Medusa: Fate's Game Ch. 11

No words. What could he say? He turned his head and looked down at the grass, but fingers took his and tugged at his hand with all the weight of a child.

The Amazon patted the back of his hand. "Come on, talk to me. It sounds like you want to let go of your past and become a different person. Hey, I get that. If anyone gets that, I get that. Everyone in our little group is doing exactly that. And it sounds like you care about me, and... well... I'd be lying if I said the feeling wasn't mutual." She continued to pull at his hand, and inch by slow inch, the tiny woman dragged him away from the center of the forest clearing.

She cared about him. The words warmed his chest, but movement in the corner of his eye ripped it away. The beast was still there, hidden in the grass.

"Alright. Not going to talk? I can talk." She stopped near a large rock against the edge of the forest, and pushed him toward it until he sat. She started pacing in front of him, fingers on her chin. "I expected to find you out here slaughtering a few beasts or something. I get that you're a giant, and that includes some animal drives I don't have."

Did giants have such a drive? For carnage and mayhem? Was it something his family had had, or something that had grown in him over the centuries of dreams? He did not know, could not know. The memories were nothing but black mist, like the creature that haunted him.

"I didn't expect you to be having a conversation with yourself, and yet not yourself. Any other girl would have been scared away by that, I might add. You are all kinds of messed up in the head, Chimera. This thing you talk to, what is it? Tell me about it."

"... I do not w—"

"Tell me about it, you stupid god damn piece of shit. I've been confessing my issues to you, with Ares, with Darian, with all sorts of shit, and you haven't told me anything. So spill it, before I cut off your gods damn balls."

He blinked, and straightened himself a little. Queen indeed.

"It is... the beast."

"Beast?"

"A large lion, with horns."

"Like the pelt on your back."

"It... yes. It speaks to me, haunts me, makes me see things, tempts me to... kill."

"Think it's doing more than tempting you to kill if you're dancing in blood." She got closer, and put her foot up on the rock to lean against it. "It sounded like it asked you to harm me."

"... it asks me to harm everyone."

"... how old are you, Chimera?"

"Many centuries."

"And all this time, you've been alone. You sleep for centuries at a time, in a hole in the ground, wearing a dead cat on your back. When did you get that pelt?"

"... from before the war, when other giants still roamed the land."

The Amazon nodded, pushed off the rock, and started pacing again. She was taking his insanity — if that's what it was — rather well. More than that, she just admitted to caring for him, the way he was starting to care for her. So unbearably long since he'd last cared for someone, he was not sure if the feelings running through his stone body were indeed such emotions.

But he did want to hold her. He wanted to thank her, for also caring for him, for giving him the opportunity to experience some contact, physical and emotional. Medusa and Darian could not give that to him, not in the same way. He—

A slap against his knee brought his drifting gaze back to the Amazon.

"Look at you!" she said. "Always thinking. And judging by how you talk when no one's around, you go on these ridiculous, long tangents in your head, filled with poetic garbage, ambiguous statements, vague meaningless questions, while actually not getting anywhere. No wonder you've gone crazy, stuck in your own damn head for centuries, with your only companion a dead cat on your back!"

A dead cat on his back. He'd killed it so long ago. He remembered the cheer of his family and friends for its death. He remembered the trials it took to turn such a hardy creature into his trophy.

"Know what I think? I think you wear that because you can't let go of the past. Well, if I can stand side by side with the man who killed my family, and actually want to help him, I think you can let go of your past a little.

"And guess fucking what, you stupid bastard." She punched him, and not a small punch. Fate's Children were strong, and she hit his knee hard enough to make him wince and knock his leg aside. The little Amazon flew backward a few feet from the impact, and jumped back over to him to frown at him. "You're the one that helped me let go of the past more than anyone. So how about you practice what you preach, and ditch the dead cat."

Ditch his pelt. He undid the knot of its arms around his neck, and pulled it over to set it atop his lap. The cat's features were the same as those of the beast that haunted him. He knew it all along, but to speak it, think it, was painful.

Get rid of it. The symbol of who he was, the symbol of his past and struggles and trials. Get rid of it all.

"Do not," a voice spoke from the black.

The beast emerged from the night shadows that surrounded them, and crept around them in a slow circle. It was more solid this time, its paws no longer fluttering fog, but lion paws that walked upon grass. The black that usually dripped from its fur was gone, and its eyes no longer glowed red; now, they were gold, as was its mane, upon yellow fur. It was simply the cat that he held in his hands.

A dead thing he'd given far too much power in the centuries he wore it.

"You will be nothing without me. Without your hunger, desires, without your need for blood, destruction, without me you will perish. The years, centuries, they will turn you to dust."

"To dust..."

Otrera blinked at him, and when he turned from the tempting feline, she reached out and tapped him a few times on one of his hands upon his lap.

"It's just a dead cat pelt, but it's a step in a new direction. And I can't begin to understand the crazy shit going on in your head, Chimera. You're not human, and you're super old, and I — well I don't know how long I'm going to live. Far as I can tell Fate's Children don't seem to grow old? But either way, I'm in this with you. And... well, you can pick. Wear the cat, or wear me." Winking at him, she reached out and put a hand on his knee once more.

"You are wise far beyond your years," he said. "You are not the woman I battled on that road outside Tiryns."

A long sigh escaped him. The pelt was heavy. But even as it clung to him, he raised his hands to the side, and let the thing fall to the grass.

The beast that circled him roared its annoyance. A quiet roar, a little thing no louder than an Egyptian temple cat's roar. Barely more than a meow as the beast melted into the Earth.

"When the end comes, Chimera," it said as the gray fog overtook it, "you will call out to me. You have before, you will again." And then, it was gone.

It would be back. But it would no longer be the great, dark monster that clung to his spine.

The Amazon walked on top of the pelt, drove her heel down against its head, and sank its fangs into the dirt. And apparently, the queen felt like being thorough; she drove her heel into it a few more times, until it was covered in soil.

"I am pretty wise, aren't I? I was a queen and a good one at that. Losing all that made me go a little crazy, get stupid, juvenile, obsessed. But now? I'm the best."

"... you do not lack for confidence," he said. But she was smiling, smirking too, and hopping a little on her toes. She was happy. And as the small warrior turned around to face him again, with hands behind her and her smile only growing, his grew too.

She hopped over to him. "You know this is just the most absurd romance story."

"Oh?"

"Think about it. We're both warriors who have lost everything, and like a couple of sad saps, we're finding a little happiness in each other."

"Only a little?" he said.

She glanced up at him, caught his eye, and he smiled down at the creature as he got up from the rock. It would not be long before sunrise, so they started walking down the path, back toward the city.

"... maybe more than a little."

That earned a chuckle from him, and he took a deep breath as he ducked underneath some branches. Lighter. He felt so much lighter. Every step, every breath, every shrug of his shoulders, it all felt so... easier.

He stopped. The Amazon collided with his leg, and fell back onto her butt.

"Hey! What's... going on?"

He turned around to face the little queen, and took a moment to admire the sight of her. A tiny thing, dark skin, long black hair, and a lean physique of slender muscle underneath her leather armor. The day Bellerophontes had appeared before him, asking for help, Chimera would have gladly eaten him then, or this woman for the insult of defeating him in battle. Instead, he owed her much.

It was, as she said, an absurd romance story. But perhaps that was another problem, another barrier for him.

He knelt down, reached out to pull her up onto her feet, and pulled her in toward him. The little Amazon didn't seem to sure of herself anymore, but it only made him smile, and draw her closer still. With him on a knee, she stood beside his other bent leg, and blinked up him as he cupped her arms with his hands.

He put a kiss on her lips. The size difference made a normal kiss impossible, but he made it work with a light brush of them against her own lips and chin.

The Amazon queen erupted in a blush. "Your beard tickles."