Pandora Gets Heart

by Carolyn Hennesy

  PANDORA

  Gets Heart

  MYTHIC MISADVENTURES BY

  CAROLYN HENNESY

  Pandora Gets Jealous

  Pandora Gets Vain

  Pandora Gets Lazy

  Pandora Gets Heart

  PANDORA

  Gets Heart

  CAROLYN HENNESY

  Copyright © 2010 by Carolyn Hennesy

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced

  in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the publisher,

  except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  Published by Bloomsbury U.S.A. Children’s Books

  175 Fifth Avenue, New York, New York 10010

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Hennesy, Carolyn.

  Pandora gets heart / by Carolyn Hennesy.— 1st U.S. ed.

  p. cm.

  Summary: Pandy, Alcie, Iole, and Homer face many dangers

  as they make their way to the sacred Mount Ida in Phrygia

  to capture another deadly evil—lust.

  eISBN: 978-1-59990-581-5

  1. Pandora (Greek mythology)—Juvenile fiction. [1. Pandora (Greek mythology)—Fiction. 2. Mythology, Greek—Fiction. 3. Gods, Greek—Fiction. 4. Goddesses, Greek—Fiction. 5. Adventure and adventurers—Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.H3917Pah 2010 [Fic]—dc22 2009022664

  First U.S. Edition January 2010

  Typeset by Westchester Book Composition

  Printed in the U.S.A. by Quebecor World Fairfield, Pennsylvania

  2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1

  All papers used by Bloomsbury U.S.A. are natural, recyclable products

  made from wood grown in well-managed forests. The manufacturing processes

  conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin.

  For Donald

  Anar

  PANDORA

  Gets Heart

  Table of Contents

  CHAPTER ONE: The Ruse

  CHAPTER TWO: The Boar

  CHAPTER THREE: All Ashore

  CHAPTER FOUR: A Deal

  CHAPTER FIVE: On Staff

  CHAPTER SIX: Odd Jobs

  CHAPTER SEVEN: The Ceremony

  CHAPTER EIGHT: Eris

  CHAPTER NINE: “To The . . .”

  CHAPTER TEN: Departure

  CHAPTER ELEVEN: Not So Fast

  CHAPTER TWELVE: It’s a Dog’s Life

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN: Paris

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN: Judgment Day

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN: Decisions, Decisions

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN: On Olympus

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: Aphrodisias

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: Temple of Aphrodite

  CHAPTER NINETEEN: The Choice

  CHAPTER TWENTY: The Apple

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: Whole New Level

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO: Aftermath

  EPILOGUE

  GLOSSARY

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  CHAPTER ONE

  The Ruse

  Iole was moving on tiptoe.

  She’d heard giggling from the cabin. And an occasional high-pitched shriek. Which meant they were in there . . . laughing about something. What? Her? At her? How they had completely overlooked her? Forgotten all about . . .

  In the girls’ cabin, aboard the ship bound for Thessaly, Pandy and Alcie were clutching their sides with glee, wiping tears from their eyes and slapping the air (and each other) playfully.

  In the corridor, Iole crept to the cabin door, her ear pressed against the wood. She caught single words, bits of sentences.

  “. . . never . . .”

  “. . . obvious . . .”

  “. . . we’ll have fun . . .”

  Just then the ship leaned hard to one side and Iole was slammed up against the door.

  “Oooff,” she cried, then quickly covered her mouth. Instantly, the sounds inside the cabin stopped. As she was backing down the corridor, she thought she heard a “shhh” but couldn’t be sure. About five meters away, she began singing loudly, walking toward the cabin again. Opening the door, she found Alcie sitting on the end of her cot, brushing her red hair, and Pandy, on the floor, playing with the enchanted rope Athena had given to her. Both girls looked supremely calm.

  “Hey, Alcie,” Pandy said, not immediately looking up, “how small do you think this rope could get without disappearing entirely? . . . Oh, hi, Iole.”

  “Hi,” she said, still standing in the doorway.

  “Hey, Iole,” Alcie said. “Wow, were you gone?”

  “Yes,” she said flatly. “I went up on deck to take a last look at Crete in the distance.”

  “Oh?” said Alcie.

  “Yes, Alcie. It was my home, as you know.”

  “Yep.”

  “The place of my birth . . . a number of years ago.”

  “Right. Got it.”

  “A certain number of years.”

  “Hey, Alcie,” Pandy said, pinching the skin on top of her thumb to keep from laughing, “speaking of home, what’s the first thing you’re gonna do when we get back?”

  Iole wondered if they were ignoring her on purpose. She slowly started to clench her hands.

  “Oh, lemon rinds, after I write to Homer? I’m going to go find the biggest, most beautiful, most expensive girdle and make my dad buy it for me as a present.”

  “Present?” Iole said, perking up.

  “Uh . . . uh . . . that’s great,” Pandy said. “I think I’m going to spend a lot of time playing with my baby brother. Of course, he won’t be such a baby anymore . . . maybe he even had another birth-day . . . gosh, I don’t know.”

  “Mmmm, maybe,” said Alcie. “They grow up so fast.”

  Now, turning her head away, Iole was getting angry.

  She knew that neither of her best friends had her superior brain power (not even combined could they match her) and that getting them to, just once, remember something this important on their own was next to impossible, but that’s why she’d left clues for the past three days. She had casually whistled the tune to “Happy Maiden Day to You,” talked about her fifth birth-day party as they sailed past Crete, and even mentioned what her favorite present had been that day— a signed first edition of Plato’s The Republic. (“At the age of five?” Pandy had asked incredulously. “Naturally,” Iole replied.)

  Lots of clues. Soooo many clues . . .

  But nothing.

  She willed herself to relax her tightly curled fists and turned, smiling, back to Pandy and Alcie.

  “Okay,” she said casually, “so you guys don’t have any big plans for the rest of the day?”

  “Zip,” said Alcie.

  “Zilch,” Pandy agreed.

  “Great. I guess, since we put into port at Iolcus tomorrow, that we’ll all just relax.”

  “Sounds good to me,” Pandy said.

  “Apricots,” said Alcie, flinging herself back on her sleeping cot, “I’m just gonna lie here until evening meal. Might not even get up then.”

  “Right,” said Iole. Then she spotted a beautiful emerald bangle, which belonged to Alcie, lying on the end of the cot as if it had just been casually tossed there. “Just one more hint,” she thought. “Give them just one more chance to prove they aren’t complete imbeciles.”

  “Oh, Alce,” Iole said, picking up the bracelet, “you went through so much to hide this from the pirates and guards on Atlas’s mountain. By Zeus, you had to hide it in your mouth.”

  Pandy choked involuntarily.

  “Problem?” asked Alcie, glaring.

  “Nope,” Pandy replied, stifling a laugh.

  “It’s no laughing matter, Pandy. Alcie’s mouth almost wasn
’t big enough. Alce, you shouldn’t leave this lying around. It’s stunning. This is one of your Maiden Day presents, is it not?”

  “Huh?” Alcie quickly grabbed the bracelet out of Iole’s hands. “Oh, uh . . . no, not that one. That’s just a ‘Good for You, You Didn’t Flunk Out of School’ present.”

  “Well, at any rate, that must have been a special day for you. Your Maiden Day,” Iole said, and then glanced at Pandy. “You, too, Pandy. Turning thirteen! I mean, not simply the presents, but the status, the importance, the recognition from your community, family . . . and friends.”

  “Yes, I suppose,” Pandy replied, yawning. “It seems so long ago, I don’t really remember.”

  Pandy got up off the floor and lay down on her own cot with her face toward the wall, effectively ending her part in the conversation.

  “All right then,” Iole said, her teeth clenched together, clomping to the far end of the room. “Well, I won’t disturb you two. Have a . . . have a . . . GOOD REST!”

  Throwing open the cabin door, she collided with Homer, who instantly threw his right hand behind his back and tried to look as innocent as possible as he slipped into a ridiculous, open mouthed half smile.

  “Oh, hi . . . Iole. Uh, hi.”

  Iole just stared at him, her little chest heaving with fury.

  “What?” she finally yelled.

  “What, ‘what’?” Homer said, confused. “I didn’t say anything!”

  “No, you didn’t, did you!” Iole cried, marching down the corridor to the stairs leading on deck. “You most certainly did not!”

  Homer stepped into the cabin and closed the door. Instantly Pandy and Alcie burst into peals of laughter. The ship rolled again, sending Pandy sprawling back onto the floor, and the two girls became hysterical.

  “I cannot— I repeat— I cannot keep this up much longer,” Alcie said. “Three times this week I came so close to spilling the broadbeans.”

  “It’s just till tonight,” Pandy said, picking herself up and sitting on her cot. “It’s all prepared, right, Homer?”

  “I just did, like, a final head count. All the Thracians, the Sithonian families, the two sisters from Imbros, the Roman consul to Thessaly, his wife and two of his consorts . . . uh, the third is still seasick, and the crazy cucumber salesman from Arabia and his two sons. Basically everyone Iole has even spoken to for the last six days. They can’t wait. Oh, and I checked with the cook. He’s making some cool veggie things for Iole and he’s baking a special ‘Vesuvius’ cake with anise seeds around it that spell out ‘You’re a Maiden Now!’ He’s adding something called chocolate. A traveler on another ship gave him a little bit and he’s been waiting for just the right time to use it. Says he’s gonna heat it up and send it out of the cake like lava, and it’s gonna trickle down and cover the anise seeds like they were Pompeii!”

  “You’re a little too excited by the lava, Homie,” said Alcie.

  “Fantastic! Gods, it was all so much simpler when Iole wasn’t a vegetarian,” Pandy said. “All right. Now, Alcie, you’re giving her the bracelet . . .”

  “My grammy Urania gave this to me on my Maiden Day,” Alcie said as she wrapped the emerald bangle in a small piece of gauze. “But I’ve seen Iole looking at it when she thought I wasn’t noticing; she’ll love it. And Aunt Medusa accidentally turned Grammy into a statue, so it’s not like she’ll find out. Besides I have drawers full of stuff like this back . . . home.”

  Suddenly, the cabin was quiet. Everyone was thinking exactly the same thing. Alcie looked at the floor.

  “We’ll get home, Alce,” Pandy said softly, touching her friend’s arm. “Your dad will buy you that girdle.”

  “Grape seeds, of course we will,” Alcie said brightly, after a moment. She straightened her shoulders. “Homie, what’d you get her?”

  “Don’t laugh.”

  He held out his right hand.

  “You got her a piece of leather?” asked Pandy.

  “Unroll it,” Homer said.

  Alcie took the tightly rolled leather and untied the thin hemp string around it.

  Together, the girls read:

  GOOD FOR TEN FREE LESSONS IN THE GLADIATORIAL ARTS, INCLUDING HACKING, PUNCHING, AND GENERAL SELF-DEFENSE.

  HAPPY MAIDEN DAY!

  HOMER

  “I’m going to teach her to protect herself,” Homer said when neither Pandy nor Alcie had spoken a word and simply stared at him.

  “I love it!” Pandy said at last.

  “Figs, it’s brilliant,” Alcie said. “But why not teach us all?”

  “Because it’s her present,” Homer said, “and after what we’ve put her through, making her think that we all forgot, she’s got to feel, like, special, y’know?”

  “Oh, duh,” Alcie said, then turned to Pandy. “You’re up.”

  “I’m giving her my tortoiseshell hair clip. I don’t need it. I can tuck my hair back behind my ears now anyway.”

  “You need your clip,” Alcie said, smiling.

  “I’ll use a piece of leather. I’ll improvise. It’s Iole,” Pandy said.

  “That it is,” Alcie said. “Very nice, my friend.”

  Pandy reached into her bag for the clip, but instead, her fingers found a small calfskin bag bound with a black cord.

  “Huh?”

  Opening it, she found a smaller calfskin bundle and a papyrus tag, which read, “To Iole, From H.”

  “Homie?” Alcie whirled on Homer.

  “I showed you my gift. That’s not from me!” Homer said.

  “Let’s open it,” Alcie said.

  “It’s for Iole,” Pandy replied, curiosity furrowing her brow. “But I have to know . . .”

  “H for Hermes?” asked Alcie as Pandy opened the bundle.

  “You think? But why . . . oh . . . oh!”

  There in her hands lay two of the most astonishing earrings either girl had ever seen. One earring was the face of Iole’s mother and the other her father, wrought in delicate curves of gold, silver, and precious stones. The hair on each seemed to actually be flowing, and the eyes, tiny agates, seemed to shift their gaze between Pandy and Alcie. Suddenly, all three realized that the faces actually were animated. Silently laughing, smiling, winking, and blowing kisses to each other.

  “H is for Hephaestus!” Pandy gasped. “Only the God of the Forge could work metal into something this beautiful.”

  Suddenly, they heard a cry from above.

  “Evening meal!”

  Pandy went to rewrap the earrings and found the bundle in her hand already tied. The papyrus note attached read, “You peeked, but I forgive you. H.” for a brief moment, then returned to its original message.

  “Go,” said Alcie, backing out of the cabin, unnerved. “Let’s just go.”

  Pandy quickly found the hair clip and was wrapping it in a small piece of gauze on her way out of the cabin. She was thinking about the earrings and suddenly wishing that, if it meant getting presents like that, she were turning thirteen all over again.

  Pandy, Alcie, and Homer searched the deck for a full ten minutes before finally coming upon Iole sitting cross-legged amidst some crates of dried goat.

  “There you are,” Alcie said. “Come on . . . oh . . .”

  Iole didn’t look at them, but they could tell right away that she’d been crying.

  “Hey,” Pandy said. “It’s evening meal. Uh . . .”

  “You all go on without me,” Iole said, staring out to sea. “I’m not hungry.”

  “Not hungry?” Pandy said. “You only had a teeny bowl of creamed oats at first meal and nothing since then.”

  “I’ve had sufficient.”

  Pandy, Alcie, and Homer were at a complete loss. Iole wasn’t going to budge.

  “Well then,” Pandy said, suddenly struck with an idea, “we’ll all just sit here with you and the goat and chat, okay?”

  “Yeah, I don’t need to eat. Let’s gab!” agreed Alcie, following Pandy’s lead.

  “I want to be
alone . . . what goat?” Iole asked.

  “You’re surrounded by goat,” Pandy said, pointing to the crates.

  “What?” Iole said with a start.

  Homer pointed to the lettering on the side of a nearby crate.

  “Right here, ‘Dried goat. Steam for best results.’ ”

  “Ahhh!”

  Iole bolted to her feet, her jaw set tight. At last she expelled a huge breath.

  “Oh, never mind. I certainly won’t be the cause of all of you not eating,” she said, striding away. “It’s of no consequence that nobody cares about me. And now I need to look before I sit anywhere!” they all heard trailing on the wind.

  Approaching the dining hall on a lower deck, Alcie suddenly slipped by the others and ran swiftly ahead, disappearing though the doorway.

  “Aphrodite’s molars,” Iole said. “What’s the rush?”

  “Oh,” said Pandy nonchalantly, “she’s just making sure that there are four seats together.”

  Iole didn’t notice that the dining hall became silent as the three friends walked the last few meters. Pandy and Homer made certain that Iole entered the doorway first . . .

  “SURPRISE!”

  CHAPTER TWO

  The Boar

  Iole’s jaw almost hit the floor.

  Every one of the nearly sixty passengers who had shared the voyage from the North African coast was in the dining hall, many with a raised goblet. Iole had charmed everyone as the ship crossed the Mediterranean, bound for Thessaly, Mt. Pelion, and other points north, with her ability to speak all their languages, her willingness to talk, and her thirst for knowledge of their countries and their stories. And just about everyone was only too willing to tell Iole of their suffering and hardship.

  Kidnapped from all over the known world only weeks earlier, men, women, children—entire families— had been marched to Jbel Toubkal, the highest peak of the Atlas Mountains, and forced into hard labor. Most of the men had actually been made to lift the heavens while Pandy’s uncle Atlas had succumbed to the great evil, Laziness. Bearing such a weight had caused the men to become shriveled, their skin wrinkled and burnt, although, since the evil had been recaptured, almost all were regaining their original forms.