Aphrodite's War

by Donna Milward

  And she was all alone. She still had no idea what had become of Amir. Jenny wouldn’t return her calls and Adrian didn’t have her number. Hugh had gone home for the evening after taking her money and handing over a set of keys.

  The door protested as she trudged inside. “Home sweet home.” Her words bounced back to her along with a violent sneeze.

  It wasn’t quite twilight yet, but she turned on the lights to chase away shadows.

  “Well, it’s mine now. I guess I should make myself comfortable,” she said to the stove.

  Great. Now I’m talking to appliances. I’m so lame. She tugged on the slipcovers protecting the end table, lamp, dining set, and finally the relatively newer brown sofa. She’d only seen pictures of these textured monstrosities in photos. It seemed that everyone had owned one of them in the seventies. God only knew why.

  She entered the bedroom and found a quaint dresser and ordinary double bed with a stained mattress that probably should have been thrown out.

  Those lumps must be the size of rats, she thought, and instantly regretted it. Knowing the province of Alberta had a militant rat patrol didn’t dismiss the image.

  Out loud she said, “Where did I put my bag?” Right. On the Formica countertop in the kitchen.

  Poetry wasn’t sure which she found more disturbing, the drone of her lonely footsteps on the linoleum or the dry crackle they caused. Better get used to it, she thought. Going to hear a lot of it from now on.

  She unzipped her luggage and rummaged through her cache of possessions. Kevin didn’t leave her much. A few cups and plates made it, as well as her hodge-podge of Value Village cutlery. Some clothes had escaped his wrath, but most were ripped or too smoke damaged to keep. She still had a few bingo daubers.

  She stopped to use the pink one in the bathroom mirror, just to cheer herself up. Some color in her hair always brightened her mood. Poetry had salvaged most of her fasteners and beads in an empty margarine container. She’d spent over an hour in the old place picking them out of the carpet.

  She’d need bedding. And clean underwear. A trip to her parent’s house couldn’t be avoided. If she didn’t she’d have to sleep without pillows or sheets.

  Just thinking about it caused Poetry’s skin to crawl with an imagined itch. That decided it. She grabbed her keys and opened the door. She paused. What was that smell?

  A floral scent wrinkled her nose. Roses to be exact. But so much more... The aroma persuaded her to remember shy company, a warm night with a whispering summer breeze. And shrimp po’ boys.

  Poetry looked down to find a single plum colored rose. She bent to pluck it from the step, ran her fingers along the soft petals as she inhaled the fragrance.

  Still fresh. Almost exactly the same as the rose from Louisiana Purchase. Where did it come from?

  A chill tingled her spine. More importantly, how did it get there? She hadn’t heard footsteps or knocking.

  Poetry almost tripped in her rush to reach the bottom landing. She ripped the closet door open and raced through the office. Nothing. “Hello? Anyone here?” She listened with strained ears as the words died. Only her thudding heartbeat sounded. Everything appeared to be undisturbed.

  “Anybody?” She heard desperation in her voice. Frightening questions whirled through her mind. Did Kevin get out already? Did he know about her dinner with Adrian?

  Was he jealous? “Ow!” Poetry dropped the rose she’d clenched between her fingers. A drop of crimson appeared on the palm of her hand. She licked the metallic spot of blood and tried to calm down. It wasn’t like her to be a scaredy cat. There had to be a logical explanation for this.

  Kevin didn’t send her the rose, she decided. He’d never given her flowers before, why start now? So who did? How did they find her? She thought of the golden-haired man with the flower basket. And Adrian. Maybe it was one of them. But if so, how did they know where she lived?

  Poetry shook the creepiness off her shoulders. Whoever it was, she felt certain they weren’t here now. The atmosphere seemed hollow somehow. But still…

  She wanted air. Open spaces. Great idea. She darted between the tables and forced herself to walk calmly until she found the exit. She would not succumb to paranoia, however justified.

  # # # Rows of taillights flared in the night like demon eyes. Strife traveled in the passenger seat of a pickup truck belonging to the same beer drinker she’d converted yesterday.

  Dave, as she’d learned his name to be, became a valuable ally. If Strife believed in unlikely coincidences, this qualified as truly serendipitous. Without the retired city worker’s help, she couldn’t fully realize the next phase of her plan. Almost the entire population of Grey drove alongside them, a juggernaut of diesel and steel bearing down on an unsuspecting city like a swarm of ants.

  She recalled the events of the day. The morning’s murder preceded a clumsy investigation. Then she’d poisoned the minds of the locals with Apple Jack and distorted tales. Only when she’d created a hum of anger did she sneak back to her room to mix her potions. She’d recruited Max and other regulars to rally the residents of Grey to her cause. Her memory drifted to a few hours prior in Max’s tavern.

  She’d balanced high above the throng, sweating in the humidity their crowded bodies created. Even now she could still smell their adrenalinesharpened body odor.

  “The enemy has stolen past us in the night like a wraith. They have taken one of our own, attacked a defenseless woman and violated her body. Do we allow such cowardice go unanswered? Do we stand by and watch while mincing pretenders steal through our ranks like slithering vermin? Who will be next?”

  A deafening roar of rage nearly toppled Strife from her pulpit on the rickety table. The power of their angst gave her a rush. Behind her, various plastered volunteers poured apple juice and whiskey into tumblers. Strife had whipped up a double batch of her special cinnamon and made certain they topped each cocktail with it.

  “Do we sit idly by, and let them take us?” she asked. “No!” The resounding negative bruised her eardrums.

  “Do we lay low and allow them to taint our way of life with their filth?”

  “No!” “The justice system punishes the innocent and pacifies the guilty. I say we show them their degradations and blasphemies will not be tolerated.”

  She focused on the passion and misguided sense of self-entitlement and absorbed its crescendo. “Who’s with me?” She pumped her fist in the air. To her delight, the crowd demonstrated its solidarity, imitating her challenging gesture along with blood-searing screams of hate.

  “Citizens of Grey,” She hushed her voice until they crowded like livestock to hear. “It is time to load your weapons and gather your courage. Tonight, we bring the battle to them.”

  The rambunctious cheer that arose swelled her bitter heart. Even now Strife replayed the scene over and over in her mind. Agamemnon would have been proud.

  She jerked back to the present as Dave decreased their speed. He signaled a lane change and exchanged friendly waves with the convoy as they zoomed past.

  “Is this our turn already?” Strife asked. “Yep,” Dave nodded. “Just a few miles down.”

  “Perfect.” Strife tasted the grit in her teeth as she smiled. Now the real fun would begin.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  “It stinks here.” Strife pinched her nose as her eyes watered. Human feces. Nothing else reminded her so much of filth and disease. “That would be the sewage treatment facility a click or so away,” Dave said. They stood before several massive tanks painted red and white, connected together with a squat metal hut. Dave jerked his head northward.

  “What we want is the reservoir.” He shifted a full pail to the other arm.

  “Don’t drop that,” she said, anxiety spilling through her voice. “Those are potent chemicals.” A look of annoyance creased Dave’s brow. “I got it, I got it. They’re also heavy.” He punctuated the comment by kneading his bicep. “The stairs are over here.”

  She hel
d out a compliant hand. “Lead the way.” He eyed her with irritation, which she ignored. He seized his burden and directed his attention to a dirt path. “This will take us to the back door.” “For which you still have a key, right?”

  “Yep.” Strife hated the way he used that word. He sounded like a yokel. “They trusted me. I worked here thirty years.” Strife detected pride in his speech, but apparently there wasn’t enough of it. Convincing him to use his knowledge for sabotage had been effortless. A little alcoholic persuasion and he quickly betrayed his employer of three decades, not to mention the city itself.

  I love my job. This kind of clandestine adventure suited Strife well. Crickets gossiped in the summer stillness. She followed Dave’s footsteps as he swished through long silken grasses that tickled her bare legs, biting down on screams when the long body of an occasional locust bounced against her knee.

  How much farther? She gazed toward the indigo sky, searching for constellations. She longed to see the twinkling symbols of her brethren, but the honeyed glow of the city diluted them to pale dots.

  “We’re here,” Dave said. He pointed to a rickety building pocked with rust. Rivers of brown ran down the sides. “These stairs are a little old, so watch your step.”

  Strife’s mouth was dry. In her zeal she’d forgotten food and drink. Even now, with the clank of Dave’s footfalls echoing on steel steps, she dismissed the need. Hatred and pain were sustenance enough, with a feast to come.

  She hurried behind him and together their climb rang out like bells in the night.

  “Almost there,” Dave said between wheezes. “Just a little further.” If you don’t collapse first, Strife thought, but kept her remarks to herself, even if it meant biting back her impatience. From here she could see the highway light up like a Christmas ribbon in gold and red. Strife stretched her lips. No one could see them up here, but they were poised to change lives and disrupt civilization.

  “Ahhhh.” Dave eased the plastic pail down to the metal grid. He flexed his creaking knuckles, rotating and rubbing his arms. She gave him her full attention, nearly tripping herself on the last step. Dave hunched over, his shoulders heaving. “Is this it?” she asked. “Yep,” Dave huffed oxygen and produced a chunky set of metal fingers from his jacket, choosing an ordinary silver one indistinguishable from the others.

  “This is the place.” He jabbed the key in the knob. “The city’s water treatment happens here.” The steel door resisted one moment before jerking open.

  “Perfect.” Strife let the old-timer catch his breath while she found the light switch. A loud clunk introduced a fluorescent glare that did nothing to flatter the surroundings.

  Water stains striped the walls in the anemic glow. Rust and mold dusted the corners. The odor wasn’t any better than outside. Instead of shit it reeked of rotting vegetation and mildew. Strife could almost taste the decay in the air.

  “Reservoir’s over here,” Dave said. “How did you stand the stench for three whole decades?” Dave chuckled. “I guess you get use to it.”

  “Smells like the Parisian catacombs,” she said. “I never got used to those.”

  “The what now?” “In Paris they have underground tunnels where they kept their dead when they had no more room for them.” Strife couldn’t help but smile when a shudder rippled across Dave’s back even though it brought back bad memories for her.

  As an alchemist and a plague survivor Strife did a booming business selling the cure. But when her expensive potions and tinctures did nothing to help them, the villagers rallied against her. Who knew they would survive to prosecute her? They’d accused her of heresy and witchcraft and she’d been reduced to hiding amongst the dead.

  Those times would forever haunt her. Sometimes she dreamed of the endless rows of corpses, still heard the squeaking of the rats and the subtle grind of their tiny teeth against bone. It angered her. She dealt death. She did not sleep with it. Irony and bitterness dogged her as she examined the technology that had made that disease a nightmare of the past. It certainly took humans long enough to learn how cleanliness destroys the pathogens that live in sewage and dirty water.

  Tonight she would receive a measure of revenge against mankind for those years spent living like a rodent. She would use subtlety and skill to topple first a city, then a nation.

  “Here it is.” She barely heard them over the roar of running water but those words snapped Strife back to the present. “What?” She joined Dave at a railing. “Where?” “Straight below us.”

  Strife gripped the slick steel of the banister. Her instrument of vengeance pooled below.

  “Could we get closer?” “Sure, right this way.” Dave led her to a bridge. Mist pelted them from the clean churning water and Strife licked it from her dry lips with pleasure.

  “Is this close enough?” “This will do,” she said. She popped the lid off the plastic canola oil drum. The bluish-green powder reminded Strife of sea foam…and Aphrodite.

  This one’s for you, bitch. She heaved it, and watched as the crystals flowed into the clear pool, causing a ripple of turquoise to fan out like abstract watercolors. The seductive scent of Monkshood drifted.

  “It’s kind of pretty,” Dave said. “What will it do?” “Not much. It should create a sort of angry paranoia for anyone who drinks it. Destructive behaviors. There’ll be other side effects as well, like fever and increased heart rate.” She waved a dismissive hand. “I wasn’t exact. Didn’t have time.”

  She studied the deepening furrow in Dave’s brow. Strife sensed second thoughts. Not her concern. “How do we get down from here?” “Uh, over here,” Dave led her down a different set of stairs. These paralleled the treated water.

  Upon reaching the ground floor, he fell in step beside Strife. “Can I ask you something?” His face creased in worry. “What’s in that stuff?” “Some household chemicals, a little belladonna, a little draco leaf, a lot of coca…” She grinned at Dave. “It’s the basis of cocaine, believed by ancient Peruvians to inspire humans to go to war.”

  They prowled along the quieting pools, toward the exit. And Strife gloried in the tension and doubt now emitting from Dave. “Oh yes,” Strife said ticking off an imaginary point in the air with her finger. “And some old-fashioned magick. Can you swim?” “What? I…” With a single shove, Strife dumped Dave into the deep water.

  He came up sputtering. “What the hell are you doing?” The senior floundered at first, but once he regained his composure he paddled to grip the concrete edge of safety. “Are you out of your mind?”

  “Oops, sorry.” Strife bent over to reach for him. “That was an accident. I meant to do this.” She grasped the top of Dave’s balding head with both hands and plunged him downward. She sighed, counting the seconds as he tore at her arms. He still had some fight left.

  Damn. I forgot. She shifted her grip until she could haul Dave up by his neck. For a brief moment he inhaled with his mouth gaping, coughing like a spent hurricane.

  Strife held him aloft with one hand, searched his jacket with the other. “Keys and wallet, keys and wallet,” She let her fingers roam. “Eureka. Thanks, Dave.” She dropped him, pressing him under again when he surfaced. She remained there until he stopped clawing and went still. Strife pocketed his possessions and left. She would have to hurry if she wanted to get a room in the city tonight.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Exhaustion and stress settled between Poetry’s shoulder blades, as though her vertebrae were grinding together. Another long shift coming to an end.

  She craned her neck side to side, the audible crackle and the relief that came with it induced a sigh of pleasure. The heavy abundance of hardearned loonies and toonies jingling in her apron lifted her spirits.

  After grabbing a coffee from the Bunn burner she plunked down in a teal colored vinyl booth with a phone book and a pen. She settled her cheek on the surface of the table, just to soak in some of the cool smoothness. But only for a minute. Her nose tingled at the scent
of vinegar and other cleaning substances she’d grown sick of. She attempted to blow the odor away from her, but only succeeded in fluffing her pink bangs.

  Normally she liked the seven-to-three shift. She earned lots of tips from the breakfast and lunch rush. Better yet, she had her evenings off. But yesterday had been hellish and sleep didn’t come easy this week.

  Last night she’d bused and transferred for forty-five minutes to pilfer bedding and snacks from her parent’s house. The situation went from awkward to tedious.

  “What new place?” her father asked. “You and Jenny got a new apartment?” “No,” Poetry said. When she opened the fridge, the fresh scent of homemade tzaziki hit her like a crisp cucumber wave. Yoink. Was there any pita bread? “Jenny isn’t living with me.”

  “Oh? Why? What happened? Did you have a fight?” her father asked. Poetry locked eyes with her mother. The grim line of her disapproving mouth said it all. Poetry broke contact to search for Tupperware in a nearby cupboard.

  “Just boy stuff.” “Not too serious I hope?”

  “Oh no, not at all.” She brushed him off, determined not to drag daddy into her squabbles with her sensitivity-challenged friend. Dealing with her mother was bad enough, thank you. “We thought maybe we should take a break from each other. That’s all.”

  “Perhaps I should drive you home,” Her mother placed half a dozen dolmades into a Ziploc bag, and a small smile perked Poetry’s lips. She loved stuffed grape leaves.

  “It’ll give us a chance to talk things out.” her mother said, and Poetry bit down hard in an effort not to groan. All the way from Stony Plain Road to Fort Road her mother lectured on Poetry’s poor choices and lack of responsibility. Whoever said that the prisoners in Guantanamo Bay were tortured and treated unreasonably hadn’t sat through one of her mother’s condescending speeches about life.

  As if she’d know what it meant to have one. Her academic parents met and married in college, and pretty much stayed there. Existence revolved around work and home. They’d never even been to her father’s ancestral home country of Greece. Poetry couldn’t bring herself to take advice about her future from a woman who’d compromised hers.