “Lord Zeus, you would not know this, but my friends and I have received much help from the Olympians already. I consider the aid your people have given more than sufficient recompense.”

  “Would you not like to be immortal as we are?” asked Zeus. “I can give you that gift.”

  From Alex’s experience, I knew that would confine me to this plane of existence. I’m sure there would be other drawbacks to immortality, but that one was enough for me.

  “Father, Taliesin has family and friends in his own world,” said Hermes, saving me the embarrassment of trying to explain why I was turning down Zeus’s gift. “As things stand, he might never be able to rejoin them.”

  “Ah, I understand,” said Zeus, “yet I wish there was something I could give you.”

  “My friends and I may require aid at some future point,” I said. “Being able to seek it here would be more than reward enough.”

  “You had that without needing to ask,” said Zeus.

  “Husband, we have more than just Taliesin to thank, if what I hear is true,” said Hera. “Several of his friends fought by his side earlier. They all risked themselves in the belief that they were fighting with us, not realizing that they were actually fighting a contrived battle at the side of some of our impostors.”

  “A banquet in their honor, perhaps,” suggested Dionysus.

  “That I am sure my friends would gratefully accept, once we are at liberty. Right now we have urgent business that must be finished first. I believe my friends are even now in Annwn, fighting at the side of Gwynn ap Nudd, and I should join them there. After that, we may need to fight enemies in our own world.”

  “Indeed I fear as much,” said Athena. “The one known as Nicneven appears not to be among the fallen.”

  “What about your blood?” prompted Changó.

  “Uh, good point,” I said. “Can any of you find out whether a false version of me has escaped from Olympus. We know Hecate has taken some of my blood. Has she used it yet?”

  “At once,” agreed Zeus, “for her scheme is bound to displease God.”

  “It may also cause a grave threat to those Taliesin holds dear,” said Athena. “Without doubt we must discover the truth of this.”

  Apollo, one step ahead, had closed his eyes when the conversation started. When he opened them, he looked grim.

  “My visions about you are confused. I see you in Annwn—right now!”

  “Physically?” I asked.

  “I am not seeing the one called Magnus, if that is what you mean,” said Apollo. “Rather, I perceive him, too. The one I meant is physical…and you in every detail.”

  “What can we do to help in the capture of this felon?” asked Zeus.

  “Taliesin is already well equipped,” said Hephaestus, “as are his friends.” Since we are trapped here, I cannot think of any way in which we can aid him.”

  “Perhaps I can, Brother, but I will need your help,” said Hermes. “Taliesin, you have mentioned a spell crafted by Magnus that can terminate this vile duplication rapidly.”

  “Yes,” I replied. “He came up with an alteration of the original spell that fools it into exhausting the blood that is its base too fast. I can cast it as well, but it takes time.”

  Hermes turned to Hephaestus. “Can you craft a ring through which this spell can be cast quickly? A minute or two might make a difference in combat.”

  “If it isn’t asking too much, I’d like to suggest also including in the ring some way to direct the spell at multiple targets,” I said. “Had the original been designed that way, it would have unmasked all of the impostors on Olympus, not just Dark Zeus, and we could have won much sooner.”

  Hephaestus and Hermes considered for a moment. “Brother,” said Hephaestus, I can craft a ring that will accommodate such magic if you can work out the spell on which it is to be based.”

  Hermes grinned. “Creating an automatically executing spell such as I suggested I could have done the day I was born.”

  “Perhaps you should have done it, then,” said Apollo. “As I recall, you spent the day stealing my cattle instead!” I and the Olympians all laughed at that. It felt insanely good to laugh again. I just wished my friends had been there to share the moment.

  Hell, at this point I would have settled for knowing they were still alive.

  “You must admit, though, Brother, that my skills at…obtaining property came in handy today,” Hermes said to Apollo. “Taliesin and Changó used my skill with locks to liberate us.”

  “That they
did,” Apollo agreed. “What of Taliesin’s suggestion, though? Can you take a spell crafted to affect a specific target and have it affect anyone in the area?”

  “That I might have had to wait until I was two days old to do,” replied Hermes, smiling mischievously. Turning to me, he said, “However, that modification is going to make the completion of the ring take longer.”

  I hated to spend the time now that I knew someone pretending to be me was on the loose again. Unfortunately, there could already be more than one impostor. Every one of my friends had bled in battle today, and Hecate or someone else could easily have collected a few drops at one time or another. Not only that, but my blood double could also cast the spell, creating more doubles once he reached Annwn. Being able to hit multiple targets with the counterspell might make the difference between success and failure.

  “I think the advantage is well worth the delay,” I told Hermes.

  “It may not take as long as you think, Brother,” Hephaestus pointed out. “Has Taliesin not taught us how to share power, which always speeds the work? And are we not all here together for the first time in months? Would not the power of all of us be enough to craft this ring in a short time?”

  “That it would,” agreed Hermes. However, Taliesin must teach us the spell before we can begin.”

  With their permission, I downloaded the counterspell directly into their minds, which saved at least a little time. Then they all—even Zeus himself—bustled off to do what I hoped would be a quick crafting. Time here ran faster than time on Earth, but from what I’d seen, not faster than time in Annwn. Every second counted.

  “I fear I must leave,” Changó told me as soon as we were alone.

  “I know you can’t come with me to Annwn or Earth—” I started.

  “I probably shouldn’t have stayed here, either,” he said with a crooked smile, “but since I have not been struck by lightning or anything like that, perhaps God has granted me forgiveness for bending the rules.”