The Haunting of Guaritori Diolco, Part 31
Undersea Showdown
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I struggled in Iskios’s arms, but his grip on me was like steel. My idea of giving him a stronger body had backfired spectacularly.
“You can’t do this!” I wanted to yell, but he was squeezing me so hard that the most I could do was gasp.
The Telchines smiled broadly enough to reveal their sharklike teeth.
“What do you wish in return for the soul of Zeus?” asked Damnameneus.
“An alliance,” replied Iskios. “The three of you and I will attack Olympus together and share power once we have defeated the kin of Zeus.”
“And what of the Titans?” asked Lycus.
“All of them except Cronus and Atlas have already been defeated. Those two are fleeing Hera’s curse and will not be able to interfere. But if you wish to avoid future trouble, you can always offer Cronus a share of the power. I would not object to such a plan if you feel that is a wiser course of action.”
The Telchines chuckled. At least, that’s what I thought they were doing. The sound was more like that of people drowning.
“If what you say is true, Cronus is not much of a threat,” said Scelmis. “But what of Zeus’s siblings, and his children?”
“Most of them are in the mortal realm, pursuing redemption.” Iskios said redemption as if it were the vilest thing imaginable. “Zeus’s siblings, Hecate, Heracles, Persephone, Medea, and the Hecatoncheires are the only ones on Olympus at the moment.”
“That is still a considerable force,” said Damnameneus “How do you propose to overcome it?”
Iskios stood taller, and from him flowed mingled light and darkness. I was pressed too close to him to see very well, but his display must have been spectacular because it drew gasps from the Telchines.
“I am the son of Tartarus, just as you are. And like you, I have also been reborn, in my case of Medea and of the bearer of Zeus’s soul and the Philosopher’s Stone. I have more power than even you can conceive of. But I can contribute far more than that.”
“We will need to test the truthfulness of your boasts,” said Scelmis. “But let us assume for the sake of argument that they are true. What more are you offering us?”
“In order to gain control of Olympus without violating prophecy, you need a son of Zeus to sit on the throne. Zeus’s soul was within my father’s body—and still is. Thus, I could make a technical claim to be the son of Zeus.”
I hadn’t even thought of that scenario. But that sounded like exactly the kind of loophole that had been exploited back in ancient times to get around prophecies.
“We already have a son of Zeus to open the way for us,” replied Scelmis. “Hermes, come forth!”
So that was why the Telchines had been so eager to get the soul of Hermes. But they didn’t have his body, and his soul had been fading. How could they possibly have resolved those problems?
I didn’t have to wait long to find out. In our direction swam an enormous, winged sea serpent, its body glowing with the same sickly blue-green light as the Telchines.
“Behold, the new Hermes,” said Damnameneus. “Olympus will tremble at his arrival.”
The eyes of the new Hermes, looked dull to me. I couldn’t tell immediately, but at first glance, I saw nothing of the real Hermes in their depths. If they had somehow grafted his soul into this monstrosity, it wasn’t in control of the body.
“I will happily consent to playing a somewhat more junior role under these circumstances,” said Iskios, his words flowing so rapidly that I wondered if he could have anticipated this development. “But surely, my power, not to mention what the soul of Zeus could do for you, is worth giving me some share of rule on Olympus.”
The Telchines looked at each other, nodded, and looked back at Iskios. “We can accommodate your request to join us,” said Scelmis. “All you need to do to complete the bargain is allow us to take the soul of Zeus.”
Iskios gestured for them to come closer. “Take it then, just as you took the soul of Hermes.”
Was Iskios really so stupid that he would let the Telchines take their prize without first swearing the appropriate oaths to create a binding agreement? My first impulse was to remind him of the importance of such a step. But he’d betrayed me and the entire Olympian community. Why should I favor him over the Telchines?
Nonetheless, I opened my mouth to speak. He might be just as evil as the Telchines—but he was still my son, at least in some sense. If I had to pick a side in this impossible situation, it would be his.
Unfortunately, he squeezed me tighter at that moment, and I suddenly lacked the breath to speak. I struggled in his arms, flopping around like a fish out of water, unable to avert the looming disaster ahead.
They would take the soul of Zeus and kill Iskios. Why add more more person to their power-sharing arrangement if they didn’t have to?
Damnameneus led the way, reaching toward me with a clawlike hand. Despite my squirming around, he reached into me, gripping the soul he wanted and sliding it outward.
“Fascinating!” said Iskios. “I was wondering how you managed that particular trick. Now I know.”
Just as I felt the soul leave me, Iskios reached across, grabbed it as if he had also inherited psychopomp powers from Hermes, and shoved it into himself.
“What is the meaning of this?” asked Damnameneus, his magic stirring darkly within him, his threat obvious. His brothers followed his example.
Iskios let me go, shoving me a little out of the way, though I remained within the air bubble. He blasted the Telchines with sunlight bright enough to blind them for a moment. Then, using the time he had just bought himself, he closed his eyes for a moment. I was near enough to feel Zeus awakening within him.
He spared a moment to look in my direction and smile. “Sorry for the deception. I wasn’t sure how good an actor you were, or I would have told you my plan.”
I was too stunned to respond at first, but Iskios couldn’t afford to wait for me to catch up. He reached toward me, covering both of us with protective magic that felt like a ward against electricity.
The Telchines probably felt what he was doing, and they tried to ward themselves and the Hermes sea serpent in the same way. Even so, when Iskios started hurling thunderbolts at them, they weren’t fully prepared.
Unfortunately, magically generated electricity behaved like the regular variety in some ways Iskios hadn’t considered. It electrocuted all the unshielded sea life for a considerable distance around us. But because the same amount of energy was dispersed over a much wider area, it lacked the raw power to smash through the Telchine shields in the way a thunderbolt flung at them above water might have done. They were jolted, but it would take more than such a shock to bring them down. I could feel their defenses getting stronger, and the water around them began to twist in a way I found hard to interpret.
“Father, help me!” said Iskios with a lot more emotion than he’d shown to me earlier. It took me only a second to see what he needed.
He had perhaps expected to knock out the Telchines in a single blow, but that hadn’t worked. Now, he faced a prolonged battle, and I could tell from the look on his face that even he was having trouble containing the now fully awake soul of Zeus. We needed to end this battle fast.
The Philosopher’s Stone was mine to command once again, so I hit the Telchines with the lumen naturae, followed by an effort to turn the sea water around them into air, confusing their spellcasting.
The Telchines were too busy defending themselves to counterattack, but Hermes, the sea serpent, swam lazily in our direction. Though its size made it seem threatening, its sluggishness undercut that impression. Looking at it more closely, I could see its body pulse with Telchine magic, perhaps to restrain Hermes from taking over. But I imagined he was fighting back, which accounted for the creature’s slow movement.
I shifted position, putting myself between Iskios and the serpent. My son hardly noticed as he focused more electrical attacks on the Telchines. He was paler than normal, and his hands were shaking. I touched him long enough to recharge him, strengthening him a little against the weight of Zeus’s soul.
As soon as the shaking stopped, I turned my attention to the approaching sea serpent. Telchine magic was darkness-based, just as Iskios’s used to be. Trying to take advantage of that, I directed beams of lumen naturae into the serpent’s eyes, not to blind it but to force light into its body to fight against the darkness.
The creature twisted, repositioning its head in such a way that my beams didn’t reach his eyes. I wasn’t about to give up, though. Using the stone to create an oxygen bubble around me so that I could move out of Iskios’s protection, I kept moving around, forcing the sea serpent to continue twisting. I couldn’t move that fast under water, but the serpent’s sluggishness made us roughly even. I could shift fast enough to counter its evasive maneuvers.
I glanced at Iskios, who I could see wasn’t doing well. I wasn’t even sure at this point who was controlling the body, Zeus or Iskios. But I remembered how fast Zeus’s soul overcame mine. I didn’t want to let Iskios endure the same experience. I had no choice but to turn my back on the befuddled serpent and swim toward Iskios.
The repeated thunderbolt attacks had filled the water with burned fish, but the Telchines were still standing. Iskios was already shaking again, and in his eyes I thought I saw more of Zeus than of him. I had to get the lord of Olympus out of Iskios or at least, back to sleep. If that meant we had to retreat, so be it.
By the tim I reached him, Iskios was still firing electricity and had controlled the shaking, but now, he stood like a statue when I reached him. “What’s happening?” I asked.
“I’m losing myself,” he replied, his voice hoarse. He started to tremble again. I could use the stone to help prevent physical damage, but I couldn’t keep Zeus from squeezing out Iskios’s own soul as Zeus had done with mine.
Pressing my hands against the back of Iskios’s head, I tried to put the soul of Zeus back to sleep. Drawing on the Hermetic magic quickly put me into headache territory, but I kept going. I had no choice.
Hecate had been able to use a sleep spell against Zeus, but I wasn’t having any luck with that, either because I wasn’t properly adapting the magic to the situation or because I just didn’t have enough power. I pushed until my head felt as if it split open, but Zeus remained awake. I knew that even if Iskios relinquished his body to Zeus, the pressure would continue, eventually erasing his own mind.
I had not gone through so much just to see Iskios destroyed.
“Pull the soul out of yourself!” I said in the most commanding tone I could muster.
“But—”
“Just do it!”
Iskios reached up with trembling hands and pulled the soul almost as smoothly as the Telchines had pulled Hermes out of him. My boy was quick study.
I hung onto Zeus’s soul, using my ability as a psychopomp. I couldn’t put him back in myself, though. I already knew I’d fare worse than Iskios had.
“Maximum distraction!” I yelled. Iskios, already looking better, nodded and started flinging mixed shots of light and darkness at the Telchines. It would take them only a short time to adjust to his new strategy, so I would have to move fast.
I took a second to glance at the sea serpent. Even without my light attacks, it had started convulsing. Apparently, Hermes was trying to gain control of the body. As long as the creature was writhing in conflict, it wasn’t a threat.
Using a mixture of air and water magic, I propelled myself toward the Telchines, who had almost stabilized their defenses against Iskios. They were paying little if any attention to me, clearly considering me as not much of a threat on my own. They hadn’t yet realized I was towing Zeus’s soul along with me.
I would make sure that oversight cost them dearly.
As I neared, they raised some additional defense against physical attacks. Too bad for them—my attack wasn’t going to be physical.
But the pain in my head was now like hot needles being driven into my brain. I only had one shot at implementing my plan before I started screaming nonstop.
I didn’t know how to lift a soul out of a body the way the Telchines—and now Iskios—could do. But I figured flinging Zeus’s soul at one of the Telchines with maximum force would enable it to enter the body.
I threw the soul, and as I had hoped, it passed right through their defenses. Damnameneus jumped as it hit him and spasmed as if shocked when it entered him.
I flew backward as Scelmis and Lycus hit me with the equivalent of a tidal wave, and my air bubble collapsed. My ability to convert water to air wasn’t fast enough to keep my breathing as long as they could keep up the water pressure.
I felt consciousness slipping away. But then I found myself in Iskios’s air bubble. He spared a moment to look down at me with concern, but as I started coughing the seawater out of my lungs, he turned his attention back to Telchines.
Damnameneus writhed on the ocean floor as Zeus tried to gain control of his body. Powerful as the Telchine was, I doubted he could resist indefinitely. Iskios struck with all the power he had in an effort to take down the other two. Light and darkness swirled around them, gradually building to strobe light intensity.
I managed to stand up, only to discover that the sea serpent was racing toward me, its mouth opening as if to swallow me in one bite.
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Loved this.