Warrior Rising (Goddess Summoning 6)

CHAPTER FOUR

"I like the lovely wine color of these robes, don’t you? They complement her dark hair well.” Venus arranged the silken drape of the stola that swathed Polyxena’s unnaturally still body.

“Anything that brings you pleasure brings me pleasure, Goddess,” said a nearby satyr.

“Yes, darling, I know. That’s why I wasn’t asking you. Now run along and finish wiping the last of that blood off the floor.” Venus patted the creature’s cheek to take the sting from her words. “Eleithyia, I was asking you.”

“Oh, yes, Goddess. I think the color is beautiful.”

“Then why are you frowning?”

“Well, it’s quite, um, unusual that you’ve arrayed the maidservant in such finery, too.”

Venus smoothed the creamy silk tunic so that the maidservant’s blush colored stola wasn’t wrinkled. Then she frowned at the little priestess. “Child, it is true that this is a servant’s body, but the soul that is going to reside there is definitely not a servant. It’s going to be a big enough shock for poor Jacqueline to wake up in a strange body and find out she has to play the part of maid to her best friend.”

“You are, of course, the Goddess. I bow to your intelligence and wisdom and—”

Venus waved away her compliments. “Bow later. Right now just tell me that the fabric is perfect.”

“The fabric is perfect.”

“Oh, Venus, the satyrs have done a wonderful job setting my temple aright!” Hera bustled in beaming at the randy woodland creatures and making them wriggle with glee.

“I told you they were marvelous,” Venus said, blowing kisses at the beasts closest to her.

“I am surprised that they did such a good job getting out all the blood and gore,” Athena said, materializing not far from Hera.

“And them.” Venus gestured grandly in the direction of the two newly cleaned and clothed bodies. “Don’t you think they look lovely, too?”

“The mortals look beautiful, as does my temple. Thank you, Venus, for a job well done,” Hera said.

“They are beautiful, though little but empty shells without souls,” Athena said.

Venus ignored the Goddess of War. “All went well with Agamemnon?” she asked Hera.

The Queen of the Gods curled her lip in distaste. “My opinion of that insufferable man hasn’t changed one bit. I do feel terribly sorry for poor Briseis.”

“Which means he’s going to take her from Achilles?” Athena said.

“Yes.”

“Good. Thetis will take care of nudging her son into withdrawing from the battle. She’ll make it a point of pride. Apparently Achilles has matured from the impulsive teenager who chose glory and battle and he is not thrilled with the fate he chose for himself, but he’s still typically prideful. Thetis assured me there will be no problem getting him to withdraw, at least for a short time,” Athena said. “Now all that’s left is for your mortal to work her magic and continue to keep Achilles out of the fray long enough for the Trojans to claim victory and then this whole mess will be ended.”

“Don’t worry about my mortal. She’ll do just fine.”

“Really? Does she speak ancient Greek?” Athena asked pointedly.

Venus hesitated only briefly and said, “She will after I do a little…” The Goddess of Love waggled her fingers, causing glitter to form in the air.

Athena snorted.

“Venus, perhaps you could put the souls into the bodies and we could get this business underway?” Hera said.

“Oh, yes! Of course. Satyrs.” Venus clapped her hands commandingly together. “Return to Olympus. I’ll send some Nyseideian nymphs to thank you for aiding me.” The hoofed creatures cheered as they disappeared. “All right. Stand back. Give me room to work.” The Goddess of Love smoothed her long blond hair and then raised her hands, palms up. “I call the mortal spirits I recently made free—Katrina and Jacqueline, I command you come to me!”

Two glowing orbs popped into the air and floated to rest on Venus’s open palms.

“First I gift you with the language you must know,

so that as soon as you’re here you’ll be ready to go.

So now is the time to begin the task I ask of you—

ensoul these bodies that you may complete the job

Love would have you do!”

Venus threw the glowing orbs at the bodies like she was a major league pitcher.

Kat gasped and choked. She sat up coughing and rubbing a hand across her forehead. Jacky moaned and pressed her hands to her chest in the exact place her wound had been.

“Oh, god, I feel like utter crap,” Kat said. “How much champagne did I drink, anyway?” She cleared her throat and blinked her eyes. “What’s wrong with my voice and where the hell—” Her words broke off as her vision cleared. She stared, wide-eyed, at three gorgeous women who where watching her like she was a new species of flower that had just bloomed.

“Kat, I think I’m having a heart attack.” Jacky moaned again. “Since when do hangovers feel like heart attacks?”

Kat pulled her vision from the three ridiculously attractive women and turned to look at the person who lay beside her and who was talking like Jacky, but didn’t sound anything like her and…

“Holy fucking shit! Jacqueline? Is that you?”

The beautiful blonde blinked several times, trying to clear her vision, and continued to rub her chest. “Who else would it be, the goddamn Easter Bunny? Why do you sound wrong? God, am I going deaf, too?”

“Have no fear, Jacqueline and Katrina. You are safe and well and under our protection,” said the woman who was standing closest to them, and was probably the most stunning of the three.

Kat closed her eyes and took several deep breaths. “Drunken hysterical dream. I’ll never drink that much champagne again. Promise. Time to wake up now and deal with my horrendous hangover.” She opened her eyes.

“You are not dreaming, mortal woman,” said the regal looking woman in flowing white robes trimmed in sky blue.

Then the statuesque woman with the unusual gray eyes stepped forward and spoke. “We have altered your fate. Instead of allowing you to perish in the modern world we have plucked your souls from your shattered bodies and brought you to the ancient world. You may thank us.”

The woman who had spoken first frowned severely at the gray-eyed woman. “Give it a rest, Athena. They don’t need to thank us. It’s not like they asked for this. And besides that, the whole abasing yourself before the gods thing doesn’t work in the modern mortal world.”

“This isn’t the modern mortal world,” snapped the gray-eyed woman.

“Really? I hadn’t noticed. I thought—”

“Okay, what the fuck?” Jacqueline said, sitting up.

“Jacky?” Kat ignored the bickering women and turned to face her friend.

“Kat? Is that you in there?”

“Yeah, it is.”

“But you’re not you. I mean, you’re nothing like you. And what the hell are you wearing?” Jacky reached out to touch a drape of the burgundy-colored robe and her eyes became riveted on her hand. “Katrina Marie Campbell, what is going on? Why. Is. This. My. Hand!”

“We can explain everything,” said the regal woman. She nodded to the most gorgeous one. “Go ahead, Venus; explain everything.”

“Well, it’s really quite simple. You two got in a horrid accident after you left your girlfriend party. I’d been watching you through my oracle.” She paused and smiled. “I am Venus, Goddess of Sensual Love, Beauty and the Erotic Arts.” She pointed to the gray-eyed woman. “This is Athena, Goddess of War, blah, blah.” Then she gestured to the regal woman. “And this is Hera, Queen of Olympus. Anyway, as I was saying, I’d been watching you through my oracle and I witnessed your accident. I just couldn’t let you die like that, so I snatched up your souls. Not long after that, Hera’s temple was defiled and Polyxena, Princess of Troy, and her, uh, maidservant, Melia, were killed. So we did some quick thinking, quick healing, and quick re-ensouling. And here you are—yourselves, but in different bodies. See, I told you it was really quite simple.”

“I—I—I—” Kat sputtered.

“I’m white!” Jacqueline sprang to her feet, staring down at her new body. “Oh, Jesus god-fucking-bless America! Jesus! Jesus! I feel faint. My heart! Kat! I’m dying!” She reached out blindly and Kat hurried to her side, gripping her hand.

“You’re not dying. We’re dreaming. That’s all.”

“Why in the goddamn hell would I dream I’m white?” Jacky cried as she clutched Kat with one hand and fanned herself with the other. “My heart, lord, my heart. The pain!”

“Darlings, I told you that you’re not dreaming,” Venus said.

“What is wrong with being white?” Athena asked.

“It’s a drunken nightmare,” Kat said, trying to stay calm and use her best counselor’s voice. “We’ll wake up in a second and find out that we passed out in your living room, again. Remember last New Year’s?”

Venus stepped up to Kat and Jacky. She sighed heavily. “I didn’t want to do this, but you need to accept what has happened.” She waggled her slender fingers until the air began to glow with diamond dust and then she flicked the dust at them saying, “Remember…”

Kat breathed in the sparkling dust with Jacky, sneezed, and was suddenly taken back to the aftermath of Susie’s party. As if watching a macabre play, she saw the two of them stumble, laugh, and hold onto each other as she and Jacky got into the cab. The cab drove down Reservoir Hill to the four-way stop. Horrified, Kat saw an SUV run the stop sign and smash into them. There was a soundless pause, then with an awful whooshing the cab burst into flames.

“Oh, god! We’re dead!” Kat said.

“We’re dead and I’m white!” Jacky said. “This just can’t be right. I was sure I was going to heaven.”

“Well, me, too. I’m supposed to be going to heaven, too.”

“I dunno ’bout that, Kat. Remember your sorority girl days? The TU quarterback on the fifty-yard line? That kind of behavior adds up. That’s all I’m sayin’.”

Kat’s mouth dropped open. “Take that back! I cannot believe you think I’m going to hell because of a few college indiscreetnesses.”

“Indiscreetnesses? Is that even a word? And you’re not just goin’ to hell—you sucked me down here with you.”

“Jacqueline, did it ever occur to you that you may have gotten me sucked down to hell? What about all those times you returned shoes? You said you never wore them but you really paid way more than you could afford and then wore them a few times and then returned them. Huh? How about that?”

“Oh, please. You know shoes are never a sin. And besides, I haven’t done that in years.”

“Years?”

“Okay, months.”

Kat snorted and put her hands on her hips. “And what about your cursing?” she said decisively.

“I don’t curse. I use expletives.”

“You use what? That is such a load of—”

“Ladies!” Venus stepped between them. “No one is in hell. You’re dead, but you’re not dead.” The goddess frowned and shook her head as if she needed to clear it. “No, it’s not as confusing as that. Your bodies are dead. Your souls live on. They’re eternal. They’re the essence that is really you. All I did was to zap them into bodies that are now working.”

“Now working? Where are the eternal souls that were in these bodies?” Kat said.

Venus looked uncomfortable and in the silence Hera stepped in. “You, Katrina, are now dwelling in the body that did belong to Princess Polyxena of Troy. You, Jacqueline, are now dwelling in the body that did belong to Melia, her maidservant.”

“I’m a fucking maid! A white maid! Jesus lord, it just keeps getting worse and worse.” She looked blearily at Kat. “I really did get sucked into hell with you.”

“I am not in hell,” Kat said.

“Neither of you are in hell,” Venus said quickly.

“Where are the souls that were in these bodies?” Kat asked her again.

Hera answered before Venus could. “They are enjoying eternal happiness in the Elysian Fields of the ancient Greek Underworld.”

“Oh, lord, let me sit down. I’m in a dead white servant girl’s body.” Jacky sat heavily on the steps of the altar, fanning herself again.

Kat was staring down at her body in horror. “But I don’t see any wounds. What did she die of?”

“Oh, lord! An awful plague? Kat, we’re plague-some.”

“No, no, no,” Venus hastily reassured them. “They didn’t die of any illness. They were killed by Greek warriors.”

“Then where are the wounds?” Kat looked inside her robes, turning this way and that trying to see all of her body.

“We healed them before we re-ensouled the bodies with you,” Venus said.

“Now that’s the first good news I’ve heard,” Jacky said, recovering enough to stop fanning herself. “So just heal our old bodies and send us back. We’ll forget any of this ever happened.”

“I’m sorry. I can’t do that. Your bodies were completely burned. I took your souls only because I’d already decided to ask you, Kat, to do a small favor for me.”

“Okay, let’s see if I have this right,” Kat said. “You were somehow spying on me—”

“And me,” Jacky inserted.

“And Jacky,” Kat continued, “because you wanted me to do something for you, but then we died and you grabbed us? This makes no sense whatsoever.”

“Of course it does darling,” Venus said. “Although I certainly don’t think of my oracle as spying. Hera, Athena and I decided we needed the aid of a modern mortal woman. I was given the task of finding her. You seemed perfect. Then the tragic accident happened, but you still seemed perfect. At the same time Hera’s temple was being sacked—two bodies became available—a little zapping here, a little healing there, and here you are, decidedly not dead and still perfect for the little task I need you to perform. And darlings”—Venus included the scowling Jacky in her brilliant smile—“I’m going to grant you each a boon for aiding me.”

“The only boon we’re interested in is being put back into our old bodies,” Jacky said firmly. “And that doesn’t mean nasty old burned-up dead bodies. We want to be put back into cleaned-up healed bodies.” She glanced down. “Like these, only ours.”

“Ditto,” Kat said.

“It is simply not possible,” Venus said. “Your bodies are beyond even our powers to heal. I’m sorry, but—” Venus began but Hera interrupted her.

“You may not have your old bodies back, but between the three of us we can find comparable vessels in your old world,” Hera said.

“Can comparable mean younger and better looking?” Kat asked.

“And we want final approval,” Jacky added.

“As you wish. If you perform the little task we ask of you, and it is your wish, we will return you to the modern world in mortal bodies of your choice.”

Jacky and Kat exchanged glances, turned their backs on the goddesses and put their heads together. “Wonder how Queen Latifah’s feelin’? Maybe she has some kinda terrible wasting disease the goddesses could hurry up,” Jacky whispered hopefully.

“I was just wondering the same thing about Catherine Zeta-Jones,” Kat said, keeping her voice low. “So we’ll go for it?”

“Yep,” Jacky said.

They faced the goddesses again. “Okay, fine. All we need to do is this thing for you guys, and you’ll put us back where we belong in the bodies of our choice. Right?” Kat said.

“Yes,” the three goddesses said.

“So what is this thing you need us to do?” Jacky asked.

“Simple. We want you to end the Trojan War,” Venus said.

“Jesus lord! You did take me with you to hell, Kat.”