The Dark Goddess

Chapter 8

It seemed like they had been running forever when Locks said “Through here cmon, we’ll be safe there” and although Ami still had her doubts about him -especially considering how he conveniently appeared to rescue her just when she was in trouble - but right now a safe place was just what she needed.

They got to an alleyway but it was blocked by a gate painted gold, silver and black in stripes, Locks knocked thrice then thrice more then once, Ami almost rolled her eyes at the gesture ‘just what I needed, a coded entrance into a dark alley’ she thought to herself.

After a few uncomfortable minutes, a single knock replied those of Locks and then the gate opened upwards like a castle gate but rather for the entrance to be dark and filthy like Ami expected, it wasn’t.

As they entered, the warmth that greeted them was unnatural but so welcoming then she discovered that the corridor actually opened up to a wide field under the night sky, at that point, all Ami could do was open her mouth in wonder at the sight before her.

At first she thought ‘yeah I’m definitely trippin’ but then considering she had never even tried drugs or weed before, not even that one time she and Sandy found a stash hidden in the girls bathroom at school, so she thought ‘maybe I’m just hallucinating from being so tired after using my powers’.

Then she heard someone say “You’re in trouble, you know that right?” Ami’s heart did a quick tap dance before she realized she wasn’t the one being spoken to, it was Locks and the person behind the voice was a guy of about the same age and the same cuteness.

Ami blushed a bit when he glanced at her, he was light skinned where Locks’ was dark, blonde with a buzz cut, had a slight double chin and a square jaw and his face was a bit angular, also he was just as tall as Locks and with the same perfect average body build.

“Cmon bruh, you know I was on a righteous quest” Locks answered and spread his arms like he was expecting the guy to hug him even though the guy didn’t look to be in a hugging mood.

“You had been warned against doing this on your own, yet you did” Blondie said (Ami also decided on that name for him because of his hair as well).

“If I hadn’t done that she woulda been killed and we woulda been sent to retrieve a dead her” Locks said back to the guy putting more confusion into Ami’s head which was filled to the brim and felt like it might burst at any time.

To herself she thought ‘wait so this had been planned? Or was in planning?’ but that thought seemed to sink down a deep sea as she just couldn’t keep her eyes of the sight of the field.

There were buildings arranged in a Stonehenge fashion, large buildings actually of different styles and she was definitely sure the arrangement was exactly like Stonehenge.

“Oh my, my bad Peaches” Locks said to Ami when he saw her expression, “Welcome to Haven” he finished and did a rowdy courtesy.

“You’re called Peaches?” Blondie asked a bit surprised.

“oh no” Locks replied before she could, “I call her that cause I don’t know her name yet and she looks sweet...” he said then realizing he might have offended her, he looked apologetically at her “I’m sorry, I shoulda asked for your name” he apologized.

“Oh that’s ok, I just call you Locks as well because… you know” she said and gestured to his hair to which he beamed up at (not the expression she was expecting but then she couldn’t help but smile at his goofy grin on hearing her nickname for him).

“I’m Darren” Locks said, “I’d offer you a full havenly introduction but you wouldn’t know what any of it meant yet so, yeah, you can call me Darr though, everyone does and I don’t mind Locks too” he finished with yet another grin.

“I’m Amita, but you can call me Ami, no more Peaches though, I’m not edible” Ami replied with humor and then faced Blondie “And you, I’ve decided to just call you Blondie, do I go with that?” she said to which Darren snickered.

“Yeah, funny, but no, Blondie won’t do at all, I’ll never hear the end of it from my hall mates, I’m Miles, son of…” he said but suddenly cut himself short after seeing Darren’s gesture for him not to continue.

“uhm hmm” Miles cleared his throat instead then continued “right, proper introduction and orientation first” he said then stretched his hand towards the field, the strikingly beautiful place Darren had called Haven.

“I don’t know if It’ll be proper for us to do the orientation for you, but we might as well give you a brush up concise version just to get you a bit up to speed” Darren said.

“Oh please, I really need answers and I’ll settle for any form for now, concise or otherwise” Ami answered as they started moving towards the beautiful Stonehenge Haven.

“Ok well this is Haven, called so because it is a safe place for our kind ‘the godlies’ as I like to call us” Darren said.

Ami looked even more confused “Godlies?” she asked.

This time Miles answered “What Darr here is trying to say is that this is a safe place for extraordinary beings that have the touch or blood of the gods”.

His answer didn’t really clear things up for Ami in fact it brought even more questions but she asked the one that came to her mind first “touch or blood of the gods? Which gods?”

“Any and all gods, the old gods to be precise” Darren answered, “so far we’ve had four major godly lines, Roman…” he said and gestured to himself as if that in itself answered another question.

“Greek” he continued and this time gestured to Miles “Egyptian, now those are really ancient and then the Norse which are even more ancient” he finished.

“Well we have a lot of other godly lines too, the Aztecs, Japanese, and so on” Miles added.

“Wait I still don’t understand, do you mean this is a place for the old gods of different eras in the past and their worshippers? Like a secret cult of old religions” Ami asked with a mix of emotions in which fear was the strongest, ‘what have I gotten myself into’ she started thinking.

“What!? No no no” Darren reassured her “we aren’t worshipping them, we are descended from them, literally”

Seeing the still confused but relieved expression on Ami’s face, Miles came to her rescue, “you see here, we are all either children of those old gods, or descendants of the children of those old gods, or vessels of those old gods in the case of the Egyptians” he said.

It actually now stared to dawn on Ami, of course, if what they are saying is true, then she has not been going crazy all these while and those two really powerful entities that suddenly showed up into her life were in fact her birth parents but they were gods.

“whoa so most of the people that live here are born of gods?” she asked now getting the gist.

“Rightly said” Darren answered her “So for proper introduction I’d say; hello, I’m Darren, son of Ceres, Roman goddess of agriculture and the harvest” he finished and did his rowdy courtesy once more.

“And I’m Miles, son of Apollo, Greek god of music, poetry, prophecy, light, medicine, well you get the gist” he said and grinned sheepishly.

“Whoa” was all Ami could say as her brain welcomed this new reality.

They walked in silence for a while, Ami mulling everything over and the boys giving her chance to digest the little she had learn because they knew there was more to come.

“Why are the buildings arranged like Stonehenge?” Ami finally asked the question that had been itching her up (well one of the questions itching her up).

“That is actually part of what makes all this possible, replicating a place of ancient power actually gave this place a power of its own, hence why there are different entrances like the alleyway you just used, well that and the magics of different magical gods and their children, you’d get more explanation on that later though” Miles answered straight forwardly.

“Also why it is safe, the magic and all protects us and keeps us hidden from humans or mortals as they are referred to here, and from things that would be considered evil and dangerous to us” Darren added and after a forethought he said “see it like this, it is believed that the gods live in Heaven -well most of them- so we that are touched, blessed by or descended from the gods live in Haven”.

That analogy was something Ami found intriguing despite herself, and indeed she not only felt safe here, but she felt welcomed as if this was her home as well.

As they took her past the buildings she had just enough time to look the buildings over and she found out that each building actually represented a particular godly era and some had more than one building to their name;

A six story building fashioned like an ancient Greek mansion caught her eye, the building was impressive and oppressive at the same time, it look so regal and elegant it might as well housed the gods themselves,

Each story told a different story so to speak, the very top was plaid with startling white and sky blue marble and sometimes it seemed like clouds drifted about it and lightening flashed every once in a while.

The ground floor on the other hand was stark black and looked to be halfway underground, ghostly figures and smoky skulls drifted about it, the sight made Ami swallow hard with fear.

Miles traced her eyes to the building and seeing her expression, he decided to calm her worries “The gods are big on representation, hence why there is so much going on with each of the building floors assigned to them” he started to say and they all stopped in their tracks for a moment.

“Actually the truth is we their descendants are also hardwired that way, heck we are the ones that constructed them to look like that -our ancestors I mean-, this particular building though we had to go overboard for because it represents the original six Olympians, the first set of the Greek gods; Zeus, Hera, Demeter, Poseidon, Hestia & Hades in that order from top floor to down” Miles explained.

Ami could see the point in the arrangements because if memory from her Greek lessons under history at school served her well, then that arrangement means from the lord of the sky to the lord of the underworld.

She was about to ask if the descendants of Zeus had to go through all the floors before getting to their own floor but then she saw by the side of the building a revolving stairs and an open elevator of sorts, Ami was willing to bet it had to be magically operated.

As they continued walking towards the center, they again encountered a pyramid like structure and this one had more than twelve floors and a whole lot of compartments, its was painted with hieroglyphs and weird pictures of people with animal heads.

“Let me guess Egypt?” Ami said and Darren nodded and gave a thumbs up.

As they moved on Ami only kept getting awed more and more, the buildings were massive and impressive and even the one Darren showed her as his was wholly awesome in its old and modern Roman structure mix, he pointed out the floor he said was his hall and tried hard to describe how she would find his own room, she found it cute that he did that.

Finally the got to the center and the building there was as plain as wood, actually it was in fact made of wood, it stood in contrast to the elegant buildings she had seen so far and she could only wonder why there would be a building like such here.

“Welcome to the neutral house” Darren said.

“So called because it represents no godly line and all godly line, this is where every representative of each line meets anytime there is an issue that requires all the lines to meet, and where a new unidentified person comes to determine their line” Miles added.

Ami thought that over, she realized it was indeed necessary to have a place like that but why it was so plain she still couldn’t figure out.

“How is that done? Identifying a line?” Ami asked.

“That is my job!” A voice boomed from behind them.

Ami moved faster than she actually wanted to as she swirled around to look at the person that talked, the sudden speedy movement drove dizziness straight into her eyes and she almost lost her balance but thanks to Darren’s sharp reflexes he caught her.

“Oh I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you” the person said in a much calmer softer voice, Ami rolled her eyes thinking to herself why he couldn’t have used the softer voice to talk at first.

“I am Victor, the shaman of Haven” the person said again and this time Ami took her time to actually look at him.

He was wearing jean trousers but his chest was bare save for the tons of beads of different kinds fashioned like a muffler scarf, he was tattooed with different images and symbols from almost all of the different lines.

To Ami he didn’t look like a Victor seeing how he looked very old and very young at the same time and the wisdom behind his eyes were depthless, the eeriest thing about “Victor” was that you can’t really say this is how he looked like, if you thought he was light skinned just look again and you’d see dark or if you were to say he had blue eyes, another look would say green or brown, same as his hair color and facial features.

“So how about we go inside so I can determine your line and we can get you fixed to where would be your new home” Victor the shaman said.

As he said that something clicked for Ami as if her eyes weren’t so open before but now they were wide opened.

“Home? Wait no, I have a home, my friend, my parents” she said and then she started to panic “what if the person that was after me had gone to them, they cannot defend themselves from him, no I have to go back, I have to make sure they are safe, oh my, what if I’m too late?” she said and turned about to leave but Darren caught her hand.

“You don’t belong there, you belong here amongst your own kind, going back is dangerous for them and for you, besides you can’t face those gods alone” he said to her.

“So are you coming?” She asked him straight up.

He looked at Miles who had a cautious look in his eyes then glanced back at her “let me go get my stuff” he answered and then pulled her along by the hand he held her with”.