Chapter 43 – The Family Tree (Part II)
Weaver
I glanced at the glass leaves of my tree and saw the reflection of the man before us. Noah Hunter. The hunter who butchered the Brekahur tribe. And countless other strange faces, but I knew they mirrored the same man.
I felt incredibly weak, but I pushed myself to my feet and faced the intruder. Selene stood next to me, supporting me, concern and confusion in her eyes.
"How is this possible? How did you get here?" I questioned, my voice gruff. I detested the uncertainty and vulnerability I currently bore in my own realm.
Hunter stepped toward Selene and traced a finger along her collarbone. Selene shuddered and I snarled, "Do not touch her."
"Oooh, so testy," Hunter stated. He dropped his hand, but he circled around us, an infuriating grin on his face. He stopped, stood in front of me, and showed me a small, round object between his thumb and forefinger. "Your foolishness to gift a mortal with this pearl."
Any gift from the dream world was an invitation, an indisputable entry to the dreams. As Markus had once accused, I had known it when I presented the pearl to Selene.
Selene gasped as she realized her necklace was missing. She scowled and said, "That was what you were after earlier."
"Well, I wanted more than the pearl. I was hoping to get you on board and use you against him, but you're obviously smitten. Such a cliché. A mortal falling in love with a god," Hunter said, again cracking up. He would not cease chortling at his own ridiculous remark, he bent forward in mirth and propped his hand on my tree.
First, he touched Selene. And now my tree. I would not have any of this! I focused on my tree and wished it to vanish so Hunter would fall on his face, but nothing happened. I remembered I was now powerless.
Attempting to quell the anxiety building up in my chest, I growled at Hunter, "Who are you and what do you want?"
Hunter stopped laughing and wiped the tears from his eyes. "Why, I thought you'd never ask."
He walked toward me again and stood straighter, trying to appear taller and broader than I was. But even with his canine ornaments and even without my wings, he remained diminutive in comparison. He adjusted the tusks around his shoulders and asserted, "I am Acteon, son of Apate, deity of deceit, first daughter of Erebus and Nyx."
What?
Hunter—no, Acteon's grin grew wide when he saw the look of incredulity on my face.
"Apate, sister of Geras, Oizys, Moros, Momos, Eris, Nemesis and Keres, the gods of old age, anguish, tragedy, condemnation, strife, retribution, carnage and violent death. My mother and her siblings—the first progenies of Erebus and Nyx. They were all banished to Tartarus simply for doing their duty. In my own humble opinion, I think they were exiled because your daddy dearest feared he would be overpowered."
Acteon tapped his chin in feigned thought and said, "Hmm. I am certain Erebus would be crushed, dethroned and chopped into itsy, bitsy pieces. Well, that is part of the plan."
Acteon looked at me and his grin dropped. "Seriously, Erebus and Nyx never told you about us? It's so annoying how they are pretending they do not have other children. Except that..."
A gleeful gleam filled his eyes as he snapped a twig off my tree. I winced at the action. Acteon gazed at the leaves hanging on to the branch, taking a moment to admire his images. Had I the strength, I would've snapped his neck and thrown him in one of my tunnels. Except that they were no longer my tunnels.
Using the woody stalk, he waved at the ground and the names of Erebus and Nyx appeared. Viscous, coarse roots then emerged and wrapped around the names of my parents. They were just words, but the roots seemed to be stifling the life out of them. The roots interweaved and formed a thick trunk covered in bristly bark. Twisted branches with dried brown leaves shot out of the trunk. The eight densest stems had plump fruits at their tips and in each circle appeared the names of Apate and her siblings. Two tiny berries materialized on the other side of the tree and I could barely read the names of my brothers. One withered stem branched out several feet from the trunk. It carried no leaves and at the very end appeared one rotten fruit. I didn't have to guess the name it bore.
The fruit dropped to the earth and split into two. Half of it resembled the rest of the fruits that Acteon conceived, but the other half was rotten to the core. A worm wrapped around the moldy half and the name Thera formed on the rind of the fruit. The fruit that supposedly represented me.
No...
Acteon looked at me, that maddening grin again on his face. He plucked the berry with Phantasos' name and popped it in his mouth. "This is delicious!"
I wasn't sure if he was referring to the fruit or the look of disgrace on my face.
"I cannot believe you never knew. You don't even have an inkling why Nyx hates you so much," Acteon prattled. "You are Erebus' drunken mistake. Nyx should've killed you when she murdered your mortal mother."
Maybe she should have.
Acteon stepped on my name, squashing both fruit and worm. Then he went back to the tree and ate the other berry that had Morpheus' name. Delighting in my torment, he carried on, "I don't understand why Erebus and Nyx would banish their other children to Tartarus and let you weak lot run around. Especially you. You are no god. The gods' gifts were wasted on you."
I felt Selene bristle beside me. Zeus, she witnessed all my indignity. Yet here she was, eager to defend the bastard beside her. I held her hand, silently urging her not to do anything.
"But then I should be a little grateful you are incompetent. It's your sloppiness that allowed me access to the dream world. And you didn't even read the fine print when you signed this contract. You did not just give me a ticket to your world. You also gave me your ability to create nightmares," Acteon claimed and I watched in horror as my leathery wings emerged from his spine.
My beautiful appendages looked gauche and heavy on Acteon. They drooped.
Markus and Francis would have immediately pointed that out. I didn't get a chance because Acteon continued his soliloquy. "I wonder. What is the boogeyman's greatest nightmare?"
Despite everything I just discovered, my greatest dream and worst nightmare remained the same. My worst fear was to lose Selene.
I cannot lose Selene.
"I see," Acteon spoke, taking a step toward Selene.
I pulled Selene behind me and told Acteon, "You see nothing. You are a deceiver."
Acteon glared at me and replied, "But aren't you and your step brothers deceivers, too? You lie to mortals through their dreams, making them long for things they could not have. Like you. I wager you now long to be a god, you feeble pretender."
I pressed Selene's hand and answered, "Not all mortals desire to be gods."
"Are you mad? Of course they do! Not all men are stupid like you," Acteon retorted. "When I communed with Mother, I told her I wanted to be an Oneiro and influence dreams. Mother scoffed at my dream and urged me to be more ambitious. Now that I have your gift surging through me, I understand what she meant. I will be the most powerful Oneiro. I will not be restrained. I will not simply influence dreams. I will affect reality."
Acteon stretched his wings and the ground shook. I held Selene in my arms as the setting changed and we found ourselves in a room with many moving frames displaying all of Acteon's conquests. The Brekahur tribe that had protected the white elephant was just one of them.
One frame showed a madman influencing followers to kidnap and murder children. Another presented a tribe dismembering tourists and offering the organs to Keres, the god of bloodshed. Yet another revealed a class of teenagers drugging random people, spreading terminal and contagious diseases. Then there were several pictures of wars leaving many orphans.
And I knew. These were not fiction. These were not plotlines of a horror story. These were current events. And it sent a chill down my spine knowing Acteon had something to do with these atrocities.
Acteon was beaming with pride when he faced me. "I couldn't do so much because I didn't want to be caught. But now I could influence the dreams and no one would know who's inspiring all the suffering, strife and violence. Oh, Mother would be so pleased."
"You cannot do this."
"Silence, bastard!" Acteon roared. "You do not tell me what I can or cannot do. You are nothing but an insect. Although you have made things surprisingly easy for me. You are lazy. The things you can do through nightmares—you have no idea. Eventually, once I've dispatched all your brothers, I will release Mother and her siblings and even Erebus and Nyx will bow down to me. That is if my mother and uncles don't rip them to pieces."
Acteon jeered as he weaved images of eight monstrosities slaughtering Father and... and Nyx. He didn't stop there. He created nightmares more horrific than any I had conceived before. They were too realistic. The worst forms of debauchery on earth.
Selene shuddered beside me as she watched in horror. I was ridden with guilt. I had dragged her here and now, I could not protect her. "I am so sorry, Selene. I am not a god. I am nothing."
She looked at me and shook her head, but she was too terrified to speak. I held her tighter in my arms. "Close your eyes, Selene."
My worst nightmare. I brought Selene to my worst nightmare.
No. I may be a mere mortal now, but I would not give up without a fight. I gently released Selene and turned to face Acteon.
But two forms descended from the sky, beating their massive wings and wiping the horrors that Acteon had drawn.
"What did we miss?" Francis asked once they had literally cleared the air of the harrowing visions.
"Aside from the ugly tree standing next to your mirror tree and this wannabe's boring monologue," Markus said.
"You are going to miss your wings because you two are next," Acteon bellowed, clearly aggravated with the interruption. "The next time you fall asleep, I am going to warp your dreams. Let me see. Hmm... I will start with the pixies."
"Not the pixies," Francis cried, upset that anyone would want to harm his pretty sprites.
"Don't listen to him. He is just a pitiful mockery trying to find his place in the world," Markus stated contemptuously, his eyes on Acteon.
"Scared, Morpheus?" Acteon goaded. "When I control the dream realm, there will be no need for three worthless deities. I could form everything—daydreams, nightmares, fantasies."
Markus gritted his teeth as he inched toward Acteon, eager to end our uninvited guest.
Acteon smirked and resumed, "But it would be dreary in dreams. True power is in wakefulness. For instance, in the dream realm, I cannot kill the girl."
Vines came out of nowhere and a particularly thorny one wrapped around my ankle, the sharp barbs piercing my skin, and I was thrown to the other side of the room. I was trying to remove the hostile plant when I saw several tendrils seize Selene, coiling around her wrists, ankles, middle and neck. She tried to pull the one around her neck, but it only looped tighter, suffocating her.
"No!!!"
I ran to Selene, ignoring the pain in my leg as longer spikes dug into my skin. My brothers also swooped in to help Selene, but for every vine they removed, more appeared, twisting around Selene and my brothers' limbs and wings.
"Enough! You are all getting wearisome," Acteon shouted. He extended his wings and with one mighty beat, he swept us out of the dream world and into the mortal realm.
The next thing I knew, I was in front of a speeding car.
Markus pushed me out of the way and we hit the pavement hard. Markus was in his human form, unscathed. I was in my only form—mortal, bruised and bleeding.
Markus helped me get inside our house where Francis was waiting. I looked around, frantic.
"Where is Selene? Where is she? Why is she not back here with us?? We have to save her..." I could not breathe. I was losing it.
"Ice, please, calm down. Selene is still in the dream realm. We can go back," Francis told me, near hysterical as well. I often forgot how important Selene was to him. And to Markus.
"But I can't go back to our world. I signed the contract. I am such an idiot," I cried, banging my head on the kitchen table.
"Then we'll go get her for you," Markus said, looking very grim.
"He's going to trick you the way he did me."
"He cannot get in our dreams. We won't let him in," Markus stressed.
"I'm afraid he can," Francis rejoined miserably. "He took Ice's abilities. Ice can traverse across dream realms. And we also don't know other powers Acteon inherited from Apate."
And with a hint of desperation, Francis rambled, "Isn't she supposed to be our sister? Where's the sisterly love?"
Markus looked pointedly at Francis and replied, "I think we should set our expectations. Our folks banished her to Tartarus for a reason."
"Oh, right," Francis answered gloomily.
"It doesn't matter. He is nothing. We have millennia of experience," the oldest dream god expressed with conviction.
And I would hang on to his conviction because it's the only thing I had left. I looked at my brothers and pleaded, "Save her. I would sacrifice anything for Selene to be safe. She is in danger because of me."
"Fool. That's not true. Your idiocy is getting worse."
"Hush, Morpheus. He's now mortal."
Markus raised an eyebrow at Francis. "You're seriously going with that excuse?"
Francis looked at me and said, "Sorry. I tried, but there's really no excuse for your lameness."
"It's okay," I said. With some of Markus' confidence rubbing off on me, I told my brothers, "We need to have a plan before you guys fall asleep."
"Yes!" Francis replied. "Although I am feeling so tired I could sleep in a minute."
I cringed but offered anyway. I stood up and headed for the coffee maker. "I'll make some coffee."
I held my breath as I prepared cups of the strong brew for my brothers. I silently prayed for Selene to be safe. I asked Athena to give me the wisdom to find the best course of action when it hit me that we should inform our parents this instant.
"Francis, get a hold of Father and..."
I thought they were just quiet, but I was stunned when I turned around and saw both Markus and Francis slumped on the table.
No, no, no! How could we plan if they were asleep? I could no longer follow them in their sleep. I was mortal and useless.
"Ice..." Francis whispered, his hand stretched toward me before he passed out. A rainbow-colored pebble fell from his hand and I caught it before it hit the floor.
I gripped the pebble. A gift from the dream world. An invitation, an indisputable entry to the dreams. My way back to Selene.
I ran to the stove and started heating milk. But this was taking too long and the fumes from the coffee on top of my rising panic were going to keep me awake. My palms turned clammy and my eyes darted around. There should be something here.
And there it was. My eyes landed on a huge bottle of vodka. Without thinking twice, I chugged it down while gripping the pebble. One liter later, I was surprised to see four of Markus.
"What a nightmare," I mumbled before I collapsed to the floor in drunken stupor.