Goddess Read online

  “My mother taught me to speak perfect Latin, as you well know,” Guinevere snarled back at him in a different language that Helen also understood without ever having heard it before. She assumed it was Latin. “She wasn’t a filthy Roman like you, but she was from the east.”

  “I’m no Roman. Don’t call me that,” the other Lucas said with a dangerous glint in his eye. “Sir Lancelot will do just fine.”

  Their baleful gazes met and held. The Furies wailed, causing both Guinevere and Lancelot to cringe as they tried to control themselves. Helen knew that if the bars in the window did not separate them they would have attacked each other.

  Lancelot looked up and down the long line of warriors that accompanied them, as if reminding himself that there were witnesses who would keep him from doing anything stupid.

  “Why don’t you just kill me now?” Guinevere hissed at him quietly. Her low tone told Helen that Guinevere was also aware that there were other people watching—people who would not understand her irrational hatred for Lancelot or his hatred for her.

  “That pleasure I leave to Arthur, my cousin and king,” Lancelot replied stiffly, almost reluctantly, like something about that bothered him. “After you marry him and ensure your clan’s allegiance, of course. Then I’m sure he’ll kill you with joy.”

  “And you call us barbarians,” Guinevere snapped at him.

  She slammed the window shut and threw herself back on the pile of furs. Helen knew—she remembered—that the furs were part of the large dowry from Guinevere’s father. He was the head of her clan, and he had sent along many gifts with his daughter in this wedding train. All of the rich goods were a peace offering to the undefeatable invaders from the east, and Guinevere was the ultimate spoil of war. The most beautiful girl on the island offered up as a gift to the big, golden-haired invader from a faraway land. And they desperately hoped he liked the gift—because if he didn’t, this King Arthur just might slaughter them all.

  Guinevere knew her father loved her in his gruff way. He couldn’t know that he was sending his favorite child to her death. He wasn’t like these men from the east or like her late mother had been. Clan leader or not, her father was just a normal mortal, and he believed he was honoring his daughter above all others by giving her to the new, young, and, by all accounts, handsome High King. Guinevere had no defensible reason to object. Her father had every right to marry her off to whomever he chose, and unless she was ready to reveal her secret, and her late mother’s secret, she had to go along with it.

  Tears of rage and frustration brimmed in Guinevere’s eyes. Helen remembered Guinevere’s feeling of desperation in this impossible situation distinctly, because once it had been her own.

  “You didn’t answer my question,” Lancelot yelled stubbornly at the closed window. “You’ve been shut up in there for over a day now. Do you need to relieve yourself, Princess?”

  Guinevere proudly dashed the tears from her eyes, smoothed her mussed hair, and pulled open the window. “No!” she howled, and slammed the window shut again.

  Lancelot barked once with surprised laughter. A few moments of tense indecision passed. His black charger pranced anxiously outside Guinevere’s barred window as if he were reluctant to leave her. Finally, he clucked his tongue at his Goliath of a mount and thundered away.

  Guinevere dropped her head onto her folded arms and tried not to think of how much she needed to relieve herself.

  Moments later, she lifted her head in alarm. Shouts were coming from the back of the wedding train—shouts and strange yelps. Someone screamed in agony. Guinevere leapt to her feet and pulled out her dagger, snarling like the heathen she was.

  Her carriage lurched to a stop, and Helen could hear men shouting all around. Something jolted the side of the halted carriage, sending Guinevere sprawling against the wall of her cage. She steadied herself on her knees as another great shove knocked the carriage over onto its side—the window side facing down. The inside of the carriage went completely dark as the only escape was pushed into the earth.

  “To the princess!” commanded Lancelot’s voice from a distance. “Surround the carriage!”

  There was a great rustling of leaves, and the sound of many men moving into position around her. Guinevere listened to the clanging of metal on metal, and the pounding of feet running over her carriage. There were men grunting, shouting, screaming, and dying in every direction. The dull thud of bodies hitting the carriage and the ground was coupled with the last rattling breaths of dying men.

  Guinevere repeatedly slammed her shoulder into the side of the carriage, trying to tip it over and expose the window, but she did little more than rock the massive iron-and-oak enclosure back and forth. She let out a moan of frustration.

  “Lady Guinevere! Are you injured?” Lancelot said in a strident voice from outside the wall of her knocked-over prison.

  “No,” Guinevere said back firmly. “Let me out so I can fight.”

  Lancelot made a frustrated sound. “They’ve taken to the trees.”

  “Picts?” Guinevere guessed. There was no sound from Lancelot, probably because he didn’t know who their attackers were and couldn’t answer her. “They’ll be back with more warriors after dusk,” she promised him. “Please believe me—you may have pushed them back for now, but they are not gone.”

  “I know. I can’t see them in the trees, but I can still smell them.”

  “You must let me out of here!” Guinevere pleaded. “They want me, not the riches we carry in this party.”

  “How do you know that?” Lancelot asked, like he suspected she was telling the truth.

  “The Picts are one of the oldest clans. They’ve handed down ancient stories about our kind—yours and mine, Sir Lancelot. They know better than to fight me, or you, head-on. Instead, they will try to lure you away, and they will leave me in this prison to starve. They’ll wait until I’m too weak with hunger and thirst to stop them. They don’t want to kill me. They want to . . .” She stopped here and struggled for a moment. “They want children from me. To strengthen their clan.”

  Lancelot uttered a foul curse. She could hear his elevated breathing as he fought with himself. “But if I let you out . . . I don’t know what I’ll do to you. Are you sure that isn’t worse?”

  “I’d rather die in an honorable fight with you than be used as a brood mare. At least let me fight,” she said in a strangled voice. “Don’t leave me to face that.”

  “If I set you free, you might try to kill me.”

  “Please,” Guinevere choked out, desperately trying not to cry. “Please don’t leave me locked up in here. I know you hate me, but don’t abandon me to such a terrible fate.”

  Lancelot exhaled sharply. “Stand back,” he ordered.

  The walls of the carriage shuddered with massive blows as Lancelot hacked his way through the bottom of the metal-reinforced floor with a sword. When the first blade was ruined, he collected another from a fallen man and started hacking away again.

  Three, four, five swords were broken to bits, but finally a large enough gash was opened for Guinevere to squeeze out. When she was freed, they stared at each other, both of them breathless with fear and anger and some other feeling they had no name for yet.

  “You saved my life,” Guinevere whispered, overwhelmed by the chance he took by setting her free. “Now I’ll save yours.”

  She looked around at the scores of bodies that littered the ground. Armored men from the east were piled on top of the small, blue-painted Pictish people who wore only basic animal skins and carried stone weapons.

  So many dead, or run off. Lancelot was the only man to stay behind to defend her, Helen noticed.

  Guinevere took Lancelot’s hand and led him away from the senseless waste of life and into the trees.

  “A trap,” Lancelot growled, pulling away from her. “You’ll lead me right to them!”

  “No. They won’t come near you as long as you are with me,” she explained, trying to stay c
alm. “Look.”

  Guinevere held up her other hand. A globe of lightning spasmed inside her cupped palm. Lancelot jumped back momentarily and then moved closer, enchanted by the naked power he saw dancing on her fingertips.

  “Why didn’t you use that to get out of the carriage?” he asked, always inquisitive, just like Lucas.

  “The metal soldered to the wood of the carriage surrounded me in arcs. My power would have died in the ground,” she said, and then shook her head. “I’ll explain someday, I promise. For now, I need to deal with them.”

  Guinevere held her hand aloft and shouted up into the thick branches.

  “Do you see this?” she said in a third strange language that Helen also seemed to understand, if only barely. “If I see even one arrow loosed on my companion or me, I will burn your sacred forest to the ground. Do you hear? I will burn your mother goddess like dry tinder, and the sky gods will rule this island forever!”

  The sounds of scraping bark and rustling branches added their whispery voices to the wind as the Picts dissolved into the misty distance. Lancelot cocked his head and held very still for a long time, listening and smelling and looking as carefully as he could.

  “They’re gone,” he said finally, exhaling with relief.

  “Yes,” Guinevere breathed. “They’ve all gone.”

  “You saved my life.”

  Lancelot and Guinevere stared at each other in amazement, both the Picts and Furies finally out of their way. In that instant, all the burning anger they felt toward each other was replaced by another kind of fire—a tender one that smoldered more than it consumed.

  Leaves fell in the forest. The sun moved in the sky and tilted itself perfectly to light up Lancelot’s sapphire eyes. The wind picked up pieces of Guinevere’s long, golden hair and sent it wafting toward Lancelot like strands of sweetly scented silk. They took a step toward each other, both open and ready for the huge gift they saw offered in the other.

  They stopped abruptly.

  “Oh no,” Lancelot whispered, more afraid now than he had been in the heat of battle.

  “Your king . . . ,” Guinevere said, her amber eyes darting around frantically as if looking for a way out. “Hector . . . Arthur,” she said fumblingly, as her multilingual mouth tried to say both the traditional Latin name for the new High King from the east, and the Briton’s approximation of that name.

  “The clans will never accept his rule unless he takes a wife from among them. They need to know that his sons will be at least part Briton,” Lancelot said, shaking his head. “They will never stop fighting unless you marry him. Many will die.”

  They stared at each other. Guinevere was still wide-eyed with disbelief.

  “I have a little sister—a half sister of my father’s. She’s only ten now, but in a few years . . .”

  “In a few years, thousands will already be dead,” Lancelot said quietly. He turned his head away, forcing himself not to look at her. “You must marry Arthur, or there will be war.”

  FOUR

  Helen hit the ground with a loud thump.

  “Wha-waz-that?” Ariadne gasped, bolting up in bed.

  “Me,” Helen moaned from the floor, rubbing the bump on her forehead. “I fell.”

  “You fell off the couch?” Andy asked incredulously. “I thought you demigoddesses were supposed to be graceful. Made out of dewdrops and rosebuds and crap.”

  “No, that’s fairies,” Ariadne said. “Minus the crap, of course.” Then she snickered, and Andy snickered back. Helen peeked up over the edge of the jiggling mattress and saw the other two girls having a giggle fit.

  “Okay, okay. It wasn’t that funny,” Helen groused as she stood up and trudged over to get Andy. “I’m starving. Let’s eat.”

  Helen stood between Andy and Ariadne, propping the two girls up as they limped and shuffled their way toward the glorious smell of bacon and muffins coming from the kitchen.

  “You’re new,” Kate said cheerfully as soon as the three girls entered.

  “Um . . . yeah,” Andy answered, dropping her eyes. “They came to get me,” she mumbled, gesturing to Helen and Ariadne.

  “This is the girl who got attacked,” Ariadne said. “Her name is Andy.”

  “Let me look at you,” Noel said kindly. She put down the tin of bran muffins she had just taken out of the oven and peered deeply at Andy. Her eyes softened with sadness, and she shook her head once. “You’re really banged up. But even still, I’m good at recognizing the types, and I can’t place your face.”

  “She’s not a Scion, Aunt Noel,” Ariadne said. “She’s half siren.”

  Andy cringed slightly against Helen, her eyes darting around like she expected something terrible to happen.

  “Uh-oh!” Noel said with mock horror and clutched her chest. “Not one of those murdering sirens!” Then she laughed and turned back around to retrieve the muffins. “Sit, girls. Before you all tip over.”

  Helen could feel Andy stiffen with confusion. Helen helped her scoot onto the long wooden bench between her and Ariadne.

  “Is this really okay?” Andy asked as Ariadne shoveled eggs onto her plate. “I just sort of showed up. You don’t have to feed me or anything.”

  “Ha! Try not eating around here,” Helen said. Then she looked at Andy with wide, serious eyes and shook her head emphatically, silently mouthing the word “Don’t.” Ariadne shook her head in agreement with Helen, and the three girls broke into quiet laughter.

  “Helen. Your father woke up for a few seconds this morning,” Kate said as she took a sizzling pan of bacon off the range and brought it to the table.

  Helen’s mouth suddenly went dry. “I checked on him before I left yesterday. . . .”

  “It’s okay,” Kate interrupted soothingly. “I wasn’t accusing you of anything. I just wanted to let you know what’s going on with him.”

  “Has anyone told him anything yet?” Helen had no idea how to broach the subject. Did he know she was a Scion? Should she just come right out and ask if Jerry knew that he wasn’t her father yet, or was Kate still in the dark about that point as well? “Did Daphne . . . ?”

  “They’ve spoken a few words back and forth. I don’t know what about, though,” Kate said stiffly, whirling away from the table abruptly. “He hasn’t been awake long enough at any one time to have a full conversation, but he knows that Beth is back.”

  Helen nodded. “Beth” was the alias that Daphne had used when she conned Jerry, leaving Helen with him as a baby before she ran off. Helen wondered how her father had dealt with seeing her. “Is Daphne around?” Helen asked. “I’d like to talk to her.”

  “No. She left a few minutes ago. Said she had some things to take care of,” Kate said through tight lips.

  Helen could see about a dozen different shapes swirling around inside of Kate. Anger, sadness, worry, and resentment—a blinding kaleidoscope of emotion that kept moving and changing until Helen had to squeeze her eyes shut and look away for a moment. This was not normal, and it was really freaking her out.

  “Helen?” Noel’s ever-watchful eyes regarded Helen sharply. “Are you feeling okay?”

  “Yeah,” Helen replied, shaking it off. When she looked at Kate again, the colors had dimmed and Helen found she could ignore them. “Just woozy. What’s up with those muffins?”

  Noel finished transferring the sticky, molasses-and-raisin-laden treats into a basket and brought them to the table. “Don’t burn yourselves,” she warned uselessly as all three girls grabbed one.

  Ariadne and Andy began juggling the scalding muffins from hand to hand until they both dropped their too-hot muffins onto their plates. Helen simply bit into hers and started chewing smugly. Andy stared at her, openmouthed.

  “I’m fireproof,” Helen mumbled around her purposely over-full mouth, rubbing it in. “I thought sirens had wings.”

  “Some do,” Andy admitted sheepishly. “My mom’s kind don’t, though. We’re more the aquatic, singing type.”

 
; “Can you breathe underwater?” Kate asked excitedly. Andy blushed and nodded. “Awesome.”

  “And where is your mother, Andy?” Noel asked delicately.

  “I’m not sure.” Andy looked down at her plate. An uncomfortable silence followed.

  “So. Ever get the urge to drown anyone?” Ariadne asked.

  “No!” Andy replied, horrified.

  “She’s just messing with you,” Helen assured her. Her face dropped. “Seriously, though. What’s your stance on strangling?”

  “You mean apart from wanting to strangle both of you right now?” Andy asked, a smile tugging at her lips as she played along.

  “You’re going to fit in just fine around here, Andy,” Noel said as they all cracked up.

  “Women laughing,” Hector drawled as he sauntered into the kitchen. “My favorite sound.”

  The reaction from Andy was immediate and frantic. She threw her fork at Hector’s head with a startled gasp. Hector caught the fork easily and placed it back on the table with a shocked look on his face. Then he caught the muffin, the empty water glass, and the napkin that immediately followed. Andy snatched anything and everything within reach and hurled it at him with all her might as she scrambled to get up from the table.

  “What the hell?” Hector said, placing everything he had caught back on the table and then holding his hands up in a placating gesture as he came toward Andy.

  Pinned by the bench, she slammed the backs of her legs against the wood, toppled over it, and then scrabbled on hands and knees across the kitchen floor to get away from him. Hector reached out to try to help her up.

  “No, no, no, oh please, no, not again!” she mumbled hysterically as she clawed her way across the floor.

  “Hector, stop,” Helen said, spinning around on the bench and standing up between the two of them. Still confused, Hector kept moving toward Andy. Helen put her hands on his shoulders and shoved him back. “She thinks you’re Apollo, you big dummy!” Helen screamed in his face. “You’re scaring the life out of her!”

  Hector suddenly seemed to register what Helen was saying, stiffened, and stopped moving forward. Ariadne helped Andy off the ground and then struggled to keep her from bolting out the side door while Hector watched with a frozen look on his face.