We continued trudging through the forest along the narrow paths covered with dead leaves and thick tree roots. We were now heading west toward the rushing river to introduce Alicia, Shane, and Camille to Pan. I was interested to see how they would react to meeting him, since he would be the first mythical creature they would see besides the Oracle, if you even counted her.
Eventually we walked out onto the damp riverbank, and we followed the river north for a ways, until it flowed around a bend and suddenly dropped off at a small waterfall, where the water collected in a small, deep pool before slowly continuing on its course. This was the only place in which the river had almost no current, so it was a popular swimming area for water nymphs, and it was Pan’s preferred hangout.
We stumbled down the steep hill, climbed down the slick rock sides of the waterfall, and turned to face the pool. There were currently two teenaged nymphs, wearing bikinis made of leaves and long blades of grass—attire that would have been considered downright scandalous by anyone from the Woods—swimming lazily through the cool water, with their long, brown hair flowing out behind them. I could tell that they were both water nymphs because of the slight blue tinges to their skin. Tree nymphs, on the other hand, tended to have very light greenish tinges.
Meanwhile, Pan was eating grapes and sitting on a makeshift throne made of large rocks, which were covered with soft, bright green moss he had collected from nearby pine trees. The way Pan was splayed out across all the rocks made it look as if he were tanning his bare chest, but it was actually pretty dark out because the pool was so well covered by trees that formed a sort of shade tent, catching the rays of sunlight before they could reach us.
When the seven of us stopped in front of the pool, however, both of the nymphs and Pan looked up, staring at us in surprise. Although seeing Zach, Luke, Connor, and me there was definitely not uncommon, seeing three new people was.
It was silent for a moment as Pan carefully studied Camille, Alicia, and Shane one at a time. Then, without even looking at them, he ordered the nymphs, “Leave us.” Quickly, the two nymphs heaved themselves up and out of the water, and they walked away barefooted, trying to wring the water out of their long hair. Even though Pan was younger than most nymphs and satyrs, they all knew about and respected our godliness.
“Let me guess,” Pan started again, and he pushed himself off his rock throne and brushed bits of moss off his hairy goat legs. He pointed in turn to Shane, Camille, and Alicia. “Hephaestus, Artemis, … and Hera.” When Zach nodded to show that the guesses were right, Pan stuck out his hand to each of them. “Pan, god of the wild, at your service.” He even did a little bow. Although he was indeed a god, Pan was only a minor god; he did not sit on the Olympian Council of the twelve most powerful ones.
I watched Camille, Shane, and Alicia closely as they shook Pan’s rough hand in mild shock. They were all staring at his goat legs, slightly bewildered, and I smirked, remembering how it felt meeting Pan for the first time. But I interrupted the moment by letting out a small cough to get Zach’s attention and nodding toward Pan.
“Oh, right,” Zach said. “So, we were on our way over here and suddenly the Oracle of Delphi shows up and—”
Zach was interrupted by Pan, “Ah, she finally told you the prophecy. Yeah, she told it to me after you four first showed up in the forest.” He looked at Zach, Connor, Luke, and me in confusion before asking, “You’ve really never met her before?” We shook our heads, and Pan shrugged, not worried at all. “Oh well, anything else?” We all shook our heads again and Pan checked his wrist, as if he had a watch, then said, chuckling, “Well, I have to go catch up with those nymphs again. Come back when you find more gods.” With that, Pan winked at us and trotted off in the direction that the two nymphs had gone.
A lot of help he was, I thought to myself. Not.
At last, the seven of us turned to walk back east toward Main Street. There was still a lot of time left in the day to search for more gods, but our trek took a while because we had to walk back to the town from almost all the way on the other side of the forest. We hid all of our new weapons in hollow logs near the edge of the forest, so our parents would never see them again, and I sighed as we all walked out into the bright sunlight from under the trees. As usual, the street was empty and quiet, but then two laughing boys our age suddenly turned the corner and started running in our direction.
The boy with curly brown hair, who happened to be winning the little race, was wearing an old pair of soccer shorts and a plain white T-shirt with the Nike swoosh on it. His name was Josh, and he ran everywhere. And I mean everywhere. He did own a very nice bike, but for some reason he preferred running, and that’s how he chose to deliver the newspapers to people in our town almost every morning. I was already considering him as the prankster messenger god, Hermes.
The second boy, who was following close behind, was Josh’s best friend and partner in crime, Cole. I was also good friends with him, so I was secretly hoping he was a god, but honestly, I just wasn’t sure. He didn’t really have the standout qualities of any of the gods we had left to find, but he had many qualities from all the different gods. He was smart, pretty tough, and a funny guy overall, at least from what I had seen.
My gray eyes met Cole’s brown ones and I waved, and he just grinned with Josh as they slowed to a stop in front of us, still cracking up at an inside joke. “Well, if it isn’t the Monster Watch … and others?” Josh said questioningly while eyeing Shane, Alicia, and Camille.
I recognized the tone of his voice immediately—curious and slightly confused. After all, the Monster Watch was well known to be an exclusive club, and not one for the faint of heart. You see, the Monster Watch was the county’s loving nickname for Zach, Luke, Connor, and me, given to us because we were always going into the woods, which was rumored by children to hide terrible monsters, although no one but us knew how true that was. A clever reporter came up with the name when we were six, though it didn’t catch on until about a year later, when our parents finally realized that they couldn’t keep the four of us out of that terrible forest.
Luke only smiled at the mention of our nickname and asked politely, “What are you two up to?”
Cole and Josh exchanged mischievous glances and started laughing again. “We just pulled a prank on Matt. Man, he’s going to kill us!” Cole managed to gasp between his laughter, but Camille and I just rolled our eyes. We both had little tolerance for mischief, but unlike me, Camille seemed to try to avoid most boys as much as possible for this reason, which, in turn, was a reason I hadn’t gotten the chance to spend as much time with Camille as I would have liked.
Just then, we heard a very angry yell coming from down the street, “Arrgh! I’m going to kill you freaks and eat you for dinner!”
As if on cue, Matt, the biggest bully from our school, suddenly rounded the corner and stormed toward us. I saw that his brown buzz cut, red shirt, and jeans were covered in paint of all the different colors of the rainbow. I had to admit he looked pretty ridiculous, so I started snickering along with the rest of the Monster Watch, Shane, and Alicia. Camille, however, was just frowning.
“You know, cannibalism isn’t tolerated in America!” Josh shouted back at him, and we all started laughing again. I had to admit that kid had some guts, messing with Matt. But the unfazed Matt only continued to stomp toward us, his face getting even redder by the second, and I could have sworn that I saw steam blowing out of his nose and ears. He really did look like he might kill them, or at least beat them up. This unwavering ruthlessness made Matt the perfect candidate for Ares, the angry war god.
Josh and Cole were just thinking about taking off and hiding from Matt when a police car slowly rolled down the street and stopped to talk to Matt. It was one of only three police cars in the entire county, and it happened to be driven by Alicia’s father. “What do we do? You two could get in so much trouble,” Alicia hissed at Josh and Cole, knowing how strict her father could be at times.
Frowning, I watched Matt turn to the officer and begin to tell his story, waving his colorful arms around his head as he spoke in a raised voice. I knew that if Josh and Cole were going to make a clean escape, there was only one place Alicia’s father wouldn’t go.
“Into the woods. Now,” I whispered.
Camille, Alicia, Josh, and the rest of the Monster Watch immediately turned and took a step toward the woods, the safe haven for our godliness. Cole, however, stood frozen in place, his brown eyes wide, and Shane simply sighed as he leaned over on his cane. With a dismissive wave, Shane ordered, “Just go without me. I’ll slow everyone down, so I’ll only go in there when I’m truly needed.”
The rest of us nodded in understanding, but Josh still looked over at Cole expectantly. Stuffing his hands in his pockets, shoulders slumped, Cole shook his head apologetically and said, “Sorry, dude, but I’m not ready to die yet.” He spun on his heel and took off down the road without another word, Shane hobbling along slowly behind him.
Yet, I thought wishfully. But maybe later.
I pushed the thought of Cole out of my mind as the seven of us left hid only a few yards inside the forest behind some trees, just long enough to make sure Alicia’s dad was gone and to tell Josh about the prophecy that the Oracle of Delphi had given to us. At first, he thought we were absolutely crazy, but then he caught a glimpse of the Minotaur from afar.
When we finally walked back out onto Main Street, the police car was gone, but unfortunately, Matt was standing there on the cracked sidewalk, still waiting for us and still covered in paint. He quickly stomped up to Josh and prodded him in the chest. “One day I will get you. I’ll make sure of it.”
Zach only sighed irritably, pushed the bully away from Josh, and growled, “Get over it, Matt. We have to tell you something.” And so, for the third time that day, we had to explain our godliness to a classmate. But unlike the dubious Josh, Matt’s face immediately brightened at the thought of being a Greek god. I knew power was everything to him; he bullied everyone he saw as a threat.
Later, we left Matt on the street outside the antique shop and slowly headed back toward our houses on Maple Street. Obviously in a hurry, Camille peeled off to the left toward her small, white home down the road, while the rest of us stopped at Alicia’s house, which was on the corner.
Lucky for us, Alicia’s father wasn’t home, and her sister, Madison, was kneeling outside in the grass next to some beautiful flowers. She wore a yellow summer dress that matched her happy mood, even though the hem was covered in soil, and her long blonde hair was held up in a ponytail, a freshly picked daisy tucked behind her ear. The five of us had talked it over earlier in the forest with Shane, Alicia, and Camille, and we had all decided that Madison, who loved gardening, would make a perfect Demeter, the goddess of the harvest and fertility.
Zach smiled and greeted her kindly, “Hey, Maddie. What’s up?” Madison returned his smile and blushed, while Alicia just glared at her. I was not the goddess of love, but I could tell when someone had a crush going on. Sensing trouble, I simply shook my head and looked down at the freshly mowed grass under my shoes, leaving the rest of the Monster Watch and Alicia to explain everything to her.
As the conversation went on, Madison’s bright brown eyes grew wider and wider, until I thought they might burst. She was definitely surprised, to say the least. By the end, all she could say was, “Wow.”
Afterward, Zach, Connor, Luke, and I left the sisters alone to quarrel about Zach and headed across the street to our own houses. We had all agreed that it was time for a snack. Chattering excitedly, we went to Connor’s house first because we thought his mother would make us ham and cheese sandwiches, but unfortunately for us, no one was home. Although we were quite capable of making the sandwiches ourselves, we nine-year-olds were much too lazy and impatient. Besides, we knew that none of the rest of our parents would be home yet either, so we retreated into the woods to play a couple rounds of reverse hide-and-seek. While we were still hungry, there were delicious berries to munch on inside the forest, if you knew where to look and which ones were safe to eat. I then tried to convince them otherwise, but the guys forced me to hide first, which was a big mistake. They searched for a full three hours before giving up, when I had just been hiding in a tree near Pan’s hideout. Zach and Luke had also taken turns hiding, but we had found them fairly quickly and with no real problems.
By the time we came out of the mysterious forest, the sun had long since set in the sky, and it was dark, with the first stars just beginning to shine. Wasting no time in returning to our human families, we bid each other goodbye and I quickly ran up the stairs to my front porch, clutching my stomach after realizing how hungry I was. Something to eat besides berries would have been nice.
Humming softly to myself, I opened the screen door and stepped into the kitchen. It was surprisingly dark at such a late time of night, and so I began frowning in confusion almost instantly. Sure enough, I heard a sniffling sound coming from my left and turned to see my mother, her silky brown hair covering her face as she tried to hide her tears. I only frowned deeper and looked past her into the next room, where I saw my father lurking, still standing tall but slightly hunched over. He was rummaging through the piles of papers strewn about the living room and grumbling loudly to himself, like a bear, about many unrelated things all at once. By the way he was stumbling around the dimly lit room, I could tell he had been drinking, probably beer of some sort. I couldn’t say I was surprised, though, as he had been labeled an alcoholic a long time ago.
When my father was drunk, he often yelled and fought with my mother, and every once in a while he would even take off in the middle of the night to an unknown location, sometimes even out of the country. But he would always return a few days later with a fancy antique in hand as a gift for my mother, acting like nothing bad had ever happened between the two of them. No one knew where he got these fancy possessions, most of which were paintings, but no one really wanted to ask, out of fear that his mysterious adventures sometimes involved illegal dealings. And he wasn’t native to the town, a fact that seemed to make him even less trustworthy in the eyes of others.
At such a young age, I was already growing to hate my father and was fed up with his immature actions, which would even force me out of my own house occasionally. I remembered spending many nights at Zach and Luke’s house, curled up on the floor of their bedroom and wrapped tightly in Zach’s extra blanket. If having a sleepover with two boys was a strange thing for a nine-year-old girl to do, Martha didn’t seem to think so. Out of worry for my safety and emotional health, she often invited me to stay there if my parents were being especially loud and possibly violent, no matter how old I was, and I was always grateful to her.
Of course, my mother tried and failed to keep these fights a secret from me and from the rest of the town. When I wasn’t camping out next door, I spent sleepless nights sitting at the top of the stairs, quiet as a mouse, listening to my parents fight for hours on end. When I was four or five years old, I used to get frightened, but I was now accustomed to their bickering and did not scare so easily anymore. Needless to say, I had seen far worse in the forest.
Therefore, I just bit my lip, thinking that it was probably time I confronted them about their arguments anyway. Unsure of exactly what to say, I awkwardly patted my mother’s shoulder and whispered, “It’s okay to cry, Mom.”
She pushed the hair out of her eyes and gave me a broken smile. She was looking down at me, and it wasn’t just because I was shorter than her. “Then why do you never cry anymore, sweetie?” my mother said as she stroked my hair lovingly.
I cringed and gritted my teeth in silence, closing my eyes to avoid meeting her sorrowful eyes. To be honest, I hated when she called me sweetie because, in case you hadn’t noticed, I was definitely not sweet. I hadn’t been sweet in three years. Truthfully, I was armed and dangerous, but I knew I could never tell my parents about what really happened in the woods. And that secret was eating me alive.
So instead, I took a deep breath and replied seriously, “Because I realize now that I’ve never come across anything worth crying over.”
Then I simply turned on my heel and walked upstairs to my room. I had nothing else to say to her.
___________________
The next day, Connor and I met Luke and Zach at their parents’ restaurant, the Fire Pit, which was named after the elaborate fireplace in the back of the room that was kept burning all day during the frigid winters. Together, we sat down in our own comfortable booth at the back of the restaurant, chatting happily and sipping the fresh, ice-cold lemonade for free. I always swore that the Fire Pit made the best-tasting lemonade in the world, but at that moment, the four of us were not savoring the sweet drink as much as usual. In fact, we were in the middle of arguing over who would hide first in that day’s round of reverse hide-and-seek when a classmate of ours strode into the room with a swagger to her step.
It was Becca, doing her best runway walk. At our age, she was already the prettiest girl in the state—probably even in the entire world—and she knew it. People of all ages would stop and stare at her whenever she strutted by, mystified by her elegant beauty, her seemingly innocent sensuousness. She was obviously the gorgeous goddess of love and desire, Aphrodite.
Becca’s soft blue eyes lit up when she spotted us from the doorway, and she flipped her silky, strawberry-blonde hair with confidence before heading over to our table. “What are you boys doing here?” she asked flirtatiously.
I was only slightly annoyed that she chose to ignore me, as usual. Meanwhile, Luke flashed his white teeth and answered her, “Not much, Aphrodite.”
Becca wrinkled her nose in slight confusion. “What did you just call me?” she asked, and I couldn’t say I was surprised to find out that she was not familiar with any Greek myths. I guessed she probably spent all of her afternoons painting her nails or going shopping at the mall a few towns away, not studying Greek history.
Great, I thought sarcastically when her eyes began to light up as Zach continued with our story. We just gave her an even bigger ego. I sighed and shook my head. Shane suddenly staggered through the doorway and came over to sit down with us, but Becca only looked down disapprovingly at him and his cane. She could be nice at times, but so snobby at other times, it was unbelievable. Unsurprisingly, she quickly excused herself and went to sit outside, though I couldn’t say I was too disappointed.
Luke, Connor, Shane, and Zach continued their conversation while I looked around the room. Over at one of the tall bar stools, our classmate Jack was on his third large glass of lemonade. I had honestly never seen someone drink so much at once, so I knew he had to be Dionysus, the god of wine. I just frowned, however, and decided that we would fill him in a bit later, when he was slightly more stable.
“So, who’s the last god?” Shane asked, tilting his head, and I turned back to face the boys. Finally, a topic worth my attention.
“Hades,” Zach replied, his brow furrowing, fists clenching.
So far, we had found no one who would match the personality of the ruler of the Underworld, but I suddenly remembered a newspaper article about missing people, specifically the mention of a classmate or two, from the week when the Monster Watch had first gone into the forest. I was beginning to think that we would not find Hades here in town. Instead, he would be stuck under the ground, perhaps lounging around in a large palace all by himself, living exactly like he had since he found out from someone else—the Oracle, most likely—that he was a god.
“Don’t forget Hestia,” Connor added, referring to the goddess of the hearth.
I snapped my fingers and exclaimed, “Haley!” Zach let out a whoop and high-fived me, obviously agreeing. Feeling extremely motivated, we left the restaurant quickly, even though we had no real reason to hurry, and headed to Haley’s house, where she spent most of her time outside of school. It also happened to be right next door to Alicia and Madison’s, which would definitely be convenient later on in our godly careers.
A few minutes later, the five of us arrived at her house, a little one-story building painted a soft lavender color, almost gray. We stepped up on her porch in unison, and Zach rang the doorbell. The screen door creaked open almost immediately, and Haley tentatively poked her head out, her long, light brown hair flowing in the slight breeze and her nimble fingers gripping the doorframe. Even though it was very warm outside, she wore a purple cashmere sweater, which she only hugged tighter around her. She always managed to stay cool and collected. I couldn’t remember ever seeing her lash out at anyone for anything, to be honest.
“Um, hi,” Haley said meekly, obviously not expecting to see us. Admittedly, she did not get too many visitors.
“Let’s take a walk,” Zach suggested as Shane politely stuck out his arm for her to take, and Haley glanced back over her shoulder, deeper into her mysterious house, before silently shrugging and taking Shane’s arm. Together, we aimlessly walked down the streets as we told her our story, and she silently listened to us. I thought she was taking the whole thing very well, better than any of the other gods had (or at least more calmly), and I was eager to see what she would think of the monsters when she visited our lovely woods.
A few minutes later, we bid Haley and Shane farewell, and the rest of the Monster Watch and I headed back into our second home, the forest. For now, our work was done. But now what? We had found all the gods (except for Hades, who was left to figure out all this on his own—if Zach could avoid a problem like Hades, he would) remarkably fast, which I thought was quite strange, even though we lived in such a tiny town. As it turned out, there was a good reason for this too. However, we didn’t find out why we had been so motivated, why the Fates had been on our side that day until six years later, when we were fulfilling the prophecy …