Pandora Gets Jealous

by Carolyn Hennesy

  "What?" whispered Pandy.

  Prometheus repeated all of Hermes' instructions and warnings.

  "In fact," said Prometheus, running his finger down the lip of the conch, "let's not take any chances, shall we? We'll just set it to vibrate and no one will be the wiser."

  "Does it really work, Dad?"

  "Honey, trust me. But be careful."

  "Let's have a signal," Pandy said.

  "A signal?"

  "Sure, if you call and I can't talk, I'll say something like 'The winged horse flies at midnight.'"

  "And if you call and I can't talk," said Prometheus, "although I strongly doubt that will ever happen, I'll say, 'Sabina made a wonderful meal.'"

  Pandy broke into a huge grin.

  "Then I'll know things are really bad back here," she said, then paused. "Oh, Daddy . . ."

  "Honey . . . ," he began, but at that instant there was an enormous crack of thunder overhead.

  "She's going," he said loudly but respectfully, staring skyward, his hand covering the conch shell. "Come on, no time to waste."

  He stood up, and quickly slipping the shell inside the pouch, began to fasten it shut.

  "Wait, Dad . . . I have to put something else in there."

  She put her diary inside; by now the pouch was bulging, but it still shut easily.

  Pandy knelt and kissed Xander on the cheek. She went to the food cupboards, where Sabina was gazing quietly out the window and threw her arms about the old, old woman's waist. Pandy felt a bony hand clasp her arm tightly, but Sabina didn't turn around. Then Pandy put on her mother's cloak and fastened it inside her girdle. She threw the leather pouch and water-skin crossways over her shoulder, looked around the house once, and walked out the door.

  Her father walked with her through the inner courtyard to the small door in the wall surrounding the house. Dido came bounding out to follow her and Prometheus grabbed him by the scruff to keep him back. Pandy patted her dog quickly and then turned toward her father, her lower lip quivering, her eyes staring over his shoulders.

  "Big-time phileo, Daddy."

  "Me you more, my daughter."

  Then she squared her shoulders, turned toward the chariot road, and walked away from her home.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  On the Road

  Pandy passed through the wrecked agora and by her school. Now that it was ruined, it looked a lot better. They should keep it that way, she thought. She looked up at the Acropolis, and the still smoldering Parthenon, and the Library, all quiet in the early morning. There was her preschool, Medea's Mini Muse and Happy Hero Day Care. After her first day there she'd begged not to be sent back; she smiled, remembering that none of the other children would play with her because of her connection with fire, squealing that she'd turn them into human toast.

  She knew every inch of Athens, every alley, temple, statue, fresh-water tap, and fast-falafel shop. She'd used every back entrance to every market stall. She knew hidden corners where the government officials whispered, the benches where the best philosophers discussed the mysteries of life, and even the secret place the dryads gathered in the evenings. She knew where the message runners went to cool down, the best watering holes for the chariot horses, and which gardens grew the most beautiful flowers.

  She'd discovered so many hidden treasures of her beloved city. And she knew that just maybe she'd been taking it all a little for granted, knowing now that she might never see any of it again.

  Six hours later, after passing olive groves and grape vineyards, Pandy crested a large hill and turned for a final look at Athens. Her legs ached and her feet were beginning to blister. Sitting down on a patch of grass by the roadside, she determined she had at least two weeks of walking ahead of her, maybe more. She was hungry but felt she had to save her meager stores, although she knew full well she couldn't make her supplies last long. She also knew she should keep moving, but the grass was so soft and it was just nice to look back and see the chariots and runners and oxcarts and people milling about off in the distance . . .

  . . . and a snow white dog running toward her ahead of two girls, one of whom kept veering off to the right.

  Pandy blinked. She stood up, slightly turning her ankle on a rock and popping a blister.

  She watched as the trio got closer and closer. It was taking a while because one girl had to keep chasing the other, who was swerving, and drag her back onto the road. At that point the girl who was being dragged would stomp her feet and swing her arms wildly.

  Pandy started to laugh as Dido came racing up the hill, almost knocking her down. She heard lole's and Al­cie's voices coming over the last fifty meters.

  "I still think we should put you on a leash, Alcie! It might help," said Iole.

  "I don't need any . . . unh!" Alcie cried, crashing into a laurel tree.

  Dido was sniffing at the leather pouch.

  "Stop it. . . not for you!" said Pandy.

  "Apricot right, it's not for him!" panted Alcie, coming up the hill. She was taking it on an angle, trying to walk toward Pandy as straight as possible. "He's been after our food and water all day I've been yelling my head off."

  "Shrieking like a siren," said Iole, joining them.

  Pandy started to cry again.

  "You guys . . . what are you doing . . . you can't. . ."

  "Don't gimme any of that, you ungrateful little grape!" Alcie cried, slapping her hand over her mouth. Then she parted her fingers to be able to speak. "Sorry. Look, we've been up all night, stealing food from the cupboards, getting blankets; Iole even found her new 'You're a Maiden Now!' sandals and she wasn't supposed to get them for another three moons, so don't try to telling us to go back, because we won't."

  "Pandy, we discoursed about it all day after you left.. .," Iole said.

  "She means we talked about it," said Alcie.

  "Right," said Iole. "The school is in shambles so it's out at least until the end of the planting season. Nothing is healing my bumps. Maybe somewhere out there we'll find a cure for them... or for Alcie's feet. Look, I brought my dad's old sword!" She pulled a short sword out of her carrying pouch. "The blade's kinda bent, but. . . but . . . We can't go back, Pandy. Unless we help you save the world, there won't be much to go back to. Anyway, you need us. We're not all best friends for nothing, you know. And if you think for a minute we'd let you go off alone and get killed or worse when we could be right there getting killed or worse with you . . . then you just don't know us at all!"

  "Lemon right!" said Alcie. "I think."

  "Okay, now look, I'm totally serious about this," said Pandy. "You guys . . . I love you both so much, but you have to go back. If Zeus finds out . . ."

  "Wrong-o!" said Alcie.

  "Pandy, if the whole thing happened just the way you say it did," said Iole calmly, "then Zeus only said that no one in your family could help. Well, we're not family . . . not really . . . so no one gets boiled in oil. He can't go back on his word. Can he, Alcie?"

  "Who gives a fig," Alcie answered. "I'm just glad to be out of my house!"

  Pandy held back her tears and buried her face in Dido's fur.

  "How did you get him to follow you?" she asked.

  "Follow usl" yelled Alcie. "That flea-farm was lying outside your courtyard wall when I passed by on my way to lole's. He spotted me on the ridge and ran up all excited. It's like he knew what we were doing. He basically dragged me over to lole's. And then when we were leaving, he took off like a crazed marathon runner. We've been trying everything we know to keep up with him. He doesn't seem to care about my little problem!"

  Alcie glared down at Dido, who conveniently looked away.

  "I think he didn't want you to get too far, Pandy," said Iole, with a giggle.

  "But your parents . . ."

  ". . . will be worried sick, blah, blah, blah," said Alcie.

  "We know," answered Iole. "It just can't be helped. This is too important."

  "We can at least get word to them that you're o
kay," said Pandy.

  "How in Hades can you do that?" asked Alcie.

  "You'll see . . . not just yet," she said, looking at the cloudless sky overhead. "It's amazing. At least that's what Dad says."

  "Right. I'm done panting," said Iole. "Let's go."

  Pandy's smile began to stretch clear across her face. The girls linked arms with Alcie in the middle so they could steer her straight. Pandy felt as if her backbone were made of adamant as the four of them turned three backs and one tail on the city of Athens and walked on up the road.

  They had several uneventful days of walking past farms and laurel groves, and fording small streams. They used lole's bent sword to hack their way back through overgrown thickets whenever Alcie strayed too far off the main road.

  "May rocks fall on your heads!" she'd cry. "It doesn't help that I have a right sandal on a left foot, you know!"

  They knew that three young maidens and a dog alone would attract some attention, so they skirted around the larger cities like Thebes and Eleusis. At smaller towns or villages they came to, however, they'd ask directions to Delphi. The first time, Pandy went into a tavern alone and mistakenly approached a petty thief who, seeing her splendid silver girdle, decided to relieve her of it. Pandy managed to run out before he could snatch it. The thief followed, only to find Dido, teeth bared viciously, waiting for him outside. That was the last time any of them went anywhere alone.

  Their nights were mostly quiet, in an eerie, apprehensive way. The very first night Pandy pulled out the map and showed them its strange symbols and the ring with the single number 179 on it. Then, as soon as she felt it was safe, Pandy took the conch and spoke into it softly. Then she held it to her ear and only had to wait an instant before she heard her father's voice on the other end. Iole gasped and Alcie leaned in closer to hear Prometheus. Pandy told her father everything: that the girls and Dido were with her and that everyone was safe. After holding the shell away from her ear so they could hear him screaming, Pandy convinced her father not to come charging after them, but only to get word to their families that both girls were all right.

  Pandy introduced Alcie and Iole to her diary and told of their day's travels each night as the girls rested. The wolfskin relayed information from Dido about nearby fresh water, or what creatures were watching from the bushes and what protections they should take. They shared two blankets and Sybilline's cloak, staying warm with Dido sleeping on their feet; although occasionally Pandy would feel lole's bumps wiggle as they snuggled and sometimes Iole would wake with a giggle in the middle of the night. Once it rained, forcing them all to find shelter underneath a small cluster of myrtle tress. As Alcie and Iole spread the blankets on the ground, Pandy casually gathered a little pile of twigs. When the others weren't looking, she blew gently and soon had a glowing pile giving off lots of heat. Alcie and Iole were startled, but Pandy held up two twigs.

  "I just rubbed them together." She smiled.

  "Oh . . . well, sure. I coulda done that, too," said Alcie.

  Pandy spoke briefly with her father at night, always ending her conversation with "Big-time phileo, Dad." Alcie and Iole began to playfully mimic "Me you more, my daughter" as Prometheus said it on the other end. Then the three best friends would curl up like spoons, exhausted, and doze off.

  However, on the third night out, they were all intermittently awakened by a peacock screeching somewhere close by.

  "Idiot pea-kook!" grumbled Alcie the next morning, trudging a winding stretch of road, all of them bleary eyed from lack of sleep.

  "Well, it's Hera's bird . . . ," Pandy said, "and she gave me the map . . . maybe it's a signpost of some sort."

  "Maybe it's telling us that we're on track," said Iole, sounding hopeful.

  From the tension in her stomach, however, Pandy knew Iole was wrong, just as she'd known on Olympus that Hera's intentions were not what they seemed. But she wasn't about to tell this to Alcie and Iole.

  "Maybe it doesn't have to be so loud when it tells us," said Alcie. "Apples! I'd like to wring its scrawny neck."

  "Alcie, keep your voice down," cautioned Iole.

  "Whatever!"

  On the morning of their eleventh day, they crested a high hill that looked down on a beautiful valley. The great city walls of Delphi were visible on the side of Mount Parnassus, as it rose majestically in the distance. Iole figured they were within five kilometers of the city.

  "We'll be there for mid-meal," she said, descending into the valley.

  "Goody, more dried fruit!" scoffed Alcie. "Dee-li-cious!"

  A little while later, they were coming around a curve and Alcie was trying out a new step, walking sideways and crossing one leg over the other (which, in addition to slowing them all down, was absolutely not working), when Dido stopped short, every muscle in his body taut like the string on a bow. He was staring at something far up the road. Pandy squinted, but she could see nothing.

  "What's up there, ghost dog? Huh?"

  Dido was both growling and whimpering, almost as if he were afraid and eager at the same time.

  "Look. There's . . . something," said Iole, squinting into the distance.

  Pandy saw two shapes emerge from some large bushes into the main road. Dido took off running, got about twenty meters, turned around in a circle several times, and barked back at the girls. Then he ran another few meters and barked again.

  "Don't know if you know this," said Alcie, "but your dog's a freak."

  "Come on," said Pandy, hurrying after Dido.

  "That freak is finding water and keeping you from going thirsty, Alcie," said Iole.

  "Oranges! Let's go."

  Ten meters from the two figures, Dido stopped abruptly and went rigid again, but the girls saw that these two were nothing more than an incredibly old woman leading a goat on a loose cord. The woman seemed frightened of Dido, but the goat was staring the dog down. Pandy noticed that the sky had suddenly become dark and overcast, and it was getting darker every second.

  "I'm sorry about my dog. He's usually very friendly," said Pandy, grabbing Dido's scruff.

  "Perhaps he sees my poor old goat as a tasty little treat, hmm?" said the old woman, her voice sounding like two sheets of papyrus rubbed together. Strands of thin white hair fell around her crinkled face and trailed down her back, over her filthy and tattered brown robes, to the ground.

  "Gods!" said Alcie loudly to Iole. "She's even older than Sabina!"

  The old woman casually turned her filmy eyes toward Alcie.

  "Shh," said Pandy, then turning to the woman, "Please forgive my friend . . . she's been sick, and we're all very tired."

  "Of course," said the old woman. "We're hunting for berries or roots, anything to feed little Laodon and myself."

  "Laodon? That's a wonderful name!" said Iole, petting the goat behind its ears. "Are you hungry? Huh?"

  "Perhaps you have something to share with us . . . just a morsel of flatbread. A dried grape? A slightly gnawed olive pit?" said the woman.

  "Hades, no!" said Alcie. "We barely have enough for ourselves! As if!"

  Pandy grabbed Alcie's arm and pinched her hard.

  "Ow!" Alcie squealed.

  "Excuse us for just a second," said Pandy to the woman as she and Iole dragged Alcie off to the side of the road.

  "Alcie! You're being uncouth," said Iole.

  "I am not. . . whatever that means. I'm being smart!"

  "We're going to have to get more food anyway," said Pandy.

  "We're going to starve before we get to Delphi, you flesh-eating Charybdis!" said Alcie. "Am I the only one here doing any thinking?"

  "I'll give them some food, Pandy," said Iole.

  "So will I. And so will you," Pandy said, glaring at Alcie.

  Pandy walked up to the old woman, now talking quietly to her goat.

  "I'm so sorry," said Pandy, "but it's true. We're on kind of a long journey but of course you can have something."

  She started rooting in her pouch for her food sack.


  "Iole, open your sack. Alcie, you too!" Pandy said.

  She looked up to offer what she could to the old woman and gasped. Iole looked up and dropped her sack in terror. Alcie simply fainted.

  The two pathetic creatures were gone. In their place stood Athena, an enormous owl perched on her wrist, and Hephaestus, sooty and misshapen, but still strikingly impressive. Pandy knew them at once, but Iole was shaking with fear.

  "Do not be alarmed, little one," said Athena to Iole, then she clucked to her owl. "Tyro, go!"

  Pandy kept Iole steady as Athena quickly lifted her arm and the owl went soaring overhead. They watched as Tyro circled again and again in a slow descent. Spreading out like a streamer behind him was a fine golden thread, which settled, concentrically, on a large clump of nearby bushes. There seemed to be no change to the bushes whatsoever, but Athena motioned everyone over to a small opening between two shrubs as Tyro landed on her arm. Hephaestus delicately picked up Al­cie as if she were a feather and carried her in his arms.

  They found themselves in a lavishly decorated tent, exactly the same mottled yellowish greenish color as the foliage, but quite spacious inside. At their feet were intricately woven rugs; each designed to blend in with the colors of the ground. Athena beckoned them to plop down on velvety-soft cushions in rich browns and rusts. Small tables were laden with plates of steaming fresh foods and goblets of juice. Dido immediately wolfed down a dog bowl of roasted lamb and then settled on his back on top of a beautiful rug, rolling around with delight. Pandy and Iole each started to reach for a goblet, but were startled into stillness by Athena's voice.

  "We are here but a moment, Pandora. We shall be brief and you must listen carefully. Hephaestus?"

  Alcie, lying on a muted yellow cushion, was starting to come around.

  "This is for you, daughter of Prometheus," said Hephaestus, stepping forward on his spindly legs. From a silk pouch at his waist, he withdrew the gold and adamantine net and handed it to Pandy. "We know what you seek. This will ensnare whatever you desire; use it well and wisely."