13 #2
His dark hair and beard are wild and wind-torn, both flowing to his waist. The waves roughly embroidered onto his kimono rise and fall. I wonder whether they keep time with the tide lapping this island or hold the rhythm of the crests surrounding his realm.
He smells like the sea. When he pushes up the sleeves of his kimono, delicate trails of salt lace his beige skin.
“You survived the first trial,” Ares remarks, glancing from August to me.
Does he want us to thank him? Bask in the praise? No, he wants us dead.
I ignore him. August also remains quiet.
Ares is undeterred by our inattention. “You’re both natural leaders, but you work well together and with others.” He grins at August. “You could write a song about the experience. I’m sure the masses would love to hear something new.”
August’s fingers blanch on the carved arm of his chair. A muscle tightens in his jaw.
Now that all seats at the three tables are filled, Hermes invites everyone to ‘gorge themselves’.
I look over the delicacies displayed on the table before me.
Hazel eyes peer at me through the steam on the other side of the table.
Like most Greeks, his hair is dark and curled, long enough to brush his brows, ears, and nape.
His pale shirt is stark against golden skin.
Where his tunic parts, his chest reveals a well-healed slash.
It’s not the one I gave him, but one equally as striking.
My eyes fall away from his. I should apologize, but what could I possibly say that would make a difference to him now? He has good reason to hate me. An apology won’t change anything.
“You have my gratitude for stopping my soldier from blazing a path that would have led to his untimely death,” Ares remarks to me, pointing his glass at his former kern.
Susanoo reaches over my plate to collect a small loaf of bread from a basket. He tears it in half and drizzles honey over the steaming center before taking his first bite. When he’s done chewing, he gestures to the Greek. “If you’re so grateful, Ares, why haven’t you offered to champion him?”
The Greek has enough sense to keep his mouth shut.
Susanoo continues. “Most pantheons have one or two divine to take part in this contest; some are helping in the design. But not the Greeks. Nearly all of you are involved.” Susanoo leans forward to peer at Ares around me.
“Why is this young man championless? He’s a skilled driver; one of your warriors, as you’ve said. Why do you scorn him?”
“As a pantheon, we agreed together that any championship we pledge must be hard-earned,” Ares responds. “Blood and even prior service isn’t enough.”
The Japanese god’s dark eyes sparkle. “Yet it was enough for you to nominate him as a potential hero?” Susanoo pushes.
The Greek god of war’s grin is positively lethal. “He deserved the nomination.”
Susanoo ends the conversation with a final jab. “Then surely, one from among your number will deem him worthy.” Susanoo returns to his bread, tearing into it with gusto, and drops the matter.
“Or perhaps another pantheon will recognize his value,” a demure voice offers.
All heads swivel to the beautiful goddess seated to the left of the Greek soldier.
Her midnight hair is rolled and pinned atop her head.
Her skin seems lit from within by a faint blue light, a hue that matches her lovely furisode.
Chang’e, Chinese goddess of the moon, begins to speak to the Greek so quietly that Ares and Susanoo lean in to try and hear their conversation.
If he’s about to earn her favor, good for him.
I distract the god of war so he can’t eavesdrop. After all, the enemy of my enemy is my friend. “Can you tell us who designed the first trial?” I have my suspicions…
He sits back, takes his fork and stabs a piece of mutton from a platter, and drags it onto his plate before sawing it into pieces.
He heaps vegetables on next and adds a variety of fruits.
Instead of answering my question, he points at my plate.
“You haven’t taken any food,” he replies.
“I would think you of all the contestants would be grateful for the abundance.”
Why should I be humiliated? Why shouldn’t it be the gods who are ashamed?
“It seems so easy for the divine to conjure such bounty,” I lead.
He takes the bait. “It is.”
“Then why do you allow so many mortals to go hungry?”
His fork goes still; the tines are stuck in the flesh of a pear. “Why should deities dangle grapes at every mouth when mortals have hands with which to work the vines?”
I shrug, then take some of the horta in honor of my brother in case he’s watching, figs – Abuela’s favorite, half a pomegranate and a cluster of red grapes for myself.
Then I add an eel and a cut of red mullet instead of boar – the thought of boar makes me shudder – a spoonful of vegetables, and a piece of bread.
“You say they don’t labor to feed themselves, when very often the opposite is true. How often do you deign to speak with the mortals in your care? Do you even take time to walk among them?” I take a bite of beet. The fuchsia root is like nothing I’ve ever tasted, so finely and fragrantly spiced.
Susanoo tips his glass of wine to me before bringing it to his mouth to smother his approving smile.
At the next table, claps and cheers erupt. At least someone’s having fun.
Ares begins to eat again. “Tyr crafted the bridge, the mountains, and their troll. The chariots, salt flat, and the weapons were designed by Horus,” he deigns to answer.
August leans forward, forearms pushing his plate against a platter. “Do you honestly intend for any mortal to make it to the games?”
“What would the games be without contenders?” Ares poses.
“You’ll have to call them off if you lose as many in each trial as you did today,” Aymes remarks conversationally before leaning back in his chair and popping a grape into his mouth.
“You’ll find every trial to be different,” Ares explains. He takes a drink of wine. “Some won’t claim any lives.”
If we survive all five, what pieces of our humanity will we lose in those contests?
Ares flicks a finger against the curve of August’s stemmed glass. “Neither of you have had any of Dionysus’s vintage.”
The Greek god of wine doesn’t have to walk to each guest and pour their glasses full. He simply wills the wine into them, and his power refills them any time someone drinks.
“I prefer water,” I explain. And to remain sober around the divine.
Dionysus weaves his will into his blends.
Everyone knows that. Some relax inhibitions with one sip.
Other vintages obliterate them entirely.
Some steal fears and secrets. Others conjure nightmares and hallucinations that seem so real, mortals have thrown themselves off buildings just to escape them.
I’m not interested in being on the receiving end of his inventive gifts.
Suddenly, a muffled thump jolts the bottom of my foot. I shove my chair back to find that our table has been set over a wooden door inlaid in the temple floor. A door that leads to a stairway and the portal we took to and from today’s trial.
Another thud.
Then bang. Bang! Bang!
Ares waits for everyone to vacate their seats, then shoves the table to the side. He pulls on a golden ring to lift the heavy door.
Standing there, squinting against the portal’s bright light, panting and covered in sweat, mud, and grit, is the twenty-sixth contestant. The thirty-something male who was stranded on the other side of the bridge when the troll broke it in two.
I smile. He made it.
The man ascends on weary, muscled legs. “Thanks for leaving the portal open. I wasn’t sure it would work after everyone else made it through.
” His tone is cutting. He takes in the surprised divine and relieved mortals, the tables and all the food on them, then throws his head back and laughs.
“Looks like I’m just in time for supper. I’m starving!”
He dumps someone’s plate onto the table, Susanoo’s, I think, and begins to fill the dirty dish with whatever he wants.
It’s silent as he reaches his bare, soiled hand into platter after platter, not once bothering with the serving spoons and forks, until he can’t fit another morsel on his plate without it tumbling over the side. Then he steals a fork and takes a seat.
He starts shoveling the food into his mouth, barely stopping to swallow. I don’t know whose wine glass he grabs, but he drains it, snorting when he sets it down and Dionysus’s power fills it again.
Twigs and pine needles hang in his braided, sand-colored hair. His tunic is frayed and every inch of fabric is stained with blood, sweat, or grime. Freshly healed cuts score his forehead and cheek.
The Greek crouches at his side, grinning from ear to ear. “How in the realms did you make it back?”
“Through the gorge,” he answers between bites. And while still chewing, he regales the room with his tale.
Long story short: he unbridled the stallions from his chariot, took one and raced to the start of the bridge, leading it down the steep mountain. He followed the stone arches through the valley.
He had to abandon the warhorse to cross a raging river and almost drowned doing so, but eventually he was spit out on the opposite shore. The rest of the way was spent on foot, avoiding the troll who was angry that his feeding had come to such an abrupt end.
The portal at the finish brought him to the abandoned arena. He found the glowing door that led to the temple, where he emerged in darkness because the golden light winked out behind him. He could hear our revelry, so he climbed the steps and started pounding on the door at the top.