Cole
The nerves under my skin tingle with anticipation. Later, I will be tired, allow myself to feel scared, or worried. Right now? I’m brassed off and ready to plant the three Weird Sisters six feet underground.
“Clever he may be,” the blond observes, “but, will it save him?” She pauses, head poking up in curious bird fashion. “If we answer your question, you will give us the eye?”
“Of course.” Gideon tosses me the eye. Blech. Oh, this is bloody disgusting. Sticky with gooey shite all over it, the thing must have a lot of power for them to want it so badly. I hold the desired object near the pit, ready to be rid of it. The fire flares higher, flames reaching for the eye. Gideon’s theatrics, no doubt, and very effective.
“Do not singe the eye!” the sisters plead. “He mustn’t have it, nooo.”
The blond steps nearer. With one hand outstretched, her mouth parts as if she’ll speak.
A sudden flash and lightning explodes in the cave, temporarily blinding me. I whirl, but the blond is on me. Attached to my back, she weighs nothing, and beats my head with both fists like a tyrannical child.
Gideon stumbles, nearly knocking us over as the other two attack him.
I twist round, grappling with the creature clawing my neck, biting my shoulder. She lets go only to sink her teeth into the shell of my ear. I shout, and double over, letting loose with a string of obscenities.
The eyeball is plucked from my hand. Victorious cackling echoes off the shimmering cave walls.
When my fingers slide over my damaged ear, the top half is missing.
This isn’t remotely how the story happened with Perseus.
And that bitch is going down.
My body hums with energy as Gideon and I face the snarling threesome.
His head tilts, keeping watch on our enemies. “Forget the eye. I’m thinking barbeque, southern style.”
I smile. Though we didn’t have good old-fashioned pig roasts in the UK, I’d spent enough time in the south to get his meaning.
While the Weird Sisters are laughing it up over their win, Gideon pulls fire from the dwindling pit. He molds the ball of flame in his hands like Play Dough. His lids lower to slits. Jaw clenched, back ramrod straight.
I don’t know where he learned that trick, but I’m glad he’s on my side.
Boom! Gideon slams the fireball to the floor.
The witches recoil in a chorus of shrieks.
The three separate in an attempt to flee, but fire races around the sisters creating an inescapable prison.
Except for me.
I concentrate on a spot in the middle of the fire ring. Muscles shake and then I’m there. The blond growls as I relieve her of the eye. Sharp teeth protrude from sickly, white gums—the same teeth that took my ear, and yeah, I’m vain enough to hold a grudge. I teleport to the space behind her. One good shove on her bony spine, and she topples face first into the blaze.
Her rags catch fire. The fabric blackens as the flames lick higher, igniting her long, knotted hair. The spectacle is terrible and (I’m sorry) fascinating. I can’t look away. Apparently, the woman was never taught to stop, drop, and roll in school, because she sprints around the circle, knee action higher than an Olympian.
Her sisters plead for mercy. They aren’t talking to me but to Gideon, who stands as stony faced as an Egyptian sphinx. In either desperation or a gleaming moment of stupidity, the burning blond leaps onto her dark-haired sister who will share her fire and her fate.
“Gideon! Hold up. We need one alive.” I teleport from the ring to my partner’s side and finish my thought unbroken. “She may know something about Pan.”
The redhead kneels. Bony hands clasped together, she begs for her life even as the blond falls to the ground in a smoking heap. The brunette staggers about, a wheeling inferno. Gideon waves a hand and the fire dies allowing the last witch her freedom.
The survivor creeps nearer, clothes blackened by the fire that incinerated her sisters. I’m ready for anything, but she doesn’t rise from her knees. Her face lifts, the hole in her forehead a filthy, dark void. “Mighty paladin, spare me.”
I don’t know what a paladin is, and right now, I don’t care. “Tell us about Pan.”
Her head retracts into her shoulders. “Very well.” She coughs and spits farther than any fútbol player I’ve ever seen. “He is not indestructible.” Thankful the woman needs no more persuasion to give up her secrets, she spills like a broken dam. “I know not how to kill him—my oath on the eye. Yet, he may be weakened. His power to see you lies in the ability to see himself. Destroy his sight to earn your freedom.”
“Bloody munter, you want us to dig his eyes out?” Nerves tweak my spine all the way to the end.
She cackles. “Fool. That simple, it is not.”
“Explain! Destroy it how?” Veins bulge in Gideon’s neck as he shouts. A ball of flame leaps from the fire into his hand.
The witch cowers with a cry. “Your weakness makes him strong. Grow stronger yourselves. Destroy his way to see!” Her fingers splay in the dust as she dissolves into tears. “I speak true, I speak true, oh great paladins … ”
Gideon’s eyes roll with typical impatience.
I lift a shoulder. It’s clear the witch is terrified. I sense no lie, but he’s right, her blathering doesn’t help us.
I kneel before the witch, and pull the manky eye from my pocket. “Hag.” The gray head wobbles on her flabby neck. Her breath holds the stench of a thousand dumpsters as she whimpers, and I wonder if she senses the eye is near. “I will give you your sight, if you tell me how to take his.”
“He seeks the living, only the living, so you must pollute the silver circles of sight. The dead may not enter there, no, no. It is forbidden. Therefore, use the dead. Only then will you be free. Blind Pan with the dead and he can seek you no more.”
Gideon curses. “Leave her, Wynter. It’s useless.”
Barking? Yes. Useless? I’m not so sure. I rise and toss the eye to the other side of the cave. The old bat scampers after it, faster than what makes me comfortable.
Gideon and I beat a hasty retreat to the mouth of the cave. Out of the den, down the hillside, to the valley, heading the opposite way we came through the swamp. We walk in silence for the first twenty minutes. I drag my weary feet, so it’s no surprise when my toe catches the edge of a rock, and I stumble. Gideon shoulders me up, and we press on. Minutes, hours, it’s easy to lose track of time here. And all the while, my mind’s fixated on the witch’s puzzling words … and Rose.
Maddox glances over and frowns. “We need to do something with that ear soon. It’s still bleeding.”
Hurts too. I glance at the white sun hanging just past noon in the sky. I know its position is merely a suggestion of time. “Thanks. You can have a look when we stop, if you like.”
We round the next bend, then another. I chew on the inside of my cheek, sizing up our journey so far. Rae’s missing, no sign of Rose, zombies, poisoned flowers, and then I go and make a bloody fool of myself when the sisters hexed us, espousing all of Maddox’s fine qualities. I need to clear that up right now. “Listen, mate, the other day, I said things … ”
Gideon gives his standard expression for get to the damn point. Or better still, don’t, and just shut up.
Right. “I was under a spell, talking rubbish the way a person might if he’d gotten rat-arsed at the pub, or gone completely mental. So—”
“Stop. I’m begging you.”
I do—both my feet and my mouth.
“Look.” Gideon’s fingers snag in his matted curls. “This place is cursed, so nothing makes sense. As far as I’m concerned, we worked well as a team today. There’s no need to discuss what either of us said back there. Ever.”
I nod, but my grin is hard to suppress. Not surprisingly, Maddox can’t deal with bromance. “Suits me, mate,” I say, clapping him on the shoulder. And for the first time since I’ve known him, he doesn’t shrug me off.