Illusions: A Grace Murphy Novel

by Nicole Hamlett

  "You are so childish."

  "Never said I wasn't." I knelt down and buried my fingers in the loose black soil beneath my feet. I could feel a slight trembling, and a cold rush of magic sputtered up my arm, sending goosebumps over my flesh. My power was trying to work but wasn't quite there yet. "I'll have an idea of where the traps are as soon as we get closer."

  "Yes, and that's likely going to be a problem."

  "Listen, I know this isn't ideal, but I'm afraid I can't do better until my power can connect."

  "What is your power anyway? I thought it was fire?"

  Did I want to reveal my powers to her? I didn't believe it was prudent in case she had nefarious intentions. I laughed at myself then at the 'Nefarious Intentions' thought. I was starting to sound like a Gothic novelist. She sent me a sharp look at my snort of laughter, but I shrugged it off.

  "Why do you need to know?" Drew asked, putting thought to my concern. I loved him a little bit just then.

  "Obviously if I'm going to help you I need to know what I'm working with." Her tone toward to him was lilting, and I cocked my head, studying his reaction. His body loosened up and he nodded.

  "That makes perfect sense." My eyes widened. What was going on with Drew? Nemesis hadn’t been wrong. He'd been effectively useless since we left the village.

  I was warier now, but on the other hand, it was possible that she'd have an idea how to get everything jump started, so I said, "I have some connection to the ground."

  "Mmhmm. And what kind is that?"

  I cursed that I wasn't good at being cagey. I really needed to work on that in the future. "I can sense things in my area. I'll be able to detect any traps around me if I can get it to work."

  "What do you do to make it work?" She cocked her head to the side and studied me.

  "I dunno. Touch the ground?"

  "Is that a question? Are you sure?"

  "Don't be a jerk. I'm out of my element here. It hasn't worked since I stepped out of the Rift, so I don't know. I don't know what's going to make it work."

  "I apologize. I'm impatient, and well, it makes me bitchy. I've had an itchy feeling for the last few minutes. I feel as though we're being observed, but I can't sense anyone nearby."

  "Hmm. Drew said the same thing. He says that it’s likely Hecate scrying for us."

  "Gods help us if she has. She doesn't just scry from a distance. She could blow us to bits if she's got a lock on us."

  "Of course, she can," I said shaking my head. "Of course, she bloody can."

  "Alright. I'm not injured; I'll go first. If I explode, run in the opposite direction." She threw me a brief smile and started forward.

  "Wait!" I cried out. "Jesus, wait. Let me try again."

  "Concerned for my wellbeing, Grace? Goodness, I'll start to think you care."

  Yeah, this lady was just my kind of sarcastic bitch. In another life, we'd be friends. "I'd just hate to lose your help before we breach the palace."

  "I see," she replied with a small smile.

  I huffily threw myself on the ground and dug both hands into the dirt. "Okay, now or never."

  "Does that work? When you talk to inanimate objects?"

  "Shush. I'm trying to concentrate."

  "I can see that. It looks like you're either going to pass gas or have a bowel movement."

  What was it with everyone and poop today? Sheesh. I shut her voice out and took a deep breath. This was one of the first things I learned. Just like riding a bike. If I just tuned out the world around me and focused, I could get this done.

  Trickles of magic wound their way into my limbs and fluttered about like drunken butterflies. I needed them to sober up. I pressed harder. The focus sharpened slightly, but I needed more. "What I need is a virgin, two unicorns, a pint of Ben & Jerry's and a wooden leg."

  "Well I could probably get you the unicorn and a virgin but what in the world do you need a wooden leg for?"

  I snorted. I hadn't realized I'd said it out loud. "I don't really need any of that. I'm channeling a raccoon."

  "What?"

  "It's irrelevant. It's there, but it's not coming in strong enough. It feels like I don't have enough contact."

  "Well then strip down and roll about in the dirt."

  "I'm serious," I said with a frown.

  "So am I. Some things work better when you're naked. Is any of the material of your clothing man-made?"

  "Yeah, it's all man-made. What, you think I dressed myself in fairy dust?"

  She growled and grabbed a fistful of my shirt. "Is any of this made synthetic materials, you inglorious dimwit?"

  Oh. Well, didn't I feel stupid?

  "Yes."

  "Take it off. You'll have an easier time connecting to your magic if you're wearing natural fibers."

  I looked nervously at Drew who was trying to keep the grin off his face. He gave me the 'go on' gesture, and I scowled. "Why Nemesis, are you trying to take advantage of me? I'm a good girl."

  "Don't be dull. You're wasting time."

  Let's be frank here. I didn't get nude often. I'd worked hard for the body I now possessed, but I still felt like that overweight mom with the heinous stretch marks. The Atlanceans, as a rule, weren't shy about walking around naked as the day they were born, but I hadn't quite gotten there yet.

  I flushed what was assuredly an ugly mottled red and scooted around in the dirt. "Fine, whatever." I quickly disrobed, making sure that I wasn't facing anyone. "You better not be looking, Porkchop!" I yelled, trying to cover my embarrassment.

  "He thinks you don't have enough hair on your body and wonders how you could possibly keep warm."

  "Me and the whales. We got a layer of fat. Now, shut up. I need to concentrate." A choked sound came from Drew and Porkchop chattered at me, but I refused to look. "Do I want to know?"

  Nemesis chuckled. "Nope."

  I sank back down to the ground, trying to ignore the detritus digging into my ass. Ah ha! There we were. The earth sang in greeting as though she'd been starved for conversation for entirely too long. A giggle bubbled up to the surface and escaped my lips.

  How odd. I hadn't realized until now that I thought of Earth as a male planet. It felt decisively masculine when I communed. But I hadn't consciously thought of it as having a Sex.

  This planet was very much a female — both maiden and maternal. Once the excitement of having the connection passed, I could feel her profound sorrow. She didn't like the magics that were prohibiting her people from communion.

  I shared in her pain and then pulled up a scan of the area. A shallow rendering appeared in front of my face. Nemesis had been right. Along the perimeter of the boundary was a sunken pit with what looked like spikes lining the bottom. We couldn't see it through the shrubbery dotting the landscape but had I let Nemesis go ahead of me; she surely would have died.

  Getting a map of the surrounding area had been hard. I had no idea how I was going to create a bridge over that pit. There was no way I was strong enough for that yet.

  "So, I have good news and bad news. Which would you like first?"

  "Give me the bad. That way the good news is a nice little surprise."

  "You were right. There's a pitfall trap along the border. It's a trope of epic proportions, but I suppose it's effective."

  "I don't know what a trope is, but yes - a pit with spikes is highly effective."

  "I wonder why we didn't encounter one when we were headed to the palace."

  "I imagine that you Rifted inside of the boundary. Although, how that happened, I do not know. The barrier is supposed to cancel out any type of magic."

  "Hmm. I don't think Rifts are as much about magic as they are quantum physics."

  "Well regardless, you're here, and we need to find a way over those traps."

  "It's possible that I'll be able to move enough dirt over one to get past. But I'm feeling pretty tapped out."

  "You'll have to tap yourself back in. You've set off an alarm. I can feel it stinging at
my skin like a nest of wasps."

  "Oh, for fuck's sake!" I bellowed up at the skies.

  Okay, what could I do here? We had to get outside so I could call in a Rift. Could Hecate's guards teleport? If so, they would be on us in an instant.

  I reached out to the presence I felt before, and I asked. What could it hurt? At this point, I was willing to grasp at straws. What surprised the hell out of me was that she answered with a definitive yes and within a blink, the ground beneath our group shifted beyond the five hundred yards.

  Power flooded through me, and I screeched in surprise. I looked over and saw that it had brought Nemesis to her knees. Drew was blinking owlishly. 'What's going on?' I thought at him. He shook his head to clear it and turned away.

  Well okay then. Situation normal - Grace wasn't in the know.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  I staggered to my feet and slashed a hand through the air, thinking of the operations room of Olympus. A Rift shimmered in the air before me and then sputtered out.

  "What the hell? You saw that open, right?"

  Nemesis nodded and stayed crouched on the ground. "I pray to all of the gods that I never travel like that again. More to the point, if we hadn't set off an alarm before, we have now. We breached that boundary without any wards or shielding. I'm surprised we're still alive. Get the Rift open."

  I looked back and shrugged. I had no idea what she was talking about. The only sensation I'd experienced was my power level going from empty to full too fast. "I had it open, and it shut. Something is blocking me from the other side."

  "Try. Again." She grit out.

  A shimmer appeared in the air before me, and I called out, "Hello? Mom? Anyone?"

  A figure appeared in the Rift, and when I saw who it was, I scrambled backward as fast as my body could carry me.

  "Well, this looks like fun." She shaded her eyes from the light of the Rift with a hand that could snap me like a twig and looked around. Snakes unfurled, twisting in angry sibilance and her tail snapped from side to side with agitated jerkiness.

  These were my first thoughts upon seeing her.

  1. Oh, Shit.

  2. Huh, her glamour must not work during a Rift.

  Whoever cursed Medusa, hadn't taken into account that her beauty would translate into her snake form. The Rift disrupts any glamour that you're projecting, and I didn't know if she realized this. Instead of the monstrous form that she showed me in California, I saw a beautiful woman with olive toned skin, luminous eyes and iridescent scales that flashed a rainbow of colors as she slithered across the ground. The snakes crowning her head were multi-hued, and they flashed and writhed in agitation. She was magnificent. I blinked in wonder, and when my eyes opened, she was in the middle of a change.

  It was only a matter of seconds before she was back to a regular looking human. Her snakes fell in light waves of auburn down her back. I was surprised by her height. Her bearing suggested that she'd be taller, but she was in fact, several inches shorter than my 5'8". Her emerald eyes wavered between amusement and anger as she took in the scenery, darting back and forth between the landmarks and my party of three.

  Not quite past the shock, I nodded at her. "Medusa. What do I owe the pleasure?" Frankly, she scared the pee out of me, and I had no idea what to do or say to her.

  Medusa cocked her head to the side, studying me, and I had to suppress a shudder. I hated snakes. "I was told that you needed help." She shrugged. "In an effort to —" She stopped and waved her hand, looking for a word. Finally, she huffed, exasperated. I got the feeling that Medusa didn't play Ambassador very well. "Never mind. I was told you needed help. Diana asked, and I said yes. Here I am."

  I let out a shaky breath. Between Medusa and Nemesis, I wasn't sure how I was going to survive this rescue. So, you can see how I'd be a little panicky right now. On one side of me, weighing in at - well, however much a giant snake would weigh - we had Medusa. She'd already beaten the ever-lovin' stuffin' out of me and crushed my throat. On the other, we had the duplicitous Nemesis, daughter of Nyx. The dangerous one. She hadn't attacked me yet, but could you put it past her? I couldn't tell which of them was worse, and that scared me.

  Medusa shifted, impatient. I tried not to flinch at the movement. What had Diana been thinking? More importantly, why had they closed the Rift directly behind her? I closed my eyes and tried to get into the head of my enigmatic mother. We hadn't checked in on time, apparently. There wasn't a preset signal because we hadn't thought we'd need one. Was something happening over there?

  I turned to Nemesis. "Could you excuse us for a moment please?"

  "Of course." She backed up a few paces.

  "Really?" I gave her an incredulous look, and she shrugged with a "What?"

  "Please, don't trouble yourself." I snapped, knowing that she had superior hearing. "We'll move."

  I gestured further away and grabbed Medusa's arm as she started walking in the wrong direction. "Traps that way." I shooed her back away from the pit and followed along, only looking back once.

  When I felt we'd gotten sufficiently far enough away, I stopped. I was about to ask Medusa what in the seven hells of Earth was going on when Nemesis called, "We're on a time limit, dears. Don't forget; we're likely to have company incoming."

  "We'll make it fast," I called back. "Okay," This time more softly. "Why are you here and what is going on back home?"

  "You are such a suspicious little thing. What makes you think something is going on back home?"

  "The Rift closed almost immediately as you stepped through and well," I looked her up and down. "They sent you."

  "What's wrong with me?" she asked, her eyes flashing. "I'm an excellent warrior and tactician, and as I recall, I beat you down with very little effort on my part."

  I had to unclench my fist before replying, "Not the best time to remind me of that, thanks."

  "Listen, Diana knew you'd have a problem with it, but she told me that she needed me here anyway. When they lost your signal, she had the analysts scour through the last reports we'd received from Aliana. I don't envy the person who missed the crucial evidence that Hecate was back."

  "Yeah, if she doesn't murder them, I probably will. We need more people. That's why I was trying to get through in the first place. How did she close my Rift?"

  That was more unsettling than Medusa's presence. I hadn't known that we could disrupt each other's Rifts. That would have been really nice to know when Hope was gadding about on Earth causing her chaos.

  Medusa shrugged. "I have no idea. She's concerned that you could be compromised. It was either send Hephaestus or me, and we all know how you feel about him right now."

  "What? How do you know how I feel - wait, never mind. That doesn't matter.

  According to Nemesis, Hecate has killed Aliana, and if we can, we need to get her body to send home and then destroy whatever is creating this boundary. From what Nemesis has confided, Hecate is sacrificing magic users and enslaving the local population."

  "Do you know what is causing this boundary?" She looked concerned, and that made me even tenser.

  "There were these mysterious monoliths on the bridge to Apollo's palace. They had ancient symbols on them. Drew thinks that they could be the cause."

  Medusa shook her head, and I would swear that I heard the rattling of snakes. "Fucking Hecate. She couldn't leave well enough alone. I should have taken her out when I had the opportunity. I won't make that mistake again. Grace, let this be a lesson in compassion. You let someone live and eventually, they'll try to take over the world. Where is Adonis by the way?"

  "He's back with Nemesis, and I don't think that's necessarily true - the compassion part." And it wasn't. There were a lot of people in the universe that were going to make mistakes. We couldn't go around killing all of them. Hell, if she killed everyone that made a poor decision, I'd have been dead ages ago.

  "Yeah, well it's not a matter of one mistake, Grace. It's been one after another since she met that barnacle on
a whale's ass. I hate to turn Hecate into a cliché, but she let Apollo turn her into a victim."

  "You know it's possible that this isn't her fault." I spat. Did women often give their power to men? Yes. Unfortunately, they did. However, (and this was a big however) men often took it. I hated generalizations and didn't want this to be yet another victim blame.

  Medusa turned her cold stare onto me, and I shuddered, but I stood my ground. "What do you know of it? Did you watch as she took him back time after time? Did you see the gashes and bruises he gave her when she dared complain about the countless mistresses he would flaunt before her?"

  "I did not. But, can you blame her for snapping?"

  "Yes." She replied. "Yes, I can. Because she was told time and time again that she had to let him go and get on with her life. She kept letting him back in. She was infinitely stronger than he could ever be, and she took his abuse. Her "snapping" was avoidable."

  This conversation made my skin crawl. I'd seen abused women. Hell, I'd suffered the gaslighting in my own marriage for years. It made me angry to think of any of them (or myself) as victims, and I certainly wasn't going to join in on the victim shaming. Whatever the reason for Hecate's present state of mind, I couldn't help but feel that Apollo was at least a bit to blame.

  "Listen, this conversation isn't going to solve the problem. It's just going to piss me off. What I need to know is why nobody else came over? I need at least half a dozen hunters to breach the palace and fight off the guards. Then, we need to destroy the monoliths, figure out what to do with Hecate, and get the hell back home."

  She crossed her arms over her chest and stepped back, scrutinizing me. I tried not to squirm. "Interesting. Well. I'm all you've got, so let's see what we can do here. I too have things to do back home."

  "What did Diana threaten you with to get you to come here?" I was curious. It was evident that she wasn't here voluntarily, and that made her unreliable.

  "That is none of your business."

  "Yeah, that's not going to work for me. Excuse me." I turned around and made a slashing wave of my hand, ripping open a Rift. Just as quickly, the Rift sealed, and I was left standing there, gaping at an empty space.