Antigoddess

by Kendare Blake

  Athena listened with half an ear. Her mind raced ahead, scrutinizing every closed door. This old one, who was he? Who would they walk in and find? Every muscle in her body was tensed and ready for the possibility of a trap. Her eyes and ears tuned to every movement, every sound. Beside her, Hermes chatted with Celine, but she knew he was ready as well.

  This reeks of Aphrodite. He feels it too.

  Celine moved slightly farther ahead of them and pivoted. They had come to the end of the warehouse, to another elevator. She crossed her arms over her chest as they waited for it.

  “Will you not tell me your names?” she asked, eyebrows raised. “We are your hosts, you our guests. It is my right to ask this question, is it not?”

  The elevator arrived with a soft ding. They stepped inside.

  “Who do you think we are?” Athena asked. She was genuinely curious. No mortal should recognize her, or Hermes either. They looked nothing like any of their paintings and statues. No vacant eyes or marble butt cheeks.

  The question, when Celine posed it, had an innocent ring, but her face darkened, becoming almost trancelike. Her pupils dilated and for a moment her hair swayed back and forth like a dancing mass of red snakes. She looked at neither Athena nor Hermes for several seconds. When the elevator doors opened on the basement level, her eyelids closed. When they opened, her eyes were back to normal.

  “Please,” she said, and motioned for them to leave the elevator. “This is our personal level. We do not conduct business here.”

  “But this is where you’ve taken the old one?”

  For a moment Celine hesitated and seemed almost fearful. “You must understand,” she said carefully. “He was very badly injured when he came to us. He had been traveling for such a long time. He was weary; he needed comfort and care.”

  “Comfort?” Hermes asked with a cockeyed expression. He looked around at the hardwood floor and leather furniture, the long oak bar along the west wall. In one corner a fireplace sat dormant, with what looked like a rug made from an entire polar bear laid before it. “I can imagine what kind of comfort you can provide here.”

  “We can provide such comfort for you as well, cher.”

  Hermes swallowed.

  “In the elevator,” said Athena. She’d have shoved an elbow into him had Celine not been looking. “You never answered my question.”

  Celine inhaled deeply and smiled. “I do not know who you are. They do not tell me.”

  “Who are ‘they’?” Hermes asked.

  Celine shrugged, confident and charming. “They,” she said and laughed. “I do not know. They who spoke to the Sibyl, I suppose. They who whisper in dreams.” Her head cocked at him for a moment. “You seem so thin to me, monsieur. You look so very frail, so very human. It is a good disguise. Had it not been for Mareden, we might never have known.”

  Hermes looked away uncomfortably. It’s no disguise, that look said. No disguise and not of my power. Athena’s jaw clenched. He should be more careful. If they didn’t know, then they didn’t need to.

  “And what about me?” Athena asked.

  “You are flawless, mademoiselle. But then, so many women are, in these times.”

  It was true. Thanks to creams and collagens and nips and tucks, goddesses walked the earth in abundance. Celine herself was, to many eyes, much more appealing than Athena. Celine, who wore beautiful clothes and cared for her body well.

  Athena glanced at Hermes. He was dying for an introduction. Revealing who he was to mortals was probably one of his favorite pastimes. And there was no more point to putting it off.

  Athena held out her hand, and Celine grasped it.

  “I am Athena,” she said, and felt the pulse jump beneath the other woman’s skin. “And this is Hermes.”

  “Athena,” Celine said carefully. Her eyes darted down the hallway; the flicker of movement was almost too fast to notice. It had probably been unconscious. “And Hermes. We are honored to have you.” She turned and resumed walking.

  “She took that well,” Hermes muttered, probably disappointed there hadn’t been more of a starry-eyed reaction. But Celine was so collected and precise. Her response was exactly what Athena had expected.

  They were being led to a room at the back, toward a dark mahogany door at the end of a long hallway lined with doors of a lighter chestnut color. The sound of Celine’s high heels clicking on the floor was distracting and loud, but Athena could still hear soft strains of music coming from behind the wood. There were also other, more animal noises: laughter and soft moans.

  My eyes must be bulging from their sockets, my ears grown elf tips. Her heart too was in overdrive, and she shoved the tip of her tongue up hard against the sore feather in the roof of her mouth to bring herself back down into her shoes. They were there. Celine’s hand rested on the silver doorknob. Then she withdrew it.

  “Perhaps you would wish to wait at the bar,” she offered. “I could bring him to you very quickly.”

  Athena said nothing. All of her attention was focused on the door and what lay behind it. Her heart hammered for an ally, for hope, for any help at all. Let it be Hephaestus, she thought wildly, reasonable, sturdy Hephaestus. Let it be Apollo, strong and brave. But maybe she shouldn’t hope for either. Both of them had fought with her, but they’d also fought against her on various occasions. And Hephaestus was Hera’s son, and Aphrodite’s husband.

  It doesn’t matter. He’s always had a mind for reason. He’s always been my friend despite them.

  The door opened in her imagination on a dozen different scenarios. In her mind’s eye it opened to reveal Hephaestus, twisted and mangled almost beyond recognition, suffering and useless. It opened on Poseidon, flashing jagged coral teeth behind his mossy beard. Water ran in rivulets down his bare legs; in his hand he held a black trident with razor-sharp points. She saw Ares of the smoldering eyes, saw him leap like a wolf for her throat. All of these possibilities flashed through her in an instant, but she said nothing.

  “As you wish,” said Celine, and turned the knob.

  There were four of them on the bed. Three beautiful girls, one blond-headed, one black, and one red. The fourth was a young man with wild brown hair. They were half-dressed at best. The boy in the center leaned into the arms of the softly laughing blonde, while the others knelt by his knees, kissing his chest and fingertips. His eyes were closed. There was a glimpse of gauze on his neck, and more could be seen peeking around the sides of his ribcage. Athena knew him immediately. His angular face, the infuriating, exhilarating confidence that came off of him in waves. Flashes of memory rose across centuries and pasted seamlessly onto the moment, flickering in her eyes like tiny electric sparks. She smiled wryly.

  “Odysseus.”

  7

  DYING GODS

  Cassandra’s mother hummed as she moved between the stove and the table to place a platter of bacon down next to a steaming stack of pancakes. The smell made Cassandra’s stomach turn, but she tried to smile. There are times when your parents’ best intentions feel almost ironic in their complete and utter wrongness, but it doesn’t do to hurt their feelings. Really it was Henry’s fault; he’d mentioned that Cassandra looked sort of pale. Their mother had grabbed the skillet without another word.

  Two days had passed since the dream. She kept expecting it to fade, to be chased away by waking life. But her head was still full of blood, of monsters that smelled like clay and moved like bugs. If she didn’t eat for a week, that’d be just fine.

  Henry and her mother buzzed about the kitchen, talking about the day, trying not to trip over each other as they coordinated eggs and toast. A crack preceded a sizzle as an egg hit the pan. Henry inhaled hungrily.

  “Mmm. They’re so much better when you fry them in the bacon grease.”

  Cassandra’s stomach rolled.

  “Cassie, why aren’t you eating?” Her mother motioned to the food, so she took a piece of bacon off the platter and forced her teeth to bite through it, then fed the rest
to Lux when nobody was watching. The spread of food grew by the minute: Henry plunked down a pitcher of orange juice to join the platters of bacon, toast, pancakes, and cubed cantaloupe. Just one piece of bacon wasn’t going to satisfy the breakfast police. Cassandra wondered if pancakes were good for dogs. Lux certainly seemed to think so.

  She was still in her pajamas, and her bare feet rested on the cold kitchen floor. The sensation felt flat, less cold than the frosty grass of the field she’d stood in two nights ago. Except she hadn’t really stood in that field. But the kitchen she sat in now felt no more or less real.

  She’d seen someone die. Someone she’d known, only she wasn’t sure how. She remembered his eyes, the steady way they’d faced down the attack. He’d been confident, right up to the end. Cassandra wasn’t so brave. If she closed her eyes the creature’s face jumped up behind her lids. She heard the clicking of malformed jaws, louder than Henry and her mother’s voices. And the screams. Of the boy being killed. She swallowed hard. The dream wasn’t receding. Instead it folded over, stretching into the world where she was awake, where things like Cyclops didn’t exist.

  Cyclops. Even though they weren’t anything like what she would have described if someone had asked what a Cyclops was, she knew their name. Why didn’t she know his? Was she supposed to do something? Had she been meant to save him? Could she still?

  I don’t want to save him. I want him to stay away.

  But she didn’t want him to die.

  “Cassie. Do you want a ride to school, I said.” Henry sat beside her at the table, halfway done with his plate of food. He looked frustrated. He must’ve asked twice already.

  “It’s nice out,” she replied. “I think I’m going to walk.”

  * * *

  It wasn’t, truly, that nice out. But the chill on the tips of her nose and fingers felt better than the claustrophobia of Henry’s front seat. And she hadn’t been in the mood to deflect his worried questions. He would have known that something was off. Anyway, in that way she had of knowing things, she knew Henry was going to hit a chunk of concrete on Meyer Road and stop to check his car for ten minutes. Annoying.

  Cassandra was showered and dressed, with her hair brushed and lip gloss on, but she felt vacant, distracted, like she might walk into traffic at any moment. When she’d gotten ready, first in front of the bathroom mirror and then at her antique white vanity, it had all been on autopilot, a lucky thing that she’d done it so many times and that she never varied her makeup and rarely her hair.

  Her feet stepped along the sidewalk, quick and indecisive, the walk of someone running from something without knowing where they were headed. Kincade High School was only another ten minutes away. Maybe she wouldn’t go. If she took a right on Birch she would head farther into town. Left and she’d eventually find herself on the highway, and if she followed that as it wound northwest, she’d hit the state park. There didn’t seem to be enough ground in either direction. Her feet slowed, then stopped.

  This was supposed to happen. The visions changing. All the little things led up to this.

  What part of her thought that? What part of her felt it? But part of her did. And if she was honest, part of her thought it made sense. Something was starting. Something was happening.

  Maybe this is the point. The reason I’ve been a little bit different all this time. Maybe this is the start of whyever I was given this—

  “Curse,” she whispered. Curse. She didn’t know why that word passed through her head. She’d never thought of it that way before.

  When she finally walked into the school, she was fifteen minutes late. The building was always kept at what felt like several dozen degrees too hot, and it melted the frozen tips of her fingers and ears too fast, so by the time she got to her locker on the second floor her face and hands tingled and stung. Aidan was there waiting and had the locker open before she reached it.

  “Hey.”

  “Hey.” She skinned out of her jacket and stuffed it inside.

  “I was getting worried. Didn’t you get my texts?”

  “Huh?” She pulled her phone out of her pocket but didn’t really look at it. “Yeah.” She flexed her fingers. “Cold hands. Figured I’d just see you when I got here.” Textbooks with frayed edges and laminated folders slid through her clumsy grip. The blood inside her hands hurt and felt slushy, like if you tore them open it’d look like a red ICEE.

  “I shouldn’t have come.” She pressed the books back into the locker and let them drop; they boomed against the thin metal and fell in a heap of open covers and bent pages.

  Aidan looked at the pile and cocked his brow. “Not up for English this morning?”

  Cassandra shook her head.

  “Music to my ears.” He took her jacket out and helped her back into it.

  * * *

  “You look better already.”

  She smiled. “I don’t feel better already.” But she did, a little. With her hands curled around a mug of hot chocolate and a half-moon cookie in her stomach, she felt close to okay.

  Aidan sipped his coffee. “Well, maybe if we got you something besides sugar. Do you want a sandwich?”

  “Not yet. Maybe in a while.” Her phone buzzed but she ignored it. A few seconds later, Aidan’s buzzed as well. Angry texts from Andie, demanding to know why they’d ditched without telling her. Cassandra sipped her cocoa and looked out onto the quiet street. The sky was gray and overcast. Everyone passing by had their necks tucked into the collars of their jackets, eyes solidly on the sidewalk or straight ahead. No stopping to admire the scenery. Cold wind reminded them that winter was coming, and they were bitter about it.

  “I dreamed the other night.” She looked down into her cocoa. “Except it wasn’t a dream.”

  “Tell me.”

  She told him about the Cyclops, about the boy with clever eyes and shaggy brown hair. Her voice sounded like someone else’s voice, monotone, and so even it might have been prerecorded. When she was done, her lips pressed together wearily. It had only taken a few minutes to tell.

  “He died?” Aidan asked.

  “He was screaming.”

  “But did he die?”

  “I don’t know.” She swallowed. “I think so.” Thinking about it again brought a whiff of caves and old decay. She covered her cocoa with her hand. Only the warmth of Aidan’s arm around her back kept her in the booth. It still felt like she should do something. Like she should stop it; as if that were possible. Aidan sighed: a sound of relief. He kissed her temple, her ear, her neck and told her everything would be fine, the way you’d calm a child, or a crazy person.

  “It won’t be all right. This isn’t normal. Not even for me. It isn’t just calling coins, or knowing when it’s going to rain. I saw you cut to ribbons by feathers. I saw a Cyclops eat someone, and I don’t even know how I know what a Cyclops is.” She kept her voice low, even though they were in the back of the café, in a corner booth. The confession felt strange. The words clung to her teeth.

  “You have to trust me,” he said. “Everything will be fine.”

  “You should be the one trusting me. I know things. And what I know right now is that everything is not going to be fine.”

  “But it is. I’ll make sure it is. I know things too.”

  “Yeah?” she asked. “Like what things?” He was looking at her so intently. His mouth opened and closed on words. Aidan never hesitated, or sputtered.

  It must be really horrible to be around me sometimes. I must’ve really freaked him out.

  She sighed and he squeezed her tighter.

  “I know I love you,” he said. “We’ll figure this out. I promise.”

  * * *

  The hockey arena stood on the outskirts of town, an enormous structure painted a bleak, pale blue with what seemed to be a mustard yellow racing stripe along the roof. It sat beside four outdoor rinks and across from the lot where the bus garage was. The town used it for all manner of events: birthday parties, senior skate nights, a
nd figure skating lessons, but the presence of so many yellow buses stamped it forever as being part of the school, and the specter of tests and teachers hung over it in a perpetual cloud.

  Cassandra and Aidan leaned against the hood of Henry’s Mustang while Andie and Henry stood on the sidewalk and talked about pucks and passing and goalies who couldn’t get their legs closed. They’d been lucky to get a close space. Even though it was a mid-week game, the lot was jammed. Andie was in all her gear except for her skates and helmet. Her black hair was back in a ponytail, her bangs kept off her forehead with a purple bandanna. Her shoulders and ass looked enormous in the padding. It was strange that something so awkward and full of bulges could be so graceful once you strapped blades to its feet.

  “I’d better go play captain,” Andie said, and motioned to Cassandra. “Want to walk me back to the locker room?”

  “So you’re not mad anymore about us ditching Monday, right?” Cassandra asked as they walked down the cement steps. Andie had given her the cold shoulder for the better part of Tuesday, but by Wednesday seemed to have forgotten all about it. “It wasn’t planned or anything. I got there late. You were already in class.”

  “It was for the best anyway. If I’d have ditched, they’d have benched me tonight, and I bet your brother twenty bucks I’d get a hat trick.”

  Cassandra smiled. Going to the café with Aidan had helped, and she was glad Andie wasn’t pissed. Afterward, they’d gone back to his house and spent the day curled up together, watching movies. Or not watching movies. It had been too long since they’d done that, kissed until their lips hurt, the heat of his hands making her dizzy. After that there’d been no more visions and no more dreams. Maybe it had been a fluke, an anomaly, or a temporary bad spell, sort of like psychic food poisoning.

  “And you didn’t mean what you said Friday night at the party, did you? About us not being friends after high school?”

  Andie made a face and flipped her blue Gatorade into the air. “Please. Since when am I serious?” She pulled open the door of the locker room. The sounds of Velcro being stretched and adjusted, sticks rattling, and the excited voices of a dozen girls spilled out to mingle with the cold hum of the arena lights. Andie ducked inside and said, “See you after.” Then she paused. “Hey, are we going to win tonight?”