Finding Athena

The Desperate Search

The next period I signed into the library, spotting a computer in the far corner, away from everyone else. Perfect for doing secret mythology research, I thought, as I was still determined to find out at least something of what Gran was hiding from me. I logged in and brought up Google – the God of the modern world. ‘Mermaids in mythology’ brought up 3,460,000 results. I sighed. This was going to take a while. I started with the Greek mythology search results, as that made logical sense to me.  I never questioned this, even though I hated Greek Myth lessons. Maybe it was because I still had the lesson’s thoughts stuck in my head. There were references to Sirens, but the Mermaid in my dream hadn’t lured me anywhere with her voice. In fact, she’d hissed at me a lot and had a scratchy sounding voice. Even when addressing my saviour, who was a man, her voice hadn’t changed a bit. So that ruled out that theory. There were the stories about Nereids, who were friendly water nymphs of Greek Mythology, but my Mermaid wasn’t friendly either. The last piece of information I found was that Poseidon was often depicted as half-man and half-fish, and that the Mermaid in the Lake was one of his daughters. Again, my logic told me this was right, and that this was the tie I’d been looking for. Thinking about it, this did make total sense. I mean, Gran made me take Greek Mythology. And Gran was the one who started prompting me about my nightmares. And Gran was the one who’d let slip that ‘they’ were coming for me. But who were ‘they’? And what did they want from an orphaned teenage girl from England? ‘They’ wanted me, that’s for sure, I mean, I was saved by one of them when the Mermaid tried to take me. 

Gran knew that's for sure. I sat there for a while thinking back to her and Grandpa’s hushed conversations that they thought I couldn’t hear. There was one conversation in particular that I remember distinctly. It was just after my parents had died and I was 7. Gran and Grandpa were in the kitchen whispering urgently about what they were going to do now that my parents had gone. At the time, I thought it was about them giving me away, and I was scared because I thought they were going to send me to an orphanage like the one in ‘Annie’. But thinking back, they seemed more scared, and they kept me, so it couldn’t have been about orphanages.

--

“Joe, what are we going to do now? Natalie was always going to be the one to tell her, and they’re gone!”

“Grace Honey, you were there when they told Natalie and John about Tory. You know everything that Natalie did. And maybe once she’s 17 you’ll be able to tell her. We have 10 years to prepare her. She can have a normal life, and then maybe she’ll just integrate into her new one”

“But what if she doesn’t Joe? I’ve heard about that place. It’s not something that you can just... integrate into. And we were specifically told not to tell her, or train her in anyway.”

“We’ll be fine. Like I said Grace, we have 10 years. That's a long time for us to adjust. I know you’re scared, and you’re upset after losing Nat and John, but everything will turn out okay”

“She’s just a little girl Joe. I’m scared we’ll lose her too”

“She’s special Grace. A girl with her potential will be a force to reckon with by the time she’s 17”

--

So I’m “special”. What the fuck does that mean? I mean, I’m awesome sure. I have good social skills, I’m fairly popular at college, and I was at high school too. I got good grades – 18 A* - C‘s and got on well with the teachers. Okay, I’ve never had a boyfriend. But does that matter? The guys were all losers anyway. I was waiting for the right guy. All the flings I’d had were just that. Flings

Yeah, I wasn't a virgin. Hell, with Ava as my best friend that was inevitable. Okay, so here in England, we didn’t have wild house parties in vast houses with cool guys whose parents were never home every weekend. We did however have the occasional house party, and with a fairly good social standing, and fairly good looks, I got invited.

So what was so special about me, apart from my ability to know when guys are jerks?

Nothing!

UGH, this is so annoying!!

I looked at the clock in the library. 5 minutes til the next period. Great. I’d found out nothing, which meant I’d have to interrogate Grandma. And that's exactly what I was going to do. She had all the answers; I just needed the key to unlock them all. And I knew exactly what that key was.

The rest of the day flew by quite quickly, a blur of English, Drama and Music. Lunch wasn't awkward, though I’d expected it to be. I simply ignored Ava, and she flirted with Rob. Whatever, the guy will just fuck her and dump her. She knew that as well as I did.

I texted Grandma in Music, telling her I’d need picking up somewhere else, I was taking a detour.

I knew exactly where Grandma would tell me.

At my parents’ grave.

---------

a/n

hello! Im so so so so sorry! College has been horrible, I've had so much work, so many exams, so little free time!

I hope you'll understand. I'm on a roll, so to make up for my general crappiness at being an author, I may even have another chapter ready within the week!

No promises mind

HAPPY EASTER!

Dizzie x