by Maz Evans
“But … but that’s not possible,” exclaimed Virgo in disbelief. “That’s not in our history. You can’t have lied?”
“I’m afraid I did,” said Zeus, shamefaced. “After all, history is only what the winners wrote down.”
Elliot shot a triumphant look at Virgo, which she chose to ignore.
“Once Thanatos and the Daemons were defeated, the power of the stones scared me,” said Zeus. “I didn’t want them to corrupt me like they had Erebus and Thanatos. I told Hypnos that his brother and the Daemons were dead, then made him swear on the Styx that he wouldn’t use the Chaos Stones himself. I commanded him to hide them where they could never be found—not even by me. I’ve not seen him nor the stones from that day to this.”
“Shut. Up,” said Hermes, taking a stunned selfie on his iGod. “You’ve got to be joking. Seriously. I’m not even joking.”
Elliot felt winded. He had less than a week to find twenty thousand pounds and his one ray of hope—the Earth Stone—was fading. He needed that stone—and fast.
“I’m not proud, guys,” said Zeus. “But now that Thanatos is free, we must get to those stones before he does. If he gets his hands on them, he can free his Daemon army from Tartarus and then we’ll all be in the soup. I’m going to need the girls.”
“Which ones?” asked Hermes.
“Athene and Aphrodite,” said Zeus firmly. “And Hephaestus, he’s always handy in a crisis. It’s getting late—we can fetch them tomorrow. Elliot, can we just crash here, if that’s okay with you?”
“Sure, why not?” said Elliot, his mind whirring.
“Super! Now,” said Zeus, pushing himself to his feet, “give me a tour of this fine home of yours. I could do with stretching my legs after that flight.”
They left the shed and Zeus looked out at the overgrown farmlands that had fallen into disuse. Elliot felt embarrassed as he looked at his home through someone else’s eyes—the hard soil was thick with weeds, the shed was falling apart, and the farmhouse was a shambles.
“I’m ever so grateful to you, Elliot. I wonder if there is anything I might do to repay your kind hospitality?” Zeus said.
“Are Gods … rich?” asked Elliot. “I mean, you’ve lived for ages. Do you have loads of money?”
“None that’s any use to you, my friend,” laughed Zeus. “Gods can’t keep mortal money. It’s against the Sacred Code. We immortals have our own currency—obals, drachma, and mina. Although most of mine goes to my ex-wives anyway … Why do you ask?”
“No reason,” said Elliot, not comfortable sharing his biggest secret with this complete stranger. Besides, Mom always said it was easier to seek forgiveness than permission. What if the Gods didn’t let him use the Earth Stone to save the farm? He’d just “borrow” it the one time, find enough treasure to pay off his debts, then give it straight back. No one needed to know …
Elliot again had the sensation that Zeus could see into his thoughts. But it passed in a heartbeat as the God smiled warmly. “My sisters Hestia and Demeter are very good around the house,” he said. “With your permission, perhaps they could help you out on the farm?”
“Great. Thanks,” Elliot said, and then yawned as the long day caught up with him.
“Good stuff.” Zeus smiled again. “You’re tired, Elliot—we can manage from here. Why don’t you head back inside? Oh, and here,” he added, producing a basket that Elliot was sure wasn’t there before. “A few leftovers from the wedding. Shame for it all to go to waste. Again.”
“Thank you,” said Elliot, struggling under the weight of it. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Night,” said Zeus as Hermes fluttered down next to him.
The two Gods watched the young boy wander back to the farmhouse with his supper.
“Thank the heavens you found me,” said Zeus. “We need to stay close to Elliot—he’s in terrible danger.”
“What gives?” asked Hermes.
Zeus pulled an ancient piece of parchment from his pocket and handed it to his son.
Hermes’s eyes bulged out of his head. “Shut up. It’s him, isn’t it?”
“It is,” said Zeus. “We need to find those stones, and there’s not a moment to lose.”
“Should we tell him?” asked Hermes.
“No,” said Zeus. “Elliot Hooper is the only person who can save the world. And I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy.”
In the small hours of Sunday morning, Thanatos stood outside the residence of Pythia, Oracle of Delphi and conveyor of prophecies.
“You’re sure this is where she lives?” he asked.
“As sure as I’ve got a spare nose,” said Charon. “I go here meself from time to time. I like to play the ponies.”
Thanatos looked disdainfully at the neon sign burning in the dawn gloom, announcing that this was BOTTOM DRACHMA BETS in Twitching, Kent.
“I’ll go back to the river,” said Charon. “Don’t be long, mind you—we’ve got a long way to go if you want to reach Hypnos’s place tonight.”
Despite the hour, Thanatos could see a faint glow emanating from the apartment above the shop. He pressed the buzzer.
“We’re not open” came the crackly reply over the intercom.
“Oh, I think you are,” said Thanatos. “Hello, Pythia.”
“Is that … ?”
Thanatos saw a curtain move upstairs.
“Well, well. You’d better come up,” said the voice, buzzing Thanatos in.
Thanatos crunched on discarded takeout cartons up the stairs and into Pythia’s cramped room. The oracle sat in an armchair. She appeared to be in a trance.
“What do you seek?” she asked in a monotone.
Thanatos picked up the television remote and switched off the home makeover show she was watching.
“Hey—I was enjoying that,” Pythia huffed, heaving herself up and venturing toward the kettle. She eyed Thanatos’s black robes. “I see you’re still making a big effort to blend in?”
“Some of us still have standards,” said Thanatos, peering disapprovingly at Pythia’s blotchy complexion, frayed robe, and threadbare pink slippers. “And I shouldn’t have to blend in. Besides, my tricks don’t work on you.”
“True enough,” said Pythia. “Cup of tea? The milk’s not that lumpy … ”
“I need to know the prophecy,” said Thanatos. “The one you gave Zeus. His last words to me were: ‘No immortal can free you. It has been prophesied.’ I want the rest.”
“Did you bring me an offering?” said Pythia.
“I did, but does it have to be—?”
“No offering, no prophecy,” said Pythia flatly, adjusting one of the curlers in her greasy gray hair.
“Don’t toy with me,” said Thanatos menacingly. “Or I might just—”
“Uh, uh, uh,” said Pythia, flashing her glass kardia. “I’m a Neutral. Like you say, your tricks don’t work on me.”
“Fine,” sighed Thanatos. “Here it is.” He produced a huge bucket of fried chicken from his robes in disgust. “Charon insisted I ‘go large.’ ”
“Good man,” said Pythia through a mouthful of chicken drumstick. “Oooh—and a toy. Classy. Right—bear with me a second.”
She walked over to a battered computer and started searching through her emails.
“Remember, I don’t make this stuff up,” said Pythia, highlighting the message she sought. “I just give you the odds.”
She hit the print button and an aged printer slowly churned out a piece of paper. The oracle handed it to Thanatos and he read his prophecy:
To: [email protected]
Date: 0016 AD
Subject: Thanatos (Plus how YOU can save on YOUR chariot insurance!)
If Death is contained in a sacred stone portal
He can’t be released by a single immortal
The Daemon you place in the shackles of iron
Needs a young mortal child with the heart of a lion
The child can’t die from a terribl
e deed
By the hand of the Daemon he generously freed
But now he could claim the power Death owns
And conquer the world with the help of four stones
Daemon beware! Your life with no end
Might now be cut short by your new mortal friend
So Life will race Death, but who will be faster?
When four stones are one, they will answer one master …
“The boy could rule the world?” said Thanatos. “With my Chaos Stones?”
“If it softens the blow, I can give you a great tip on the three-fifteen race at Chepstow,” offered Pythia.
“And I can’t kill the child?” Thanatos mused. “How inconvenient. Does he defeat me?”
“I’m not psychic,” said Pythia, flicking her television program back on. “I can’t even tell you if they’re going to wallpaper this living room in sixty minutes. But while the mortal child is alive, your odds aren’t great.”
The conversation was over.
“I see,” said Thanatos, retreating back down the staircase. “In which case, Elliot Hooper can’t stay alive for very much longer.”
Elliot jolted awake with a gasp early Sunday morning. He’d spent a troubled night. When he had made his mom supper the previous evening, he’d found the remains of a cake he hadn’t bought. Who had been in the house? He’d tried to find out from Josie what had happened, but the day was already a distant memory and Elliot didn’t want to push his mom’s tired mind any further.
Even though an owl was still hooting her night music outside his window, Elliot got up to prepare for the day. He felt uneasy leaving Josie again, especially with Patricia Porshley-Plum on the prowl. But he needed to find that Earth Stone to save their home. It was for the best in the long term—once he’d saved Home Farm, he could get back to taking care of Mom.
After he’d sorted the laundry and cleaned the house, he quickly went through what had become his morning routine—making sure that Mom was washed and dressed, cooking her breakfast, and then making a sandwich for her lunch, leaving it on the kitchen table in a clear plastic tub so that it would stay fresh and she could see it.
“Mom—will you fold the laundry while I’m out?” he shouted up.
“Of course, lovely—leave it in the kitchen, I’ll see to it after breakfast.”
With a grimace, Elliot dumped the neat pile of laundry he’d carefully folded earlier that morning on the kitchen table. He had learned that the best way to keep Josie in the house was to make sure she had something to do. She could spend hours on a single task and Elliot could always sort it out again when he got home.
As soon as Josie was settled in front of her breakfast, Elliot kissed her on the head.
“Remember—that important package is due today, so make sure you stay in,” he said.
“Yes, bossypants!” she said as she squeezed him back. Elliot had also discovered that telling his mom there was a reason to stay in the house helped to keep her there, even though she couldn’t always remember what the reason was. The fact that it was a Sunday and there was no important package didn’t occur to her.
“Good morning, Elliot. Good morning, Josie-Mom,” said Virgo cheerfully, untroubled by not being invited in. “Elliot—they’re waiting for you in the shed.”
“Who’s waiting for you, Elly?” said Josie. “And who’s this?”
“The handymen, Mom—they’ve come to fix the shed,” said Elliot quickly, wincing at Virgo’s spectacular lack of subtlety. “And this is … ”
“Virgo—we met yesterday,” said Virgo, looking confused.
“Did we? I don’t … ”
“Don’t worry about it, Mom,” said Elliot, pushing Virgo outside. “Stay here. Please. I’ll see you later.”
“Love you, baby,” his mom said, starting on the pile of laundry.
Elliot and Virgo headed toward the cowshed, which was clanking with an orchestra of building noise.
“What is wrong with your mother?” asked Virgo plainly.
“Nothing,” said Elliot in reply to the question he had been dreading for so long. “She’s just tired.”
“She didn’t recognize me although I clearly introduced myself yesterday,” said Virgo. “I have been researching mortals and this is not normal. What’s What informs me that mortals are largely friendly creatures who like to discuss the weather and prefer their negative thoughts to be expressed behind someone’s back or on social media. Is your mother suboptimal?”
“She’s fine,” said Elliot defensively. “It’s been a tough year.”
“Perhaps you should replace her with a mother in full working order?” Virgo suggested.
Elliot laughed sadly. “It doesn’t work like that,” he said. “You can’t replace your mom.”
As they walked across the field, Elliot’s feet sank into the newly plowed soil, which had been hard as rock just hours ago. But before he had time to unstick his shoe, he was knocked sideways as a fully grown tree, laden with apples the size of bowling balls, burst out of the ground.
“Mind how you go!” laughed a ruddy-faced woman in overalls. “I’m Demeter, Goddess of the Harvest—hope you don’t mind if I do a spot of gardening?” She continued to scatter seeds, which immediately sprang up into mouthwatering, oversized fruit and vegetable plants.
“Er, no—thanks.” Elliot smiled back as he waded through the field, wondering how he was going to explain giant banana trees in the middle of a damp Wiltshire farm to anyone who came looking.
He pulled open the door to the cowshed, but was immediately knocked down by a swarm of tiny people who came to just above his knees.
“CUSHIONS!” yelled a petite, dark-haired Goddess, dressed in a smart red suit, who was marching around with a clipboard and a pair of golden glasses perched on the end of her nose.
“What the—?” spluttered Elliot, struggling to his feet, only to be bowled over again by another gaggle of pint-sized people whizzing past him in a cloud of smoke.
“Penates,” said Virgo as she too was sent flying by the workers, who Elliot could now see were made from clay, wax, silver, or gold. “They work for Hestia, Goddess of the Hearth. What she can’t do with plywood and some contact paper isn’t worth knowing.”
Hestia strode past with a quick smile, muttering about color schemes and creating space.
Zeus was reclining on a makeshift hay sofa reading the Daily Argus, apparently oblivious to the chaos around him. He gave Elliot a warm grin.
“Morning, good sir!” he roared happily. “Ready for the day?”
“I guess,” said Elliot, wondering if today was going to be as mind-blowing as the one before.
“Awesome!” said Zeus, struggling off the sofa before it was swept away by some Penates. “First off, we need to get my daughters Athene and Aphrodite. But I’ll need your help—they’re a pair of feisty fillies and they might behave better with a dashing new face around. We’ll start with Aphrodite. You’ll like her. Most boys do.”
Elliot had zero interest in girls and Zeus’s daughter wasn’t going to be any different, but he smiled politely.
“Why have you guys come to England?” asked Elliot. “Why not, like, Barbados or somewhere?”
“We needed a place where a group of eccentric individuals with strange personal habits could fit right in,” explained Zeus. “England seemed a natural choice.”
“Makes sense,” said Elliot with a proud grin.
“Peg!” Zeus hollered at his horse, who was lying down with a pencil in his mouth doing the crossword. “Saddle up!”
“Imbecile!” shouted Pegasus, rising to his hooves.
“Easy there, old chap,” scowled Zeus. “I might not be the brightest star in the constellation, but that’s a bit … ”
“Fourteen across—a stupid person, eight letters,” explained Pegasus. “Although if the helmet fits … ”
“Hermes and Virgo, you start tracking down Hypnos—but tread carefully,” said Zeus. “The Daemon of Sleep always
was as nutty as a squirrel’s packed lunch.”
“Daemon of Sleep?” said Elliot. “That doesn’t sound very scary.”
“He was scary all right,” said Hermes. “Total psycho. He abused his sleep trumpet to torture mortals and immortals, making them fall asleep, keeping them awake, or giving them impossible dreams and banging nightmares. He’s dangerous. I’m not even joking.”
“So let’s find him,” said Virgo, handing Hermes the iGod he was searching for. “We get him, we’ll get the Chaos Stones—and put Thanatos back under Stonehenge.”
“Nice one. Last one to spot him is last season’s sweater dress,” said Hermes, grinning.
“That’s the ticket,” said Zeus amiably. “See you later.”
Pegasus knelt to help Zeus and Elliot clamber aboard.
“Come on, Peg—giddyup!” yelled Zeus, strapping on the invisibility helmet before spurring Pegasus on to a gallop. One, two, three giant strides and they were climbing into the morning sky, leaving the industrious immortals far below.
It was another beautiful cruise through the sky. But as they floated over the sunbathed countryside, Elliot voiced a thought that had been playing on his mind overnight.
“What powers do you all have?” he asked. “The Gods, I mean.”
“That depends,” said Zeus. “Athene is the Goddess of Wisdom, so there’s not much she can’t figure out—she’s also a dab hand at arts and crafts, so she can create anything out of anything. Aphrodite, Goddess of Love—she can make anyone fall in love, often with her. Hephaestus, God of the Forge—he’s a bit of a whiz at inventions. Hermes—he’s our messenger, but he can also turn himself, or anything else, into whatever he wants. And as for me … well, I can do a bit of everything—jack of all trades, master of none … ”
