by Diana Tyler
Hermes stood, and with his wand traced a triangle shape in the air. He rapped lightly against it with his knuckles; it sounded as though he were striking stone. Leto mirrored him as he raised his palm to it, but their touch was impeded by the invisible wall he’d erected between them.
“The All-Powerful seldom works so spectacularly,” said Hermes. “It wasn’t his hands that constructed the wall but the desperate prayers of his disciples pleading for protection.” He stepped around the unseen shape and tenderly cupped Leto’s cheek. “You inspire fear in all but me.” Then he beckoned Leto to follow him toward the courtyard wall.
He pointed up at the Hesperides, and with his wand, connected the stars with an amber streak, as brilliant as a meteor’s tail. “You’re familiar with the tale of the seven sisters?”
“I know they guarded the golden apples of Zeus, along with Ladon the dragon,” she said. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Did you know the apples were once stolen?”
Leto shook her head as she sighed. “No, schoolmaster. Do enlighten me.”
“Hercules, greatest of the demigods, was sent by King Eurystheus to steal them, just one of the many feats the hero performed.” Hermes’ eyes jumped wistfully from star to star as he spoke. “Hercules’ quest to obtain the apples was not without peril. He did battle with Ares, wrestled two of Poseidon’s sons, slew the eagle that afflicted Prometheus, and, finally, dined with the Hesperides, who then gave him the apples freely, without a fight.”
“Oh, Hermes, I do hope this prattling is headed for a conclusion of reasonable interest to me.” Leto feigned a yawn. “I was hoping our meeting tonight would end in something slightly more exciting than tedious woolgathering.”
The Hesperides dimmed as Hermes dragged his wand away from the constellation and set it on the wall. His temple protruded as he clenched his jaw. His patience with Leto was wearing thin.
“The lesson is this.” He turned and stared at her sternly until he knew he had her attention. “The Hesperides were won over not with force, but friendliness.”
“And so,” said Leto, turning with a smile toward the stars, “I will befriend the Ashers.”
Hermes nodded.
“And what of the wall that separates them from me?”
Mischief glinted in Hermes eyes. “If I know anything about mortals, it’s that they’re hopelessly proud and invariably reckless. And Ashers, as you well know, my queen, are known for their proclivity to seeking out adventure; they think themselves invincible.” He laughed. “These three won’t remain hidden for long.”
“And you think they’re stupid enough to pass into my territory.”
“I think they’re young people in a new world with heads full of questions, and domas they don’t yet understand. Why would they stay behind bars?”
Leto smiled. “So I will let them come to me.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
PREMONITIONS
Damian sat on a settle by himself in the tent eating a bowl of cold lentils, finally relaxing after the premonitions had passed. Artemis lay sleeping at his feet as the bush crickets began their nightly noise outside.
Chloe walked in quietly, holding a candle and wearing a lilac robe. Her hair was damp and her face free of dirt. Evidently, she’d had a bath.
“Where were you?” Damian asked.
Chloe shrugged. “I honestly don’t know. I was with Carya somewhere.” She yawned and reached for a ewer resting on a small wooden table. She took a sip straight from the wide ceramic mouth.
“That’s wine,” said Damian. He’d accidentally drunk from it earlier and spewed the stuff onto the ground.
Chloe didn’t seem to mind, however, and smacked her lips. “I know. Circe’s was better.”
Damian swallowed the last bite of his supper. “What are you talking about?”
“When we have a good hour or so, I’ll tell you.” She knelt beside Artemis and scratched behind the dog’s ears. “Where is everyone?”
Damian pointed outside. “Around a fire somewhere, eating the rabbits Artemis killed.” His face twisted with disgust. “I watched Tycho and Ethan skin them. It was the nastiest thing I’d ever seen.”
“Ethan skinned a rabbit?” Chloe laughed.
“Yep.” Damian reached down for his cup of water and took a drink. “It seems everyone’s adjusting to this nightmare rather well.”
“Nasty-tasting beverages. Bloody animals. Smelly dogs. What’s not to like?” Chloe said as she sat beside him.
“You forgot to add ‘a sister that still doesn’t trust you.’” Damian leaned onto the arm of the settle and propped his head in his hand. “I wish you’d be honest with me and tell me where you went.”
“I was being honest.” Artemis lifted her head and wagged her tail at Chloe. “I told you, I was with Carya. We were in some black void. If I had the latitude and longitude coordinates, I’d give them to you.”
Damian sat up again and turned toward her. “Do you remember, when we were kids, any of the times I came into your room and found you holding that stuffed lion, crying?”
“Leo,” Chloe whispered. “You ripped his nose off when we were four.” She furrowed her brow, angry at the incident all over again.
“Chloe, focus. You remember those times, then.”
She nodded. “Not as clearly as I remember you defacing Leo, but I remember.”
“I’m sorry about Leo, okay? If we stumble across a toy store here in the boondocks, I’ll be sure to buy you a new lion.”
“Thanks.” Chloe smiled. “So, back to your story.”
“I would get these feelings, kind of like hunger pangs.” Damian pressed his fingers to his abdomen. “They almost made me sick sometimes. Then I’d see you crying, in my mind, and I’d get sad, too.” He looked up to see Chloe’s eyes moist with tears.
“I always felt better when you hugged me,” she said. “I didn’t feel so alone anymore.”
Damian pressed his lips together to keep from tearing up himself. He’d been so proud the day he finally ignored those psychic feelings, when he walked past his sister in the playground at school. Or when he passed her in the halls at home and pretended he didn’t know she was struggling. Over time, the telepathic bond he had with Chloe had been so suppressed that it disappeared completely—until the day she stepped into the portal to Hades. The day he’d been too selfish and afraid to save her.
“I, uh…” Damian began as he nervously scratched his neck. “I’m sorry I stopped.” Artemis stood and rested her chin on his knee as if to comfort him. “I’m sorry for a lot of things.”
“I told you, I’m leaving the past in the past,” said Chloe. “I meant it.”
“I guess I’m having a harder time doing that than you are.”
“Not entirely.” Chloe brought her hair to one side and fiddled with the silver brooch that secured the larger panel of her robe to her shoulder. “I wasn’t completely honest with you about where I went.”
“I know,” said Damian. “I saw it.”
He drew a deep breath through his nose as the images flickered past once more: Ethan’s parents running; eight giant hooves pounding; flames gushing from the bulls’ bronze mouths; debris floating on the sea; bone-chilling terror on Chloe’s face as her heart beat like a drum; the bloody tangle of limbs where Ethan’s parents lay fallen.
“You saw them die?” Chloe asked.
Damian rubbed his forehead as if the movement might erase the memories—memories of something that hadn’t even happened.
“I’m so sorry you saw that,” said Chloe.
“Why did you have to see it?” Damian looked at her intently once again, anxious to see whether she’d hold back the truth or reveal it.
Chloe sighed and smiled softly. Artemis curled herself into a ball and laid her head on Chloe’s foot. A few moments passed in silence, but just when Damian felt convinced the conversation was over, Chloe opened her mouth again.
“I can’t put out every fire,�
�� she said. “It isn’t my job to save Ethan’s parents.” She sounded robotic, as if she believed what she was saying but didn’t yet accept it.
“Carya showed you one version of the future if, hypothetically, you went back and saved the Rosses. It’s not written in stone, is it?”
Chloe shrugged. “I guess not.” She sat up straight. He could see she already knew where his thoughts were taking him. “Damian, her point was that death isn’t something to be manipulated. People make their choices, and the family they leave behind has to move on.”
“Like our parents made their choices?” Damian said, indignation burning behind his eyes. “Our parents were innocent, Chloe.” He rocked himself out of the settle, causing Artemis to yelp as he accidentally stepped on her tail. “They didn’t choose to die the way they did.”
“I can’t save them, Damian.” Chloe’s voice was so low, so broken, that he could hardly hear her. “Please try to understand…”
Damian shook his head, giving himself a few seconds to try and see things a different way. But it was useless.
“How can I?” Chloe said.
He paced around the tent, and then stopped abruptly by the opposite wall. He knew that what he wanted to say would hurt her, but she had to hear it. It was the truth.
“If I had your doma, Chloe, there’s not a god in hell that could stop me from saving Mom and Dad.”
He felt the sting of his own words boomerang back to him as Chloe stared at the ground, speechless and stunned. Then she got up, swept the edge of the robe over her shoulder, and walked out of the tent with Artemis panting at her heels.
Damian tried falling asleep for over an hour, but he was kept awake by the cacophony of crickets, barn owls, and musical instruments playing outside.
Chloe hadn’t come back in again. Artemis had checked on him once without so much as a tail wag, and then left him alone after licking the empty bowl that had held his lentils. He couldn’t blame Artemis for her sudden indifference toward him; he’d been harsh with his sister, but he wasn’t sorry. The truth hurt sometimes.
After he’d had enough tossing and turning on his sorry excuse for a bed, Damian got up. Surely enough time had passed for him to use his doma again.
Each of the previous times he’d become invisible, it had happened quickly, involuntarily, activated not by will but emotion.
The first time, he’d had no say in the matter whatsoever. The walnut from Carya had contained some sort of magic. After that, it had been a strong desire to save his sister that made his physicality disappear. Likewise, it had been his eventual cowardice that had brought it back. And later, when he helped Ethan and his parents escape, his doma had been precipitated by an overwhelming sense of duty, as if saving them could simultaneously redeem him and stop the Fantásmata.
Channeling that same sense of purpose, of ineluctable responsibility, Damian felt the electrifying tingle pulse in his hands and feet, then race up and down his body. Within a matter of seconds, he was completely invisible.
The air outside the tent was unseasonably thick and muggy, and carried the smells of dying campfires and imminent rain. The hills were dark and quiet, and everyone was asleep inside their tents under a full moon that kept watch overhead.
He’d never seen so many stars. There was no smog here and so no discernible barrier between Petros and space, no distinction between order and chaos. Everything seemed so pure, untainted by pollution, not cluttered with industry. It was as though Petros was an infant kept safe in the arms of the cosmos.
Damian’s thoughts were interrupted when he heard the pattering of paws on the rocky soil. He glanced back to see Artemis trotting toward him, her hackles raised in suspicion.
“How can you see me?” Damian said.
Then he remembered the fat dachshund he’d run into at the Rosses’ house just after he learned they’d been evicted. He’d been invisible then, too, and still the dog had seen him—and bitten two of his fingers. He realized that animals must have powers, too; they could see him despite his doma.
Artemis wagged her tail and ran to him, her blubbery dewlap flapping as she panted.
“I guess you’ve forgiven me, then.”
The dog sat down and canted her head to one side, as if asking him to say it again.
“Wanna do a little exploring?” Artemis’ ears pricked forward. “You can be my tour guide.”
Damian scratched the top of her head and walked toward the path leading into the valley. When he didn’t hear her following, he turned back and watched her go to the door of a tent and lie down.
Maybe the dog had been trained not to venture off, but Damian hadn’t. He was done waiting around to receive snippets of information and disturbing premonitions based on what Chloe was learning and seeing. He wanted to see for himself.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
MEDUSA
It was nearly sunup and Damian was still walking through endless fields, waiting to find civilization. He wondered if it even existed, or if the people here were all nomads living in clans and tribes.
Every few minutes, his eyes scanned the horizon for signs of Mania. It was not that he was afraid of her; in his invisible state he was impervious to the weather. He just hoped she hadn’t released any Asher-hunting canines to track him down. I should’ve taken one of Tycho’s swords, he thought.
“Have you lost your way? Or perhaps your sanity?”
Damian jumped at the sound of a woman’s voice coming from a rocky outcrop.
“Do not come this way,” said the woman, “unless you want to become part of this rock.”
“Who are you?” Damian stepped closer as he skimmed the ground for a stick to fight with or a stone to throw. “Are you a centaur? How can you see me?”
The woman laughed, then hissed, and then did both together, the sounds blending into a haunting harmony.
“You really are mad, aren’t you?” she said. “Do you think yourself a dandelion seed floating in the breeze?”
“I’m mad? You’re the one making snake noises.” And then it hit him. He remembered a lesson from his ontology and mythology class that mentioned a hideous woman with wings and claws and venomous snakes for hair. “You’re Medusa.”
The hissing stopped. “See for yourself, if you’re brave enough. I promise I won’t turn my face to you.”
“I am brave, but I’m not an idiot. You can stay right where you are. I’m leaving.”
Damian picked up his pace, jogging around the outcrop toward a hilltop he’d been eyeing. Maybe he could see the coast from there, or some evidence of a culture. He didn’t even know what year he was in.
“Are you trying to find Mania, little dandelion?” Medusa called after him. “If so, I’m afraid you’re headed in the wrong direction.”
“My name is Damian,” he said, still refusing to turn around. He heard the snakes start hissing again. “What do you know about Mania?” He heard something plop onto the grass near his foot. He looked down and saw an ivory-handled mirror, as polished and clear as any modern one back home.
“It’s obvious you’ve heard of me.” Her voice seemed incongruous in light of the unflattering descriptions of Medusa in the myth books. It was sweet, soothing, with a smoothness that was almost hypnotic. “Don’t you wish to see if the rumors are true?”
Damian couldn’t deny that his curiosity was piqued.
“Use the mirror. Hephaestus made it for me. That’s the only way he could look upon me without turning to stone. He was my lover, you know. His heart was so riven with pity for me that he escaped Tartarus to find me. We were happy, for a time.”
“No, actually I didn’t know.” Damian knew a little about the crippled god of metalworking and fire who had been expelled from Olympus by his own mother because she considered him too ugly to be her child. But those were all children’s stories. Like Medusa, like the Centaur… Why had it all been painted as fiction?
Damian could hear her walking toward him.
“I suppose it’
s a bit of a secret. But I feel I can trust my secrets with mad country wanderers.”
Damian picked up the mirror and spun it in his hand. “I’m not mad. And I’m from Eirene. But you’re right,” he conceded, “I am lost.”
“And looking for Mania?”
Damian nodded and held the mirror so it reflected the morning sky. “What would stop your reflection from killing me?”
“You don’t know Hephaestus well at all. The materials of his forge are resistant to even Athena’s curses.”
“Athena turned you into a…” What should he call a winged woman with snakes coming out of her head?
“A gorgon. Yes. Jealousy will drive women to do unspeakably cruel things to others of their own sex.” The snakes fell silent as sadness quivered in her voice. “It’s a cancer that’s eating away at Leto even as we speak.”
“Who’s Leto?”
“Everyone else in Petros knows her as Mania.”
She was standing a few inches behind him now. He almost felt her loneliness as a magnetic force, drawing her to him. Despite himself, Damian raised the mirror. He tried not to gasp but failed. The myths didn’t do justice to just how grotesque she really was.
“No need to pretend my looks don’t alarm you,” she said. Her gaze, and the gaze of all the serpents’ eyes, fell to the ground. “I’m under no illusion that I’m anything but hellish.”
Damian waited for her eyes to meet his before he replied. His mother had once told him that eyes reveal more about a person than anything else, and from the quick glance he’d had of Medusa’s, she wasn’t the man-killing monster of lore.
“I’m sorry people have treated you unfairly because of how you look,” he said, hoping she wouldn’t be insulted. But she had told him to be honest.
“Unfairly?” She laughed. “Unfairness is when two children perform their chores with equal excellence and only one receives a sweetcake for their labor. Unfairness is a virtue compared to what my fellow man has done to me.”