Earthrumbler

Chapter Three: So it Begins

True to his word, Poseidon hung me for three days with no respite. The shoulder that I’d dislocated less than a year prior throbbed so fiercely, I feared it was out of place once more. My breaths were shudders, thin gasps that brought fresh pain to my muscles. Dry and chapped, my lips fixed together, only prying apart when I worked my jaw. My only indication of the elapsed time was his reappearance. My blurry mind and parched throat formed words for me. “Papa?” I asked, my voice hoarse. Soon an image of the stern god with a thick red beard formed in my thoughts. I laughed aloud.

“Papa? Amused by the thought of me being your father?” He strode toward me. “What would you like more than anything else, Genevieve?”

My dry mouth answered for me. “Water.” Hunger panged at me, but my head pounded with dehydration. On occasion, I’d even been able to drift asleep before shooting pains awoke me. “Please.” The clinking chains removed my desperation for a moment. My arms lowered to shoulder level, completely sprawled out. I laid my head back against the wall, absorbing the relief in my shoulders. My feet rested on the ground.

He sighed when I licked my lips in an attempt to moisten them. “Ah, yes, fragile human life, sustained by such a simple thing.” With a sharp breath, he exhaled a crystal of ice and fashioned it into a drinking glass. Once he tapped the side, it filled to the brim with water. My hands reached out, but chains held them to the wall. “Perhaps, you’ll have get it after our chat.”

My eyelids fell and fluttered. The cold floor on my toes awakened me. “Not sure how interesting I’ll be.” The sarcasm dripped off my tongue. Freezing water surrounded me, jolting me into consciousness. I shivered. “Okay, I’m awake.”

“You’re only to speak when I address you.” He raised his hand. When I recoiled in fear, he chuckled. “I will never hit you without just cause.”

I snorted. “Define just.” Water trickled down my face. The sharp slap rang through the room just before the stinging.

“I did not address you, now did I?” He brushed my damp hair out of my face. “So, Genevieve, why don’t you tell me about your mother?” He clasped his hands together.

“Well, she’s about seven feet tall with square pupils, like a goat. Oh, and her hair is purple. Perhaps, you’ve met her?” I leapt against the wall at his sudden lunge forward.

His hand clasped around my throat. “You wouldn’t happen to have a death wish? There is more than one way to break your mother.” He squeezed. When I gasped, a thick laugh escaped his lips. “Mortals are so delicate. Why, I give you a week until you beg.”

I was weak. Strands of pain tugged at me. After only three days, my body was stiff, my head clouded. Both begged for a soft place to rest. Once I found the will to speak, I said, “Beg? Beg for a more intelligent captor maybe. My mother, what do you want with her? What has she done to you?”

“What do I want with her? A foolish question. Time and time again, she has caused my suffering. She’s taken places, women, and anything else I dare call my own. At the very least, she cannot take the ocean from me. So, I took what she is too ashamed to claim, a mortal. You are the only thing in this universe that she’d dare crack for.”

I arched an eyebrow. “Petty revenge? You’re a child.”

He offered a patient smile. “Oh, no. I am far more practical than simply revenge. I am indebted to my brother. Once, he saved me from my father’s tyranny. More recently, I spared the life of his grandson, a mortal with the blood of a god. In sparing his life, I caused the shift in the eras for this boy thought an entire world should know of our existence. My brother made me swear that if I were to discover such a mortal again, that I would deliver it to him. Destroying a world and allowing it to start over, Genevieve, is no easy feat. It has aged many of the gods, some beyond repair.”