by Maz Evans
“Elliot!” shouted Zeus, seeing the unconscious boy floating down to Home Farm in Virgo’s constellation.
In a mad scramble of arms and hands, the immortals lifted Elliot down and laid him on the ground.
“He’s drunk water from the Lethe,” cried Virgo bleakly. “I tried to get him here as fast as I could, but … ”
“We have to get that water out of him. Father—put your hands like this,” commanded Athene, placing her hands on Elliot’s ribs. “When I nod, gently press down on his rib cage.”
As Hermes shot into the air to check that Josie was still safely in the farmhouse, Athene started blowing rhythmic breaths into Elliot’s mouth, signaling to Zeus to pump his chest.
“Come on, Elliot,” panted Zeus. “Spit it out. Come back to us.”
The other immortals stood frozen around Elliot’s body, barely drawing breath as Athene and Zeus tried to force the water of oblivion from Elliot’s body. They looked on in desperate hope, watching for a flicker of consciousness, a movement, a sound, any sign that Elliot was going to wake up. But the pale boy lay comatose on the floor and gave not so much as a finger twitch in response to the Gods’ desperate efforts to revive him. After several endless minutes, Athene stopped her breaths.
“It’s too late,” she said quietly. Zeus put a heavy hand on her shoulder.
Virgo hung her head. She was experiencing another unpleasant new sensation in her chest, a kind of hollow, twisting feeling that spread darkness around her body and forced drops of liquid out of her eyes. As the leakage ran down her face, she had never felt so suboptimal.
A tearstained Aphrodite forced her way to Elliot’s side.
“CALL THAT A KISS OF LIFE?!” she screamed wildly, pushing her father and sister out of the way. “Come on, Elly, time to come home!”
And with a tearful sob, Aphrodite lifted Elliot’s head from the ground and planted an enormous and very long kiss square on his pale lips.
Everything was silent, the still air broken only by Virgo’s sobs. Zeus pulled her to him.
“He’s at peace,” he said gently.
“He’s been through so much,” said Athene, biting back the tears that shone from her brown eyes.
“He’s a hero,” said Hephaestus, shaking his head.
“He’s … he’s blushing,” said Hermes. “Not being funny or anything … ”
Everyone craned their necks to stare at Elliot’s face. Hermes was right—the face that had been a sickly shade of gray just moments before was becoming steadily more scarlet, as if it were being filled from the chin with fruit punch.
“Elly!” cried Aphrodite, breaking from the kiss. “Elly, are you there?”
With an almighty belch, Elliot sat bolt upright and spewed the Lethe water volcanically out of his body.
“Elliot!” screamed Virgo, freeing herself from Zeus’s embrace and hurtling toward her friend, knocking him flying with a diving hug and impulsively kissing him on the cheek with relief.
“I preferred it when she did it,” croaked Elliot, still gasping for air and now rubbing a sore head from Virgo’s enthusiastic welcome.
“Elly!” screamed Aphrodite, diving in as well to hug him senseless.
“EPIC BOSH!” yelled Hermes, joining the fray.
“Give the boy some air, for goodness’ sake,” said a relieved Athene, wiping a tear from her eye. “Oh, what the heck!” and she too threw herself at the pile of people on the ground and gave Elliot a delighted squeeze.
“Well done,” said Zeus softly to Virgo, who beamed with pride.
When Elliot was finally allowed to his feet, he slunk over to Zeus and handed him the Earth Stone with his eyes glued to the ground. Zeus lifted Elliot’s chin and answered his guilty glance with a reassuring smile. Now was not the time for words. Not those ones.
Hermes’s iGod rang in the background.
“Virgo, babe—call for you,” he said. “It’s the Zodiac Council.”
“Ah,” said Virgo with a satisfied smile as Hermes projected the hologram of the council table into the evening air. “Calling to congratulate me, no doubt. Hello, everyone.”
“Virgo!” roared Pisces, with a look that didn’t seem very congratulatory at all. “I thought we made ourselves perfectly clear! You were forbidden from using your Constellation powers!”
“I was, however—” said Virgo.
“It seems that you have developed a callous disregard for authority,” huffed Aries. “The rules are there to be obeyed!”
“Yes, b-but—” stammered Virgo.
“There will be no more buts from you, young lady!” shouted Taurus. “But I have a big but!”
“You’re not wrong,” muttered Leo as the other Zodiac Councillors sniggered behind their papers.
“She saved my life,” said Elliot, looking gratefully at his friend.
“Silence!” shouted Pisces. “Virgo, this is very serious indeed. You have proven, once again, that you cannot be trusted to follow a simple set of rules.”
“Of course I can, it’s just that—”
“Just what?” demanded Sagittarius.
“It’s just that … maybe sometimes, on certain extremely rare occasions, when no other viable alternative presents itself, then and only then, perhaps … OUR RULES SUCK!” Virgo blurted out, immediately clasping her hand to her mouth.
The council gasped in horror as Aphrodite and Hermes high-fived in the background.
“I can see you have been spending too much time around mortals and their strange, lawless ways,” said Scorpio.
“Indeed,” said Aquarius. “Well, let’s see how you manage among them on a more permanent basis … ”
“Now hang on a minute,” said Zeus, “she was only trying to—”
“I’m sorry, Your Majesty,” said Pisces. “But Virgo has left us no alternative. Nor staples—we can’t find a single one. Virgo, Constellation of the Zodiac Council and former Guardian of the Stationery Cupboard, I hereby strip you of your kardia. You will be suspended from immortality pending a formal trial upon completion of forms X4suf Recategorizing of an Immortal, VF4gl Breaking of an Arbitrary Rule and Gh74p Because We Feel Like It.”
“No … please!” cried Virgo as a thin stream of stars appeared around her neck and unfastened her kardia.
“We will fight this!” shouted Athene as the kardia came away from Virgo’s neck and floated up into the sky.
“Mate!” said Hermes, trying unsuccessfully to grab it midair.
“Give it back to her, you bureaucratic butthead!” yelled Aphrodite.
“You can make your case at the trial,” said Pisces. “But until then, Virgo will live her life as a mortal, with all the dangers and discomforts that brings.”
“But … but that’s not fair,” said Virgo weakly.
“Life isn’t fair,” said Pisces as his hologram faded away. “As you’re about to find out. Good-bye, Virgo.”
The Brysmore exams came around quickly in early December, but after four weeks of Athene’s tuition—and without the wishing pearl that the Goddess of Wisdom had confiscated—Elliot went into them better prepared than he could ever have imagined.
His English exam was easy as pie as he recalled the Gods’ memorable performance of Romeo and Juliet, with Hermes playing the tragic heroine. Latin was a cinch: He had to translate a passage about Perseus, who had dropped by during his world tour to sing a ballad about Medusa called “Heart of Stone.” Even history was a gift: Elliot had to write an essay about the Roman wars against Carthage, which Athene had reenacted a few days previously, transforming an ant colony into a full-scale Roman battlefield, with a wood louse taking the role of Hannibal.
The results were to be posted on the school bulletin board on Thursday morning, the last day of term. Elliot barely slept a wink on Wednesday night. At first he’d felt the exams had gone well, but now he’d had some time to reflect on them, had the French comprehension really been about some talking pigs? And had he actually gotten Nigeria muddled up with
Norfolk in geography?
But Elliot also had bigger things to worry about. Since the Gods discovered the sale of Home Farm, they had worked night and day to find a way to get it back. They had explored every legal—and at least one illegal—possibility that Elliot could take, but they couldn’t find a way to stop the sale. Patricia had legitimately exchanged contracts on the farm, and if they didn’t do something, the sale would complete the next day.
“We’ll think of something, old boy,” Zeus kept saying, reading Elliot’s sad face every time he thought of losing his beloved home.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” said Virgo, breaking Elliot’s thoughts as she banged around the kitchen in a flap, dropping eggs, spreading jam on her cereal, and putting three big spoonfuls of salt in her tea. “Since becoming a mortal, I have this curious sensation demanding that I fill my stomach with food every hour of the day. But today, all the food just wants to leave my body by the nearest exit.”
Virgo was still struggling to come to terms with her newfound mortality. Elliot found the things she was struggling with highly amusing, smiling to himself as she ran to the toilet for the umpteenth time that morning.
“Whoever thought of this system should be locked up in Tartarus,” she yelled from the downstairs bathroom. “I wish I’d never found out what this room was for … ”
The Gods came into the kitchen, looking every bit as nervous as the two students before them.
“How are you feeling?” said Zeus, attempting to sound cheery as he paced around the kitchen.
“Okay,” said Elliot unconvincingly.
“WE’RE FINE!” shouted Virgo angrily from the bathroom. “Snordlesnot! Just remembered I got that photosynthesis question wrong. That’s it, I’ve failed. I am totally suboptimal.”
“I’m sure you’ve both done your best,” said Athene, who looked like she hadn’t slept, despite the fact that she hardly ever did.
“You’ll be amazing, Elly,” said Josie, giving Elliot a hug. “You are always are.”
“Well said, Jo-Jo. Will you all just calm down,” said Aphrodite, perching on the kitchen table and taking a bite of Elliot’s toast, the only Olympian to appear entirely relaxed. “So you get kicked out of school, big deal. Don’t stress, Elly, we’ll look after you.”
“That’s all he needs,” muttered Athene, who had now taken to pacing around the kitchen behind Zeus.
“Oh, come on, let’s get you to school and put you out of your misery,” said Aphrodite, magically summoning her car keys. “I’ll let you drive.”
Elliot had been enjoying this secret part of his daily trip to school down the quiet country lanes, but even he knew that today it would be particularly unwise for a sleepless, anxious twelve-year-old to get behind the wheel. He threw his backpack into Aphrodite’s car, which had been transformed into a luxurious pink 4x4 as a more suitable vehicle for the English winter, and sat in silence as Aphrodite drove them both to the school gates.
“Good luck, Virgo; good luck, Elly,” she said cheerily as Virgo threw up her breakfast on the side of road. “I’ll see you later. We’re proud of you whatever happens.”
The two friends trudged toward the school as if they were walking down death row, their nerves keeping them silent as they entered Brysmore through the grand wooden doors.
A crowd of pale students hung around the bulletin board, awaiting their fate with dread. Briony and Dominic comforted each other in a corner, each holding a tissue in case one cried and the other threw up.
The staff room door opened with a long, slow creak, every head spinning toward the shaking figure that emerged. Call Me Graham tottered nervously to the board, apparently surprised to find a large group of children in his school. He quickly stapled the results sheets up, then hurried away, looking like he might cry.
There was a moment’s stillness as everyone froze, not wanting to make the first move toward their doom. But the slightest twitch of someone’s foot was enough to send the entire crowd racing over to the board.
Elliot and Virgo held back, watching pupils peel away from the crowd with cheers or tears. They waited until the last person had left, before walking side by side to the board. They looked over every sheet of paper, taking in the information on each one, before turning to each other once more.
“Snordlesnot,” they chimed in unison.
Back at the farm, the Gods paced around the kitchen in anxious silence, staring at Hermes’s iGod—Virgo had promised to contact them with the phone Aphrodite had smuggled to her.
“Not being funny,” moaned Hermes, fluttering from one end of the room to the other. “But I haven’t been this nervous since I last ate carbs.”
“He’s a smart cookie,” said Aphrodite, painting Josie’s nails. “Prissy-pants has been stuffing his head with this nonsense for weeks; he’ll ace it.”
“I don’t know,” said Athene. “He was a long way behind; if only I’d had more time.”
“You’ve done everything you can,” said Zeus. “The rest is up to Elliot.”
“My boy will be brilliant.” Josie smiled. “He always is.”
Hermes’s iGod beeped a text message, making all the Gods jump. They stood and stared at the phone, no one daring to read the news.
“Well, go on, for the heavens’ sake!” shrieked Aphrodite, all illusion of calm now gone. “Read it!”
“No way, babe!” said Hermes. “What if it’s bad news?”
“We’ll never know unless you read it,” snapped Athene.
“You read it, then,” said Hermes, throwing her the phone.
“Well, I, it’s not my— Father, you should read it,” said Athene, passing the iGod to her father.
“Not on your life,” said Zeus, pushing the device toward Aphrodite. “My nerves are shot. Aphy—go on, open the darn message.”
“Oh, give it ’ere,” said Hephaestus, who had been fixing the damage to the kitchen floor caused by the Earth Stone. “I’ll read the bloomin’ thing.”
He stormed over to the iGod and snatched it up.
“Mate, seriously, any chance you could wash your hands before you … Nope, never mind.” Hermes winced at the blacksmith’s filthy fingers smearing his screen.
Hephaestus scanned the text.
“Well, I’ll be—” he grunted.
“WHAT?” screamed the Gods in unison.
“The boy done good.” Hephaestus smiled. “Average of ninety-two percent across the board, with ninety-six percent in history.”
The Gods exploded into a chorus of whoops and yells.
“Told you so,” laughed Josie as Hermes hugged her in midair.
“Well, this calls for a celebration!” cheered Zeus. “Let’s go and pick up Elliot in style.”
Later that day, Zeus, Athene, Aphrodite, and Josie stood by the enormous pink limo created from Aphrodite’s car. Zeus was dressed in his light-blue tuxedo with the frilly white shirt, his white hair slicked back. Aphrodite sported a bright-pink strapless evening dress, while her sister wore a more modest dark-blue satin off-the-shoulder gown. They had dressed Josie in her favorite red dress and had delighted in doing her hair and makeup. The car was filled with balloons decorated with Elliot and Virgo’s faces and was laid out inside with a banquet of all their favorite food.
“Hurry up, Hermy, we’re going to be late,” Aphrodite called inside the shed, as they waited for Hermes and Hephaestus.
Hermes floated elegantly out of the shed in his designer tuxedo, abandoning his usual winged hat for some expensive sunglasses with little gold wings on the side.
“Hold tight,” he announced. “May I present your driver for this evening, the grump with a hump, Mr. Heph-aes-tus! Boom!”
“I am not going out like this,” huffed a moody voice from inside the shed.
“Oh, mate, you look great,” grinned Hermes. “Not even joking. C’mon … out.”
Heaving a sigh, Hephaestus trudged to the car. The other Olympians bit their lips at the sight of his shiny gold cha
uffeur’s outfit, complete with a gold hat that had CONGRATULATIONS ELLIOT AND VIRGO written in sequins around it.
“Not. One. Word,” the blacksmith grumbled as he assumed his place at the wheel, slamming the door loudly enough to hide the eruption of laughter outside.
“Looking good, my friend,” said Zeus as he helped Josie into the back of the limo. “To Brysmore! Let’s bring our boy home.”
The morning had flown by in such a blur that Elliot felt as though he’d barely arrived when the final assembly finished and school was over for another term. His heart was heavier than Mr. Boil’s backside as he contemplated the loss of his home the very next day—although he did allow himself one moment of cheer as he passed his teacher in the corridor.
“Merry Christmas, sir,” he grinned as Boil pushed passed him with a horrible grunt. “See you next term. Go easy on those mince pies.”
“Get lost, Hooper,” snarled Boil without stopping, furious at being stuck with this irksome boy and suddenly extremely hungry for a pack of mince pies.
Elliot and Virgo stepped out into the chilly afternoon.
“You did it,” said Virgo, getting over the worst of her wounded pride at being beaten by Elliot in every single exam.
“Never thought I’d be pleased to come back to this place.” Elliot smiled. “But it actually feels good. Not as good as leaving it, but pretty good.”
“Yes, this Christmas break will be an excellent chance to get ahead for next term,” said Virgo. “But I suppose we can take today off. After the surprise party—oh.” She bit her lip as the words she’d been forbidden to say slipped out of her mouth. “Listen, look surprised when they all turn up. Urgh—I’m no good at this lying thing.”
“You’ll learn,” said Elliot. “Trust me.”
The pink limo sped into the Brysmore driveway, spilling the immortals and Josie out of the car. They cheered and pulled party poppers the size of champagne bottles over the triumphant children as the other pupils stared, bursting with jealousy.
