“What is that”, she started, but Pandora had already closed the door in her face. Cassandra sincerely hoped that that glittery thing wouldn’t get them into too much trouble. It looked expensive.
“Try not to look too threatening tonight, ok?” Pandora called through the door. “And please get rid of the knives. They make you look fat.”
Cassandra briefly wondered whether she should force her way into Pandora’s room to look at the shiny object but decided that they had ruined enough furniture for one day. With a sigh, she went to her room, washed her face and then sat down to wait the remaining 59 minutes until the beginning of the opening ceremony.
2 Opening Night
Pandora emerged from her room looking stunning while Cassandra had at least grudgingly left her weapons belt behind. Pandora wrinkled her perfect little nose when she saw that Cassandra hadn’t even tried to make an effort but didn’t say anything. She had never managed to change her sister’s mind on anything and she knew that today wouldn’t be any different.
Cassandra was just about to say that they should go when she heard moaning from one of the other rooms on their floor. She indicated to Pandora to be silent. Pandora did her best but eventually ended up knocking her head against the door while trying to listen to the sounds coming from the other side of the door.
They heard a stifled cry, then some shuffling and eventually the door was opened by a sniveling girl, barely taller than Pandora but about four times as big, who looked at them with big, scared eyes.
“I cannot go to the ceremony, I’m sick”, she said with a pronounced German accent and wanted to close the door again but Cassandra stuck her foot in.
“No you are not”, she said and walked into the room that smelled of earth and rain and a little of decay.
“You are homesick and that won’t get better by staying in your room all by yourself”, Cassandra said and knew it sounded harsh but she only meant well. “I suggest you wash your face and brush your hair and then you come with us.”
The girl hesitated. Her hair was flaming red and went down in waves to her waist, her eyes were green with yellow spots and her flawless, almost translucent skin was covered in freckles. She was quite pretty yet she looked the picture of misery with her swollen eyes, runny nose and sagging posture.
“I really, really don’t want to go”, the girl almost wailed and looked at Pandora for help.
Pandora, who had been standing in the doorway, came in and handed her a tissue.
“We’ll stay with you all the time, promise”, Pandora said and patted her hand. “Why don’t you do as Cassandra says and freshen up a little? I am Pandora, by the way.”
The words seemed to soothe the girl a bit. She blew her nose and then looked up at Cassandra again.
“My name is Summer”, the girl said, biting her lip. “My presumed forefather is Demeter and I think she was too busy with all the attacks on Mother Earth these past decades to claim me and my ancestors as family.”
Cassandra and Pandora didn’t know what to say to that. They had all at some point thought about why they hadn’t been claimed but the girl seemed so sure that this was the reason that there was no bitterness in her.
“We need to go now”, Pandora said and the girl nodded.
“I’ll come with you”, she said and got up. “Just give me a minute.”
The girl reached for a shawl and then went to a trunk in the corner where her belongings seemed to be stored. Cassandra nodded and together with Pandora she went down into the kitchen where the rest of their housemates seemed to have gathered for a little round of fortifying tea – or in Charlie’s case something else entirely. He seemed to look less wild and hairy with each sip he took. Cassandra sat down beside him, curiosity getting the better of her despite their earlier run-in. After the fifth sip from out of the bottle he turned out to be quite attractive. He had strong arched eyebrows, a three-day beard and unruly, slightly curly brown hair, a finely chiseled nose and light-brown, almost golden eyes that seemed to look to a place beyond her. He managed a smile and she saw that even his teeth were clean and even now.
“Spiriting away, are we?” Cassandra said and he laughed.
It was a deep laugh that spoke of better days, of festivities and happiness long gone. The little boy called Jim warily said hello to Cassandra but didn’t seem to have the same reservations towards Pandora. Soon, they talked like they were old friends. The ease with which Pandora connected with other people was one of her sister’s talents. Pandora never judged, she simply took everyone the way they were and trusted that everyone had something good in them that was worth exploring. Cassandra had never been able to do that. She always looked for the bad and seldom had trouble finding it.
Summer came down and was quickly introduced and then it was time to leave for the opening ceremony. Cassandra wondered how far their brother Hector was on his way to the university and hoped he would be with them soon. She saw Pandora throw a quick look towards the gates and knew that Pandora was worried about him, too.
It was a short walk from their house to the palace but it felt like they were entering a different world. Graveled pathways led to the half-circle square in front of the stately building, each one ending with a statue of a god looking sternly at those approaching. Right in front of the entrance were statues of Hera and Zeus standing next to each other in all their glory. Above them, sketched in stone, was the university’s motto “Protect and Serve”. Reading that, Cassandra automatically stood a little taller but no one else seemed to share that feeling.
About two dozen of the older Unclaimed had arrived with them. They were trudging along with hunched shoulders and a defiant look to them, as if they were expecting to go into a fight rather than to a ceremony. Cassandra tried to say hello to them, but they wouldn’t even look up. They didn’t talk to each other either and Cassandra wondered what it was that made them so guarded.
“It hasn’t been easy for them here”, Charlie, who was looking at her with a mixture of curiosity and something else she couldn’t quite place, said. “They come here to escape their little lives, the orphanages that offer nothing but hunger and cold and fighting and then they realize that nothing much changes here. They are still cold and hungry and when they fight, they barely stand a chance because they don’t have the money for good weapons or protective gear. They become low-level Protectors in obscure countries and it doesn’t matter that some of them are better than the Claimed because no one cares.”
Cassandra frowned.
“I thought everybody gets the same chance here”, she said and Charlie almost choked on his drink.
“Have your Parents taught you nothing?” he asked, shaking his head in grim amusement. “No one ever gave you theʻwe are all equal but some of us are more equalʼ speech? Us living in those little huts and them in splendor didn’t give you the first clue?”
He raised his eyebrow questioningly and comprehension started to dawn on Cassandra.
“I thought…”, she started but then broke off.
What had she thought? That they would only be judged by how well they did? That she would have a chance to become a famous Protector like she had always dreamed? And now it turned out that this wouldn’t come true after all? Because that’s how it had always been?
“We’ll see about that”, she said and raised her chin defiantly but Charlie only laughed.
“It’s the only time we are allowed through the main entrance”, Charlie said quietly, nodding ahead and then slowly walked up the stairs to the palace.
Cassandra followed him but her legs felt like lead. They were greeted by a row of silent servants who quickly ushered them in and Cassandra immediately felt overwhelmed by the size and splendor of the entrance hall and she wondered what the rest of the palace would look like if the foyer already held such treasures. On each side of the entrance hall, massive marble stairs lead up to the next floor. The walls were lined with paintings and there were gold, silver and bronze statues of the g
ods everywhere.
Cassandra started up the stairs, touching the exquisite tapestry on the walls and feeling the soft velveteen curtains that covered the floor-to-ceiling windows. She took the time to look at an intricate statue of Eros releasing an arrow and was immediately approached by one of the servants who chastised her for lingering. Cassandra, biting her lip, did as she was told but took a moment to compose herself when she reached the top of the stairs.
From up there, she could see that the entire floor of the entrance hall was covered in a mosaic showing the victory of the gods against their fathers, the Titans. Everything in the palace seemed to be there to remind them that it was the gods who ruled the world. But yet they didn’t, did they? They had appointed one of their mortal children to do the job for them and had retreated to Mount Olympus, or to the Underworld, seemingly not caring about what was happening on earth any more.
She saw Charlie and the others disappear through a big wooden double door when she felt a familiar tingling at the back of her neck. She reached for a knife and swore when she remembered that she had left her weapons belt at home.
The boy standing at the edge of the stairs was roughly her age and she was sure he hadn’t been there a moment ago. He was dressed entirely in black, but it was an expensive kind of black and seemed to cling to him like a shadow. There was a sword strapped to his back that looked like it was made of silver moonlight and even though he wasn’t tall, the shirt he was wearing revealed strong, sinewy arms. Their eyes met and she felt a shiver run down her spine.
He had short black hair but it was his eyes that threatened to draw her into an abyss of the darkest night. She couldn’t tell what color they were but she didn’t doubt that they were as black as everything else about him. She felt he could cross the distance between them in a breath if he thought her a threat. But it was obvious that he didn’t. When he saw that she was a mere Unclaimed, his look became cold and dismissive. He threw one last look around and then disappeared.
Cassandra, shaken by the encounter that hadn’t lasted more than five seconds, finally followed the others into the big hall. It was filled with hundreds of chairs, decorated with a sea of flowers and lit by twelve enormous silver chandeliers.
“Not even the servants respect us”, Jim muttered when she sat down next to the others and Charlie laughed.
“No one in their right mind would respect you”, he said and Pandora chided him for being mean.
Statues of the Olympian gods indicated where each one of the Claimed filing in was supposed to take their place in the huge hall. According to rank, the sons and daughters of Zeus came first. Zeus’s likeness, looking regal and benevolent, raised his hand in greeting while Hera looked slightly displeased. No wonder, her husband was famous for his infidelity while Hera had never had any children with a mortal.
Next in rank were Poseidon, god of the sea and Hades, lord of the Underworld. But while Poseidon, blessed with a perfect physique that was barely covered by a well-positioned leaf and standing on a wave raising his trident with a battle cry on his lips, stood right next to Zeus, Hades and his wife Persephone were placed a little to the side. There were no seats reserved for their children because there had never been a descendant of Hades at the university.
Cassandra frowned. The boy she had seen at the top of the stairs looked almost exactly like Hades: the same sharp features and cold eyes. Again, Cassandra felt her nerves tingle at the memory of the darkness emanating from the boy. When she asked Charlie whether they expected a descendant of Hades this year he shook his head and Cassandra let it rest.
Ares, the god of war, looked equally awe-inspiring. He was dressed in full battle gear, like he was about to go into a fight. His brother Hephaestus took it a little easier and was sitting on an anvil with a hammer in hand looking at his wife Aphrodite who, even carved in stone, was more beautiful than any human being could ever be. To the left, Apollo, the sun god, was standing so close to his sister Artemis, goddess of the moon, that they formed a perfect unit, like night and day.
Something inside Cassandra’s stomach knotted when her gaze fell on Athena, the goddess of wisdom. She was portrayed with helmet, spear and shield, but she also had an owl sitting on her shoulder, an indication that she would never go into a fight head-on, without considering the consequences. Cassandra had always thought that it was most probable that Ares was her forefather. Now that she saw Athena depicted like that she was starting to wonder but again, there were no chairs reserved for Athena’s children and Cassandra remembered that Athena, like Artemis, was a virgin goddess.
The chairs set for children of Demeter, goddess of agriculture and fertility, were numerous but they were nothing compared to the number of chairs prepared for the children of Hestia, goddess of domesticity and family. There were a lot of chairs reserved for the children of Dionysus, the god of wine, and again fewer for the children of Hermes, messenger of the gods.
Thanks to his winged shoes, Hermes was hovering above his half-brother Dionysus. He gave him a mischievous grin and a ruffle through the hair, while Dionysus seemed about to slide off his chair, a goblet of wine in hand, his gaze a little off, like he had had too much to drink already.
“Your forefather doesn’t seem to be in good grace with the other gods”, Cassandra said to Charlie and again Cassandra thought how much he had changed with the help of the little flask he was nursing from time to time.
“I guess not”, he said and shrugged. “His parties usually led to a lot of chaos. And a lot of unwanted children.”
He looked with some pity on the Unclaimed sitting around them and she thought she saw something else in his eyes that could have been remorse but was quickly gone.
“Maybe one day he will be welcome again”, Charlie said more to himself than to her. “Must be pretty boring on Mount Olympus without him.”
Cassandra felt like there was more to that story but Pandora interrupted them by asking why the ceremony wouldn’t start now that everyone was here. Cassandra estimated that there were now about fifty Unclaimed in the room and about ten times as many Claimed.
“Should have started by now”, Charlie said and as if on cue, the teachers started filing in and conversation was halted for a while.
The first teacher to come in was Florence Nightingale, the famous nurse, who was in charge of teaching healing, herbology and potions. Summer whispered that she would study with her and Cassandra thought that this somehow fit perfectly. Next in were William Shakespeare and Jane Austen who headed the department of history, languages and literature. Both were rumored to be direct descendants of the Muses; some even said they were Muses themselves.
William Shakespeare was dressed in red tights and a white long sleeved shirt with a ridiculously high collar that went up to his ears and framed a smallish, chinless face that was barely covered by a lovingly tended goatee. His small eyes looked around with conceited pride and he made a series of complicated movements that in the end turned out to be a bow and then pranced on to the seat next to Ms. Nightingale who was looking at him with barely disguised displeasure.
Jane Austen, a middle-aged spinster who was wearing a white dress with small flowers on it that was a little too youthful for her and bound up tightly above her waist, was holding on to a small leather book as if it could save her. But then she gave such a warm smile that Cassandra felt herself automatically smile back. Jane Austen then curtsied quickly, rushed to William Shakespeare’s side and hid her face behind the book.
“Jane Austen”, Pandora whispered in awe. “She’s so cool.”
Then she actually got up and cheered. But Pandora’s outburst was nothing compared to the little boy’s excitement when he saw a wiry old man come on stage who was wearing some kind of a toga and who eventually took to the podium and started to fumble around with the microphone.
Cassandra, pretending to be confused, asked who the old man was and Jim looked at her like she was quite possibly on the verge of being dangerously stupid.
“And how exactly did you manage to get admitted to this university?” he asked incredulously. “That’s Icarus, of course, master of the sciences and quite possibly the only one between heaven and earth who might be more intelligent than I am.”
Cassandra watched the old man who was still trying to get the microphone to work with a raised eyebrow.
“Wasn’t he the one who flew too close to the sun?” she asked but then fell silent when her teachers came in and she suddenly felt a wave of excitement wash over her as well.
First in was Hippolyta, the epic Amazon warrior queen who looked regal and battle-worn at the same time and with her came Ajax the Great, a bulk of a man, made of pure muscles and with a dangerous intelligence gleaming in his eyes. Behind them came Ariadne, a slightly greyish person who held herself very straight. They all stood waving for a moment before they sat down. Behind them, several other, not quite so famous members of the university staff came in and the only one missing now was the dean of the university. Cassandra stretched herself as far as decency allowed but he was nowhere to be seen.
Now the teachers’ seats were all filled and they could be seen chatting and starting in on the wine and refreshments. The whole right side of the podium was still empty but when Cassandra asked Charlie who else would come up on stage with the teachers, Charlie shrugged, telling her that he didn’t have the faintest idea.
Remembering her vision of getting hurt, Cassandra took a look around for the guys that would match the description of the ones she had seen smashing her into a wall and decided that it would probably be one of the sons of Hephaestus. They were big and strong, each one of them, but why they should attack her in the first place was still beyond her. But she would find out soon enough. Even if she left that minute and decided to hide in her room, it would be no good. Her visions had a way of coming true no matter what she did.
The Unclaimed (University of the Gods Trilogy Book 1) Page 2
