Goddess by Liv Savell (books for 6 year olds to read themselves txt) 📗

Tristan arrived first, tearing his eyes away from Delyth and Enyo long enough to lunge at Etienne. “What are you planning, you worthless—” and then he was trapped, screaming uselessly and unable to move more than a pace in any direction.

Delyth came next, dropping out of the sky so that Enyo hit the trap feet first with a thud before throwing herself free in a tangle of arms and wings. She landed heavily but pushed herself up quickly enough, turning towards him. “Now, Etienne!” Already Meirin and Maoz were nearly upon them.

Enyo threw herself against that invisible wall, screaming, spittle flying from her lips. Her face contorted in fury, and she didn’t look anything like a human anymore. She was foaming at the mouth—a rabid animal that ought to be put down.

Meirin rushed past with a look of desperation, Maoz prowling behind. The Hunter God didn’t seem to be moving fast enough to stumble into one of the traps, he was still steps away when the earth shuddered. Etienne barely kept his footing, and Meirin shrieked as she fell. Even Enyo was distracted; she quieted, looking around.The ground heaved again, knocking Etienne and Delyth into each other hard enough to make sparks dance across his vision. He dropped the book and snatched it back up from the ground.

Enyo was shouting again, her voice muffled by the trap, but she wasn’t looking at Delyth anymore. She was staring at Tristan, who in turn looked frozen.

A crack of lightning flew through the air and blasted the land between them, scattering dirt and chunks of rock. Smoke rose from the charred earth, and Enyo slunk down to her haunches. She looked afraid in the still, staring way of a rabbit that had spotted the wolf.

༄

In the wake of lightning, silence followed. Delyth staggered to her feet, hauling Etienne up as she went. Everything was strangely muffled, a buzz where before there had been screams, the rush of wind. She shook the mage to get his attention. “Etienne, keep going before she kills us all!” Her words sounded distant even to her and Etienne couldn’t  seem to hear at all. “Etienne! The spell!” She was screaming now; she could feel it in the rawness of her throat.

Delyth had assumed that Enyo would not have control of the weather once in the rune trap, but no one else could have called this storm, this lightning. They would have to hurry, to bind her as quickly as possible.

Shaking, Etienne turned back to his work, blood streaming from a cut he opened in his arm to join smoking herbs in a bowl at his feet. His voice was nothing but a drone to Delyth’s ears, but he appeared to be uttering the spell forcefully, his expression grim but confident.

Only, nothing seemed to be happening. No change came over the Goddess in her invisible cage.

Instead, all was quiet. The remains of the crater quivered,  tendrils of smoke bending, parting like a curtain for a dark, man-shaped figure. Only, no man could have hair as red as paint and eyes as black as pitch. No man would have delicately pointed ears nor tattoos of vines and flowers ebbing and flowing over his skin, as if swaying in a breeze.

No man could make Enyo mute and Maoz hesitate. Even Tristan seemed surprised.

“Mother,” the man purred, his voice rich and beautiful to behold. Dark eyes darted to Tristan, and he smiled, exposing teeth with long canines. “Father.”

“Mascen,” Tristan called, his voice long and lazy. “You’re quite a way from home, son. What brings you to our side of the ocean?” Delyth drew her sword, ignoring the warning shake of Etienne’s head.

⫸

Meirin watched from the ground, scrabbling backward. Where had this man come from? And why was he calling the mortal, Tristan, father?! He seemed to have stepped from the fulmination that had struck the plains, and he stank of otherworldly power.

They hadn’t counted on a third God joining them, and Etienne looked as if he were struggling already. Meirin edged towards Etienne when the stranger’s dark eyes locked her in place.

“So many little friends, you’ve brought together, father. I’m hurt that you didn’t invite me. You know I haven’t had a good festival in years.” Meirin felt her gut churn at the idle way the stranger—Tristan had called him Mascen—sauntered closer to the contained Gods. Not at all intimidated or afraid.

What kind of lunatic wouldn’t be afraid of Enyo?

His gaze slithered over Enyo, where she crouched, teeth bared in what might have been a hiss if she were making any sound. Had she been a cat, her fur would have been on end. He leaned forward, gaze unblinking, and Enyo pressed back against the rune barrier. A trapped animal.

“That’s a clever little trick —What, Mother? Can’t you escape this human magic? How pathetic you are now.”

“Mascen,” Enyo croaked, somehow terrible and vulnerable at once.

He grinned and, with a flip of his wrist, pushed through the magic holding Enyo in place. “You should have stayed asleep,” he murmured, his tone sweet, intimate. He might have been speaking to a lover. Enyo scrambled for the blade strapped to her pack, only to stiffen as his fingers met flesh, closing around the thin bones of Alphonse’s wrist. A scream ripped from her throat. Where he touched, smoke rose.

Mascen merely looked interested in what was happening to the Goddess, veins of black tracing their way up her forearm and elbow, snaking towards her shoulder and neck.

Tristan shouted, striking at his prison until his nails tore and spit flew from his lips. Maoz lunged forward, and Etienne fumbled in the dirt, perhaps trying for magic or runes, but neither moved with the speed or ferocity of the winged woman. Meirin had barely lifted her spear by the time Delyth had raised her sword and attacked. Her face was granite, and her movements a blur, impossible to track.

✶

Etienne stumbled backward, away from the violence, his hands trembling and his face ashen. This creature, whatever he was,