OF WAR Anthology Novels 1-3

by Lisa Beth Darling

  Raven didn’t stop crying when his parents came into the room; in fact, when Alena didn’t immediately reach for him to take him out of the crib, it got worse. The baby, standing there nearly jumping in place began yanking on the rail. He pulled it back and pushed it forward with such strength the crib shook, his face all gnarled up and red as tears spilled down his cheeks. In between screams he looked at his mother and made a little gasping ‘fuah-fuhh-fuah’ sound, little red cheeks puffing in and out, as he geared up for the next round of wailing.

  “Stop it, boy!”

  The sound of Ares’ stern voice made Raven jump and lose his grip on the railing. The baby fell backwards on his diaper-padded butt. He sat there for a moment, silent and looking around, wondering what happened. When he couldn’t hold the sitting position he’d fallen into, he tilted back until he was lying against the far rails. Looking up at his mother, Raven started up again.

  Alena stared at Ares as her body turned toward Raven and her hands reached out for him, “Ares, honestly, I don’t…”

  “Don’t pick him up,” Ares advised firmly. “Leave him there. Come with me, it’s time to go back to our room.”

  “He needs me,” Alena protested.

  “So do I,” Ares countered, staring at the infant still wailing away. “If you go to him every time he cries, he’ll never learn to control and calm himself.” Alena stood there frozen between them, her arms reaching out for the baby but her eyes locked to Ares’. “I said, come with me. He’s fine. All he wants is your attention.”

  Of course he wanted her attention, she was his mother! What was wrong with Ares? How could he stand there looking at his son in so much distress and just turn his back on the baby? In the crib, Raven continued fussing until every muscle in his tiny body was strained; little legs stretched out stiff as boards, threatening to pop his tiny feet right through the soft cotton of his pajamas while his cheeks puffed in and out and his arms reached up for her. “Hush, Raven, it’s all right, mommy’s here, it’s all right,” she spoke softly but without reaching in to touch him. At the sound of her voice, he quieted for a moment but when he realized he still wasn’t going to be picked up and cradled, he began wailing with lungs of iron. The little fingers stretched out in her direction gnarled into fists as he started to pound them and the heels of his feet onto the mattress.

  “Don’t.”

  Alena couldn’t listen to him scream any longer; she reached into the crib to pick him up. “It’s all right,” Alena soothed as she brought him to her shoulder and held him tightly. History said that Ares was a terrible Father and perhaps History was right.

  “You’re raising a wimp,” the God of War said in disgust as he turned on his heels and walked out of the nursery. Alena may have missed it but Ares did not; just as her fingertips brushed along his tearstained cheek, Raven looked up at his Father and nearly smiled, knowing he had his mother wrapped around that teeny-tiny little finger of his.

  It took quite a while but after rocking him, singing to him, changing him and feeding him, Raven finally drifted off to sleep.

  The third night was a near repeat of the prior two but with a few differences, the first being the bit of paregoric that Ares slipped into the Ambrosia Raven ate for dinner and the second being his long refusal to let Alena out of bed once Raven did awaken. The boy slept so long that Ares was nearly convinced he’d been put out for the night and he did what any married man would do and made a move on his Wife. Just before he was going to make his much anticipated entry, Raven woke and started crying to beat the band. It soon became apparent that getting his way with her as she squirmed and tried to wiggle out from under him could be great fun but terribly costly in the long run. Letting her go but not immediately following her, he again warned that she was raising a wimp, a mama’s boy.

  Ares waited too long to let Alena go and by the time she’d got into the nursery Raven worked himself up into a frenzy. Standing at the rail, pulling on it for all he was worth, he tried to raise a tiny leg to the bar and climb over it as he screamed at the top of his well-developing lungs. Tears streamed down his unhappy crimson cheeks as he threw his head back and nearly howled his displeasure. Hands on the rail, head all the way back, he shook the rail until it rattled and Alena feared it would give, causing him to tumble to the floor. “Raven,” she began before realizing it was so cold in here; she saw her breath hanging in the air. “It’s freezing.” Alena grabbed up the squirming screaming boy and held him close to warm him but she was far too late to soothe him. Raven’s little body was rigid head to toe, he continued screaming and screaming, his head thrown back so far she feared his neck would snap. “Raven, shhh, stop, stop, it’s all right now, mommy’s here.”

  The boy would have none of it as his body bent backward into an arch, toes nearly touching the top of his head, his arms stretched out wide to either side and both fists clenched tight. His face was so red and each scream so long, she started to fear that he wasn’t getting enough oxygen. “Raven, it’s all right, it’s all right,” she soothed again and tried to hold him to her cheek as she bounced him gently, but the wailing just went on, echoing through the Fortress like an alarm piercing the stillness of night. Feeling the chill in the air deepen, she grabbed the nearest blanket and wrapped it around him just as he stopped screaming to take in a whooping gasp of air. That caused him to start coughing. He coughed and then he screamed, then he whooped in a breath, only to scream and cough and then a thick spew of hot vomit ushered from his tiny mouth, soaking her hair and her shoulder. It was full of mucus from his lungs.

  Raven had cried and thrown a fit until he lost all control. Until he couldn’t stop and he made himself sick. Alena held him closer and rushed him out of the freezing nursery into the warm bedroom where Ares just getting to the door. “There’s something wrong in there,” she tossed her head toward the open door, “it’s like ice.”

  “Something’s wrong in here,” he grumbled before taking note of the seriousness on her face. Knowing that no room in his Fortress was cold as ice, he wanted to question her but, instead, left her and the screaming baby behind while he poked his head into the nursery. His nose tingled as soon as he entered and he saw white whiffs of his own breath exit his nostrils. The hearth was burning brightly and should be giving off more than enough heat, yet Ares felt he could stick a freshly brewed six-pack in here, come back in an hour and it would be ready to drink. With the second floor having no windows, there was no draft to speak of and so he had no idea why it should be so cold in Raven’s room. Giving a swift wave of his hand, the large hearth burned hotter as it lit up the entire room in a happy glow.

  Was that a thin layer of ice on the mirror over Raven’s dresser? Ares went to inspect it, drew his finger across the glass, and came away with frost. Turning back toward the door and the crib, he saw the railing glistening with little icicles.

  For four nights the entire second floor of the Fortress was frigid as the Arctic. The instant Alena went to put Raven down for the night he would claw at her and grab onto her as though someone was trying to throw him into an open flame. All the while, the temperature dropped until the chill went straight through to the bone.

  On the second night, he scratched her neck so deeply Ares put a stop to her putting the baby to bed and did it himself for the next week. Night after night, he struggled to keep Alena in their room and out of Raven’s while she fought with him or stuffed her head under a pillow to block out the baby’s screams and the sound of him choking, lost in his own rage.

  On the fifth night Raven began to get the idea, even though it was clear he disapproved of such treatment. On the sixth night he cried, but started playing with his toys rather than throwing them around the room. By the middle of the next week, he was drifting off on his own. The temperature in the Fortress remained at a constant and comfortable seventy-two degrees.

  The peace held for a week or two, until Raven learned how to climb out of the crib. Wrapped up in each other’s arms, making love, they
would hear the heavy thud of the boy hitting the floor and then his wail. Alena would break free of Ares to run to the boy, find him unharmed, put him back to bed with a song and a story. By the time she returned to their bed Ares was beyond frustrated as he teetered on the edge of anger. More than once, he threatened to put a lid on the crib that would keep Raven in tight for the entire night. Wanting to please her Husband and her Son, Alena piled soft pillows under and around Raven’s crib. This way if the boy fell, there was no chance of him getting hurt and she wouldn’t have to feel guilty when he started crying. She wouldn’t let his wailing stop her intimacy with Ares and she would tend to Raven when she was good and ready.

  The first night of that plan, Raven hit the soft pillows, confused by the lack of noise and the ease of the landing. He cried anyway. His mother didn’t come. Raven pulled himself up using the bottom of the crib; he swayed on his legs as he let go and fell several times on his way to the door, where he reached up for the knob as leverage to stand. Banging one little fist against the heavy wood with all of his might, the other slipped on the knob and the door opened. The boy fell to his knees, crawled through the crack in the door and over to his parents’ bedroom where his insistent banging brought his Father to the door.

  Ares looked down just in time to watch Raven fall into the room as he yanked open the door, pissed off at having been interrupted in the throes of passion. He picked up the wriggling protesting Raven and rudely put the boy back in his crib before locking Raven’s door and returning to Alena. Raven screamed for the next hour; Ares turned up the music in the bedroom to block him out. When he and Alena were done, when they lay sweaty and unable to move in each other’s arms, he turned down the music and heard only silence. In the morning, they found Raven curled up in the pile of pillows grumpy but unharmed.

  That wasn’t enough to deter the boy for long and he soon learned how to toddle just so he could get to the door in the night. Finding the knob wouldn’t move, Raven flung himself against the door over and over with as much force as he could possibly muster.

  WACK!

  THUD!

  BANG!

  Then he would stop and let out screams so bloodcurdling it sounded as though someone were cutting him to pieces.

  Unable to take the sounds of her son hurting himself any longer, Alena broke free of Ares’ hold and ran to Raven’s door. She waited until he stopped hurling himself against it before she slid the key into the lock and let the door open. Raven, naked, his nose and face bloody, sat upon the pile of pillows with his fists clenched at his chest. The sight was shocking as she ran to him with the sudden whiff of something foul making her nose curl. Just as she bent to pick him up, Raven thrust his arms forward as hard as he could as he opened his little fists and let two handfuls of shit fly into her face.

  III

  By the time Raven was five months old, he was running all over the Fortress like a champion and running his mother ragged. Raven didn’t hesitate to grab whatever he could reach and explore it to fullest by putting it in his mouth. All of the hundreds, if not thousands, of sharp objects in the Fortress had to be raised or put away. Already an expert climber, if something really caught his eye he’d scale the wall or bookcase nearest to it. If that didn’t do the trick then he moved the furniture about and built intricate ladders; chairs with pillows and books placed on top of them for the most part. No matter how many times Alena told him ‘no’ and dragged him away from some dangerous object, he sprinted right back to it, totally ignoring his mother’s wishes, generally with a loud giggle and a wide toothy grin. Once, out of exhaustion, as Raven reached for an old dagger, she slapped his hand and sternly told him; “No! Don’t touch it!”

  She was utterly shocked when her six-month-old Son grabbed her hand, flipped it over, and gave it a good smack as he shouted; “No! Mine!” He pointed a serious finger at her as his eyes narrowed. “Woo-man.”

  “Ow!” Alena cried out. As she pulled her hand away from the angry-faced toddler, she saw the frostbitten imprint his handprint he’d left on her milky skin.

  While her eyes were taking in the damage to her skin, Raven scrambled up his makeshift ladder, grabbed the dagger and scrambled down again. Then he was off and running, waving the sharp knife high in the air over his head as he hooted and shouted in victory.

  “Raven! Raven!”

  The boy, at the height of joy, rounded the corner still whooping and ran straight into his Father. Not bothering to look where he was going, he didn’t even see Ares, and he barely understood what happened when the dagger in his hand sank deep into his Father’s calf. No hesitation at all, Ares reached down and snatched Raven from his little feet by the scruff of his shirt and held him high in the air as he looked down at the dagger protruding from his leg and the Ichor pooling on the floor.

  Alena came rushing out of the Throne Room, stopped in her tracks and threw her hands in front of her mouth at the sight as she uttered, “Oh dear gods!”

  Trying to keep from crying out in utter agony as the blade wiggled within his flesh, Ares looked sternly at his Son. “What are you doing with my knife, boy?”

  Raven, dangling in the air and hearing the anger in his Father’s voice, started kicking his legs as though he could find traction in mid-air and sprint away. When he realized he couldn’t, he began squirming.

  “Are you all right, my Love?” Alena whispered as she dropped her hands from her mouth and rushed to her Husband’s side. Dropping to her knees, she inspected the damage. “Do you want me to …just… pull it out?”

  “If you wouldn’t mind too much,” Ares grumbled as the pain throbbed. Then he turned his smoldering eyes back to the wriggling boy in his hands. “Those are my favorite boots,” he sneered.

  With shaking hands, she grabbed hold of the hilt and, swiftly and straightly as she could, removed the blade from the thick muscle of his calf. Dropping the bloody knife to the floor, she wrapped her hands around the wound and held it tightly to keep Ares from losing Ichor. The knife had gone straight through the leather pants and thick leather boot below, through the skin, muscles, perhaps even bone, until the tip jutted out the other side. Keeping up pressure on the wound, she glanced up to see Ares still holding Raven in the air. “I told him to put it down, I tried to take it away from him but he hit me and ran off with it,” she said hurriedly.

  Ares’ ears only really heard three words in the entire bit of rambling; he hit me. It was bad enough Raven plunged a dagger into his leg but… “Did you strike your mother, boy?” Raven kept squirming and the tone of Ares’ voice only served to frighten him further; his little body began turning cold in Ares’ grasp. Ares countered with a bit of heat in his palms. “You’ve got a long way to go before you can take me on, boy,” Ares warned firmly. “Answer me! Did you hit your mother?”

  “Woo-man, no!” Raven shouted, his white breath heavily hanging in mid-air as his face gnarled in anger. His body grew colder as he struggled to escape only to have his Father’s hold grow warmer in return. “My knife!”

  “MY knife,” Ares lobbed. “MY woman. Hit her again, boy, and I’ll give a smack you won’t soon forget.”

  Alena swallowed hard at the threat. Raven hadn’t meant any harm he was just pushing the boundaries of his independence. “It’s ok, Ares. It’s fine.”

  “No, it isn’t.”

  “He didn’t mean any harm.” As far as she could see, Ares’ wound was much worse than hers. “I’ll take care of this.”

  “Get up.” Ares turned Raven around like a football, tucking his wiggling body under one brawny arm, and then offering his hands to help her to her feet. “It will heal soon enough.” It wouldn’t bother him at all if it were any ordinary knife from the Mortal World. In that instance, it would have gone straight through without leaving a mark behind. The dagger was his own and so it could wound, and even kill, him. Her hand in his, Ares ran his thumb lovingly over the back of it, only to feel and then gaze upon the frostbite. Grabbing her hand, he shoved it under Raven’s
eyes. “Did you do that?”

  “Woo-man, no!” Raven shrieked as he squirmed and his entire body turned frigid as it was tucked under Ares’ arm.

  “Mother,” Ares corrected, “she is your mother. Stop calling her woman.” It upset Alena very much that her beloved son had yet to look up at her with strange serpent-like eyes and say ‘Mommy’. Instead, from the time he started to talk he called her ‘woo-man’. The God of War knew his Son got it from him, but when Ares said it to her it was a term of affection and was usually the prelude to a kiss or more, but when Raven uttered it, it was completely condescending and it was though the boy knew it.

  “Why don’t you give him to me? It’s time for his nap anyway; I’ll put him down and get some gauze to tend the wound.” Alena held her arms out for the boy but Ares wasn’t having it.

  “I’ll do it.” He walked off with Raven still under his arm and squirming. As they passed Alena, Raven stretched his arms out to her and called for her to rescue him:

  “Woooo-man! Woooo-man!”

  Alena, after seeing him stab his Father, just shook her head and watched them go even though there was a pang of dread in her heart. Ares wasn’t the most patient man or god on Olympus but she had to trust that he wasn’t going to hurt the boy he loved.

  Raven screamed and turned blue all the way up the mighty marble staircase to his bedroom. By now Raven was in a twin bed, the crib long gone and useless. By five months of age, he was climbing in and out of it at will. Alena feared he would take a tumble and be injured—her biggest fear seemed to be that Raven would fall onto the top of his head and break his neck. Ares thought the possibility of that was so astronomical as to be laughable, but indulged her with the arrival of the twin-sized bed. When she voiced a fear that he would accidentally roll out of it in the middle of the night (and break his neck) Ares put the bed against the wall and a side rail on the free side. Later she expressed the concern that Raven might want to wander down the heavy marble stairs in the middle of the night and he would fall and, yes, break his neck. Ares put a wrought iron gate at the top of the stairs with straight rails so that Raven couldn’t climb them.