Children of the Gods Read online

  We were running down the staircase, as far as we could get from the food court, when my mother finally stopped. She turned around to face me when we were on the landing between levels and grabbed both of my arms so tightly it hurt.

  Before she could say anything, the question burst out of me. “What’s going on?”

  My mom shook her head, her platinum blonde hair danced in the dim light. My brain was still processing everything too fast, the conversation was going to take way too long.

  “I thought you’d be safe for a day,” she answered. Her voice sounded like it was stretched out again, slower than it should’ve been.

  “You’re in danger, you have to get somewhere with trees. Tell the trees you’re a demi-god and you need to get to school.”

  Alright, my mom had gone crazy. I probably had too. That thing couldn’t have been real, but I wasn’t telling anyone to talk to trees.

  I tried to take my mom’s hands, intent on insisting she calm down and tell me what she was talking about, but she shoved me toward the second flight of stairs.

  “Go! I’m right behind you!”

  Even in the distorted, slowed down voice I was hearing, my mother’s terror rang loud and clear. I didn’t want to argue. Especially when the bird-woman screeched again, much closer than I had expected.

  I raced down the stairs to the first floor, checking to make sure my mother was behind me before I sprinted toward the mall’s exit.

  It was strange, hearing the slowed down footfalls behind me and the screech of the creature chasing us should have been enough to leave me wheezing in a corner. My chest was tight, my heart was trying to break out of my body, but otherwise I felt fine.

  Sure, I was terrified, but it had a direction this time. Usually when my veins pulsed with adrenaline and my heart went into overdrive, I was freaked out for no reason. This time, I knew exactly what the reason was. Somehow, that kept me from spiralling out of control.

  I made it across the same strip of stores that my mom and I had passed on the way into the mall. The smell of pretzels and pizza hit me again. This time, there were more people. They stared at me and my mother as we ran by, but with looks of confusion on their faces. That meant the bird-thing wasn’t close, we were at least going to make it outside.

  I pushed open the glass doors and stopped to hold it open for my mom. She was yards behind me, and when I looked for her, I saw the creature that was chasing up.

  Its grey wings spread wide, flapping every few seconds, thrusting it forward faster than my mother could run.

  The people around the entrance had stopped to scream and crouch down. Nobody had even bothered to run, except my mother, who was waving me away.

  “Lexi, go! GO!”

  Yeah, right. Like I was going to leave my mother to be attacked by whatever that thing was. I held my ground until she finally made it through the door, and then I slammed it shut and leaned against it with all of my weight.

  The creature slammed into the glass a second later. The door shattered completely, but only half of the bird-woman made it through. Her leathery face and wings were instantly covered in long gashes, black blood oozed out of her like she had tar pumping through her veins. She looked dazed, but still conscious.

  My mother grabbed my arm and pulled me away. We ran around the side of the mall and then turned the corner, headed for a small garden area just behind the mall.

  She had been serious, she wanted to talk to trees.

  We stopped once we reached the little garden. I leaned over, with my hands on my knees, panting for breath. My mother ran toward the nearest tree, and I wondered how to book an appointment with a psychologist.

  The garden area was barely large enough for us, the two trees, and the bench that sat in it. There weren’t any weeds or flowers growing in the soil, which seemed a little odd. The grass was all exactly the same height, I couldn’t help but notice while staring directly at it. This mall didn’t seem like it would waste money paying landscaping for this little spit of grass.

  My mother cursed and sat down on the arm of the bench. She was panting, too, her hair was stuck to her forehead with sweat, and her entire torso heaved with every one of her breaths.

  “What?” I asked, between gasps.

  “It’s a fake... the tree is just for decoration,” she panted. Her eyes were watering like she was going to cry.

  “Yeah, okay, mom, listen to what you’re saying,” I said in a slow, careful voice.

  She shook her head. “We need to get back to the car, now hurry,” she responded as she stood and started to run again.

  Time was already returning to normal, I heard my mother’s voice at regular speed, but my heart was still racing and my breathing was heavy. When I tried to follow after my mother, I realized we were both moving much slower than we had been while running through the mall. Neither of us was exactly in shape, we weren’t going to be able to run much longer.

  We got back to the car without a problem, but when we did I could see the creature again. It was still stuck in the door, struggling to free itself from the metal frame that had held the glass it had shattered. It screeched and raged, flailing around in an attempt to free itself, but it looked like it was in the exact same position it had been in when we had left it.

  By the time I shut the car door, with myself inside it, the car was already running. I heard the tires squeal as my mother peeled out, driving over the empty parking spaces in the most direct route to the parking lot’s exit.

  “Care to explain now?” I demanded as I fumbled with the seat belt that didn’t seem to want to buckle.

  “They told me this would happen,” she said. I didn’t think she was responding to my question, it sounded like she was talking to herself. “They told me you had to be there by your birthday.”

  The seat belt finally clicked in, just before our car violently bounced over the speed bump my mother hadn’t slowed down for.

  “What would happen?” I insisted.

  I almost wanted to shake her, but her eyes were so wild and focused I wasn’t sure that was the best idea. I imagined her spinning the wheel wildly if I so much as touched her, and I didn’t want to die in a car crash.

  The car spun, my mother had driven out into traffic without slowing down. The world swirled around me in a blaze of color. Then, we were speeding down the street so quickly it made me dizzy and I had to focus on my mother again. From the whine of the engine I could tell we were definitely going over the speed limit.

  “Where’s the nearest tree?” My mom demanded.

  “Mom! What’s going on?”

  “There!”

  There was a loud thud, it felt like the car had jumped. I was lifted off my seat and was airborne for a second before I crashed back down and the car bounced up and down a few more times.

  I chanced a glance outside. We were driving across a field of grass. There was a small park near the mall, apparently, and instead of driving around to the entrance, my mother had driven over a sidewalk to get there.

  The brakes squealed and the car slid sideways as we skidded to a halt. My mother was instantly out of the car without even killing the engine. I staggered out, a little dizzy, and couldn’t help but gawk at the four long ruts in the grass that had been left behind by my mother’s mad dash.

  My mother hurried around the backside of the car. I thought she was coming to hurry me along, again, but she stopped to open the trunk.

  “What’re you doing now?” I asked, no longer demanding, now just resigned. I had reached the threshold for confusion.

  She pulled out the laptop box and shoved it into my hands when I walked up to see what she was doing. I grabbed it out of reflex and then looked up to see her pointing behind me.

  “That big tree behind you, that’s definitely one of them. Hurry, tell them that you’re a demi-god and you need to get to school.”

  Her face had calmed down, she looked more like my mother again, but her voice was frantic. Somehow, besides the strands stuck to her forehead, her hair was still in perfect condition. I didn’t even need a mirror to know that mine looked horrible. I could feel it sticking up in odd places and see loose strands all over my field of vision.

  “I’m not taking another step until you tell me what’s going on!” I insisted. I stomped my foot in anger, an action I immediately regretted. I felt like a child throwing a tantrum, but it felt fitting for the situation. At least until I had done it, then it just felt embarrassing.

  My mother glanced over her shoulder, like she was expecting the creature from the mall to have followed the speeding car all the way to the park. When she turned back to me, she took a deep breath and sighed.

  “There’s not a lot of time, even if the harpy isn’t following us, there are more out there, so just listen: you’re a demi-god, the school you’re going to is for people like you, and the fastest way to get there is to get a dryad to tree-walk you.”

  Yup, mom was crazy. That was all just a little too much to ignore. Creepy bird-thing, I could believe that existed, I think she called it a harpy? But the rest, nope.

  “You think I’m a ‘demi-god’?” I asked slowly. “Like you’re a god?”

  A smile touched my mom’s face. For just a second, she broke through the mask of crazy. I thought she might come to her senses.

  “Of course not. You’re half god, because your father is—”

  A strange scream tore through the air. It didn’t sound like a person this time, it almost sounded like an angry cow.

  My mother and I both turned our heads toward the source of the sound. I knew in that instant that my mother and I were both insane.

  Charging toward us, every step shaking the earth, was a man twice as tall as any I had ever seen before. His chest and arms bulged
with more muscle than anyone could have ever needed, and he had a huge head. It looked like he was wearing half of a bull mascot costume, equipped with two horns the size of my arms and everything. His head was lowered, pointing the horns directly at us as he ran. Besides the bull head, he wore only a ragged pair of jean shorts, like he had just gone Incredible Hulk.

  “Lexi, go! Tell the tree!” My mom yelled as she shoved me toward the tall oak she had pointed at before.

  The giant guy cleared the last of the space between us in a matter of seconds. My mother’s shove made me stumble just enough that I made it out of the way, and my mom dove to the ground just in time. The guy slammed his head into the car, having not stopped or turned in time to hit either of us.

  That was when I should’ve run away, but it was also the second I realized the guy was not wearing a mascot head.

  First, he had destroyed the car. His horns had pierced right through the metal, and he had been charging with enough force to make the back end crumple. The trunk was gone, and I could see the thing’s horns jutting into the backseat through the car’s windows.

  Second, the smell hit me. The bull-man had been too far away before, but when he slammed into the car the smell hit me full in the face. It was like rotting eggs and cow manure mixed with sweat.

  I could see the man’s rippling muscles slowly grow hairier as they moved toward the head, until finally his shoulders bristled with thick brown fur. Something tickled my brain, I knew what this thing was, they taught greek mythology in middle school and I had learned about this creature, I just couldn’t remember its name.

  “Lexi!” My mother screamed. Her voice came from the ground on the other side of the bull-man. Her voice kicked my brain back into action. I hadn’t even realized I had been frozen.

  The fact that this thing was from greek mythology, stories littered with the children of gods, somehow made the entire situation make a little bit of sense.

  I turned around and ran toward the tree my mother had pointed at. The creature let out another cow-roar and then I heard the sound of scraping metal.

  I figured he had freed his horns from the car. If he went for my mother first, she was dead. Something told me that I was probably his target, though, so I put on as much speed as I could without dropping the laptop box in my arms.

  As soon as I reached the tree, I shouted, not exactly sure what I was supposed to be speaking to, “I’m a demi-god and I need to get to school!”

  I felt completely ridiculous, but I had followed my mother’s instructions.

  Nothing happened. I turned to look for my mother, I hadn’t heard the bull in a few seconds, which didn’t seem like a good thing.

  My heart, which had been hammering painfully against my chest again, skipped a beat. The bull had my mother in the air, its catcher’s mitt sized hands on either side of her waist, like it was trying to squeeze her flat. She wasn’t screaming out in pain, like I would’ve expected. She looked frozen.

  There was a flash of purple light, and then my mother was gone. The bull turned in slow motion to face me. Snot dribbled out of its enormous nose, mingling with its shaggy brown fur, and then it started toward me, its head lowered. Its horns directed toward my torso.

  Then, something grabbed my shoulder. I was yanked backward. There was a swirl of brown and green, and then my head slammed into the ground and the world went black.

  Chapter 3

  MY HEAD HURT. BAD.

  Slowly, memories of my mother shouting at me that I was a demi-god and the bull creature squeezing her into a flash of light came back to me. It had all been a dream. The pain in my head was from dehydration. I was going to wake up to my mother shouting at me to come have my birthday breakfast. I was sick, but happy that my fever dream hadn’t been real.

  “I’m so sorry, are you okay?”

  That was not my mother’s voice.

  My eyes popped open. There was a girl leaning over me, her face way too close to mine, like she was trying to kiss me. I screamed, which didn’t help the painful pounding in my head.

  The girl leapt backward and fell on her butt, her eyes wide with alarm. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you!” she apologized again, this time with her hands up in surrender.

  I slowly sat up, because my aching head wouldn’t allow anything more, and took the girl in. She was wearing a skin tight, brown dress that reached halfway down her thighs and had deep green hair. Her features reminded me of those Lord of the Ring movies my mother liked. High cheekbones, small nose, green eyes, even the pointed ear that peaked through her pixie-cut.

  I propped myself up with one arm and held my head with the other. Standing wasn’t going to be an option right that second, I needed a minute.

  “Where am I?” I asked.

  The first thing that I noticed was that I was in a grassy field. Trees were all over the place, but it was otherwise empty.

  The second, was that the grass was shining, almost glowing. The leaves on the trees around me were doing the same thing, as if the plants surrounding me were more alive than any other plants I had ever seen. I must have hit my head really hard.

  “You’re at the school. Sorry I waited so long, but we aren’t allowed to let mortals see us,” the elfish girl answered as she shifted her body so her legs were bent at her side and she was propped up on one of her arms.

  Mortals. If the dream I had had was real, hearing that word would make perfect sense. I slowly sat forward and crossed my legs so that I could get a better look at the girl. She gave a soft smile, but waited for me to speak.

  I could feel my chest tightening, but this time it wasn’t with panic. I needed to ask if my dream had really happened. If it did, that meant that my mother was gone. If that bull-thing had really grabbed her like that, she must have died. I could feel my throat tightening just thinking about it.

  Besides the obvious problem of not wanting my mother to be dead, I had one more. I wasn’t great at talking to people. I always felt separate, like I couldn’t connect to anyone the way that everybody around me did. At school, I didn’t have any friends. I was the weird girl who couldn’t hold a conversation. The words didn’t come out right, and I wasn’t great at understanding tones of voice. It was almost like I was trying to talk to a different species. It made me nervous and uncomfortable just thinking about it.

  For the first time in my life, I didn’t feel that with this girl. She had green hair and pointed ears, I shouldn’t feel like I had any connection with her at all, but it felt right. Except for the part where I had no idea what was going on and I was pretty sure I had just watched my mother die.

  “Did I have a box when... I got here?” I asked.

  Close enough. If I had a brand new laptop, that would prove that everything else had happened, too. I just fumbled the end because saying “when you pulled me through the tree” would make me sound like a crazy person if it hadn’t actually happened.

  “Oh, yeah,” the girl answered brightly. She pointed behind me and said, “You dropped it when you fell.”

  I slowly turned around until I could see the pristine black box lying on the ground. The laptop was there. It had all happened. My mother was dead.

  It hit me in an instant, and I couldn’t fight the wave of pain that crashed through me. I was on the ground, crying and clutching onto my chest to hold myself together. It felt like my heart had shattered into a thousand pieces of glass that sliced through me, leaving a hole behind that threatened to destabilize my entire body. I couldn’t live with a hole in my chest any more than I could live without my mom.

  I felt a brief sensation of being moved and then laying on something softer than the ground, but I didn’t care either way. Nothing mattered if my mother was dead. I heard the girl’s voice, it sounded comforting, but I couldn’t make out the words over my own sobbing.

  I just wanted to lay there forever and waste away to nothing. Dying on my birthday would’ve been so much better than losing my mother. The knowledge broke me, and I didn’t want to live like that, it was too much.