Runaway Goddess

Chapter 12-Iris

     Andrew looked like a little kid lying on Apollo's back. This was a side of him that I hadn't seen before. Megerea must have messed him up for him to act this way...

     I needed to talk with Megerea right away, she was going too far. Hurting someone just because they're in love with a girl who apparently ruined their life.

     I looked back at Andrew, his face pale. He looked so sweet but so drained at the same time. How could she do this to him? He did nothing wrong at all. I thought.

     She was so heartless and was determined to make my life miserable, even though I did nothing wrong to her.

     Apollo and I started walking faster, eager to leave. When I first learned that Andrew was being held captive, I immediately went to the Underworld and asked Hades personally where the Erinyes sisters were. It was a struggle, but Hades finally told me that he hadn't seen the furies. What a waste of time I had thought. When I returned to Olympus, I knew I needed help. Apollo and Artemis were the first ones on my list. When I asked, they accepted immediately.

     When we finally located Andrew, we came up with a plan. The plan was that Apollo would come with me to find Andrew, just in case he was hurt. Which was a good idea, seeing Andrew's condition. Artemis had agreed to keep the Erinyes sisters occupied. While we were discussing, Poseidon came up behind me. "Need help calling the guards off?" Why he would agree to the Erinyes sisters to imprison Andrew, I had no idea. I made a mental note to ask him about it later.

     We walked through the corridors and then started running when I heard footsteps down the hallway behind us. "I think they're coming," I whispered.

     "Yeah, no crap."

     We ran and took sharp turns, trying to lose the people behind us. Somehow, we had found a staircase in front of us. We looked at each other. Apollo nodded, and we ran up the stairs. As exhausting as running upstairs was, we still ran through the Underwater Palace. Our agreed place was the entrance in the very front of the Palace. That was where Poseidon would take us back to Olympus. We were making progress without any damage. This is easier than I thought...

     Just as we turned the corner to the entrance, we saw Artemis and the three sisters surrounding her with knives. Apollo gasped. We both knew that Artemis had a disadvantage with a bow as her weapon.

     Artemis narrowed her eyes. "Are you just going to keep walking around me or are we going to start fighting?"

     "We know what you're doing." One of the sisters said. The woman was beautiful. She had black eyes and long black hair. She was tall and had big black feathered wings. That's when I realized, it was Alecto. "You are trying to steal the boy. He is a criminal. The boy must pay for his crimes of-"

     "No, he isn't," I interrupted. My voice was harsh and cold. Everyone looked at me. "Andrew is not a criminal. He is a 16-year-old boy who sells newspapers to people and does what he can to provide for himself and his sister. But none of that involves committing any crimes."

     "Of course, you're defending your little boyfriend. I knew I wasn't going to get a useful answer from you." She scowled.

     "So what? I was going to give you an answer to anything you said anyway." I stared at her.

     "I don't know what happened to you, to all of you, but what you're doing is getting out of hand. Why would you hurt him?"

     "Because I hate seeing you live your perfect little life," Megaera chimed in. She stood right in front of Artemis and me. "Aphrodite, everything good happens to you. I was the one they sacrificed to give away. Do you know how it feels? No, you don't." She snapped.

     Everybody stepped back and watched us argue.

     "If I'm the problem, hurt me instead. Stop ruining other people's lives to see my reaction. If I'm the problem, take it out on me and not them. Plus, how was I even supposed to stop our parents from taking you away? I can't control them! Nor was I even old enough to even try" I said.

     "You didn't even care, that's the problem. You just let me leave, you didn't even say goodbye." She started to cry.

     "Look, I'm sorry that all of this happened to Megaera," I begged, and stepped forward. I tried to use persuasion, something that I had learned as a young child to make people do what I wanted. I applied only a hint of it in my words."I wish you weren't sacrificed to leave, I did miss you, you know. What you are doing now isn't going to fix it though. Leave it in the past so you don't hurt others."

     "You don't understand," She said, her voice rising. "You never understand. You never have, and you never will." She glared at me, threateningly.

     "You can't do anything to me, Megaera. You know that."

     "Yeah, but me and my sisters don't need to use powers like the rest of you to hurt someone," Megaera said.

     "Megaera, you need to stop. You're hurting everybody, it's also extremely dangerous."

      "No, it's not, I'm just having fun."

      "Did you even see what Andrew went through because of you? You hit him and brainwashed him thinking that-"

     A hand pushed in between me and Megaera. I turned to see that it was Andrew. It startled me for a moment, seeing him awake all of a sudden. Andrew was still pale and swayed from side to side.

      Andrew shook his head, telling me to stop arguing and calm down. I nodded and took a deep breath. 

     "Look Megaera, you can be a better person. I want to see you happier and healthier. If you just listen to me-"

     Megaera started to giggle.

     "You want me to change? For what? Do you think I'm going to listen to someone who betrayed me? Of course not."

     "Megaera please."

     "This is not over between you and me. I will never ever change for you." Megerea glared. She walked off and the two other sisters followed her lead.

     "What does she mean more? Hasn't she done enough?" Andrew said as he came to my side.

     "She just wants to put all her anger and pain on me to watch me suffer. I hope she realizes that." I said.

     Apollo and Artemis looked flustered from the argument but I was just left there hurt. I always realized that since I have been down in the city, everything has gone wrong. I still had so many questions too.