Coils by Wright Barbara Ann

Author:Wright, Barbara Ann [Wright, Barbara Ann]
Language: eng
Format: azw
ISBN: 9781626395992
Publisher: Bold Strokes Books
Published: 2016-09-13T04:00:00+00:00

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Medusa stared at the wall of darkness. Her hair ruffled gently as Aix breathed in and out behind her. Memories of childhood rose again, and she clung to them, clung to anything besides the fact that she was trapped in Tartarus.

Her sisters had cared for her when she was very little; their mother couldn’t do much more than hunt for them and protect them. It wasn’t until long after Aix had died that Medusa had wondered who’d cared for her sisters as infants. She supposed that Aix had always done the best she’d could, even against Zeus himself.

She remembered being carried in her mother’s mouth, grasping her mother’s teeth. One day, after being carried far enough that Aix’s mouth dried out, Medusa had tumbled into a sandy hole with Stheno and Euryale, and Aix had covered them with dirt. As Zeus rampaged through the desert, hunting them, they’d cried out for their mother to hide with them, but she was far too large to fit in the hole. Euryale begged Aix to flee and hide in the nearby mountain that was always belching smoke and lava, but she never ventured far from her young, and they couldn’t stand the same great temperatures she could.

Aix had faced Zeus and lost, and she’d probably never understood what he wanted or why he’d come. She hadn’t thought to run because she couldn’t carry her daughters far in her mouth, and she hadn’t thought to have them cling to her back. She’d never been smart, but she loved her children and died for them. After Zeus had skinned her, he’d let her daughters be.

Medusa slid her fingertips across Aix’s snout. “I didn’t know you were here, Mom. I looked for you in Asphodel. I hoped Zeus had sent you to the Elysian Fields, but why would he do that for a monster?”

And he wasn’t even the one she was really mad at. She’d let her mother become just Aix in her mind, just another Titan, and she hadn’t come to Tartarus because she didn’t want these memories again. Tears started down her cheeks, and she couldn’t stop them any more than she could stop breathing. “Well, we’ll have plenty of time to get to know each other again.”

Aix gently rubbed her head up and down Medusa’s side and purred, a sound that dredged up deep memories of being lulled to sleep in her mother’s warm coils. She supposed she’d come to enjoy it again.

If she couldn’t figure a way out of here.

“Right.” She wiped the tears away and thought of Euryale’s words when they’d realized their mother was never coming back: “We always have to get back up.”

She turned to the square of blackness and wiped her hands on her jeans. Cressida was counting on her. She didn’t know what the other three were planning. They were probably leading Cressida away, and each second Medusa spent lost in the past feeling sorry for herself was a second the villains got farther ahead. She wasn’t surprised at the anger inside her, the sting of betrayal, but the jot of fear was new and sharp.

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