Chapter XXVIII #2
It is like fire, searing hot as it ripples from the point of her touch and makes its way across my entire head.
My knees buckle and then collapse as the pain intensifies.
My head slams against the floor and stars explode in my vision, but even that isn’t enough to distract me from the burning.
It rips me in and out of consciousness, dappling my vision so that I see the world around me only in broken pieces.
I feel something graze my shoulders, my arms. In a moment of clarity, I see my locs begin to fall around me as if they were being cut.
There is so much pain, but beneath it, I still feel the utter anguish of that loss. I pray.
My hair. My hair. Please, don’t take my hair.
The locs continue to fall. I screw my eyes shut, but that does nothing to block out the new sound—a hissing.
My locs are gone, but something else is on my head.
Beneath the pain, I feel fresh horror. Has Athena set live serpents on me?
I don’t see them, but I can hear them all around me. Where are they?
The pain stops as suddenly as it began. I didn’t realize I’ve been rocking back and forth; my body shudders to a stop as I sit back on my heels.
My head feels strangely heavy, and I stare at the floor as a new sound fills my ears alongside the hissing: frantic whispers from the gods watching all around me.
My pulse leaps again. What is going on? Why do they look so afraid?
“Meddy!”
Someone in the crowd pushes through. Tears still blur my vision, but I’d know that voice anywhere. Theo. My friend is pushing through the throng of gods, struggling as one of the other slaves tries to hold him back. Theo shakes him off and runs toward me, his expression determined.
“Meddy!” There is a desperation in his voice.
“Theo.” My voice breaks. “Help me, please.”
“It’s all right, Meddy.” The words come out choked, but Theo is still coming toward me. “It’s going to be all right. We—”
It happens fast.
My eyes lock with Theo’s, and he falters in his steps. A look I don’t understand flashes across his face as he stops moving. He is still staring at me, but there is confusion there, pain.
I stand. “Theo?”
Theo’s throat bobs, as though his response were trapped there.
He opens his mouth, but no words leave it.
Instead, something else catches my attention.
It is small, so small at first that I wonder if I’m imagining it.
A tiny fleck of Theo’s skin near his jaw seems to be leached of color.
I watch the warm brown skin turn white, then ash gray, then harden. I go numb.
“Theo!”
My head is still throbbing, I still feel sick, but I run to him.
No one stops me as I close the gap between us.
Theo isn’t looking at me anymore. His eyes are coin-wide and gaping at something in the distance.
I grab his shoulders, vaguely aware that they are turning to stone, too.
I watch as the gray spreads up to his cheeks, his ears, his curly hair.
“No.” I moan. I feel myself falling, dropping down so that I’m at Theo’s stone feet, clinging to his cold, hard legs. “No, please!”
The hissing returns tenfold, right against my ear, and I shudder.
There is no controlling it now: My stomach empties itself right there at Theo’s feet. Someone gasps; others make sounds of disgust. I don’t care. Slowly, I rise. In my periphery, I see people turning their heads away. It takes a beat for my mind to process what’s happening.
They’re turning away…because they’re afraid.
I keep my head lowered until I catch a silver glint and chance a look upward. It is a mirror, a large one my father had ordered the slaves to install in the hall some time ago. I look directly into it.
That is when I understand that Athena has not set serpents on me.
Staring back at me in the reflection is a creature with brown skin, full lips, and pus-yellow eyes.
Its pupils aren’t round and black, but slitted like a feral cat’s.
Worse still is the place where its hair should be.
The creature’s head is covered with long black snakes.
No, not covered: Its hair is made from snakes.
They writhe against one another, tangling like so many grotesque locs.
The creature in the mirror’s reflection blinks back at me, and I see a single tear roll down its cheek.
My cheek.
No. I know the truth, but I still plead. Please, no.
He turned to stone. Theo turned to stone…because I looked at him.
There are no longer whispers in the hall. Somewhere distant, I hear shouts. Gods are backing away in earnest. I hear snatches of their words.
Monster.
Abomination.
Athena’s words return to me.
This girl has chosen to use her beauty for blasphemy and wickedness, so she will have beauty no longer.
Monster. That word strikes me over and over. She’s made me a monster.
I am still upright, but my knees are threatening to give out again. Not here: I won’t fall here a second time. I can’t. I taste danger in the air, and some primal instinct gives me a single directive.
Go.
I spare a final glance at Theo, at the statue of my friend. His face is still the picture of fear. That is the last way he’ll ever look at me.
I turn on my heel and sprint toward the nearest door. No one stops me.
Go.
I crash through the hall’s doors and run into the darkness without looking back.