by Raine, Eliza
‘When you’re feeling stronger, you’ll be able to fly alongside the Tethys,’ I said, squeezing his hand. He glanced down at his unresponsive arm, strapped to his chest in a sling Zali had made.
‘I hope so,’ he said. I was relieved he was well enough to come with us. I’d missed him fiercely on Gemini.
A blast of warm wind suddenly hit us, and I heard the solar sails snap taught. We were dropping, I sensed, and leaned over the rails. Sand covered the earth below us, and I could see a great stone city growing on our left as we descended. A flag flew from a pyramid, this one smooth like the ancient Egyptians had built in my world. As we got closer, I saw a few ships docked at long piers jutting out from one of the larger pyramids, and mentally guided the ship towards them.
‘That flag says Egypt,’ said Icarus, as we approached the pier.
‘Egypt?’ I looked at him in surprise. ‘We have one of those in my world, and they built pyramids like this too!’
‘Gods, you’re so ignorant,’ grunted Vronti. ‘Most of your countries were started by humans from Olympus. Your world is Athena’s experiment.’
‘What?’
‘We’ll talk about that later,’ said my mom, sharply. ‘You must keep your wits about you now.’ I opened my mouth to argue but Icarus squeezed my hand and gave me a serious look.
‘Fine,’ I grumbled, and Vronti gave me a sneery smile. The ship soared to a stop, and another hot wave of air swept over us. I’d never been to the desert, but I imagined this is what it was like back home too.
‘I’ll pay the dockmaster,’ said Vronti, and vaulted over the rails before anyone could respond.
‘Fool boy,’ spat my mom. ‘We should be sticking together.’ I squashed down the satisfaction of hearing someone else call Vronti a fool.
‘Well, we’d better join him then,’ I said, and climbed over the rail, landing on the sandy stone pier.
9
The air was dry and smelled dusty as we walked along the pier towards the imposing pyramid. I wondered if the locals would be wearing what the ancient Egyptians wore back home, picturing topless men in white skirts. Then I saw the dockmaster and stumbled slightly. He was gold. As in his skin was the color of gold. It actually shone in the bright light. His head was shaved to the skin and his eyes were jet black, with barely any white iris showing. I couldn’t help thinking of Tak and the others the Keres demon had attacked, and suppressed a shudder. The dockmaster glanced up at us as we approached, his eyes scanning us and then fixing on Icarus’s wings. He was topless and wearing short black pants, and his muscles were enormous. I gulped, then regretted it and pushed my chin out.
‘Everything alright, Vronti?’ I asked as importantly as I could.
‘You’re the captain?’ the dockmaster asked me. I nodded. ‘Sea nymphs don’t come by here often,’ he said, looking pointedly at my mom. Her scaly outfit was reflecting the light so much that she stood out in our group almost as much as Icarus. She’d refused to wear anything else though. ‘It’s a bit dry for your kind.’
‘We don’t plan to stay long,’ answered my mother. He gave her a look as if to say ‘I should think not,’ then scribbled something down.
‘Bit young to be a captain aren’t you?’ he said to me.
‘I don’t think so,’ I said evasively.
‘Hmmm. We got fighters your age who are pretty good I ‘spose,’ he shrugged, and took Vronti’s offered coins. ‘On your way. Six hours paid up.’
‘Fighters?’ I murmured to Zali after we thanked him and carried on down the pier. ‘Do you think this place has fighting pits?’ I’d read about the Aries pits. They sounded a lot like ancient colosseum or gladiator pits, and I really, really didn’t need to see one of those in real life.
‘Most places on Aries do,’ she whispered back. ‘I’m sure we won’t need to go near one though.’ I hoped not.
When we got to the end of the pier there was a gaping square entrance to the pyramid, and it was so much darker than outside that I could see nothing at first. But as my eyes began to adjust I could make out colorful artwork across the walls, which held sconces with burning torches, lighting the long passageway. They were hieroglyphics, just like the ones from my history books back home. So Egypt really had been founded by someone from this city? The thought was incredible. How many other cultures from my world started here? All of them, a little voice in my head said. My home world was nothing compared to this place, mortals like my dad and sister meaning nothing to the gods of Olympus. I took a long breath.
‘So are we just going to start asking people where we can find Ares?’
‘Yes, or find a temple where we can pray to him directly,’ my mom said. A shudder of apprehension made my muscles twitch. We would be meeting the god of war himself. A tiny part of me thought that was a very bad idea, but it was silenced immediately by the part that was desperate to know what he looked like, how he spoke, what kind of being he was. Would he be cruel and angry, as I expected a god of war to be? I hoped not. Oceanus had led us to him directly, so I was confident he wouldn’t smite us all down where we stood just for being Titan. But I was still nervous about his reaction to us trying to find Oceanus. Taking our quest to an Olympian directly seemed risky. But I guessed Ares and Oceanus must have had an agreement worked out before the ocean god disappeared. A gold skinned woman wearing a white scarf around her head was hurrying past us and I paused.
‘Excuse me,’ I said, and she jumped in alarm. She uttered a string of words I didn’t understand, and then scurried on down the corridor. ‘It’s like she was scared of us,’ I said, frowning after her.
‘Why would she be scared of us?’
‘Women are not always treated well in Aries,’ said my mom stiffly. ‘Especially not female servants. I do not know who the current king of Egypt is, or his disposition towards women.’
‘Busiris is the current king of Egypt,’ said Vronti a few paces ahead of us.
‘How do you know that?’ Thom asked him.
‘My family are well connected. Plus I’m not ignorant.’ I rolled my eyes at his back. He was a million times worse than Arketa, I decided. I glanced at her. She’d been so quiet since we left Gemini. I hadn’t told anyone what I’d learned about her sister. If she’d managed to keep it a secret at the academy for this long, I didn’t feel like it was my place to tell anyone now. And besides, what would I say? I didn’t like thinking about it at all. I should probably tell Icarus though, I thought reluctantly. He should know why she hated Titans, given that he was one too.
‘There’s a hauler here,’ said Thom, and we slowed down as we reached it. It was set back in the stone, looking more than ever like an elevator from back home. I looked around nervously. It was oddly quiet in the pyramid, nothing like it had been on the bustling Gemini. Other than the nervous woman, we’d seen no-one.
‘Let’s go down,’ I said with a deep breath, and stepped into the open hauler.
We all crammed into the hauler and it started to move, but not just in a downward direction. I was sure it was moving sideways too, though it was impossible to know for sure. Eventually it came to a stop, and light flooded through the door as it opened. A blast of heat hit me as I stepped outside, and after the dimness of the pyramid my eyes watered slightly at the brightness. We were at the base of the pyramid, and sand covered everything. More small stone buildings surrounded us, in different sizes, most of them plain and dusty. There was a distinct lack of fabrics or color, no drapes or rugs or painted wood anywhere. A few people were milling about outside the buildings, some walking with purpose, others seeming to be just drifting aimlessly. They all had either gold or dark tanned skin, and most were men. Muscular men, I noticed. Land of war, I reminded myself. To survive on Aries you needed to be a fighter.
‘That looks like a temple,’ Vronti said, pointing at a building a little way off in the distance. It had a tall spire in the middle, and statues with human bodies but animals’ heads stood in a ring around the spire, their backs to it.
A massive pyramid, larger than the one we had entered through, towered behind it.
‘OK,’ I said. ‘Let’s go.’
It took us about twenty minutes to walk to the temple, and as we got closer I began to notice more color. It seemed the larger and grander the building, the more likely it was to have painted decoration. A few big houses looked like people lived in them, but we mostly passed simple shabby cubes that looked more like shells than homes. Pyramids were scattered about, the smallest I saw only a little bigger than the elemental building at the academy. It looked like it might be some sort of hospital, as everyone I saw leaving it had a limp or bandage or someone supporting them. I supposed a place where people fought needed a good hospital. Maybe a few good hospitals.
When we eventually reached the temple I couldn’t help stopping to admire the statues towering above us. About four stories tall, they were breathtaking. They weren’t life-like as they were too angular and stiff, but they had an incredibly imposing presence. They were made from the same yellow stone everything here seemed to be made of, plus a dark shiny black stone that might have been onyx. The one stood on the left of the huge temple entrance I recognized as a jackal and the one on the right was a cat. They both had fierce black eyes and long, powerful limbs.
‘Why is this doorway so big?’ asked Thom as we walked under the massive painted archway into the temple. ‘Who are they expecting?’
‘Me,’ boomed a voice, and my mouth fell open as the biggest man I’d ever seen rose to his feet in front of us.
10
The giant was at least three times my height, and he had no shirt on. Jet black hair fell forward over his scarred face and as he stepped towards us I saw that his eyes were the brightest blue I’d ever seen. He chuckled as he saw us staring.
‘I’ll be seeing you, Busiris. Think hard about my offer. This could be the chance of a lifetime,’ he said, then strolled past us, out of the temple. We all turned our heads to watch him go and my jaw dropped further when I saw that he had a tattoo on his back of a whole bunch of snakes, and it was moving. They writhed and slithered across his back as he stepped out into the light and curiosity welled inside me. How was that even possible? Who was he?
‘Did he just say Busiris?’ asked Icarus quietly, and I turned my head quickly back to the temple. ‘Didn’t Vronti say that was the king’s name?’ I scanned the huge hall, and my eyes barely took in the elaborate statues, the gold vases and ornaments, the channel of flames flickering around the edge of the room. Instead they snagged on a second man who was standing in front of a huge stone monument, that was obviously representing the god of war. The statue of Ares dominated the far wall, and was wearing ancient style fighting armor and a plumed helmet. The man in front of it had gold skin, wore a white pleated skirt and had a shaved head, like the dockmaster had. Except he was much larger than the dockmaster had been.
‘Will you not bow before the king?’ he said in a rasping voice, without turning around. I looked at the others, and Vronti and my mom dropped hastily to one knee. I did the same.
‘I apologize, we came to pray to Ares, we had no idea royalty was present,’ said Vronti, in his teacher’s pet voice.
‘You are excused,’ Busiris said, and turned to us. His black eyes fixed on Icarus. ‘You have wings,’ he said simply. Icarus glanced at me.
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘Who are you? You are young to be roaming the streets of Egypt with just a sea nymph for protection. She’s little out of her depth here.’ The corners of his mouth quirked up in a smile that looked more cruel than amused.
‘We have business with Ares,’ I said. King Busiris chuckled.
‘Is that right? You think the mighty Olympian has time for a bunch of kids?’
‘We’ve been sent to him by someone far more powerful than-’ I started, but my mom gripped my elbow hard.
‘We shall pray to him and see if he deems us worthy,’ she said, dipping her head respectfully. I frowned, but clamped my mouth shut. Busiris looked over all of us again, then shrugged.
‘Fine. It is my duty to encourage prayer to Ares. And anyway, I have much more important things to occupy my mind. You may rise. Pray. Just leave Egypt when you’re done. This is no place for you,’ he said, looking directly at my mom.
‘Of course, your majesty.’
He strode past us, his eyes lingering on Icarus’s wings, then left the temple. I let out a breath and we all moved cautiously closer to the Ares statue.
‘Well, he’s intense,’ whispered Zali.
‘He’s a half-giant, and much more intelligent than most of the species are,’ said Vronti, admiration unmistakable in his voice. ‘He’s made Egypt very wealthy, very quickly.’
‘Was the guy with the snakes on his back a full giant?’ I asked.
‘What do you think?’ sneered Arketa.
‘Yes,’ said Zali, more kindly. ‘And eyes that blue means he’s a direct descendant of Poseidon.’
‘I wonder who he is?’ I mused.
‘It doesn’t matter who he is. What matters is that we talk to Ares,’ Vronti said, and I refocused my attention. He was right.
‘It should be you, Pandora, who asks him to come. You have the essence of Oceanus about you,’ my mom said. I tipped my head at her.
‘The essence of Oceanus? What does that mean?’
‘For the sake of the Gods, stop asking infernal questions and just pray to Ares!’ snapped Arketa. I leaned away from her and held my hands up.
‘Alright, alright,’ I muttered. I closed my eyes and thought of the huge warrior god.
‘Ares, I don’t know if you can hear me, but Oceanus has sent me to you. We seek to find him, and...’ and what? Did I tell Ares about the Keres demon? Would he care? I remembered the poem from the box, thought of Dasko’s words. ‘We seek to find him and bring about an age of peace between Titans and Olympians.’
A great, booming laugh filled the temple, rebounding off the walls and making me stumble in surprise.
‘You call the god of war with a plea of peace? You are a foolish child indeed.’ The deep voice echoed off the statues and the Ares figure began to glow. ‘I want no part of an age of peace with Titans. However, I have been expecting you for a long time.’ I looked up, around the room, searching for a source of the voice. I caught Icarus’s glance, his body stiff and alert. My mom dropped to one knee again, and uncertainly, still looking about furtively, I did the same.
‘Were... were you friends with Oceanus?’ I asked timidly.
‘Ha!’ the voice bellowed, and the sound of stone cracking drew my attention to the top of the Ares statue. It was starting to move. The head, face covered by the plumed war helmet, tilted down towards us. ‘All humans should spend more time on their knees,’ Ares said, the jaw of the statue moving with his words. ‘Pathetic little creatures. So desperate to kill one another.’
‘We’re not all human,’ I objected, before I could stop myself.’
‘Other than that sea nymph, of course you are. Being a demigod doesn’t mean you’re not human. Although you two...’ he tailed off. ‘I was not friends with Oceanus. Nor will I ever be. But he had a way of finding things out that were none of his business, then using them to be very persuasive.’
‘He blackmailed you?’ The statue gave a roar of annoyance and I shrank back.
‘And now my debt will be paid! Go to Evenus, son of Oceanus. If you can earn it, he has a prize that will show you on your way.’
‘Thank you,’ I said, standing.
‘Know this, Titan scum,’ the statue boomed, and I froze. The plumage on the statue’s great helmet was starting to glow a scarlet red. ‘I may have been bound to help you, but I wish you no luck. I hope Evenus puts an end to you all.’
Then he lifted his huge stone foot off the temple floor.
‘Run!’ yelled Icarus, as the gigantic stone sandal came crashing towards us. We all raced for the temple exit, the ground shuddering as Ares’ foot made contact with the ground. I ski
dded out of the temple into the bright light, panting, adrenaline shooting through me and I could still hear Ares’ cruel laugh echoing off the stone as I scanned our group, making sure everyone got out.
11
‘So, how do we find Evenus?’ I gasped, as we ran back towards the pyramid with the piers, where the Tethys was waiting for us.
‘I don’t know, but I hope it’s a long way from wherever Ares is!’ Zali answered, running alongside me.
‘The dockmaster will know,’ Vronti called, quite a few feet ahead of us. We didn’t slow down until we reached the hauler, and I was panting for breath as we all crammed into it again.
‘Do you think he would actually have squished us?’ asked Zali, her eyes still wide.
‘Yes,’ said my mom, the only one not breathing hard.
‘But-’ I started, but her stern eyes stopped me.
‘Titans are not popular, Pandora. You need to be more careful what you say to people.’ I scowled at her, but said nothing, as I knew she was right. When we exited the hauler we hurried down the pier, until we saw the dockmaster.
‘Excuse me,’ said Icarus. The gold man turned slowly to him.
‘You’re leaving now, are you?’ he asked pointedly.
‘We sure are,’ nodded Icarus. ‘Could you tell us how to get to Evenus?’
‘Evenus?’ the man gaped at us. ‘What in the world of Olympus would you want to visit him for? He cuts off his visitors’ heads!’
‘What!’ I exploded.
‘Yeah. Believes everyone who visits him wants to marry his daughter, so he challenges ‘em all to a longboat race. When they lose, which they always do - he’s a cheater, you see, he cuts off their heads and sticks them on his wall.’
‘What about his daughter?’ asked Thom.
‘He’s locked her up and hidden her away somewhere,’ he shrugged. ‘Either way, I wouldn’t be visiting him if I were you.’