Ares And Mia

Chapter 43

Ares presses my palm against its cheek scale and I choke on my breath. Nauseating, spinning, light-headed, all of which disappear as abruptly as they came when the god beside me pulls me away. I gaze at him alarmed as his lips curve into a smile. "We learned from the dragons how to teleport. And you will too, doll." I glance at him, before turning back toward the dragon, heart skipping a beat.

Ares was close, way too close. I could feel his body heat spreading to mine and I can't help the blush spreading up my neck. "S-Sure." My voice is shaky, but Ares doesn't point it out. "How should I start?" 

"Think of where you want to go, like that rock over there," I turn to look at the stone a few feet away. "Imagine that you're already standing there and think about the dizziness. Imagine it's already happening." I close my eyes, breathing out. Think about it. Okay, yeah, sure.

Spinning, dizziness, imagine. Got it, it can't be that hard right?

Nothing happens. Ares shifts beside me. Two more seconds past. I grit my teeth, imagining profusely. Nothing. I open one of my eyes. "It's not possible." Ares watches me with an aloof grin, almost as if he were amused at my efforts.

"It is possible."

"I'm human. I can't do... that. I don't have any magical powers besides my electricity." Ares tips his head to the side, pondering my words. Or maybe he was wondering whether or not to ditch me altogether.

He raises his hand to the dragon's scales, before snapping a small chip of the armor off. It gleams in the light, texture unlike any substance I've ever seen. "That's fine. It took me a week to learn how. Keep this in your shoe and no one can take you anywhere without your consent." A week?! And he just... expected me to know how to teleport in less than a minute? 

Did he expect me to be some sort of genius?

I take it with a huff, running my finger over the eggshell like surface. "Thanks." I crouch down and slip it right beneath my heel, the smooth surface barely noticeable as I stand up straight. I walk around for a few steps and back, the weight barely noticeable.

The dragon heaves itself to its feet--to which I flinch when it moves--before retreating into the shadows. "Sweetheart," I gaze at the speaker, who holds his hand out to me. For some reason, he's stepped out into the light. And he looks... angelic. The sun behind his wisps of hair, illuminating them into a gold that make me want to close my eyes. The shadows on his face are perfect, beyond perfect actually. And his silver irises, glinting in the light. 

Gleaming, shining with some sort of allure that makes me nervous. 

He speaks. "Don't miss me too much, okay?" I pause for a moment, tipping my head.

"What?" I mumble, but the wind masks the words from my lips and he tilts his head toward his hand. I'll ask him later. I put my fingers in his and without pitiful resistance, I'm spinning and lightheaded and nauseous.

Because I've forgotten that gods can also manipulate wind and steal fragile words from lips of cursed girls.

- - -

"You were wrong." Poseidon towers over me, eyes ever-changing like the tides of the ocean, threatening to swallow me whole in an instant. I freeze, but my heartbeat picks up. I can feel everything on my skin, grime, water, pebbles stuck into my elbows--My eyes flash from side to side, clinging to the walls of the broken cell.

The cell in the sea, where I was trapped.

"You fell for every illusion I gave you," Poseidon plucks a trident from the very air and holds it above my chest like I've seen Ares do. I don't have the heart to move, to scream, to get up. I'm pinned to the floor, wrists tied with rusted metal and tar. I call for the electricity, for the tingling that I've grown familiar with, but the only thing I can feel is hot, hot fear. "The silly human girl shall die a silly human death. Don't you get it?"