The princess had to be used to the doting questions of others about her unique looks – how could she not be?
Evagoria tied the last ties onto her dripping tail sack and sat motionless for a few moments. Appearing to Adamarcus as if calm and relaxed to this point, the princess now began to fidget in place. Finally, she swung her tail to the side of the fountain and let out a nervous laugh. Evagoria then reached for her walking sticks sitting on the rim of the fountain. One walking stick under each arm, the striking beauty moved toward the three friends and leaned in close. Eyes of the deepest ocean blue opened wide with a twinkle of curiosity.
“Did you actually mean to ask me that?” she questioned softly with a hint of disbelief. As Adamarcus and Persepolis burst into laughter, Evagoria smiled sweetly at Taharqa while letting out a small chuckle herself. His head drooped downward, but he kept his eyes focused on his fascinating subject.
“I would not be the first to ask this,” Taharqa replied sheepishly.
“Nor the last,” she added dryly. “I will not bore you with myth or what so many others back home might say, but will simply tell you what I believe.”
Evagoria straightened herself. A regal look now graced her glowing face. Her birthmark shaded slightly darker than the rest of her now turning a noticeably deeper blue ––
The stories were true!
The same way a Centaur would twiddle his thumbs while thinking, she brought her palms close together. Evagoria created a glow between them, but bronze-made nothing. She inspected herself for a moment and then spoke in a slow, thoughtful manner.
“I have the same colorful tail, light blue skin, gills to breathe underwater, and the gift of bronze-making every Mermaid has owned since Thessalonika. Born of my mother with her same poise and smart looks, as I ––”
“And the sunflower colored hair and beautiful …” Adamarcus caught himself and coughed, “and blue eyes no Mermaid is known to have ever had. Your birthmark as well – how are these explained?”
Although Evagoria’s birthmark blended well with the rest of her, it was clearly visible up close. Split in perfect halves by her right eye, it was this birthmark, not her unique hair and eye color, why Mermaids called her the Gift from Poseidon. A grand myth even Adamarcus now believed just might be true, this mark was proof that the god of the sea had touched Evagoria the day she was molded.
Perfectly shaped, perfectly placed; that it changed colors depending on her mood – what more evidence did one need?
Evagoria gazed upon Adamarcus in a way she had yet to show them. She bit her lower lip and tilted her head slightly to one side. After a long pause, she cracked another smile. Evagoria then looked to the sky and spoke with her hands as much as with her mouth.
“If a storm departs and a calm sky returns – is this a gift from Poseidon? By way of the spring rains, when the green meadows return to choke out the burnt grasses of winter, what do we say to this? Another gift? Is a god no one has ever seen or met somehow involved? As lightning must strike somewhere, then must not a Mermaid be born someday who appears different from any other? Despite my hair and eye color, I am the same as any other.” Evagoria touched her face under the right eye. “Well, aside from the birthmark. All the same, these things are just by chance and mean nothing.”
After a few silent moments, Taharqa spoke a little more carefully, but his words were no less sensational. “All the same, we have heard many legends about you. More than one suggests that you were born from magic and delivered to the queen by Poseidon himself.”
“Actually, my good Nubian,” Evagoria proclaimed with a chuckle, “every Mermaid babe is delivered into the waiting arms of eager mothers by kind-hearted snow petrels that swoop down from the clouds!”
Taharqa’s face now beamed brighter than the sun. He then turned to Adamarcus and Persepolis and threw them the smuggest of looks. “HA! I knew it!”
“We will never doubt you again!” Persepolis nodded.
“No god – Poseidon or any other – plays a role in this. Especially when it comes to me.”
Persepolis took a step back and turned his head as he looked at Evagoria. “By how you speak of him, it sounds like you do not share your kind’s belief in the almighty Poseidon?”
Adamarcus very much wondered the same. He had never heard of a Mermaid who didn’t. Evagoria rubbed her chin and her birthmark quickly turned more violet than blue.
“Do I believe,” she began slowly, “that an all-powerful being no one has ever seen exists? The ruler of all the seas, has he ever sent a messenger on his behalf or just once taken or saved a life that we know of? As it was Desdessandra who created the Mermaids and Centaurs – perhaps she is the goddess? On the other hand, as I recall how it ended for her, maybe not!
“If I were a goddess, the Queen of queens – or if not so lucky, the King of kings – I would walk amongst my creations. Their hearts would always be at peace, for they would know that I was always there to protect and guide them whenever, wherever.” Evagoria raised her hands to the sky, looked all around, and then focused on Persepolis. “My good Arachna prince, look about us. From the Pillars of Fire to the northern sea, from West to East, do you see this Poseidon among us?”
A vacant look and more shaking of his head was Persepolis’ only response.
Adamarcus took in all Evagoria said. As was usually the case in regards to such talk amongst his friends, his fertile mind itched to stretch less gifted ones. The one question every intelligent creature had ever asked himself should do the trick.
“Somehow, someway, we were made from something by someone? No matter if honest or wicked, another much wiser must eventually judge us for our actions. It would not be fair if a murderous Centaur met the same fate upon death as the kindest Mermaid. What would be the point of it all?”
This question silenced them all for a short bit. As she seemed to have a habit of doing, Evagoria broke the stillness yet again.
“HA!” the wide-eyed princess crowed. “Whosoever said life was fair? In the end, a living Poseidon or no, this matters not.” As if she sought to echo her mother, Evagoria puffed out her chest and did her best to deepen her voice. “A future Mermaid queen lives her life with two goals in mind above all others. Ensure the kingdom she passes on is better off than she received it, and as our world’s superior species, help the other nations strive to match the grand achievements of the Mermaids.”
Queen Diedrika might as well have spoken these words. Perhaps she had and Evagoria was just now repeating them.
No matter her lineage, birthright, or destiny, such words were of one who ruled, not of one who hoped to.
How Evagoria had said this in such a matter of fact way left the three friends thunderstruck. Still with codfish mouths and bulging eyes, Komnena’s loud voice swept over them. It was time for the groups to reassemble. All around them and from every direction, students rushed toward her.
“‘Superior species’?” Persepolis grumbled. His head cocked as if a wild animal hearing a sound for the first time, he just glared at Evagoria. She craftily ignored him. So much so, she did not even bother to glare back. Instead, the princess passed between the shocked friends and began to make her way toward the assembling groups.
“No matter who is superior to the next,” Evagoria announced without looking back, “I have become quite fond of you three. HA! A Mermaid, an Arachna, and two Centaurs as such good friends – who would have ever thought?”
The trio could do little more than slowly turn their speechless heads. For many moments, they watched the princess before finally finding the will to join the other students. As they meandered down the same path Evagoria had just taken, Adamarcus’ charmed expression returned. He now gazed dreamily in the direction of his heart’s desire.
“Have you ever met anyone so arrogant, so full of themselves?” Persepolis growled. Adamarcus nodded his head in a distracted motion.
“So magnificent … so beautiful,” he drawled dreamily to help finish this thou
ght. “There can be no doubt who the most heavenly of the heavenly creatures is.”
“Someone’s in love! Someone’s in love!” Taharqa teased, as he pranced around them like a Sapien show pony. Adamarcus just smiled, but Persepolis was still too angry to play along.
“‘A Mermaid, an Arachna, and two Centaurs as such good friends,’” Persepolis mocked in a voice that sounded more like Evagoria’s than he would likely care to admit. “We are probably the only ones crazy enough to be friends with her!”
After a good laugh, Taharqa threw a puzzling stare at the stomping Arachna. “‘Favored son of our King Achaemenes’ – really? Persepolis, you are the only son!”
“It must be so hard to remember eating your brothers and sisters,” Adamarcus added sarcastically.
Persepolis stopped and looked at them as if ready to confess guilt for a heinous crime. Adamarcus and Taharqa halted as well.
“It’s not my fault!” Persepolis protested in a high-pitched tone blended in equal parts shame and disbelief. “It’s not my fault! I was too young to know what I was doing.” The two Centaurs continued to stare at Persepolis with goofy grins. “I did not eat all of them you know. Some were taken away in time, set free deep in the forest,” Persepolis finished softly, as if this disclaimer pardoned him.
Adamarcus and Taharqa each patted a limb and the trio again made their way toward the other students.
“Of course not!” Adamarcus drawled in feigned agreement.
“Glad I’m not your relative,” Taharqa whispered as he leaned into Persepolis. “I wouldn’t want you to eat me.”
“Careful now! If I get much hungrier, I just might have to start adding my juiciest friends to the menu.”
After a slight pause as Taharqa leaned away, the three laughed just a bit too loudly. Their walk down the long path complete, they had reached the back edge of the separated groups. The last to heed Komnena’s call, the rest of the students – aside from Evagoria – looked up at them stupidly. Once the trio sat and were quiet as well, the first of many lessons for the coming year began.
*****
“In regards to the size and intelligence of Arachna,” Zarathustra once told Adamarcus, “Centaurs – and to a lesser degree Mermaids – often forget exactly what we are. Gryphons really do not care; they just despise us. Molded from Theraphos and Saltiportia spiders at the dawn of the Knowing Time, we still share many of their savage ways, yet do what we can to keep them hidden. Do not judge us harshly, my young friend, if you happen to catch sight of us in the glory of such ways. Just turn your head and kindly step aside – quickly, of course.”
Best friends with Persepolis and having tutored under Zarathustra for a few summers, Adamarcus knew a lot more about Arachna than he did Mermaids.
Arachna molted, spun silky webs, and ate live prey turned into a fleshy soup just like any spider, but owned many obvious differences as well. Unlike their distant relatives, Arachna males were larger than females. And these females never attempted to eat their mates. Males could be a menacing black, blood red, sky blue, deep purple, or brilliant yellow color. Females were always silver. For a reason Adamarcus could never get a good answer to, females almost never ventured from the center of the Agathis Australis. Both genders displayed emerald green mouthparts at birth that turned to a burnt orange as adulthood grew near; Persepolis’ own mouthparts had just turned to this orange with his latest molt.
Once in a great while after a female Arachna’s eggs hatch to release her spiderlings, ‘survival of the fittest’ knows no greater meaning. And not of the many, but of the one. Upon birth and for many weeks after, hundreds of tiny milk white spiderlings wander about aimlessly. But then, one night … a spiderling ‘turns’. From late evening until just before dawn, this lucky one grows many times larger. Suddenly an Arachna Majora – it dominates like one – and sets out to devour the entire brood of much less lucky ones. In Persepolis’ case, he had only munched through a few more than half of his brothers and sisters before his mother could stop him.
Only one Arachna possible from each egg sac, if no blameless serial killer arises, the spiderlings then scatter off into the forest to live a trivial life in whatever way they or what might soon eat them sees fit. As Persepolis’ two younger sisters made plain, many years could pass before spawning another.
Chapter Fourteen
LEGEND FORGED AND THRUST FORTH
Powerful magic and the gift of long life wasted – just look at them now! A race given so much has so little to show for it. Perhaps as the coming years unfold, I will bear witness to the mystic might my Queen Mother often tells me of, but have never seen. And if my disbelieving eyes see ALL that the countless legends suggest is possible – so what? In the end, I believe I will always see Sapiens for what they are: a race to pity, to feel saddened for, to wish they had not squandered such gifts. In short, a species that is beyond pathetic.
– Evagoria, Mermaid Princess
– Mid-Spring, Year 4,253 KT[17]
Studies that started on this day would run until the last day of summer. Aside for the summer festival, very few days until then would be free days. This first teaching day now over, it was time for the students to return to their kinds’ district inside the common city.
Using her walking sticks, Evagoria made her way across the large garden area. Now beside the fountain where she had earlier met Adamarcus, Taharqa, and Persepolis, she stopped and leaned her walking sticks against its lower wall. Next, she sat down atop the fountain’s rim. Within a few moments, the figure of an unexpected visitor cast a long, dark shadow over Evagoria.
“Another season of teachings upon us once again,” Queen Marseea said proudly, “we are honored your time to join us has finally come.”
Evagoria greeted the queen with a shy smile, but felt wary inside. In an effort not to show it, she tried her best to cast a friendly twinkle in her eyes. As did her mother, Evagoria liked Queen Marseea most of any Sapien. Diedrika respected Sapiens – Marseea most of all – because of their mystic power and long life (another form of power). All the same, respect and trust were very different things. She did not know for sure if her Queen Mother truly trusted Marseea, but guessed that she probably did. Evagoria, on the other hand, thought less of the dying species. Considerably less. She did not respect Sapiens, and she surely did not trust them.
“Hello, Headmistress,” Evagoria returned in her most polite voice as she swept stringy strands of hair away from her face. The fading sun now setting in front of her, orange and warmth took the place of these wayward strands. “As you are honored, I am honored much more so and looked forward to teachings under your watchful eye.”
Evagoria felt more at ease after taking in Marseea’s warm smile. For a sorceress more powerful than any in many centuries, the Sapien queen owned a soothing manner. Diedrika warned her to expect this. Wanting something to do with her hands to calm her racing mind, she looked down:
Perfect!
As good a time as any to rewet her still moist tail sack, Evagoria began to undo its ties. As she did so, she did her best to keep eye contact with Marseea. Unsure of what to say next, a sparkling tower much older than the shared city that housed it pointed the way.
“The Golden Clepsydra,” Evagoria gasped as if seeing it for the first time.
For this grand bronze sculpture rising from granite and awash in falling waters, every time truly was as if the first. Built at Elkabydos by finally free Gryphons twenty-four centuries ago, Mermaid artisans had yet to exceed such splendor.
“I was just a youngling, barely able to keep steady on my tail, when I last saw it,” Evagoria continued. “If having not gazed at it in wonder with my own eyes, I never would have believed such splendor could be real. Is it as magnificent now, Headmistress, as when first built?”
“In much the same manner,” Marseea said with pride, “my favorite former student once asked this. How fitting that her daughter has done the same.”
Marseea’s beaming smile put Evag
oria at ease even more.
“Is it every bit as magnificent as when it chimed the days away in the old city – yes, I believe so, Princess. When Queen Sthenele ordered Sapiens to abandon Elkabydos, those in charge of doing so must have exercised great care when they brought it here for the histories tell of none executed for doing otherwise.”
Marseea’s smile changed in a way that suggested she might not have minded such an outcome. Evagoria offered little more than a blank stare in return. Her headmistress may have thought such a line was clever, but she did not. In fact, Evagoria thought just the opposite, but fought hard not to show it. Queen Marseea moved closer, but stayed standing. She then bent down and ran her elegant fingertips in the waters of the fountain’s lower bowl.
“As I think of both the Golden Clepsydra and your mother, I am reminded they are very much alike.” Marseea’s strong voice turned dreamy. “Both unique, both majestic – aside that one draws breath and one does not … there is little difference. Although we are in the present, my mind cannot help but wander into the past. A day unlike any other I will never forget now races about my mind. Showing no mercy, it dominates my thoughts.”
Evagoria sat perfectly still. She fiddled with her tail sack no longer and gripped the fountain’s rim with both hands. Marseea spoke as if trying to wrap a spell around her ––
AND SHE LOVED IT!
“For fourteen decades I have taught Terra Australis’ most gifted and talented younglings. Of the nobility or kindly sponsored by them, I have taught them all. Every leader who now walks our world – no matter the nation – they sat where you do now. So many students, I could have formed my own horde of legions by now! Nevertheless,” Marseea took in the deepest of breaths, “one student, one legendary Mermaid, stands out above them all.”
Evagoria’s widened gaze met soft, smoky eyes. She already knew of whom the queen dreamily spoke. Still, as if a little girl holding an unopened present, she eagerly waited for this name to roll of Marseea’s gift-wrapped tongue.
The Gift From Poseidon: When Gods Walked Among Us (Volume 2) Page 16