Their ShadeDaughters of Olympus

by Charlie Hart

  “I’m okay, just not feeling myself.”

  “Is that why you made us drag this stranger to the middle of nowhere?”

  “I asked you to do that because there is something about him.”

  “Right. Something special.”

  I see the hurt in his eyes. “Hey, don’t be like that.”

  “Like what?”

  “Jealous.”

  He scoffs as we make it to the front steps. Behind us Hawthorne and South drag Eric, and I knock on the door, noticing the way Eric’s eyes are rolling back ominously.

  “He’s practically dead,” South grunts. “Tell me again why we aren’t just letting his soul do what it wants?”

  “I don’t know. Just trust me. He is important.” I knock again, my body on edge as I wait for an answer.

  Finally, the door creaks open and a small, frail woman opens peers out from behind a thick wooden door.

  “Yes?” she asks, her voice distant and her body growing hazy before our very eyes.

  “We need help, with our friend,” I tell her. “Something is wrong with him. He just arrived and is... Well, I don’t know what. But it’s not good.”

  “Come, come, my child,” she whispers, motioning us closer with her finger. I can already see the translucent covering over her body. “Let me see if I can help in the time I have left.”

  She pushes open the door and we walk inside, her shack looking more cottage-like now that candlelight fills the room. The place has probably been here for centuries. When one soul departs, a new one takes up residence in the homes left behind. This one has probably seen thousands of witch doctors over the years. Apothecary jars line the shelves and a big witch’s cauldron-like pot hangs in a fireplace.

  It is hard to know what is real in Styx, and what is fabricated in the in-between. But this cottage, and the witch living in it feels substantial as if there was anyone here that was going to help us, it would be the woman before us.

  “I’m Marden Crow, and my time is almost out. But let’s see what we can do for your friend.”

  “Are you sure?”

  She smiles softly at me. “I’ve learned the best thing to do when someone -- or something -- comes knocking on your door is to answer.”

  She moves bowls and books from the table in the center of the room, and lays a blanket down, telling South and Hawthorne to place him there. They do as directed and Eric’s chest heaves as if he is using all of his energy, even though he is doing none of the work.

  “Where did you find him?” Marden asks, unbuttoning Eric’s shirt and revealing a broad chest, muscular and defined. She reaches for a jar containing a white colored paste and she removes the lid. It’s filled with a salve of comfrey and ginger.

  How do I know this? The names of things I’ve never touched, never tasted?

  “He was at the river, stumbling around, looking confused,” I explain. “I told him where he was, but he just said that Gaia told him he was coming here to help Harlow’s sister. I have no idea what that means.”

  “Gaia?” Marden stops, her hands trembling.

  “Do you know her?” I ask, my best friends standing beside me.

  Marden nods ever so slowly, taking me in as if seeing me for the first time. I wrap South’s leather jacket tighter around my body, feeling exposed in front of this stranger.

  “I know of her.”

  “Is it relevant?” Hawthorne asks.

  “Gaia?” Marden twists her lips and begins smearing the salve against Eric’s chest. “I’d say she is most relevant to Styx. To Earth. To life and death. To all of us. She is the beginning and the end for many.”

  “You’re speaking in riddles I don’t understand,” South says, and his words are exactly the ones I’m thinking.

  “It’s not intentional. Gaia is Mother Earth. A Greek goddess. Her web connects us all, whether we want it or not.”

  Maybe for someone still living on Earth, the idea of Greek gods would sound ridiculous or foreign -- I can’t say for certain, as I never considered their existence before I was sent to Styx. But I do know what Lennox and Hawthorne have shared of Earth. And that is, no one on Earth believes in Greek mythology anymore. They’re just stories, legends.

  But then they arrived in Styx and became believers.

  How could you not, when you see the spirit world in the flesh? When Hades is a real, powerful being ruling the Underworld, forcing passage on those he chooses?

  Maybe before death, people had the privilege of choosing what they believed; but once you pass through that life to this one, it’s no longer about believing. It is about truth.

  And the Greek gods rule this world. So, it stands to reason they would rule other realms too.

  “Mother Earth?” I repeat. “What would she have to do with this man?”

  “More importantly, what do you have to do with this man?” Marden asks pointedly.

  We all look down at Eric, his skin so pale, practically translucent.

  He needs to wake up because he is the one with answers.

  The answers that I have been looking for my entire life.

  6

  Tennyson

  “He died recently, of course,” Marden says looking him over, her hands on his cheeks, dropping a tincture into his parted lips. “Maybe he was even been buried. But his skin is that of a sea creature. It’s as if he was preserved in salt water, and somehow, he floated from the ocean depths to the marshy land of river Styx. The question is, why?”

  “Harlow,” I say. “He said he was looking for Harlow’s sister.” I run a hand through my hair, beginning to doubt this unplanned mission. But then again, maybe Eric is the path I need to take to change my direction.

  One day can change everything.

  The witch nods. “Why did you bring him to me?” she asks.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Do you know Harlow?”

  “I haven’t a clue,” I tell her honestly. “But I’ve been here since I was four. I know nothing about anything. All I know is the stories people have told me over the years.”

  “You’ve been in Styx since you were four?” Marden asks, wide-eyed.

  I look at Hawthorne. We’ve always been here together.

  “Yes.”

  She sputters. “But that’s... How could you... it doesn’t work that way.”

  “I know,” I say, blinking back years of loneliness. “I know most people are here for weeks or months and maybe, on rare occasions, a bit longer before passing through to their final resting place.”

  “But not you.”

  I swallow. “But not us. Hawthorne and I have been here that long, and Lennox and South have been here for years too.”

  Her wrinkled face crinkles even more. “How unusual.” As she speaks, her torso fades for a beat, before returning. “He will be okay,” Marden says looking down at Eric. “See, his color is returning. But you, my darlings, are another matter.”

  “What do you mean?” Lennox asks, his brows furrowing as he speaks.

  “I mean that you are unusual. The question is why. Why are you so special? And why were you drawn to this man tonight? Why risk saving him instead of letting his soul depart as it wanted to? You wanted to intervene. To keep him alive. There must be a reason.”

  I lick my lips, but South huffs, crossing his arms.

  “What is it?” Marden asks him. “What is your guess?”

  “Tennyson has the hots for him, that’s all.”

  My shoulders tense at his accusation. “God, South, stop being like that,” I say, my voice raised more than I’d like.

  “Do you?” Marden asks. “Is that what this is about?”

  I shake my head. Yes, he is handsome, and appealing in a way that is new, but that isn’t what made me ask the guys I’d just pushed away for help.

  “No. First, Hawthorne and I had been talking and I said I wanted to change my life, change the course of things. And he said one day could change everything. So, I thought, hey, maybe he is the th
ing that could change everything, after all, I was the first one to see him when he arrived.”

  I sigh, knowing there is more to it than that. “But then, when I touched him.” The sentence causes Hawthorne, Lennox, and South to scowl. “Not like that. God. I touched his arm when he was like, falling apart.” I huff. “And it was like…“ I wave my hands in the air. “I felt something. A spark. A connection. And not a physical one. It was more like we were linked somehow.”

  “Linked?” Lennox scowls. “That’s a new one.”

  “You know, it’s really shitty to confess your love to me when you never actually trusted me. Love doesn’t work that way, Lennox.”

  He looks at me with tears in his eyes. Is he actually crying, over this? Over thinking that I wanted to hook-up with this stranger? “What do you know about love, Tenny?”

  Now I’m the one with tears in my eyes. I know about love. But to admit that to them means four broken hearts.

  Steeling my eyes at him, I glare. “I guess I don’t know a damn thing, Lennox, do I?”

  “Enough,” Marden says, a dropper between her fingers as she applies medicine of some sort to Eric’s eyes. “Whatever you felt is real,” she tells me. “Connections in Styx are stronger than connections anywhere else. It is your souls’ last chance to get something right.” She exhales, slowly. “You four, have you got it right yet?”

  She looks at us, her eyes slits, she wavers back and forth, her body ghostly as if deciding if it should stay or should go. Instinctively, I reach for her, not wanting her to leave just yet. But as my hand touches hers, her body still fades. She isn’t here as clearly as she was a moment ago.

  “Why didn’t it work?” I ask, wishing the words hadn’t been said out loud. I look over at Eric, who appears to be fading himself, and I press my hands to his chest, quickly, without pause. I don’t want him to die.

  Why is everyone going out on me at once?

  My touch works, and it isn’t until I look around the room that I’ve given myself away.

  Marden, though is scared. Her hands clasp tightly. “What are you?”

  I shake my head, confused. “What do you mean?”

  “Have you done that before?”

  “What?”

  “Kept someone here.”

  I bite my bottom lip. “I have. I mean, I can.”

  “What do you mean you can?” Hawthorne asks. His voice is filled with annoyance since he believes he knows every last thing about me. And with reason. We’ve lived together in Styx forever, and for all intents and purposes, he does know everything about me.

  But not this.

  Not the truth about what is happening.

  “I’ve seen Lennox and South... and you...” I can’t look up, suddenly the words are so heartbreaking I don’t want to say them aloud. But Marden presses me to speak.

  “Tell us, child. Tell us what you can do.”

  “Why do you care?” I ask her.

  “Because I lived a long life Earth-side and, for all my witchiness, I never knew a soul who could bring back the dead.”

  I begin to cry, something I never, ever do. I try to act tough, using my physical attributes to get what I need when I need it. I don’t have much in ways of book smarts to give me a leg up here, I never went to school for a day in my life. So, I’ve always used what I had to survive.

  I wipe my eyes, hating that this conversation is happening here, in front of Eric who is now blinking and breathing, and Marden, a witch who is about to fade away forever.

  It’s private, the words I have to say. The words I want to hold back.

  “Just tell us what you mean, when you say you can bring souls back,” South pushes me for an answer.

  Cover my face with my hands, not wanting to be the bearer of this news.

  “Who have you saved? Kept grounded?” Marden asks me.

  I shake my head, not wanting to answer.

  “Dammit, Ten, tell us,” Hawthorne says, pacing the small room.

  “Fine,” I shout. “You won’t want to know. It’s not a good story.”

  “Just tell us,” he asks, reaching for my hands. South and Lennox look at me, but I realize, maybe they already know.

  Maybe that’s why they confessed their love. Maybe they are as scared as I am.

  “I’ve seen all of you fading, and I’ve touched you all when it happens, and it keeps you here.” The words force everyone in the room to flinch. Lennox’s dark eyes are now black, South’s piercing blue eyes filling with tears. They know what this means as well as I do.

  “And?” Hawthorne asks jaw clenched as if he knows when I am holding back. “Who else?”

  “Eric.”

  “And?” he asks again, this time louder. More urgent.

  “And what?” Eric asks. At some point during the interrogation he sat up, and while his shoulders are still slumped, he’s alert.

  “The what matters greatly,” Marden says with a hush that fills the room. “You may have thought you fell for a Shade, but this woman is not dead.”

  7

  Hawthorne

  I fell in love with her the moment we met. Both of us lost in a world we didn’t understand.

  I knew, then and there, that I would always protect her, no matter the cost. Of course, I had already made the deal, but seeing her changed things. It was no longer about the bargain. It became about devotion.

  To her.

  Ambitious for me, even then. Tennyson was always larger than life. With ideas that challenged me and instincts that overwhelmed my own.

  Still, she took my hand when I offered it and together, our bodies those of children, we navigated the in-between.

  Even as we grew, and she learned how unusual it was to stay here for so long, she decided we were lucky that we had been given this gift for finding one another. Our souls weren’t ready to depart and that made us unique. That created a bond that couldn’t be broken.

  Hades always came looking, sending spies to haunt the night.

  It was my job to keep her safe.

  And that I did.

  Of course, as we got older, as South and Lennox joined our crew, desire grew inside me.

  I loved Tennyson like a best friend, but as my body changed from that of a boy to that of a man, my love changed too. It became something deeper, passionate, true.

  My downfall was admitting this to South and Lennox, who felt the same way as I did. When they spoke, I knew they meant what they said; our love for Tennyson was different but equal, and we wanted her to know it. Needed her to understand the implications.

  We loved her in a carnal way as much as we loved her as our oldest friend.

  Looking at her now, the sorrow in her eyes, with an oversized leather jacket hanging on her shoulders, she looks smaller than she usually does. Her bravado is gone and what remains is fear.

  I realize then, that I have never witnessed my best friend being afraid. Not all those years ago when she broke her arm, and not when she got in fights with girls over who had what. Not when she marched into a party uninvited or introduced herself to some new arrival who was supposedly some famous Earth-side celebrity.

  Never did she waver, but now, she does.

  “Is it true?” South asks. For such a strong man who grew up on the streets of Detroit, full of hard edges and rough stories, he looks so damn sad right now.

  He may have died once on Earth, but it’s as if we’ve taken our unprecedented longevity in Styx for granted.

  He’s going to die all over again.

  “How would I know?” she asks in a whisper. So softly I can hardly hear her and at that moment, I hardly recognize her either.

  “You’re alive?” I ask, stepping closer, cupping her face in my hands instinctively the need to touch her overpowers my mission; my soul knows we don’t have forever.

  I’m fading, and she is not.

  She steps away from me, as if not wanting me near. But I know she does. She’s pushing us away because she knows she is going to lose us.r />
  Fixing her eyes on Marden, she asks, “How do you know this about me?”

  “You know it about yourself, child, and it’s not fair of you to touch these men and keep them here when they are meant to go,” Marden says plainly. “Let them be free!” She smiles softly at as but it’s impossible to match her countenance. “But the bigger issue remains,” she says. “What has brought us all together tonight?”

  “It’s him,” Lennox says, pointing to Eric. “You said this Gaia person sent you here. Why?”

  Eric rubs his face with his hands as if trying to get the story straight. “She sent me to find Harlow’s sister. She said she couldn’t risk coming herself. That coming to Styx would kill her. So, after reviving me, she sent me to this place.”

  “Why does Mother Earth care about you, and who is Harlow?” I ask, needing to get the facts straight.

  “Harlow is the daughter of Poseidon and the love of my life.”

  “Are you fucking kidding us with this?” South asks, but Lennox raises a hand, wanting to ask Eric a question of his own.

  “You’re in love with Harlow? Not interested in anyone else?” he asks.

  Eric nods.

  “Are you freaking serious?” Ten asks, turning on Lennox, South, and me. “You’re a bunch of macho assholes, you know that? When you look at me all you see is a piece of meat. And you can’t imagine me talking to a man without plotting how I might hook up with him.”

  “You haven’t done much to help that, have you?” Lennox pushes.

  “You know literally nothing about my ‘sex life’, Lennox. Maybe ask me directly if you want information, okay?” Tennyson crosses her arms, seething across the room.

  Eric whistles, two fingers between his lips. “Hey, you guys, look,” he says and points to Marden. We were so caught up in the argument we missed the fact that the witch doctor is fading, fast.

  “Shit.” Ten rushes over to her. She reaches an arm out to the woman, but she brushes it away.

  “No, it’s my time,” the old woman whispers. “Don’t play with souls like they are yours to control.”

  Tennyson steps back, wringing her hands. “Okay, I didn’t mean...”