People's Champion

by Lizzy Ford

  People’s Champion

  Episode Two

  Theta Beginnings Miniseries

  By Lizzy Ford

  www.LizzyFord.com

  Smashwords Edition

  Published by Captured Press

  www.CapturedPress.com

  Theta Beginnings Miniseries copyright ©2016 by Lizzy Ford

  www.LizzyFord.com

  Cover Design ©2016 by Lizzy Ford

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.

  This novel is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events; to real people, living or dead; or to real locales are intended only to give the fiction a sense of reality and authenticity. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and their resemblance, if any, to real-life counterparts is entirely coincidental.

  People’s Champion

  “… and this is the part where he won the gold in swimming and later that afternoon, in judo!” Alessandra boasted.

  I paused to listen, concealed from view by the night and trees in the forest where I had lived with soon to be thirteen-year-old Lyssa, the female nymphs who kept her company, and the priests managing the orphanage where we all lived.

  “Wow!” breathed one of the slender, elegant teens with her. “I heard he competed in seven separate events in one day and won gold in all of them.”

  “He did. He’s called the People’s Champion, because everyone loves him,” Lyssa said proudly but in a whisper. “He’s stronger than all the gods combined.”

  “That’s not possible!”

  “But it’s true!”

  I smiled despite my disapproval. Lyssa knew I didn’t want her talking about my gold-medal past. She was too young, and sheltered, to understand why, but I couldn’t think of my past without recalling everything I was ashamed of. Would she look at me with the same glow of admiration and love, if she knew what I did to her real parents?

  The past was best left in the past.

  Even knowing this, I hesitated to interrupt. No one had ever loved me the way she did, never believed in me. Since we hid in this forest seven years ago, I’d enjoyed a life I never thought possible, one of peace, family and happiness. Alessandra was my adopted daughter, and I her ugly protector.

  One day, she’ll learn the truth. The soft whisper in my mind tormented me from time to time.

  “But not today,” I replied quietly.

  Today, I was her Herakles. The nymphs who had appeared from the forest to play with her when she was six had remained with her, sensing what the priests knew. Alessandra was important and one day, she was going to need all of us to protect her. They were part of my family, too, sisters to the special little girl the priests and I had to hide at all costs.

  I purposely snapped a twig before moving forward into the light of the small campfire Lyssa had started. She quickly closed the browser on her cell phone, and the clips of my days as a champion disappeared from the screen. I pretended not to notice, and she hastily tucked the phone away.

  Two of the other nymphs had accompanied us this night to camp in the woods. Usually, five or six of the thirty girls came. Recently, however, they’d discovered the campground next to our forest and worse, the boys who often visited it with their parents. All of my past heroics paled in comparison to the appeal of teenage boys.

  The nymphs giggled, and I sat down across from them. Lyssa’s bright blue eyes found me. She was smiling.

  “What did the priests teach you this week?” I asked gruffly, already aware of her slow progress in class. The priests blamed me for her lack of interest in school, and I humored them the best I could. I was no scholar. I didn’t see the use in most of what they taught. The potential threats to Alessandra wouldn’t be defeated by her ability to speak Greek, or how many deities she could accurately name in under sixty seconds, or how well she recited the credo of the priests who plotted to rid the world of gods.

  None of that mattered. But I had to pretend it did, for the sake of what normalcy a secret orphanage run by rebel priests, and filled with magical creatures, could provide.

  Lyssa sighed and rolled her eyes. “Nothing.”

  I raised an eyebrow.

  The nymphs giggled and glanced at one another.

  “Shut. Up!” Lyssa snapped at them, features flaring red.

  “What?” I asked.

  “We started health class this semester, and Lyssa is the only girl in class who hasn’t … you know,” one of the nymphs said cheerfully.

  Alessandra groaned.

  My brow furrowed. “Hasn’t what?” I asked.

  “You know,” the other nymph said impatiently. “Started.”

  “Shut up, Hectate!” Lyssa snapped.

  “Started what?” I asked, confused.

  “Her … period.” Hectate whispered the last word almost too quietly to hear.

  Oh, Gods. Lyssa and the nymphs were starting to transform from children into young women. I wasn’t ready for that change. Not yet. Maybe not ever. My first instinct was to back away and disappear. Discussing a woman’s monthly cycle was as far from my comfort zone as anything could be.

  “Some people are slow,” the other nymph, Leandra, taunted.

  “You can never have kids if you don’t have one,” Hectate said matter-of-factly. “You’re going to be a lonely, old maid, and no boy will ever kiss you!”

  No, I was not at all ready for this stage of raising a daughter.

  Too stunned to speak let alone react, I saw the look in Lyssa’s eyes before she launched up and tackled the blonde girl but was too surprised to stop her. Leandra screamed. Alessandra drove the nymph to the ground and punched her before I caught her around her waist and hauled her back.

  Leandra scrambled to her feet, glaring at the angry Lyssa. “You hit like a priest!” she shouted at Alessandra.

  “Then come back and let me hit you again!” Alessandra wriggled in my grip.

  “Enough,” I said quietly. “Leandra, sit over there. Alessandra, there.”

  Alessandra pushed my grip off her and obeyed grudgingly. Leandra went to the other side of the campfire. Prying Alessandra off a nymph had become second nature. My sweet Lyssa had a temper and the combat arms training to cause harm, if she wasn’t careful. The priests believed her aggression to be a stage. For the sake of others, I hoped so. For her sake, I hope she remembered how to punch better than she spoke Greek when she was out of this stage.

  An awkward silence fell. Secretly relieved by the change of subject, I was trying hard to erase the image from my mind of my little girl kissing anyone ever, let alone growing up and wanting to leave the forest and me behind. The priests had tried to talk to me about what to expect, but I ignored them. In hindsight, I should have listened.

  Leandra and Alessandra were glaring at one another. At times, I was concerned that Lyssa wasn’t quite … normal. At least, not compared to the nymphs, who were probably not remotely normal either. But I had no one else to compare her behavior to, and the differences between her and the nymphs were clear on most days. They excelled in school, rarely threw temper tantrums, and were generally less wild than my Alessandra. I didn’t care if she was wild, but every day, I witnessed her struggle to fit in with the other girls. She, too, was aware of how different she was, and this hurt me on a level I wasn’t able to escape or treat with medicine.

  It was this concern that led me back to a topic I didn’t feel remotely qualified to discuss.

  “Is there a reason you ha
ven’t started … uh, your … female cycle?” I asked, uncertain what else to say. “Are you eating well? Sleeping enough?”

  “Herakles!” Alessandra groaned.

  “I don’t want your training to interfere with your development,” I reasoned.

  She covered her face with her hands, embarrassed.

  Leandra giggled and then laughed.

  “Don’t you laugh at him!” Alessandra bolted to her feet.

  I tugged her back down. She sat heavily, fuming.

  “That’s not how it works, Herakles,” said Hectate. “When she’s mature enough, she’ll start.”

  “That’s right. You’re just a silly little girl, and we’re women now,” Leandra added.

  “Like I want to bleed to death every month!” Alessandra retorted. “At least I won’t end up pregnant if I kiss a boy!”

  “Like any boy would kiss you!”

  I was starting to sweat just listening to them. “No kissing, no boys,” I growled, unable to help it. “And no one is getting pregnant. Understand?”

  The words came out much harsher than I intended. Even Lyssa gazed up at me in surprise.

  “Yes, Herakles,” the three girls chorused.

  I preferred breaking up fights to discussions of boys, kissing, pregnancy … Gods, I wasn’t going to survive Lyssa going through puberty or the knowledge she would one day want to be on her own, alone to face the world. I understood too well how dark and disgusting the world was, how twisted and deceitful people could be. I wanted to save her from those things.

  Aware it wasn’t fair or possible, I likewise couldn’t help thinking I wanted her to stay a child forever. I glanced at her. Her cheeks remained red from embarrassment. I didn’t want to press the issue and decided to talk to the priests about her development. I was not a traditional father figure, and her life was not normal. If some part of how I was raising her was interfering with her growing into a woman, even if I didn’t really want her to, I needed to know.

  Hectate gasped, drawing all of our attentions. She was gazing up at the night sky.

  “Meteor shower!” she exclaimed and pointed.

  I looked up, and my jaw went slack.

  The streaks of light crossing the sky weren’t meteorites or anything else natural. They were too low – barely higher than the tendrils of fog drifting inland from the Maryland coast – and consisted of orange fire rather than the cold burn of a meteorite.

  The girls stood, excited, and started to file through the forest to a clearing nearby, where they could see what was happening better. My eyes lingered on the sky as I tried to sort out what exactly I was witnessing.

  As I watched, more streaks filled the sky, until the night was lit up as bright as twilight. I stood, alarmed by the unnatural display.

  The cell phone in my pocket vibrated. I pulled it free as I followed the path the girls had taken to the meadow.

  We need you to return now with the girls. Quickly. The message originated from Father Cristopolos, who was the head of the priestly order managing the orphanage.

  “Lyssa, Leandra, Hectate!” I bellowed. “We’re going back to the orphanage.”

  “But, Herakles, we have to see the –“ Alessandra objected.

  “Now, Lyssa.”

  She knew better than to argue when I used that tone. Assured they would obey, I returned to the camp and put out the fire then swiftly picked up our camping supplies and loaded them into my rucksack. I handed Lyssa her pack when she appeared and then stood aside for her to lead us all back towards the center of the forest refuge.

  They were excited, oohing and aahing at the night sky, while I grew more perplexed. Such a display wasn’t manmade, and it was located too close to the little girl we were hiding from the world to be coincidence. Had the gods or politicians – both of which were feared by the priests – figured out where we were? Was this some kind of attack? If so, why were the fireballs crisscrossing the sky without striking our refuge?

  Three hours later, we reached the manor house at the center of the forest unscathed. The other nymphs were gathered in the greens, most lying on their backs, as they watched the show overhead.

  Lyssa went to join them, as did Leandra and Hectate, while I hurried inside to find Father Cristopolos.

  “Herakles!” a voice called behind me. “Come quickly!”

  I spun and struck off, following the smallest and youngest priest – Father Renoir – as he rushed through the corridors on the ground level of the manor house. He had hiked up his brown robes to help him move faster, and I kept pace with him, sensing his urgency in his pace and quick breathing.

  He led me past the halls and conference rooms that had been turned into classrooms for the girls and into the instructors’ break and administrative area at the end of the hallway.

  I entered the break room, and Father Cristopolos closed the door behind me. The other priests were gathered in front of a television.

  “It’s everywhere,” Father Cristopolos said in a tight voice. With a sturdy build and baldhead, he was the only one of the priests who ever took me up on the offer to teach them to fight.

  “What’s everywhere?” I asked.

  “This firestorm. The Gods are setting fire to the world.”

  Although critical of the intentions of supernatural beings of any kind, even I had a hard time processing this statement. He joined the others in front of the television and I trailed more slowly.

  Newscasters were panicked as they reported on the fireballs raining from the heavens, and the tickers at the bottom of the screen raced too quickly for me to catch much at all. My reading was rusty, but I managed to make out some words before returning my attention to the panicked woman on the screen.

  … New York, LA, London, Paris … fireballs in every major city … the ticker had read.

  My body became tense, and my pulse raced. I glanced upward, as if I could see the fireballs through the stone roof.

  “Is Lyssa safe here?” I heard myself ask without being fully aware of anything beyond my shock.

  No one answered.

  I grabbed Father Cristopolos by the arm. “Is Alessandra safe here?” I demanded, ready to snatch her and run as far as I had to in order to protect her.

  His eyes remained glued to the television, but he nodded. “These will protect us.” He lifted the red cord he and the other priests wore at their waists. I didn’t understand magic or the powers of the gods, but the perimeter of our forest refuge was lined by the ropes, which were said to turn our home into a blind spot. We were hidden from men and gods – everyone except for our Titan benefactor, Lelantos, and our Olympian benefactress, Artemis.

  “Turn the channel!” Father Renoir urged.

  Static was on the television. One of the priests flipped channels with a shaky hand, until he found another news station. This one lasted five minutes, the next two, and the third a full ten minutes before it, too, followed in the footsteps of the rest of them and disappeared.

  Silence filled the break room. No one was willing to say what I was thinking, that we could end up the only people left on the planet. My hands trembled from emotions, and I stared at the blank television screen, willing someone else to pop up and tell us what was going on.

  Of everyone, Father Cristopolos was the first to react.

  “Renny, bring the girls in. Francois, cut the cable, internet and phone feeds to the girls’ rooms. Until we know what to tell them, we’re going to hide this,” he said.

  My first instinct had been the opposite, to warn the girls about what was going on. Father Cristopolos was shrewd and smart and had been elevated to the rank of leader long before I met the priests. He was also more aware of the dangers facing Alessandra. I trusted his instincts in his area.

  The two priests hurried out of the break room, and Father Cristopolos returned his gaze to the blank television screen.

  “Herakles, would you be willing to check our boundaries? Ensure none of them are hit by fire?”

  �
�Of course,” I said instantly.

  “I plan on seeking out Artemis. I don’t know if she’ll be willing to talk to me after all this, but …” He drifted off, and bewilderment expressing the same shock we were all experiencing crossed his features. “This can’t be the end!”

  “It is not what was foretold,” one of the remaining priests agreed. “But I can’t explain it either.”

  Their belief in a prophecy involving Alessandra was yet another of the differences we shared. I believed no one, not even a god, could overrule my free will, and I didn’t give much credence to the existence of gods anyway. For the most part, the priests believed in the gods and free will, with the exception of Alessandra. They believed her fate to be something that had been determined ten thousand years ago.

  Which had always run counter to my own beliefs. It was pure madness to believe everyone had free will – except for one person. Everything around me, and everyone in my life, had one purpose: to protect Lyssa. I shared this priority, even if I didn’t always understand or agree with the reasoning behind why the priests did what they did.

  “I’ll go now,” I said when no one else spoke. “I need to grab some supplies from my shed.”

  “Cell reception will be coming down soon, if it hasn’t been knocked out by the fireballs,” Father Cristopolos said. “I know you plan for everything. Do you have backup communications? Something analog or line of sight?”

  I had never asked, but I often suspected Father Cristopolos had been in the military at one point. His easy command and pragmatism elevated him above the other priests, who were often too scholarly for me to relate to at all. “I do,” I said. “I’ll bring you a radio.”

  Without waiting for his response, I hurried out of the break room. The girls lived in rooms on the second through fourth stories of the manor house, while the priests and I shared the two guest cottages tucked behind the house. I had taken over one of the maintenance sheds as well to store gear and emergency supplies.

  Exiting the orphanage, I heard the girls complaining to Father Renny how much they didn’t want to go to bed yet. Unlike usual, I didn’t stop to help. The idea we could be on fire soon if I didn’t check the ropes around the boundaries possessed me with the kind of fear a father felt knowing his family was in danger. With jerky movements, I snatched everything I thought I’d need from the storage shed and slung a pack with weapons, water and more of the red ropes onto my back.