Disclaimer: I am not Rick Riordan. I don't own any works credited to his name. I'm not Cassandra Clare, either, and I don't own any works credited to her name, either. I'm simply just me, and I only own works credited to my own name. Check out my profile if you'd like to see those! (Writing Desk's Raven, previously JustAnotherChapter, Fangirl Queendom, and some other name I don't remember.)
The young woman sent me North, following the stars and sun and forest. She said I would find my destination, but not without interference. That worried me. It could mean anything, and I kept thinking back to whatever had chased me into that market in the first place.
I found the temple after a week. I lived off of what plants I could, and slept high in the branches of trees, away from anything that might attack me on the ground.
But I wasn't expecting anything like what was there. I didn't only find the temple, but I also found two children. Identical twin girls, they looked to be about seven years old.
They seemed to be alone, but I knew someone must be near. Because they were tied up, sitting on the ground in torn, dirty dresses, their backs against each other and their hands tied together. Their feet were tied, too, so they couldn't move.
One of the girls noticed me. Her eyes widened, and she mouthed something. I couldn't tell what she was trying to tell me, so I moved closer.
One thing I realized, as I kept moving closer, was that I was terrible at reading lips. When I knelt down by them, she whispered to me. "Please help us. They're going to sell us. They'll be killed, of course, they don't care who's hurt, they find it fun. They just want us dead."
Her twin whispered as I began to try to untie their hands. "You won't be able to untie these knots, they're much too complicated. And the wire can't be cut by anything short of special cutters."
"Is there anything I can do?" I asked desperately. I heard footsteps approaching, and I didn't even want to imagine what horrors these girls had already faced and would face if they weren't freed.
Neither girl had an answer. I looked around, searching for something, anything. Silver glinted in the sunlight filtering into the clearing, and I noticed a flask dropped in the dirt. I picked it up and opened it. It was filled with alcohol.
So I did the only thing I could think of. I took the vial from my belt, and I dumped it into the flask. I could only hope it was something that might drug them, and not something meant to help myself. There was also a very real possibility that it was poison, and that these people would die, but I had to take that chance. If it did kill them, at least they'd have that mercy over the death of whoever was to take these girls.
I had just tossed the flask away and began again trying to untie the knots when the footsteps reached the clearing. Whatever conversation they were having faded as they noticed me. "Well, look what we have here, Adam, a pretty little thing trying to take our profit from us."
"If she's gonna take from us, Jeremy, I say we deserve to take from her." The other responded. They both came toward me, and I kept trying to untie the knots on the girls. I wasn't worried about the men, I'd taken on creatures bigger and nastier than them before.
I wasn't worried, that was, until one of them grabbed me with a superhuman strength and threw me to the ground. He was much stronger than any mortal should have been. And while Achilles's curse protected my skin, it did nothing against him slipping a set of manacles over my wrists and attaching the end of the chain to a stake in the ground I hadn't noticed because the girls were leaning on it.
He got back up and stepped back beside his friend, who had picked up the forgotten flask. "What d'you think, Adam, do we wait for the rest of the group or should we get started with her now?" He asked with a leering grin towards me. I glared back at him.
"Let's wait, it'll be more fun. We've got awhile to wait for them to collect those ones, anyway." The other said.
It didn't take long for the others to get back. They all laughed and whistled when they saw me, but none of them bothered me for the time being.
Instead, they started a campfire, the others had apparently been collecting wood, and hunting. They got themselves a dinner cooking once the fire was set up. I could just feel the heat from the small fire from where I sat with the girls.
While the men talked and laughed, the girls started explaining their situation to me, whispering quietly. They had bad people after them, people who were after all their family and them. Those people were offering a reward for their capture, but it wasn't real. They said that those people were just going to kill these men for sport before they took their time and had their fun tearing them apart.
They told me not to worry, though, because they only came at night and they couldn't enter the temple. So if whatever I had put in that flask worked, (which, if it did, it would get to all the men because they shared the flask), then they could help me out of the chains and I could take the wire cutters one of the men had on him, and get them out. Then we could hide in the temple.
That was the second clue that things weren't normal. First, the superhuman strength. Now, people who only came at night and who couldn't enter a temple. I wondered what the girls were, for these people to be hunting them.
It was getting closer to night fall when the men finished their dinner and began looking over at us. One of them came over and took the chains off of me. I tried to stand and fight, but with the way I'd been sitting, my limbs had fallen asleep and I could do nothing. The men all laughed as he pushed me to the ground.
I tried again to fight as he pinned me to the ground and stuck a hand under my chiton, but it did nothing. The other men all came over and cheered him on. I silently prayed to every god or goddess I could think of that whatever was in that vial kicked in soon. And I knew a lot of gods and goddesses.
I started screaming when the man reached up farther under the chiton. He backhanded me across the face for it, but I didn't stop. The twins looked away, and I noticed that one of them was quietly sobbing. I wished they didn't have to be here for something like this.
"Stop screaming for lover boy. He can't save you." One of them sneered. I hadn't even realized I'd been screaming a name. Sage.
It was at that moment that the entire clearing darkened, so much so that it was almost pitch black, with just enough light to see by. Every one of the men looked toward a spot that I couldn't see. "Get your filthy hands off of her." I knew that voice, but I didn't. I'd never heard it so angry, so full of rage.
The men at least looked unnerved by the sudden darkness and his appearance from the forest. But one of the men swaggered up to him to get in his face. "And what are you going to do if we don't?" He asked smugly.
The man pinning me to the ground melted into shadows, and I pulled myself into a sitting position, my knees hugged against my chest. The one man who had gone forward did not see, but his friends did, and they all stiffened. When there was silence, the man turned around to see why.
And then he too stiffened, because Sage had a dagger at his throat. Sage glared at the rest of the men, four of them. "Untie those children." He demanded.
One of them started to protest, but another quickly got to work cutting the wires when the other two suddenly dropped dead. When the children were free, he stepped back quickly, not wanting to risk what Sage might do. I don't think either of them realized I'd slipped something in their alcohol.
"None of you will ever touch a woman again. None of you will ever touch a child again. And if I ever hear of any of you doing anything remotely like what you've done and tried to do tonight, I will hunt you down like deer, and I will kill you." He ordered. The two men both nodded vigorously, then took off running. Sage held onto the one man who's throat he had a dagger at for a moment longer, then he let go of him. The man ran fast.
Sage came over to me and dropped to his knees in front of me. "I got your letter, Mikayla." He murmured. "I went, but you disappeared just as I got there. You didn't see me. I tried to follow, just making wherever you were my destination. But something held me back, and I couldn't follow for a few days. When I could, I was somewhere on the coast of Greece. So I picked a direction and went walking. I was somewhere in the forest when I heard you screaming."
"I'm sorry." I whispered. "I'm sorry. Are you okay? You just killed someone-"
"Mikayla, I killed my own brother. These men that were hurting you, that was nothing. Granted, we've already determined that my brother had no soul, he never went to Hades after he died, and he also tried to destroy everything I know and love, so there's that." Sage cut me off. "And Mikayla, I would do anything for you. You're my best friend."
One of the twins spoke. They were standing now, but hadn't moved. "Back away from her, please. You'll have to stall them. They draw closer sooner than they were to, attracted by the surge of power. They'll kill us all if we don't get her into the temple." Sage took a few steps back, while I stood and brushed myself off.
"Why don't we all go in, now?" Sage asked. "Protect her there."
The other twin spoke. "The suppliant must perform the sacred ritual alone. Do not worry, they cannot enter the temple. Only when this world falls to their reign will they be able to enter, and if we succeed, we can hopefully hold them away for centuries to come."
"If she has to do whatever it is she's agreed to do alone, then how are you two supposed to go in there?" Sage asked, narrowing his eyes at them. They only gave him a smile.
Four figures entered the clearing.
And then I screamed and backed away, walking so far backwards that my back hit a column of the temple. The two girls were standing on the steps, just outside the open doorway.
The creatures were the creatures that plagued my nightmares. The ugly, demonic creatures that killed my friends and family in my dreams every night. They were gray skinned, like stone. They looked mostly humanoid, but they had sharp fangs and claws and glowing red eyes. I knew, from my nightmares, that they could shift into wolf forms, wolves the size of bears.
Before Sage could go to me, the figures looked right at him, and one of them spoke in a gravelly voice. "Ah, Tartarus, wonderful to meet you!" Sage blinked at them, surprised to be recognized and greeted like that.
Another spoke. "Tartarus, I see you've caught our prey, and a girl. Why don't you hand them over to us, and you can join us. We can give you everything you've ever wanted, power, money, recognition, anything. Much more than you'll ever get up on Olympus where they've been forcing you to reside. Why do you think your predecessor moved into the pit?"
"What are you going to do with them?" Sage asked. How he made himself sound curious, I'll never know. But I did know he was stalling them.
"The children must die, there is just simply no other way. But the girl..." The one speaking looked to me. "Have you come to join her court? If so, you must die. Well, you'll die either way, but it'll be so much more fun if you've already joined her court."
They all turned to Sage. "So, Tartarus, care to join us?"
"I already have everything I want on Olympus." Sage told them. Then he blasted them with a bolt of darkness. I would've stayed to help, somehow, but the girls pulled me into the temple and told to me to run for the altar. So I had to turn around and leave him behind once again.
The small temple was quiet and empty, so it didn't take long for us to get to the center. When we reached the center chamber, I realized it wasn't we, but me. The girls had slipped away at some point.
I stepped cautiously forward. There was a small altar at the center, a simple column of marble with a silver bowl resting atop it.
I wasn't really sure what to do. I took another step forward.
"The ritual may very well kill you. This is your last chance to choose not to accept. What will you do?" The voice and presence were back.
"I've come this far, I'm not backing out now." I announced.
"This is what you must do, then." The voice told me.
When the ritual had been explained to me, I took a deep breath, and then I began.
I approached the altar, and set the dagger from my belt atop it. I removed the chiton I wore, cast it aside, and knelt in front of the altar. I set a hand on each side of the altar, and images flooded my mind.
The only thing I could think of when I saw the images was pain. Suffering. Cruelty. The images showed me every single last wrong in the world, every instance of evil or bad. The images showed me all the bad in the world, past, present, and future, and even showed me all the bad in myself.
I don't know how long the images lasted, an hour or days, a week or months.
I don't know when I started crying, either, but I was crying. The tears ran down my face and fell on the dagger, before slipping off and pooling in the silver bowl of the altar.
The images finally ended with what the world would be like if those creatures outside were to win, if they were to take over.
With the images gone, I picked up the dagger with one hand, and gathered my hair in the other. I chopped off most of it, so that it reached just above my shoulders, rather than the middle of my back.
I set the dagger back on the altar, and stood. "Please Fates, allow me to help right the wrong in the world. Allow me to do what I can to help, allow me to do my part in saving this world from all it's evils." I pleaded in ancient Greek.
A young woman materialized on the empty dais behind the altar. Her form flickered and shifted through the forms of many different young women, all come here to try to help the voice that had led them here.
She gave me a smile, then dissolved into a mist. The mist surrounded me, entered me, through my mouth, my nose, my ears.
It happened within seconds, and the moment it ended, I collapsed.
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