Nearly Witches

Chapter Nine

Alysanne leaned against the door as she watched soldiers walk past her without giving her a single glance. No one would see her, not until she wanted them to do and now, she didn’t want the Romans seeing her, not until she had gotten her revenge for what happened at her temple steps; Mark Antony was already dead.

“The Queen of lower and upper Egypt,” Alysanne said as the door closed behind her. “Or should I say, ex-Queen of lower and upper Egypt, if Egypt is still around by tomorrow morning.”

“Egypt will raise again,” Cleopatra told her as her hand maidens just blinked at her, kneeling on the floor as they bowed their heads.

“Lady Artemis,” they said.

“You don’t get it, do you, Egypt is now part of Rome,” Alysanne told her. “Your line will die with you and never raise again.”

“You murdered my son!” Cleopatra hissed at her. “My son was Horus reborn and you murdered him in cold blood.”

“Has you had your siblings murdered?”

Cleopatra just glared at her, while Alysanne just looked at her. Bored with the whole thing, this was the woman who thought she could have someone dragged from her temple and killed, did she really think Alysanne wouldn’t do anything to her? That she would just turn her eyes and forget about the whole thing?

“Some might call you brave, but most would think you a fool.”  

“I am Isis reborn.”

“Isis is not as backstabbing as you are, Set was the one who killed her husband and she wasn’t the one who ordered it.”

Cleopatra just looked at her, while Alysanne pushed herself up and walked around the small room that Octavian had put her in.

“Your son was a threat, so Octavian had him killed,” Alysanne told her as her fingers traced the detailed pictures on the walls, even she had to admit they had talented artists. She and Apollon would visit just to look at them, the buildings that had built for their gods. “Funny; how he had paid for your misdeeds.”

“What do you mean?”

“Your son was killed, not nearly as horribly as your siblings.”

“I’m going to be humiliated.”

As your remaining children will be, Alysanne thought to herself. Apollon didn’t see her youngest son living through the trip, but she wasn’t going to tell her that and she didn’t think she deserved the information as it would be a comfort.

And that was the last thing Alysanne wanted to give this cold-hearted monster.  

“Like Queen Arsinoe of lower and upper Egypt had been?” Alysanne asked her. “But unlike her, you’re far to troublesome to keep alive.”

“I’m going to be killed then,” Cleopatra said, Alysanne grinning as she walked back to stand in front of her, while her handmaidens never moved from their position on the floor.

“You see, the worst thing you can do in Rome or Greece, is kill your family.”

“I’m being judged by you then.”

“In life, yes. In death, I don’t see your heart being lighter than a feather, but who knows.”

Osiris had been killed by his brother, Set, so she didn’t see him giving any mercy to someone who had done the same.

“You don’t die by Octavian’s hands, he wants to keep you alive,” Alysanne continued putting her hand behind her back. “Show off his strength, show how he brought you and Antony to his knees by parading you around the streets.”

The handmaidens just looked at her, Alysanne knew that she couldn’t allow them to live but she didn’t want to kill nameless woman.

“Then why whom?” one of the handmaidens asked.

“What is your name?” Alysanne asked her.

“Charmion,” she told her.

“Salma.”

“Well, Salma, you will die by hand,” Alysanne told them.

“But why my lady?”  

“Cleopatra, you had someone killed on my temple steps and thus have gained my and my brother’s wrath; just as much as Antony had done.”

“Your bother?” Salma asked her.

“Apollon, but then, you might have gained my wrath more so; Antony didn’t have his siblings murdered.”

Alysanne looked at them before removing two needles from a small bag that Apollon had given her for this task. It was useful, when your brother was the God of Medicine and it wasn’t her fault if people forgot that meant knowing how to kill someone without a trace.

Catching Cleopatra, Salma stood up and helped her move the body to a golden couch. Alysanne wasn’t a monster, she would treat her body with respect that wasn’t shown to her siblings as her brothers were at the bottom of the Nile.

“I’m sorry,” Alysanne told the handmaidens before putting the poisoned needles in their arms, before catching them and moving to lay them on the floor near their mistress. Looking at them, she quickly fixed their clothing and jewellery.

Alysanne just looked at them, before removing herself from mortal eye. She was known as many things, man hater since she had a habit of turning any men who’d seen her naked into a deer and turning their dogs on them.

She didn’t want to add ‘Queen killer’ to that list and she knew that new stories weren’t really being added to their myths. Alysanne watched as guards to run into the room, with a smile and she disappeared not watching their reaction.

--

Alysanne sat on the bakery’s roof as she thought about her dream last night, she looked at the moon appearing in the sky. She doubted that Mors or his shadow hellhounds wouldn’t be turning up nor did she think that anyone would be breaking any laws or hurting anyone.

She didn’t have any headaches, ignorable or not. Alysanne wasn’t in any sort of pain, nothing and she knew she would in bed by midnight even through it was tomorrow was the start of the weekend and all she had was her Irish Dance class in the afternoon.

Nymeria and Ghost were wondering the street below, Alysanne watched with a smile before wondering if she should throw a ball for them to play with. It wasn’t raining and cameras were still working, so it would be a last-minute decision if any crimes were committed.

‘Tribe’s arriving,’ Nymeria told her.

“You’ve decided to turn up,” Captain Justice said as landed on the roof, before sitting next to her and letting their legs dangle off the edge.

“Didn’t think it would be a good idea with a cold,” Alysanne told her raising an eyebrow before spotting Tribe with a ball in his hand.

“Never had a cold before, never gotten sick.”

“Heard that hay fever is worse.”

“Never had it.”

“Never.”

This was the first time she had a cold or a flu; that might have left, and she felt fine in the morning, like nothing was ever wrong. The dreams had stayed, they also stayed in the same era even if she doubted it would stay that way for long, since the last one was Cleopatra’s death, even if she hadn’t seen how Mark Antony had died and she had a feeling that Artemis might have had a hand in his demise as well.

Since both were recorded as suicides.

In between her research into Greek and Roman Myths, she started looking into Egyptian history and watched a few documentaries about Cleopatra the seventh and Arsinoe the fourth, including about their deaths.

Alysanne had only find one that suggested that Cleopatra had been murdered by Octavian and not by Artemis; but then, most people think that the Greek Gods were never real, so could a woman from myths end someone’s life?

She had found it interesting, but she had been well-researched in cold cases. Everyone else agreed that she had taken her own life, even if they didn’t agree on how she had done so, had she used a snake? Or pure poison kept on her person?

She wouldn’t have had time to collect anything from her bedroom, but did she take her own life to avoid her sister’s fate? Even if the people had spared her life because she wasn’t a barbican and was a young princess?

Would they had shown Cleopatra the same petty?

None of them had mentioned her children, but Alysanne knew that her eldest son had been murdered because he was Julius Caesar’s son. Did she know enough to say something as fact? No, she didn’t, and she didn’t have enough time to completely investigate it; some of the books she had ordered on the subject would take a few days to a few weeks to arrive.

“Let’s go down,” Captain Justice said to her, before holding her hand out for Alysanne to take and when she blinked at it, Captain Justice put her hand around her shoulder, before putting Alysanne’s arm over her shoulder.

“We have new information,” Tribe told them as Captain Justice landed on the ground, Alysanne removing her arm from her shoulder.

“Andromeda, Perseus,” Captain Justice greeted.

‘Rosalie,’ Ghost and Nymeria said back, not that Captain Justice would know what they were saying, only Alysanne could.

‘So, it is her?’ Alysanne asked them.

‘It’s her scent,’ Nymeria told her.

‘Definitely,’ Ghost agreed.

“Sit, Cap likes to be able to move around as she thinks,” Tribe told her, Alysanne sitting down with Ghost and Nymeria sitting next to her legs.

“New information?” Alysanne asked them, she already knew, since she was the one to tell them about the extra people; but she couldn’t allow them to know that she already knew about it. That was enough to cause her some heartache, more so if they decided not to share what she had told them with her.

“Mors might not be working alone,” Tribe told her.

“They rarely do. Have you seen them?”

“No, but we were told about them from a witness and they had done something to her,” Captain Justice told her. “She was pale and was most likely in shock from what happened.”

“Mors does look a bit of a pervert,” Alysanne said, well, one of them did and she didn’t know how she didn’t notice it before. But the person who threw her off the building and had helped her a few days ago.

“Didn’t think of that,” Captain Justice admitted.

“She was quite pretty,” Tribe said.

“Girls are nice to look at.”

“That they are.”

Alysanne just looked at them with a raised an eyebrow.

‘You are pretty,’ Nymeria told her.

‘In a human sense,’ Ghost added.

“Anyway,” Alysanne said shacking her head, before smiling. “Did she give you any names? Or are they like Mors and just talked without any useful details?”  

“She was given names,” Tribe told her.

“Hecate, Mnemosyne and Hypnos,” Captain Justice said.

“You know anything about these names?”

“Other than their Roman names? The fact they were Greek Gods and what they oversaw, along with what generation they from?” Alysanne asked them. “No, they don’t figure much in Greek myths, they might have shown more, but not in the stories that have survived.”

Captain Justice just looked at her, while Tribe narrowed his eyes.

“There’s a pattern,” Captain Justice told her.

“And you know more than we do,” Tribe pointed out.

“Hecate is the Goddess of Magic and Crossroads; she was part of the triple goddess with Persephone and Demeter, she was the Crone,” she told them. “Her Roman name was Hekate, it’s Latin and means something.”

“Part of the underworld then?” Captain Justice asked.

“After Persephone started going to the underworld every six months, yes,” Alysanne told them.

“And the other two?”

“One, the other was a first-generation Titian.”

“Go on,” Tribe told her.

“Mnemosyne is the Greek Goddess of memory; she’s a first generation of Titan’s and she was Cronus’ sister. Her roman name is Moneta,” Alysanne told them keeping an eye on Captain Justice as she started pacing. “Hypnos is the Greek God of Sleep; Thanatos’ twin brother and is said to have a gentle touch. His Roman name is Somnus.”

“You don’t know anything else?” Captain Justice asked.

“I’ll just need to some research,” Alysanne told them, she didn’t know enough about them and she knew it would be hard to find anything. “But like Mors, I don’t think they showed up in many myths or they might not be in any myths that we have. Hecate, I know one myth in some versions, she helps Demeter look for her daughter, Persephone when she either taken or went to the underworld with Hades.”

“You don’t know any with Thanatos, Hypos or Mnemosyne?” Tribe asked.

“None.”

“Damn.”

“We’ll just have to look online,” Captain Justice said.

“It’s going to rain in a few hours,” Tribe told them.

“Unless someone decides to do someone last minute,” Alysanne told them while tapping her along her arms. “We should be fine to go home.”

“Then Mors and company aren’t around then?” Captain Justice asked.

“They aren’t. Katniss hasn’t found them nor as anyone else.”

 ‘If anyone has, they might not be alive to us about it,’ Nymeria suggested. “Mors had already snapped one Hawk’s neck.’

‘Why not kill others?’ Alysanne asked her. ‘Animals would be used to others just disappearing, even I don’t pay attention.’

‘Animals need to eat,’ Ghost said.

‘True, there’s been evidence that even Herbivores will occasional eat meat if they need to survive, including bunny rabbits, there was a video of artic rabbits eating their own dead.’

“This isn’t good,” Tribe said as he looked at the phone in his hands; Alysanne narrowed her eyes at it slightly as she tried to see what was on the screen. One thing that she found out, was that she couldn’t see a camera on the front, something that wouldn’t sell well in the market, some people might not a camera, but she doubted it would be enough to be worth selling.

“What isn’t good?” Alysanne and Captain Justice asked him.

“An airplane has gone missing; but I can’t find out what flight and where it was going. Nor where it went missing.” Tribe just looked at Alysanne before shaking his head and reaching into his pocket before pulling out another phone.

“That’s odd,” Alysanne told him as she accepted the phone, before looking at it. “Usually they knew where their going, along with where they disappeared; they also usually have a flight number when reporting it.”

“Can’t find any of that.”

She just looked at him, before looking back at the phone. Like she had thought, there were no cameras on it. If there wasn’t a touch screen at the front or if she hadn’t seen Tribe with a version of it in his hands; she might have thought it was a fancy paperweight.

“It’s custom made; that way no one can track it,” Tribe told her as Alysanne looked at the crescent moon on the back with a wolf standing in front of it. “I make it custom to the person I’m giving it to, that way we can connect you and you can connect us.”

“Just in case something stops you from meeting us,” Captain Justice told her. “Like an illness or a family tragedy.”

“Even mental breakdowns,” Tribe added.  

“Wait, Tribe, you made this?” Alysanne asked him.

“Family business.”

“He did,” Captain Justice told her, before removing something from a pocket in her dress and Alysanne blinked when she stared at the white phone in her hand, unlike her black one, Themis symbol on the back.

The Greek Goddess, a first-generation Titan, of divine or natural law, order and Justice. Some said that her name meant justice. It made her wonder what symbol was on the back of Tribe’s phone, if it had anything to do with Avatar; the Last Airbender.

“That’s why there’s no cameras,” Tribe told her.

“We were worried that even burner phones could be hacked,” Captain Justice told her. “And we do some things that would put her in jail if the cops found us.”

“And it looks like a fancy paperweight when the screens off,” Alysanne said as she looked it and turned back around in her hand.

“It’s also harder to break into, there’s a tracking feature that only turns one when you turn it on or press the button,” Tribe told her. “I designed it that way, so no one looks at it twice and thinks it’s a phone.”

“He has the same features on mine,” Captain Justice told her.

“But you can’t trace it without it being activated?” Alysanne asked him.

“Not without you pressing on the distress button or keeping your finger on the bottom for more than thirty seconds; no,” Tribe told her. “Not without taking a few hours to go through the code on your phone, which will only happen if you go missing and don’t answer.”

“Safety procedure,” Captain Justice told her.

“Where is the distress button? So, I don’t accidently press it,” Alysanne said looking at him before trying to hand it back. Tribe shacking his head before showing her his own, he must have placed it in the same place on all of theirs.

“It’s just under the volume button, it’s small so no one will see It,” Tribe told her.

“Makes sense.”

“He had to show me where it was as well,” Captain Justice told her, before slipping her phone back into her pocket. “Tribe’s a genius; already finished with high school.”

“And university by the looks of it,” Alysanne stated. “It would seem you have your own real-life Tony Stark.”

“And what would that make Cap then?” Tribe asked her.

“Captain America,” Alysanne said.  

“I would like to think I’d talk to my partner, more so if had something to do with parents, instead of stabbing the back,” Captain Justice told her. “There were a million ways he could have handled the situation better.”

“To be fair; Tony wasn’t all that good talking with him either.”

“And what about you?” Tribe asked her.

“What about me?” Alysanne asked.

“Who would you see yourself as?”

“Hawkeye,” Captain Justice suggested.

“Or the Winter Soldier or Black Widow,” Alysanne said, her willingness to kill meant she might be more like them than anyone else. “I don’t think of it much.”

“It’s Fury’s fault for Steve for not trusting Tony,” Captain Justice told her.

“And Howard for Tony not trusting Steve.”

“Geeks,” Tribe said.

“Says the man who can make phones,” Alysanne retorted before turning her phone on, she was curious about what was on it and she didn’t think she could download anything onto it, so she needed to know if there was any apps on it. “Along with designing apps, I’ve never seen any of these before.”

“We have our own communication apps.”

“Safer than f*******:’s messenger,” Captain Justice told her. “Or any other social media, can’t text anyone else but each other.”

“I’m guessing everything is already set up?” Alysanne asked Tribe.

“It has been,” Tribe told her.

“When I get home, I’ll start looking into myths; about the three newbies, but I wouldn’t hold your breath. I might not find anything.”

“How many stories are missing?” Captain Justice asked her.

“And how many are in mere fragments?” Tribe asked.

“Too many, too many for comfort,” Alysanne told them before slipping the phone onto one of her pockets in her shorts. “Far too many, along we don’t know how much was lost in translations or if anything was mistranslated or misunderstood.”

“Or how many words we didn’t have one for in English,” Tribe said. “But then English is really good at just stealing words.”

“And having multiple words with the same meaning,” Captain Justice said. “Anything else?”

“We don’t know how much was changed by the Roman Church or even by the Ottoman’s when they started writing things down,” Alysanne told them.

“Why am I not surprised?” Tribe asked her.

“Because if the Roman Church could’ve done that to Celtic lore, who’s to say they didn’t leave Greek or Roman Myths alone.”

“And Ottoman’s?”

“Don’t have any evidence, but I wouldn’t be surprised.”

“I don’t like this,” Captain Justice said.

“Nor do I,” Tribe added.

“No one does,” Alysanne told them putting her hands together, while looking at her partners and she wondered if they had fallen asleep.

‘Nope,’ Ghost told her.

‘Conversation is dull,’ Nymeria replied.

‘Why don’t you haunt?’ Alysanne asked them.

“Where are they going?” Captain Justice asked.

“They’re going to haunt down vermin,” Alysanne told them raising an eyebrow as they looked at her like she had grown another head, before rolling her eyes and glaring at them. “Back to the conversation., history is written by the victors.”

“But these aren’t stories of the victors,” Tribe pointed out.

“We have to look for the stories of those who have lost, sometimes what we think is true for hundreds of years,” Alysanne pointed out. “Then we find evidence that points that out as false, such as cocaine and tobacco being find in Egyptian mummies, then sometimes what we think is false is true.”

“So basically, what we know about history might fake,” Tribe said.

“Or rewritten,” Captain Justice added.

“Or we’ve just been missing pieces, not everything was written down back then,” Alysanne told them, keeping an ear out for Nymeria and Ghost; just in case they were attacked by shadow hellhounds. “Some things were so closely guarded that it was easily lost in time; others were burnt and there are a hundred or thousands of reasons we might not know something that happened in the past.”

You can’t hide forever; they had told her. But Alysanne didn’t even know what or who she was hiding from; something was strange about the whole thing and she felt like she was looking at an incomplete puzzle, ones where she doesn’t know how they fit or if they even belonged to that puzzle in the first place. Or if she was missing pieces that were hidden elsewhere.

That somewhere hidden from her.

“We best get moving then, even I can tell that it’s going to rain,” Alysanne told them. “And I don’t think anything is going to happen tonight.”

“Remember, Artemis, use the distress button when needed,” Tribe told her. “If Captain Justice can’t arrive, I know I’ll be able to, even if it does take slightly longer.”

“I’ll remember that.”

“Give us a chance to show you that we can be trusted.”

“The first step is usually the hardest,” Captain Justice told her.

‘We’re leaving,’ Alysanne told Ghost and Nymeria.

‘We’ll catch up with you along the way,’ Nymeria told her.

‘See you soon.’

‘I have so many rabbits,’ Ghost told her.

Alysanne nodded her head, Captain Justice flying off and Tribe nodding before he walked off in the same direction. Putting on her protective gear for her motorcycle, before she left in the direction that would take her home, which was in the opposite direction that Tribe and Captain Justice went in.

‘Something’s up ahead, along with a male and female,’ Nymeria told her.

‘Mors?’ Alysanne asked.

‘Doesn’t smell or look like it,’ Ghost told her.

A large black god made her quickly break, almost throwing her off her own bike. Looking at the creature, it just laid down before putting its heads down on the ground; heads because it had three of them.

Six pairs of eyes were looking at her, while she was staring at the large creature; Nymeria and Ghost broke out of the tree line to walk over to her side, in front of her slightly as she stared at and it stared at them.

‘It has three heads,’ Ghost stared.

‘That it does,’ Alysanne replied. ‘Spot?’

‘Spot?’ Ghost and Nymeria asked her.

‘Cerberus,’ Alysanne told them before looking in the direction that Nymeria said a man and a woman were waiting. ‘The guard of the underworld, the guard that made sure the living didn’t enter and the dead didn’t leave.’

‘I think you’ve lost it,’ Ghost told her.

‘I might have.’

“Niece,” a man greeted as he walked towards Cerberus; a woman with rich brown hair walking behind him.

“Half-sister,” she greeted. “It’s been many years since I saw you last.”

“Hades, Persephone,” Alysanne greeted.

“I wasn’t always Hades,” he told her. “Thanatos wasn’t always that, nor was Persephone. The Greeks and Romans weren’t the only ones to return.”

“The memories.”

“Then it’s already started.”

“Mnemosyne has seen her then,” Persephone stated.

“Her and a few others,” Alysanne told them. “But Thanatos threw me off a building the first time I saw him, before attacking me and a few others another one or two times.”

“That doesn’t sound like Thanatos, he doesn’t go anywhere without Hypnos,” Hades told her.

“I’m not lying.”

“No, you wouldn’t be.”

Alysanne just looked at them, before looking at Cerberus. His heads looking around the forest with his ears up. Before she looked up at Hades and Persephone, they were looking at them with worry and she just stared at them.

“This is bad,” Persephone said.

“No one can know about this, can they?” Alysanne asked them.

“No, humanity wouldn’t understand,” Hades told her.

“The witch haunts show us what fear can do, more so of the unknown,” Persephone added.

“I’m sorry,” Alysanne told them.

“We were born years before that happened.”

“And things have changed,” Hades added.

“Something cause the Gods to disappear, didn’t it?” Alysanne asked.

“Depends on which Gods, some were able to hold on longer than others,” Hades told her.

“We were among the first to disappear, but only fates know why,” Persephone told her.

“Then I guess you already know where I live?” Alysanne asked them, when Hades nodded she looked at Persephone. “Then we should continue talking there, it’s going to rain soon, and I don’t need another cold.”

“We all do, apart from father dearest,” Hades told her.

“And his henchman, mainly his brothers apart from Oceanus,” Persephone told her. “He has always stayed out of it.”

Alysanne smiled at them before looking around, neither Captain Justice nor Tribe were anywhere near them.

“Remember child, Gods don’t have DNA,” Hades told her, while Persephone put her arm in his elbow; smiling at her. “And all of us will come back at some point; you’ll find that your old life will be a mask to be worn, to protect your family and friends.”

“Along with protecting old wounds,” Persephone told her.

“I’ll see you at my place,” Alysanne told them.