Daughter of Hades

Chapter Seven

Dracon Leader of Hade's Legion

I'd be damning Hades to hell right about now, if he weren't already there. How am I supposed to get Meline back to the underworld in one piece without the use of any of my weapons. Hand to Hand combat is not something I would chose against other creatures. If I could use my wings than it would be an even fight, but I'm left floored literally, by humanities naivety.

I have nothing to use to protect Meline, but before I know it I'm stepping toward the Harpies. She is a beautiful creature I must admit, but often beauty can be deceiving as any god or paranormal creature can tell you. Especially when they know they are beautiful.

I jump in front of meline with my back to her and my front to the Harpies. The harpies is already in action with a huge wing flying towards both meline and myself, seeing as her wing span is big enough to knock us both of our feet. Fortunately, Harpies do not have arms, but instead have wings, which means were getting hit by wings and not talons. Unfortunately, the human skin I am wearing slows my actions down and I realize I am not fast enough to push Meline out of range for the swipe of the wing. I know there is no way to avoid being hit so I turn toward Meline and pull her to my chest in a bear hug. I step to the right and meline steps to the left, just like I'd hoped she would.

I couldn't contain my demon side from coming out, when the Harpies wing strikes the entire length of my back, instead of her wing striking me and meline's sides. I can only hope that the unearthly growl that came from deep in my chest was silenced by Meline's fear as we fly backwards.

Got to say I haven't fallen in years, not since training. Wings make falling an unnecessary evil, but while in training we were never allowed to use wings unless instructed to, so I knew how to fall safely and without injury. Can't say I've ever had to fall with someone though. As we fly through the air I realize that Meline will hit the ground before I do and seeing as she is also not in true form the fall will hurt as if she were human. I use my weight to swing me to the left and I'm successfully under Meline. I grit my teeth, before I hit the ground and a pain filled grunt files out of my mouth.

There seems to be no air in my lungs as I try to breathe, but as I look up into Meline's face from the position she landed on me and if I had had any air in my lungs it would have left me. The look Meline was giving was as if I was her hero and god damn it all if I didn't want to be her hero. She was looking at as if I was a hero, but what would she think if she saw the demon I truly am? The things I've done?

With that thought I roll over so she falls to my side and she's no longer staring at me. I roll to my stomach and do a perfect push up to get to my knees and then I'm up and ready for battle again. Which seems to be good timing as one of the other two Harpies sisters comes racing at me with a wing pulled toward her chest so she can hit me. Except this time I'm ready for it as I drop to my stomach and roll to the left sticking a leg out to right. Already off balance by not hitting her target she hits face first into the floor when she trips on my right foot. The cracking noise as her forehead hits the floor is followed by a squawk or maybe it was a screech it's hard to tell with harpies.

The clicking on the floor alerts me to another harpy close behind. As I turn I see it is yet another sister, but not the one that appears to be the leader. This time the harpy is using her razor sharp talons to try and swipe at me. Generally Harpies use there talons more than their wings, which leads me to believe that whoever sent the harpies did not want Meline harmed in anyway. The Harpies reside in the Underworld, but hade's would not send two separate groups to get one mere person, which again makes me believe that perhaps Zeus is behind this attack. Seeing as a famous nickname for these four harpies' sisters is 'the dogs of great Zeus'.

Unfortunately for me, Zeus does not care if a mere human is killed in the process let alone one of Hades demons. Those talons were created to torture their victims, but the talons are also sharp enough to slice a throat open with one swipe. Damn it, I need weapons. Hand to hand combat doesn't work when the other opponent doesn't have hands! The talon coming straight at my throat, tells me this Harpy doesn't care. I manage to sway far enough back to avoid the swipe, but when the harpy starts to flap her wings and raise off the ground, I realize that now I have to fight two sets of talons not just one.

Why did this have to be a rich kid's party? Were inside and the stupid ceiling is ten or fifteen feet high. Who needs a ceiling that high? The harpies will have no problems flying around in a room this tall as the one in front of me is proving.

Right as the harpy leans forward a beer bottle hits its wing, followed by a voice yelling, "leave him alone." I would smack my hand over my face right about now, if I didn't need it to see the harpies. What was she doing?

"You stay out of this Princess," I practically snarl at her. What happened to be being her hero?

"The damn captain of the cheerleading team just turned into a bird thing! And you can't fight it on your own, so shut up!" She yells at me and damn if it's not adorable seeing her all worked up.

"You cannot fight with me," I say not explaining myself.

"Oh yeah? Watch me," She says as another beer bottle is launched. The damn girl has a death wish! The squawk alerts me to the flying harpy, only now she's a falling harpy. Damn the girl is a good shot.

"Holly shit. Where'd you learn to throw like that?" I ask.

"My dad is the opposite of athletic and wanted to live through me so he put me on the soft ball team, but you know it is what it is," She explains with a shrug.

"It's hot is what it is," I tell her, loving that a blush colors her cheeks. She pretends to play the comment off by rolling her eyes, but I know she secretly covets being called hot.

"You preposterous humans are forever talking with little actions. Mark my words. It will be your down fall," the leading harpy tells us.

I look around at the two harpies already on the floor. One is cradling her nose, which hit the floor shortly after her forehead. The second is lying in a heap cradling the wing she landed on and squeezing her feathers to get the alcohol out of it. If harpies are about anything they are about their physical features. They groom themselves for hours every day.

The third harpy doesn't appear to want to fight at all as it curls its hair around its finger and stares off into space. However, the leading harpy looks more and more annoyed as the seconds tick by. When the leading harpy glances at the one twirling her hair, she rolls her eyes.

The leading Harpy looks exasperated as it steps toward me. She shakes her and lets out a frustrated roar before charging me. The wing that is trying to swipe me is several inches too high and I'm able to duck underneath it and spin around. Before the harpy has time to turn around, I plant my foot into its back and kick forward, causing her to fall forward, but she manages to catch herself. She turns to me with a sneer on her face and starts bring her talons towards me. Only for some reason she stops moving altogether. Confused I lean to the side and see a butter knife lodged into the top of the harpy's spine. Although the person who put the knife there is still attached to the handle, as meline slowly lets go of the handle and looks at it in horror. The leading harpy slowly pulls her limbs back into her body and tries to reach the knife, but she doesn't have hands just wings.

"I will concede today, because this rusty knife needs to be removed, but I will be back," the harpy sneers at me, even though Meline but the knife in her. The harpies each blink out of existence as if they were never there. The leading harpy's actions do not surprise me. They are notorious for being scared away easily, even something as small as a knife or hitting their heads will drive them away. They often go after the weakest pray they can get their hands on. If Zeus wanted the harpies to grab a human, they generally wouldn't have a problem, but if humans fight back they generally run in the other direction. They are the lowest form of cowards.

Meline is still looking wide eyed at her hands as if she had killed a person not stabbed a mythical creature, but as I look around the rest of the room I realize everyone is wide eyed. The only difference is Meline faced that fear and tried to help me. Even without the smell of gods on her, I would know meline is a god, because a human would not have done what she did. I know without a doubt she is a god.