Raven saw the creature’s point, simply being born that way was more punishment and eternal curse than any should ever have to bear. “Fine, give me the first one.”
Briareus settled back on all of his haunches, sheathed all of his swords, and then folded all of his arms over his plump caterpillar-like body. “Very well. The more you have of it, the less you see. What is it?”
“Seriously? That’s too easy.” Raven chuckled and rubbed his hairless chin. “The answer is darkness.”
“Very good. Something a little harder then. Ripped from my mother’s womb, beaten and burned, I become a blood thirsty killer. What am I?”
Raven stood silent and still, letting the riddle settle in his head and work its way around his brain, fighting the urge to give his own name as the answer. The shiny glint of the blade in his hand caught his eye and Raven gave a knowing grin. “You are iron, iron ore.”
“Excellent, little God of the Damned, I see you are intelligent despite reports to the contrary.” Settling back further until half of its long bulk nearly sat on the ground, the creature considered and then finally spoke. “Last one, answer me correctly and you may pass. If you break me I do not stop working, If you touch me I may be snared, If you lose me, Nothing will matter. What am I?”
Wracking his brain, going over every syllable of the riddle for a hidden meaning, Raven was stumped. He looked to the blade but found no answer. He looked behind him to Trinity who was staring at him with open eyes that reflected an open… “Heart, you are a heart,” Raven uttered breathlessly and then tore his eyes away from his Sister. “Now let us pass in peace.”
All fifty swords unsheathed at once causing a great grating sound to fill the air. Raven cringed, and Trinity grabbed onto his waist as Briareus held his swords aloft. “Those with foolish hearts may be right, there may be Hope for you after all, Raven Son of Ares. Give me my meat and then pass in peace, bring the girl to the Fields and finish your Trial.”
Raven reached into the pouch and very begrudgingly threw the last of his meat and bread to the beast in return for safe passage.
VIII
Although traversing the distance between the opening and the doorway to the Elysian Fields passed without incident, it was not easy and it was much farther than Raven anticipated. The sun Ares spoke of had already risen when they reached the other side of the remains of the dark cavern. While it didn’t seem to affect Trinity, it bore down on Raven with a vengeance and heat as great as the river they left behind. He sipped from the meager supply of water, offered some to Trinity but she refused saying she didn’t need it. Before he knew it, the water was gone, not a single drop remained to quench his thirst or to drive the thick oily film from the back of his mouth.
The sun that he couldn’t see rose higher and hotter into a sky Raven couldn’t see; it zapped everything from him, his strength, his determination, and left him weary. Bits of fluff that looked like milkweed began to float in the air indicating there was some type of plant life around. The milkweed grew denser and more frequent until they finally came upon a grove of willow trees. Raven stumbled into them on exhausted rubbery legs. His body weak from hunger and thirst, he fell to the ground, and curled up in a ball under the blessed shade.
“Get up,” Trinity tugged at his arm, “come on, get up, Raven.”
“I’m tired, Trin, I can’t keep going, I need some sleep, some rest. Just gimme five minutes.” Raven rolled over on his side.
“Get up!”
“Sit down, Trin, rest with me.”
“You can’t rest here!” Trinity pulled on his limp arm trying to drag him out of the shade of the trees. “Come on, get up! These are Sleeping Willows! If you fall asleep under them, you’ll die here. You’ll never wake up again, so get up!” Putting her back into her work, she tugged and pulled as hard as she could but Raven moved just the slightest bit then his arm creaked in its socket. In desperation, Trinity cocked her foot and kicked him in the ribs. “You wanna die here/ That what you want?”
No, that wasn’t what he wanted but the call of Sleep was so enticing he couldn’t refuse. He’d traveled so far and fought so hard, it was time for a bit of respite, just a few winks. Surely that couldn’t hurt anything. The welcomed veil of darkness began descending when a hot spray of salty water hit him in the face, bringing him around. Raven held his up his tired arms to shield his face. “What the…quit it…” Talking turned out to be a mistake, the stream of urine found its way between his lips and over his tongue. “Ugh! Gross!” Raven rolled away and then got up on his knees. “What the hell are you doing?”
“Getting you to wake up,” Trinity huffed as she lowered the hem of her toga. “We’re almost there,” she pointed to the way ahead of them and a glowing amber light. “Don’t give in now.”
Dragging himself to his feet, Raven fought the urge to lie down and sleep as Trinity’s hand closed down over his and she pulled him away from the grove and the cool shade back into the harsh sunlight. The last few yards of his journey were the hardest Raven faced to date. His legs didn’t want to move at his command, the thick air seized his lungs in a vice, and his entire body, wounded and caked with dried blood, cried out for water. He trod forward on burned feet scarred with blisters and nothing but instinct and the last bit of strength he could muster until they came to the Golden Gate of the Elysian Fields.
Trinity looked up at her exhausted Brother, took in his haggard handsome face and dry cracked lips. “You did it,” she whispered. “Your Trial is over.” She grasped his hand, gave it a hard squeeze and held it tight. “I know what you think, but there is more glory in Peace than in War. The Mortals aren’t pawns in a chess game, they’re people, Raven. This is their world, not ours. You can still make this right, my Brother, you can still go and live a good life. Do what Tisiphone asks; wake your Mother.” Trinity let go and passed through the Golden Gate to the Fields. She stood on the other side gazing at him. “I forgive you.”
Raven’s eyes grew wide at the sight. No longer was her neck broken, or her face split open and oozing blood. She stood in the Fields whole, hale, hearty and stunningly beautiful. Every inch the young Goddess that she would have been if Raven hadn’t snuffed out her life thinking it no more important than a candle in the wind. “I’m sorry,” he muttered as the last of the precious water in his body emerged as tears in his sore eyes and he held his hand to the Gate. On the other side, Trinity raised her hand to lay it against his but he couldn’t feel her touch, only the strength of the force field between them. “So sorry.”
IX
The next thing Raven knew, he was standing in the Great Council Chamber with all of the Olympians staring at him.
“Raven, Son of Ares and the Fae Magdalena MacLeod, you have passed the Trial of Death.” Reaching into the sleeve of his black robe, Hades produced a smooth white stone that he held out to Raven and dropped in the boy’s open hand. “I, Hades Lord of the Underworld, Accept you as one of us.”
“Gia Raven!” Ares cheered as the Olympians echoes his hearty salute.
Standing there, covered in ash, soot, sweat and blood, Raven was no longer certain he wanted to be part of their number. Accepting their accolades and watching them settle their bets, he felt sick to his stomach as he stared at Hades, not knowing what to do or say. That Trial wasn’t a simple test of death, it was a warning and the most vivid one he would ever get. Raven’s blood ran cold when Hades smirked at him as though the God of Death could read his mind. Hades was a wild card in this game but perhaps he’d just shown his true hand. After all, Hades did a lot of business with Ares over the centuries and undoubtedly owed the God of War a few favors. “Did all of you watch?”
“Yes,” Hades chimed easily before the others could speak, “but the sound was no good.”
If Raven had to place a bet, he’d say Hades probably heard everything just fine, it was only the others who were being given the silent treatment. “Wasn’t it, Uncle?”
“Couldn’t hear a thing,” Hades said
with a solid poker face.
Raven gave the old bastard credit for his open underhandedness and getting away with it. The other Olympians either didn’t notice or didn’t care. Right in front of their smug faces, Hades let Raven know he knew exactly what the young Olympian was up to in the Mortal World. Why shouldn’t he be? Surely, he was doing a good deal more business in the Underworld these days. Like his Brothers and Sisters, Hades sat on the information until the most opportune moment came along. The question was, did he also know about Morpheus?
Raven’s eyes scanned over to his distant Cousin floating in the air. “You? Did you enjoy the show?”
“Very much,” Morpheus returned, not liking the glare in the boy’s eyes. “You’re very brave, Raven.”
“Yes, he is. Good job, Raven, I knew you could do it.”
Raven’s strange eyes shifted from the ghostly Morpheus to the Golden Apollo. “Did you Uncle?”
“Of course, I did.”
Having won the wager, Ares scooped up the coin purses on the table and then slyly joined the conversation. “Then why did you bet against him?”
Chapter Twelve
We, The People
While the Olympians bickered and argued amongst themselves over the use of Trinity in Raven’s Trial, Raven went back to the Fortress, devoured nearly everything in the kitchen and then stumbled up the stairs to his bed where fell asleep for three days. Raven hadn’t slept through a single night since his Mother fell down the stairs, he caught little power naps here and there but the luxury of sleeping from night ‘til past dawn eluded him. As his body fell toward his waiting bed, he tried to fight it, he tried to stay awake knowing he had to sneak down to the Mortal World and see how the pot was brewing before Poseidon presented him with the next Trial. It was no use, he was so drained from his time in the Underworld that all he could do was collapse in Jilios’ waiting arms and dream of the new world he was helping to create.
II
It began just a few weeks before Alena’s fell. One by one, the world’s major economies fell apart and the countries went broke. Massive bad investments spurred by greed and a severe lack of giving a shit about the Average Joe led to Wall Street crumbling, taking the American stock market with it. Suddenly faced with another bailout for big banks, the citizens of the United States railed against it quite loudly. Most were already out of work and struggling to feed families, keep a roof over their heads, the last thing they wanted to do was hand over the last few eggs laid by the Golden Goose to an institution that couldn’t understand their value. Joe Average was still waiting to be paid back from the last go-round but instead of getting a hefty ROI, Wall Street snubbed them, gave the big old bird by giving out huge undeserved bonuses to their employees. Funded by Joe Average. Needless to say, Joe Average had no desire to be used like a five dollar whore handed over for the pleasures of the wealthy and pumped past dry—AGAIN.
Americans took to the streets in droves from New York City to Detroit, from Sacramento to Chicago and all points in between. They left their jobs to picket and protest, to holler and shout, to voice their displeasure and their need for real change. At first, when Joe Average did this, he did so with bullhorns and signs reading something about being The 99%. The American right-wing media represented Joe Average as a kook, a lunatic on the fringe by most of the World’s Societies. The liberal media quietly ignored Joe Average hoping he’d go away on his own.
He didn’t. Not this time.
With more jobs lost each day and nothing much to do, Joe Average only gathered momentum and friends. They marched in protest on streets and college campuses, in public parks where they conversed, pitched tents and exchanged ideas on how to effect the Change they so desperately needed. Sick to death of having to make-do with what little bit of cash flow that ‘trickled down’ to him, Joe Average’s voice got louder and angrier. However, with the media effectively blocking them, their outrage wasn’t as spotlighted as they needed.
Everyone’s a photographer today and everyone walks around with a camera and a video recorder on their cell phone. Joe Average, so unwilling to be ignored by the ‘free press’, created his own news channels on YouTube and the Internet. He blogged. He posted pictures. He put up videos of protests, fists pumping in the air, voices chanting in unison, police and National Guard standing by on the side, and encouraged others to join. They did. Every day Joe Average’s number grew.
Faced with the irate Joe Average staring them in the face en masse, the United States Government did not bailout Wall Street and the banks once deemed ‘too big to fail’.
That was when the NYSE and the NASDAQ plummeted to somewhere south of Hell. London quickly followed with the rest of Europe hot on its heels. The World Economy sunk into a Global Recession that quickly turned into a Universal Depression. Seemingly overnight, more than three-quarters of the world’s population sank into abject poverty with no clear way out.
It didn’t take long before the discontent became malcontent. Not long before those videos of people peacefully protesting or sitting in tight rows to block paths while the policemen stood by became videos of policemen beating the crap out of unarmed citizens, dousing them with tear gas, shooting off heavy rubber bullets into crowds, hitting them with water cannons, and tasers set to full. Those videos hit YouTube like a force five hurricane. The whole world watched as throngs of people in Greece were tear-gassed and had several hundred volleys of rubber bullets fired at them as they gathered in Syntagma Square in the center of Athens when the riot police were sent in to disperse them.
Suddenly, even those few souls remaining to call the Protestors ‘the fringe element’ started crying foul. They stood up to say that was wrong, it was unfair, and uncalled for.
Then came a pivotal moment in the entire scheme of things; in a small town called Marshall, Texas and a place called East Texas Baptist University the ticking time bomb exploded with a woman named Mary Masterson. Gathered with hundreds of her fellow students and citizens of Marshall as part of a sit-in protest, an eight-month pregnant Mary Masterson, sitting peacefully and chanting with the rest, was caught on tape being pepper sprayed and then viscously kicked in the head several times by Campus Security. It went viral as it happened courtesy of several hundred smartphones and, of course, members of the media.
The riot that blasted forth needed the Texas National Guard to come in and break it up. When all was said and done seven students, three professors, two reporters, and four National Guardsmen were dead.
It wasn’t long after that the United States Government tried to censor the Internet, tried to shut down blogs, websites, uploads, and the free exchange of information.
That was when it REALLY got UGLY.
Up until this time, Raven watched most of it unfold on his TV and on the Internet, two things he loved and his Father detested.
With Alena now deep into the clutches of her long sleep and the whole Fortress preoccupied, Raven began making covert trips to the Mortal World to add a good dose of fuel to the fire. The boy had a deeply guarded secret for getting off the mountain and back again undetected. Being part Olympian, Raven had a totem animal. Ares’ was the wolf and Raven’s was a huge raven. At will, he could change into it and take flight right off Olympus and down to the Mortal World. Without a need to open the Gates of Olympus, no one ever knew he was gone. Understanding that his absences had to remain hidden, each of his visits lasted only hours but they had a lot of impact on the volatile situation below. It was more than enough to stir the pot and keep it rolling toward a full steaming boil.
On Wall Street, with its crowd of angry Americans it seemed like the best place to start so Raven went to New York City, picked up the nearest protest sign and started shouting out chants and mantras along with the rest of them. Joe Average never questioned why Raven was there or who he was, they just accepted him into their numbers, welcomed him right in and, because he was young, some of them even tried to take him under their wing to protect him. As he marched and shouted, he
felt the combined anger, frustration and righteous indignation of the crowd well within him. Gratefully, almost greedily, Raven took in the chaotic energy as though it were food for a starving man then quietly let it slip back to them two-fold in a perverted feeding frenzy. Raven found it all most gratifying.
Yet, Joe Average’s spirits waned a bit as he was hit with pepper spray and rubber bullets. For a while Joe Average seemed ready to quit. Raven didn’t want that and so he spurred Joe Average on telling them how it unfair their governments and the wealthy had been to them all of these years. Did they want his generation to suffer through the same fate or did they want to change the world and save it for those to come? His words always lit a fire under their beleaguered spirits and reinvigorated their determination as they returned to the streets ready to take on the establishment and continued their protests.
The pepper spray, tear gas, and rubber bullets were real deterrents to the cause of Joe Average. Raven showed them how to make pepper spray that was fifty times stronger than what the police were using and how to disperse it over them in a shower of red rain rather than trying to spray them directly in the face or eyes. The pepper spray was so strong it sank through their clothing and burned their skin as they tried to charge forward. When the police donned rubber slickers to protect themselves, Raven added a special little chemical that melted the rubber to the clothing and eventually seared the mess to the skin beneath. It had to be cut and picked out by a doctor. The recipe for both varieties of pepper spray were tweeted and facebooked all over the world within a matter of minutes. From Beijing to Sydney the people in the streets were spraying the nasty solution at those in authority who would oppose them.
Raven instructed Joe Average in hand-to-hand fight techniques and showed them how to disarm a man, even a heavily armored military one. In no time at all, Raven found that Joe Average reveled in giving The Man a dose of his own medicine and it did wonders for morale! Within a matter of days, The Cause of Joe Average was reinvigorated; those who had been on the verge of giving up and giving in now had lion hearts and foxy minds.
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