"You'll never escape her, Ishtar!" Thorn called after her as she slammed the door of the room with her departure. "You are her spitting image. She's coming after you with a vengeance, Child."
Ishtar sighed. She should have known never to trust Thorn with the name of her mother, but he had been asking repeatedly since she had come to his realm. 'What does he care if I use a false identity?' she asked herself as she walked away from his throne room to her bedroom. 'He doesn't even know that I'm his daughter. He has his head too far up his own ass to notice, and I'm too much like my mother for him to see any resemblance to himself.' She tossed a solid oak table that was in the hallway on its side on her way by.
Ishtar balled her hands into fists to keep herself from blasting something inside of her bedroom as she stepped into it. "He's pig-headed, stubborn, and a jerk! Why the hell did I ever think he would treat me the same way he does Cade?" She growled, flipping her bed over in her anger. Nothing she had ever done was good enough for Thorn, and she had done more than her fair share of hunting for the primordial god over the past nine years. She flipped her bed back to its proper position and carefully re-made it before laying down on her back and snuggling into the were-tiger fur that covered it. She stared up at the black ceiling and recalled the day Thorn had plucked her off the streets of New Orleans.
Six-year-old Akantha overheard her parents, Hera and Zeus, arguing. From what she could hear, Zeus had discovered that Hera had been unfaithful. She could hear him yelling something about her not being his child. Her eyes widened as she heard Zeus shout that she belonged to a primordial god named Thorn. The young goddess hadn't waited around to hear any more of the argument. As soon as she heard that she had been lied to, she ran off in search of her true father.
Akantha swore never to use her Greek name ever again and changed her name to Ishtar, a Sumerian name she enjoyed. She could feel her mother pursuing her as she stowed away on a cargo ship that was headed for America, hearing Hera's voice screaming inside of her head that she must return so that Zeus could have the vengeance he insisted on having. The young goddess ignored her mother, using her powers to disguise herself as a teenager as the cargo ship docked at the Port of Philadelphia in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She made her way from Philadelphia to New Orleans, Louisiana, by hitching rides along the way.
Once Ishtar was in New Orleans, it wasn't that difficult to find out that Thorn was in charge of a group of various kinds of preternaturals who were called Hellchasers. After she had fought off a group of what she later learned were called Daimons, the Hellchasers had appeared in front of her.
The small group of Hellchasers stared at the young goddess for several minutes, having no clue who or what she was, before one of them spoke. "What's wrong with her?' the tall woman with sleek black hair asked. "She feels wrong."
Ishtar thought about running, but she knew that if her true father didn't take her she had nowhere else to turn. She cleared her throat and squared her thin shoulders as she gathered enough courage to speak. "I want to see Thorn," she stated in a loud, clear, voice as she crossed her arms over her chest.
"Who are you to request an audience with our Master?" the tallest demon in the group asked as the others moved aside for him. He was dressed completely in black gleaming armor and he possessed an aura of power that she could feel even with the distance between them. "How do you even know who to ask for?"
Ishtar remembered something she had heard Zeus say about Thorn as she studied the demon. She stepped in front of him so that they were toe to toe, allowing her power to touch his. "Why should I bother to make my request for an audience with Thorn when I already have one?" she responded to his question with her own. She rolled her eyes at him as she poked the chest of his armor with the tip of her finger. "You are Thorn."
Thorn had studied the power he felt emanating from her for several moments before pulling her into his arms and signaling to the others to return to his realm.
Ishtar sighed as she sat up on the bed and pulled her feet up under her knees in a cross-legged position so that she could meditate. Although Thorn had taken her in and knew that she was using a false identity, he had only just called her out on it. She'd never shown him her true form. She sighed again as she closed her eyes to meditate.
None of the Hellchasers understood why Ishtar meditated for close to three hours every day, but none of them were the offspring of the queen of the Greek gods and a highly powerful, highly unstable primordial god. They didn't have to deal with the power surges she did any time her temper went out of control. She had to meditate in order to keep from frying everyone that crossed her path.
One of the other perks of meditating was the fact that it gave her an opportunity to spy on her mother. Now, she smiled to herself as she focused her powers on her mother and saw that Hera was still angered about her latest disappearing act. One of her mother's minions had been tailing her during her last job, but she had managed to slip past it and return to the safety of her father's realm before it recognized her power signature. Hera couldn't entertain the idea that her daughter would join up with her father.
A sudden knocking on her bedroom door interrupted Ishtar's meditation. "Ishtar!" a voice called from the other side of the door. "Why aren't you out with the others?"
Ishtar growled, using her telekinesis to throw a book at the door. It seemed as if the beings who lived in her father's realm always knew exactly when she would be meditating and always chose that time to interrupt her. "Go away!" she called back. "I'm meditating!"
Hera was paying attention this time as Ishtar returned to her meditation, glancing up toward the area she could feel her daughter's powers emanating from. "You are making this worse on yourself, Akantha," she stated. "Have we not been calling for your return long enough? Nine years on your own cannot be better than being here with us. We are your family. We are the only ones who matter."
Ishtar scoffed in response to her mother's comments, knowing that nothing the other goddess said would change anything. "Considering you want me dead, I'm better off on my own," she sarcastically answered her mother. "I'm not coming back. Ever. You should be used to this by now." She grinned, allowing her powers to go a little closer to her mother. "How is Zeus? Is he still fuming about your infidelity?" she inquired in a taunting voice.
Hera screamed in rage and threw a vase toward Ishtar's power.
Ishtar laughed as she broke off the connection and stopped her meditation. She grinned wickedly as she laid back down on the bed and laced her fingers behind her head, crossing her feet at the ankles. She knew the king of Mount Olympus was still angry with his wife and he still wanted to find the illegitimate child that his wife had tried to pass off as his. She also knew that she was safe in her real father's realm, despite the fact that Thorn had no idea who she really was. Being her gave her power that she'd never dream of and she smiled thinking of Zeus' face when he'd found out about her. She rolled over onto her side and pulled one of her pillows against her torso as she thought about who Thorn might think her father was. 'He must think Zeus is my father since he knows that Hera is my mother. He is so hard headed when it comes to his own life and his male genitalia.'
Ishtar frowned as she suddenly realized that whoever had tried to disrupt her meditation was still standing on the other side of her bedroom door. "What do you want?" she asked in a growling voice. She wanted to change into her natural form for a while, but she knew she couldn't if a Hellchaser was going to intrude while she was asleep. She groaned when the being on the other side of the door didn't leave but remained silent. She sat up, leaving the pillow on the bed as she moved toward the door.
The being vanished.
"Good!" Ishtar shouted, frustrated. "Go back to the hole you crawled out of and leave me alone for once!" She shifted into her natural form and ran a hand through her long auburn hair as she put her forehead against the cold wood of her bedroom door. She closed her bright green eyes and put the palm of her shaking hand against the door as well. She knew that had been a close call. If any of the Hellchasers found out her true form, she knew they would run back to tell Thorn the truth about her existence and she was sure it would end the same way it did with Hera and Zeus.