Medusa: Fate's Game

~~Medusa~~

"So, what do you think?" Darian said. He posed for them, a brown cloak wrapped over his body, dirty edges and blotches of stains on it.

Chimera grunted, but Medusa smiled and slithered around him.

"You look charming."

"I'm not supposed to look charming! I'm supposed to look forgettable." He adjusted the horrible garb, but no matter how he wore it, his great smile and young face showed through.

"You'll have to hide your face then." She reached for his shoulders, and pulled the cloak over his head until it was all buried in shadow. "Besides, you'll want to hide your mark."

He nodded, and reached up to adjust the hood while scratching the V etched on his forehead.

"This will be tricky," he said. "A bad breeze or if I trip or something, someone will see. They'll recognize me."

"The whole city will recognize you?"

"Yeah, yeah they would."

Medusa tried to whistle, but failed horribly. A hundred years of trying, a hundred years of no whistling. She missed it.

She slithered up behind her man, hooked her arms over his shoulders, rested her chin on one of them, and looked out over the valley below them. "Are you sure you want to do this?"

"No, but I have to save Pegasus. Besides, you don't want to talk to Athena? To at least say something to her?"

"I... I don't know what I would say."

Darian reached up to hold her hands where they met on his sternum. "It'll come to you when you meet her. And if I rub off on you at all before then, you'll punch her too."

She giggled into his ear, and rubbed their cheeks together while her hair snuggled into his. "You didn't punch the merchant you stole this blanket from."

"He seemed innocent enough, dumb enough. So you were watching, eh? Told you two to stay out of sight, or I'd have to kill him so he didn't tell anyone you were on the mainland."

"I stayed hidden!" She slithered around in front of him, keeping her hands on his chest throughout the motion. "I have hunted boar and other animals for a hundred years, I'll have you know." Silly man, always forgetting.

He sighed, and nodded. "Yeah, you're right. Sorry." His hand around hers tightened, squeezed, and tugged on them to bring her closer. Just when she thought he might look a little guilty for underestimating her, he flashed his perfect hero's smile, and kissed her.

She giggled again, wrapped her arms around him, and squeezed him all the tighter.

Below them, the valley spread out over the Argolic Gulf. The hill they stood upon let them see out over the thumb of the sea and to the harbors of Tiryns, Argos, and even as far as Eion, its docks specs on the horizon. To reach Tiryns, Darian would have to walk around Argos and make his way into Tiryns on foot. With whatever they were hunting being in Tiryns, they had to suspect someone knew he was coming. And that made her stomach want to hurl the deer she ate a day ago.

"Ok, your helmet is in your bag, and it's the only thing in here. Make sure you get a moment to put it on if things go badly, and just throw the bag away." She let go of him, slithered over to the bags, and picked his up. She opened it up, checked to see if his helmet was in there, checked again, and checked again, before handing it to her lover. "And some apples too! If you get hungry. And a little dried meat, if you get hungry again. And—"

"Medusa."

"Make sure you keep your sword and shield hidden inside your cloak. You'll have to hunch over when you walk to hide the shape of your armor — you are not taking off your armor! You can't fit your spear, so Chimera will hold onto it, but—"

"Medusa."

"Tiryns is still a good five or six miles from here. Pace yourself, it'll be a while before you get there dressed like this, and you'll need your energy for whatever they may—"

"Medusa." He reached out for her hands, and grabbed them. She pulled away, but he didn't let go. "Come on, look at me."

She lowered her head and looked at the ground instead.

Darian raised a hand to touch her chin, and he lifted it to look at her. "I'm just an old man in a raggedy old cloak." The small warrior put some gravel and cracks in his voice, and the impression made Medusa chuckle. "No theatrics, no heroics. I figure out what's going on, and then I come back."

"You better! You better come back. We haven't spent a single night apart since we met! And I... I can't... go back to..."

"Hey, hey." He kissed her knuckles, and winked at her. "I'll be back tomorrow night at the latest. And if I'm not, you and Chimera can march into the city and tear it down looking for me."

"We will!" Images of Darian, dead by the sword in the streets of Tiryns sparked heat and bile in Medusa's chest. She would do anything to get him back, anything! "Anything!" She squeezed his hands and brought them close.

He blinked, but after a moment he smiled, squeezed her fingers again, and let go. "Don't worry. I've walked these streets for years. I know every inch of that city. And I got you waiting for me here. I'll be back."

When his fingers slipped from hers, she squeezed at the air where they were. Empty. She almost reached for him, fingers aching to grab him and pin him down and keep him away from the city. Coil around him, protect him, and keep him all for herself.

She lowered her hands. "Please be careful."

"I will."

With a long, heavy sigh, Darian took a deep breath, smiled at her, and walked down the hill toward the road.

Medusa opened her mouth, but blocked her lips with her fingers. She wanted to say something, something stupid, something silly and childish and... and she couldn't even think it. So she watched the cloaked warrior walk down the hill.

He looked over his shoulder to her from a distance, and waved. She raised her hand high and waved back with far too much enthusiasm. But Darian blew her a kiss, and she almost squealed.

A minute later, he was a fading spec on the long road.

"You two reek of love." Chimera snorted, cracked his neck, and stepped down the other side of the hill they were on. While the North East lead to Argos and Tiryns, the South West was a thick forest patch nested along a curved cliff face. There was no cave to hide in, but the trees would hide them well enough.

Medusa slithered after him. "Love?" She brought her hands up to her cheeks and held her blushing face. "We've only known each other for several weeks!"

Chimera looked over his shoulder at her. "How?"

"How?" Medusa blinked at him. The giant was asking her how they met? Was he into gossip too? She thought of Pinna, and smiled. "He was on a boat and being shipped to Athens to be sold as a slave. A giant sea creature attacked it, and he was marooned on my island. He saved me from some warriors trying to kill me, and... and we just..." Fell in love?

"That is a very large stroke of luck."

With a loud groan, the hulking beast lowered himself to the ground, and sat cross-legged. He grabbed a branch from the ground, and chewed on it like a blade of grass. With the lion pelt dangling behind his neck, he looked like any human, except naked but for a loincloth, and fangs. Of course, once she got close to him, the difference in their sizes was obvious. She may have had a thirty-foot snake body, but her human half was human, and Chimera's titanic frame dwarfed her considerably.

When she coiled next to him in the grass, she had to look up to talk to him.

"Stroke of luck? You... think he lied?"

"No. Bellerophontes is trustworthy. It is the Fates I fear have their hand in such luck."

"The Fates? They said they hadn't been following Darian for some time."

"Do you believe them?"

"I..." She stared down at the grass and dirt. If they had been following Darian and manipulating his life, then maybe their meeting was their doing? "Maybe... maybe we met because they wanted us to?"

The beast nodded.

She frowned. "But, but... but I..." Gods damn them. She grabbed her head and shook it. "What if we love each other, but it's only because the Fates make us?"

"I do not think the Fates have that power." Chimera shrugged, leaned back, and hooked his fingers behind his head. "And if they do, would it matter? You are happy, are you not?"

"I... I am!" She giggled and slithered a little closer to Chimera. He wasn't so bad, sometimes. "I am. He's so... dangerous, and deadly, but when he's alone with me, he's kind, and sweet, and loving, and—"

"He feels the same way." Chimera dismissed the weight of his statement with a wave of his hand before putting it behind his head again. "And from what I heard the night before, you both enjoy each other's touch greatly."

"You! You... you big oaf!" She put her hands against him and pushed him. Without her snake length anchored proper, all her pushing did was make her fall over and away from the giant. "That's private!"

The Chimera managed the smallest smirk, but made no other movements. A wall of stone.

"So... do you think... Darian will be ok?" She laid herself along her inner coil and started to trace lines in the dirt and forest floor.

"Bellerophontes — Darian, is a great warrior, and blessed by the Fates with strong life. He will survive."

"Yeah, but, it's not just him surviving I'm worried about," she said. The Chimera opened his eye closest to her and quirked his brow. She looked up to him, and nodded. "He... he just gets so angry. He thinks people are horrible, and... and sometimes I agree with him. That doesn't mean they should all die though! And I'm worried if he has to deal with the king, and he probably will to find this mysterious thing, that he'll... drown the city in blood."

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~~Darian~~

He already missed her.

The thought made him laugh. How long had it been since he'd even seen Philonoe? Over a year. He didn't miss her a bit. But Medusa? Only a mile between them and he was tempted to run back just so he could hear her laugh again.

He hugged the cloak tight around him. It smelled old, of dirt and animal shit. Perfect. Snug over his head and dragging on the ground, every bit of his armor, sword and shield, all of it was hidden. He wore his pack over his cloak; he'd have to throw off the entire ensemble if he got into a fight.

No fighting. No killing. Repeat it Darian. You're not going to kill Proetus or his conniving bitch of a wife. That's not what this is about.

"But then, I don't even know what the fuck I'm looking for. The only recourse I have is to either ask Proetus by force about some mysterious 'thing' or 'person' he may or may not be holding, or stumble upon it by accident." Not the best plan, but the only plan. He couldn't bring Chimera with him into the city to sniff out whatever it was, not unless he wanted every guard on their ass.

He considered the possibility for a moment. It'd be a great battle, him and Chimera against waves of guards, many of whom were old friends. Would they sympathize with him? Or did they know what Proetus had done?

Bile rose in his throat, and he gritted his teeth. No fighting. No killing.

Another mile down the road and he started to walk past other people. They treated him about as well as expected, with a few feet of space from the smell, and avoiding looking directly at him. He looked like a homeless beggar after all, and in Greece, that made him good as dead. Perfect.

He went around Argos along one of the roads. That was simple enough; no one cared about a wandering beggar. It was when he started to approach the familiar roads of Tiryns that his heart started to beat faster in his chest. Wagons. Donkeys. Gates. Columns of white and homes of stone. The chatter of fishermen, farmers, butchers, bakers, dressmakers and guards started to get louder. He'd walked these streets in the colors of Tiryns armor before. Walked them, watched over them, guarded them, and fathered them.

He spit on the ground.

As the streets converged, winding paths and twisting ways between temples and buildings grew closer and closer. The smell of cooking food, manure, and people filled the air. All along the road between the old homes, young and old littered its pools of shade and went about their business. He looked to his left, where Argonar would be cooking fish. He was, and Darian smirked under his hood. Argonar still owed him some coin, but it wasn't enough for the fat fellow to owe him a huge favor like assisting him now. Pamana, an elderly woman with crooked fingers and a long nose, was weaving clothes in dull whites. She owed him too, but not enough to risk her life.

He stepped further into the city. The well-tread ground lead under an archway, tall and thick between two flat buildings, before it opened up into the agora. In the middle of the day, the open space was filled with people. Dozens, hundreds of people. Men carried around racks of fish and buckets of food. Women carried bags of clothes, or children. Chitons of different colors — mostly white — were all he could see in any direction. Over their heads, the gold-colored roofs of nearby temples and archways circled them. They casted shade for the wandering people, many held chatting groups, some others held stalls where people sold the finer wares. Jewelry, of course, was visited only by the fanciest men and women, the ones with slaves following them around, wearing only loincloths.

Darian breathed the air deep. He recognized so many of the faces. When they approached, he was quick to hide his eyes under the hood of his cloak, but he took peaks at them as they walked by. Nalla, a woman he'd saved from thieves. Pallus, a man he'd taught to fire a bow so he could go hunting. Kargos, a young kid — well, young man now — he'd caught spying on a couple enjoying their private time.

And they'd all turned against him the moment Zeus shot him out of the sky.

Darian growled, a weird animal sound, and he brought a hand up to his mouth when he faked a cough. He shook his head a few times until the white blur in his vision was gone, and carried on.

Statues of the gods lined a wide stairway that lead onto a huge platform of stone floor and a great arch. Zeus, Poseidon, Hades, Hera, Hestia and Demeter. The six children of Cronus and Rhea. Looking at them made Darian's teeth grind, and he had to look away. Look at the ground, better to look at the ground.

Upon the platform, it was the rich who bathed in the daylight and the attentions of their servants. Some of them were even fat with the fruit of their money. Darian hadn't liked them when he lived here, let alone now, but at least it wasn't new hate. He walked past them like he belonged, which he didn't of course. What was a beggar doing up with the rich? Nearby guards frowned at him as he came closer to them. He smiled under his cloak, and kept walking.

Another stairway between two of the greater temples. Columns of marble as thick as the greatest trees, dozens of them, holding up enough stone to hold hundreds of worshipers, workers, and the riches of their betters. Within the shadows of their roofs, men in fancy himations and chitons bargained over coins and baubles. Others argued over politics. Some even argued over food supplies, a step up from the typical garbage the rich argued over. Darian grinned, and stepped into the building through one of the open pathways between the humongous pillars.

And disappeared into the shadows.

One of the pathways behind the temples, untouched by guard or servant, and unknown by the rest, was easy enough to step into. No one cared about some beggar wandering the streets as long as he didn't make a ruckus. The pathway lead nowhere, stopping at a wall of stone that blocked off a harsh fall into the agora he'd just left. But, with some sure footing, he braced against against the two walls beside him, and inched his way up like a spider.

He was light, even in his armor; climbing up the buildings with arms and legs out at his side was easy. And of course the Fates had blessed him with inhuman strength, so once he was up to the top of one of the temples, he only had to grip its edge with one hand to pull himself over and onto it. For a moment, he considered thanking them for his demi-god strength and healing, but then, none of this insanity would have happened if they had never found him in the first place. It was a bad deal.

Grumbling, he crouched low and crawled along the roofs. He was forty feet up, but that didn't mean someone couldn't see him if they got lucky, so he kept to a squatting crawl, and worked toward the acropolis.

Typical of kings, the palace was built upon the raised land, and a winding road with the occasional stairway and archway lead from the palace gate down to the city. While anyone could walk up the road, it stopped at the gates of the palace, and a beggar with no pass or business would not be allowed into its walls. But, the larger temples, the ones he was crossing over the rooftops of, drew near the cliff face of the small mountain the palace sat upon. It took time, and having to do it at a crawl made time slow to a crawl with him, but he grew closer to the mountain, and closer. One building, and another, and another. He peaked down to watch some of the traffic of people walk by, jars of water on the servant's heads, and different colors of tunics among the rich walking between the greater temples.

For a moment, he thought he was on the walls of the palace again, and he was watching the people come and go. His citizens to protect, to guard. A lifetime ago.

An hour later, he was in the shadow of the cliff. He pressed his body against it, dug his fingers into the hard rock and random sprouts of bush, and started climbing. He knew the path, a path only he had ever found or used. He was a good guard captain, and an adventure-seeking fool. Climbing the cliffs around the palace in search of secret paths? Perfect way to spend a day off.

The climb moved him between a crevice in the mountain. Beneath him was a hard drop, and below the cliff was nothing but flat, smooth rock; the only way to get into the crevice was from the rooftops. He jammed his sandals into some grooves, cracked his knuckles, and started climbing upward.

He still didn't know exactly what he was going to do. Talk to Proetus? He couldn't talk to Stheneboea, she'd try to trick him and get him killed. Proetus though, maybe he could talk to him. Maybe.

It was a big maybe.

After a while, a long while, he found the ledge of the clifftop. He vaulted up, only to be greeted by the walls that surrounded the palace. There were no back doors or secret passageways through a palace wall, but there were unguarded areas, and he knew them all. With a snicker, he jumped up, and found a groove cut into the stone wall. A groove he'd made long ago, when he was guard captain.

How often people underestimated him. It wasn't until he'd defeated the Chimera that people started taking the little warrior seriously. Their loss.

He had to go fast. Guards walked the walls, and it wouldn't be long before someone did spot him by accident. But in less than a minute, he scaled the tall wall and poked his head up just enough to see the guards. They weren't looking in his direction, they weren't even patrolling. Two of them stood near with eyes cast out to gaze over the road down to the city, spears holding their weight, and they were chatting. Security had grown lax since he'd moved on.

He rolled over the wall, onto the stone balcony, and off. No time to consider. He knew where he was landing, and quiet as a feather, he fell to his sandals and rolled back. A second later, he was hidden in the shadow of a raised stairway that lead into the grand center of the palace. Above and beside him were its colossal pillars of marble, and they stood upon walls of thick stone, all more than enough to hide him from sight between them and the outer wall.

Breathing deep, he slid off his pack, took a bite of its dried meat, and set it aside in the corner. Next, he took his helmet from the bag, and set it aside, before taking off his cloak and jamming it into the bag. He reached for his helmet again, but before he put it on, he looked at it. A beautiful helmet, meant to stand out, meant to be a mark of a legend, a hero in the tides of battle and blood. The glorious white crest would stand out so well against the red of his conquests.