Beautiful Cries

Chapter Twenty-One: Sailors of Old

A cruel and bitter smile spread across Scylla's faces with nothing but pure repugnance towards her mother.

"You sealed my fate the moment you allowed Circe to curse me, and I would never wish to be associated with a woman who was so uncaring that she thought it wise to destroy the one person who ever loved her. So, Mother, in answer to your question, I would much rather die a thousand painful deaths and rot in Tartarus then stand by the side of the woman who single handedly ripped my heart out."

"I did it for your own good!" Hecate screeched with indignation, the flames of her torches stretching higher as her temper grew. "You were obsessed with your lover Glaucus that you could not see him for what he truly was nor keep the responsibility of the duties given to you! Love is blinding and you fell into its poisonous grasp!"

Scylla's heads thrashed out in fury, one snapping only inches away from her mother's face. "I loved him, Mother! Was loving my mistake?!"

"Yes!" Hecate screamed, swinging at her daughter's face with one of the torches, sending it colliding with the bridge of one of Scylla's noses.

A deafening roar ripped from Scylla's throat as she fell backwards, crumpling to the ground with a reverberating boom.

Hecate turned swiftly away from her daughter's form to stare with a wrath-filled gaze at Alena and Damari, the growling that had called to the goddess from the mist earlier now roaring for death.

Her unwavering gaze settled upon the couple that had backed away from the entrance of the cave, their hands tightly clasped together as they stumbled upon the rocks.

"Kill them." Hecate stated firmly, turning away from the mountainside and the mist to face her daughter again as a hoarse battle cry unlike any other sprang forth from the mist, hundreds of ghostly sailors emerging from within and storming the bottom of the mount.

"Run!" Alena screamed, grabbing ahold of Damari's arm and pulling him deeper into the cave and towards the fiery hole in the ground.

The sailors crashed into the mountain like a tide breaking over the rocks on a coast, not leaving one inch uncovered by their onslaught.

Scylla rose from the ground carefully, the same golden liquid streaming from her nose steadily as a shadow descended across her faces.

Letting out a low howl, Scylla changed form, her many heads melting together like metal under Hephaestus' forge, morphing into the long elegant neck and innocent face of a nymph long forgotten.

Hecate's lips drew back in a sneer as she drew her two torches against each other as a shield. "What trickery is this?" she called above the cries of the sailors. "No mere magic could bring back your true image, Scylla."

"You have your tricks, Mother," Scylla laughed, uraising her sword in the direction of her mother's torches, "and I have mine."

With a slight twitch of her eyebrow, Hecate allowed a nearly invisible frown to mar her face before letting out a war cry of her own, sending one of her torches spiraling towards Scylla.

Just as the first one went flying, barely skimming the edge of Scylla's nose, she dodged its fiery point while hoisting her sword into the air to meet the medium sized dagger that Hecate had torn away from her chiton.

As their blades collided, a tidal wave went out, wiping out the first set of sailors that were scaling the mountain, leaving more of them to take their place as others poured into the cave's mouth.

Alena could hear the screams and cries of the sailors as they ran after them, the pebbles beneath her tail and Damari's feet shaking with the numerous feet pounding upon its surface.